I begin reading in verse 14 to
sort of remind us where we are in this passage. Paul said, For
this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus
Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,
that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to
be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man. What could be more important
in this life and to be strengthened with his might by his spirit
in the inner man. Every exhortation in scripture
that we read, walk worthy of the calling wherewith you're
called. Lord, strengthen me. Strengthen me. Love one another
as I've loved you. Lord, strengthen me. Strengthen
me. Here is my father glorified that
you bear much fruit, Lord. Strengthen me. Strengthen me. That Christ may dwell in your
hearts by faith. That Christ wouldn't just be
a nice story in a book to you. That he would dwell and live
in your heart. that God would give you the kind
of faith that worketh by love for Him. And that you being rooted and
grounded in love might be able to comprehend with
all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height
and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that
you might be filled with all the fullness of God." To be filled
with all that God is. Being rooted and grounded in
doctrine is important. In knowledge, in the scriptures,
Paul said it's a good thing that the heart be established with
grace. And if you look at the context
of that, he's talking about the doctrine of grace. Because he
says there, be not carried about with every wind of doctrine.
It's a good thing that your heart be established with grace. That's important. But to be rooted
and grounded in doctrine and knowledge only will only puff
you up and make you self-righteous. That's just the truth that Paul
knew this and he had experienced it with the Corinthian believers
who were so greatly gifted of God. He spoke of their gifts
that God and yet they had so much need for rebuke and correction
when you read those letters to the Corinthians. Some might react this way to
that. Well, false doctrine will puff
you up, but not the right doctrine, not true doctrine. Arminianism
leads to self-righteousness, but not Calvinism. Oh, yes it
does. Oh, sure it does. True doctrine, right doctrine,
it'll lead you to self-righteousness every time without the grace
of God in your heart, the love of God in your heart. We must
know the truth to be saved, and doctrine, right doctrine is vital. We must know Him and we know
Him through His teachings. But if all you have is knowledge
without the love of God shed abroad in your heart, you're
gonna look down on everybody else that doesn't agree with
you, that doesn't know as much as you know, just like the Pharisees
did, and you're gonna trust in your knowledge just like they
trusted in their works. There's not a bit of difference,
one just as bad as the other. In fact, your mental capacity
to grasp truthful facts is just another work. It's just another
work if you depend on that to make you accepted of God. You're not saved by that. You're
saved by means of that. But you'll perish in your sins
with a head full of doctrinal truth unless you're rooted and
grounded in love. Only the love of God shed abroad
in our hearts by his Holy Spirit will make knowledge To be wisdom
unto salvation What in the world do you mean by that Chris Well,
this is exactly why Paul advised and admonished the Corinthians
the way that he did he said your knowledge will puff you up But
love will build up Not love without knowledge. That's
useless too. That's not even true love. You
can't love the Lord without knowing him. And you can't show his love
without knowing him. And if he loves you, you're gonna
know him. So it's not love without knowledge,
but love and knowledge. Knowledge without love is worthless. And love without knowledge is
worthless. Not real love. You don't even know who you love
if you don't know him. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 2.16
that we have the mind of Christ. That's how we know what we know
because Christ in us is the hope of our glory. Christ dwells within
us. His Holy Spirit dwells within
us, and He takes the things of Christ and shows them to us.
We have the mind of Christ. 1 Corinthians 2, 16. And He said,
because we do, we understand all things. Not that we know
everything as we ought to know. We know nothing as we ought to
know. But everything that we need to know to be saved, to
be comforted, to glorify and worship Him in this world, We
know it because we have the mind of Christ. But he writes to them
also that we must have the heart of Christ. You got to have his
heart, too. When we weren't born with it,
if we're his, then we will have, by his grace and power and mercy,
his mind and his heart. Listen to this first Corinthians
13 when you turn there if you'd like to you're very familiar
with this language But I want us to hear it in the context
of this be rooted and grounded in love First Corinthians 13
1 Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have
not loved I'm just making a bunch of obnoxious, useless, irritating
noise. You think about that. This is
why we're looking at what we're looking at in the word of God.
Be rooted and grounded in love. I can get up here and speak like
an angel, men and of angels, because angels can't preach the
gospel, but a man can by God's grace. But even if I preach the
truth and preach it with the eloquence of an angel, And I'm
not rooted and grounded in the love of God. It's worthless,
irritating noise. And I'm pretty sure I've heard
some of that. I'm pretty sure I have. I've probably made some
of that noise. I'm pretty sure I have. A sounding
brass or a tinkling cymbal. And wait a minute though, that's
talking about people preaching like an angel but not preaching
the truth. No, it's not either. And though I have the gift of
prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge. It doesn't
say false knowledge. If I understand all knowledge
and all the mysteries of the gospel, and though I have all
faith so that I could remove mountains and have not love,
I am nothing. Well there's doctrine, what about
works? Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor. And though I give my body to
be burned and have not love, it profiteth me nothing. to be rooted and grounded in
His love is to be saved by God's grace unto good works that bring
Him glory. Because faith worketh by what? Not by fear of the law, by love. Faith worketh by love. And the fruit of the Spirit is
faith which worketh by love. And herein
is the Father glorified, that you bear much fruit. Galatians
5, 1 through 6. Let's turn over there and read
that. Galatians, it's just a few pages over. If you're in Ephesians
there. Galatians 5, 1. Galatians 5, 1. Stand fast, therefore,
in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free And be not
entangled again with the yoke of bondage. In other words, be
established in the grace of God. Don't be under the yoke of the
works of the law. Don't try to please God by what
you do. No flesh shall be justified that
way. Behold, I, Paul, say unto you
that if you keep the law, Christ will profit you nothing. If you
be circumcised. That was the first thing a Jew
was to was to happen to them under the law. He said, I testify
to you, to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor
to do the whole law. If you're circumcised in order
to please God, in order to have a right standing before God,
if that's your way of salvation, is to please God by your works.
Christ, verse four, has become of no effect unto you, whosoever
of you are justified by the law, Which he clears up what he was
saying about keeping doing that outward thing. It's not Performing
that outward act that makes Christ of no effect to you. It's you
saying I'm justified now because I do the right thing You forfeited Christ You're falling
from grace For we Through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness
by faith Not works Grace through faith For in Jesus Christ neither
circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision but faith
Which does everything it does? because of love Be rooted and grounded in love Paul said I want you to know
the breadth of of God's love. I want you to know how broad
it is, how wide it is. You know what that looks like?
John, I believe John knew something about that when he wrote Revelation
9. Look at Revelation, let's see if I wrote this down right.
It doesn't look right. Let's look at Revelation 9 and
I hope I got this right. If not, I'll just try to tell
you what it said. No, that's not right. I knew
it wasn't when I looked at it. But listen, wherever I was trying
to take you, John, he looked and he said, I saw a number,
a multitude, which no man can number. And you know what they
were doing? They were shouting the praises of the Lamb. They
were saying, worthy is the Lamb. They were praising the glory
of His grace, who was slain for their sins and washed them from
their sins in His blood. And that's the breadth. That's
the breadth. Listen to 1 John 4.10. herein
is love. Not that we loved God, but that
He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our
sins. And if we ever find that passage
in Revelation, which we will eventually, that's what they're
doing there. They're acknowledging Him who
was the propitiation for their sins. How many? You can never
number them. No way. You think about that. No man can number it, shouting
the praises of the Lamb. It doesn't say God doesn't know
the number, because He does. When they cast that net, when
the Lord said, cast your net, and they said, we've been fishing
all night, Lord, and we haven't caught anything. One time they
cast it and there was a multitude that broke the net and they never
did figure out how many there were. Another time they cast
it and there was a hundred, how many, do you remember how many
there were? A hundred and fifty three. And the first time shows
us that it's a number which no man can number. A multitude of
fish. The ship was sinking. The second
time shows us that God knows exactly how many. 153 how many
millions Ricky and I sang that song not long ago who can declare
all the triumph of his cross millions dead now live again and he said I want you to know
I want you to understand that you know Armenians and people
who preach free will they say oh that they're preaching that
not that many are gonna be saved You know just the chosen few.
No, it's the chosen multitude Ain't no chosen few to it. It's
the chosen number which no man can number They're gonna be shouting his
praises forever and Paul said I want you to know something
of the length Of God's love The breadth of God's love is
seen in the magnitude of the triumph of his cross. And that's
what John saw when he said, I saw a number which no man can number. Shouting worthy is the lamb. The length of his love is seen
in how far he'll go to save one sheep. Forget about the multitude
for a second and think about that one sheep. What's the length
of his love? How far will he go? He'll leave
everything and everybody else to save that one sheep. And he'll
go wherever it is. How far away from God were we?
How far away from God were you? That's the length of his love.
How far did he go to find you? Forget the multitude. He left,
my great shepherd, he left everything and everybody else and went after
one sheep. This world would say that's not
a very smart shepherd. You know, he risked everything
to save that worthless sheep. No, he didn't risk everything,
he gave everything to save that one sheep. He gave it. And I'll tell you this, if that
one sheep was you, you won't have a problem with it. That sheep, you see, it wasn't
worthless to him. It was precious to him. He said,
that's my sheep. And that one sheep was me. That's
why I can preach to you of his love this morning. I can speak
however pitifully and however weakly I can speak on the length
of it. Paul also said, I want you to
know something of the depth of his love. I was that one sheep
and he traveled a long way to find me. He came all the way
from the throne of glory down to this cesspool of sin. And
I'll tell you this, when he found me, he had to reach way down
for me. the depth of his love. Let this
mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who being in
the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God,
but made himself of no reputation, and took upon him the form of
a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. That's humbling
enough. That's humbling enough. But being
found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself. even further,
and became obedient unto death, even the death of Carl." How
far did he reach down to get you? How much humbling of himself
was necessary for him to take your place? Paul said, I bow my knees unto
the Father. And I beseech him to show you
something of the height of his love. How high is the love of God?
It's divine love. It's infinite love. It's love that can never be forfeited. It's not like your love and my
love. He said, I have loved you with an everlasting love and
therefore with loving kindness I drew you. His love suffereth long. Can you testify to that? His love is kind. His love envieth not. His love vaunteth not itself,
is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly,
seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked. How quickly we go from love to
hate, but not him. Thinketh no evil. How is that
possible? How can he look at me and think
no ill of me? No ill. Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but
rejoiceth in the truth. Beareth all things. How high is his love. Divine love believeth all things,
hopeth all things, endureth all things. His love, how high is
his love? His love never fails, never fails. Whether they be tongues, they'll
cease. Whether they be knowledge, it's going to vanish away. But his love is everlasting. His love is not like what passes
for love in this world. It passes knowledge. That's how
high his love is. He said it, I want you to know
something of the love of God which passeth knowledge. I want
you to know what you can't know. By God's grace. And then he said that you may
be filled with all the fullness of God. Verse 19. Think about that. Can that be
saying... Can that possibly be saying that
to know the love of Christ is to be filled with all of the
fullness of God? Let's think about that for a
second. Many kind of put the love of God on
the back burner. They say, well, you know, we've
got to talk about the doctrines of grace. What about total depravity? We can't just talk about love
all the time. We can't just talk about the love of God all the
time. We've got to talk about total depravity. The Bible teaches
the total depravity of man. Let me ask you something. Do
you know why? Do you know why the Bible teaches
the total depravity of man? Do you think it's so you can
know how bad evil is? You think that's why? God wants
you to know how bad evil is? Is that the ultimate reason? You think about this with regard
to total depravity. God said to Hosea, Go and take
unto thee a wife of whoredoms. And God caused Hosea to fall
in love with a wretch named Gomer. You read the book of Hosea Gomer. I can't find one thing good about
her in that book. Can you? Not one good thing.
She is an example of the very worst of humanity. But God caused Hosea to fall
in love with her. You know the word, the name Gomer,
it means complete. What she was, she was completely. Total depravity. That's what she represents. A
complete wretch. The root word from which her
name is derived, it means to end, to end in the sense of completion
or failure. In other words, You've gone as
far as you're gonna go, you have failed and you can't do anything
about it, you're done. That's total depravity. We've
hit rock bottom and there's no way up for us. That's what total
depravity is. We not only sin all the time
in everything we do, there's no good thing, but we can't not
sin. That's what she represents, and
she proved to be what she was. We're totally depraved in Adam.
But then we were born into this world, and we proved to be exactly
what we were, unfaithful, ungrateful, despicable, so wretched that
anybody but Hosea would have killed her. You think about that
for a second. Well, that's going a long way,
Chris. You think about that. If you walked in on your husband
or wife, And God let you do what you would
naturally do. What would you do? Anybody but Hosea would have
killed her. But Hosea loved her. Do you know
why he loved her? Because God told him to. God caused him to. And when she proved to be what
she was, the wretched, horrible... adjectives fail, don't they?
Can you think of anything that would hurt you more, or devastate you more, or make
you more angry? Make you feel more disgusted
and angry and helpless? And when it came to that, God
said to Hosea, go yet, love her. Though she's an adulteress. And
if you look at Hosea 3.1, we won't turn there today, because
I don't wanna, but you write it down. You return to Hosea
3.1 sometime, it does not say, go yet and love a woman that
used to be an adulteress. It says, you go yet and love
her, though she is yet, an adulteress. You think about that for a minute. Why God, why? According to my
love for my people. What are you saying Chris? You
can't talk about total depravity without talking about the love
of God. Why do you think he shows us
how black we are? He showed Hosea in order to show
him how much he loves us. What about unconditional election?
We gotta talk, we can't talk about the love of God, we gotta
talk about the unconditional election of God. That the purpose
of God according to election might stand, God said, Jacob,
have I, I love him. God doesn't choose his people
randomly. His love is his choice. Election
is love. What about limited atonement?
I know my sheep, I lay down my life for my sheep, and they shall
never perish. Any questions? Herein is love, not that we love
God. but that he loved us and sent
his son, not to make anything available, to be the propitiation
for our sins. That's what love is. Limited
atonement is the definition of love. You see why Paul said,
be ye rooted and grounded in love, not just doctrinal facts,
not just truth divorced from Christ and the heart of Christ,
What about irresistible grace? I've loved you with an everlasting
love. Therefore, therefore, with loving
kindness have I drawn thee. That's what irresistible grace
is. It's just what love does when it comes where you are. Our Savior said nobody can come
to the Father, come to me except the Father draw him. And the
Father says, I have drawn thee because I've always loved you
and I always will. What about perseverance of the
saints? What about preservation? What about what's saved always
saved, you know, they say. Who shall separate us from the
love of Christ? Who? Shall tribulation, or distress,
or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword,
as it is written, for thy sake we're killed all the day long,
we're accounted as sheep for the slaughter. Nay, in all these
things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us. We
can't fall because he loved us. He's not gonna let us go because
he loves us. We're secure forever because
he loves us. For I'm persuaded that neither
death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers,
nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth,
nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the
love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. There's the perseverance
of the saints right there. So you see why the Apostle Paul
said, I'm getting down on my knees
before God because I want you to know He had written about
it in Ephesians chapter 1 in the same letter. God loved you
and blessed you in Christ before the foundation of the world.
Every blessing that God has to give is yours in Christ Jesus
and was before you were ever born. And now he's saying, I'm
gonna get on my knees before God to pray that he'll teach
you something about that. That he'll show you that love.
The kind of love that reaches down through eternity and picks
a worm out of a bunch of other worms. Because God loves that worm more
than anything else. How much does he love that worm? Oh father, you've loved them
as you've loved me. Be you rooted and grounded in
love. I want to know every doctrinal
truth that there is to know, don't you? But we need to understand
something now. The gospel, the gospel begins
and ends with the free, distinguishing, eternal, infinite, divine love
of God. May He root us and ground us
in it and shed it abroad in our hearts for His glory. Let's pray.