So I'm gonna start here in verse
14, just make a few comments to get where I wanna go. Paul,
he says, you know, for cause of what God taught us in Christ
and His eternal purpose, he said, for this cause, in verse 14,
I bow my knees, I bow my knees, not to just anybody, not to no
king or queen on this earth, not to anybody in this world,
not to a pope, priest, or rabbi. I bow my knees under the Father
of the Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven
and earth is named. God calls, we bear the name of
the Lord Jesus Christ. We're his family. Brothers and
sisters, that's what we call one another. Brother this, sister
that. You know why we do that? Because we're all members of
the same family. God's family, and that He would grant you,
that He would grant you, give you according to the riches of
His glory, to be strengthened with His might by the Spirit
in the inner man. You know, and He's addressing
believers here, and He prays there in verse 16 that they might
be strengthened. You know, we need to be strengthened.
We need strength for strength. Not only strength to do, but
strength to be still. It takes a lot of strength of
the grace of God to be still. Be still and know that I am God. Rest and know that I am God.
Sit still and know that I am God. Don't let the world upset
you, I'm God. Don't let things get you in an
uproar, I'm God. Don't think things are out of
control, I'm God. I'm God, things are in control.
Things are going just exactly the way I will for it to do,
purpose for it to do. And then we need strength to
see the Lord. You know that? We need strength
to see the Lord. And we need strength to know
His presence. We need strength to see His presence
and feel His presence. We don't have that naturally.
We don't have that naturally. And it's like Simon Peter one
time. You know, the Lord Jesus Christ, they'd fished all night
and the Lord got in the boat with them. Said, cast out there
and launch out into the deep and let down your net. He said,
Lord, we fished all night. I know fishing. That's all I've
ever done. He said, I said, let down your
net. Peter started pulling up them
fish and he said, oh Lord, I talked back to you. I didn't know that
I would ever talk to you the way that, Lord, I know something.
And he said, oh Lord, depart from me. I'm such a sinful man. To think that I'd question you,
doubt you, doubt you, and oh my. And you know when John saw his
glory in Revelations 1, he fell as a dead man. And so we need
strength to see the Lord. He gotta put His hand on us.
And then He says, and I want you to be strengthened there
in verse 16, with might by His Spirit in the inner man. His
Spirit's the one that's gotta give us the strength. And He's
talking about that inner man. What inner man is He talking
about? He's talking about that new creature in Christ Jesus. That
new creature, that new life, that new, that new birth, that
man inside of you that's alive, that man that knows Christ, that
man that submits to Christ, that man that knows Christ. This flesh
keeps us from him the way we want to be, but that inner man's
who he's praying for. And then look what he says there
in verse 17, that your hearts, that Christ may dwell in your
hearts by faith. that Christ may dwell in your
hearts by faith. Do you know what that means to
be that Christ lives in you? Christ dwells in you. And without
his spirit, you're none of his. And the scriptures tells us so
plainly that Christ dwells in us by faith. And here's the thing
about it. We receive Christ by faith, we
live by faith, But the Scriptures tells us that Christ in you,
Christ in you, that's the hope of glory. You know, we don't
have no hope of glory. We don't have no hope of glory
of seeing Christ, knowing Christ, having a relationship with Him,
apart from Christ dwelling in us. How do we know Christ dwells
in us? Paul said, he said, I'm crucified
with Christ, but yet, nevertheless, I live. Yet not I, I'm not the
one living. But who's living? Christ in,
living in me. Who loved me and gave himself
for me. So Christ in you. You know when,
I've told you this before, but Christ in you answers to Christ
from the gospel. Ain't that right? You know why
you respond to the gospel? Because Christ in you. Christ, you know, you look in
the mirror and you see yourself. You look at Christ and you see
yourself. And you see your need of him
and you want to hear him. Ain't that right? Oh my. And the scriptures tells us,
and then he says there in verse 17, that you be rooted and grounded
in love. Rooted. Rooted. Everybody knows what it is to
Be rooted you plant plants and you hope the root and then the
root goes down. He says I want you your roots
Your root Christ. I want your root to be grounded
down deep in Christ in his love and I'll tell you in God's love
for a son His love son's love for us and I love for him and
I love for his word, I love for his church, and I love for his
people. We know we've passed from death unto life because
we love the brethren. We really do. And I know this,
love worketh no ill to his neighbor. And you know the scriptures tells
us so plainly, there's no danger of folks mistreating one another
that love one another. They won't do it. They just can't
do it. And let me tell you something,
it takes love to see love. If you don't have any love, you
can't see love. And there's people that don't
know a thing in the world about love. But if I see the love of
Christ in you, it's because I got the love of Christ in me. The
love of God shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost. And
it takes grace to see grace. You can't see grace in anybody
unless you've got grace in yourself. Ain't that right? You'll just
go around seeing something wrong with everybody. But boy, if you've
got love, you'll see love. And love will be manifested and
grace will be manifested. And if we don't see it in others,
maybe it's because we don't have it ourselves. And then he goes
on to say there in verse 18. And you've been rude and grand
in little love so that you may be able to comprehend. with all
the saints. Oh my. And what he said is that
you may be able to understand more fully to grasp what? The love of Christ. He says what
is the breadth, the length, the depth, and the height about the
love of Christ. And then he says, and to know
the love of Christ, which passes knowledge that you might be filled
with all the fullness of God. You know God, he says, to know
the love of Christ. God's people know, God's people
know the love of Christ. And to know it, it means more
here, it means more to, you know when you say, well I know somebody,
I know this. That means that you've actually
experienced it, you know it for yourself. And so he says that
we truly know the love of Christ. We don't know it like we want
to, We don't know it like we're going to, but we know it. We know something about the love
of Christ that know it and feel it and experiences. Then he says
it passes knowledge. Oh my goodness. How do you know
something that passes knowledge? How much do you know about the
love of Christ? I tell you, his love is infinite. It involves an infinite subject. God is love. How in the world
do you describe God and the love of God? And it's an infinite
subject because of our Lord Jesus Christ coming down here and what
He undertook for His people, what He did for His people. You
want to know how much God loved somebody and how much Christ
loved somebody? He died for those people. Huh? And oh, look at this, come down
in the sufferings that he went through. And it passes knowledge,
not only in how it's infinite and what it secured for us, but
it passes knowledge and comprehension when you understand all the blessings
his love secured for us. Do you know what His love secured
for us? It secured for us eternal life. It secured for us a righteousness. It secured for us justification. It secured for us forgiveness.
It secured for us a hope, a righteousness, a glory. It secured for us life
and a relationship with God Almighty in Christ. Huh? Oh. And these things are behind
our comprehension? Oh my. And still yet, we've experienced
His love for us. We've experienced it. We know His love is like Himself. It's glorious. I don't know how
many points I got, but when I get to the last one, I'll tell you.
I'll tell you. Let me tell you something about
the matchless love, the glorious love. He says, to know the love
of Christ. Here's the first thing about
the glorious love of Christ here. He says, you may know it. It's
eternal. It's eternal. He said, I've loved
you with an everlasting love, and with chords of loving kindness
have I drawn thee. God's love has no beginning.
God's love had no beginning. As long as God's been, that's
how long He's loved His people. If you can go how long as God's
been, that's how long He's loved us. And as long as God exists,
that's how long He'll love us. Huh? That's a long time. Huh? And it's like God. It's like Him. It's His nature
to love us eternally. The scripture says God is love.
His love. Christ's love toward us was before
we knowing. Before we knew anything about
Him. And He loved us knowing us. This is what I'm going to
tell you. He loved us knowing us. Knowing who we were. what we were, and what we did,
and what we will do, and what we'll do tomorrow, and if He
lets us live, what we'll do next year. If He loved us before time,
He loves us in time, and He'll love us all the way through eternity. It's eternal. And listen, there's
nothing we can do, nothing we can do that can stop him from
loving us. When David took Bathsheba, Uriah's
wife, I'll tell you something, if God could have forsook anybody,
he would have forsook him then. Then when he had Uriah murdered,
if he was going to forsake somebody, he would have forsook him then. But he said, I'll never, I'll
never, I'll never in no way ever cast you out. When Albert Simon Peter denied
him three times, Peter, I'm done with you. I ain't having nothing
else to do with you. I'm through with you. Simon, son of Jonas, do you love
me? Listen, I've done some terrible
things as a man, terrible things as a child, as a teenager, and
as a believer, and as a preacher. But I tell you one thing, bless
his holy name, I ain't done nothing that can
make him stop loving me, because I did nothing to make him start
loving me. And oh, I tell you, and the people
still try to compare God's love to this, that, and the other
thing. There's nothing on this earth, no love on this earth
can compare to the love of God and the love of Christ. You know, Our love to one another is dependent
upon so many things, but His love toward us is not dependent
on anything except Himself. Let me give you another thing
about the glorious love of Christ. It's free. It's free. Hosea 14.4 says this, I will
love them freely. You know why it has to be free? How is she going to get it? You got enough money to buy it? You got enough worth for him
to give it to you? Have you done enough works for
him to love you? That's the stumbling block that
so many people stumble over. They feel like they have to earn
his love. I've got to earn his love. And
they feel like that when they've done something wrong that he
don't love them as much as he did before they did something
wrong. So they're all the time trying
to do better to get God to love them more. But they say it's
free, it's free, it's free. You know they used to give out
commodities. I don't think they do it anymore. But they used
to get, a truck would come around and give out commodities. You
know, a big truck would open up in town or somewhere and they'd
have it full of peanut butter and butter and cheese and all
that kind of stuff. And people, it's free. And they'd
line up to get that stuff. But you tell them that the love
of Christ is free. That God's grace is free. That
salvation is free. I don't believe it. I don't believe
it. Well, I believe it, because I
know that there's nothing I could ever do to pay for it, earn it,
or work for it, or deserve it. Oh my, God loves, God's rich
in love. How rich is He in love? He has
so much love in His Son that He gives it freely. Freely. And that's the only way in the
world God can love us, is love us freely. Christ will not master,
will not accept any work we've done. This is how you know people have
such a hard time with the free grace of God and the free love
of God, is that they want to pay for it. They think they can
pay for it. But our Lord Jesus Christ, our
master, will not accept our works as payment for his love. He won't
accept our love. He won't even accept our love
as a payment for it. Because we could never love him
that like he's worthy to be loved. Right? And people think, well,
I've done something today, so God's gonna bless me. No, no. If God blesses you, He blesses
you for Christ's sake. If you're going to do anything
for Him, you're going to do it for Christ's sake. His love is free. Free. That's the most wonderful thing
you'll ever hear in your life. His love is free. His grace is
free. Free. And you're talking about
resting and peace of heart and peace of conscience and peace
of mind. That we don't have to do anything to get God to love
us, to keep loving us. Don't have to do anything to
get a blessing. He's already blessed us. Just
the fact that you're here and you want to hear and want to
be here, that in itself is a blessing. And that you got the strength
to be here, that's a blessing. That you got an ear to hear,
that's a blessing. What have you got that He didn't
give to you, that you didn't receive? Oh, let me tell you
something else about His love. Not only is it free and eternal, but His love
is faultless. What in the world does that mean? Search it. That's why I said
I want you to be able to comprehend. Take the love of God. Take the
love of Christ. You take His love and you examine
it. You examine it when He was born of a virgin. You examine
it when He is 12 years old, the first time you hear anything
about Him. You examine it when He entered the ministry. You
examine the love of Christ. Examine it from top to bottom,
inside and out. Examine it from the Bible. And
if you examine it, you can't doubt it. You can't doubt it. His love is faultless. I mean,
there's not a flaw in it. Now you and I, we can love to
a fault. We can, we can love to a fault. We can love to a
fault that we'll let somebody we love keep us from coming to
hear the gospel. We can love to a fault that we'll
do things for our kids we ought not do. We'll love to a fault that we
will love someone so much that we'll let them get by with things
that we wouldn't let nobody else get by with. But not our Lord. Not our Lord. Having loved His
own, He loved them to the end. Huh? Oh, he's getting ready to
wash disciples' feet. No, Simon Peter said, oh, Lord,
Lord, Lord, you're not gonna wash my feet. Oh no, you're not
gonna wash my feet. He said, if I don't wash you,
you got no part in me. Oh Lord, listen, start at the
top and work your way down. Listen, I'll tell you, and I'll
tell you something else, whom he loves, He chastens, and there's
no fault in His chastening. Now you keep Ephesians 3, and
look over here in Hebrews chapter 12 with me. Look in Hebrews chapter
12. Let's look at this together.
Talking about chastening. We talked about this last Sunday
night, if I'm not mistaken. Some of us were talking about
it back there. About the chastening of the Lord. And this says here in verse 6, Hebrews 12 6. He even, He chases, and His chastening
is faultless. It says there in verse six, for
whom the Lord loveth, He chasteneth, and scourgeth
every son whom He receives. Now what in the world does that
mean? That means that He lets us know that we've done something
wrong, lets us know that we failed some way. lets us know that we're
too worldly, lets us know that something's going on in our life
that shouldn't be there. And he chastens us. And let me
tell you, there's no punishment in his chastening, because we've
already been punished in Christ. There ain't no wrath in his chastening,
because his wrath's already been vented in the Lord Jesus Christ.
So what he does, then he says, if you endure chastening, God
deals with you as what? As sons. For what son is he whom
the father chastens not? How many times have you chastened
your children? You know all I had to do to chasten,
now my daughter was different, but all I had to do to chasten
Doogie once or twice is just raise my voice at him a little
bit or ask him why he did something and I disappointed in him and
he'd go to cry. And that's, you know all the
Lord needs to do to chasten us, and this is what we talked about
the other night. All God needs to do to chasten us is take his
presence away from us for about three weeks. Let you come to
a service and you can't hear, you can't feel, you can't see,
you can't pray, you get nothing out of the services. Let him
lead you that way about three services. And you'll say, oh
Lord, oh Lord, oh Lord have mercy on me. Oh God hear me and climb
the air unto me. Why am I so cold? I tell you, that's all the world
he's got to do to you. Just lift you alone. Just lift
his presence from you. And I'll tell you something else
he does. Now when I'm preaching or we're talking to one another
or something, You know, our Lord, when He chastens us, now He may
be chastening somebody today, I don't know. But I do know this,
that He chastens His children by themselves, and nobody else
know what He's doing. Now, if your mama takes their
son or daughter out of the house, or their father takes their son
or daughter to the back of the church, you can hear them, whoa,
whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. But when God chastens us, the
only person we say oh to is the Lord. Oh Lord, save me. Oh Lord, please give me your
presence. Oh Lord, speak to my heart. Don't
let me go to service today and get nothing. Don't let me go
there and be so cold. Please don't let me do that.
And I tell you what, these old fundamentalists and of course,
legalists, they preach, you know, if God will chase you, you know,
if you don't give so much money, he'll take it out of your, he'll
take it out of your car. Or he'll take it out of your
home. He'll take it somewhere or another. But listen, God don't
deal with people like that. Not his children. And I tell
you what, he don't, and look what the next verse says. Up
there in verse eight. But if you be without chastisement,
where all of God's children are partakers. You know what he says?
Then you're a bastard, not a son. You don't whip somebody else's
children. God don't whip children, don't blow them in. So if you
ain't never been chastened by the Lord, what? I ain't gonna
tell you what he said, but that's what he said, ain't that right?
Ain't that right? Then I tell you what, when he
chastens his children, it's between him and his child. never chastens
in anger. And what he's doing is he chastens
us to conform us to the image of his blessed Son. And he chastens
us to wean us from this world. Oh my, to get weaned off this
world, to get weaned from ourselves. And the scripture says open rebuke
is better than secret love. I've told you this story before.
I was with Brother Henry and some other brethren. We was down
in Mexico one time. Henry got on to me twice. Now
I mean he got on to me pretty hard twice. One time out in public
and another time, you know, and there was other people around
when he done it. And one of the men got to me and when we was
sitting, talking, he said, oh boy, what, he said, what do you
think about Henry talking to you like that? I said, well,
open rebukes better than secret love, and I'll tell you this,
he must really love me to be able to feel like he can talk
to me that way. And I believe that. I've seen the other folks do
things worse than I would do, and he'd not say a word to them,
but you let me get out of line just a little bit. You know why I done that? Because
he loved me. He loved me. And I tell you what,
if you love your children, you know what you'll do with them?
You'll chase them. You don't have to beat them to
death. God don't beat us to death. He don't even hurt us when He
chases us. And nobody will know it but us and Him. And then I'll
tell you something else about His love. Not only is it faultless,
but it's discriminating. Now, you know, when you hear
that word discrimination, That's thrown around now, lots and lots,
thrown around all over the place. Well, he discriminates against
blacks, he discriminates against Chinese, discriminates against
Asians. Listen, that's not what we're
talking about here. God's love is discriminating.
What does that mean? That means he just doesn't love
everybody. That's all that means. He does love to love everybody.
He's discriminating in his love. You know that? He's discriminating. He don't care what color you
are. He don't care how rich you are. He don't care where you
come from. He don't care who you know. He
don't care what you know. He don't care what you've done. He don't care where you've been.
You know that? And I'm gonna go, he doesn't
love everybody. And I'm gonna go so far as say
this, he doesn't love America. Everybody thinks that you know
America's God's nation. He loves people in America. He raises up nations and sets
down nations. He raised up this nation and
it looks like he's setting it back down. Ain't that right? People think
they equate being American and patriotic with being Christian. I hope I'm not upsetting you,
but I'm telling you. I used to say, God bless America, but now
I say, God have mercy on America. Have mercy on this nation. Have
mercy on this country. This country's going downhill
so fast that you can't keep up with it going downhill so fast.
But God doesn't love America. He don't love Israel. The nation,
they say God loves Israel over there. We got to pray for Israel.
God don't love nations. He loves people. God didn't give
himself for nations. He gave himself for people. Didn't give himself for races,
he gave himself for people. Ain't that right? Oh my, God don't discriminate
as men think of discriminating. And consider who he loves shows
you that he's not discriminating. You know who he loves? Sinners. That's it, he's not discriminating
about that. He loves sinners. Is there a
sinner in this building today? Cover my defenseless head. Thou art full of grace and truth,
I am all unrighteousness. Oh my, I'll tell you who he loves,
discriminates, he considers, he looks at the sick, sick of
leprosy, sick of sin. Oh my, he loves nobody's. Nobody's. Paul said, I'm less
than the rest of all the saints. He started out, I'm less than
the rest of the apostles. I'm less than the rest of the
saints. And then he said, I'll be nothing. And then the last
thing he says, I'm the chief of sinners. He went down. Oh my, he loves nobody's. Anybody, nobody's here today? Oh my, we're nobodies. You just go, you go somewhere where they don't
know you and say, well, who are you? Your people say, well, who's
he? Well, he's nobody, nobody. And he is, oh, I'll tell you
who he discriminates, he discriminates toward the poor. I'll tell you
who he discriminates against. Them that are full, them that
are rich, them that are increased with goods, them that have need
of nothing. Oh, He discriminates against
them. He discriminated between two sons, twin brothers, born
from the same mother, born at the same time, born of the same
father, and before either one of them was ever born, ever done
anything bad or good, God said, Jacob have I loved, Esau have
I hated. Huh? That sounds pretty discriminatory
to me, don't you? But look over here in Romans. Look in Romans chapter 5. Look
in Romans 5. Look here what the scriptures
tells us about this. Romans chapter 5. Oh my. You know, He didn't come to call
the righteous, but sinners to repentance. Sinners to repentance. Look what it says up here in
verse 6, Romans chapter 5 and verse 6. For when we were yet
without strength, we're talking about strength. Paul prayed for
us to have strength. For when we were yet without
strength, in due time, according to the time, Christ died for
who? The ungodly. You know what you've got to do
to be ungodly? Just be without God. People think to be ungodly
is to go out here and do some awful, awful evil thing. All
to be ungodly is just to be without God. That's all it takes. And then look what else he goes
to say. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die. Why in the
world would somebody die for somebody that's already righteous?
And maybe, just maybe, there's a good man. Somebody say, well,
that fellow's good, so, and I'm not so good, so I'll die, I would
dare to die for him. But God don't do that. He didn't
die for the righteous, didn't die for good, but God commendeth
his love toward us in that while we were yet sinners. Christ. You know, let me tell you just
a couple of stories here from the scriptures. You all remember
Hosea's wife? God said, go, told Hosea, go
marry Harlot. Go marry Harlot. Well, Hosea did it. He went and
married a woman named Domer. He married her. But she went
to other men's houses and did go there and she got poor. Hosea
would bring her, put her corn and put her wine and put her
food and put her money out in her lover's houses. Took care
of her even when she was in other men's houses. And then she got put on the block.
She got to be an old woman. She was used up. Sin had used
her up. Her lovers had used her up. And
yet, Hosea is providing for her all the time she was doing those
things. And she is put on the block.
What do you give for her? What do you give for her? Hosea
stood up and said, I'll give you. I'll buy her. I'll pay for her. She's already
my wife, but I'll pay for her. And that's the way we were. We
went from one lover to another. from one spiritual lover to another,
and God provided for us all the days of our life, and then when
we were put on the slave market, our Lord Jesus Christ, when we
stood up there and we had nothing to pay, we was ruined in our
sin, without any hope of God or Christ in this world, Christ
said, I'll pay for it! I'll pay for it! And he set the corn, he set the
wine, he set the food, he set our tables, clothed our bodies,
until sin had used us up. And he said, oh, I'll pay for
you. How much you owe? Ah, more than
you got to pay. And that Samaritan woman, our
Lord Jesus Christ, Walked all day. High noon, he sat down on
the well, thirsty and tired. A woman came to draw water. Our
Lord said, give me the drink. Said, well, you're a Samaritan,
and you're a Jew, and I'm a Samaritan. We don't have no dealings. He
said, well, I'll tell you what, go call your husband and let
him do it. She said, sir, I have no husband. She said, you've
rightly sinned. You've had five of them. And you won, you got
now, it's not yours. Oh, sir, I perceive you're a
prophet. And she run, after she gave him,
he gave her a drink of water, she run, left her water pot and
said, come see a man, told me all ever I did. He's the only one who knows everything
we did. He's the only one. And oh my. And like Paul, he was a murderer,
a wicked man. But there was a time, a time
of love, and God put him down on the Damascus road. Moses, he killed an Egyptian,
buried him under the sand. God sent him to the back side
of the desert for 40 years. He comes and said, now go down
there and tell Mero to let my people go. His love, listen to me now. His
love is so discriminating, His love singles out all these kind
of people I was telling you about and makes them, listen, His love
singles them out and makes them, makes them sinners, makes them
sinners. And I've said it, I guess probably
a thousand times in all these years, That if you ever become a sinner,
you're a saved man. And I tell you what, His love
for us created in us a need of Him and He just keeps creating
that need. He loves us so much that He will
not let us not need Him. Will not let us not need Him.
And then his love is glorious because it's faithful. Oh, how
faithful is his love. How faithful. You know, his love is unchanging. He said,
you sons of Jacob, you're not consumed. Why? Because I am the
Lord and I change not. You know how many times you've
changed in this service today? Your mind's went here and it's
come back. It's went yonder and it's come back. You've listened for a while and
then your mind thought about something else. But you know why he loves you
no matter where your mind's at. You know why? Because he's faithful. You know, my mind wonders while
I'm preaching sometimes. In fact, my brain gets ahead
of my mouth sometimes. That happens pretty often. Don't
it, Shirley? Oh my. You see, we're faithful
to them that are faithful to us. And many, many marriages
fail because somebody was unfaithful and they can't never get over
it. Can't get over it. And there's people who say, well,
I loved you, but I don't love you anymore. God will never say
that. God will never do that. I don't
care how unfaithful we are, how unfaithful we get, and how many
times we've been unfaithful. He's never, never, ever been
unfaithful to us. And His love's never been unfaithful
to us. Our master, you know after Simon
Peter had denied him and he said go you tell your brethren That
I'll go before Galilee to see him and he said I'll tell you
this go tell Peter. I'll see him in Galilee Why did
he say Peter because Peter's one denied him? Oh Christ, he said I prayed for
you that your faith fail not and he said I'm persuaded that
neither life nor death nor angels nor principalities Life, death, angels, principalities,
thanks present, thanks to come. Angels nor any other creature
is able to separate us from the love of God. Where's it at? In
Christ Jesus. Oh my, that rich young ruler,
I'll tell you our Lord told him, said, oh listen, what I need
to have life. Our Lord told him, he said, I've
done this. And he went away sorrowful. But the scripture says that Christ
loved him. And if Christ loved that man, I'm telling you, Christ
loved that man. That man was saved somewhere
down the line. God just said Christ loved him.
And if Christ says he loves you, you can't stop it. You can't
stop it. You can't do it. And I tell you,
let me show you one last thing and then I'm done. John chapter
12 and verse 47. Excuse me, John chapter 12 and
verse 24. And I'm done. Oh, what love, what love, what
love. What glorious, blessed love.
Love is wonderful. You know what? If you've been
blessed to have somebody to love you and you're able to love somebody.
God gives you a good mate, somebody that loves you and you've been
together all these years. And they love you and I mean
they've seen you at your worst and they've seen you at your
best. They've seen you sick, they've seen you on your bed
of affliction, they've seen you in every way you could possibly
be seen. And yet they've loved you all these years. 60 years,
62 years, 40 years, 45 years, 50 years, 37 years. Oh, to be loved by somebody and
have somebody love you. Love is wonderful. It is wonderful. God's blessed me with two loves.
Two blessed loves, and I'm so thankful for it. I'm so thankful. I'd hate to not be loved by people,
wouldn't you? I'd hate to have not somebody
to not go get into bed with and, you know, snuggle up to on a
cold night. Somebody to sit and talk with,
have a cup of coffee with. Oh, love's wonderful. And if
it's wonderful for us, Imagine how blessed it is, the love of
Christ for us. Not only is it all the things
that I said, but it's fruitful. Look what he said here in chapter
12, verse 24. Well, I'm in the wrong chapter. I'm
sorry I moved one page too far. He said in verse 24, or verse
23, and Jesus answered them saying, the hour has come that the Son
of Man should be glorified. Verily, verily, I say unto you,
except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it bides
alone. And if it die, it bringeth forth
much fruit. If it just lays there and don't
die, And our Lord said, this is what my life's gonna do. I'm
gonna die. And if it dies, it brings us
more fruit, much fruit. Look at the fruit that's here
this morning. Our Lord's love was to death,
and death accomplished something. Salvation for all whom He loved,
all for whom He loved. He loved us knowing that He had
to create in us our love for Him, even though He died for
us and suffered so for us. And not only did He create that
love in us, but He also must sustain that love in us. Sometimes because of our love
for somebody, we want to do something, we're not able to do it. But
nothing can keep Him from being able to do anything. He loved
us, And he refused to let his love be in vain. He said, I laid
down my life for the sheep. And when he died for his sheep,
there's all lost. But you know what he did? He
found every single one of them. He found whole bunches of them
at a time. He found 3,000 one day on Pentecost.
He can find them one at a time or find them by great big bunches.
But oh my. As the separate, he laid down
his life for his sheep. And when Mary and Martha sent
word to him, said, he whom thou lovest is sick. And he stood
outside Lazarus' tomb, said, oh, how he loved him. Dear dying
lamb, thy precious blood shall never lose its power till all
the ransomed church of God be saved to sin no more. Oh, what glorious love, what
blessed love, eternal, free, faultless, discriminating, faithful, and fruitful. And we still know hardly anything
about it. Our Father, in the blessed, blessed
love of our Lord Jesus Christ, we bow our hearts before you,
thanking you for your great love. We're with you, loved us, even
when we were dead in trespasses and sins. Lord, thank you for
the gospel. Thank you for the truth. Thank
you for the ability to say something. Lord, it's in your hands. And
you said your word will not turn unto you void. So Lord, I believe
that. So Lord, it's going out. You'll
use it. You'll use it to your glory and
the good of those who heard. We bless you in Christ's name.
Amen. Amen. Let's do 67 in the hymn book. We sung
that the other day, but it's a good one. Number 67 in the
hymn book. Let's stand together.