I want you to turn in your Bibles
to Proverbs chapter 8. Proverbs chapter 8. It's so good
to be here. It's so good to be with you.
It's a joy. I really mean it. We've been
loving the fellowship here at rescue for over 15 years. It doesn't seem that long. But every time we can come together,
it's always a delight. That's one of God's precious
gifts to us, is the fellowship of his saints. What I want to
talk to you about is very, very important. I want to talk to you about the
most sublime subject any human heart can contemplate. A subject that all of God's people
are acquainted with and utterly and totally delighted. I want
us to consider for a little while just a season. The love of God. The love of
God. That's what I want to talk about
tonight. Particularly, I want to talk
about the unconditional love of God. Here's my proposition. It's a myth. A myth. Listen to me carefully. The idea
of unconditional love is a total myth. It's an oxymoron. It's a contradiction in turn.
It's an absurdity. I know that we have heard this
word used so pervasively that we have sort of unconsciously
allowed it to seep into our dialogue and our conversation. Because
it feels so good. But the vast majority of the
people that I hear using the phrase unconditional love know
nothing at all about the love of God. And the way they use unconditional
love tells me that they don't know what love is. And what I want to share with
you just for a little while is this reality. that love cannot
be unconditional. Love is never unconditional. Your love is not unconditional. My love is not unconditional.
And God's love cannot be unconditional. My text is Proverbs 8, verse
17. Listen to the wise man. He says
I love them That love me And they that seek me early shall
find me I Bet you never heard an Armenian
use that verse ever in your life. Have you? Because that verse explicitly
sets forth conditions You know what it says? That God loves
those that love Him. And it also says, those that
seek Him early will find Him. Which means, love is by nature
conditional. As I said if it sounds if it
seems uncomfortable for us to contemplate this and wrap this
around our heads sisters and brothers is because we have Accepted
this this term. It's become a foregone conclusion
that somehow God's love is unconditional and and and the idea of unconditional
love means that God just he just loves me as I am and And that's
just the way that it is. His love doesn't require anything. His love doesn't demand anything. There are no prerequisites to
God's love. There are no stipulations to
God's love. Now think about this with me for a moment. What would
love be if it didn't demand something? What would love be if it didn't
require something? What would love be if love allowed
the objects of its love to act in a way contrary to love because
love therefore is unconditional? I submit to you that unconditional
love is just as nonsensical as free healthcare. I want to make sure that you
understand that when I bring to your thoughts this term, unconditional
love, and I set it forth as unbiblical. I also set it forth as ungodly. I set it forth also as contrary
to the gospel. And I set it forth as that which
is used by the enemies of the cross and the enemies of the
gospel to obscure everything that the Word of God has plainly
declared about what Christ has accomplished for our eternal
redemption. I say that because the question
that you and I have to consider is what is the effect of this
term unconditional love when you hear it? other than make
you feel good. Where do you hear people who
use this phrase most often? Well, God's love is unconditional.
It's amongst those brothers and sisters who actually despise
the gospel. They despise the claims of God's
sovereignty. They do not recognize that God
himself is a law unto himself and that God doesn't act willy-nilly
within the framework of his own purpose and grace, nor towards
those who become objects of his mercy. When we hear this term
unconditional love used, I want you to realize that it obscures
the glory of God, and it denies the character of the work of
the triune God. specifically the work of the
Father in purposing and determining and predetermining the redemption
of sinners in Jesus Christ. It denies the absolute necessity
of Christ's work being accomplished for those whom the Father had
given Him. And it denies the specifics of
the work of the Holy Ghost in calling out His sheep on the
grounds of a covenant that God made with His Son before the
world began. And here's what I'm saying. If the gospel is as we know it,
there's nothing about the gospel that is unconditional. Everything
about our redemption is predicated on conditions. Conditions that
needed to be accomplished in order for you and I to be redeemed.
So, there are several things I just want to share with you
along those lines. The idea of unconditional love
is so contrary to God's word. Unconditional love rejects God's
glory and unconditional love also denies the true condition
of the human heart. It denies that which is necessary
upon the whole human race while as yet they stand outside of
the mercy of God, and that is eternal destruction. Unconditional
love, ladies and gentlemen, is a myth. Now having said that,
I just want to share with you a few things around that. What
is love? What is it? Love is the ultimate
good done in the most perfect way in order to honor both the
objects of that love and the source from which that love has
its origins. Did you get that? Love is the
ultimate good done in the most perfect way in order to honor
the objects of that love, at the same time honor the source
from which that love came from. Now if that's a valid definition,
then unconditional love is a myth. The Bible tells us that God is
love, right? The Bible also tells us that God is good. If then
God is good and God is love, then God in his love towards
his people must act in the way in which I have just defined
it. Meaning God does not act willy-nilly. God does not purpose
in a frivolous way. And God does not save in some
type of emotional disorder. Well, you know, God just, He
just decides to save people because He loves sinners. No. God saves
on purpose, He redeems on purpose, and He loves on purpose. And
God saves and loves and redeems sinners according to His character,
according to His nature, according to who He is in all of His glorious
attributes. Let me say it one more time before
we develop it just a little bit more. If the love of God is unconditional,
then God is not gloriously holy, righteous If God's love is unconditional
Then God is not gloriously holy or righteous our text says he
loves those that love him. Isn't that what it says? Isn't
that a condition? He loves those that love him.
Is it fair to say as we consider this that God does not love those
that don't love him? Is that fair to say? Is that
a condition? Is that a requisite? Absolutely! And I'm here to say, ladies and
gentlemen, we hear terms used in religion all over the place,
and around the world, and I can tell you when I begin to suspect
an erroneous concept, or a statement, or a quick phrase that's contrary
to the gospel, is when the world can use it easily, just as religious
folks in the church. When they both use terms that
seem to be acceptable because it feels good, I have a funny
suspicion that they are ignorant of the glory of God. Is there
any offense in the term unconditional love? Nothing. Nothing. But our Bible tells us, if you
are reading your Bible carefully, not only is God's love Conditional. It must be conditional. God's love must be conditional. More than that, ladies and gentlemen,
God's love is seen all through the scriptures as conditional. Almost everywhere you read about
the love of God, does it not demand something or promise something? Thou shalt love the Lord your
God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. Did you hear
that? For me, that is profoundly conditional. I don't care how bad it makes
you feel. It's conditional. There's a requisite there. There's
a purpose there. There's a demand there. And it's
glorious. You know why? Because God, our
God, deserves to be loved with all of our heart, soul, mind
and strength. Is that true? The glorious being
in his magnificence and brilliance, only understood by us a little
bit, deserves for those who are the objects of his love to do
both what the proverb says, love him back and seek him with all
their heart, soul, mind and strength. Am I telling you the truth? God
deserves it. God deserves it. God deserves
it. Let me share with you just a
few Bible verses in relationship to what I'm talking about. Proverbs
chapter 3 verse 12. Be ready to flip through a few
pages and then we'll go back to our text and I'll move us
forward. I understand if you have some
apprehension about what I'm saying. Proverbs chapter 3 verse 12. Here is an aspect of God's love.
For whom the Lord loves, He what? Corrects. Even now watch this
as a father the son in whom he what delight Do you see the redemptive? Necessity in this text of scripture
Do you see how that in relationship to the love of God God demands
that list people understand that there are? radically important
Conditions that must be met in order for a holy God to love
his people the text tells me that God must chase in his son
If he's gonna love his son He must do it Hebrews tells us that
if you aren't chasing your bastard, is that what the Bible says?
All right, just stay with me there. Here's another condition
Proverbs not problems with Psalms 97 verse 10. You don't have to
go there. You've heard it before I want this to marinate in your
mind because I want us by the grace of God to respect the love
of God and Psalm 97 verse 10 you who love the Lord what hate
evil You know what it says? Hate evil. And has not God, our
sovereign God, taught us that we must do that? Didn't Paul
say in Romans chapter 7, the good, the evil that I do, that
I what? Hate. If you love God, you've
got to what? Hate evil. I argue therefore
that love cannot be unconditional. Psalm 116 verse 1. Look at Psalm
116 verse 1. This is what David said. Now
we know that God loved David, didn't he? And we know that David
loved God. So these two meet the requisites
of this idea of the love of God. And yet here's what David says.
Now I want you to meditate on this. Think about this now. This
is critical. I want you to think. Psalm 116
verse 1. Here's what David said. I thought
this was so remarkable years ago. As I began to contemplate
the love of God as it is expressed all through the scriptures, both
in terms of God's declaration of love for His people and God's
people, their declaration of their love for Him. Listen to
what David said. David says, I love the Lord. Do you see that? Now watch this. Because He hath heard my cry.
Isn't that good? See, David's love for God wasn't
unconditional. David's love for God was predicated
upon God doing something for him. I love the Lord because
He had heard my voice and my supplication, because He had
inclined His ear to hear me. Therefore, will I call upon Him
as long as I live. And I submit to you, as we move
forward here, we have another glorious, glorious, truth latent
in this text. This is not merely the reciprocal
love of a believer in expression of thanksgiving and gratitude
to God for hearing us. We do that. We thank him for
hearing us. But this text is actually demanding that we understand
the one whom God really heard in David's behalf so that David
can love the Lord. I want you to follow me now,
hang on. Because what I want us to do is to think about terms
when they come into our hearing just because everybody holds
to it. Because I know that in this present generation, the
way the enemy works is he uses phrases and he Conscious praises
in order to disarm you from thinking about what's being said and nothing
is more important for the people of God than to know God and to
know the glory of God and to know its Attributes and its characteristics
and to know I'm gonna talk to you about this tomorrow night
and brother Gene lets me keep preaching My my God can do anything no
he can't No, he can't That's another one. You know, God can
do anything. No, He can't. Am I telling the truth? God can't
do anything. If God could do anything, then
God would be whimsical, He would be lawless, He wouldn't be holy,
He wouldn't be righteous, He wouldn't be impeccable, He wouldn't
be glorious, He wouldn't be separate from sinners. God can't do anything. Can't do anything. And God can't
love you unconditionally. You have often heard the phrase,
you know, God loves me just as I am. Sorry, He doesn't. He can't. He can't love a sinner just as
He is and be God. Is He coming home yet? It's a beginning to come home
that there is something about the love of God that must be
understood in relationship to his redemptive glory before we
can talk about God's love. And I know the world doesn't
understand this, but I want you to understand it. Psalm 119 verse
113. Just go with me a little bit
longer. I hope that this comes home to
you. Psalm 119. I am saying to you that while
that term may feel good rolling around on your lips, it is an
ill-advised term and it does not reflect the glory of God.
Psalm 119 verse 113, here's what David said again, now watch this,
I hate vain thoughts. Do you see that? But your law
do I love. Now why do I call your attention
to this? Because what David just set forth, as well as in the
previous psalm is, when you exercise this virtue called love, it by
necessity demands that you exercise a virtue called hate. When you
love something, it means that you hate something opposite to
it. Am I telling the truth? And it's
very important for us to know this because this idea of unconditional
love is couched under the idea of universal love which is the
lie that the enemy has been spawning for generations to a people who
are just bent on emotions and paganism and somehow the idea
that you and I in ourselves according to our present constitution is
worthy of the love of God is blasphemy. Utter blasphemy. It cannot be that God is holy,
that God is the ultimate good, the highest good, who operates
in a perfect way and honorable to the objects of that love and
to his own self. And God loves something that
he must by nature according to his intrinsic character hate. So we got a problem, don't we? I know the problem that we have,
brothers and sisters, and I mean for us to consider that problem
that we have, because that problem that we have is necessary for
us to understand the true nature of the love of God. Let me say
this, the love of God, when earnestly contemplated, is pure, is distinguishable,
I heard our pastor say that in his prayer. The distinction between
the redeemed and the non-redeemed is the grace of God. Well, where
does the grace of God come from if it doesn't come from the love
of God? I know that it does. You do too if you know anything
about God. Listen to me. The grace of God flows from the
love of God out of which all of God's glorious, redeeming,
saving attributes and intentions come. It comes from His love.
It comes from His love. God, His love is pure, His love
is distinguishable, His love is efficacious, effective. So, is his love powerful? Come
on now, tell me, is not the love of God powerful? Does not God's
love actually accomplish its purpose? If it does then, his
love cannot be unconditional. Because there are multitudes
who perish under the wrath of God. And they can't be said to
be loved and hated at the same time. Is that okay? Is it okay for
me to talk to us like this? Listen, there is nothing more
glorious than the thought of God's love. Nothing. Nothing
more glorious than the thought of an infinite God who loves
sinners. I understand that. I'm an object
of it. But I've been taught by God that
there's something about God's love that we must understand
in order to not do what man by nature will do. You and me too. You know what that is? Steal
His glory. We'll steal His glory. We're
still as low. Let me help you. If I bought
into the idea of unconditional love, I will not say that the
Father chose a people from before the foundation of the world and
redeemed them on the grounds of an explicit covenant that
demanded perfect obedience in order for them to be redeemed.
I'll just go around saying God's love is unconditional. Come on
in. And what I'm doing is denying the glory of the Godhead. When
we preach the gospel, we're not just preaching the effects of
the gospel. When we preach the gospel, we're
not preaching merely the call of the gospel. When we preach
the gospel, we are preaching the glory of God. And if you
don't know God's glory, you're not preaching the gospel. It
just can't be done. You can't preach the gospel is
the gospel of his glory And God must reveal his glory to you
and when God reveals his glory to you. He reveals himself And
when he reveals himself, he reveals himself in very clear and specific
ways. I'm going to talk to us about
it tomorrow night There's another time this evangelical church
world and the whole world uses all the time You can't put God
in a box I'll talk about it if you let
me. You can't put God in a box. I'd like to know what you mean
by that. Are you saying to me that God can't be known? Are
you saying to me that God doesn't act in ways that are consistent
with his nature? Are you saying to me that we
can't know something certainly about who he is and what he does? Is that what you're saying to
me? Then I'm telling you, you don't know God. Is that okay? See, in this generation, what
we have to do as we preach and teach and exhort the people of
God to continue to look to Christ, we have to, by the grace of God,
Brother Gene, Pastor Don, and all you pastors, make Him known. What happens when you begin to
do that, is God begins to lay everybody low. Because you won't
steal His glory and stand before Him. Listen to a couple of more
verses. Go with me in your Bible to John
chapter 8. Don Priest stoned this several months ago. It was
out of John chapter 8. I'm only going to read one text.
When I saw the title of his message, Immediately, there was a confirmation
in my spirit and a greater understanding of the necessity to talk about
God's love the way that I'm talking about it tonight. The Lord Jesus
Christ stood before the rulers of the church of His day. They
were the Pharisees and the Sadducees. Some were Herodians and other
extraneous groups, but primarily the Pharisees. These were men
and women who were, men rather, stewards of the law. Every jot
and tittle of God's Torah, His Tanakh. They thought they knew
God. And they were confident that
Jesus was not of God. But here's what our Master said
in John chapter 8, verse 52. Now, you tell me if this is not
a condition predicated of love. John chapter 8 verse 42. Are
we there? Listen to this. Jesus answered and said unto
them, If God were your father, you would love me. Can I tell you what that means?
If God's not your father, you don't love God. I don't care
how much you say it. And, if God is your Father, you
will necessarily love the Son. Those are conditions, ladies
and gentlemen. In other words, people can talk about loving
God, and loving the Father, and He's my Father, but if they deny
the Gospel, if they deny the glory of God in Christ, they
don't know God, nor the love of God. Christ said, I know that
the love of God is not in you. Because if it was, you'd know
me, you'd know that I came from Him. That's a condition of recognizing
the love of God in your own heart. There are folks who want to say
that, you know, you can't really know if you're saved or not.
I mean, you just can kind of hope and maybe you go to glory.
Listen to me. The way we know that we are saved
is because He's revealed Himself to us. He's revealed Himself
to us. John Chapter 14. Go there. John
Chapter 14. Our Lord does it again in John
Chapter 14. I want you to hear this. He's speaking to his disciples
now, as he always does, and as he speaks to his disciples, they
are the ones who receive, they receive the most stern admonitions
from the Master, because the Master loves them. And he would
see to it that his disciples did not fall prey for all of
the loose jargon that goes on in religion as well. He would
see to it that they would have everything necessary for them
to be confirmed in not only their salvation, but their calling
as apostles of the glory of the gospel of Jesus Christ too. And
you tell me, saints, if this is not conditional love. Verse
15. Are we there? Chapter 14, verse 15. If you
love me, keep my commandments. Isn't that right? If you love
me, keep my commandments. Pastor, I don't like that. I
don't blame you. But there's two reasons, before
we move on to my next very critical point in turning through this
message, that it necessarily requires that if you love God,
you will obey Him. The first is because God demands
it of His creatures. You and I have a right to obey
Him. He's glorious, and He's God. And the only way that we
can rightly respond to God in love is obedience. Is obedience. Secondly, when God says, if you love me,
keep my commandments. The man or the woman that comes
to see God's glory and His beauty and His fullness and His redeeming
work, everything in my heart wants to keep His commandments.
Everything in my being wants to obey God. I say yes to obeying
God, don't you? Here's the problem, here's the
challenge, here's the difficulty that we struggle with around
this almost impossible demand on the part of God with regards
to God's conditional love. Because it's true, isn't it,
ladies and gentlemen, that there are multitudes that are going
to perish under the wrath of God. Isn't that right? Multitudes
are going to perish under the wrath of God. And are they not
going to perish under the wrath of God? Because every commandment
that God has stipulated, of which I've just shared with you, men
and women boldly and proudly deny. Is that true? So they will
perish under the wrath of God justly, won't they? Okay, let
me help you with that before we move on to the next point.
Because there are folk who are ignorant of what is critically
important in gospel preaching, and that is God's glory. Not
how you feel, not how I feel. What you and I feel at the end
of the day is not the issue. What is at issue, what is at
stake in the ministry of the gospel, I submit to you, is God's
glory. Now watch this. If love is the
ultimate good, done in the most perfect way, with the greatest
honor bestowed upon the objects of that love, while at the same
time maintaining honor from that love wherein it has its source,
Meaning this, if God is love, and He is, God being the highest
good, must necessarily do everything to His own glory. God must love
Himself. Is that okay? God must love Himself. Doesn't that, ladies and gentlemen,
doesn't that stand to reason? If God is perfect, if He's holy,
if He's glorious, if He's wonderful, if He's just full of glory, if
He's impeccable, if He's flawless, doesn't it stand to reason that
everything redounds to God's glory? Because God must love
Himself? Watch this. Therefore, when He
sends men and women to hell, because of their indolence and
rebellion against Him, it is nothing but God loving Himself,
which He must necessarily do, since God Himself is the highest
good. Now watch me. And when men perish under the
wrath of God, for their rebellion against God, they are simply
experiencing the fullness of love for themselves. Keep your hand here and go back
to Proverbs chapter 8, verse 37. There's one more verse in
John chapter 8, not John chapter 8, but John chapter 14 I want
you to see. But I want you to see this in Proverbs chapter 8. This
is in verse 37. You never hear this verse quoted
as well. But I want you to hear it today. Now let me say what
I just said once again so that I can move forward and close
out this message. If God is the ultimate good,
and if God is love, God is both love and God is both good, then
everything that God does, in fact, let me say this, everything
that takes place in this universe, everything that takes place in
this universe falls under the canopy of God's love. Now watch
this. If a man goes to glory, It's
because of God's love. If he goes to hell, watch this,
it's because God loved himself. He cannot deny himself. God must
be holy. He must be righteous. He must
be just. and what that means is when God
stands before the creature and the creature stands before God
and the creature opposes this glorious God who should be loved
and must be loved saying that you're not worthy of being loved
and therefore I love myself to the exclusion of you God who
is lovely must send that man to hell in order to love himself
because he's the highest good listen to what the text says
Proverbs chapter 8. Are you there? Verse 37. Let me start at verse 34. Now
as you know, the Proverbs speak of wisdom. And the wisdom here
is a personification for who? Jesus. Jesus is here speaking
in verse 36 and 37. Sorry, verse 34 through 36. Blessed
is the man that heareth me. Watching daily at my gates, waiting
at the post of my door. For whoso findeth me findeth
life, and shall obtain favor of the Lord. But he that sinneth
against me wrongeth his own soul. Now listen to this, ladies and
gentlemen. All that hate me, love death. Got it? Got it? Go with me back to John
chapter 14. I'm going to let you move forward.
What I know that you are thinking, write along with me if you are
informed biblically. That if what I'm saying is true
concerning the conditions of God's love, the conditionality
of God's love, the requisites of God's love, His demands, that
God cannot violate His own nature, His own character, His own being,
and His own glory just to love you if you are not qualified
to be loved. I know that what you're thinking
is this, if what he is saying is true, that God's love is conditional,
then none of us can ever receive the love of God. Now if you've
been able to make that connection, I don't know, we California folk,
we're kind of slow, but if you've been able to make that connection,
that connection is legitimate. And here's where the glory of
the gospel comes in. If any part of God's character or God's work
depends upon your character or your work, it cannot be the gospel. When we preach the gospel then,
Brother Gene, it must necessarily shut everybody out on the grounds
of their own nature. and bring us to a state of utter
helplessness. Only hoping that God who is gloriously
lovely and sincerely holy will find a way to love sinners without
violating His nature. Is that true? Until He kills you, you can't
be brought to life. Until God eradicates all hope
from the sinner, we have not preached the gospel. If in the
preaching of the gospel we have given you just a little bit of
hope that the reason why God chose you was because there was
something in you that God saw worthy of choosing you, even
your decision for Jesus. Am I making some sense? Let's
see, the great error in the evangelical church, right along with not
knowing the glory of God in the gospel, is not knowing that man
is so utterly and totally depraved that God cannot save the sinner
in the condition that he's in. How's he gonna do it? Oh, I'm
glad you asked the question. How's he gonna do it? I won't
be much longer with you because I simply wanted to arrest your
attention on the subject of the love of God so that if you have
been deluded by it, you can stop being deluded by it and go back
to doing what the scriptures tells us to do. Prove all things,
hold fast to that which is good and see to it that everything
we preach and teach glorifies God. Glorifies God. It's absolutely necessary for
us to know that God hates sin and therefore he hates the sinner
and in love for himself he must throw the sinner into hell. Is
that right? But the mystery of His will. And this is the glory
of God. This is the glory of the gospel
of His grace is that God does love some sinners. Am I telling
the truth? God does love some people who
in themselves are not qualified to be loved. How can he do that? He can only love men and women
who don't meet the conditions of what is required to give God
all the glory he necessarily deserves. He can only love them
by meeting the conditions in himself. Am I making some sense? Am I making some sense? In order
for God to love you, He's got to meet the conditions for you
in Himself. In order to remain consistent
in His love for Himself. Because we declare, we confess,
we profess God to be holy. And as soon as God lowers His
standard for you and I, He is not holy. But God won't do it,
and God didn't do it. How then can God love a sinner
who must be hated by God because God must necessarily love himself
in Christ? Am I making some sense? This
is the glory of the triune God. When Jesus said in the Proverbs
chapter 8 verse 17, I love them that love me. He was telling
the truth. When God says, I love them with an everlasting love.
In fact, He says, I have loved them. Most of the declaratives
of God's love for His people in the scriptures are in the
past tense. Most of them. Did you know that? What that
means is God didn't look down the corridors of time and decide
to love you, but rather He loved us before the world began, having
already met all All of the requirements, all of the demands, all of the
conditions by which he could rightly and justly love me. Are you hearing me? How did he do it pastor? By placing
the guilty sinner into his holy son. Which we call election. Which we love. And we call it
union with Christ, which we love. Because union with Christ is
our only hope for glory. Now God can talk about loving
me, and I can talk about loving God, if we want to get at it
right now. If I really want to get at it, I can tell you that
right now, I love God with all my heart, soul, mind and strength.
Right now, I can say to you, I have sought God, and I have
found Him. Have you? Right now, I can talk
to you about how confident I am to stand before God as His own
darling Son, because in Christ, everything that God demanded
for me, Christ has fulfilled. Are you hearing me? See, I'm
going to shut it down here and I'll take this up next week.
What I wanted to do is to help you and I see how easy it is
by silly phrases to miss the gospel. And our brains get foggy
on these matters because we are not focused on the glory of God.
Absolutely critical that the father be preached in all of
his covenant purposes and the son be extolled in all of the
Accomplishment of those covenant purposes and the Spirit of God
be understood as to only act consistent with the terms of
the covenant and They're all conditional Are you back at John
chapter 15 John chapter 14 look with me at John 14. I'm almost
done John chapter 14 Verse 21, listen to this. He that hath my commandments,
and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me. Who's the same Christ
that said this here in John chapter 8 that he said in Proverbs chapter
8 you know right? He that hath my commandments
and keepeth them he it is that loveth me now watch this saints
and he that loveth me Shall be loved of my father And I will
love him and I will manifest myself to him Isn't that glorious
look at verse 23 Jesus answered and said unto them unto him if
a man loved me he will keep my words And my Father will love
him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode in him." What
is Jesus saying to his disciples? He's saying this, that in order
for God to love the sinner, the sinner must love Christ. In order for the sinner to love
Christ, Christ must be that sinner's surety, that sinner's representative,
that sinner's substitute, that sinner's mediator. The sinner
that loves God is the sinner who is found in Christ. And that
sinner who was found in Christ, then in the mind of God, loves
God and has accomplished all of God's requirements in order
for God to love him. And this is the glory of the
gospel. I close with this verse for you
to meditate on this and never forget it. But of God. Are you in Christ who of God
is gloriously manifested to us in the preaching of the gospel
as everything? Am I telling the truth? Now you
can rest! Because what God demands of us,
God himself performs in order that God might have us. Now comes
the saying, if God spared not his only son, but deliver them
up for us all. How shall He not with Him, do
you see it? Freely give us all things. How does God freely love the
sinner? In Christ. I pray that God would direct
our hearts over the next two days into the love of Christ. That's the only way that you
and I can have a relationship with God. Amen.