If you would turn in your Bibles
to 1 John 4. I'd like to read verse 9 and 10. In this was manifested the love
of God toward us, because that God sent His only begotten Son
into the world, that we might live spiritually through Him. Herein is love, not that we love
God, but that He loved us. and set his Son to be the propitiation
or satisfaction for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us,
we ought also to love one another. John Owen said this, We are never
nearer Christ than when we find ourselves lost
in a holy amazement at his unspeakable love. Let me give that to you
one more time. We are never nearer Christ than
when we find ourselves lost in a holy amazement. And beloved,
the people of God are amazed, are we not? The song that Mitch
chose to lead us in first and then the song that that Brother
Glenn called for. These songs and then the song
that Pat sang at last, they certainly set forth our amazement at the
love of God, the love of God. Now we're not here this morning
to talk about our love for Him because that's inadequate and
that's not a subject that we would like to spend the morning
talking about. But we certainly can talk about His love for us.
His love for us. The amazing love of God. So he
says we are never nearer Christ than when we find ourselves lost
in a holy amazement at His unspeakable love. And so we are amazed. I would like this morning just
to call to your attention some scriptures that are common scriptures
that we all may be familiar with but which will excite our hearts
maybe this morning with a degree of amazement for the love which
our God has for His people, for those that He's chosen and called
out of the world unto Himself. I've been thinking a great deal
about this. My heart's been done good by
it. My soul has been blessed by thinking
upon that love which my Heavenly Father had for my poor soul before
the foundation of the world. that love which moved Him to
put me into His Son, Jesus Christ. Now, in Ephesians chapter 1,
first of all, I read verse 3 and verse 4. As I say, these verses
are very common. We read them often, and often
you hear preachers use these verses. But this morning, there's
something about this that really moved my heart, and I want you
to look at this. Blessed be the God and Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ. We ought always to bless God.
He's the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. And without Christ, where
would we be? Where would we be? Blessed be
the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed
us. Now, beloved, every child of
God has been blessed. They've been blessed with a Father's
grace, with a Father's love, with the Son's sacrifice, His
ransomed blood. And so every child of God has
been blessed. And we've been blessed with all
spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ. All blessings
which God was doling out to sinners before the foundation of the
world. was given to every believer in Jesus Christ. According as
He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world,
that we should behold Him without blame before Him in love." Beloved,
as the Father looked upon the Son before the foundation of
the world, He loved His Son. And He chose us in His Son in
reference to His Son. He chose us and accepted us in
the Beloved One, in a person, in Christ. And all of this was
because of His love. The cause of His love. And so
we're holy and without blame. We have that standing before
Him. And this is due to His love.
Due to His love. Now, friend, you may not be thinking
too much about having a standing before God that's a holy standing,
one without blame. You may not be thinking much
about this this morning. You may be younger in life, and
you may feel that, well, there's no need for me to get serious
about having a holy standing, a blameless standing before God. But my friend, those of us who
are nearing eternity We think a great deal about having a holy
and blameless stand before God, and we are grateful for His love.
We are amazed at His love, that His love could have given us
this blameless and holy standing. Now, beloved, it's not because
we never committed a sin. It's not because we haven't broken
God's law. It's not because we haven't in
some way or another been deserving of the wrath and the judgment
of Almighty God. It's due to the love of God that
we have a standing before God just as if we had never committed
one sin in our lives. What a blessed standing that
is. Now, beloved, it takes amazing love. It takes wondrous love
to give that kind of a standing before a thrice holy God. Before
a God who is so holy that He cannot look upon sin without
punishing it. And we know He punished His Son,
the Lord Jesus Christ, in our place. Punished Him out of love
to us and delivered us from our sin, and give us this blameless
and holy standing before Him. Now notice in the second chapter
of Ephesians, these two are very familiar and common verses, but
verses which really excite my heart. In verse 4, But God, who
is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us. God
is rich in mercy. Oh, who could ever calculate
the mercies and the riches of God's mercy? No one can. God is abundant in mercy. If you're here this morning and
you're a sinner, you're a son of Adam, and you're lost, you
need the mercy of God. Well, God is rich in mercy, and
God will abundantly pardon sin. We want you, as a church, we
want you to know that we believe that God abundantly pardons sin
and iniquity, that He will blot out sin, that He will forgive
sin. And so God is rich in mercy,
and this is due to His great love wherewith He loved us. That's
the only reason why that we're saved, is because God has loved
us with a great love. It's His love that saved us,
that brought us out. It was His love that gave the
gift of His Son. It was His love that put our
sins upon Jesus, and He became the satisfaction for our sin. It was the Father's love for
our souls. And so He's rich in mercy, for
His great love wherewith He loved us. Listen to this. Even when
we were dead in sins, even when we had not the life of God in
us, Even when we were without hope and without God, even when
we were cut off and alienated from the blessings of God in
Jesus Christ, even when we were dead in sins, He quickened us
together with Christ. He quickened us together. He
gave us life. Whenever He raised up the Lord
Jesus Christ, we were raised up in Him. By grace, ye are saved. By grace ye are saved. So we
claim full salvation by grace due to the love of God. Not our
love toward Him, no, because we read in our text that hearing
is love, not that we love God. Not that we love God, but that
He loved us. and gave His Son to be a satisfaction
for our sins. And so here we have the people
of God being raised from the death of sin and quickened together
with Christ by the love of God and by the grace of God. By the
grace of God, ye are saved. Now then, John 15 and 9 says,
As the Father hath loved me, These are the words of the Lord
Jesus, the words of the Master. As the Father hath loved me,
so have I loved you. Now this is so very important
that we see this. As the Father hath loved me,
so have I loved you. Continue ye in my love. Now beloved,
the scripture is abundantly clear that the father loved the son. Jesus was the beloved son of
God. Jesus was that one whom the father
spoke from heaven and said, this is my beloved son. in whom I am well pleased. And in John chapter 3 and verse
35, it says that the Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things
into his hands. Now beloved, we cannot talk about
the love of God without talking about the love that the Father
had to the Son. Because it is that love It is
that love, beloved, that we lay claim to in Jesus Christ. We believe that the Father loved
the Son and then He put all His people in His Son from the foundation
of the world and loved them all equally as He loved His Son. Can you fathom that? Can you
lay hold of that? Can you not see by that how wondrous
and amazing the love of God is? God loves you because He loves
Christ and He loves you in Christ just like He loved His Son. And
so Jesus told us that. As the Father hath loved me,
so have I loved you. I love you just like the Father
loved me. And you're loved to the Father
just as I was loved to the Father and as I am loved to the Father.
And so, beloved, don't you see that it's our connection, our
union with Jesus Christ that gives us an end to the love of
God? That's where you find the love
of God is in Christ Jesus. The Father loved the Son and
has given all things into His hands. Are you in Christ? Are
you a believer on the Lord Jesus Christ? Have you trusted Him? Is your soul safe in the arms
of the Lord Jesus Christ? Now then, there's another passage
I want you to look at with me, and that's found in the book
of Romans chapter 8. And this brings this out, I think,
clearer yet. In Romans chapter 8. And I want
us to look here beginning with verse 37. Verse 37, he says,
Paul does, nay in all these things, he's talking about the persecutions,
the famine, and the peril, and the sword, and all of the trials
and tribulations of God's people, and the tests that they have.
And he said earlier in verse 35, who shall separate us from
the love of Christ? Shall any separate us from Christ's
love? And in verse 37, Nay, in all
these things we are more than conquerors. How? Through Him
that loved us. through him that loved us. God's
people are overcomers. They are overcomers, I tell you.
God's people have a victorious captain, and he is the author
and the finisher of our faith. And the Lord Jesus Christ will
give the victory to his people. God's people have the victory,
because they are in Christ who loved them, and they are more
than conquerors. Now he goes on to say, for I
am 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
where? In Christ Jesus our Lord. The
love of God is in Christ Jesus. That's where it is. And we've
said that over and over, but will we ever really understand
it? Do you think this morning that
God loves you because you've been a good girl or a good boy?
Or that God loves you because you're just simply, you know,
above reproach in your Christian life? Is that why God loves you? My friend, God loves you in His
Son. In His Son. Now, beloved, the
reason I harp on this, if someone might say, you harp on that,
preacher, well, okay, so we're guilty of harping on that. that love is in Christ and you
gotta be in Christ to experience it. And when God loves you, He
loves you because of Him, not because of you. He loves you
because of Him. Because of Him. Get that straight.
You say, I want to go to heaven. Well, you will go to heaven because
of Him. Not because of anything that
you do. Not because of anything that you can do. It's because
of Him. And the fact that the Father
loves Him. And when you're in Him, then
you have life. And you have salvation. You have
forgiveness in Him. In Him. And so therefore you
can sing these old hymns. And can it be? Emptied Himself
of all but love. And can it be? And can it be? What an amazing thing. There's
another old song that we didn't sing this morning, but I thought
about it, and that is this, My Savior's Love. I stand amazed
in the presence of Jesus the Nazarene, and wonder, and I wonder,
and I truly do wonder, my friend. God saved me in 1949, and I truly
wondered then, and God knows I wonder now. after all this
time, that God could still love me, a sinner like me. But I stand in the maze of the
presence of Jesus the Nazarene and wonder how He could love
me, a sinner, condemned, unclean. How marvelous, how wonderful
my song shall ever be. How marvelous, how wonderful
is my Savior's love for me. When with the ransomed in glory
His face I at last shall see, to be my joy through the ages,
to sing of His love for me." Beloved, listen. I tell you this
is a tremendous theme and God's people need to be reflecting
upon it, thinking upon it, and understanding it so that it might
thrill their souls and give them some assurance in their life
and some peace My soul, do we ever need peace? We need it now,
if we ever needed it. Some assurance in our hearts.
And beloved, we have no security apart from God in Christ and
being hid by God in Christ. We're hid in Jesus Christ by
God. And this is where we get our
assurance. Now I want you to turn back with
me to the book of 1st John, if you will, the book of 1st John,
and let s look a little bit at this scripture. I hope that I
have the time this morning to get through what I was wanting
to say, but if I don t, well, then I ll be coming back to it
next week, I suppose. But nevertheless, I want to show
you a couple of things. In 1st John chapter 3, 1st John
chapter 3, And verse 16, look at it. Hereby perceive we the
love of God. How do we see the love of God
as believers? As men and women, boys and girls
in this world, how can we see the love of God? And it's because
He laid down His life for us. He laid down His life for us. Beloved, that's love. Now, one
of the old writers said that affection without action is like
Rachel, beautiful but barren. The Lord Jesus Christ loved his
people and he laid down his life for them. He laid down his life. He died for them. Okay, so he
says he laid down his life for us. and we ought to lay down
our lives for the brethren. And then we look over here in
the fourth chapter, these verses that we use for our text this
morning, and let's talk a little bit about that. Might we say,
seeing that the Lord Jesus, and that we perceive His love for
us, God's love for us in giving His Son, we're told here in verse
10, that He loved us and sent His Son to be the satisfaction
for our sins. It means that God exacted from
Christ on the cross full payment, that which was due from us to
Him. He exacted from Christ in His
agony and shed blood and His sufferings. He exacted from Him
all that we owed. All the debt that I owed, He
paid it on Calvary. He suffered our death. He was
God's satisfaction. God took out satisfaction on
Jesus for your sin, my friend. And He paid the price of your
redemption. And so somebody says, actions
speak louder than words. True love must express itself. And the Lord, He asked us to
believe in His love. There are many proofs of God's
love. But hereby we are made to know, and that is that He
laid down His life. In laying down His life, Christ's
love is best seen. I don't know how you could want
any evidence more plain than that He loves you, in that He
laid down His life for you. My friend, this to me is the
proof that God is a God of love and that he loves his people
because he gave his son to die to satisfy the eternal justice
on our behalf. There could be no greater proof
of love than for a person to lay down his life for the object
of that love. Now our Lord Jesus Christ has
proved His love to sinners by dying for them, dying for them. Now beloved, if you ever have
revival, and if you ever have the icicles thawed out of your
heart, it's going to be when you come back to the fact that
God Almighty did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up
for you, that you might be delivered from everlasting condemnation
and judgment and hellfire. that He delivered you, and that
you must love Him in return. Now, Jesus need not have died
at all. Now, let's think about this a
little bit. He laid down His life for us, but He needed not
to have died at all. Let me explain. Let's take a
mother in a burning house and she has two children and she
takes those two children and runs from the house and spares. Well, she takes one of them out
and then she goes back to get the other one and gets to the
door and she falls and she dies. But the children are rescued.
Now, what's the difference between Christ dying and that woman dying
to save her children? And then you take a man who goes
off to war, and he is killed in battle. What is the difference
between this lady that we mentioned, this woman, this mother, and
the soldier on the battlefield, and Jesus Christ? Well, the difference
is this. You see, Christ needed not to
die at all. And when the mother died, She
was just hurrying up, as it were, nature, what was going to happen
anyway in a little while. And the soldier the same way.
He was going to die anyway, sooner or later, according to the nature
of things. But the Lord Jesus Christ, he
had no need to die. He could have lived forever,
but he died because of his love. Over him, death, The scripture
teaches this clearly had no power it had no Power now there was
no claim upon him on the part of those for whom he died No
claim upon him. What claim did we have on him? I mean, what was it that we could
have done? Possibly. I mean, we were worthy
of judgment. We were worthy of condemnation.
We were worthy of hellfire itself. All sinners deserve to go to
hell because they've broken God's law. And we had no claim upon
the Lord Jesus Christ. None whatsoever. But He came
because He loved us. And came down here and paid the
price of our redemption. Now, think about the potter and
the clay. The potter makes the vessel out of the clay. If he's
not satisfied with it, what does he do? He just throws it over
in a pile and gets another lump of clay. But the Lord Jesus Christ,
when we fell in Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ, He came and delivered
us out of our sin. But we had no claim on Him. We
are like the clay that the potter has in his hands and God in abundant
mercy and wondrous grace and mercy sent his son to die in
our place. Then let me say again that there
were no appeal whatever made to him to die by those for whom
he would die. No appeal made to him. Do you
read any place in the Scripture where Adam cried to God to provide
him with a Savior? Do you see that in the Scriptures?
No, you don't. No, you don't. Adam did not cry
to God and say, provide me with a Savior. I'm falling. I'm falling
and I'm going to hell and judgment is upon me. Please send me a
Savior to deliver me, to die for me. No cry like that. No
cry like that. Just like there may not be any
cry coming from your heart this morning, Lord, may you save me
with that Savior which you sent. There may be no cry in your heart,
but the Lord Jesus Christ was unasked for, undesired, and unsought,
but He came anyway. He came anyway because of the
Father's great love. Now, another thing that I think
is very important is that He knew Jesus Christ knew that He
would get no love in return from those for whom He died unless
He created that love in them. We love Him, 1 John 4, 19, we
love Him because why? Because He first loved us. And beloved, He knew that unless
He regenerate our hearts, unless He raise us spiritually from
the dead, unless He create in us, a love for the Lord Jesus
Christ. That love, which most surely,
we're taught of God to love, and that love is surely in our
hearts. Oh, we can't talk about it. John
Boyce said that no man loves less than he that tells you how
much he loves. And we don't tell you how much
we love the Lord Jesus. But we, like Peter of old, have
to cry out sometimes when the Lord says to us, hymns us up. and says, Lovest thou me? Lovest
thou me? Three times he asked Peter, Lovest
thou me? And finally, Peter, you know,
he had denied the Lord. He had denied the Lord three
times, so our Lord asked him three times in the presence of
his friends and the other disciples. He said, Lovest thou me? Lovest thou me? Lovest thou me? Peter was grieved. He wasn't
rebellious. His heart was broken. He was
grieved. And he said, Lord, Thou knowest.
Thou knowest all things. You know that I love Thee. And
beloved, every child of God has to admit the fact that they don't
know how much they love the Lord. They don't know what they do
the days when they feel like they don't. Whether, and the
old songwriter said, do I love the Lord or no? Am I His or am
I not? There are days when you don't
know. How much you know, how much you know about how much
you love. It's just that I know I'd like to love Him more. I
need to love Him more. We must love the Lord Jesus Christ. Because the Scripture says, if
any man love not, hear me, if any man love not, Our Lord Jesus
Christ, let Him be anathema. Let Him go to hell when the Lord
comes, if He doesn't love Christ. Well, praise be unto God. He created that love, didn't
He? Yes, He did. He created that love in us. He
did. He did. What a wonderful thing that is,
that He creates love. in the hearts of those that would
never have loved Him for what He did. He had to create it. Proud this morning. You go out
of here with a broken heart. Had God sent His Son to die and
that you never loved Him for that until He created that love
in your heart. Oh, what an indictment that is
against our lives, against our hearts. Well, it's wonderful to be able
to say this He's done. He has done it. He has done it. And so we sing from our hearts. We open the hymn books and we
sing, can it be? We sing these great hymns of
the faith. And we do it because He's done it. He's created this
love in our hearts. He's done it. Well, there's so much more that I'd
like to be able to say, but I don't even know whether I can say it
now or not. He knew, our Lord did, and I'm
going to close just right away here. He knew that in dying for us,
He was taking upon Himself an awful mass of shame and dishonor,
and also a most intimate connection with sin. He knew that. Do you know that when the Lord
Jesus Christ came into the world, He knew He was going to die?
He came here to die. He came to die. And He knew that
He had to take upon Himself an awful mass of shame and dishonor. Our sins. Our sins. The Scripture says, He was made
to be sin for us. He knew no sin. But that we might be made the
righteousness of God in Him, He was made to be sin. And in
Isaiah 53, it tells us that the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity
of us all. Sin and shame that our Lord Jesus
Christ had to be intimately connected with. And you've heard the cry
from the cross, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? Our
Lord cried out. And you know why it was. It was
because he was the greatest sinner that ever lived. Because he had
all of the sins of his people upon him. He had taken full responsibility
upon himself to get you to heaven. To satisfy the Father on your
behalf. So you could go into the presence
of God without fear. So you could go into the presence
of God and there Rejoice and sing. Open your mouth. Sinners,
we all are. Open our mouths in holy hymns
around the throne of God. The Lord Jesus Christ took upon
Himself our sins, our shame, dishonor. He took it upon Himself. Well, can we sit here and not
be amazed? at the love of God toward our
souls in sending His Son. Well, it is impossible for a
person to know that he's loved without feeling some love in
return, is it not? Is it not? Is not your heart moved to some
degree to a greater appreciation for His love? You know, it says
that 1 John 4, 19 there, we quoted it a time or two, many times
we've quoted it. That we love Him because He first
loved us, like an echo returns. His love, our love, we love because
He loved. So we know something about His
love and we're feeling something of love in return. We're feeling
something in our hearts. My God, I pray that we'll feel
something of love in return for what He's done. For what He's
done. Well, Psalm 31.23 says, and you
listen to this exhortation and we'll close. It says, O love
the Lord, all ye His saints. O love the Lord, all ye His saints. Love the Lord. Love the Lord. Father, in the name of Jesus,
we ask that you'll bless these few remarks to the good of the
souls of these dear ones and to our souls. And Lord, if there
be a lost soul in our midst, then it'd be a miracle if there
wasn't. Father, I pray that they shall
take hope and they shall never forget that our Savior came, and He's
a friend of sinners. And He came and died to provide
everything God demanded of them, and to give them life, everlasting
life. Might they fall in love with
the Lord Jesus. And Father, may that sweetheart
love which we had at different times in our lives,
May it come back upon us, great power and force, revive this
church, I pray in Christ's name, amen.