ITS ALL ABOUT LOVE
Matthew 22:36-40
God morning Greater Macedonia. It is good to be here with You.
You can stay seated for the moment.
Any time you wake up in the morning is a good day. It is a
good day in the Lord, Amen. I want to thank my Pastor, Vincent Lewis,
for allowing me to address you this morning. I want to thank you
for coming out to hear a word from God.
In the late 60’s. one of my favorites artist was Sam Cooke. His
voice and his lyrics, even today captivate me. One of my favorites
was a song called Cupid. Walk with me down memory lane.
Cupid draw back your bow and let your arrow go
Straight through my lovers heart for me
Cupid please hear my cry
And let your arrow fly
Straight through my lovers heart for me.
Our first encounter with love is the warm embrace of a mother.
With a gleam in her eyes, she would always say I love you.
My second encounter was a pat on the back from my father, with some like
I am proud of you son.
As we grew a new kind of love emerged.
You met this girl or boy and there was a special feeling that moved
all over you.
It was some one you couldn’t keep your eyes off.
Finally you get the courage to say hello and a friendship
began to grow.
Then there is that first kiss that sealed the deal and hormones
began to run in places you never paid attention to.
As you continue from you teen age years to adulthood
You meet your life long partner and love took a different turn
You learn that love is about giving and sharing. Some times
more on the giving side.
When kids come into the picture, love takes a different and more
stressful, but joyful turn.
You learn that love is all about sacrifice, baby bottles and
and late night and early morning diaper changes and feedings.
From elementary school to middle school to high school
and college, you find out that love is not about you, but everyone else.
Some where along the line you lose your identity and become just mom
or daddy.
Love become more giving than receiving. Love becomes sacrifice after
sacrifice, working, bills and more bills.
You look up one day and discover that you need help and that help
comes from the Love of Jesus.
In Jesus, love takes another turn and another meaning unlike any
of your previous experiences.
Turn with me to Matthew 22:36-40
36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
38 This is the first and great commandment.
39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.
40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.
A brief prayer
Father, thank you for this opportunity to speak a word from you to
your people. I pray that the Holy Spirit will be our guide and our teacher
this morning. I pray that you will use me to expound upon your word
so that when your people leave this service, they will leave enriched,
empowered and convicted to be the servant you have call them to be.
This is my pray in Jesus name Amen
I want to take a few moments and speak from the subject
“IT IS ALL ABOUT LOVE”
For your information, there are four types of love describes in
the Bible.
Eros sexual or romantic love
Phileo friendship or brotherly love
Storge natural affection for kinfolk
Agage Self sacrificing , what the best for you,
moral good will
We are going to focus on the Godly Agape Love
I have four points, I want expound upon this morning
THE AUTHOR OF LOVE
THE COMMANDMENT TO LOVE
THE RESPOSIBILITY OF LOVE
THE JOY OF LOVE
The Author of Love is the Lord Himself
1 John 4:16-17
And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.
God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him. 17 In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him.
Love is a life long journey with Jesus Christ. Once in Jesus, love
becomes the object of daily living.
God is Love and He imparts His love to us continuously. Believe it or not,
God’s love for us started before the foundation of the world.
Before He made Adam, He loved us.
Ephesians 1:4-7
For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love 5 he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will— 6 to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.
We were chosen to be like Christ. We were chosen to Love. Anything other than Love is outside the will of God. In all our activities, Love is the objective.
The God we know, does not need a world for His existence.
He always was and always will be. He has no ending or beginning
Out of His divine Love, He decided to create a world to worship Him.
It was after the world and all the animals were created that He made
man in His own image. He made a perfect world for a perfect man to reside in.
He turned over the authority, over all the animals on land, in the sea and in the sky to man. Look all around you, this is His love for us.
As far as the eye can see and the mind can conceive is God’s Love
The word love is not a passive word. It is not a warm fuzzy feeling.
The Word love is a verb, an action word.
God describes His love as Agape. It is derived from a word that means agony,
Agape is the nature of God’s Love toward his Son.
Agape is the nature of God’s love for us
Agape Love is known by the actions it prompts.
John 3:16, God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son
that whoever believes in Him shall not parish, but have eternal life.
We sang a song last week with these words
They hung him high, they stretched Him wide
He hung His head and died for you and I.
That’s Love.
But that not how the story end, In three days He rose again
That’s Love.
1 Peter 2:24
24 He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed. That’s Love
Romans 5:7-8
7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.
Every day when you wake up and see the bright sun light and feel the warmth of its heat, That’s Love.
When you walk into your house and see your shelves stocked
with can goods , vegetables and fruit and freezer full of meats.
That’s God’s love
When I was growing up, I spent time on my grandparents farm
The didn’t have no money, but the grew all types of vegetables
and Fruit
They knew God’s love from what He did for them from year to year.
God provided the seed they planted and water them with His rain and cause
things to grow. They always had something to share with anybody
that came by. That’s Love.
God is the author of Love then
WE HAVE A COMMAND TO LOVE
Its in the text
Matthew 22:37
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind.
Love the Lord. This is a command, not an option. Our first objective in life
ought to be to learn how to Love the Lord.
1. Love must be sincere; with all your heart
2. Love is intelligent; with all your mind
You have to make a choice to love the Lord
You have to make choice to put God first
3. Love is emotional; with all your soul
If you love the Lord you are going to make some noise
People will know you love the Lord by what you talk about’
People will know you love the Lord by what you shout about
4. Love is intense and energetic; with all your strength
If you love the Lord you will labor and toil for God’s glory.
Every moment of every day is a time to glorify God.
5. To love God is to delight in Him
The thought of the goodness of the Lord ought to put a
smile on your face.
6. To love God is give praise and honor continuously.
7. To love God is to be obedient to His commands
God would rather obedience than sacrifice.
8. To love God is to want to know more and more about
Him and to know what pleases Him.
If you love God you will come to Bible Study
If you love God you will come to Sunday School
If you love God you will study your Bible on your own
To love God is to stay in communication with Him
We are commanded to pray without ceasing,
The second command is Love you neighbor as yourself.
The Lord says the second command is like the first;
The way you treat yourself is the way you treat your neighbor.
If you love your neighbor, you do him/her no harm
If you love your neighbor, you will not envy what they have
If you love your neighbor you be joyful when they are joyful
If you love your neighbor you will want the best for them
If you love your neighbor, you will help when they need help.
The text says, that if you can Just love God and love you neighbor
you will automatically keep all God’s other commands. These two
are the basis for all the law and the prophets’
Love covers a multitude of sins
THE RESPOSIBILITY OF LOVE
My third point is there is a responsibility to Love.
God is the Author of love, we have the command to love
and we have a responsibility to Love
We are expected to treat everyone the same way
God is no respecter of person.
1 Corinthian 13:4-7 gives us a picture of what love looks like.
4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
There is a lot in these 4 verses. Let me break it down for you
a. Love is patient, not in a haste to judge or criticize one another
b. Love is tolerant Not everyone is on the same page. We all do
things differently. We must make allowances for our differences
It is the differences that make us unique.
c. Love is kind. It never hurts to be kind
Proverbs 12:25
An anxious heart weighs a man down,
but a kind word cheers him up.
God made us dependant on each other. It’s our Job to encourage one
another.
d. Love does not envy. I am glad you got what you got, and hope you get
more
e. Love does not boast, it is not proud.
What do I have to boast about? Everything I have came from God.
What do I have to be proud of? Every energy I exert, every
accomplishment is through the power of God. I am what I am by the
Grace of God. God hates the proud.
f. Love is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no
record of wrongs.
This is an attitude that you and I have to work on. We were born selfish.
We were born to scream to get mom’s attention. From a baby, out of the
womb, we cried when were wet and hungry. We screamed when we wanted
attention. When we got what we wanted we calm down.
If we tell the truth, Some of that is still in us. It is a sign of maturity
when we learn to be considerate of others. It is a sign of Love when
we make a decision to put the needs of others before our own.
g. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth.
There is only one truth, and that is the Word of God.
I cannot tell you how important it is for you to know God’s
word for yourself.
Psalms 119:105-106
Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light for my path.
I have taken an oath and confirmed it, that I will follow your righteous
laws.
Evil brings you down. God’s righteousness lifts you up
If I be lifted up. I will draw all men to myself, Jesus said
There should be joy in doing the right thing.
h. Love always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
You protect those you love. That’s normal instinct.
But you have to trust God for His protection.
No matter what you are going through, your hope has be in the God of
Love. He will not let you down
God will not put more on you than you can endure.
We have the Author Of Love
The Command to Love, The Responsibilities of Love and finally there is;
JOY IN LOVE
I have three grandkids in Houston. One is 2, another is 4 and the oldest is 6.
From time to time, which is often, my wife and I have the Joy of keeping
all three at same time.
We are always amazed at the stages of their growth and development
Every time we see them there is something new the blesses our heart.
We get a chance to spoil them for a while, then send them back home.
Working with all three of them can be very trying. But it keeps us young
at heart. There is always something that they will do to put a smile
on our faces. It not long after they leave our house, that we are
rejoicing that we had them and looking forward to the next time
And all the while, there is something that they did or said that keeps
us smiling.
It is the Love that we show others, that returns to us multifold.
It is the joy we share with others that invigorates our souls.
Every one of us, are brothers and sisters in Christ. We are all family.
We got one Father, God Himself and one big Brother, Jesus, who is our
friend for life. We got the Holy Spirit inside us, that reminds us of
the Love of God that has molded us into one big family.
Each time we get together here at GMBC is a family reunion.
We sang together, pray together and rejoice together.
John 15:10-13
Just as I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete. 12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.
NIV
John 16:24
Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete.
Look at your neighbor on the left and say neighbor it is the love I have for you that give me joy when I see you
Look to your right. Neighbor, it is the love I have for you, that gives me joy
when I see you.
There is Joy in Love, unspeakable Joy in Jesus Christ.
God is the Author of Love
We have a Command To Love
We Have A Responsibility To Love
There is Joy In Love
Remember Life is “All About Love”
Is there anyone here that don’t know the Love of Jesus Christ
Let me get every one to close your eyes
It you are here today and don’t know Jesus as your personal savior
raise your hand.
Eyes close If you are here today and don’t have a Church Home
raise your hand. Don’t be ashamed, we have all been here at the same place
Don’t let this day go by with out Jesus in your life. This moment is not
promised. Tomorrow is not promised.
Amen
Rev. M. Mitchell
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