Identity Series: Called to Love All People - Steve Henry

1 (1s): Good morning Harvest Church. Let's stand and praise and worship the Lord Jesus this morning together. Amen. I have been saved by the grace of God. Amen. I been raised to a loyal sing. 1 (42s): Jesus, Jesus, 0 (52s): Love you. 1 (1m 1s): She's i a in the, you won't. 1 (2m 28s): That's who that is. The 0 (3m 14s): You She. 1 (4m 24s): There's, that's the power name. Just giant strongholds. And there is, that's the, 0 (5m 24s): There's 1 (5m 25s): A hope. There's a hope that courage, the c expectation giants fall. 1 (6m 6s): That's, 0 (6m 10s): It's, 1 (6m 40s): I see you taking ground. I see you press hand. Your power is dangerous. The enemies can. Yeah. You still do miracle. You'll do what you, you've always sing it. Your kingdom, 0 (7m 19s): You still do 1 (7m 21s): Miracles. 0 (7m 22s): You'll do what you, 1 (8m 49s): How could I 2 (8m 57s): Sing this out? Sing. And you never with your hands, don't you get lift soul, You lie inside. 2 (11m 34s): Praise the sing it 0 (11m 41s): On. 2 (11m 43s): Don't you get, 0 (11m 48s): You 2 (11m 48s): Gotta 1 (12m 31s): Raise you again and again. All that I have is and knows I'm set for singing. 2 (15m 30s): You 0 (15m 31s): Are my. 2 (16m 54s): Yeah. Let's declare that together. 0 (18m 50s): I 3 (19m 20s): Amen. Amen. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you that perfect love, cast at all fear, Lord. And because your presence is here this morning, Lord, we pray in the name of Jesus, you'd cast at all fear. Fear does not belong in this place. Lord. Lord, your perfect love would just envelop us, Lord God, 0 (19m 42s): That 3 (19m 42s): We be, we just feel a tangible presence of your love this morning, and that we would then after this service to be able to go out and share your love with the world. Lord, we invite you here. In Jesus name you pray. Amen. You can take a seat. Well, good morning, Church is so good to see you. My name's Jeremy. I'm the youth and family pastor. And on Sundays I also double as a parking lot attendant. So I'm sorry if I'm the first face that you see in the morning, you know, chasing away from parking spots. Be gracious with us and with our neighbors, they've, they've kind of requested a few of their, their spots on a Sunday morning. So if you're looking for different places to park and that parking lot's full, we have a bunch of spots over here, right behind Clawdy Parts Pizza. 3 (20m 30s): And you just get a free voucher that'll let you outta the gate for free. There's some across the street, if you have family, the great spot to park is over by the kids minutes back there. So there's a lot of spots. Park right behind our church on the freshly re paved spot. And then in, in, right in front of Anderson Burs. Those are all available to you, but they get filled up fast, especially if, if you're a little on the later side. So just, just putting that out there. And a few announcements for you this morning is next week is a really exciting week in the life of our church. We're having child dedication. It's, it's a way that our church is growing. And so next week so far, we have five children being dedicated. 3 (21m 10s): And what that is, is it's not, we're not baptizing them. We're not sprinkling them. We don't believe in infant baptism here at Harvest Church, but we do want to dedicate these children. And it's, it's less to do with the child as, as it is with the parents and the, the family and the community. So we pray over these children, over the, over the families that the families will just raise these children up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. So that's gonna be next week. If you haven't yet sent me an email to have your child dedicated that day, then just do that and join the, the, the fun. And then another way that we can love our community is next week for Halloween, we're gonna be opening up. We're gonna take all the cheers out of the sanctuary and we're gonna be opening up and having a number of game booths. 3 (21m 54s): And we're gonna be inviting the community into the, into the sanctuary and have them have some fun at some different booths. Now, some of the children that are gonna come will have never stepped foot in a church. And some of the parents will maybe never have set foot in the church. So it's a way of opening up our sanctuary, letting them see that it's not strange in here. It's a really cool building and inviting them in to to, to have a little love and to be loved on, and maybe hopefully invite them back to church and join our community. So it's gonna be a great, great time to serve. We do need people to help out with volunteers. So it's, it's an afternoon Halloween. It's, it's a Monday, I believe. So sign up back at Info Center. 3 (22m 36s): It's a great place to do that. And then thirdly, I don't know if many of you remember, but Dust and Chelsea, they served here at, at Harvest Church for a long time. And I think I might have a picture there We are, Dustin and Chelsea. And they were just great volunteers around here. They, they, Chelsea helped out with the kids' ministry. They both helped out with the youth. And earlier in this year, back in May and May 1st they felt the calling to move to Florida we're like, Okay, you go. So we prayed them out for our youth group. I know we, we, we, we just prayed for them as they went for our staff team as well. They went out to Florida, they got hooked up with a church there and started volunteering right away. 3 (23m 18s): And they happened to move to Fort Myers, Florida. And so that was May 1st. They, they were there for not very long, got really involved with their church. And then September 1st they felt like, Man, Fort Myers not, may not be our place. They were right on the coast. So September 1st, they got a new place in Naples. And so the end of the month, as many of you remember, and, and some of it's, this is kind kind of in the rear view mirror, but Hurricane Ian came through and, and, and wiped out Fort Myers, Florida where they were living now, Dustin and Chelsea won, say they're doing great. God protect 'em. God put them in this little bubble right there in Naples. 3 (23m 60s): They're a little bit inland. And so they said the only damage they had on their, the house that they're renting is tornado damage. Like who would've thought, you know, a hurricane of flight comes to and they had a little hurricane or a little tornado, They never lost power, They didn't lose water. But they're, they know a lot of friends and a lot of people in their community that are hurting. And so we want to partner with Hope City Church and that's the church that they're volunteering at that they're involved in. Hope City Church has a video about how we can help partner and help love on our brothers sisters in Christ in Florida. So can we roll that video? 3 (26m 15s): So a number of years ago with my old church, we, a year after Hurricane Katrina, we got to go and help out rebuild homes and, and, and get involved in the life of people that had been just demolished by that hurricane back then. So I, speaking with people being in their homes even a year after the fact, the the damage is lasting. So this joining with Hope City Church is just a great way to partner with our brothers and sisters in Christ that are hurting there. You can go back to the info center to find out more about how you can donate or you can give to help that church and their, as they're going out to reach people for the gospel in a tangible way. So just a great way to get involved in that way. So right now we're gonna have a time of meet and greet. 3 (26m 55s): So say hi to someone that's around you and yeah, God bless you guys 5 (27m 5s): Life and in your love and kindness raise me up with Christ and made me righteous. 0 (27m 16s): You have of remain love, 5 (27m 26s): Love 0 (27m 33s): Save, love 5 (27m 37s): You that broke the you soul. When I am ho if ever I forget my true identity, show me who I am in. Help me believe you 0 (28m 6s): Have grand chance of your amazing and love 5 (28m 16s): Made. Love 0 (28m 46s): My 5 (28m 46s): Sadness being 0 (28m 47s): Raised. 5 (28m 51s): I'll never be 0 (28m 52s): The same You 5 (28m 58s): Back. Love made love with love by your Grace House. Save 0 (29m 13s): You have love 5 (29m 23s): Made. Love with. 6 (29m 58s): Morning. Good morning. Good morning. Welcome. I love that video. The opportunity for us to partner with my microphone is on fire. It is. Okay, good. So I wonder, in the spirit of generosity, I wonder if in just a way to love people who've been impacted by Ian, the hurricane there, I wonder if there's a way for us to set a goal. 6 (30m 49s): I wonder if we should set a goal, you guys game for a, like a financial goal that we can bless that part of the world with. I mean I think we need goals, right? I think it's important for us to, to love our community and our world with the life changing message of Jesus Christ. And, and so what do you think? Do you think we could raise $25,000 to send off? Is that possible? Do you think? Okay, if if I just occurred to me, I we didn't have, I haven't had any conversation with anybody about this until now. So is it unrealistic to do $50,000? 6 (31m 31s): No. No. Who said no? Who said 50,000? Everybody 7 (31m 39s): Gave a hundred. 6 (31m 41s): Oh, okay. So if everybody gave hundred bucks. So I think we, we put a ton of money into this building and renovations and we are always putting in money into our facilities and our community and that sort of thing. But how cool would it be to, I mean, can we do, I mean if we all pitched in a hundred bucks, both, you know, all the people in our church, every family. I mean, I think, I think we could do that. How many families do we have at Harvest Church? You think so? Yeah. Per family. 6 (32m 22s): Per family. Okay. So let's try to do that 50 grand, right? I mean it's, I think it's, I think it's doable. I'll pitch in a couple hundred bucks and you'd, so, I mean I'm just, this is just kind of coming right now. Thanks. I'm not gonna put you on the spot cuz I don't want you to feel like you gotta raise your hand. But who's got real faith for this kind of thing? Josh, You got some faith for it? Josh, come on up and pray for us. Can we get a microphone and I think, yeah, come on up. 6 (33m 3s): And this is Josh Erman. He's gonna pray that the Lord would just open up the windows with heaven through us so that we could send them off a blessing. And I don't know what $50,000 will do in the scheme of things, but I think more important than the $50,000 I think is just the, the, the church coming together. Amen. And us you know, us thinking outside of our own 8 (33m 26s): Little, just realizing one, that the fact that we can gather together here free, we can gather together with warm water and, and Lord and sends money through tough times. Their faith is challenged. We at work, Thank you so much. Our church can be there in present giving hugs and encouragement. And may we as a church just brighten their light of faith, funnel money over to that church and seeing your kingdom grow. Lord God, I pray that each person here, their face would be, their faith would be increased with the opportunity to serve. 8 (34m 12s): Maybe not everyone here has the, the ability or time to, to fly over and be there and be directly your hands and feet, but through just modern technology and the, the ability to send our finances over Lord may, may that be multiplied. Yes. May the the the money that we we send have so much more of an impact than it would be with what we were to do in our own neighborhoods. Lord, I pray for encouragement. I pray that there would be excitement and that this would be an opportunity for us as a body here locally to, to grow and to, to get that fellowship where all of us can contribute and serve together in a unique way outside of the, the traditional ways of helping Lord Godda, may you be glorified in our time together in Steve's message. 8 (35m 2s): And I just am encouraged in his spontaneity and challenging us. I mean we all rise to that and make you proud. Your name I pray. Amen. 6 (35m 13s): Amen. Thank you brother. Appreciate it very much. Yeah, the back. So I, I just, I don't know about you guys, but are you about looking at Shelly because we were ask the Lord what would do and then the 9 (35m 54s): Pray 6 (35m 59s): Again. And so then their faith was, I think sometimes we make commitment. We've heard from Lord about this 50,000. But I just think that, that God's honored when we're generous with the resources that he's blessed us with, helping those who will never pay us back, they'll will never even know who they are, this side of heaven. But imagine the other side. When we are in the presence of the saints and the presence of the living God, and we meet people who've we've helped, we didn't even realize we, we, they're gonna come up to us somehow we're gonna know and there's gonna be a connection there. 6 (36m 45s): So think there's something eternally minded, connected to a drive like this. A a desire to help people. So do whatever you feel like you want to do. Just make out your check or do whatever and just put in what, what should we put Ian? Or hurricane or hurricane? Hurricane Relief. How's that sound? Good? Okay. Sounds good. Sounds good. Thanks for that. How many, you're gonna jump in a little bit. I gotta get you a little bit of a commitment, right? I'm not asking you to jump in with how much, but if you've got money or even if you don't have, I think sacrificially giving, I think it's just the way we're talking about love today. So this is a great example. We're really, I mean this is like the rubber meets the road kind of way to love people who will never be able to love us back. 6 (37m 30s): This side effect, we'll never get, like, you know, it's not like you're helping your neighbor across the street who will someday maybe help you back, right? Like, hey, here's, you know, some help. We'll never get it back. Never, ever. I think that's the most beautiful way to give to sacrificially. Give unselfishly. So anyway, we'll be receiving those gifts over these next couple weeks. It'd be great if we could get it done in a week. You think we can get it done in a week? You think we can get it done in a week? It'd be really good. This has nothing to do with church except for we get to help. So I'm not, you know, we're just gonna see what we can do. See what the Lord will do. 6 (38m 12s): Yes. If you need to borrow 200, yes, that's fine. I don't know who's gonna give it to you, but yeah, somebody will loan it to you. Who's got 200 bucks for Keith over there? Hey, thank you so much for honoring us. The pastors last week at Pastor Appreciation week. We, Jeremy and I are the only two pastors right now. Well up to that, up to last week. And now Curtis is on the team. So yeah, we wanna, we're so thankful. Just want to, if you weren't here last week, we, where did he go? He disappeared. He, he went out anyway, so we ordained my son Curtis, who has been serving in the church initially as a volunteer, then slightly paid staff and then just kind of grew in his role and his graduate. 6 (38m 58s): So we've, you know, besides the graduate studies, besides all of the most important stuff is what we've just seen in Curtis's life. The way in which he's grown. His character, his love for people, his love for the ministry. So we're just so grateful. And so, hey, so Jeremy talked about if you get here late park across the street, I got here late this morning, so I was, I parked across the street and so the way you get a free way out of there is you go back to the info center and get a parking pass. What's it called? Validation. There we go. So there's lots of parking around here actually. There's lots and lots of parking around here. So it's just literally like right across the street. 6 (39m 39s): So at the Century 21 parking lot there. All right, so we're, I, I got 17, so how can I be down to 17 minutes? Alright, I gotta be 17 cause I spent a lot of time doing other stuff here, but I'm gonna try to wrap this up here in 17 minutes. Our core values we're committed to the lordship of Jesus Christ. Confident in the word of God. Created. Oh, good, good. And called to love all people. There we go. There we go. We'll be in First John four, seven through 21 today. So these core values that we've been talking about, these are kind of the wheels that we roll forward on. And if one of those wheels is slightly flat, I got a flat tire recently. I don't believe in karma. 6 (40m 19s): You know why? Okay, thanks for asking. Because everywhere I go, like when I'm walking or running, if I see a nail, I will pick it up. In fact, I intentionally look for nails because I, it's a bummer to pick up a nail in your tire. So karma would say that because I pick up nails, I will never get a nail in my tire. I get nails in my tires all the time. Karma doesn't work. But I still, anyway, so I, I'm noticing my tire is, is low. And then the next morning I wake up and my tire is just dead, just dead flat. And so it, like, I aired it up and it, it goes flat within like 30 minutes. 6 (40m 59s): And so, so the idea is that you gotta keep some air on those tires and those are the tires that you roll forward on and you get better traction, you get better, all kind. You just, you're able to do what you're meant to do. So we're gonna be talk, we're, this is the last study this week or the last sermon on the core values called to love all people. And so we're talking about the love of God. I love, I love talking about the love of God because I know, we know, we know if you've been a Christian for any amount of time, you know that it's the love of God that keeps us, that draws us, that calls us in Jesus name. A friend of ours who's passed now, Cheryl Hancock was a missionary in Israel for decade couple, I don't know, 20 years or so. And I would, I, Ron d and I went over there to visit her a couple times and, and just did some ministry with her. 6 (41m 46s): And I asked her, what makes your ministry so effective? I mean, why, why are Muslims and, and Jews, why are they giving their lives to ge? I mean, why, why are they converting to Christianity? Says, she said, it's because of the love of God. It's foreign to them. And when they experience the love of Christ through Christians, they're just, they're excited about that. They, they get excited about that. So I I love talking about the love of God. It's important, it's crucial. It's, it's the identifier for us as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. We are known the world will, will know that we're disciples of God because of our love, one for another. 6 (42m 28s): So I first wrote this, we first as a staff leadership team and elders, we got together, I think back in 2014 and wrote out these core values. And we, we said, Hey, what identifies us? Not what do we hope to be? What do we or what what we're striving to be, but who, what who are we really today, right now? And, and so we identify these core values and we just know that we're, we're called to these things and that God has given us purpose as we live out these core values and we're hopefully gonna be impactful as we live out. These core values we're called, literally called. So it's, it's not just like something we should do, but it's actually a calling upon our lives as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. 6 (43m 12s): If you are in Christ, then you are called to love all people. When Jesus walked the shores of the Sea of Galilee, he called his disciples one by one, just like he called you. When you came into the faith as a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, he called them, He calls us to a new life, a new way of thinking, a new way of living, a new way of being. It's like we're born again. And that's what the Bible says to we're actually like born again. John three, three we're born again. It's your new way of living and thinking and being. We're called. We're called. And the core values don't say we, we should love all people while we, while we should love all people, but we are actually called, It's, it's, it's not just a, a should an assignment, but it's actually part of our DNA as believers. 6 (43m 60s): It's actually part of our spiritual makeup. So it's not something that we do outwardly necessarily. It is outwardly, but it's, it's birthed out of the core of who God has called his people to be. As believers we're called, we are called to love all people. Why? Because we're new believers in Jesus Christ. So, so God has called us to do wonderful and supernatural. He's put it within our DNA to do this. A visitor to one of Henry Ford's auto plants met Ford after a tour of the factory. The visitor was in awe of what he had seen. 6 (44m 42s): And he said, it seems impossible. The visitor told Ford, it seems impossible that a man who started with nothing could accomplish all of this. You say that I started with nothing. Ford replied, But you are wrong. I started with all that I needed. He Ford had an understanding about who he was. He had a God given ability to envision and then accomplish something most don't even consider. So because of our new birth in Christ, we have everything that we need to do what God has called us to do because the spirit of God has filled us, taken up resident in our lives. 6 (45m 27s): We actually have, by the grace of God and the power of God, the spirit of God, we have the ability, the strength, and the grace to do what he's called us to do. And so we have within us, by God's grace, because of his filling, because of our adoption, because of our new life in Jesus, we have the capacity to love all people. Do you? Is that, do you, do you believe that? Yes. Okay, good, good, good. We talked about this first last week in Jesus, two 10. For we are God's handy work created in Christ Jesus to do good works. And so if we're doing all kinds of works, but it's not out of the love of God, we're just a noisy going and a clingy symbol. 6 (46m 14s): But if we're doing all kinds of busy things, but we're not actually loving, we're created to do great works with the heart of love, with the, and part of those great works is obviously love for we are God's handiwork created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. So let's jump into our main sex this morning. First John four, seven versus seven through 21 says to your friends, Let us continue to love one another. So John the apostle is writing to the church, He's writing to believers and he's challenging them. And he is challenging us, challenging us to continue to love because it's hard to love. 6 (46m 56s): And sometimes we don't wanna love and sometimes we give up on people because we just, they're just too hard to love. But John is saying, Hey, brothers, sisters, family of God, dear friends, let us continue to love one another. For love comes from God. And anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God for love comes from God. Anyone who loves God as a child of God. So he's telling us, reminding us of our responsibility and really the privilege, it's a privilege to love people. It's a, it's a privilege because what we get to do in loving the unlovely people in our lives, it's easy to love people who love us back is really hard to love people who don't like us at all. 6 (47m 47s): Right? But the privilege is we get to be the hands and feet of Jesus. We get to be Jesus with skin on. And that we get to love people who don't love us back. And we get to confound them by God's grace and his love and do what the world doesn't do and choose to love in the face of hatred. And when, when somebody hates you and despises you, we, we get a chance to, I say this all the time, everything that God requires of us requires his power, his supernatural grace at work in our lives. And so there's people in your life that you're like, I can't love that person. You don't have to like everybody, right? 6 (48m 28s): You don't have to agree with everybody, but you gotta, you gotta love them. And and that maybe just means that, Hey, I'm not gonna hold a bitterness darkness in my heart toward this person. I don't agree with them, I don't like them, but I'm gonna pray that God, you know, God would bless them and help them and speak to them. Doesn't mean we have to hang out with everybody cuz we're not gonna do that. There's just some people who great on us, right? Anybody else have people and we all do. Right? Okay, good. And so, but the important thing is that we would express the love of God to them and that we're gracious by God's grace. 6 (49m 10s): I, a couple weeks ago I was in the back here and it was Sunday morning and this couple had come through the parking lot. And this person, one person in the in particular was just really harsh a number of years ago. And I was surprised at my reaction to them. I was like, Hey, are you guys coming to church? I was like, where's this coming from? You know, like afterward? And they said, Oh no, we've already been to church. We're just coming for lunch. I said, Hey, I, I love you. And they were like, Oh, thanks. And afterwards I thought, where did that come from? It wasn't like contrived. I, I didn't like think about it. 6 (49m 51s): It just came out. I just decided to love them. It doesn't matter what they've done. And I probably might have to decide that again. If something else happens or if I see them in I'm in a bad mood or something, I might have to decide I gotta love them, right? Right. We got to love. So the John is right. He's telling us, reminding us of our responsibility and privilege to love others. John reminds the church that love actually originates with God and we demonstrate that we belong to God. When we love like God, when we love like God, we actually demonstrate that we belong to him. 6 (50m 32s): So the result or the result of a true confession of faith is the indepth dwelling spirit of God that enables us to love. So this verse is saying that the ability to love the way God calls us to love can only happen when his abi, when his abiding presence is with us. So everything that God asks us to do, that when you serve, give, do whatever. It's all a result of the grace, the abiding presence of the living God within us versus anyone who loves as God calls us to love. Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. So we can't love like the world loves cuz the world's love is very conditional. 6 (51m 14s): Like if you do A, B, and C, I will love you. If you do 1, 2, 3, I will love you. That's not the kind of love that God has called us to love each other with. And it's not the kind of love that God loves us with. He actually loves us with this unconditional love God. I got called Agape. It's this unconditional love and it's a love that we actually can't earn and a love that we can't keep by our own actions. We, we never, we can never earn the kind of love, the unconditional love that God gives to us. And it's interesting that he gives us that love so that we can experience it so that we can choose by God's grace to love others. 6 (51m 57s): Anyone who loves is a child of God and knows God, but anyone who does not love does not know God. For God is love. Wow. Interesting. Anyone who does not love anyone who does not love does not know God for God is love. So maybe your challenge this morning about how to love, who to love, why to love if there's a certain person in your life that you need to forgive, maybe that person is already passed and you're struggling to forgive what happened, You're struggling and it's just wearing you out, right? 6 (52m 38s): I mean, it's just like thrashing you internally because you're going over the pain, you're rehearsing the incident, you're going over in your life, what has happened and it's just wearing you out. Say, you might have to say, God, I, I wanna forgive that person. I want to, Well I can't express love in the, in the sense, but I can, I can release this person and allow the true, We can't have love and unforgiveness and bitterness in our heart. They, they, they cannot share the same space. And so we will not be able to love until we let go of bitterness, unforgiveness, resentment. We will not be able to do that. So maybe you're struggling. How do I love? Begin with just letting go of things that are taking up space in your heart. 6 (53m 22s): Let let that stuff go. Then you'll find that there's of room and plenty of capacity to love the way that God has called you to love. What does love look like? Jesus said in Matthew 5 43 through 48, You have heard the love that says, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But I say love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you. Love your enemies. Love your enemies. Did did Jesus have any experience in this? Maybe, right? I mean of course he did. Right? 6 (54m 3s): So he's not just speak, it's not just hypothetical, right? In Jesus' life. It's not just, oh, this is a good idea. I think I'll share it with my followers. This is who he is. Verse 45. In that way, you will be acting as true children of your father in heaven. For he gives his sunlight to both the evil and the good. And he sends rain on the just and the unjust alike. If you love only those who love you, what reward is there for that? Even corrupts tax collectors do that much. If you are kind only to your friends, how are you different from anyone else? Even pagans do that. But you are to be perfect. 6 (54m 43s): And that word means mature even as your father in heaven is perfect. So we need to allow our lives to mature in this area, to be, to grow in perfection in this area. We're called to love. We're called to love. Number one, as God's people, we cannot get away from this call, this call to love. And there's nobody outside of, outside of that call. We, we, we have to love all people. Again, the the action of love is distinctive to us as believers. 6 (55m 25s): It distinguishes us from all other people in the world. Our ability to love it distinguishes us. And if we don't have that distinguishing characteristic in our lives, it's probably a demonstration that God needs to do some, He needs to do some heart surgery on us. Love is part of the evidence that a person is actually born. Again, the ESV footnote remarks, the person who lacks love shows himself to be unchanged at the core of his being by the gospel message. 6 (56m 10s): John is not saying that God is only love, he has numerous other attributes, nor that love is God a statement for which there is no scriptural support. God is love means that God continually gives of himself to others and seeks their benefit. Whew, that's a strong statement. Let me read it again. God is love. Quotes means that God continually gives of himself to others and seeks their benefit. So this type of agape love that the scriptures are talking about is, is a selfless, supernatural love that can never be generated out of our natural flesh, but can only be generated out of the spirit of God. 6 (56m 57s): I'm gonna just skip down to the last part of my message because we got 40 seconds left here. But I wanna talk about the different types of love because it helps us in contrast to contrast the kind of love that we're talking about compared to worldly love. There are great different types of love in the Greek language. Here are a few. A aeros is one of the words for love. It describes all emotional love, the feeling, the feelings of love. It's where we get our word erotic. So aros love is that insatiable desire to be near the target of this love. 6 (57m 37s): The exciting, passionate, nervous feelings that sweep over people in the appropriate circumstances. This is the love that says, I love how you make me feel. Interesting, huh? I love how you make me feel. Then there's fee loss, fee loss, love or brotherly love. Friendship, love is the next kind. We'll look at fee loss describes the love between two people who have common interests and experiences or fondness. For felo steadily grows like a building, being constructed stoned by stone. For this reason, when close friends are separated for a while and united, they will often say it's like we picked up exactly where we left off. 6 (58m 25s): Felo is half about the circumstances and half about the commitment of two people to one another. It says, I love who we are together. Or in a case of a non-person, I am fond of this food feel loss love generally grows over time, except in the case of some kind of betrayal. And there's storey love. Dogie is the love one house for a dependent. It's an emotionally, it's a commonly called motherly love. So there's different types of love. So we say in our English language, I love hot dogs, I love my wife, I love God, right? 6 (59m 11s): So there's a great hot dog place in the poem. You gotta go. It's like a, I dunno if it's like, anyway, it's, it's on the east side, you get off test street, turn left. It's, it's a Chicago hot dog place. Anybody know what I'm talking about? What's it called? Peppers stuff on. Oh, there it is. Yeah. So it's So you go there, yeah, you go there and you get this hot dog, it's all beef and it's got pickles and onions and peppers and you can build that thing, right? So this is, this is a type of love, right? I love, like I went yesterday cuz I was really wanting a hot dog and they were closed. I didn't love that at all. 6 (59m 52s): Right? We're not talking about hot dog kind of love. We're talking we're, we're not. That's not the kind of love that got, I mean it's like, you know what I'm saying? Let's jump into Agape kinda love. Agape love is entirely about the one who loves and it's nothing whatsoever to do with the one being loved. Wow. So sometimes we're like, Ah, I'm not sure I let my wife today, she didn't make my eggs just right, Right? We're like, Ah, I'm kind of put off right? As got love says, it doesn't matter if she burns my eggs, which she never does. 6 (1h 0m 32s): But if just hypothetically, if she burned every meal that she ever could, I'd still love her, right? Because my love for her has nothing to do with anything. Just a decision. It's a decision on the person who is loving has little to do with the one being loved. It got beloved in its purest form, requires no payment or favor in response. So when we're sending off this money to the Hurricane Ian victims, we're, this isn't agape kind of love. We're expecting. No repayment requires no payment or favor in response. The most common word for God's love for us is a go babe. And it gives lists. 6 (1h 1m 13s): The love we are commanded to have for one another is this type of love. It's the kind of love that First Corinthians 13 talks about. It's kind of love that John's talk first John, for talking about, it's like every time God calls us to love, it's this type of love. It's this type of love. And so when we talk about we are called to love all people, we're, we're called to love people who disagree with us theologically. Yeah. We're called to love people who differ with us politically. You're like, Oh really? Yep. We're called to love people who disagree with us, philosophically, socially, just in every way we're called to love people, right? 6 (1h 1m 56s): We don't have to agree with everybody, but we gotta love. We've actually got to love everybody. It's commanded to us in the scripture that we'd love God and love others. And so with that, I'm gonna invite the worship team up and we're gonna worship some more. And I gotta learn to write shorter sermons. That's I gotta learn to do. Let's go ahead and stand up. Ah, thank you Lord. Thank you Lord. Let's just in the quietness of our own hearts and minds, ask the Lord. 6 (1h 2m 36s): And I'm not gonna call anybody out on anything today. I'm just, let's just ask the Lord. Lord, who do I need to love? And Lord. So that's the first question. Who do I need to love? That's probably someone that we're having a hard time loving. And then Lord, we're asking this next question. Lord, how do I love better? Show me how to love better within a agape kind of unselfish kind of love. Lord, I pray that as a church, that we'd be unselfish in our love. That we would, God, that we would love unconditionally seems really hard, Lord God, that we would love the way that you love us, which is unconditionally, Lord. 6 (1h 3m 30s): So help us to realize that, that we have the power by your grace and strength within us to do these things. And so help us to do it, Lord God. So day to day, throughout the course of this week, we pray that you remind us to love. Remind us to love. We ask in Jesus name. Amen. Let's worship 0 (1h 4m 34s): You. Hi 2 (1h 6m 39s): To to 10 (1h 6m 49s): You. 2 (1h 6m 58s): To 0 (1h 7m 16s): You 2 (1h 7m 16s): Are, 10 (1h 7m 22s): Thank you, Father, that you are our God, Thank you that we can exalt you, Lord, we choose to exalt you even when we don't feel like it. But I pray that you would give us the courage and the strength to love and to love. Well this week, Lord, would we hide scripture in our hearts? Would we call on you in our times of need? Would we exalt you and lift you high? Thank you for being our present help. Thank you for being our comforter and our healer and our provider. We love you and we praise you. It's in your preciously we pray. 10 (1h 8m 3s): Amen.