Be Diligent to Supplement Yo..

Welcome to Cornerstone Reformed Baptist Church. Thank you for using and sharing our resources. What you're about to hear is God's Word from one of our teaching elders. We trust that God's Word will inspire, instruct, and bless you. For further teachings or information on our ministry, please visit us on our website at cornerstonerbc.

com. That's cornerstonerbc.com. We are going to be finally addressing the last of the virtues that is found in chapter 1 as part of this study, brothers and sisters, that we have been doing in 2 Peter 3, verses 17 and 18, in which the Spirit of God, through the Apostle Peter, calls us to grow in the grace and in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, to Him be glory both now and to the day of eternity, forever and ever, in other translations, it will say there in verse 18 of chapter 3. And as I have said a couple of times now, many times, perhaps more than a couple, a few months ago, I decided and I wanted and I hoped, that's the desire of the Spirit of God for our congregation and for our church, that we will study together and that we will meditate together upon the spiritual growth of the believer.

The expectation, the divine expectation, that the person who, by grace, through faith, has been inserted into the person of Jesus Christ, that that person will die to self, and that person will be conformed to the image of Jesus Christ, according to the terms, or the words, or the concepts of Paul in Romans, or that we will grow in grace and knowledge, according to Peter, or that we will grow in fellowship with God, or with Jesus, according to John in 1 John. And in doing so, I desired and I wanted us as a congregation to study together those virtues that are found in chapter 1 and 2 Peter. And we have addressed each one of them. And as you know, the one that we're going to be addressing today is love. We're going to be speaking about practical love.

We're going to be speaking about the love that is expected that we as believers will have in our lives. The Apostle is addressing spiritual practical growth for believers. These are virtues, and we are called in verse 10 and 11 of chapter 1 that we are to practice these things. So these are those virtues which are expected to be practiced. Last week, we spoke about a type of love, and that was brotherly affection.

And now we're going to be speaking about love in a more general sense, as it is expected to be practiced and lived out by the Christian. You can see that in verse 7, how we are expected to add to our brotherly affection in chapter 1. We are to add that love, supplement that with love, and that is the final one of those virtues. As I called it in the past, when I did the series through chapter 1, the change of the Christian life, we have faith, and all of these virtues are supposed to be added to our faith. then we arrive to the climax of all of these virtues, which is love, the practical expectation of the life of the Christian in love.

So, as we have done, beloved of Jesus Christ, in these times that we have had the opportunity to share from this version of the Scripture, we are going to be reading the first 12 or 11 verses of chapter 1. We are going to be speaking, by God's grace, about love. May the Lord Jesus Christ bless us as we speak, as we read, and as we hear. So brother, sister, dear soul, let's pay attention to the words that are in front of us in our language, or in your language. English, let's just read them there as the Lord speaks to us.

And let's just read them by faith. Let's just read them in the spirit that he may be among us, guiding us as we think and as our heart is moved to speak of his love. And I hope that as your heart is moved to know more of the love of God. 2 Peter 1. Simeon, or Simon Peter, a servant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have obtained a faith of equal standing with ours by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.

May grace and peace be multiplied to you in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence. by which He has granted to us His precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. For if these qualities are yours and are increasing, they keep you from being ineffective or unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.

For whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind, having forgotten that he was cleansed from his former sins. Therefore, brothers and sisters, Be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election. For if you practice these qualities, you will never fall. For in this way, practicing those qualities, for in this way, there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.

Let's pray. My soul requires the spirit among us. So let's pray. Lord Jesus, we are coming before you and we give you thanks for your word, for your providence, for who you are and the things that you have done. The glorious gift of the revelation of God given to people that in other times you spoke to the fathers through the prophets, but in these last days you have spoken to us through the son.

Lord Jesus, we're coming before you and I ask you, Lord, that your Holy Spirit may indeed move among us mightily. Do not leave us, nor forsake us to the flesh, Lord. Do not leave us, nor forsake us to our pride, to our desire to be observed, to be heard, to be followed, to be accepted. Help us, O Lord, to speak your words and to do it with a heart that is taken captive by the gospel and by your beauty. Help us, Lord, to increase in love, and to increase in our desire to die to self and to be in your presence.

Guide us as we speak and guide our brothers and sisters as they receive the word. Purify our hearts, sanctify our souls, and give us a greater glimpse into who you are, your love, and what you have done so that we will not only be hearers of the word but also doers of the word. We praise You, Lord, with limited words and hearts that are not enlarged enough. Bless us, Lord, with Your Word. In Your name we pray, Amen.

Beloved of Jesus Christ, we are speaking about this topic of love, a very important love. Preventionally, our brother has spoken extensively about that. And what I want to do is to speak primarily about the practical manifestation of love in your life. There's no point in speaking about love and agreeing and noting with your head when a preacher speaks about love and love of God. If your heart is cold, indifferent, and dead.

If those people around you are not the object of your love. If brothers, sisters, the lost is not object of your love. If the government that many times we are very quick to accuse them as unrighteous and wicked is not the object of your prayers and your tears because of that unrighteousness. If there's no love in your heart that moves you to be broken in the secret place, when was the last time that that happened to you? There's no purpose in speaking about love and the great manifestations of the love of God if that is not a reality that is applied to your heart.

And as I speak, your conscience testifies about the reality of that in your life. Each one of you, my heart, as I speak, my heart testifies to me right now. If the things that I'm saying are hypocritical words that are coming from a death preacher that simply wants to come to a spectacle, a show, or if it's a reality, my wife knows. who I am in the secret place when it comes to love. Some of you know who I am at a certain extent.

And you know to a deeper extent. And God knows to the fullness of that extent. There's no point of speaking about love if that love is not manifested in your life. There's no point in proclaiming the love of God when the lost is in front of us. We're not moved to preach the gospel.

and we're slothful and lazy to serve our brothers and sisters and to minister the lost. There is absolutely no point in having church and speaking about all the great virtues of Christianity if they are not a reality in the life of those who preach primarily, hold or hail to a greater judgment, and those who receive the word. Because if the words that are proclaimed from the pulpit correspond to the heart of God, then it's not the words of Amen, but are the words of God. And then the one who hears is to submit, as our brother said, to all the ways of God, all the commandments of the Lord. The Lord Jesus Christ, through his servant John, in the revelation that was given to him, praises the church at Ephesus.

Remember the church at Ephesus? I know your works. I know your toil, and I know your service. I know the many things that you have done. I know your discernment, that you're able to identify those who are evil.

I know that you're able to test those who call themselves to be apostles, and they are not. But I have this against you. that you have left your first love, that you have abandoned your first love. Remember, therefore, from where you have fallen and repent and do the initial works, so that I will not come and remove the lampstand." Repent.

praising a church for the mighty works that had been done. Toil and discernment and truth, able to test those apostles who said they had the truth, but they were not genuine apostles. All external works and manifestations of religion with courage and power. Yet none of those works and toils and discernment and endurance and patience of this church was enough for removing or restraining or taking back the threat and the admonition of the Lord that their lampstand will be taken and removed. Why?

Because all of those things were done, all of these labors, all of these things were accomplished without love. Losing, abandoning, leaving their first love, fearful. Because a person can engage in mighty activities and works and things, yet having a heart that is indifferent and cold to the experience of love. A person can engage him or herself in speaking and proclaiming the mighty things of love, yet having a heart that is foreign to the experience of God's love. and brother and sister, dear soul, love is the substance of our faith.

In Jesus Christ neither circumcision or uncircumcision avails for nothing or anything. It is only a faith that works through love. Love is the substance of your faith and faith is the substance of your obedience. If obedience is not rooted in faith, it's sin. And if faith is not moved by the love of God that has been poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, then all your works and all your faith are just simply taking you in a nice path into hell.

because it is not about knowing, understanding, comprehending, proclaiming. It's not about dissecting the love of God, but it's about having that love of God, as our brother said from Romans chapter 5, poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit. Poured! As when he came in Acts chapter 2, upon a person with might and power, not in an intellectual sense, not in a theological sense, but with might and power, transforming the life and the heart of the person who has been visited by the presence of the Spirit of Jesus Christ and the love that comes in Him, because He is love, as John says in 1 John chapter 4. Brothers and sisters, here we're speaking about a very important matter.

We're speaking about practical love. We're not speaking about intellectual love. He says, if you practice these things, You will never fall. And by practicing these things, there will be richly provided for you an entrance into the eternal kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ. Practical love.

Not only the love that is meant to be manifested to our brothers and sisters, but the love that is meant to be manifested to the lost. Think about the life of Paul, how he gave himself. He renounced everything. He gave up everything for the sake of the lust to go and preach the gospel and bring the good news of salvation in this man who is God, Jesus Christ. Moved by the condition of the soul of those who were lost.

Moved by that, the power of the gospel operating in Paul. Not only is to love our brothers and sisters and the lost, but to love our enemies, as I said. When was the last time that our enemies were the cause and the motive of our tears of their unrighteousness? When was the last time that we were broken in the secret place for the unrighteousness of the government and the unrighteousness of our enemies, rather than filling ourselves with anger against them? There is a place for rightful, or whatever word you have, anger, or right to correct anger.

And there is a place for you to be upset and to be frustrated with the government. But when was that initiated by a God-given love that condescended to save your soul? You who are so righteous, in the same way that Christ did. Brothers and sisters, our hearts are deceitful, very deceitful. and the presence of practical love within you, within your heart, within your soul, is that which testifies of the work of the Spirit in your life.

Because we cannot produce anything that is contrary to our nature. We're very good at hating. We're very good at rebuking unrighteously. We're very good at bitterness. We're very good at envy.

We're very good at all of those things natural to us. Impossible in our hearts to be moved by a love condescended, that saved us, that gave himself of great value for something that is worthless. And that is the type of love that is supposed to be practical in our hearts. I'm not saying that we have to accept the unrighteous things of the government or whatever things are going on. What I'm saying is that our hearts are to be unmoved by love.

Lord, save them. Save them, Lord. like Nebuchadnezzar. Save them in that way that the judges of this world and the kings of this world will be brought to their knees. Save them, Lord.

Bring salvation to them and to their families and their children. Mock this world with the operation of your spirit when they thought that they were going to accomplish something in and of themselves. Bring salvation to the lost. That that would be the heart in our souls. That that would be the desire of the Christian Church.

Practical love. Not only manifested, as I said, to the brethren in brotherly affection, but now the Apostle takes us to the pinnacle, to the climax of these Christian virtues. Love for everyone. Love. So, brothers and sisters, what is love?

Or better, what is the love of God for you? Because here we're speaking about practical love. I want us to know practically what the love of God is. If you were going to put a definition into your mind, as I always have tried to do here, to make it easier for us to comprehend these concepts, I will just simply say this. The love is your personal experience of God's love for you.

That is manifested in your experience of love for others. That is how practical love works. Practical love, the love that we are supposed to do, the love that we are supposed to live in, is a personal experience. It's your personal experience of God's love for you. that is to be manifested in your experience of loving others, the lost brothers, sisters, the unrighteous enemies, loving God ultimately, of course.

I have said it is a personal experience of God's love upon your life that moves you to action. It is not something that initiates in you, but rather, it is your reflection of God's love for your soul. And it's not something that you behold and understand in a communal or community sense, but rather, it's your personal experience of God's love for your soul. for your soul. Brother, sister, just in that pronoun, there's a lot of complications in our lives.

Because it's easier for us to comprehend the love of God for the church, that He gave His Son to die for His people. We easily understand that. But in the secret place, when your soul is in anguish, and when you are confused, and you're in darkness, what you need is the love of God experience for your soul. As your Savior, as your Redeemer, the love of God manifested for who you are, the things that you have done, the secrets that you have in your heart, the things that you don't want anyone to know, the things that He knows, and even the things that you don't know about yourself. Your love, practically and outwardly manifested, is the result of your personal experience of God's love.

Not for the church, but for you. If each individual, in the context of the church, understands and experiences the love of God for their individual soul, then the community of believers, as they individually are and abide in the presence of God, will come to the realization, in a deeper and more profound sense, of the love of God for the church. Because at many times, it's easier for a person to say, God loves him so much. God loves the church so much. Does God love me?

In the secret place. The thing that I have just done, is that enough for God's love to be cut and just to be removed? I know that God will forgive them, forgive him, forgive her. But when it comes to the relationship of God to my soul, then the situation is different. I'm not saying this because I know your secret place.

I'm telling you that because I know my secret place. So, brother and sister, practical love is an experience of God's love, your experience of God's love, that is meant to be manifested and will be manifested. Because if a person truly and genuinely experiences the love of God, that God, of course, has for him or her, that will be manifested externally in love for other people. So we can conclude that when we don't have external manifestation and experiences of love for the enemy, for the lost, for the brethren, and for our families, and for everyone as we ought to have it, then there is a root problem in our hearts. Because Paul says in 2nd Corinthians chapter 5, that it is the love of Christ, or the love of God, that compels us.

It is that which moves us to action. So, it's very important, beloved of Christ, that we understand that. And when I say experience, dear brother and dear sister, I mean experience. I'm not speaking about an intellectual, abstract idea of the love of God. I'm speaking about the experience of God's love in the heart and in the soul of a person.

I'm speaking about life in the person experiencing God's love. Of course, we do not live our lives by emotions and by feelings and by things that we perceive in our flesh, but rather we live them by faith in the words of God, the Beloved of Jesus Christ. We will make lots of violence against the Scriptures if we put love into a category of an abstract concept that is just simply to be defined and just to be accepted with the mind. Love in and of itself is an emotion, an inclination of the heart. That is love.

So, beloved of Jesus Christ, I'm going to invite you to 1 John chapter 4, and I want to show you a couple of things about this love that is meant to be manifested within us. 1 John chapter 4. I have said to you, and I hoped that you do not only understand those words, but that you try to bring them to your heart and not actually apply them to your soul, that you will never be able to love as God has commanded us to love if you have not experienced God's love for your own soul. So what I want to do here is just to do what the scriptures do when it comes to the practical life of the believer. Brother, sister, this is what the Scriptures do when it comes to the practical life of the believer.

The Scriptures cause us to rejoice when we are in various trials. That is something that is against our nature. We cannot rejoice when we are in various trials. But the way that the Spirit of God works in us for us to do something that is contrary to our nature is by telling us the promises of God and what God says about that something so that we will be able to live and experience that which is contrary to our nature. So it is impossible for a person to rejoice when they are in suffering.

Suffering is even contrary to rejoicing. It's impossible for a person to have gladness and joy when we're going in many and various trials. Yet the Scriptures call us to count it all joy when we are in many and different trials. Why do the Scriptures do so? I have just said that many times.

Because the Scripture explains to us, from God's Word, what the purpose of those things are. Therefore, says Apostle Paul in Romans chapter 5, verse 1, Therefore, since ye have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom also we have access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And then he continues. And not only that, but we rejoice in tribulation. How?

Knowing that tribulation produces endurance, and endurance character, and character Now, hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit that was given to us. So, we are to rejoice in tribulations, knowing that the tribulation has a particular purpose. So, if you are going to experience the love of God, and if the love of God is going to be genuinely experienced, just as the Christian is to rejoice in tribulation, then I need to inform your mind about the love of God. I need to inform your heart and your soul about the depths of the love of God. Because if you understand what the love of God is, and then the power of the Spirit is in us, as we understand these things, then we will be able to experience the love of God.

I'm not going to leave you only by pointing you to what the love of God is. But I'm going to call from the Scriptures your soul, how the love of God is to be experienced. I'm going to point to 2 specific emotions of your heart that are to be rooted and connected to your understanding of the love of God. So, if we are going to experience genuinely, in our hearts, the love that God has for me, then I'm to come to the Scriptures and understand what the love of God is, and how that love is connected to my response, or expected response. That we're going to do from 1 John chapter 4, from verse 7 through verse 11.

So we're going to pay attention to that as we are going to read. But before we read, let me just simply put here the two things that I want us to do. In this portion of Scripture, that by God's grace, and if He extends our days, my days, and if He allows us to come together, we're going to be addressing that in the future once we get into 1 John. But there's a couple of things here that I want us to see of the love of God that is supposed to be understood so that we will experience it. Two things.

The first thing that I want you to see here is what is the love, or what the love of God is. What the love of God is. And the second thing is how the love of God is manifested. We have even those words there, just in the text. There are many more things that are given to us there.

But these two things, as we are about to read, as a congregation and as a family, brother, sister, dear soul, I want to speak to your soul about, from this Scripture, what the love of God is, And secondly, what or how the love of God is manifested. By pointing to those two realities, I want to connect them to two experiences that we are to have in our inner being that will move us to external manifestations of love. What the love of God is and how it is manifested. Let's read a portion of scripture from verse 7 to verse 11. And then I hope the Lord guides me with clarity of words to speak to you about these matters.

Verse 7, it says, Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9. In this, the love of God was made manifest among us, that God had sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. 10.

In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. First thing that I want you to notice from this text, and then in verse 11, that the definition that I gave you is exactly contained there. I said to you that practical love for your life is your personal experience of God's love for you that manifests externally in loving others. So, in the words of the apostle, he says, If God so loved us, that is, if God so loved me, then I am to love my brothers and my sisters.

That is that my practice of love is a reflection of my understanding, and as I said before, my experience of God's love. I cannot love my brothers whom I have seen, if I do not love and I do not experience the love of God that I have from God, whom I haven't seen." The apostle would say later on. You can see there in that verse 11. Now, second thing that I want you to see here is that very clearly in this passage, we are told how the love of God was made manifest.

Even we have those words there. It says, In verse 9, "...in this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God hence send His only Son into the world, so that we may live through Him." That is the way that the love of God was manifested, or made manifest. How?

Through the sending of Jesus Christ to be the propitiation for our sins. We're going to speak about that. But the first thing that I wanted to say to you is what the love of God is. That is the first thing that we're going to pay attention to. what the love of God is.

And it says in verse 10, it's going to help us to conclude that. It says, verse 10, "...in this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us." Again, "...in this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us."

Very simple to understand the statement that we have there. Now give me just simply your attention. What is the love of God? The love of God is that He loved us. But now, the fact that He loved us, as our brother spoke about, is a majestic fact.

Love is not that we have loved God, but rather that He loved us. This speaks of the divine preeminence of divine love. It is comprehensible or expected that we, human beings, will love Him who is altogether lovely, who is perfect, who is holy, who has created all things and has blessed us with many things. It is expected that that will be the case. But when it comes to, He loved us, that does not make any sense.

He loved us. There's a pre-eminence, as I said, of the divine love. We cannot understand love if we do not understand that His love is preeminent. Because He is the One that loved us and not us. That is very simple to understand and to see in the text.

You don't need a preacher for that. But brother and sister, I want to point your attention to something that we have there in the text that I think is going to help us to see deeper into that fact and into that divine preeminence of God's love for your soul. Because it's not that you love God when you were saved by grace through faith, but rather that He loved you. And as you pay attention there to the verse that is given to us, it says that God loved us. When did that happen?

When? In the past. It says that God loved us. Right? It says in verse 11, and this is love.

Not that we have loved God, but that He loved us. That is, that the preeminence of God's love for your soul is not only seen in that He is the one that loved you, but that He loved you... And then He says in verse 19, if you go down, He loved you first. Now, the apostle gives us a clue in the timing of God's love for your soul. Once again, if you do not hear the words that I'm preaching as something personal, but rather something collective, then your heart is not going to be moved to where it should be moved.

God's love for your heart, your soul, was not only preeminent above the love that you have for Him, but it happened in timing first. That is, that happened before the love that you had for Him. Now, one is to ask, when did that happen? It happened just a few minutes before I was converted, as the Lord was drawing me for 2 or 3 days, when that night I confessed my sins and I was broken upon that bed and I was saved? Was that when the Lord started to love me 2 or 3 days before, as He was drawing me closer to Him?

When did this Savior or this God love my soul? And then, when we attach that word, first, or time, to God, we understand that God is not subject to time. He created all things. He is the owner of time. So, when the Scripture says that He loved us first, it's not only the divine preeminence that His love is perfect and ours is not.

It's not that His love is greater than ours, but also, it's that the timing of God's love is indeed first. That He loved us first. And that type of love is explained and given to us in Ephesians chapter 1, as we have explained it now many times. Now, if we go to Ephesians chapter 1, then the question that follows is, how did that love of God, eternal love, was manifest or made very happen for us? Then go, please, to Ephesians chapter 1.

What is the love of God for your soul? The love of God for your soul is that he loved you. And when he loved you, he did not only love you with his preeminent divine love, but he also loved you first. And when did he love you? being God and eternal, He loved you in eternity.

It says in Ephesians chapter 1 verse 3, Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him in If you have the ESV, the in love will belong to the next statement. If you have a different translation, the in love will belong to the previous statement. It does not make any difference to the point that I'm making, because that in love is attached either to the eternal choosing of God in Jesus Christ, or is either attached to the predestination for adoption as sons. Eternal love in Him. Brother, sister, how is the love of God given to your soul?

The love of God defined for your soul is a love that happens in eternity. And that happens in union with the person of Jesus Christ. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ, in union with Christ, with every spiritual blessing, even as He chose us in Him, before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him in love. Beloved of Jesus Christ, brother and sister, dear friend. So many complications that are brought to the tables of theology.

So many difficulties that are to be understood when we try to comprehend the revelation of God. Why did God choose some and did not choose others for salvation? Why did God pass over certain peoples for salvation? Why did God choose Israel and did not choose other nations? Why did God use this particular thing and He didn't do that other?

All of those questions and difficulties of theology throughout history have been given answers by men. Many good answers and some of them not very good. But when it comes to the difficulties of what is revealed in Scripture, perhaps the greatest definition of the greatest difficulty is why, before the foundation of the world, we were united to Christ. Because union with Jesus Christ, before the foundation of the world, is the foundation for every single blessing. We have been blessed by Him with every spiritual blessing in Jesus Christ.

Our justification, our choosing, our election, our predestination, our sanctification, our glory, the promise of the gospel, all of them rest upon the glorious doctrine of the union with Christ. Not a union with Christ that happens intellectually, but the union of your soul. The union of your soul, my dear soul, my dear brother or sister. Beyond who you are, beyond your days, beyond your power, beyond your might. When you did not exist, you were united in God, in the person of Jesus Christ.

And by virtue of that union is that He loved you. Because Jesus Christ is the object of God's love. And by virtue of that love that He had for your soul in union with Christ, He gave you all the spiritual blessings, including your salvation. Again, you take this as a big doctrinal doctrine that is just so weak and belongs to just the preacher that speaks difficult words, and that is it. You lose the power of it.

But now think about the love that your sinful husband, or your sinful wife, or your unrighteous children, unrighteous husband, unrighteous... Your fallen people around you have for you. You have experienced the beauty of the love of them, their sacrifice, and their days, and how they give even their lives for yours. And you have experienced the love that people can have for your soul. That is, in a sense, a response of providential circumstances in you coming together, liking one another, having children, being united in the flesh, and that is the result of it.

Yet, God loved your soul, not in the moment when you believed, not in the moment that you became a Christian, not in the moment in which you were united vitally to Jesus Christ by faith, but God loved your soul in eternity past. I don't have any other words just to speak about the majesty of all of those statements. And I hope that the Holy Spirit will speak to your heart and your soul in that particular way. Because if that is a reality in your heart, then that means that the love that God has for you, what is the love of God? That God loved you, that He loved you first, is rooted in something that transcends even time.

So then when you go outside and you see the majesty of creation, and then you see the beauty of the mountains, and then you see the beauty of the sky, and the beauty of the animals, and the beauty of everything that He has created, none of it is compared to the eternal fact that you were united in God, in Jesus Christ, and that you were the object of His love in union with Him. And that is glorious and it's majestic because creation and everything that we see will pass. But there is a reason why nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. Not anything that has been created can separate us. Not even Adam, not even being born in Adam, and not even the sin that we have committed.

Not even the unrighteousness that was imputed to us upon conception when we were born in Adam. And not even the sin that we committed was able, and will be able, to separate us from the love of God that did not start when we were saved, but started in the eternity path. What is that to do to your soul? Come to Romans chapter 8, please. Let's just read it together.

Romans chapter 8. Let's read verse 28 very quickly until verse 39. I want you to see here the eternity of God's disposition towards your soul and how that moves and concludes into the love that He has for your soul. And it says, Verse 28, and we know that for those who love God, all things work together for good. For those who are called according to His purpose, for those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, in order that He may be the firstborn among many brothers.

And those whom He predestined, eternity passed, He also called, and those whom He called, He also justified, and those whom He justified, He also glorified. What then shall we say? What then shall we say to these things, if God is for us? who can be against us. We could just simply stop there.

We could just simply, before we speak about what he's going to say about the love of God, that nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus, as we know the passage, that nothing that has been created, not in heaven or on earth, nothing can separate us from that love. But just that particular simple statement. That because you happen, my dear soul, you see, there's someone outside of this church, or perhaps seated in these chairs, who was not in that choosing, who was not in Christ, who was not in His love, who was not in Him. And you know what the destination of that soul is? Do you know it?

What is the destination of that soul, beloved? You tell me, please. Hell. Apart from that eternal, Union with Christ for your soul? There was absolutely nothing that you could do to escape the eternal decree of God.

Absolutely nothing! That is the eternal choosing of God in the person of Jesus Christ. Hence, the apostles conclude, if God is for us, who can be against us? Are you going to be afraid of what they can do to your soul? Are we going to be afraid of the One who can take our lives temporarily?

We are to be afraid of the One who can send our souls to hell. But the One who can send our souls to hell is on our side, or better, we are on His side. And the way that we are on His side is that in eternal love, in union with the person of Jesus Christ. So, the apostle concludes in verse 37, In verse 36, as it is written, For your sake we are being killed all the day long. We are regarded as sheep being slaughtered.

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Absolutely nothing. Now, brothers and sisters, you know the power of certainty, and you know the power of faith. When a person has certainty and faith, that person is bold, because they know the truth.

When a person has doubts, that person is fearful and that person is doubting. But the power of certainty is established in the fact that certainty will move a person to act and to move because they are fully assured of whatever thing. In this case, the scriptures, not the preacher, but the scriptures clearly testify to the Christian that nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus. Should that give us certainty and confidence and power? I think that it should.

But there is a disconnect many times in the things that we read and the things that we experience. Second thing that I wanted to show you, come please back to 1 John chapter 4, and I will try to be brief on this. I'm supposed to finish the book today. 1 John chapter 4, return to that. I said to you, What is the love of God, or what the love of God is?

What is that love of God for your soul? That He loved you, and that He loved you first. And in loving you first, He loved you in eternity past, eternal love. And that eternal love is in union with Jesus Christ. Now, how did that love manifest?

Because you can see it very clearly there, that the apostle connects the 2 statements. He loved us and sent His Son, right? So that is that the love of God that happened in eternity past was manifested upon the cross, Jesus Christ, in the propitiation of our sins. That is what the apostle says here in verse 8 or 9. In this, the love of God was made to manifest among us, that God sent His only Son into the world so that we might live through Him."

Then he's going to qualify that in the next verse when he says, "...and this is love, not that we love God, but that He loved us." What I have said first. "...and because He loved us with preeminent love, the result of it, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins."

Now, have you noticed something very interesting in the writings of the Apostle Paul, at least in the verses that we read in Ephesians chapter 1 and in Romans chapter 8? It says, nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in... Christ Jesus. And then in Ephesians chapter 1, he says, Blessed is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as He chose us in Christ. Even as He chose us in Him, Jesus Christ.

Now, preachers these days are not as careful as the Puritans used to be. But the Puritans used to pay attention very carefully to the way that the Scriptures were referred to the Son. Because Jesus Christ is the Son of the Father. Yet, when we speak about our eternal union with Christ, we don't speak of our eternal union with the Son, who is the eternal begotten of the Father, who was the Son of God in eternity past. But rather, the Scripture says that our eternal union in the past happened in Christ, Jesus, A name that was given to the Incarnate Son of God.

An office, an appointment that was given to the Incarnate Son of God. A characteristic name that spoke of the role of the Son of the Father in eternity past, dying and being the Messiah. I don't know if I can explain this with words, but I hope that I can, beloved of Jesus Christ. Because our eternal union with Jesus Christ, is indeed union with the eternal begotten Son of the Father, as the One who was supposed to come to the earth, incarnate, become like one of us, taking our flesh like a servant, live a perfect life and die upon the cross. That is that the eternity of God's love for your soul is contingent upon the fulfillment of the role of Jesus Christ upon the cross for your soul.

And because God who decrees and knows all things knew that the work that was given to Jesus Christ before the foundation of the world would be fully accomplished, then He could He could choose you in Jesus Christ before the foundation of the world, so that in time, the manifestation of God's love that is rooted in eternity will be that. For when we were still without strength in due time, Christ died for the ungodly, for scarcely for a righteous person one would ever dare to die, yet perhaps for a good person one would die. But God demonstrates, He shows, He reveals His love in time, in that while we were still sinners, Christ Jesus died for the ungodly. Now, having been justified by His blood, how much more we will be saved from wrath, the wrath that is to come through Him. Why?

Because the fulfillment upon the cross of what Christ was supposed to do is the greatest of the manifestations of the love of God for your soul. Now, I'm not going to speak much about that because our brother spoke to it extensively. How is that supposed to be manifested in your soul? You heard our brother preaching about the propitiation of sins. And I could speak about the wrath of God being poured upon the cross and all of your sins taken and all of the eternity given to you.

How is that supposed to be manifested in your soul? Was that manifested in your soul when we were hearing those words? How is that meant to be experienced? Because propitiation, the cross, is the manifestation of God's love for your soul. I said to you that practical love, real practical love, will be your experience of God's love for your soul.

And that will move you to love externally. How is the propitiation of our sins? How is that Jesus Christ, dying upon the cross, is meant to be experienced by those who, by grace through faith, have been saved? Come with me to Luke chapter 7 and I will just elaborate on there. Luke chapter 7.

Luke chapter 7, verse 36, and let's just read until the end of the chapter, and let's just pay attention to that, brothers and sisters. Let's just read carefully that. Luke chapter 7. You may remember this when the Lord was invited into the house of the Pharisee. He says, one of the Pharisees asked him to eat with him, and he went into the Pharisee's house and reclined at the table.

And behold, a woman of the city, who was a sinner, when she learned that he was reclining at the table in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster flask of ointment, and standing behind him at his feet, weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head, and kissed his feet, and anointed them with the ointment. Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, if this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner. And Jesus, answering, said to him, Simon, I have something to say to you. And he answered, Say it, teacher. A certain moneylender who had two debtors, one owed 500 denarii and the other 50.

When they could not pay, he canceled the debt of both. Now, which of them will love him more? Simon answered, The one, I suppose, for whom he canceled the larger debt. And he said to him, You have judged rightly. Then turning toward the woman, he said to Simon, Do you see this woman?

I enter your house. You gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in, she has not ceased to kiss my feet. You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment. Therefore I tell you, her sins, which are many, are forgiven, for she loved much.

But he who is forgiven little loves little. And he said to her, your sins are forgiven. Then those who were at the table with him began to say among themselves, who is this who even forgives sins? And he said to the woman, your faith has saved you. Go in peace.

Propitiation, dying upon the cross. How is that to affect your heart, your experience, your emotion? Forgiveness. Have you been forgiven? Have you experienced forgiveness?

Have you seen your unrighteousness, your sin, in such a way that when someone preaches, or when you hear the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, and when these terms, propitiation, and the cross, and the wrath of God upon the cross, and when you hear all of those things, they are so clearly applied to your heart, that your response is that you are forgiven by faith, because that is the only answer? And is that forgiveness and intellectual assessment a religious agreement with the preacher? Or is that an experience? And I don't want to offend your Reformed traits, but that is an experience. Because forgiveness is meant to be experienced in the heart.

If someone does something against to us and then we ask forgiveness and peace arrives. When genuine forgiveness has taken place. How are we going to experience the love of God? He loved us first in Christ Jesus, before the foundation of the world. Nothing can separate us from the love of God that is in Christ for our souls.

Certainty and assurance by faith. And not only that, but the manifestation of that eternal love that He had for me, in eternity past, that I don't know, because I was not there. That was made manifest 2,000 years ago upon the cross, where my Lord, my Savior, Jesus Christ, went upon that cross and died for my soul, so that the wrath that I deserve would be received by Him in fullness. And the application of that is that now I'm saved and I'm forgiven. That I have the certainty that when He said, debt canceled, that it was canceled.

that I'm not walking with a burden of uncertainty upon my shoulders that perhaps it was not canceled. How can a person experience forgiveness when there's doubt? How can I experience forgiveness when I'm not sure that what he says is true and that is right and correct? How am I going to be able to love others, basically what I'm trying to do in my sermon, if I'm not loved by God according to my experience? I will be able to love others only when I have genuinely experienced the love of God for my wicked and righteous and deserving soul.

And the more that I see my unrighteousness in it of myself, the greater that His righteousness is. But not for me just to only depart. It will make you depart. But also, Christ Jesus brings me into fellowship with this God of whom I am not worthy. and the love of God now is being made manifest in the heart.

How are you going to do so? Allow me please to speak to your soul for ten more minutes, or five minutes, I will try to be short. I don't want to give you just simply with doctrines and concepts thrown at you in the air. I want you and my soul to experience the power of the Holy Spirit. And again, I don't want to offend your Reformer Calvinistic traits, but this life is meant to be lived, and that is lived out by the power of the Holy Spirit, day by day, second by second, with the power of this Spirit coming upon us, and being made manifest in our lives.

How are we going to do that? Last week I told you something about how to love brothers and sisters. Remember? What did I say that we should do practically to grow and to keep ourselves in the love of God? I say that we are to pray in the Holy Spirit.

By praying in the Holy Spirit for our brothers and sisters, and praying, and praying, and praying, and praying, then we grow in love. We build ourselves in a most holy faith, and we keep ourselves in the love of God. Jude chapter 20, verse 20. Come with me to 1 John. Then, just simply keep these in your heads, if you want.

if you desire and you're moved, of course, on your hearts, more importantly. 1 John chapter 2. First thing that a soul needs to practically do to keep themselves in the love of God and in the power, in the outpouring of the love of God into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, is by praying, Jude. Then, verse 4 of chapter 2, 1 John. Whoever says, I know Him, but that does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him."

The truth is not in him. Now, pay attention to verse 5. "...but whoever keeps his word, In Him, truly, the love of God is perfected. We're not going to speak about the rest.

We're going to preach about that, Lord willing. But it says, in Him, but whoever keeps His Word, in Him, truly, the love of God is perfected. As simple as praying in the Holy Spirit. Keep the Word of God in your heart. Keep the Word of God in you.

You will never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever, and as many evers as can be pronounced, one after the other, be able to love as the Scripture calls you to love. I will never be able to love your soul, to love my wife, to love my family, to love the lost, if I do not give myself to pray in the Holy Spirit and to keep the Word of God. I can come here and preach with much boldness and sweating. I can move here the chairs. I can do everything that you want.

I can move you and I will be the highest of the hypocrites. And I can speak truths from the Scripture. And I can be like the Ephesus, right? Like the Ephesians, the church at Ephesus. Toiling and doing and this.

Yet, my heart will be empty of love. Now, have you abandoned your first love? Have you left your first love? Remember when the Lord first saved you? 1 year ago, 2 years ago, 5 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago, 40 years ago.

Have you abandoned? Do you see that word? It's not that you don't know the love of God anymore. Have you departed from the love of God? Have you left that place?

There was a point in your life in which you did not keep yourself in the love of God, and then you were taken so easily by religion and by Christianity and by the things of this world, and not so much sinful and external things that we, wow, they are so unrighteous, but just have you been taken by these, by these, by Cornerstone? Have you been taken by preaching a sermon? Have you been taken by moving chairs? Have you been taken by just sitting there? Have you been taken by just doing these things?

that now your heart is indifferent? You see, brother and sister, my goal is not to bring any guilt upon your soul. I'm saying those things to my heart also. I'm in exactly the same position. Like a thunder should come upon me, you know, lightning should come upon me now and destroy me because the things that I'm saying is not a full reality in my life.

I just want this to be real. I just want us to speak real things upon what is written in the Scriptures, and move us towards that in the power of the Holy Spirit. Pray, and then keep the Word of God in our hearts, that the love of God will be perfected. And then when you go to John chapter 4, and you continue reading in your own time, because now the time is just very short, then you will see that when the love of God is perfected in your heart, there is something that is removed, and that is fear. Fear.

fear is removed, because love covers a multitude of sins. Sin brings guilt, and guilt brings fear of punishment. Then, when you're walking in the Holy Spirit, by praying in the Spirit and keeping His Word, the love of God is so clear that, He loved me first, eternity passed. He gave His Son for my soul. How am I not going to love the other people, practically and genuinely?

That is the power of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Amen? Let's pray.