sermonette: God's Love
Comparing Human Conduct to God's Love
Bill Cherry
Given 23-Apr-03; Sermon #608Bs; 12 minutes
Thank you, Martin, and greetings to you all. Please turn to Matthew 5 and verse 43. One very effective way to identify and purge spiritual level is to compare our righteousness to God's righteousness. And we will read beginning in verse 43. And see what he says in the
sermon on the Mount. You have heard that it has been said, thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you. Do good to them that hate you and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you. That you may be children of your Father which is in heaven. You want to be a children, a child of
God, learn to love your enemies and do all these things with the kind of love that God does. Now God, in the next part of this verse, gives an example. He says, look at my example, or Christ says, look at my, look at my Father's example. He, for he makes the sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends the rain on the just and the unjust. Without partiality, I'm saying this now, without partiality, unconditional love, he gives to all mankind. So the purpose of this sermon is to identify spiritual level in ourselves by comparing it to the righteousness of
God's love. Some people on the face of this earth are evil. They're unjust, they are rebellious, they blaspheme God. They do a lot of wicked things. And some people are good and honest and just, and they love God and fear God and try to obey God the best way they understand. But God shows gives rain and sun and tender mercies and love and
kindness to all mankind. And sometimes when we see people do wickedly and do things that are blasphemed to blaspheme God or directly an affront to our Father, we say, why does he let this go on? Why does he just zap them and The answer is. God's love is different from man's love. Now, I'm going to sing you a song about God's love, and I want you to see if you can recognize the source. Love suffers long and it's kind. Love does not envy. Love does not parade itself, is not puffed up. Love does not behave rudely, seeketh not its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, rejoices not in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Well, maybe you. I, I hope that you recognize that it's a part of I Corinthians chapter 13 called the love chapter, and it was Taken from the New King James Version, but that's the kind of love that God has, and the kind of love that he is putting in us, so we can have his glory shine through us as we heard this morning, and, and we can be called the children of God. But there is going to be a time when God withholds the rain, and maybe when I read this scripture, I, I thought about Zechariah 14, and uh, a time when God will withhold the rain, and we will not turn there, but this will be a time of the millennium. All rebellion has been put down by God's power. The law of God covers the earth like, like the knowledge of God has covered the earth like the waters cover the sea, and there will need no question about who's in control and who's in charge, no doctrinal differences, and what God's laws are and what his commands are. And it will be time to come to the
feast of Tabernacles, and some will say, No, I'm not going. And what, and God is going to punish them, or what is his punishment? Now he could zap them with a with a wall of fire and just burn them up and scorch them or open the earth and let them fall through the earth or plague them with hail and storms and tornadoes or any other kind of natural disaster, or he could send insects and animals and to plague them and torment them or diseases. He could do anything he wanted to. But what he's going to elect to do. is to withhold a blessing that he's been giving man over and over day after day, the sun and the rain. If this happens long enough, they will realize the source of blessings, not that they have a right to it, not that they can shake their fists and say, God, give us rain. But that he is the one that gives, and they will hopefully. Come to the attitude and heart and mind where they can be taught God's way of love and where they can understand that God is the source and he wants them to experience the
joy that he has about from living His way of life. So God is Holding back the rain in love, and he's expressing his love by holding back the rain so he can teach these people his way. Now The nature of man, I think, is epitomized in a story that Richard referred to in a recent sermon in II Samuel 6. Now we will not turn there but for lack of time, but it concerns Michael and David. The ark of the Lord was coming to Israel. There was great excitement, especially in the heart of David, and he was so happy he could not contain himself. He began to leap and dance for joy and praise God. The ark is coming, and he was so happy, but Michael His wife looks out the window and says, It, it says that she despised him in her heart. The level rises. Envy, jealousy, resentment. I do not know what went on in her heart, but she despised him in her heart. David enters the city. He sacrifices to God. He blesses the people, and he goes to bless his house. And instead of the warm welcome, he anticipated, he gets an icy stare, piercing words. How glorious the king of Israel was today who uncovered himself in front of the handmaidens and the servants as one of the base people. Accusation, the Len rises, sarcasm, put down, exaggeration. See, she made it sound like he did a striptease or flashed himself before for the, just to try to impress the girls. And now David's response, and guess what you can find in David's response. Le You can find some love in David's response. You can see a little of pride, anger, put down, justification, self-righteousness, and vengeance. It was before the Lord that I danced. The same Lord that chose me over your Father. And If you think I was dancing before them, you said, I humbled myself but so the servants, and I will humble myself, and they will give me honor. And then As the last part of the last verse in this chapter says, Michael had no children till the day of her death. And so the unspoken vengeance. You can sleep in a cold, lonely bed for the rest of your life, and this is what the king of Israel did, and we can see how Levin, in this case rose and rose between these two in this circumstance and how it led to splitting up and destroying a marriage. That that the union that God intended a man and woman to have from lovers to enemies. Now Let's give this scene a replay. And replay it by taking away the leaven. And let's inject the leaven of God's love and loving kindness, tender mercies, forgivingness. Michael sees David dancing and leaping, and she says, oh, praise God, how wonderful. I'm glad to see David return. He is my son, and he is my husband, and how happy I am to see him. He's just like a little boy, he can't contain himself for joy. And it's David Enters. She says, welcome my husband, the king of Israel. Uh, Israel is fortunate to have a king like you. Welcome back, and we are so happy that the ark is back, and I am very lucky to be your wife. You must be tired. I want you to rest. I want you to eat this good food that I have prepared. And David said, Greetings, you beautiful daughter of Saul, the first king of Israel, the man that was first anointed. I will not rest or eat until I give you an affectionate embrace, and so they live happily ever after, but God's unleve and love. Now, we can learn from this episode, we can see elements of Levin which we may have seen in other people and maybe even in ourselves. But God's love is impartial, it's unconditional, it is without spiritual Len. It goes to the just and the unjust, and we should have this kind of love in us and try to reflect God's glory.