John: Hey, friends, and welcome back to the podcast of the Eagle Community Church of Christ. My name is John Gunter. This week, we are finishing up our series of Advent. This is the last one is love. Sorry it's a little bit late.
I went on vacation right after I preached this. But this is a a sermon where we focus on what love really means We just don't say and we do say, we love all kinds of things right? But what does the word love in the Bible actually mean? So we explore that and we explore what it means to live in this way. So hope it's helpful for you.
Have a great week and come see us sometime. The hope that God brings through the fulfilled promises that you have seen, the peace, the wholeness, the completeness in your life, that that God again can provide. And also as we talked last week, the joy that doesn't depend on our circumstances here, but depends on who he is and what he can do for us despite our circumstances. And so this week, we talk about again the subject of love. What is love?
One last video from the Bible project to talk about what biblical love is all about. So
John: so if you've heard of Jesus, you probably know about one of his famous teachings called the golden rule. Do to others what you would want them to do to you. And this actually is a restatement of something else that Jesus said that the meaning of life is to love God and love your neighbor as yourself. Now that's really beautiful, but what does he mean exactly by the word love? It's an unclear word in English because you can love your mom and you can love pizza.
And if the word love means the same thing in both of those cases, your mom's gonna feel real bad. So what did Jesus mean in his language? Well, first of all, this love your neighbor phrase is a quotation from the Hebrew scriptures where the word for love is nahavah. However, the language Jesus spoke and taught in from day to day, it was a cousin language of Hebrew that is Aramaic in which the word for love is rachma. But then as Jesus followers spread his teachings around the world, they translated them into Greek using the word agape.
But here's what's fascinating. The earliest followers of Jesus who wrote the books of the New Testament in Greek, they didn't learn the meaning of agape by looking it up in ancient dictionaries. Rather, they look to the teachings of Jesus and the story of his life to redefine their very concept of love. So, one time, Jesus was asked about the most important command in the Jewish scriptures and he first quoted from the ancient prayer in the Torah called the Shema. Love the lord your god with all of your heart.
So, love for god is the most important thing But then, Jesus quickly followed up by saying another command from the Torah was also the most important, to love your neighbor as yourself. So, which is the most important, loving god or loving your neighbor? Jesus' answer is yes. To ask the question means you don't get his point. For Jesus, they are 2 sides of the same coin.
Your love for God will be expressed by your love for people and vice versa, they're inseparable. And so this makes it clear that for Jesus, agape love is not primarily a feeling for someone else that happens to you, like our phrase, I fell in love. For Jesus, love is action. It's a choice that you make to seek the well-being of people other than yourself. Jesus also went on to teach that genuine love for God and others means seeking people's well-being without expecting anything in return, especially from people who are in difficult situations, who can't repay you even if they wanted to.
According to Jesus, this kind of generous love reflects the very heartbeat of God. And he took this even further. Jesus said that the ultimate standard of authentic love is how well you treat the person that you can't stand.
John: Or in
John: his words, you shall love your enemy and do good to them expecting nothing in return. For Jesus, this kind of enemy embracing love imitates the very character of god himself. Now we wouldn't be talking about Jesus still today if he had only said things like love your enemy. This is how he actually lived. Jesus was constantly helping and serving the people around him in very practical and tangible ways.
And he consistently moved towards poor and hurting people who couldn't benefit him in return. He showed love for the forgotten ones, the people who usually fall through the cracks. And when Jesus eventually marched into Jerusalem, he made himself an enemy of the leaders of his people by accusing them of hypocrisy and corruption. Them. After Easter morning, Jesus and then his followers claimed that it was the power of god's love for the world that was revealed in Jesus' life, death, and resurrection.
As the apostle Paul put it, god demonstrated his own agape for us in this. While we were still sinners, the Messiah died for us. Or in the words of the apostle John, god's own agape was revealed when he sent his one and only son into the world so that through him, we could have life. And for John then, this leads naturally to the conclusion, beloved ones, if that's how God has loved us, then we ought to show love for one another. So Christian faith involves trusting that at the center of the universe is a being overflowing with love for his world, which means that the purpose of human existence is to receive this love that has come to us in Jesus and then to give it back out to others, creating an ecosystem of others focused self giving love.
And that's the New Testament meaning of agape love.
John: Well, what do you think? I appreciate that. I appreciate, how they dive into it. We're used to, talking about faith, and when we talk about faith, talk about the action that it brings. Right?
That we've, we know that faith isn't just saying I have faith. Faith is expressed through action. James will tell us, unless faith does something, it's dead. Right? And it's the same concept as love.
It's worthless almost to say, I love you if I don't act like I love you, if I don't show that in some way, if I don't actually care for you. Right? You may have been in a relationship with someone who said they loved you, but their actions showed something much, much different. Anybody been there? If you are there right now, let's not make it awkward.
Okay? But but love is about, again, expressing that. I think it's much easier for us to think about love and think about God as love and think only about our relationship with God, this one to one God loves me and and so I love him and and that's it. But again, as we saw there, when Jesus was asked about the greatest command, he said, love God, but also love your neighbor. And scripture expanded, it says, even love your enemy.
Love the people around you. Receive that love, that gift, that grace from God, but your role is also to give it away. Give it to others. Show others that you love them. Just like when we talked about peace, that not only do we not have an absence of conflict to have peace, actual Biblical peace is to care enough about someone else that I want to help you be fulfilled, to have that peace or that wholeness in your life.
And love is the same way. Those of you who have felt genuine love for someone, you know how that feels. Right? They express it in different ways, which is interesting. I think even generationally, we express love in different ways.
My dad's not here so I can talk about him, and I don't think he watches online. But my dad is from a generation that that didn't give out like a whole lot of love. Not a big hugger, doesn't tell you, he loves you. He will work his tail off for you. Anybody know somebody like that?
Like, I I will make sure you have enough, I will give you enough and weirdly enough he tells my kids he loves them. But that's just who he was, how he was formed as a kid and you probably know a lot a lot of people like that. But we express love in different ways but we still express it. Right? We had Jerry and Lynn Jones, come in and do a marriage seminar for us and they do a great job.
But Lynn has a saying, Not right, not wrong, just different. You ought to use that in your in your life. When you're looking at someone else, especially not right, not wrong, just different. You may express love different than someone else. Anybody ever done the 5 love languages?
Yeah. Yeah, one of the first things you do is take an assessment to see how you, like, want love. Like, some of it is like receiving gifts, basically providing, working for someone, you know, all these physical touch, all these different things. But to, a lot to fix a lot of the problems that we have is to understand how the other person receives love. Because you may be working your tail off and all they want is a hug.
Right? But in scripture, love means something happens, that I care enough about you to do something to love you. And just like we have each week, this week we're going to read several passages. Again, not only about love, but also about the coming of Jesus, the coming of the Messiah and God's fulfilled promises. We start this morning in 2nd Samuel 7 and we'll read several different passages in here.
After the king was settled in his palace and the Lord had given him rest from all his enemies around him, he said to Nathan the prophet, 'Here I am living in a house of cedar, while the ark of God remains in a tent. Nathan replied to the king who's the king he's talking to? David. Yes. Whatever you have in mind, go ahead and do it for the Lord is with you.
But that night the word of the Lord came to Nathan saying, Go and tell my servant David, this is what the Lord says, Are you the one to build me a house to dwell in? Skipping down to verse 8, I took you from the pasture, from tending the flock, and appointed you ruler over my people Israel. I have been with you wherever you have gone, and I have cut off all your enemies from before you. Now I will make your name great like the names of the greatest men on earth. And I will provide a place for my people Israel and will plant them so that they can have a home of their own and no longer be disturbed.
Wicked people will not oppress them anymore as they did at the beginning, and have done ever since the time I appointed leaders over my people Israel. I will also give you rest from all your enemies. The Lord declares to you that the Lord himself will establish a house for you. When your days are over and you rest with your ancestors, I will raise up your offspring to succeed you, your own flesh and blood, and I will establish his kingdom. Do you see the forward looking to the reason for the season?
Now, David didn't know in his time when this would happen. He just knew that God had promised that he would take care of it. That sometime in the future, there would be a descendant of his that God would make him his own kingdom. Verse 14, I will be his father, and he will be my son. Your house and your kingdom will endure forever before me.
Your throne will be established forever. And so, as we anticipate, again, God's coming back Jesus coming back, we look at the fulfilled promises. We know what David didn't know, that the son God was talking about was named Jesus. And he came not in any grand fashion, not with wealth and money and fame, but in poverty, living a life that a lot of us wouldn't sign up for. But he came again in a way that we wouldn't normally expect, which seems to be the way God wants to work most of the time.
That you want something, but I'll give it to you, but it's not gonna be what you expect. And Jesus, again, begins his kingdom, not on the throne, not with a military campaign, but showing love, even to those who would betray Him. Now, that's tough for me. Is it difficult for you? Now, it is easy for the person who expresses their love and you know where you stand with them and, man, we just get along.
We we're on the same wavelength. Maybe we're from the same you know, we're raising kids together or something. That's easy to express love to those people. What's hard is expressing love to the people who seem to not want it at all and certainly do not give it. Right?
So how do you act around those people? How do you show love to people who maybe are your enemies? Did you notice the guy was sitting there, he was smoking, and he had his loud music? Well, that's a get off my lawn type of moment, wasn't it? And the lady slides some food over.
Right? That maybe we shouldn't meet those who maybe we deem annoying in our lives or even our enemies. Maybe we shouldn't meet them with the same anger and and things like that, but meet them with love and kindness, Being reminded that that's exactly how god treated us, with love and kindness despite the way we've treated him and turned away from him. Amen? Yeah.
From Romans 16, now to him who is able to establish you in accordance with my gospel, the message I proclaim about Jesus Christ in keeping with the revelation of the mystery hidden for long ages past, but now revealed and made known through the prophetic writings by the command of the eternal God, so that all the Gentiles might come to the obedience that comes from faith. It's talking about who? Us. People that they didn't see as part of the plan for a long time. But God said, yeah.
They're a part of all of this, and that's what Paul is saying here. Gentiles might come to the obedient obedience that comes from faith. To the only wise God be glory forever through Jesus Christ. Amen. And all we have to do this morning is to look around the room.
And to see that Paul's conviction to take the word, take the gospel to the Gentiles of the world has led to this. We think those little things don't matter. We're scared to talk to anyone about our faith. And look what Paul did without the use of a vehicle, might I add. I don't know.
Some of you grew up without having air conditioning in the vehicle, and I don't understand that, how you're still alive. But can you imagine the way that Paul traveled, the amount of travel he had with a zeal that I can't understand? I am going. I mean, we look out this morning. It's kinda rainy, but we think, no, I don't think so.
And Paul either saddled up or walked because the message of God, the gospel of Christ was that important to him. He had seen God's faithfulness throughout scripture. He had Jesus show up and say, you need to fix this, and he did exactly that, seeing the love of God and understanding it for his life. In Luke 1 verses 26 through 38, in the 6th month of Elizabeth's pregnancy, God sent an angel Gabriel to Nazareth, a town in Galilee, to a virgin pledged to be married to a man named Joseph, a descendant of David. The virgin's name was Mary.
The angel went to her and said, 'Greetings, you who are highly favored, the Lord is with you.' Mary was greatly troubled at his words and wondered what kind of greeting this might be. But the angel said to her, Do not be afraid, Mary. You have found favor with God. You will conceive and give birth to a son, and you are to call him Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High.
The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over Jacob's descendants forever. His kingdom will never end. How will this be? Mary asked the angel. Since I am a virgin.
The angel answered, the Holy Spirit will come on you and the power of the most high will overshadow you, so the holy one to be born will be called the son of God. Even Elizabeth now your relative is going to have a child in her old age, and she who was said to be unable to conceive in her 6 months is in her 6 months. For no word from God will ever fail. Do you hear the faithfulness there in that verse? No word from God will ever fail.
I am the Lord's servant, Mary answered. May your word to me be fulfilled. Then the angel left her. I love the faith there that Mary shows as a teenager. This young girl probably scared out of her mind.
What am I gonna do? How in the world is Joseph gonna believe this one? Right? I said in class this morning, you kind of have to put yourself in this, scenario, right? 1, when Mary tells you this story, what are you thinking, guys?
Okay. A, she's either cheated on me, or, b, she's crazy. Right? But the angel also shows up to Joseph, and I've gotta imagine even then he's a little, I don't know about this. But what you see is all of a sudden she starts showing signs of being pregnant.
Right? Well, something's happened. And the story goes on and the story goes on. Well, it was promised a son, call him Jesus, and I can imagine that she thought and she got more and more pregnant. Well, okay.
What if I have a daughter? Does that throw everything out? But then no word from god will not be fulfilled. Right? That God is faithful and as she has a son, she names him Jesus in an act of showing her faith.
That I will do don't you love her reply, I am the Lord's servant. Man, if we had that reply to the Word of God, God, I am your servant. Use me in whatever way. The Mickeys of the world will stand up and lead singing. Use me in whatever way, and I'll tell you, that's a beautiful thing.
That we give of our life and the way that we show our love, the way we reciprocate our in the way that I act, the way that I care, the way that I love you. And that's what we're called to do. Can you imagine a world that looks like this? I can't I can't even imagine it. Can you?
Just pure love for one another. I wanna go and live with God and experience that. How about you? To experience that love firsthand from everyone, experience a peace, a perfectness of being complete in God and expressing joy in a way that maybe we haven't ever felt like we've expressed it. What a day that will be.
From Psalm 4, Answer me when I call to you, my righteous God. Give me relief from my distress. Have mercy on me, and hear my prayer. How long will you people turn my glory into shame? How long will you love delusions and seek false gods?
Know that the Lord has set apart his faithful servant for himself. The Lord hears when I call to him. Tremble and do not sin. When you are on your bed, search your hearts and be silent. Offer the sacrifices of the righteous and trust in the Lord.
Many, Lord, are asking, 'Who will bring us prosperity? Let the light of your face shine on us. Fill my heart with joy when their grain and new wine abound. In peace I will lie down and sleep for you alone, Lord, make me dwell in safety. Did you catch peace and joy in there?
That there is this time when you will experience all of these things right from God. For God so loved the world that he did what, church? Gave his only son. That the way God expresses his love for us is to even give His only Son. Coach might have read my notes this morning.
I don't know. Because of us. Right? Because of our story. The story we've read over the past year of walking close to God and then walking away.
Coming back and deciding to leave. Yet, God shows his love, his unending love for us, and sending his only Son and saying, I'll do whatever it takes. What if his church did the same thing? That we will do whatever it takes to show love, to bring people together, to not divide. Right?
Can you imagine a group of people that did that? Yeah. A prayer for us this morning is that we are a loving church. That we are a people who seek to love, to receive love, but also give it. We say sometimes that I hope and pray that when you come to church, you're not here just to receive and to say, well, that was either good or bad.
That as we come, we come to give, that we come to encourage, that we come to help others and not be so self centered. The world pushes us to that all the time. Right? And I love it too. Amazon's on speed dial for me too.
I love my stuff, but I wanna love you more. I wanna follow God more closely. I wanna love him more. Our prayers every night as we pray as a family are always for our church, that we grow closer together and we grow closer to him. May that be our prayer.
If you have any need this morning, we've got a song of invitation. Would you come as we stand?