The Love of God (04/21/2002)

Park Meadows Church

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We've studied the holiness of God and the justice of God, so this morning we will turn to this majestic topic of the love of God.

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Let's pray together. Father, we thank you for your word. We ask you to direct our hearts to your word, to take it from our minds to our hearts, and then that our minds and hearts both might be taken into the heavenlies for a while this morning.

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We ask you to teach us by your Holy Spirit. We pray in the name of your Son, Jesus Christ. Amen. The love of God is one of what the theologians call three comprehensive attributes of God.

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By comprehensive, they mean that there are three attributes listed in the Bible, which are not things that God has, but things that God is.

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For example, in John chapter 4, verse 24, the Bible says God is spirit.

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It doesn't say he has a spirit, it says he is spirit. In 1 John chapter 1, verse 5, it says

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God is light. And then in 1 John chapter 4, verse 8, the

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Bible says God is love. So, these three things, spirit, light, and love, are not things that God can do or things that he has, but they are things that God is.

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God is love. First of all, let's study God's love by way of contrast.

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It's almost the only way we can study it. God's love is not something that God has to attain.

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It is not something God has to maintain. As we think of these things, think of how love is in your marriage or in your home, and then compare that to this kind of love that God has.

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It is not a love that God goes out and gets or attains. It's not a love that he has to maintain or try to keep going.

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It is not a love that can be won. It is not a love that can be earned.

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It is not a love that can be bought. It is not a love that needs to be banned, and it is not a love that can be quenched.

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God's love is not the love of affection or friendship, which can be stirred up or increased by the action of its object.

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God's love is not the warm feelings of fellowship, such as in friendship or even in marriage when one spouse is treating the other well.

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God's love is not the infatuation of youth, which dies away with familiarity.

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God's love is not the lust of romantic love, which is motivated by the attributes of the other.

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God's love is not a response. It is not a response to beauty or to strength or to integrity or to attractiveness or to benefits that come from the other.

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God's love is not a need on the part of God to get something from someone else.

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But rather, if it's a need at all, it's a need to give or to bestow or to impart.

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You know, sometimes we say that God doesn't need anything. What we really mean when we say that is that there's not something that any of us can give him that he has to have.

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We speak of us as humans, as his creatures. And what we mean by that is that his need is not based upon someone else giving him something.

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And if we define it that way, it's true that God doesn't need us. He doesn't need anything. He's God. However, if we really look at the

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Bible revelation of God, his own revelation of himself, there is a type of need that God has.

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And that's why we're here this morning. And I don't mean that's why we're saved. I mean that's why we exist and why we're saved as well.

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But it is a need, if you will, to give, to bestow upon another or to impart something of himself to another.

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At least from our vantage point, as he has revealed himself to us, he has that need.

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And we ought to be very, very thankful that he does. Let me try to give you a definition of God's love.

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It is a free, sovereign manifestation of all that God is toward all that belongs to him.

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And it is from eternity to eternity through the cross.

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The love of God is a free, sovereign manifestation of all that God is toward all that belongs to him.

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Notice I didn't say all that belongs to him. I would have said that if I had just been talking about people. I'm talking about everything that belongs to him, the whole cosmos.

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And it is from eternity to eternity through the cross.

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It cannot be induced. His love cannot be seduced. It can only be received.

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It is eternal, unchangeable, and unquenchable. Tribulation cannot mourn

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God's love away. Distress cannot worry God's love away. Persecution cannot threaten

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God's love. Famine cannot starve God's love. Nakedness cannot shame

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God's love away. Peril cannot frighten it away. The sword cannot destroy it.

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Death, nor life, nor angel, nor any earthly or heavenly principality or power, nothing today, nothing tomorrow, nothing above us, nothing below us, nothing in the created universe is able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our

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Lord. You might find something like that in Romans chapter 8, verse 35. His love is immutable.

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It cannot change. His love is eternal. It had no beginning. If you want to say he chose us, then you have to say he chose us before he chose us because there was no time when he chose us.

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We were always his. His love is eternal. It didn't have a starting place. His love is unquenchable.

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And the scripture reveals to us in more place than one that his love is in Christ.

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That would be something to explore on a different Sunday morning entirely. That's an amazing thought.

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The love of God is in Christ Jesus our Lord. God's love is more like a mother's love for a badly deformed child.

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Think about this. It is more like a mother's love for a badly deformed child than it is like a lover's attraction to a beautiful damsel or a strong knight in shining armor.

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Charlotte and I were talking last year from us.

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We had a beautiful little baby boy. And the little healthy baby boy was born into this world.

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And they thought he might need a little extra oxygen. So the nurse put him in the little incubator and closed it and turned the oxygen on and forgot about it and left the oxygen going full speed for so long that it did permanent brain damage.

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This little boy is now something like 21 or two years old. And he has the mind of a three -year -old physique.

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And yet they love him every moment of every day. He has that three -year -old ability to love back.

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And they never lose that. That love of that mother is more descriptive of agape love because it is not based upon the object of her love being perfect.

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It's not based upon the object of her love treating her perfectly every day. I'm sure sometimes he spits at her.

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Sometimes he might knock her down. He's so strong now. But her love is based upon something that's in her heart.

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God's love is that way. It's based upon him. It's not based upon us. Now we've looked at God's love by contrast.

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Let's see if we can look at a little bit by comparison.

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Let's contemplate a few things about God's love. It's interesting that when evil came into this world, and I'm not talking about in the universe because that happened when

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Lucifer said, I will be like the Most High God, but I'm talking about when he infected this world, when he brought that attitude into this world, into the

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Garden of Eden. And when man sinned, evil entered this earthly realm.

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And at that point, at least from a human viewpoint, there became a conflict between the attributes of God, some that we've already studied and the one we're studying today.

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Let me tell you what I'm saying. The holiness of God that we studied time before last and the justice of God that we studied last time condemned sin.

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The punishment for that sin was eternal banishment from God's presence in a place called hell.

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And yet the love of God seeks to save the sinner. Do you see the conflict?

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At least in the way we would think. In the way we think, there's a conflict there. God's holiness and justice demands condemnation and punishment for sin.

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God's love seeks to save the sinner from it. Psalm 85 verses 9 through 13 give us the answer, and the answer is found in the cross of Jesus Christ.

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Surely His salvation is nigh them that fear Him, that glory may dwell in our land.

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Mercy and truth are met together. Righteousness and peace have kissed each other.

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And then verse 13 says, Righteousness shall go before Him and shall set us in the way of His steps.

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That doesn't sound like we did a lot, does it? It sounds like someone did something to us, someone did something for us, and it was love behind that thing that was done.

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When God's love determined in the council, the predetermined council of God before anything was made, that His Son would come and die on the cross, that was the full expression of God's love.

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So we see because of the cross and the blood of Jesus, the perfect one who would die and pay the punishment, pay the penalty for this sin,

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I'm sorry, for this law that was broken. We see that because of this death and this blood that God's mercy and truth can meet together.

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And God's righteousness and peace have kissed one another. The cross of Christ, which exemplifies the love of God more than anything else in the universe, is what reconciled this seeming conflict between the justice and the holiness of God and the love of God for His own.

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You have to remember that we were His own long before we were born and long before we ever sinned.

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And long before Adam and Eve ever sinned in that garden, we were His because His love for us is eternal.

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So we see another interesting thing is that love alone, if we want to look at the attributes of the

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Father, it is only love that can provide the sacrifice that is necessary to destroy.

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Now when we think of the kind of love that it took to offer this sacrifice, which was

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His only begotten Son, you mothers might identify with that feeling a little bit if you thought about this for a few moments even here.

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While we were yet sinners, while we yet hated God, we were yet His enemies,

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Christ died for us. The Father sacrificed His Son. While our minds were in that state, if you will, think about what a sacrifice this was.

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Only the great love that He had both for His Son Jesus, who suffered this for the joy of bringing

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His brothers and sisters in, and the love that He had for us, only that love could have motivated us.

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Because we have to understand whose hand is back of the cross. It was not really the

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Romans. It was not really the Jews. It was really the Father's hand who sacrificed the

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Son of God that disguised through dark the earth and shook.

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God's emotions were seen. The Father let us know that this was the ultimate sacrifice and yet He writes,

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For God so loved the cosmos, His ordered world,

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His ordered universe, that He gave His only begotten Son, so that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.

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So that whosoever believed in Him could both be saved and not perish and yet make

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God just in doing it. Because the penalty had already been paid in full on that cross.

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Romans 5, 8, But God commendeth His love, He shows forth His love toward us, and that while we were yet sinners,

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Christ died for us. The word for is so important. The substitutionary word in the

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Bible. Substitutionary death of Jesus Christ. The love of God so much that He would give

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His only begotten Son as the little lamb for the sins of us.

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1 John 3, 16, Hereby perceive we the love of God, because He laid down His life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.

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It's interesting that there was God's love before there were objects for His love.

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Now you think about that for a moment. We're just contemplating now some things about God. Can there be love without an object for love?

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Can I love a wife without having Charlotte? She's the object of my love.

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So how could God be love? Remember we talked about it's not that God has love. It's that He is love.

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How could He be something that demands an object before there were any objects created?

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Well, the Bible tells us why this is possible, and I'll tell you it's a great secret to understanding a proof of the

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Godhead. It is a great secret to understanding the fact that God subsists as the

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Father and the Son, and He sends forth the Holy Spirit. And God existed that way before anything was made, and that is how

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God was able to be love before He made us. Proverbs 8, verse 22 speaks of wisdom, but it is wisdom personified in the eternal

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Son of God. And it gives us a view back before time started, before Jesus was born in the manger, when

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He existed as the eternal Son of God in what we call eternity past.

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And look at this love that was already there before the universe was even made.

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Proverbs 8, verse 22, The Lord possessed me in the beginning of His way before His works of old.

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Before He created anything, I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning or ever the earth was, before the earth was made.

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When there were no depths, I was brought forth. When there were no fountains abounding with water, before the mountains were settled, before the hills was

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I brought forth. While as yet He had not made the earth nor the fields nor the highest part of the dust of the world, when

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He prepared the heavens, I was. When He set a compass upon the face of the dead, then

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I was by Him as one brought up with Him, and I was daily

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His delight, rejoicing always before Him.

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God is love. Before He created us, before He created the universe, anything physical, before seemingly the objects of His love were made,

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He was love because He is love, and there was love among the Godhead. John 17, verse 5,

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Jesus gives us a glimpse of this. He says, And now, O Father, glorify Thou me with Thine own self with the glory which

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I had with Thee before the world was. It is true that love existed before the objects, but that same love anticipated the objects.

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It is love. Acts chapter 2, verse 23, and several other verses in the

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Bible mention this predeterminate counsel, which is a mysterious teaching in the

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Bible. It seems to tell us that there was a time before time when the

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Father met with the Son in the presence of the Spirit and had a counsel meeting.

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Now, obviously, that counsel meeting was not in order for the Father to be instructed by anyone about what might happen, but it was, nevertheless, a counsel meeting.

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We have to be a little careful before we humanize it too much when we think of what our counsel meetings might be like.

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But there was a counsel of the Godhead before anything was made, and that counsel had much to do with you and me.

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That counsel had much to do with the redeemed. And in that counsel, it was determined that Jesus Christ, the eternal

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Son of God, would be born of a virgin in a manger and live as a man and be tempted in all points as we, and yet without sin and would become that perfect Lamb of God and would be slain to answer

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God's law and His truth and His justice and His holiness, and that all of our sins that we've ever done or ever will do or ever think about were in His body on the tree when

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God's wrath was poured out upon that one. Jesus Himself, the man side of Jesus, said,

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My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? Why have You turned Your head? Why have I been separated from You?

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Separated from the One that we just saw before Him in Proverbs chapter 8, before Him, before anything was made, always before Him, always delighting in His presence, and now

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God will not even look at Him or have anything to do with Him. That's what He feared that day in the garden.

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It was not physical death. That is the love of God. Now, that doesn't make any sense to us, especially not to modern

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American theology anyway. They don't think of God that way. To them, love is always rosy.

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Love is always something that's there, that's good and soft and easy. It would never hurt anyone. It was the love of God that slew

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His Son. It was the love of God that gave the law.

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It slays everyone who never receives His Son. All of this is a part of the love of God, and we find it in the predeterminate counsel in Acts chapter 2, verse 23,

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Him being delivered by the determinate counsel. You see, it was not the Romans that really killed

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Him. It wasn't really the Jews that turned Him over. It wasn't even really Judas that caused

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Him to die. It wasn't necessarily even your sins and mine, even though our sins were in His body.

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And it was because of our sins that God turned His back upon Him. And yet, when you get down to the ultimate cause of the cross, you find it in the predeterminate counsel.

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He was delivered by the counsel. He was delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God.

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And yet, by that same counsel, the means of it were predetermined. It was predetermined that Judas would kiss

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Him and turn Him over. And the Bible says, yes, even though it was determined before the foundation of the world that He would die, woe be unto

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Him that betrayed Him. So we see the responsibility of all the parties.

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So now we bring in the responsibility of Judas. We bring in the responsibility of the Romans. We bring in the responsibility of the

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Jews. And we bring in the responsibility of us every time we sin. As we go out from this place,

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I love it when Tom Brotherhood said, define the present. Well, I can't do that. The only way I can define the present is to leave this place and go into the heavenlies.

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Now I'm in the eternal present. But here there isn't one, because as soon as you try to put your finger on it, it's in the past and you're in the future.

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So you think about it going out of here today. As you go out into this week and as you are tempted by the evil one, if you choose to sin, you place that one on his body somehow a long time ago.

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Somehow you've defied time. And you are making a willful choice tomorrow to put a sin on him yesterday, two thousand years ago, and it becomes an additional weight.

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There's the responsibility side of it. But let me say this, you didn't cause it. Only indirectly.

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Only because he loved you so much. Only because you sinned and created a conflict with his love that had to be corrected.

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But that correction was not something like a response that God had to your sin. No, no, no. We can't even put a time period on it because it goes out as far back as we can go in time and you drop off into eternity somewhere where this counsel takes place and it is determined at that time that he would die for you.

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That his love was so strong that this conflict would never really be a conflict because it was answered before it came to pass.

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Wow. We can't even hardly think about it or talk about God's love. We don't understand how a love can be without time.

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Being delivered by the predetermined counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken and with wicked hands have crucified and slain and we all had a part in that.

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Whom God hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death because it was not possible that he should be holden by it.

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All a part of the predetermined plan of God. Acts 4 .26 alludes to this.

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Again, as you read down through this. The kings of the earth stood up and the rulers were gathered together against the

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Lord and against his Christ. Do you hear what I'm reading this morning? The kings of the earth stood up. The rulers gathered themselves against the love of God.

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And they killed him. Because he was love. Not because he was a theologian.

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Not because he was a prophet. Not because he was a good man. Not really because he healed. Because he was love.

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And the world hates love. The world likes lust. The world likes affection.

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The world likes friendship. As long as you're friendly. And as long as you do right.

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And treat the person well. But the world hates agape. The world hates a kind of love that does not have anything to do with the objects of the love.

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And so the world tried to destroy it. And the kings of the earth stood up and the rulers were gathered together against the

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Lord and against his Christ. For of a truth against the Holy Child, Jesus, whom thou hast anointed both

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Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the people of Israel were gathered together.

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For to do whatsoever. Now listen to this. For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done.

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Didn't surprise God, did it? God caused it to happen. But we thought we did it.

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We thought we chose to do that sin. It went on his body. It helped to kill him.

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Tomorrow we'll think we're making that choice. And we are responsible for it. Because we're doing what we want to do.

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I never learned another thing from that man.

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I'll always be thankful I learned that. And I'll have learned a few other things. But that is a biggie.

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Whoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before. That's foreordination.

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That's predestination. That's a dirty word today. That's why we're not on the air.

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Right, Brother Greg? You didn't punch the button and send it out beyond the tape. Of course, then Brother Bland ruins it all and passes them out all over the country.

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They show up at the door. We'll hope it's one of those times when Brother Otis is teaching.

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Acts 5, 38. Alludes to this counsel. And now

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I say unto you, refrain from these men and let them alone. Now this is interesting because this is

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Gamaliel, an enemy of the cross, speaking. And yet he mentions the counsel of God.

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Only indirectly, though. He says, refrain from these men. Remember, they were preaching the gospel.

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They wanted to put them in prison or kill them. He says, well, we don't really have to do that.

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And he gives a reason why here. He says, refrain from these men and let them alone. For if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to naught.

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Now here's where he implies the determinant counsel. He didn't even know what he was saying. But if this counsel be it of God, ye cannot overthrow it.

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Yeah, he was right, wasn't he? You cannot overthrow it if the counsel be of God.

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Lest haply ye be found even to fight against God. There was only one counsel. God doesn't have to make it up as he goes.

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Any issue of life. Lest haply ye be found even to fight against God.

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Man loves to try that, doesn't he? You see, man is the eternal Arminian. Man thinks that he runs around and just makes

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God mad and can move God around and cause God to do all sorts of things by the actions of man.

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He doesn't understand that everything was determined at that one counsel. I really believe the only reason

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God describes it that way is so we can have a way to understand it. I don't even know. There's not a counsel like we think of a counsel.

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There was never a time when God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit said, hey, why don't we do this? But he describes it that way so we can have even the inkling, little bit of understanding that there at least was a time before time began when all of this was determined and man is not going to thwart it or change it or have any determination in it.

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And that counsel seems to have been a counsel of death and justice and even eternal punishment, but really it was a counsel of love.

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Acts 20, 23 and following, he speaks of it again. Save that the

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Holy Ghost witnesseth in every city saying that bonds and afflictions await me,

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Paul says. But none of these things move me. Neither count I my life dear unto myself so that I might finish my course with joy and the ministry which

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I have received of the Lord Jesus to testify the gospel of the grace, the unmerited favor, the unmerited love of God.

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The word grace almost defines the God they love better than any other single word. And he goes on and he says, which

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I have received of the Lord Jesus to testify the gospel of the grace of God and now behold

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I know that ye all among whom I have gone preaching the kingdom of God shall see my face no more.

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Not going to pass this way again. I'm going towards my end, my finish line. Wherefore I take you to record this day that I am pure from the blood of all men.

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Why? He had preached the gospel clearly. For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel.

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Paul knew something about that counsel that really no one before him knew I think. And out there in that Arabian desert for three years

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Jesus taught it to him. He said let me tell you Paul there was a thing called a counsel that happened before anything was made and I was there.

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And I was with the Father. And these things were determined and it was determined that I would die for all of God's own.

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For all that God owns. And I gladly received that.

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Every teacher and every Christian. The full counsel of God. The fact is what seems like the bad of it as well as the good of it.

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What seems like the bad of it to man is that God's love includes justice. It really doesn't conflict with it.

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It certainly doesn't conflict with it on this side of the cross. And the only conflict that can come is if a person willfully rejects the only begotten

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Son of God that God gave as the ultimate sacrifice of love and they don't even care. That can get them in eternal damnation.

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That's part of the gospel isn't it? The whole counsel of God. All of this was determined.

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Take heed therefore unto yourselves and to all the flock over which the Holy Ghost hath made you overseers to feed the church of God which he hath purchased.

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That was God's Son who died. That was God's blood. Sometimes my dad used to kid with me. He would tickle me and I'd say stop doing that.

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And he'd say well that's whatever he was tickling. That's my armpit. I'd say no that's mine.

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He'd say aren't you my boy? And I'd say yeah then it's my armpit. He'd keep tickling. So now I do that with my little ones.

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Except for Katie. I always slap him when I try to tickle her. I scream hysterically. Ephesians 1 .11

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In whom also we have obtained an inheritance being predestinated according to the purpose that purpose took place in that counsel of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will that we should be to the praise and glory of him who first trusted in Christ.

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And in Hebrews chapter 6 alludes to it once again. I didn't realize the counsel was that many verses.

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But it is a mystery. There are a few little passages that allude to it.

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And here it talks about the Abrahamic covenant. And it talks about saying surely blessing

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I will bless thee and multiplying I will multiply thee wherein God willing more abundantly to show unto the heirs of promise that's us.

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The immutability of his counsel. His counsel won't change. Confirmed it with an oath.

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Anybody whose name was there the day that that counsel took place before there was a day.

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If that counsel took place and you are one of his then

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Jesus Christ will take everything. He goes on and says that by two immutable things in which it is impossible for God to lie whatever was determined in that counsel

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God can't change it. We might have a strong consolation who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope set before us.

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Which hope we have as an anchor of the soul both sure and steadfast in which entereth into that within the veil where God is.

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We can go into that place whether the forerunner is where he entered in the forerunner who is even

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Jesus made a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

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Now look at John chapter 17 the love of God existed before there were any objects in us because there was love among the

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Godhead. Secondly however God anticipated the objects.

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We see this in many many verses John chapter 17 verse 6 talks about us and says thine they were notice that's past tense you see past tense implies that going back before time began they were yours already we already belong to the

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Father I have manifested thy name unto the men which thou gavest me out of the world thine they were and thou gavest them me and they have kept thy word if you drop down to verse 23 in that same chapter

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I and them and thou and me that they might be made perfect in one and that the world may know that thou has sent me and has loved them as in the same manner as thou loved me how did the

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Father love the Son in Proverbs chapter 8 back when there was no time with an eternal love that means that we were at least in his mind forever we were at least if not yet created we were at least in his mind and even our names in his heart and mind and our faces forever and he's always loved us then there came a time in time when we sinned and from our vantage point that created a conflict and yet there was no conflict that Jesus Christ would die and pay the price in full eternal death eternal separation from God and eternal

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Son of God who died a death clearly say in Revelation 13 8 the

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Lamb slain that is the greatest description of God's love as you picture

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Jesus willfully as a lamb putting his hands out submissively so that they might drive the nails in and lift him up above the earth our sin in his mind that was the love of God Jesus did not go toward that without some hesitation in that garden because he knew separation of God was not something he wanted to have happen he did not cherish the separation but he did cherish the joy and fellowship of all of us and that's the kind of love that is a godly love

38:40

Father we could never say the right words to thank you for this we think back before time begins that's about as far as we can think with any understanding and yet you tell us even before that point you had already determined that we would be saved by the blood of the

38:59

Lamb and the Lord Jesus had already stood up as we would picture it and said

39:05

I will go send me I will go and die for the sins of the world

39:14

Father how can we thank you how can we thank you that long before we loved you you loved us how can we thank you enough that you can even put within our hearts some of that love that we might love you back that we might spend the most joyous moments of our days fellowshipping with you and being aware of your presence in the car or in the closet or in the kitchen or at work and we can feel that love and sense a bit of it and as we grow we can sense and feel more of it and you give us the ability to love you with that same love more and more as we grow what a motivation you've given us to grow and to be in the word more so that we might love you with a stronger love as we grow we thank you that you've revealed to us that your love is in Christ Jesus our

40:16

Lord therefore Father any time we want to study your love more we can sit at Jesus feet gaze into his eyes learn more of him and we learn more of your love thank you for this as well we ask you to go with us into our time of fellowship where we express and enjoy our love for one another the love that you've given us we can enjoy your presence as well and we ask you to bless the meal we're about to have together in our afternoon service and we ask these things for Christ's sake