Title: Abounding Love of God
Text: I John 4:8-10
Intro: A man saw a sign in a flower shop that read, “Say it with flowers.” The man went in and told the clerk to give him one red rose. The clerk looking puzzled at the request had to ask the man “why just one rose?” To which the man replied, “I am a man of few words.” Sometimes we have a hard time understanding God’s love for us. God’s love for us goes beyond human comprehension, He does not love the way that we do. God does not love us for what we have to offer, or how we look, or if He can get anything in return. I want you to see that there are four important aspects to God’s love.
I. God’s Love is Sacrificial
1. Many would say “Well God doesn’t love me or I would not be going through this or that”
2. I have never felt or seen God’s love for me
3. People he died for you what more could you ask?
4. He left His throne in Heaven; took on the form as man; walked this earth; endured ridicule, persecution, & rejection. Bled suffered and died, why because he loved you.
5. This world says that if you do not get what you want out of a relationship that you need to move on to the next one.
ILL. Marriage ceremony “For better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness or in health, till death do us part.” It is all about loving through sacrifice.
6. This world has the idea that we will stay together but if things don’t go the way we want or if something better comes along we will give up.
7. Aren’t you so glad that is not how God loves us?
ILL. Little boy who’s sister needed a transfusion of his blood the doctors ask him would he give his blood so that has sister could live. “Sure,” he told the doctors. As they took him into the operating room He looked at the instruments and at his little sister, he watched as they put the needle into his arm and the blood began to flow from his arm into his little sister. With a tear in his eye he turned to the doctor and ask, “When do I die?” He was ready to give it all for her.
II. God’s Love is Unconditional
ILL. Hettie Green was a famous millionaire. She lived in seclusion and became a virtual recluse. She had only a few friends and an ugly mongrel dog that kept biting the few friends that she did have. One of the friends told her, “You’ve got to get rid of that dog.” Hettie refused. She said, “that dog loves me and he doesn’t know how rich I am.”
1. Look at Romans 5:5-8
Romans 5:5 And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us. (God’s love is poured out through the Holy Ghost)
Romans 5:6 For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. (without strength means we had nothing to give but He died for us anyway)
Romans 5:7 For scarcely for a righteous man will one die: yet peradventure for a good man some would even dare to die. (most would not die for a good person but God’s love was such that when we had nothing was nothing no hope of being something He died for us)
Romans 5:8 But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
2. We must realize that God loves the sinner but hates the sin
- Hates Abortion loves the Abortionist
- Hates Homosexuality loves the Homosexual
- Hates Adultery but loves the Adulterer
- Hates Lying but loves the Liar
1 Timothy 2:4 Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.
2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.
3. God’s love is unconditional He said that whosoever would come…
- You don’t have to clean up to come to Christ.
- I got to give this up to get saved
- First you come to God, second let God clean you up
- Old song “Just as I am”
- He Loves us right where we are
ILL. In 1995, Christopher Reeve, the "Superman" actor, fell from a horse in a riding accident that severed his spinal cord and paralyzed him from the shoulders down. In the days which followed both he and his mother considered pulling the plug on his life support system.
In his new memoir Still Me, which recounts how he battled back from the accident, Reeve said he first shared his thoughts with his wife, Dana. "I mouthed my first lucid words to her: ’Maybe we should let me go,’ " he recalled.
But his wife, through tears, persuaded him to fight back, saying, "I want you to know that I will be with you for the long haul, no matter what. You’re still you, and I love you."
She loved him unconditionally.
III. God’s Love is Tough Love
1. Many would think that life becomes easier when you become a Christian.
- You wake up with heavenly morning breath
- Nothing ever comes against you
- You never have a day of defeat
- Because you are His
2. But God loves with a tough love
- God allows battles to come against us
- He gives us power and strength to overcome
- But He will not do what it is that you are suppose to do
3. That is why He is such a good father. He will not give us everything we want. Everything we need yes but not everything we want.
• what about that verse that says “He will give you the desires of your heart”
• The first part say’s to delight yourself in the Lord
• When you are delighting yourself in the Lord then your desires will be to line up with what God wants for your life not what you want.
4. Some would think of God as a spiritual Santa Clause, give me this I want that, and don’t let me go through any trials.
5. We have become Spiritual spoiled brats
Hebrews 12:6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
6. If we need a good spanking we will get it; If we need to be told NO He will tell us.
Proverbs 3:12 For whom the LORD loveth he correcteth;
ILL. Of lady that got a pet squirrel and loved it to death by feeding it nuts that had no shell. The squirrel’s teeth grow into his jaw because he was not using them to crack the nuts.
IV. God’s Love is Forever
Romans 8:35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
Romans 8:36 As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.
Romans 8:37 Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.
Romans 8:38 For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,
Romans 8:39 Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
1. What does this mean?
- No condition of existence can make God stop loving us (Life or Death)
- No beings can make God stop loving us (Angels or Principalities)
- Nothing in time (Present, or Future)
- Nothing in the way of powers (earthly rulers)
- Nothing in space (Heights or Depths)
- Nothing in creation (Any Thing Created)
- “But God I have lived in sin, there is no way you can forgive me.”
- Paul said that he was the chief of sinners
2. God does not fall out of love
- Not like some teenager that has a new girlfriend every other week
3. You can reject God’s love, turn away from Him, refuse to accept Him, but it will not change the truth that He will still love you.
