The Lord looks for those who are so-called unqualified in the eyes of man, yet He has made us qualified to be in His presence. He has also qualified us to hear His Word. He has given us His Holy Spirit to dwell within us, so that we may have spiritual ears to hear what He is saying. That is our desire today: to have an ear to hear.
Lord, we are thankful for the completeness and fullness of the victory that You have won at Calvary. Lord, truly, it says in Peter that You have made every provision for us for life and godliness. There is no lack.
And Lord, as we come to this time in Your Word, we would look to You, who have no lack, and not to ourselves. Lord, we offer ourselves to You, that You would have great freedom and liberty; that Your Spirit could work and move, to truly redeem this time for Yourself.
We are thankful, Lord, that it is still called today; that it is a time in which You can continue to reveal more of Yourself to us, to teach us, to train us, to discipline us, and to bring us more and more into conformity with the image of Your Son. We offer ourselves to You, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Today, I would like for us to consider the necessity of the love of Christ in these last days. I tried to come up with a shorter title, but I could not leave any of those words out. I am sorry, particularly for the guys who have to label it.
In the days in which we are living, we know how critical they are. We see wars everywhere—more and more every day. We see famines, natural disasters, and everything that is going on. Really, the Lord is trying to wake us up and prepare us.
One of the vital essentials for living in these last days is the love of Christ. It can become so familiar to us that we overlook it at times. So I would like for us to stop this morning and look at it.
We have touched on this matter a little bit in the past, but I was not able to finish. Hopefully, today we can look at another aspect of the love of Christ.
The Lord, in His great love, reveals to us what will happen if we neglect His love. In Matthew, as He speaks to us about the end days, it says:
Because iniquity shall be multiplied, the love of many shall wax cold.
That is from the American Standard Version. I like that wording: “Because iniquity shall be multiplied, the love of many shall wax cold.”
We are also familiar with Revelation 2:4:
But I have this against thee, that thou didst leave thy first love.
The Lord is a full-disclosure Guide. He does not leave surprises out there. He says, “If you do this, there will be great blessing, great reward, great honor, peace, and rest.” You can go on and on. But if you do not, this is what is going to happen.
If you leave His love—if you allow that love to get away from you, if you do not focus upon it and do not allow the reality of it to touch you—you are going to become cold. You will leave it, forget all about it, and do your own thing.
The great battle in the conflict of the ages, since our creation, is the battle between the love of God and the self-love of man. We can express it in many different words and phrases, but in a simple way, it is a battle between God and unredeemed man.
For encouragement, Paul shares in his testimony in 2 Corinthians 5 how the love of Christ controls us. Some translations say, “constrains”; it controls us.
For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died;
and He died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto Him who for their sakes died and rose again.
To me, this is one of the keys in Paul’s life. He is saying, “Look, you can see my life. I have tried to make it fairly transparent through all my writings—the good times and the bad times. But one of the keys in my life is that I have allowed the love of Christ to control me.”
Because the love of Christ controls and constrains him, Paul no longer desires to live for himself. He wants to live for Him who died and rose again on his behalf, and for those whom He loves.
As we keep this matter of the love of Christ in our hearts and in perspective, we want to see Him, because it is so vital in these last days. We speak about being prepared, and this is one of the necessities of preparing and being ready.
When we hear something so often, it can become a familiar phrase. Has this thought of being ready really become a reality within our hearts? Do we think that we always have tomorrow?
That is why Hebrews says that it is called today. We still have today, because we do not know about tomorrow. There are plenty of examples of that.
There are several keys in preparing for His return, but I want to look at one of them today: knowing the surpassing greatness of the love of Christ. His love is so far above our love that it is difficult even to use the phrase “comparison,” because there is no comparison.
Other matters related to being ready include a living faith, a living personal relationship with Him, an ear to hear what He says, and a wonderful relationship with the indwelling and empowering Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit can be overlooked in discussions of the last times. We may consider that at another time, but staying fresh and being ready for Him requires several things. It comes back to our life and walk with Him—to staying fresh with Him.
The Lord, in His great love, has been speaking to us recently about this matter. If you remember Jim Bogg’s recent word to us concerning the exiles, they were experiencing God’s judgment, but they were also experiencing His great love to bring them back to Himself.
It was a time of discipline and judgment. However we phrase it, it can be painful to the flesh. But when we come under it and see what it is, we recognize that we are experiencing the love of God in a living way.
What God was after was not to punish the people of Israel by putting them into exile. He was bringing them under discipline so that they would return to His heart, His purpose, and His desire for them—the purpose for which He had created them.
They would no longer be living for themselves, but for Him who loved us. Thank the Lord for that.
Then we heard from our brother Prim, who shared God’s loving call from salvation to His return: “Be ready.” Be ready in our salvation, ready in sanctification, willing to be sanctified, redeeming the time in which we are living, and being prepared for His return.
God consistently calls us throughout our lives to be prepared. As soon as we are saved, that is not the end. It is, “Be prepared for the next step.” As we go through that next step, we are prepared more and more to come into a living relationship with Him.
Recently, we also heard Kenny share on Paul’s testimony in Romans 8. It was the cry of the love of Christ to each of us, that we might know the absolute security we have in Him.
Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ. Nothing can come in and separate us from that love. There is a security that we have there.
This is the closing argument of Paul’s great epistle in the first eight chapters of Romans. Because of all that He has done, there is a tremendous security that we have. We are thankful for that.
Everything God does, He does out of love. His motivation is love. In our natural and frail minds, we need to attach adjectives to His love in order to help us understand it.
It is not that God has different kinds of love. God has one love: His great love. But to help us understand it, we may say that it is a tough love, an enduring love, a longsuffering love, a comforting love, or a disciplining love.
These descriptions only touch the tip of the greatness and multifaceted nature of His love. It is a fatherly love that sometimes disciplines and can be a little stern. It is also a motherly love that can take us into His arms and hold us so wonderfully.
As we took the table, we saw that it is also a sacrificial love. Many of us taste the various expressions of His love each day. That is why, in His love, He warns us not to neglect the great love He has given us.
As we read in Matthew 24, the love of many can wax cold. There is a great contrast between this and 1 Peter, where Peter speaks of fervent love—a fiery love that keeps us going on and on.
The Holy Spirit is never careless with words when He writes Scripture. He chooses the proper word. We often struggle to find the right words. I know that I do; my vocabulary is limited. Some people have such a broad vocabulary, but I have a small sphere and sometimes have trouble finding words.
But the Lord says that the love of many will wax cold. He is speaking about love gradually cooling off and fading away unnoticed because of evil and the intensity of the days in which we are living.
It does not happen all at once. It fades gradually. “Waxing cold” uses the picture of a candle. As long as the flame is burning, the wax is hot. Even after you put the flame out, the wax remains hot for a while.
But if you leave it there, the wax gradually becomes cold. Depending upon the circumstances, it becomes solid, hard, and resistant. That is what can happen within our hearts.
If we become distracted, ignore the love of God, and become caught up with other things, at first we may think we are doing great. But the flame is out. We are almost living on the residue of that flame, and eventually it slowly fades away.
Nobody goes from being zealous for the Lord one moment to automatically being zealous for the world the next. Normally, in our lives, it is a gradual process.
At first, we can be very good at being Christians and being hypocrites. We can play-act as though things are going well. Even when the flame is out, there may still be hot wax there, and we can act as though we are still on fire for the Lord.
I was thinking this morning about actors in a movie or on television. What is the definition of a great actor? It is someone whose acting you do not recognize. They look so real. Those are the ones who impress us.
This can happen to us as believers. The flame can go out, but we still know how to play-act. It can look like we are still on fire for the Lord, but inwardly we are growing cold.
May the Holy Spirit awaken us and convict us of this, so that we can continue to stay in a place of fervency with Him.
We are also warned, “Do not leave your first love.” To me, one of the key words in that statement is left. That means you were there. This is not speaking of those who were cold all the time. These ones had been in first love.
Something came along, and they were distracted by other things. I am not going to go into the letter to Ephesus, but they were distracted, and they left that first love.
First love is a quality of love. It is not merely a sequential kind of love. It is a love unlike anything else. There is nothing that compares to it, and it is so beautiful.
The believers in Ephesus became distracted by their religious activities. Everything appeared to be going well. They could discern good from evil and do all of these things, but they did not need the Lord. They had knowledge in their heads that allowed them to keep going.
It took the Holy Spirit to come in and say, “You have left your first love.” They were totally unaware. They thought they were on fire for the Lord, but they had waxed cold and left that first love.
Another way of expressing first love is this: all of us are governed by first love. The question is, what is the first love in our lives? Is it our job, our family, sports, fashion, or something else?
You can go into some people’s closets and find forty-two ties—not bow ties, but regular ties, real ties. Or they may have fifty-two pairs of shoes. What is our first love? What is governing us? What is motivating us?
This is a challenging time if you are a sports fan, because bowl games are getting ready to start, the football playoffs are beginning, and the NFL is winding down. You can wrestle within your heart: “Let me check this. What is the score? What is going on?”
I am not saying that you should never check scores or watch a game. But do not let that govern what we are doing in our hearts and lives.
This requires us to be very honest with ourselves. Each of us is susceptible. In ourselves, any one of us can have love that waxes cold. Any one of us can leave first love.
Can we say, “I would never do that”? Can we declare, “I am in first love. I would never wax cold”? No. If we are honest, we cannot say that.
But we can say in our hearts, “I desire for my love to stay hot. I desire to stay in first love.” We do not know ourselves well enough to say, “I am in first love.”
I remember Brother Kong saying, many years ago and even more recently, that as an assembly, we can never say that we are a testimony. We can say that we desire to be a testimony.
We cannot say that we are a testimony to Jesus, but we can say that we have a desire to be a testimony to Jesus. That is our desire. That is what we want within our hearts and lives.
How do we avoid our love growing cold? How do we avoid neglecting and failing to appreciate the love of Christ? As with many things in Scripture and in our life with the Lord, it is not complicated. We avoid it by Calvary—by the cross.
Everything is done there. If you stop and think about it, the greatest display of love in history is Calvary. It is the greatest display of love.
At Calvary, our Lord sang a beautiful love song. We sing our songs, but He sang the most beautiful song in all of history. Do we have ears to hear that song—His continual love song to us?
To use a modern term, that love song is on a loop. It keeps going over and over: “I love you.” You can put something on your phone and set it to loop, and it just keeps playing. His love song is continual; it goes on over and over again.
When we speak of Calvary, do we see it as His love? Do we see the cross as the love of God? That is what He wants us to see.
Related to avoiding the loss of first love and allowing the love of Christ to become real, the cross has a coworker: the Holy Spirit. The cross and the Holy Spirit work together.
The cross opens the door, and the Holy Spirit comes in and works. I may not refer to the Holy Spirit every moment today, and perhaps we will consider Him next time, but I am not neglecting Him. The cross is coming in, and that is what we are considering more today.
What is the cross to us? Is it positive or negative? When we think of the cross, does our face fall? Do we have a long face? Or do we see it in the greatness of all that it has done for us?
We often say that the cross is our friend. It may not seem that way, but Proverbs tells us:
Faithful are the wounds of a friend.
There is obviously a negative aspect to the cross. But we are thankful that the cross our Lord bore—the cross of Calvary—was a cruel cross. He drank the bitter cup so that we could drink the cup of blessing.
When we look at the cross, we see that it is so positive because it sets us free from self, the flesh, sin, the world, and all the things that entangle us.
When we speak of the cross, we are not speaking only of His death. I appreciate how Brother Sparks always emphasizes that when we refer to the cross, we are referring to His death, burial, resurrection, and ascension—the fullness of the work that He did.
Through His death, burial, resurrection, and ascension, the Holy Spirit came. Calvary always precedes Pentecost. We need to remember that.
Praise God for all that He has done for us at the cross and through this great salvation. He has made us sons. He has made us priests. He has made us kings, to rule and reign with Him.
What a glorious work that is. That is how much He loves us. He took us out of that pit. I was sinking deep in sin, but He lifted us up. God lifted me. He lifted each and every one of us up. Praise God for that.
The cross is vital, particularly in these days. The cross brings us into the spiritual reality of all that Christ has done for us.
We have received so much teaching, and we are thankful for it. Many have shared. We heard last night that we have had forty-eight family conferences and fifty times together, if we include the two at Raza.
Throughout all of those times, there has been a consistent theme: God’s eternal purpose—God’s purpose for us. It has been shared. But the question is, is it experientially real in our lives?
As we yield to the cross, what is in our heads is made real in our hearts. The battle among believers today is not so much about teaching. There must be teaching; do not think that I am devaluing teaching. There needs to be teaching.
But there must also be the working of the cross in our lives to make the teaching a reality in our daily experience and walk. This is where we lack so much, because the cross is not popular.
The cross is what allows the Holy Spirit to work within us and bring out the reality of His life.
Consider Peter as an example of the cross bringing revelation into spiritual reality. In Matthew 16, Peter had a revelation of Christ:
Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.
Peter also had a revelation of the church:
Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church.
He had a revelation of the kingdom:
I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven.
He also had a revelation of the cross. But none of this was yet real to Peter. At that point, Peter had revelation, but he did not yet have reality.
Peter loved hearing about Christ. He loved hearing about the church. He loved hearing about the kingdom. But when the cross came, he said, “No. No, Lord, You cannot do that.”
We can be the same way. When the cross comes into our lives, we say, “No, just take me back to hearing about Christ, the church, and the kingdom. Do not mention a cross. I do not want that.”
What did the Lord say to Peter? In order for all that had been revealed to him to become reality, the Lord said—using Luke 9:23:
If any man would come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me.
This thing messes up your nose. You all deal with the outside, looking at me. I have to deal with the inside part.
If we want to come after Him—if we want to enter into the reality of all that He has done regarding Christ, the church, and the kingdom—then we must go the way of the cross: denying ourselves, taking up our cross daily, and following Him.
“Daily” is such a key word. We could spend another whole message just on daily life.
When did our Lord go to the cross? How often did He go to the cross? He went to the cross of Calvary one time, obviously. But every moment that He spent upon this earth, He was walking the way of the cross.
He was denying Himself for our sake. Every moment that Christ was upon the earth, He was walking the way of the cross. What does that say to us? Are we any less?
We need to walk the way of the cross daily and allow Him to bring us into the fullness of what He has for us.
This is where Paul’s encouragement means so much. As we come into that love of Christ, it controls us. It comes in mightily to show us its power and to help us live not for ourselves, but for Him who has loved us.
The basic question each of us has as believers is this: who or what controls our lives? Is it self? Is it the world? You can fill in the blank. What controls your life? Or is it Christ?
I know that this is progressive. Experientially, we are all sinners saved by grace, and we are not going to do it one hundred percent. I am not trying to present perfect believers walking in the love of Christ every moment.
That is where the blood of the Lamb comes in, and why we appreciate it more and more. But hopefully there is a progression in our lives—a movement more and more into the way that He desires us to be, as He conforms us to His image.
One thing about His love is that He never forces it upon us. He shows us His great love. As in Romans 12, He says, “By the mercies of God”—you could say, “By the love of God”—how are you going to respond?
His love does not force. It is sensitive, like the picture of a dove. If our hearts are not open, we cannot receive that love.
Even though we have His love, our hearts can wax cold and leave it. It is amazing that the love of God is so powerful, magnificent, and all-powerful, yet our hearts can affect our experience of it.
Our hearts cannot change His love, but they can ignore it, reject it, or limit it. The most powerful thing in the world is His great love, which transforms us into His image. But if our hearts are closed, if they are not ready and willing, He does not force.
That is why we have the table every Lord’s Day. He says, “Remember,” because He knows we forget. But our forgetting does not affect His love for us. He is always there, every day. He says, “Come and remember Me.”
Praise God for that. May our hearts become more and more open to receive the love of Christ and allow it to work within us.
When we speak about the love of Christ and ask what it is, it can sound elementary. Children sing, “Jesus loves me.” But I want to pop your bubble: “Jesus Loves Me” is not merely a children’s song.
“Jesus Loves Me” is a song for all believers. Fortunately, it is easy for children to learn, and it is one of the first songs we learn. But we do not want to limit it to children.
If we could see how fundamental and essential it is. I also remember Brother Kong saying that when you try to define the love of Christ, you confine it. You can describe it, but you cannot fully define it.
When you look through the Gospels, you see His life. You see His love lived out.
As I mentioned earlier, I shared some of this last December—only a year ago, so I expect all of you to remember. I shared a couple of aspects of this before, and I am going to take a brief review.
Before that review, I want to mention the way Brother Wuest translates 2 Corinthians 5:14. If you do not have a Wuest Bible, Steve is the biggest advocate and salesperson for Wuest. Steve mentions Wuest, and we sell out again. But it is a wonderful translation.
Sometimes Wuest translates in a way that is almost a commentary because he expands the meaning. I appreciate the way he translates 2 Corinthians 5:14, because I think he captures its full essence:
For the love of Christ, which Christ has for me, presses on me from all sides, holding me to one end and prohibiting me from considering any other, wrapping itself around me in tenderness and giving me an impelling motive, having brought me to the conclusion that One died for all; therefore, all died.
There is a love pressing on us from all sides. We are surrounded by His love. It holds us to one end, to one purpose.
There is one goal, one end in view: His heart and His purpose. He desires to conform us to His image and prepare the bride. It is all done with one end in view.
That love prohibits us from considering any other love. When we are really in love with something, it sets boundaries for us. We say, “No, I am not going to do that, because I know that would be harmful.”
His love wraps itself around us in tenderness. The arms of God love us and give us an impelling motive. His love motivates us to press on in Him and to know Him more and more.
We have tasted and seen, but that makes us more hungry. His love impels us to move forward.
Paul was brought to a conclusion. This is similar to what Kenny mentioned in Romans 8. Paul saw the love of Christ, concluded the matter, and continued:
One died for all; therefore all died.
The love of Christ has two aspects. It has a restraining aspect—the meaning carried in the word constraining: “Not I, but Christ.” It also has a governing aspect. It is the power that governs us in life:
For to me to live is Christ.
At the same time, His love restrains and governs. It pushes us onward.
Previously, when I shared on the love of Christ, I was able to cover the first two aspects: security and sufficiency. The phrase “the love of Christ” is used three times in Scripture in these three books: Romans, 2 Corinthians, and Ephesians.
In Romans, we see the security of the love of Christ. In 2 Corinthians, we see its sufficiency. In Ephesians, we see its supremacy. I mainly want to focus on supremacy today, but let me briefly refresh our memories concerning security.
In Romans 8:35, Paul asks:
Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?
Shall tribulation, or anguish, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?
Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ. There is security there.
Paul says again in Romans 8:38 that he is persuaded, or convinced, that nothing will be able to separate him from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
The word persuaded or convinced means to bring about a change through the influence of proven experience. Paul came through a process and arrived at a settled conclusion.
The things Paul spoke about—tribulation, strife, life, death, hunger, persecution, shipwrecks, perils—were not theories. He was not writing merely to be poetic. They were actual experiences in his life.
Because of those actual experiences, he was able to say, “Nothing can separate me from the love of Christ.” He knew the truth of it, and then, as he went through the reality and experience of it, it became real in his heart and life.
By going the way of the cross, it became settled. Nothing can separate me from the love of Christ.
Do we know this security in these days? The whole world is shaking. A sister commented in our prayer group on Wednesday night that perhaps, in one way, we are already in World War III because the whole world is at war.
Everything is shaking. The enemy is trying to rob us of our security in Him. We can be tossed here and there, but do we know this security through everything in life?
In 2 Corinthians, as in the verse we have been reading, we see the sufficiency of the love of Christ. In Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians, the words sufficient and adequate are key words, depending on your translation.
In every circumstance and situation, His love is sufficient.
This reminds me of a story Spurgeon tells. I have told it before, so see how your memory serves you. Spurgeon did not look anything like Philip. Spurgeon looked more like Mac.
Spurgeon was obese, troubled by gout, and had a horrible diet—but he loved to eat. One day after church, after finishing his sermon, he went home with a farmer. The farmer’s wife prepared a good meal.
Farmers’ wives prepare the best meals because they use lard, fatback, and lard in everything. It is delicious—horrible for you, but great tasting.
Spurgeon had a good meal and a wonderful dessert. Then he went outside to walk around a little. He looked up at the farmer’s barn and saw a weather vane at the top with something written on it.
Spurgeon asked, “What is that written on the weather vane?” The farmer said, “It says, ‘God is love.’”
Spurgeon reared up, in a rather judgmental way, and said, “How dare you put God’s love on a weather vane? That should be in your house over your mantle: ‘God is love.’”
But the farmer held his own, with meekness. He said, “Well, that reminds me that whichever way the wind is blowing, God is love.”
On warm, beautiful days, God is love. In the fiery winds of winter, God is love. Whichever way the winds of life are blowing, God loves us, and He is sufficient to carry us through those situations.
Now I want to come to what is especially on my heart today: the supremacy of the love of Christ. This is seen in Ephesians 3:19, the third place where the phrase “the love of Christ” is used.
And to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled unto all the fullness of God.
We are to know this in our hearts and in reality. Paul had already prayed that the eyes of our hearts would be enlightened, so that we might know the riches revealed there. We are to know the love of Christ in reality.
What is the supreme manifestation of His love? It brings us right back to Calvary. The greatest and most supreme way we see His love is at Calvary.
Nothing can separate us from the love of Christ because of what He did at Calvary. His love is always sufficient. The problem is not the love of Christ; the problem is our hearts—not really coming into it because we love ourselves too much.
In Ephesians 5:2, we see that Christ loved us and gave Himself for us. He gave Himself for each and every one of us.
Walk in love, even as Christ also loved you, and gave Himself up for us.
Then in Ephesians 5:25, we see that He did not do it merely for individuals:
Christ also loved the church, and gave Himself up for it.
There is no greater love than laying down one’s life. It is beyond the individual; it is for the church, for God’s heart, and for God’s purpose. There was an end in view for which He was willing to do everything.
Everything Christ did had that end in view. That is why Paul wrote that the love of Christ has one end and one purpose. That is what He is after. He is working in our hearts and lives.
He is not simply trying to make us so-called better Christians. He is not merely making us more godly, though that is part of it. He is preparing us for what lies ahead and for His call upon our lives.
His great love is the key to the revelation of God’s heart and purpose. It is a key to understanding His purpose.
We can hear about His purpose. We can hear about Christ, the church, the kingdom, and the bride. But the key to entering into the reality of these things is the love of Christ coming in and becoming real.
As the Lord enlightens the eyes of our hearts, we begin to see from His perspective. I love how Paul says this in Ephesians 1: it is the eyes of our hearts.
In many ways, our physical eyes relate more to the mind, because they see things naturally. But to see with the eyes of our hearts changes our perspective. We see things from His perspective; we see the spiritual reality.
This is what He is after.
In Ephesians, Paul uses the word agape, whether as a noun or verb, more than in any other letter he writes. When we first think about which letter uses the word love most, we might think of 1 Corinthians.
But Paul uses it more in Ephesians—perhaps twenty-four times in Ephesians and twenty-two times in 1 Corinthians. Do not hold me to those numbers; I am not a numbers guy.
The abundance of love in Ephesians shows the connection between the love of God, the love of Christ, and God’s eternal purpose. If you remove that love from His purpose, all you have is dogma—a teaching, mental comprehension, and truth without life.
The heart itself speaks of love. When we say someone is heartless, we mean they do not have love; they do not care about anybody. When someone has a big heart, we mean they love everybody.
The very nature of the heart speaks of love. Throughout the letter to the Ephesians, we see the love of Christ coming in, meeting us, and encouraging us.
I am not going to lead you through all the uses of agape in Ephesians, but we can see how it is used in relation to God’s heart and purpose.
In Ephesians 1:4-5, we read:
In love having foreordained us unto adoption as sons through Jesus Christ unto Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will.
What was the basis for calling us into sonship and bringing us into what He desired before the foundation of the world? It was love. Love motivated Him.
That same love motivates us. It enables us to press on—not merely to know that we have been predestined, but to enter into all that He has brought us into. He has created us in Him for good works, that we might be His testimony and His glory.
Praise God for that. We see the vastness and necessity of allowing the love of Christ to work so fully and genuinely within our lives.
Again, His coworker is the Holy Spirit.
In Ephesians 2, we have one of John’s favorite phrases: “But God.” John is Mr. “But God.”
But God, being rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us,
even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace have ye been saved.
His great love with which He loved us is the motivation. He made us alive together with Christ, and it does not stop there.
He raised us with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. In spiritual reality, we are seated with Christ in the heavenlies. We are here right now, but spiritually we are seated with Him.
Do we know that? You cannot fully comprehend it. If you think you understand it, you probably do not. Sorry to pop your bubble.
We can know about it. We can understand the teaching, but to fully comprehend all of that is beyond our natural minds. He uses words to help us understand it, because that is the great work He has done.
Again, it is all with purpose in view. Ephesians 2:7 says:
That in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.
As He accomplishes all things and sums all things up in Christ, as the bride makes herself ready, that is the display of the surpassing riches of His grace that came out of His love.
May this impact us so that we hunger and say, “Lord, I want to know more of this love of Christ—not merely the phrase or hearing about it, but the reality of it, that it might motivate us and carry us onward.”
In Ephesians 4, we read:
From whom all the body fitly framed and knit together through that which every joint supplieth, according to the working in due measure of each several part, maketh the increase of the body unto the building up of itself in love.
This refers to the whole body—all believers, regardless of where they meet, what denomination they are in, or even whether they are walking with the Lord at this moment. If someone has turned their back on the Lord, He has not turned His back on them.
When we are born again, every one of us is a living stone because we have His life within us. The issue is not whether we are living stones; the issue is whether we are functioning living stones.
Every believer who is born again has His life within and is a living stone. Is that life being lived out? Are we functioning as living stones, or are we simply sitting there, doing our own thing, perhaps even turning our backs on Him?
The whole body, fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, causes the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love.
Love is what builds the body of Christ. The love of Christ is doing this great work of building us together. Praise God for that, brothers and sisters.
It is not merely our knowledge of Him, though that is important. It is not merely our actions. It is His love that is the motivation for building up the body of Christ, and that love will be manifested in our actions.
Our actions are the fruit of His love. We love not merely in word, but in deed. Deed is the fruit of the word becoming real within us and being lived out. Praise God for that.
In Ephesians 3:17-19, Paul prays:
That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; to the end that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,
may be strong to apprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth,
and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled unto all the fullness of God.
There is the heart again. We are rooted and grounded in love. The foundation of our very life is the love of Christ. This is where He works—roots going deep and a foundation firmly established.
We are to comprehend with all the saints the breadth, length, height, and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that we may be filled up to all the fullness of God.
Notice that Paul speaks of comprehending this with all the saints. We can be so self-centered. We want to comprehend, and that is wonderful, but there is more: we comprehend with all the saints.
That is what I love when saints get together and have fellowship. I appreciate the young guys—and you will always be the young guys, no matter how old you get. Sorry, you have to live with that.
The young guys and gals have Bible studies and fellowship all over the internet because they desire to know more and more. They desire to comprehend with all the saints who God is, what He is doing, and the height, breadth, length, and depth of His love, purpose, and heart.
They desire to be strengthened and encouraged to press on.
The love of Christ is the supreme love that surpasses all things. We want to come into it so that we may be filled up to all the fullness of God.
What a phrase. Ephesians contains certain phrases that cause us to think, as we look around, “This will never happen.”
But by faith, think about this: one day there will be a church without spot or wrinkle. That is beyond our comprehension because we see so much with our own eyes. We know ourselves, and we know our brothers and sisters.
But praise God, in reality, that work is going on and is being done. Praise God.
We may be filled up unto all the fullness of God. Actually, we have already been filled with the fullness of God, because who is the fullness of God but Christ? And we have Christ in us.
That is our hope of glory. When we were saved, we did not receive merely a little bit of Christ. We received Christ in us. Each one of us has Christ in us.
As we allow the cross to work, as we allow the love of Christ to constrain us, and as we allow the Holy Spirit to move, we enter into the experience of more and more of that fullness.
The fullness of God Paul speaks of here can only be experienced with all the saints. That is where the phrase begins: with all the saints.
Each of us has a fullness of Christ within us, but together we can enter into and enjoy the fullness of God with all the saints. Praise God for that, brothers and sisters. That is the supreme love.
I simply wanted to touch this morning on how vital the love of Christ is in these last days. May the Lord work within our hearts and lives so that we do not consider it merely elementary.
May we allow the love of Christ to remain fervent within us. And if it has grown cold, praise God—that is only one step away. We can repent, and the fire comes right back on.
Sometimes that fire is like smoldering embers. If you are camping and have smoldering embers, one little breath can make the flame rise up again.
I was going to compare it to instant gas fires in fireplaces, but that is not real fire. But with smoldering embers, a breeze comes along, you breathe upon it, and the breath of life comes.
Suddenly, the flames come up, and they grow. They continue more and more. We want to stay fervent like that.
We want to allow the love of Christ to control us. That simple phrase, “Not I, but Christ,” should govern our lives and lead us into all that He has for us.
We want to experience the reality of the security, sufficiency, and supremacy of the love of Christ. It is an absolute necessity in these days.
Everything that can be shaken will be shaken, but the things that remain will remain. The love of Christ will remain.
As we allow that love to hold us, we can go all the way to the end. May we pray that the cross would bring us into the spiritual reality of God’s heart and purpose.
This is so vital in these days. We hear much about many other things, but we do not want to neglect the cross or the working of the Holy Spirit in these last days.
We must see the absolute necessity of comprehending the love of Christ with all the saints. That is His heart. That is His purpose.
It is not merely so that we would be individuals knowing Him. Praise God that we can know Him individually. But there is a fullness that He wants us to enter: the love of Christ with all the saints.
“All” is a very inclusive word. There is a breadth, width, height, and depth to it. All the saints—not merely some, not merely the ones we like, not merely those who believe exactly what we believe or hold the understanding that we hold.
All the saints. That is where the fullness of Christ is seen. That is a testimony.
Sadly, in the world today, that testimony has been weakened because it is not seen through all the saints. It is seen only through some.
But praise God, there are remnants—those scattered here and there who are standing for His testimony. We want to be faithful where He has placed us to stand.
We are here for all the saints, that the love of Christ might be seen in us and shown forth in our lives, not merely in word.
It is easy to stand up here and say, “Oh yes, we are one with all the saints.” Then you leave and meet one, and you say, “Oh, you mean him too? Her? Wait a minute.”
But no, it is all the saints. We have Christ; there is our common bond.
Let me be clear: this does not mean that we embrace all of another believer’s teaching or practices. But we can embrace the life of Christ in any believer. That is the connection we have.
May this necessity govern our hearts and lives. May we allow the love of Christ to be revealed within our hearts in a fuller and greater way, because this is one of the ways He prepares us and hastens His return.
May we be those who seek Him, are available to Him, and call out to Him.
Lord, we do want to thank You for the magnificence of Your great love. Lord, whenever we touch upon it, we automatically see that, like Amy Carmichael, we are only touching the edges of Your ways.
There is more to this than we have been able even to touch today. But we want to have hearts that are available to You, that You would be able to work and reveal within us the necessity of the love of Christ.
We recognize the necessity of the cross and the necessity of the Holy Spirit truly working within us to make us a people whose love does not wax cold, a people who remain in first love.
This is our desire, Lord. Lord, we recognize our limitations and failures. But we are thankful that we do not have to focus upon our weaknesses and failures.
Just as we did around Your table, we can focus upon You, because You are the One who first loved us. You are the One who paid that great price so that we could be called children of the living God.
So we are looking to You, Lord, in a mighty way, to work within our hearts and within our lives. In Thy name we pray. Amen.