5 THINGS: Love according to the Word - September 21, 2025
INTRODUCTION
Surgery and the things you think about
What if I don’t make it?
What should I tell my loved ones?
Will I ever feel better?
Love - staying up all night with you kid for the 5th night in a row, giving your friend your last dollar, being at your loved ones bedside at the hospital
Love is one of the most powerful emotions we have. The actress Joan Crawford once said “Love is a fire but whether it warms your heart or burns your house down, you can never tell!”
Love can motivate, give pleasure, hurt even destroy. It can make us do bold, even stupid things.
During the 17th century, Oliver Cromwell, sentenced a soldier to be shot for his crimes. The execution was to take place at the ringing of the evening curfew bell. However, the bell did not sound. The soldier’s fiancé had climbed into the belfry and clung to the great clapper of the bell to prevent it from striking. When she was summoned by Cromwell to account for her actions, she wept as she showed him her bruised and bleeding hands. Cromwell’s heart was touched and he said, "Your lover shall live because of your sacrifice. Curfew shall not ring tonight!"
Roger Whipp, Sermon Central, Dec 31, 2014.
Love seems to be missing in our world today. Love as sacrifice is rarely uplifted. There is love for those who agree with you or for those who do things for you. But is that love?
In this sermon series, I will be sharing with you thoughts on these issues.
The love of God - September 14, 2025
Love according to the Word
Love in the Kingdom
Love and righteousness
Love yourself
1 John 4:8 NIV
“Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”
1 John 4:8 NIV
Let us pray.
1. LOVE GOD
Agape love, the highest form of love, is referenced in the New Testament 137 times as a verb and 116 times as a noun.
Charles Mallory, Sermon Central, February 9, 2001.
A. Love is a command, not a suggestion.
Deuteronomy 6:5 NIV
“Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.”
Deuteronomy 6:5 NIV
B. Love starts with God.
“The love of God is one of the great realities of the universe, a pillar upon which the hope of the world rests. But it is a personal, intimate thing too. God does not love populations, He loves people. He loves not masses, but men.”
A. W. Tozer
1 John 4:7-12 NIV
“Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.”
1 John 4:7-12 NIV
C. God is love.
1 John 4:16 NIV
“And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.”
1 John 4:16 NIV
Meister Eckhart, the German theologian form the 14th century, says we are looking for something along with God, and behaving exactly as if we were making of God a candle to look for something. When we find the things we are looking for, we throw the candle away. Whatever we seek along with God is nothing. It does not matter what it is - be it an advantage or a reward or a kind of spirituality or whatever else - we are seeking a ‘nothingness’, and for this reason we find a ’nothingness’.
He also says that some people want to love God in the same way as they love a cow. You love it for the milk and the cheese and for your own profit. So do those who love God for the sake of outward riches or inward consolation. But they do not love God correctly, for they merely love their own advantage.
1. LOVE HIS COMMANDS
A. Love by keeping His commands
John 14:21 NIV
“Whoever has my commands and keeps them is the one who loves me. The one who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I too will love them and show myself to them.””
John 14:21 NIV
I wish I could find out who said,
“It is not said that after keeping Gods commandments, but in keeping them, there is great reward. God has linked these two things together, and no man can separate themobedience and peace.”
Anonymous
B. Love as fulfillment of His commands
2 John 1:6 NIV
“And this is love: that we walk in obedience to his commands. As you have heard from the beginning, his command is that you walk in love.”
2 John 1:6 NIV
C. Commands as demonstration of love
John 14:15 NIV
““If you love me, keep my commands.”
John 14:15 NIV
1. LOVE OTHERS
A. Love one another
1 Thessalonians 3:12 NIV
“May the Lord make your love increase and overflow for each other and for everyone else, just as ours does for you.”
1 Thessalonians 3:12 NIV
John 13:34-35 NIV
““A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.””
John 13:34-35 NIV
B. Love by doing
In his book, Dad, The Family Coach, Dave Simmons tells of an act of sacrificial love that occurred in a shopping mall. One day he took his eight year old Helen and five year old Brandon to the Cloverdale Mall. He needed to buy some tools in Sears.
When they pulled into the mall parking lot, there was a big sign that said, "Petting Zoo." Immediately the kids jumped up and asked, "Can we go, Daddy? Can we go? Please." Seeing that it would be not trouble at all, and concluding that it might even make his trip quicker, Dave said, "Sure," and handed both his kids a quarter. They bolted away as he headed for Sears.
A few minutes later he was making his way down the aisle when he spotted Helen slowly walking up behind him. She looked up at him and said, "Well, Daddy, it cost fifty cents. So, I gave Brandon my quarter." then she said the most beautiful thing of all. She repeated their family motto, "Love is action!"
What do you think he did? Not what you might think. Dave finished his shopping and then took Helen back to the petting zoo. They stood by the fence watching Brandon go crazy petting and feeding the animals. Helen stood with her hands and her chin resting on the fence just watching. Dave felt fifty cents in his pocket, almost burning a hole, but he never offered it, and she never asked for it. Helen was following through with the lesson.
Love is not just action. Love is sacrificial action. Love always pays a price. Love always costs something. Love is expensive. When you love, benefits accrue to another’s account. Love is for you, not for me. Love gives; it doesn’t grab.
1 John 3:17 NIV
“If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?”
1 John 3:17 NIV
C. Love by forgiving
Matthew 5:43-48 NIV
““You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
Matthew 5:43-48 NIV
Proverbs 10:12 NIV
“Hatred stirs up conflict, but love covers over all wrongs.”
Proverbs 10:12 NIV
Leviticus 19:18 NIV
“ Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.”
Leviticus 19:18 NIV
CONCLUSION
Several years ago, John MacArthur had the opportunity to spend several days traveling with the well-known gospel musicians, Bill and Gloria Gaither. At one point, he asked Bill what, in his estimation, were the greatest Christian lyrics ever written, aside from the inspired Psalms. Without hesitation, Gaither began quoting the words from F. M. Lehman’s “The Love of God”:
The love of God is greater far
Than tongue or pen can ever tell;
It goes beyond the highest star,
And reaches to the lowest hell.
The guilty pair, bowed down with care,
God gave His Son to win;
His erring child He reconciled,
And pardoned from his sin.
When hoary time shall pass away,
And earthly thrones and kingdoms fall,
When men who here refuse to pray,
On rocks and hills and mountains call,
God’s love so sure, shall still endure,
All measureless and strong;
Redeeming grace to Adam’s race—
The saints’ and angels’ song.
Could we with ink the ocean fill,
And were the skies of parchment made,
Were every stalk on earth a quill,
And every man a scribe by trade,
To write the love of God above
Would drain the ocean dry.
Nor could the scroll contain the whole,
Though stretched from sky to sky.
O love of God, how rich and pure!
How measureless and strong!
It shall forevermore endure—
The saints’ and angels’ song.
Dr. Larry Petton, Sermon Central, June 12, 2023.
The Scriptures commend us to love God, love His commands, and love others. As we leave this place, let us love this week.
INVITATION
It is our custom to offer an "invitation" following the preaching of the Word. You may want to follow Jesus. You may want to proclaim your faith. You may want to repent (stop doing ungodly things and start doing Godly things). Perhaps you want to be baptized for the forgiveness of your sins and receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Possibly, if you have already responded to God’s call in these ways, you would like to become a member of Kenwood Church. If you have been moved by the Holy Spirit to make a decision in your life, you can come forward now. If you would like, I would be honored to speak with you following the service about what God is doing in your life.
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