The Love of Christ Compels

Well, good evening. It's good to see you this evening. My wife informed me after church today that I had this little microphone thingy all twisted on my ear the morning and looked like a pirate. Arrgh. I said it looked like a dog's bent ear. I knew it felt crazy. And I kept messing with it and I thought, oh, I'm just going to let it go. But I didn't know it was that drastic. So hopefully I've got it. Where's my wife? Dear, is it fine now? Good. All right. Thank you.

Well, thank you. See, there's the true test, see. You know, whether they're distracted, if you guys were really focused in on what God was trying to show you. And if you were being obedient, then that wouldn't have mattered. So it must not happen. All right. Very good.

Because nobody, nobody else said anything about it. And I figured if anybody had seen it, they were, where's, yeah. You know, somebody would have come up and fixed it for me.

We just laughed when we got it. Is that? Yeah. I just took my glasses off. Well, I noticed, I noticed Tom sitting over there. He was going like this because he did. He evidently didn't want to look.

So anyway. All right. We got it fixed up. And you've got the thing fixed tonight. Good job, guys. Yeah. All right.

Yeah. Again, that's the kind of doctor that don't do nobody no good, as the guy said. Amen. Yeah. All right. I'm not going to do, per se, the counterculture thing, except I am going to go back to something that I had made comment about a couple of weeks ago in that session that I thought would be good for us just to kind of look at tonight.

You know, I don't know if you've noticed or not in the sessions and particularly in the discussion times that, you know, and they've been good discussions and good comments.

I've noticed, however, that in a lot of that, we just seem to have the idea of this is what we need to do.

All right. This is how we need to approach this and that type of thing. And the thought came to me, OK, that's good and that's right. But how do we make ourselves do that?

How do we make ourselves do that? You ever tried to do that? Yeah. Yeah. I'm going to do something for God. I know I'm supposed to do that, so I'm just going to do it. And you go out there and it doesn't take much to get you to the point that you really don't want to do it or you find yourself not even attempting to do that.

I want to address something that will help us in that this evening in a comment that I made a couple of weeks ago. But first, I want to start by asking you questions. I know the recording this. Do you have the microphone handy? Anybody?

All right, Dan. Dan's ready. OK. I want you to think just a moment about the love of Christ. When you think of the love of Christ, what do you think about?

What do you think about when you consider the love of Christ? Just my first thought is salvation.

OK. All right. What else? It's grace. OK. Beyond comprehension.

OK. Yes. No. Yeah. Nobody can take that away from us or take us out of the love of Christ. Tremendous. Yeah. Yeah. Anything else?

I'm sorry? Sacrifice. OK. Not only has my ear got bent, it made it where I couldn't hear. Yeah. What does Christ will take?

I mean, it's the uncomprehend. Can you think about what Christ? OK. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Anyone else?

Yes. We love the father of the man. OK. Good. Good. Anything else? Grace. Yes.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, that term grace, the Greek word used, or translated as grace, is a word that talks about a favor generally done to a friend.

In the New Testament sense, the grace of God speaks of something, a kindness done to someone who is an enemy with no expectation of recompense.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that idea of grace, the grace of God, poured out upon us while we were yet enemies of the cross is tremendous truth.

Anything else? He gave me mercy. Okay. All right. Good. Anything else?

All right. Good comments. We can just quick go home. All right. 2 Corinthians chapter 5. Turn there with me, if you will. 2 Corinthians chapter 5.

Paul, in the earlier part of that chapter, talks about the commendation, you know, whether he's not really commending himself again. In the second letter to the people of Corinth, some have said he was a madman.

He said, whether I'm mad or not, God knows. But whatever God does in me is for your benefit. And then he makes a comment here in verse number 11.

No, excuse me, verse number 14. He said, for the love of Christ constraineth me, or constraineth us, because we thus judge that if one died for all, then we're all dead.

The love of Christ constraineth us. You know, I was thinking in the counterculture studies, whether it be the culture, the wealth, sexuality, human life, race, faith, whatever the topic may be.

The thing that I think is imperative for us to get a hold of in order to confront these things, to embrace those, whatever we do with those topics, is the idea of what Paul shows us here.

Having the consideration of what the true love of Christ is. I'm pretty sure I forget who it was that mentioned the degree of that love.

When we stop and think about just exactly what he did to reflect that love for us, or in that love that he has for us. The love of Christ constrains us.

John 3.16, of course, the popular passage that we all know by heart, from being a little kid in Sunday school, God so loved the world.

And I think that term, so loved, speaks volumes to us. He's so loved. When you stop and consider that again, Paul says in the book of Ephesians, it's the fact that we were, he quickened us, made us alive, when we were dead in the realm of trespasses and sins.

You know, we were not, really, not lovable in any other means, in any other way, other than through the love of Christ. Because we were by nature the children of wrath, because of the nature of sin that dwells within us.

Paul says he's quickened us. When we were in that state of being lost, in trespass, in the realm of trespasses and sins, controlled our lives and minds and hearts, controlled by the God of this world, by the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience, that's who we were.

Now, qualify that. That's who we were in our nature. All right? You're looking at a guy, you're looking at a guy that was just a good kid.

Amen? Nobody here knew me when I was young. Ha, ha, ha. Yeah. Well, it's the old saying, never smoked, drink, spit, whittled, and never went with the girls that did.

Yeah. Seriously, I was a good kid. I always, I always had a fear. My dad, I respected my dad. I always had a fear of doing something that would bring reproach to him or that would, that would disappoint him about me.

So I tried my dead level best as a kid not to disappoint my dad. So I was a good, moral, upstanding kid, had a good upbringing in that, not necessarily a spiritual upbringing, but dad knew what was right, dad knew what was wrong, taught us that.

All right? And so, and so, it came to the point in time, though, when God did show me in reality, it doesn't make a difference how good I was, within me lies that nature of sin that is just despicable.

All right? Separates me from the holiness of God because of what I am. So it's the love of Christ, then, when we stop and think about that.

When Jesus gave his life, he gave it, what was it, the book of Hebrews speaks about, you know, comparing the animal sacrifices to the sacrifice of Christ, speaks something to the effect, he who, through the eternal spirit, offered himself, that idea of the eternal spirit, was the idea that, unlike the cattle, Jesus had a free will in the matter.

All right? His will was to follow the will of the Father, which for him was to die as the Lamb of God for the sacrifice of the world. Animal sacrifices could not do that.

And it was while we were in the midst of trespasses and sins that he did that. While we were yet enemies, as the book of Romans says, we, he died for us.

Now, what did that, what did that love of Christ do for the Apostle Paul? Back in 2 Corinthians chapter 5.

For the love of Christ constraineth us. That word constraineth is an interesting word. You know, we would think sometimes we would probably get the idea that that is the idea of a motivating factor.

It's the love of Christ for us. When we consider that, that it motivates us. But that's not what the word means here. You've driven down the highway, you do that down tuxedo now.

Drive down tuxedo, and all of a sudden what happens? Those barriers are up there and those cones pull you over to one side. One narrow lane.

The idea of constraining that, that word constraineth us, has that meaning to it here. It's the idea of being confined to a narrow walled road where you can't see anything to the right or anything to the left.

You just have to look straight ahead and see what's down the end of the road as far as you can. So Paul is saying here, the love of Christ has focused, has narrowed my focus, all right, to one thing.

And then he gives us the idea of what that thing is. He says, because we have judged, in other words, we have come to a deep, settled conclusion about something here.

And the deep, settled conclusion is that when Christ died, He died for all. And if He died for all, then all were dead.

You go back to Romans chapter 6. Go back there just a moment and we'll check out and remember what exactly He's talking about here. In Romans chapter 6, I love the passage because it really gives us, it really gives us impetus here to know how to live a life of righteousness before God.

And of course, the question is raised in Paul's day here. He says in verse 1 of chapter 6, what shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?

And of course, the idea was where sin abounds, grace much more abounds. So it sounds like a good idea, doesn't it? If we want more and more grace, let's just sin more and more.

What fun we could have. Amen? Sin and then just get a bunch of, a fresh dose of grace just added upon us. So that was the question and some were raising, you know, and the idea that was floating around.

Paul said, shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? And of course, he said, God forbid. You know, God forbid that we even entertained that thought.

And there's a reason for that. And it's not just the mindset of saying, all right, we won't sin because we're not supposed to. It's a picture of what Christ has done in our life.

All right? Look what he says here. Look what he says. How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?

Realize we're a bunch of dead people. Amen? Yeah. We died to sin. He goes on and explains that to us. Know ye not that so many of us as we're baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?

Therefore, we are buried with him by baptism into death that like us, Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father. Even so, we should walk in the newness of life.

For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection. Look at verse 6. Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed that, or annulled is the idea, that henceforth we should not serve sin.

Again, Paul is saying this. We've come to this conclusion, and here's what we know. We know for a subtle fact that our old man, everything we were in the old Adam, has been crucified with Christ.

Everything, past, present, and future. He nailed it to his cross with him. We died with him when he died on Calvary's cross.

Because that's what he did when he became the sin of the world. nailed our sin to the cross with himself. Knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Christ, that this body of sin might be annulled, so that henceforth we should not serve sin.

For he that is dead is freed from sin. Now that's a confusing statement, isn't it? How many of here have lived a day that you've never sinned? Good question would be, if we stayed in bed 24 hours a day, would we sin?

Okay. Even if it's just in the mind, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. but what he's saying is this, the potential for us is this, when Christ died for us, he died to the extent that he takes us in the old man, nails it to his cross, so that then sin is not the motivating factor of our lives.

But the motivating factor of our life becomes service to Christ, or living in the will of God. He that is dead is free from sin. Now if we be dead with Christ, we believe that we shall also live with him.

Knowing that Christ being raised from the dead dies no more, death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died under sin once, but in that he liveth, he liveth under God.

Tremendous picture here. I know some people that have the idea that, all right, I can't live a life without sin some way and somehow some form, and so every day then I've got to die to sin.

How many times did Jesus die? One time. If we died with him, if he took the old man and nailed it to his cross, he did that one time.

There's no need to go back to him and say, Lord, nail my old man to the cross again. No, he's already done that. He's done it one time. So that tells me, in reality, we don't have the right.

Amen? We don't have the right to be motivated in our life to sin, because he's already nailed that to the cross of Calvary when he died.

Now, he takes it further. Verse 11. Well, go back to verse 10. For in that he died, he died unto sin once, but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God.

Now, I like this. He doesn't say he lives only once. All right? He just continues to live, and he lives unto God. Likewise, reckon, place it to your account, reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Christ Jesus our Lord.

So let not sin then, or therefore reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in the lust thereof, neither yield, now there's the idea, neither present, as you present an offering, neither present yourselves, your members, as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but present yourselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God.

I like that picture. Present. Just, you know, Romans 12, 1, to beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercy of God, that you present your bodies the living sacrifice.

It's the same idea of bringing the Old Testament sacrifices up to the brazen altar, presenting them to the high priest type thing. Present your members as instruments of righteousness.

We have nothing of the old man to present to God. Nothing. Nothing. It's all flesh. Besides that, Christ nailed it to his cross.

But we have our life to present to the Lord as instruments of righteousness. God, here I am.

Take me. Use me to whatever extent you want. Now, that's what Paul speaks of back over in 2 Corinthians chapter 5.

verse 1. He reckons, comes to the conclusion, that if he died for all, then we're all dead, and that he died for all, that they that live should not live unto them, or should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them and rose again.

old man wants us to live to ourselves and for ourselves. But Paul is saying here, he's already concluded in the fact that because Christ died, everyone was dead, those that appropriate that salvation to their lives live their life, not unto sin, but unto God, unto the one that gave himself for them.

And the idea, picture of this is good. Again, it's not the idea, okay, I'm saved. God saved me through the blood of Christ.

So, I'm duty bound, and I will then attempt to do everything I can to live unto him. That's not the idea here.

The idea is a natural thing. Those that have genuinely come to faith in Christ find that they live unto the one that died for them.

All right? Boy, you know what a good thing for us to do is. And I understand life is filled with clutter.

Amen? It's filled with a lot of stuff. And sometimes that stuff gets in the way. That's why the book of Hebrews says, you know, seeing where compassed about was so great a cloud of witness, let us lay aside the weight and the sin that doth so easily beset us.

You know, the weight, the weight, I characterize the weight as anything that's not in and of itself sin. Because he categorizes two things. Let us lay aside the weight and the sin.

of course it's a picture of the runner. Anything that clutters up the life and hinders us from satisfying the will of God.

Alright? So those things happen and we've got to do that. We've got to clear out the clutter. My wife's good at clearing out the clutter. Amen? How many of you men, how many of you men have wives that like to clear out the clutter?

Well, come on, be honest, guys. Yeah. How many times when they want to clear out the clutter, you find something you didn't want cleared out? Amen? And what is her first question?

Yeah, I said, why do you need it? Do you ever use it? No, but the day may come.

My wife has found out that that's true because in some of my little projects around the house, I dig out some stuff every once in a while that's been stashed away for a long time.

And I would dig it out and use it, and it worked well. Amen? So, men, stick with it. But in our lives, in our lives, we need to clean out the clutter, right?

so we can live unto the one. A natural thing for us to live unto the one that died for us. Now, there's a key to us here, for us here in doing that.

Back over in the book of Ephesians, chapter 3. Let me find it here. Yeah.

Ephesians chapter 3. Look at verse 14.

Paul, just encouraging the believers at Ephesus, and tells them what he prays for as far as they're concerned. For this cause, I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.

of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith, that you being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth and length and depth and height, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fullness of God.

Let me read that to you out of the Amplified. That you may really come to know practically through experience for yourselves the love of Christ, which far surpasses mere knowledge without experience.

picture here is that we're continuing through our lives to come to a further understanding and knowledge of what the love of Christ is.

We see it pictured in his death, love of Christ. But is that the only way we recognize and see the love of Christ?

What are some of the other ways we see the love of Christ? Wes? Yeah.

Yeah, his provision for us, right? His care for us. Through our life's experiences, God just has a way of showing us and reminding us of the love of Christ.

You know, he reflects that in his word to us so that we'll know the fact of it. You know, there's nothing that can separate us from the love of Christ. And he goes through that big long list of possibilities that aren't really possibilities because he said none of these things can separate us from the love of Christ.

And so we have the fact of it there. But by personal experience, daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, whatever it may be, God does some things that remind us of how much he loves us.

Realize that is the work of the Spirit of God within us. Now, as he shows us, as he shows us the love of Christ and we continue to see more and more of that come into a more full knowledge of the love of Christ, what does that in turn do for us?

Or I should say, what does that in turn do to us? that in turn do What does that in to us? Okay, okay, yeah, yeah, we love him more because the Spirit of God energizing our spirit brings us further into that realm of submission to him.

To me, that's the whole key to all of this. It's recognizing the love of Christ, it's experiencing the love of Christ and as we experience the love of Christ, the Spirit of God which energizes our spirit then causes us to see and experience and understand, appreciate, acknowledge, apprehend, get a hold of the love of Christ more and more.

You know, if we don't love Christ more now than we did when we first got saved, then we have not grown in the grace of God. Amen? Yeah.

The more we recognize the love of Christ, the more it becomes natural to serve him. The more we, the more natural it becomes for us to serve him, the more then we are reaching out to others.

Again, go back to 2 Corinthians chapter 5. The love of Christ constrains us. Verse 15 again, that he died for all that they which live should not henceforth!

live unto themselves, but live unto the one, or him, unto him which died for them and rose again. Now look at verse 16. Wherefore, henceforth, in other words, as a result of that, as a result of living for God because of what we've comprehended in the love of Christ, we then know no man after the flesh, yet now henceforth,!

excuse me, yea, though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth know we him no more. I'll say, putting all this together, the thing that's resulted in all of that is that when we see people, we see them differently than we did in the old natural man.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, you see me through the eyes of the old natural man, you see a bald headed guy that just stands up and hollers a lot, amen, yeah, but through spiritual eyes, eyes that are, what should we say, eyes that are conditioned by the work of the spirit of God within us through the love of Christ for us causes us to see people differently, whether it's a sexual thing as far as the counterculture, whether it's dealing with the problems with the sexual attitudes of today, whether it be race, whether it be wealth, culture, whatever it may be, we see these things and approach these things through the eyes, if you will, of Christ.

Now, so he says, I've seen Christ, and the idea here, of course, is before Paul was saved, he said, I saw Christ through the natural eye, but when I got saved, I don't see him that way anymore, see him through spiritual eyes, see him as the one that loves me, gave his life for me, to save me, type thing.

Now, he goes on a little further with it here then. Therefore, if any man be in Christ, if we're in that relationship with God through Christ, in intimate communion and unity with Christ, we are a new creature, all right?

All things passed away, all things, everything have become new. Why? Because we're looking through different eyes. Amen? Looking through different eyes.

I've had a hard time the last whenever, months, year. You know, I've got an iPhone, I've got an iPad, we've got a computer at home sitting on the desk, all this kind of stuff.

But I always enjoyed taking my cup of coffee and my newspaper out on the patio in the morning to read my newspaper.

That morning newspaper kept getting smaller and smaller, the paper thinner and thinner, and then of all things, they send you out of notice that sorry, but we're forced to raise the price of the paper.

What they wanted, they wanted to jack the price up, $30 a month, $2.30 to $33 something a month for the Tulsa world to read what's not become much of a newspaper anymore.

so I'm like the lady on Facebook. I ain't doing it. I ain't doing it. So I stopped and I found that I can take out the E edition of the same newspaper for $5 a month.

Not a bad deal. So now I'm out there on the patio with my iPad, flipping through that thing. And I get to the point where you're reading this story, you just can't wait to read the rest of it, and boom, there's some red lettering that says, in order to read the rest of this story, you have to go to the different news website, newspaper in Oklahoma City, I think it's the Oklahoma or something, and it may require a subscription to it.

So I'm having a hard time looking at things differently through these eyes, amen? Yeah, yeah. But with God, when He saves us, it just transforms us, even in the way we see things.

That's why, that's why, again, we need to be sure that we are on a consistent course of growth, allowing the Spirit of God to control our heart, mind, and lives, so that we can become more and more like Christ in the way we see things.

Yeah, yeah. Used to be, used to be, Calvita and I would be driving in town somewhere, we'd get behind this guy that's really slow, and I looked through his rear window and I could tell, I could tell the guy had a lot of gray hair.

So every once in a while, the natural man would come out, I'd say, come on, Grandpa, get along, Grandpa, and then I told myself, well, one of these days I'm going to be there.

And now I are one. I'm a Grandpa. Now I don't poke along like that. I obey the speed limit, don't poke along, but I am a Grandpa, so I got there, amen?

Amen. Spirit of God has got to enable, we've got to enable the Spirit of God to cause us to grow so that we more and more become like Christ in the way we see things. Now, let's go a little further.

And again, again, that's the key to what we're trying to show here and trying to say, is however we counter culture, the way to counter culture is to let the Spirit of God grow us into maturity, into the image of Christ, so that we can be like He is and respond the way He responds.

And that's what He shows us here. Notice something here that I think is really ideal for us. Now, again, if any man be in Christ, verse 17, he's a new creature, old things passed away, all things become new, and all things are of God who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given us then the ministry of reconciliation, to wit, that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them, and hath committed unto us the word of reconciliation.

Now we then are ambassadors for Christ. the definition of an ambassador is someone that is sent out by a royal to accomplish the purposes of the ambassador.

One definition even goes as far as saying that the ambassador does, I mean, the, yeah, the ambassador does the work of the royal law, just like the royal would do if he were here.

Hmm, yeah. So what does that mean? He's given us the ministry of reconciliation. We are ambassadors for Christ. We are to conduct the work of Christ exactly the same way He would do it if He were here.

Amen? Remember with the old WWJD bracelets, what would Jesus do? It should be more like, how would Jesus do it? Amen?

How would He do it? And that's the thing we, you know, it does us good, and rightfully so, to go to the scriptures and study out the ministry of Jesus and see how He conducted Himself, how He responded to things, what He would say, what He would do, and in certain circumstances with a variety of different people.

But, along with that has to be the idea of us being so in touch with and walking with the Spirit of God so that the Spirit of God, as He inclines our heart to be obedient to what God says, we can naturally do those things that He's called us to do.

Amen? Yeah. It should not be, it should not be, as we mature more and more in the things of God, it should not be a time in us when we feel the inclination of the Spirit of God directing us to do something that we would stop and say, you know, can I really do that?

Or, you know, I don't know if I can do that or not. No. It should be a natural response to the Spirit of God. This is what He says. This is what we're going to do.

Yeah. because we are ambassadors. We've got marching orders. Amen? If you will, we've got a royal edict from the King that needs to be spread, needs to be broadcast to everyone, to everyone.

And so we can do that because God is developing within us spiritual eyesight that stems from our consideration, our recognition, and our getting hold of the love of Christ for us.

Boy, if we could ever really, and I don't know if it's possible or not in human life, earthly life, but if we could ever really, I mean, really grasp a hold of the reality of what it costs, the Lord Jesus.

to die for us. Not for his own sins, but for us. We mentioned, we talked a little bit about this in Sunday school this morning, Mike's class.

You know, when Jesus hung on that cross and said, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

Why? In that moment of despondency and despair, when I need you most, why have you abandoned me?

Notice with me. He said, my God, my God. Picture in the old Levitical law, shows both the Father and the Spirit.

abandoning the Son on the cross of Calvary as he dies and takes on the sins of the world.

Something that he's never experienced from eternity past. in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God. That's literally facing God, face to face, in communion and fellowship, and the Word was God.

I don't know about you, but I still have difficulty fully comprehending that, and more so, comprehending the why of it.

except for the passage that's so familiar, for God so loved the world.

Who is it? Is it John? First John? Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God.

That word manner there is the word means foreign or alien. What foreign or alien kind of love, foreign and alien to the natural man, the Father hath bestowed upon us that he would claim us as his own.

Amen? Yeah. Yeah. That ought to cause us to jump up and click our heels. Amen? So you say, how come you didn't do it?

It's because I'm too old to do it. I'm not in a glorified body yet. Amen? Yeah. All right. Any other thoughts, questions, comments before we dismiss?

I'll let you out just a little bit early. Yes, Wes? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. To try to comprehend that type of love, I think, for us in the natural body is almost impossible. God has told us he has that love so we can rejoice in that.

But yeah. Never forget my late wife and I when I was in the Air Force Station in Louisiana. They were closing the site down and before we got transferred, we wanted to run to New Orleans one time.

and she was pregnant with our first daughter middle of summer and we just wanted to go down there and look around and see what it was all about and so the only parking space we could find was on the street right in front of a fish cannery, fish processing plant.

So we pull in there because it was available, we pull in there and we get out and of course the smell was, you know, you could smell the fish and all of those things being processed.

Here my wife is well pregnant. Yeah. Yeah. And we walked up the sidewalk a little bit and laying right over here, laying right over here, is an old drunk.

I mean, just laying there on the street. Nobody bothering him, just laying there. We go do our thing and we come back, he's still there. Only this time he's awake and he sees us and he starts to approach us.

And my first inclination, I want to protect my wife. Yeah. So I was, I was ready to do that but we did the best we can to avoid him and get in the car for her sake.

But I think to myself, you know, God loves that man just the way that he is.

Amen? Yeah. To society, to society, he's useless. But to God, the son loves him, he died for him.

Yeah. Got to see it through spiritual eyes and do those things that God directs to do by his spirit. Let's pray.

Father, again, we thank you for your love and grace, your goodness, your kindness to us. Father, thank you for loving us. Lord, you know that it's just impossible for us to grasp a hold of the true character and quality of that love you have for us.

Lord, thank you for bringing it down to a human perspective that we can understand so that we can somewhat see that love and understand some of it and rejoice in it because you saved us from what we were to make us what you want us to be.

So, Father, thank you for that tonight. Thank you for the time together in your word and ask, Father, that you enable us then to focus on your love for us, that it may be that thing that narrows our focus to serving you in the capacity you want us to be used.

And we'll thank you for it. In Jesus' name, for his sake we do pray. Amen. Amen.