To know the One Who first loved us

first love

Sunday 05/07/23

Message: To know the One Who first loved us

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To know the One Who first loved us

 We ended last week with the words…

“(18) I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the glorious riches of His inheritance among the saints,  (19)  and what is the immeasurable greatness of His power to us who believe, according to the working of His vast strength.”

“(20)  He demonstrated this power in the Messiah by raising Him from the dead and seating Him at His right hand in the heavens–  (21)  far above every ruler and authority, power and dominion, and every title given, not only in this age but also in the one to come.  (22)  And He put everything under His feet and appointed Him as head over everything for the church,  (23)  which is His body, the fullness of the One Who fills all things in every way.”

Ephesians 2:1-22, 

“(1) And you were dead in your trespasses and sins  (2)  in which you previously walked according to this worldly age, according to the ruler of the atmospheric domain, the spirit now working in the disobedient.”

“(3)  We too all previously lived among them in our fleshly desires, carrying out the inclinations of our flesh and thoughts, and by nature we were children under wrath, as the others were also.”

“(4)  But God, Who is abundant in mercy, because of His great love that He had for us,  (5)  made us alive with the Messiah even though we were dead in trespasses. By grace you are saved!  

In our study of the importance of coming to know Jesus better, in knowledge, experience and intimacy we’ve found how this really is the reason ours is a relationship with God. It isn’t that we lack religion, for religion in the heart of anyone desiring to know and honor God is simply the worship of Him. It includes reverence and awe of God, out of which spring convictions which powerfully influence how we live our lives. It produces actions which would please Him. Religion however contains one more thing and that is true loving devotion. This devotion is NOT just one way.

Our passage here makes the claim that, even though our situation was so grave and our hearts, lives and actions were so demonically base – even though we were spiritually filthy and reveling in it – and in what seems like stark contrast to the anger and wrath these thoughts, actions and situation stirred in God, something even greater was stirred as well.

We are told that while we all were in such a condition, God reconciled us to Him. What was His motive? Love! 

It says, But God, Who is abundant in mercy, BECAUSE OF HIS GREAT LOVE that He had for us,  (5)  made us alive with the Messiah even though we were dead in trespasses. By grace you are saved!” 

I know as humans we all have days like I had yesterday. You’d think with the privilege of one of your opening passages being this one, you’d have a great and easy time of it – in regard to study and preparation. I mean, the great love of God for us… Not a hard sell and what a warm, eternally safe and inviting topic of study – right?

You ever have days when the things that SHOULD matter – don’t. And worse than that, you know it and cannot seem to change it.

As I was trying to prepare for today I was having a bad day. I was having one of those days where I just wasn’t “there”. Nothing was connecting for me, I felt very little desire, I was a little lethargic and I just wasn’t able to get into the mind set necessary for meaningful and productive study.

Anyway, as I was trying to do what was now, “the work of the ministry” in plowing through with some effort, verses which should be joyful and effortless – some verses and songs were swimming around in my mind.
At first I just found them distracting and aggravating, but when I finally slowed down enough to lend them my ear I found answers.

I heard the lyrics to “One of those days” , a song from Chris Rice which I’m having Teri read for us so I can maintain my composure.

Then there was an unsuspected song from one of those insanely talented singer/songwriter Steve Taylor, called “Principled Man”.

Just two stanzas of that song are,

Under a flag

they sword a bond

caught under fire they ran

are you the one

standing your ground?

are you a principled man?

 

Bleeding and hushed

hung between thieves

there the foundation began

are you the one

taking your cross?

are you a principled man?

Then I began to talk it out with God and verses began to come to me. 

Verses like,

“For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son

So that anyone who believes in Him would not perish but have eternal life.”

and

“(9) God’s love was revealed among us in this way: God sent His One and Only Son into the world SO THATwe might live through Him.  (10)  Love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins.  (11)  Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must l one another.”– 1Jn 4:9-11  

1Jn 4:15-19, “(15) Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God–God remains in him and he in God.  (16)  And we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and the one who remains in love remains in God, and God remains in him.  

(17)  In this, love is perfected with us so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; for we are as He is in this world.  (18)  There is no fear in love; instead, perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment. So the one who fears has not reached perfection in love.  (19)  We love because He first loved us.”

And then there is this passage we are looking at today. 

Really, this passage was originally just some verses we needed to read to get to where I wanted to lead us. 

We are and have been talking about knowing Jesus and there are upcoming passages which address this, but THIS right here was the reason we are to come to know Him.

Knowing Him is about love – receiving it and responding to it.

There is, of course, the need to hold God in His true and elevated position of being ALMIGHTY GOD, Creator of all, but there is also the absolute need to know, believe and respond to His love.

I believe the saints of old, grappled with thoughts like this and it is a practice we have lost. 

You see, my day yesterday would not have been what it was if I was not so selfish. I realized as I woke up this morning, that the reason the fog had settled down on me so pervasively was because I was in the swamplands of my emotions yesterday. I didn’t “feel” anything and THAT made it very hard to seek God regarding where we should be going in our times of learning together…and that’s important! If I am doing what I am called to then I am teaching you, and helping you grow into Christ and equipping you for ministry work, but this little obstacle of “ME” – was making that a near impossibility, and perhaps that makes ME part of the teaching today. Don’t be like me or at least do not be like I was yesterday. 

When God was able to address my lethargy and get me to refocus on Him I began to come out of my fog and see how and why all of this matters again.

We need to grasp that there will be a day when we all stand before God and we are going to be both shocked and deeply penetrated with a sense of familiarity all at once. God is NOT Who we’ve always imagined him to be – at least that isn’t all He is. All of the brightness of the sun, and brilliance of colors and thickness of smoke with lightning flashes and a voice that sounds like a mixture of the roar of many waterfalls and thunder and an immediate awareness that you are completely and entirely transparent to Him. You are naked as naked can be and there ain’t a fig leaf in sight. In some ways He will probably look as foreign to us and anything ever could be, and yet much like the distance spanned between His wrath and His love – we will be overcome even more with a sense of being loved and belonging.

It is this entity – that loves us. He has set His love upon us. He WAS infuriated at us and justly so, but even greater than that rage was a love for us. You talk about being inwardly conflicted – and yet it really isn’t a conflict at all. Both are true of Him. All He had to do was remove the offense, clean the stain and renew within these fallen frail creatures a steadfast spirit.

God loves and that is the purpose of our coming to know Him.

Yes knowing God addresses all the known religious requirements revealed in the scriptures, but it is so much more than that and when we lose sight of this everything in life is reduced to shades of gray.

“(6)  He also raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavens, in Christ Jesus,”

No wonder Colossians encourages us that

“if you have been raised with the Messiah, seek what is above, where the Messiah is, seated at the right hand of God.  (2)  Set your minds on what is above, not on what is on the earth.  (3)  For you have died, and your life is hidden with the Messiah in God.  (4)  When the Messiah, Who is your life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory…(9)  Do not lie to one another, since you have put off the old man with his practices  (10)  and have put on the new man, who is being renewed in knowledge according to the image of his Creator.”

Now don’t forget what this means that God raised us up to sit with Christ in heavenly places. He just told us in chapter 1 what it meant – when it happened to Christ.

“(18)  I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened so you may know what is the hope of His calling, what are the glorious riches of His inheritance among the saints,  (19)  and what is the immeasurable greatness of His power to us who believe, according to the working of His vast strength.”

“(20)  He demonstrated this power in the Messiah by raising Him from the dead and seating Him at His right hand in the heavens–  (21)  far above every ruler and authority, power and dominion, and every title given, not only in this age but also in the one to come.  (22)  And He put everything under His feet and appointed Him as head over everything for the church,  (23)  which is His body, the fullness of the One Who fills all things in every way.”

Eph. 2…

He raised us with Christ and seated us together with Him so that… 

“(7)  so that in the coming ages He might display the immeasurable riches of His grace in His kindness to us in Christ Jesus.  

(8)  For by grace you are saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is God’s gift–  (9)  not from works, so that no one can boast.  

(10)  For we are His creation–created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time so that we should walk in them.  

(11)  So then, remember that at one time you were Gentiles in the flesh–called “the uncircumcised” by those called “the circumcised,” done by hand in the flesh.  

(12)  At that time you were without the Messiah, excluded from the citizenship of Israel, and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, with no hope and without God in the world.  

(13)  BUT NOW in Christ Jesus, you who were far away have been brought near by the blood of the Messiah.  

(14)  For He is our peace, Who made both groups one and tore down the dividing wall of hostility. 

In His flesh,  (15)  He did away with the law of the commandments in regulations, so that He might create in Himself one new man from the two, resulting in peace.  

(16)  He did this so that He might reconcile both to God in one body through the cross and put the hostility to death by it.  

(17)  When Christ came, He proclaimed the good news of peace to you who were far away and peace to those who were near.  

(18)  For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.  

(19)  So then you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints, and members of God’s household,  (20)  built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus Himself as the cornerstone.  

(21)  The whole building is being fitted together in Him and is growing into a holy sanctuary in the Lord,  (22)  in Whom you also are being built together for God’s dwelling in the Spirit.”

This all connects with what we are going to be reading in Ezekiel with the new temple this next Wednesday.

Blessings!

Hi my name is Mark and though I am opposed to titles, I am currently the only Pastor (shepherd/elder) serving our assembly right now.

I have been Pastoring in one capacity or another for nearly 30 years now, though never quite like I am today.

Early in 2009 the Lord revealed to me that the way we had structured our assembly (church) was not scriptural in that it was out of sync with what Paul modeled for us in the New Testament. In truth, I (like many pastors I am sure) never even gave this fundamental issue of church structure the first thought. I had always assumed that church structure was largely the same everywhere and had been so from the beginning. While I knew Paul had some very stringent things to say about the local assembly of believers, the point of our gatherings together and who may or may not lead, I never even considered studying these issues but assumed we were all pretty much doing it right...safety in numbers right?! Boy, I couldn't have been more wrong!

So needless to say, my discovery that we had been doing it wrong for nearly two decades was a bit of a shock to me! Now, this "revelation" did not come about all at once but over the course of a few weeks. We were a traditional single pastor led congregation. It was a top-bottom model of ministry which is in part biblical, but not in the form of a monarchy.

The needed change did not come into focus until following 9 very intense months of study and discussions with those who were leaders in our church at the time.

We now understand and believe that the Bible teaches co-leadership with equal authority in each local assembly. Having multiple shepherds with God's heart and equal authority protects both Shepherds and sheep. Equal accountability keeps authority and doctrine in check. Multiple shepherds also provide teaching with various styles and giftings with leadership skills which are both different and complementary.

For a while we had two co-pastors (elders) (myself and one other man) who led the church with equal authority, but different giftings. We both taught in our own ways and styles, and our leadership skills were quite different, but complimentary. We were in complete submission to each other and worked side-by-side in the labor of shepherding the flock.

Our other Pastor has since moved on to other ministry which has left us with just myself. While we currently only have one Pastor/Elder, it is our desire that God, in His faithfulness and timing, may bring us more as we grow in maturity and even in numbers.

As to my home, I have been married since 1995 to my wonderful wife Terissa Woodson who is my closest friend and most trusted ally.

As far as my education goes, I grew up in a Christian home, but questioned everything I was ever taught.

I graduated from Bible college in 1990 and continued to question everything I was ever taught (I do not mention my college in order to avoid being labeled).

Perhaps my greatest preparation for ministry has been life and ministry itself. To quote an author I have come to enjoy namely Fredrick Buechner in his writing entitled, Now and Then, "If God speaks to us at all other than through such official channels as the Bible and the church, then I think that He speaks to us largely through what happens to us...if we keep our hearts open as well as our ears, if we listen with patience and hope, if we remember at all deeply and honestly, then I think we come to recognize beyond all doubt, that, however faintly we may hear Him, He is indeed speaking to us, and that, however little we may understand of it, His word to each of us is both recoverable and precious beyond telling." ~ Fredrick Buechner

Well that is about all there is of interest to tell you about me.

I hope our ministry here is a blessing to you and your family. I also hope that it is only a supplement to a local church where you are committed to other believers in a community of grace.

~God Bless!