Sunday, 9/21/2025

LOVE LIKE JESUS

Matthew 22:34-40 (NIV) Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. ³⁵ One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: ³⁶ "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?" ³⁷ Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' ³⁸ This is the first and greatest commandment. ³⁹ And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' ⁴⁰ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments." 

“All you need is love,” sang the Beatles back in the 1960s. And 65 years later, “love is love” has become the rallying cry of celebrities and social media influencers alike. The two phrases are signposts along a cultural trajectory from idolizing romantic love to worshipping sexuality as the core of human identity, its every expression beyond critique.

God’s love makes a difference in our individual lives and His love through us makes a difference in the lives around us, friends, family, husband and wife. 

Gods love, agape, is the selfless, sacrificial, and unconditional love of God, seeking the good of those who don’t deserve it, and by extension the love Christians are to show one another.

Storge: meaning affection

Philia: friendship

Eros: romantic love

Agape: selfless, sacrificial and unconditional love

The three natural loves must be subordinate to it and framed by it.

Our lives are evaluated by how much or how little we love. 

It is only to the extent that we love well and deeply that we are truly alive.

CS Lewis in the Four Loves: “To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable.” 

CS Lewis: “ the only place outside of heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is hell.”

Love has direction, movement and purpose.

 John 13:34–35  “I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you are also to love one another. ³⁵ By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

John 15:9-10 “As the Father has loved me, I have also loved you. Remain in my love. ¹⁰ If you keep my commands you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love. 

The difference between what I feel and what I do.

When every fiber of your being feels against it, you act in love anyway. That is love. That’s the kind of love that Jesus shows us.  

The difference between I should and I can.

God will never command us to do something He won’t empower us to do.  

The difference between old and new.

A lot of what we call love is just polite selfishness. 

An example greater than itself

A foundation stronger than itself

A Purpose higher than itself

Ephesians 5:2 “Live a life filled with love, following the example of Christ. He loved us and offered himself as a sacrifice for us, a pleasing aroma to God.”

1 John 2:6 “Those who say they live in God should live their lives as Christ did.”

John 13:1–5 “Before the Passover celebration, Jesus knew that his hour had come to leave this world and return to his Father. He had loved his disciples during his ministry on earth, and now he loved them to the very end. ² It was time for supper, and the devil had already prompted Judas, son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. ³ Jesus knew that the Father had given him authority over everything and that he had come from God and would return to God. ⁴ So he got up from the table, took off his robe, wrapped a towel around his waist, ⁵ and poured water into a basin. Then he began to wash the disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel he had around him.”

John 13:12–15 “After washing their feet, he put on his robe again and sat down and asked, “Do you understand what I was doing? ¹³ You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and you are right, because that’s what I am. ¹⁴ And since I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you ought to wash each other’s feet. ¹⁵ I have given you an example to follow. Do as I have done to you.”

We love like Jesus when we express our love in actions and not just words. 

"service and Ministry is allowing the Holy Spirit to express Himself and God’s love in and through me by using and being used in whatever God has given me to serve him and the needs of others."  

First we minister to the Lord.  

Then we minister to other believers. 

Hebrews 6:10 “For God is not unjust; he will not forget your work and the love you demonstrated for his name by serving the saints—and by continuing to serve them.”

Third we also minister to unbelievers.  

Matthew 5:13 "You are the salt of the earth.  You are the light of the world."  

We minister to people's physical needs. 

Matthew 25:35–36 “ ‘For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat; I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger and you took me in; ³⁶ I was naked and you clothed me; I was sick and you took care of me; I was in prison and you visited me.’ 

Matthew 25:40 ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’ 

Matthew 10:42 “And whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones because he is a disciple,^, truly I tell you, he will never lose his reward.” 

To people's emotional needs.

1 Thessalonians 5:14 “And we exhort you, brothers and sisters: warn those who are idle, comfort the discouraged, help the weak, be patient with everyone.”

When you minister a word of counsel or encouragement or comfort, that is ministry.

To people's spiritual needs.

2 Corinthians 5:18, "God reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the ministry of reconciliation."  

Colossians 1:28 We proclaim Christ, warning and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so that we may present everyone mature in Christ.

1 Corinthians 12:4–7 (GNB)There are different kinds of spiritual gifts, but the same Spirit gives them. ⁵There are different ways of serving, but the same Lord is served. ⁶There are different abilities to perform service, but the same God gives ability to all for their particular service. ⁷The Spirit’s presence is shown in some way in each person for the good of all.

God wants to use me to build up His body.  God wants every one of you to be a body builder.  A spiritual body builder.

Galatians 5:13–14 “For you were called to be free, brothers and sisters; only don’t use this freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but serve one another through love. ¹⁴ For the whole law is fulfilled in one statement: Love your neighbor as yourself.^,