John chapter 13. We're just gonna read the first verse John chapter 13 verse 1 Now before the feast of the Passover when Jesus knew that his hour was come That he should depart out of this world unto the Father Having loved his own which were in the world. He loved them unto the end Huh You know that verse, you just read over it and you don't stop and consider what heavy things are there in that verse, what important things. That's what we're gonna preach on this morning. Hope you can get a little bit out of it. Try not to take too long. But we're preaching about the life of Christ and this is something you need to know about Him. You need to know about His life so you know Him and what He's like. You don't know anybody unless you know their life. Unless you are acquainted with them intimately and you know their heart, you don't know them. And you need to know Jesus. You need to know his heart. You need to know what he was about. I mean, what he was from the inside out. And boy, this is a verse that reveals it very plainly. Now, before the Feast of the Passover, you know, I did a little studying on this verse, and there's the commentators, they'll give you a lot of light about it. You can take it out of one of the Gospels, and if you don't check it and compare Scripture with Scripture, you might get the wrong idea about when it was. and the series of events and how they played out here. It just says, before the Feast of Passover, looks to me like actually this was about two days before the Passover. This was in Bethany, and he was in the house of Simon the leper, or Simon, Simon, not the, you know, Simon, when this happened. But the whole point of it all is the time had arrived. This is the, and Jesus knew it. It's not gonna be next year at Passover. It's not gonna be two more years at Passover. He's 33 years old or so, and he's been through a Passover every year of his life, but this is the one. This is it. This is the Passover that all the other Passovers pictured. This is the moment in time that all eternity's been waiting for and all that's gonna be accomplished. And here's Jesus with His disciples with all of this in front of Him and on His mind. And what's He thinking about? He's thinking about them. What's He focused on them? What about them? He means to show them His love. He means to leave a lasting impression on them that He loves them. Not only on them, but on us. Everybody that followed, and I'm getting ahead of myself here, but when Jesus was facing the end of His earthly life and the cross, that He'd be crucified was already in town. His mind was on His disciples. He was on those who would believe in him. As he prayed in John 17, we're gonna see in a few chapters here. But when his mind might have been occupied with a lot of other things, you know, the most important thing that ever happened was about to happen. And he was the centerpiece of it. Knowing that, think how the devil must have been putting the pressure on him. Think of the battle that must have been going on in his soul. You think the devil stood back while all this happened? No, sir, buddy. Why do you think he sweat great drops of blood after this? The prophecies of old were about to be fulfilled in him and he was about to be the Passover, the Passover. lamb for all mankind. Christ is our Passover. And this was the time at hand that he done it. The glory that he would soon be experiencing in heaven with the Father and all the holy angels. I mean, he knew that was at hand. He knew that in just a few days, he was going to be, you know, in eternity. That would kind of, where would your mind be focused? I mean, if you knew for sure that you were gonna die tomorrow, what would your mind be on today? Where would you be focused? What would you be thinking about? Would it be kind of hard for you to focus on other people? Well, it might. Depends on what kind of a person you are. And so now much of the love of God really dwells in you. The love of God is in you, you're gonna care about other people. And that's gonna be the concern of your heart. That's what Jesus, he was the perfect man. And that's what was on his mind and heart. That Satan's eternal damnation was about to be accomplished. Just think, Jesus knew that. He knew that in spite of all that was coming the pain and the misery and the suffering and the shame Involved not just in those few days, but for the next 2,000 years He's gonna suffer shame He's still suffering shame for the sin of man, but the devil was about to be defeated and Jesus knew it and But he was focused on his disciples and his love for them. And he had loved them all along. And he wouldn't forget them or put them in second place in his mind and heart, no matter what he was facing in the next few days. I've known a few people that had a little bit of that in them. Didn't matter what was happening to them, how much they were hurting, didn't matter what it was costing them, they were concerned about other people more than themselves. And that's a sign, that's a pretty good sign of a healthy soul. Jesus did this for the 12, but he meant it to be understood by the same, that the same love he had for them, he had for all who would believe in him through the centuries to follow until he comes again for his church. And you need to think right there, me, me, he did that for me too. Now, who did Jesus make this special effort for? Who are we talking about here? What kind of friends did he love so faithfully? Men love those who love them. If love's not reciprocated, it pretty well kills it for us, don't it? Not so with Jesus, and it shouldn't be that way with us if the love of God dwells in us. Peter, who he told at the end of this very chapter that he was about to deny Him, that he even knew Jesus. And Peter said, oh no, no, no, can't be so, but it was so. Jesus went, he went right out, Peter did, and denied Jesus, that he even knew him, that he had anything to do with him. And he cussed and swore to identify with the world so that they would believe him, that he didn't know Jesus. Man, Peter, you know, his head disciple, really, Peter. That's the kind of friend we're talking about here. James and John who got their mother to try to get Jesus to guarantee them the highest place in the kingdom. Remember that? What kind of friends would you give yourself for? That kind of friends? See, I'm just trying to get us to understand the difference between us and Jesus and how we need to be like him. If we're going to follow him, we're going to have to understand these things about him. He loved them. He loved them all along, having loved them that were in the world, his own that were in the world. He loved them to the end. It didn't matter what they did along the way. It didn't matter what they did right now. It didn't matter what they're going to do tomorrow or in between here in the cross and the resurrection. Jesus' love for them is not going to waver. How can that be? All of these three, Peter, James, and John, they were the closest to Jesus. They were the three that he took up on the mountain. They were the three that he took with him to pray in the garden. They were the three that were the closest to him. And they couldn't even watch and pray with him when he was in his agony in the garden for an hour. They couldn't watch and pray. They'd go to sleep. Showed how much they cared, didn't it? Well, that's kind of how we think. Did Jesus say, boy, what kind of friends are you? If you can't even watch with me for an hour, I'm just going to call this whole thing off. If you're the best that I got, what? No, not the way it happened. Thomas, who was a skeptic about everything, said to Jesus, We know not whither thou goest, and how can we know the way? After three years of being with Him daily and hearing all that He said, which was much more than we have in the four Gospels, Thomas heard Him every day. You reckon Jesus, here's how I would have felt. I'd have felt like, man, I've wasted my time with you. I've wasted my life, my words, my strength on you. It hadn't done you any good. Three years and you don't even know where I'm going or how the way that I go. Philip piped in right after that, you know, and said, show us the Father, and it'll suffice us. Here's two of them, see? I mean, at the very end, and they're saying things like this. Like, we don't know nothing. We don't understand nothing. What's this all about? What are you talking about? Weren't you listening? It's easy to feel that way. It's easy to feel that way as a preacher a lot of times, because you just feel like people ain't listening. It's easy to feel that way with your children sometimes, because they won't listen. You know, it's easy to get frustrated and disgusted and discouraged and disheartened with them because they don't listen. People won't listen. Well, they didn't listen to Jesus either. His own disciples didn't listen to Him either, but that didn't stop Him. from staying the course and from being faithful in his love toward them, having loved his own in the world, which were in the work. He loved them to the end. Jesus saith unto them, have I been so long with you, and yet thou hast not known me, Philip? I can hear it. I mean, can't you feel what Jesus felt? It wasn't that he was just callous to it and he was so high and above everything else that it didn't touch him. It wasn't that he was just looking beyond it all and knew how it was going to turn out, so he just discounted that as nothing. No, it hurt him. It hurt him that they were so shallow. When they cried out in the boat, Master, carest thou not that we perish? And he said, oh, ye have little faith. How is it that you have no faith? None of them could cast the devil out of that boy in Mark chapter nine, none of them. In other words, they were just pretty useless to him in the ministry, weren't they? I mean, they caused more problems, really, than anything else. with their waywardness and their carnality, they weren't converted. You know, that's what everybody misses it on. He said, Peter, Satan has desired to have you, have thee, but I have prayed for thee, that when thou art converted, comfort thy brethren. Jesus knew. He knew. It's just like what you said in Sunday school. They knew the truth, but the truth didn't possess them. They were still possessed by themselves. None of them. All of them forsook Him that night and did all that they could to disassociate themselves from Him, to save their own hides while He was mocked, and beaten and spit upon and falsely accused and condemned and then nailed on a cross. They all forsook Him. The Bible says that plainly. They all forsook Him and fled. Left Him alone. After they had sworn that they would not do it. I'll die with you. Don't you know how much I care and how good a friend I am to you? But they fled. Peter fled. John fled. James fled. Thomas, Philip, all of them fled. Ran away, left him by himself. That's a lot different than what he did for them, isn't it? They stood with his enemies. and watched him mistreat him and abuse him and then nail him to a cross to die. And they knew it was wrong. They stood with his enemies. When Judas came, the Bible says he stood with them. Peter stood with them by the fire. Stood with the enemies of Christ, his enemies. What does it make you feel like when somebody you love stands with your enemy? when they find fellowship and friendship and camaraderie among people who hate you for what you are. How does it make you feel? That's what they did to Jesus. He had loved them. He had loved them up until then. And then they stood with the enemy. Judas walked right up to him and gave him a kiss. To betray him as a sign, he said, he whom I kiss, that's the one, then you'll know to take him. And Jesus said, friend, betrayest thou the son of man with a kiss? Friend, wherefore art thou come? Betrayest the son of man with a kiss? They stood with his enemies. That's an ugly, bitter thing. But it didn't stop him. I mean, he knew all this. He knew all this that was gonna happen. He knew it all that had happened. He knew where they were at right now. But it didn't stop him. They stood with his enemies. But having loved his own, which were in the world, he loved them unto the end. He had called them his family over his own mother and brethren. You remember that. When they said to Jesus, thy mother and thy brethren are without and they call for you. And he said, who is my mother and my brethren, but these that do the will of God. He said, this is my family. He called them his family. These guys we've been talking about that stood with his enemies and that forsook him. His mother never forsook him. Yeah. But the next time you get to feeling like God has abandoned you, remember these things. He was faithful to love them even though they were so very unfaithful to him. Now the devil is going to work on you. Whether you're saved or lost, he's gonna work on you and he's gonna tell you the same thing. You're worthless, no account, unfaithful, and there's no hope for you. And the devil's gonna convince you that God is just like any other man and that he'll just put up with so much and then he's done with you. And you have passed the limit. That's what the devil's gonna tell you. That's what he's gonna try to tell you. Life is a series of failures, do you understand that? That's what life really is. It's not a series of successes that end in the bright and shining star. Life's a series of failures that just finally chisels away your old hard crusty stony heart and mind and will till you finally realize what you really are and what God really is. While you're remembering, remember also that after he was risen from the dead, he sent word to his disciples and Peter who had forsaken him. To meet him in Galilee, and there they would see him. Mark 16, verse 7, it says that. It says it also in the other Gospels too. He sent for them. After he was risen, he sent word to them. Be at a certain place. You're gonna be able to see me. After he was risen from the dead. Who was he looking for after he rose from the dead? First, his disciples. Yep, those very same guys who had just forsook him, who had stood with the enemy, and who had identified themselves with the world instead of him. Remember how he loved them unto the end, after he was risen, and after they had all done him so wrong, and no doubt felt that they had been such a disappointment to him. I think that's why he said, tell my disciples and Peter, because, well, wasn't Peter one of the disciples? Yeah, but don't you remember how that Peter stood there by that fire, and he cursed, and he swore, and he said, I tell you, I do not know the man. Talking about Jesus. And he turned, the cop crew, and he turned and he saw Jesus looking at him. And Peter went out and wept bitterly. Do you think Peter had any hope in his heart left? Of course not. He thought, that's it for me. There is no way. How in the world could he want me? How could he love me? He certainly couldn't love me after what I've done for Him. See, my goodness, I hope you can get a hold of this. This is why Jesus, this was important to Jesus. This was priority in such a time as it was. It was the priority for Him to nail this down hard. Tell my disciples and Peter, don't forget Peter, And Peter came, and Peter saw the Lord. You remember? Simon, lovest thou me? Lord, you know I love you. But Simon, do you love me? Three times. The important thing there and the key to everything that healed everything was that Jesus loved him when Peter didn't. Wasn't faithful in his love toward Jesus. You think Peter loved Jesus? Well, yes he did. But Peter messed up. It's the thing about God. We're not minimizing sin, and we're not saying that it doesn't lead to death, but there's a God in heaven who forgives because He loves. And there's always a way. There's always a way for you. if you come to him. Now, what if they went to the disciples and said, Jesus sent word to be in Galilee on a certain day because he's going to be there and you can see him. And he said, especially tell Peter. What if Peter would have said, no, I'm not going. I can't face him. Not after what I've done. I can't. I won't. It's a good thing he went, isn't it? What manner of man is this? You know? When they were on the ship, and the storm came, and the ship was about to sink, and Jesus walked out there and just spoke. He just stood up and said, peace, be still. And immediately there was a great calm, it says. And the people, the men on the boat, these men, They stood there and I said, what manner of man is this? That even the wind and the waves obey his voice. Well, yeah, that's pretty, that would set you back, wouldn't it? I mean, that's a pretty, you know, that is pretty awesome for lack of a better word. What in the world? What kind of, what manner of man is this? But let me tell you something, that's not the most awe-inspiring thing about him to me. He's God. He spoke the world into existence. It's no wonder that he can command them and they obey his voice. That's no great, thing to marvel at if you understand that He was the Creator. What there is to marvel about, you know, what I say, what manner of man is this that sets me back and makes me wonder, is that He can love people who take a lifetime to learn to love Him back. And He can love them all the way through. How can He do that? How can it be? It's so different from us. So different. We get offended so easily. Our feelings are so tender and they matter so much. I mean, our feelings are priority. You hurt my feelings. You know, you're on my black list. You ain't my friend if you hurt my feelings. If you do something to offend me, why? I'm done with you. It's just about the truth, ain't it? God ain't like that at all. And that's hard for us to grasp. Hard, it's harder for me to grasp that than it is for me to grasp the fact that he commanded the wind and the waves and they obeyed his voice. Or that he commanded Lazarus to come out of the grave and he walked out of the grave. God's life, he's the giver of life and he can, he can command anything to live or die. But man, how can he love somebody that don't love him back? How can he love somebody who's absolutely unlovable, who has nothing about them that is worthy of love? How can he do that? It's our only hope. If he wasn't that way, boy, there'd be no point in us being here today. And we'd have no hope, no hope in this world or the world to come. at all. He can love people who refuse him to his face. That young man who came to him, you know, and said, good master, what must I do to inherit eternal life? Jesus told him, sell everything you got. Give it to the poor. Come follow me. And you'll have riches in heaven. And he walked away. The Bible says Jesus looking upon him, beholding him, Jesus beholding him. Tell me the next words. Loved him. As he walked away from him. As he said, no, no, I'd rather have my stuff than you. Jesus loved him as he walked away. Yeah. He sees things we don't see, don't he? He can put up with people and continue to love them when they're so slow to understand. Luke chapter 24, the Imaz disciples after the resurrection and they're walking down the road so sad and blue and moaning the blues and carrying on about how what a terrible blow this has been to their life and Jesus joins them and starts walking with them. You remember what he said to them? He said, oh fools and slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have said. Old fools and slow heart to believe. We don't have that much patience with people, do we? We tell them, get it, you know. We tell them, you ought to get it. Can't you understand? What's the matter with you? We tell them, they don't get it. We say, well, they're just a reprobate and a rebel and they just won't believe nothing. They're just hard hearted and against. Oh, but Jesus, he began at Moses and he expounded to them in the scriptures and he showed them all the scriptures that talk about him. And then it says, then opened he their understanding and they understood, see. So he can put up with people and continue to love them when they're so slow to understand, and who have so little faith in him. It's kind of like your children. You'll have more patience with your children than you will with somebody else's children, won't you? Some of them are hard-headed and stubborn and turned the wrong way and hard to deal with and all of that, but you'll keep trying, won't you? You'll keep trying. You're not gonna give up on them when they're eight years old and say, well, this kid's incorrigible. I can't do nothing with him. Forget him. Are you? You ain't gonna do that, are you? Why? Because you can't stand the thought of him just being lost. We'll get it. Jesus looks at us that way. Those who have so little faith in him. than any other human being would give up on in despair. We'd give up on people. We'd say, you gotta trust me, trust me. Can't you believe what I'm telling you? Listen to me, I'm trying to help you. And they'd say, no, I don't listen. I don't believe anything you say. I'm not gonna hear it. What do you wanna do, smack them? Yeah. You want to just say, all right then, have it your way. Not Jesus. Jesus saw the value in a bunch of unlearned and ignorant men that no one else saw. And he loved them for what they were going to be, not for what they were at the time. or even in the near future, what they were going to be. I've said this to you so many times through this, you know, Jesus said so much. In fact, just about everything that Jesus taught during his three years of ministry on this earth and his disciples listened to, just about everything he said, they had no clue what he was talking about. They did not understand. He would take time apart from the multitude and with them alone to teach them like one-on-one, to teach them more personally and expand things like the parable of the sower. He turned to his disciples and explained to them what it meant, but they didn't really understand. There was one time when he said, believest thou this? And they said, oh Lord, we believe. And he said, dost thou believe? You know, in other words, you don't understand a thing I'm talking about. I know you don't. But here's the thing. He knew that one day they would understand. So he told them anyway. He told them anyway. Because he loved them anyway. That's why. See, love carries, it covers a multitude of sins. But love covers a multitude of everything. It'll take you, it'll give you a broader view, a longer view of things and people. You can look at somebody and have hope for them and have faith to believe that God's gonna save them or God's gonna work in their life. And love is the power behind that. If you don't care and you don't love, then you ain't gonna care about people, and you ain't gonna have patience with people, and you're not gonna put up with people, and you're just gonna trash people and run from people, and your whole life's gonna be about culling people out of your life. But he saw the value in them. And it's that way with the Lord for every man and woman who has ever been born. He's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Whosoever will may come. Whosoever will may come. And if it's that way in the Old Testament, it's that way in the New Testament. It's always been God's way. Jesus sees the potential and the value while very few men and women think in that realm at all. You just don't look around you. There's more people in this room than there were with Jesus this night here. And we don't look around and see the potential that's in this room right here. We don't have any idea what the potential is. For the kingdom of God, in the time that we're living in, if we did, if we had faith to believe in that alone, it might turn the world upside down, and that's a fact. There've been a lot of little churches made a big difference. Yep, they sure have. And it's just a matter of faith and trust. He was willing to lay down and having the mind of Christ. See, Jesus looked at these disciples and he knew he was God. He knew what lay ahead. But he also was looking at them through the eyes of a man also. And he knew what they looked like in the world to the rest of the world. They were unlearned and ignorant men. And nobody had respect for them. Who would have thought that a few fishermen were gonna turn the world upside down? Change human history like they did. Jesus did. He believed it. He knew it. Never underestimate what God can do. And never underestimate the potential of any boy or girl or young man or young woman. He was willing to lay down His life for you and me while we were yet sinners, because that was the only way for us to have a chance to be saved. Please listen to me, and I'm going to hurry up here and be done in just a minute, but this is so important. This is the whole gospel message. This is it right here. It's still the only chance that people have to be saved and they must see Jesus in someone else Jesus laid down his life for you and for me it had to be he was the Passover lamb He was the sacrifice for our sin. He was his blood made atonement for our sin his death by his death we are reconciled to God it had to be and He died in our place. He took our place. He was our substitute. He was the propitiation for our sin. He had to die and he was innocent and he was pure and he was the spotless and sinless Lamb of God. And he had to suffer and he had to die. He had to be spit on and hated and reviled and beat and falsely accused and lied about. He had to suffer all of that in order for you to be saved. Do you understand that fact? It had to be that way. Now, we can go tell people that message that Jesus did this for them. And that's a good story. It's the gospel story. But here's the mystery of godliness. Jesus, God was manifest in the flesh. It has to be Christ in us, the hope of glory. They were called Christians first at Antioch. Why? Because they were like Jesus. What do you mean like Jesus? How like Jesus? How were they like Jesus? They were like him in the part of him that we're reading about right now. Jesus said in this chapter, he said down toward the end, this whole chapter is in this subject right here, but he washed their feet, you remember? That's all in this chapter. And then down toward the end of this chapter, he said, by this, he said, I knew commandment I give you that you love one another. And he said, by this shall all men know that you're my disciples, that you have love one to another, the way you love one another. That's why they called them Christians. Here, people got to see Christ in us. They got to see the same kind of love that motivated him right here. They got to see the same, the love that made him do these things has to make us do the same things. We have to love the unlovable. We have to be patient with All men. We have to love them to the end. At all times. Regardless of how they treat us, regardless of what they do to us, we must be willing to lay down our life, our pride, our feelings, our reputation. We must be willing to sacrifice ourselves for others. Or Christ, you know, Christ is just a story to them. You know, when missionaries go to a foreign field, and I've always, I've read this in every one I've ever read, every story of every missionary story I've ever read, what won the people was the sacrifice of the missionaries of themselves, you know, that they came. And they watched them bury their wives and their children and suffer and suffer and they wouldn't give up. And they kept loving the people and reaching out to the people and that's what finally convinced them. Regular men are not like this. There must be something divine in a man that would do this, that would give himself. and sacrificed so much and would count himself so little for us. He finally reached there. They must see this Jesus, having loved His own in the world, love them unto the end. They gotta see Him in us. And they must see this Jesus, who was the sinless, spotless Lamb of God, the just one, willingly laid down His life for the guilty. We who do not even, who don't even know about Him yet. You know, I mean, He did that when we didn't even know about Him. And who would all universally hate him before they ever came to love him. He did that for all these people who never knew him. Who would all, all of them were gonna hate him before they loved him. He knew that. And he laid down his life. He prayed for those that would believe in his name through the centuries. You know, he prayed for us. John 17, he prayed for us. Hereby perceive we the love of God because he laid down his love his life for us And we ought to lay down our life lives for the brethren See what I mean first John 316 that'll be easy to remember John 316 first John 316 If we're going to know Jesus in the power of his resurrection, we must know him in the fellowship of his sufferings. You remember when Paul said that in Philippians, he said, oh, that I might know him in the power of his resurrection and in the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable to his death. How are you going to know Jesus? If you're not, if you're not, if you don't know him in the fellowship of his sufferings, what was his sufferings? Being nailed to a cross? Uh, I don't believe that was his worst sufferings. Everybody makes more of that than they do of other things. They overlook other things. I believe it was painful for him when people treated him like they did. for standing with his enemies, you know, to see Peter standing over there. And do you understand that Jesus heard Peter curse and swear and deny that he even knew the man? Wouldn't that pierce your heart? You know, what if it was somebody you dearly loved? Speaking that way against you. But this is what it means to take up the cross and follow Jesus. It's the just suffering for the unjust and doing it willingly and in order to make a way for the unjust to be justified. That's what the cross was all about. That's what the whole redemption of man is about. That's how God, that was the only way that God Almighty could make a way for man was for one to give his life for the rest. And that's our calling as Christians, to give our life. You know, I want to read a verse here before I quit, but I want to say a couple more things here. It's, He was the sacrifice for our sins, and we must be willing to be the sacrifice for the sins of others. And I don't mean in the place of Jesus, I mean that they might see Jesus in us, and trust in His great sacrifice of Himself. If I mean what does that verse mean that I just read because he laid down his life for us And we ought to lay down our life for the brethren. What does that mean then? That means we ought to be just like him You get it Suppose somebody you love your children your wife and you know, some other loved one of yours, siblings, whatever, or, you know, or any other person in the world, that you try to befriend somebody, and you try to do them good, and you try to win them to God, and get them, and they just spit in your face. What are you supposed to do? Well, here's what I've seen a lot of them do. I'll stomp the dust off your feet, brother. Ain't going back there no more. That don't sound like Jesus to me. Well, he said that, and that was to the disciples, and that was a different thing. That's not a, what do you call it? That's not a part of the whole plan. That's not what we're supposed to do. What about that turning the other cheek? What about if he forgive you, how many times you supposed to give what he tell Peter? You know, should I forgive him seven times, Peter said? Jesus said 70 times seven. In other words, there's no end. Don't ever give up, don't ever give up on people. How can you if you love them? How can you give up on them if you love them? Jesus didn't, thank God, This kind of life will have its rewards in eternity. And others may not see it here, but God does, and God's keeping records, and you better count on that. God's keeping records, and we're going to give account of every idle word that we speak. So I want to read this to you, this verse here, Luke chapter 9, verse 23 and 24. And then I'm gonna be done. And he said to them all, if any man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it, but whosoever will lose his life for my sake, the same shall save it. So take up your cross daily. It's our way of life. You get offended easy? You get your feelings hurt easily? Huh? Do you just write people off easily? Churches off easily? You hear something out of somebody that you don't like and you just write them off easily? Do you do that? Well, that ain't like Christ. Just let me tell you that. You can be that way if you want, but you ain't like Jesus. And if you ain't like Jesus, how can you call yourself a Christian or think yourself to be one? Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus. What was he about? When he came to do the will of the Father, and what was the will of the Father? He gave His only begotten Son, for God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. John chapter 3, that's what Jesus explained to Nicodemus about His whole purpose of being here. And so what is our purpose of being here now? Play church, you know, just have our little cliques and little parties we run with and always, you know, I know it's one of these things that bugs me about people. There's some people that always, there's always an enemy and it's always somebody. Now, there's always an enemy and it's the devil. We told the kids the other day, it's all right to hate the devil. You can hate the devil all you want to. You can't hate him enough. But you can't hate people. You can't hate people that are being manipulated by the devil. You gotta love them. If there's any hope for them, somebody's gonna have to love them, care about them. And that puts rubber on the road. It's not just words. It's not just speaking from an ivory castle, as they say, or palace. You just, you gotta do something about it. Love is an action, not an emotion. It's not about feeling, it's about what you are. God is love. Amen. We can preach and preach and preach on it, but it's still missing. You know, people talk about love, but boy, it's awful shallow. It's awful fragile. Jesus didn't have that kind of love. I hope you understand that this morning. Father, thank you for the Word of God, and I pray you bless it to our hearts and minds. Very important message here this morning about one of your attributes that is most important. We sit in just one verse of this chapter. We see this whole this whole chapter is about this subject but this this first verse just Just lays it right out for us my What manner of man was this They could love like this that does love like this and to think that we can That the whole work of sanctification is to bring us to the measure, the stature, the fullness of Christ. To make us like you. To bring us, to conform us to the image of God's Son. Lord help us. Lord, I pray everybody, including myself, pray you'd help me with this to really examine myself and make up my mind that I'm gonna, that my life is gonna be conformed to you and to your mind. I want your mind, Lord, to be in me. I wanna Look at people like you do. Help me. Help me, Lord. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. There's so many hindrances. And I know it's that way for everybody. Please help us to crucify self and to walk in your light. In Jesus name. Amen.