God is one of those attributes of God that is often most cherished by Christians, right? So, when you think about just the way, the amazing love of God, and like, how many Christians, when they think of God, the first thing they think of is God's love. When we see this, we have to know who God is in worship. Because worship is done in spirit and truth, part of that is knowing who God is. God wants us to know who He is so that we can worship Him accurately and truthfully. The only way we can know who God is is through His Word to us, which is in the Word of God, the Bible. And there's much to say about the love of God. So today we'll be going through, first we'll look at the love of God as displayed in the Trinity. And then second, we'll look at the love of God displayed toward sinners in election. And then finally, we'll look at the love of God displayed toward sinners through the cross, the Lord has expressed. So if you would, let us turn to John chapter 17. We read part of it this morning, actually. It starts in verse 22. So just while you're turning there, in this portion of the Gospel of John, we find the Lord Jesus on the night of his betrayal. This is right before he and his disciples are going to travel to the garden where he will be betrayed. These are the last words, in a sense, that John reports in his Gospel before Jesus is arrested. They do not contain some great command to the disciples, some great charge or direct encouragement to them. Instead, we see the prayer of the Father. This one stands out because of how much you see of its detail. Great richness, it was great. Worth the thought. It's often called the High Priesthood Prayer for its content that centers on the work of Christ, praying for the unity of his disciples that they would have, not only their protection, but for all of them to live in peace, protected, and united. So now let's start on verse 22. The word of the Lord says, The glory that you have given me, me as the father to my I have given to them that they may be born just as we are born. I am them, and you are me, and they may be perfected in me. so that the world may know that you sent me and love them even as you have loved me. Father, I desire that they also who you have given me be with me where I am so that they may see my glory which you have given me. You loved me before the foundation of the world. So like I said, up to this point in the Gospel of John, it's centering on the prayer, on his high priestly prayer for his people. And we've seen up to this point that he consistently emphasizes that he is going away. Jesus says that he will not be with the disciples for much longer, but that he's going away to the Father. This is the backdrop that we see for this prayer, that he's praying for their unity and oneness as he is departing to go to the Father with everyone. He's going to the Father. He's not going there for the first time, but He's returning to the glory that He had with the Father before the Incarnation and for the glory that He's had for all eternity past. We see Jesus referencing the glory shared with the Father before the world was even created in verse 5 earlier, but also in verse 22 here. Jesus requests the Father, His disciples will see His glory which the Father has given Him. But what's most interesting here, what's most glorious is the reason He gives for why the Father has glorified the Son. The key is the last phrase of verse 24, which says, "...because you have loved Me for the foundation of the world." The father has glorified the son. The reason for him glorifying him is because he loves him. He has loved him before the foundation of the world. Before the heavens were established, before the earth and all its fullness of trees, oceans, seas, and animals, before there was a single atom or molecule spoken into existence, there was God. And there was love. Now we know from all scripture, the testimonies of scripture, and the whole counsel of God's revelation, that there is only one God. There's only one being of God. It's this intrivial testimony we see, that we're supposed to worship, Yahweh. Yahweh of Israel, the Lord, our God, who is one. There's only one essence of God. And yet, the scriptures also testify And God exists in three unequal and co-eternal persons, the Father, the Son, and the Spirit. And this verse gives us a glimpse into that glorious and perfect fellowship that the persons of the Trinity have. with one another and that they would have for all eternity. We see a glimpse into the love that the Father shared with the Son and the Spirit before time began and continues on to this day. There was never a time when the Father did not love the Son, or the Son loved the Father. There was never a time when the Spirit was not loved by the Father and the Son. There's no lack. There's no lack in the world. This picture of the love of the trinity is also expressed beautifully elsewhere in John chapter 1. You know how the trinity of the angels belongs here? John chapter 1 verse 1, where God says, in the beginning was the Word, and I'm speaking of Jesus, the Son. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. When John writes the word, was with, and he writes the word with there, he's using the Greek term hos. which displays, in this context, the nature of the relationship between the Father and the Son as one of closeness, as one of intimate fellowship. And we know this because, also, this scripture, Paul testifies, he uses the same word across 1 Corinthians 13, 12, and he talks about how right now, in our present state, we see God, and we are seeing him again because of our earthly states and because of our sin. But, soon we shall see God. The translation there is face-to-face, which shows us the same relationship that the Father had with the Son. It was a face-to-face relationship. There was no distance between them. They were perfectly in fellowship with one another, in perfect love with one another. And in the prologue of John, beginning of John 1, John 1.18, it talks about this theme of love and intimacy. It continues it further, it says in verse 18, No one has seen God at any time, but the only begotten God, who is in the bosom of the Father, He has explained Him. Jesus, who is the monogamous Theos of the Seventh Day, the only unique God, It's where? He's in the bosom of the Father. He's in the closest relationship with the Father for all eternity. If we think also in John, we see later in the Last Supper, we see the disciple whom Jesus loved. What is he doing? He's kneeling or crying in the bosom of Jesus. And we see that picture there. John uses it to describe the greater relationship of the Father and the Son in eternity past. Also we see from this reality, we see what type of love this is. We notice the eternality of God's love that has always existed and will always exist. When we say eternal, it's not just that it always will exist, but that it exists outside of time. Even before time was created, we got free of time in the beginning. He spilled time into existence and decreed all that would come to pass. But we know that God's eternalness means that he's outside of history, he's outside of time. The same with his love. And so as we're examining the love of God, we'll see that this attribute of love, it cannot be separated from the other attributes of God. It cannot be separated from His eternalness, as we've seen now. All of His attributes, they're not just parts of Him that you can take here and there, that you can divide up. He's not just 25% love, or 25% holy, or 50% good, and so whatever. He is 100% love, holy, and good. He is all of them. And so forth. So when we discuss the love of God, we see it's an everlasting love. A love that will never fade. Because He Himself, by nature, is everlasting. His love is a love that does not only end, it does not end. It goes on forever. Because He Himself, our God, goes on forever. And all this we have seen in the way that He is self-loving in returning to the Father and the Son. Alright, so next we will look at the will of God displayed in a legend. First we'll turn to another passage, Ephesians chapter 1. That's where we'll turn next. And we'll start in verse 3. You know, Paul's greatest letters, very dense theological. There's a lot there. And he starts this letter in a way that he starts most other letters. And yet, he goes with section on praising God for who he is. It's called doxology. It's a doxology to God, praising who he is. And it goes into a very lengthy section of this praise for our God, for the great salvation which he has given to his people. So Paul wants to go back to the beginning of salvation. He wants to point to where salvation comes from. Maybe he would go back to Jesus, to the ministry that we see of Jesus coming. He came to this earth, he dwelt among us, he incarnated, and he died on the cross. Maybe Paul would start back there, but he doesn't. Maybe, possibly, we would start with the glorious promise of Abraham that we have studied, the covenant, the Abrahamic covenant, that Abraham would be a father of many nations, of the world that he blessed with heaven. Maybe all this might be better if we don't. Surely he would link the origin of our salvation back to the promise that was given to Eve in Genesis 3.15, that the seed of the woman was crushed ahead of the serpent. Surely, he would point right there, but he does not. Where does he go? He goes back before the world was created. Because our salvation did not begin in history, it began in eternity. For it was an eternal purpose to God. There was no created thing but only our Triune God when the Father shows us His Church. Let's go ahead and read verse 3 here. It says, Blessed be the God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heaven and places in Christ, just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him and love Him. by predestining us to adoption as sons through Jesus Christ to himself according to the good pleasure of his will, to the praise of his glory, of the glory of his grace, which he graciously freely bestowed upon us and the beloved. So like I said, Paul goes back to before the world began, before the foundations of the world, before creation. He goes back and links our salvation to that point. He chose us in Christ. He chose us and it was in Christ. It was not separated from Christ as if our salvation had come from any other place. There is and there was no other avenue for our salvation. There was no other way that we would become holy beings before God and our communion in Christ. God's choice of us to be His perfect people, the bride of God's thought, the bride of God's oneness, was through the union with His Son, with Christ, before the world began. For there is no other way than that we may say, but in Christ. He's the only one. Next we see God chose us, in Him, for the foundation of the world, that we would be wholly blameless before Him, in what is the key, in love. Or, some, as I used to read, in love, the best of us. The Greek can go either way, but it's the same idea. That our election is centered in God's love. His choosing of us was done in love. Father's choice of us came from His attribute of love. It came from His own loving nature, the way He looked at it. Before the world existed, before you and I came into this world, He loved us and He did so by choosing to save us. What is the nature of this love? Is there something in us? Is there something about us that drew or brought up this love in God so that He would desire us? Is there something that we offer? That He saw us and something in us brought out this love? May it never be. May it never be. God is totally free. to love who He wants to love. Because He is God. He is God. And as God, He is sovereign. So we see God's love is a sovereign love. Who are we as preachers? Who are we to say that God must act a certain way towards His creation? Is He not in the right, as the sovereign creator of all things, to display His love for Jesus? To whom He pleases. Paul goes on to say in verse 5, it's according to the good pleasure of His will. It's according to His will. God, whose very nature is love, decided to set His love on us. He decided to love us because He is love. It wasn't anything in us. It was nothing that we could have brought her off the table. It was because He is loving. He is love. There's nothing we have done, no good works, no effort, no striving on our part, no forcing faith or any good intentions in us that could have influenced God, that could have influenced His decision. No. It was according to His own will and pleasure. The reason for God's election is found not in man, but in God and in God's love. If this is true, if this is true, I want you to see this. If God loved us before we were created, before the world was created, there is nothing, there is nothing you can do. No failure, no weakness on your part, no sin. There is nothing that can make God love you more but I can make God love you less. His love is fixed and unchangeable because it was settled in eternity. It will never change into you. There is nothing that can come against His love for you, for you are His forever. Nothing can separate us from His love. Praise God. Praise Him. Well, how can this get better? Well, let's look in verse six. So the praise of His love. Grace here, if you look at grace, and then also what was bestowed on us in the Beloved are freely. Grace here is something that's free. It's something God, as we've talked about, there's nothing that we deserved. There's nothing that we could have influenced Him to decide about us. No, it was free because grace is undeserved favor, and so it can't be demanded. It has to be freely given. He freely bestowed His grace upon us in the Beloved. It cannot be demanded because we are sinful human beings and we deserve condemnation. But look what the last phrase of verse 6 says. He bestowed on us in what? In the Beloved. We already saw how it said in Him earlier, which in Him is referring to Christ. And now it says, and the beloved, which also refers to Christ. But it shows, again, what we've looked at, that the Son is beloved by God, that the Son is the object of God's love. And this idea of the Father's love for the Son in connection with Him choosing a people, in connection with election, is seen throughout the Gospel of John. In chapter 6, we've seen it. In chapter 10, verse 29. And then even in chapter 17, which we looked at, Jesus, He talks about how the Father has given Him a people, that the Father has given Him a people for Him to love and for Him to die for. And it's connected with God's election. And we see in John 3.35, which you don't have to turn here, but it says, Everything has been given to the Son. He has given Him the authority. He's given the authority over everything, and that includes for Him to give salvation to whom He wishes. The Father has given the authority to the Son to redeem those who are chosen by the Father. The church is, in a sense, then, a gift that the Father gives to the Son in love. As the Beloved, God gives Christ the gift of a bride, the church, before the foundation of the world. And additionally, we look back at Ephesians 1-6 and we see that we're in the Beloved. The same love with which God loves the Son has now been given to us because we are in the Son. We are united with Him. We have been united with the Son and now our love because Christ is the beloved one. That great, unique, and special love with which the Father loved the Son has been given to us as well. What a magnificent reality that God's eternal, unchangeable love for his own Son is now ours because we are in Christ. We are in the beloved forevermore. And no way could we have earned it. There is nothing to boast about. It is all His doing, all His glory and praise. So let us praise Him, His never-ending love. Amen. Alright. Next, we will look at the love of God displayed through redemption and the cross. And let us turn just to the next chapter in Ephesians 2 to start off, which would be in verse 1. So we see here, or I'll go ahead and read it. It says, and you were dead in your transgressions and sins in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom we also formerly conducted ourselves in the lusts of our flesh, doing the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest." So Paul opens up this chapter by saying we were dead in our transgressions and sin. Paul reminds the Ephesians, and he's speaking to everyone, of their bleak, their hopeless condition. without Christ before they were saved. He says that they were dead while they were physically alive, just as any other human being. If we were to look inside, look into their soul and in their inward being, we would see nothing but death and decay. All men are spiritually dead. There'll be no signs of life. Absolutely none. The state of all those who are born into this world is that of spiritual deadness. Nothing we can do can change that. There's nothing we can do to please God because we are dead in sin. There's nothing totally unable to please God. And Paul goes on, he says, in which you formally walked according to the course of this world, according to the ruler of the power of the air. Before Christ, we walked or we continuously were in this. We lived our life in a way that we were living according to the way the world goes. We were living according to our master, Satan, who was working in our own disobedience. He was like a father to us, training us in unrighteousness and in disobedience for his own will and gain. How wicked. Not only did we serve Satan, but we also served our fleshly desires. We served the flesh, which is not, as we know, which is not our physical body, because what God created was good, but yet it is the inward nature that is sinful and fallen. Now, before Christ, we cannot help to serve our own fleshly desires. We are a slave to our sin, as the gospels say. We were totally at the whim of the world, at the whim of Satan, and of our own fleshly desires. We did not have the power to overcome it, which comes through the Spirit of God. We did not have the Spirit, and so we did not have mastery over our flesh. Paul continues on and says that we were, by nature, children of wrath. The very essence of our being ever since the fall, was corrupted by sin. Children of wrath. We are not born, contrary to what people think, as children of God. We are not. We are children of wrath when we come into this world. Everything we did, every action, every word, every thought that we said, only brought wrath upon us. did not please God, but it brought wrath because of our sin. Paul agrees with David on this point, how David said he was born in iniquity and he was conceived in sin. This is the testimony of Scripture about all our states before we knew Christ. And it says in verse 3 that we are children of wrath even as the rest. This is a universal condition over all people. It is in condition of everyone. It is shared by all people no matter who you are, what nation, No matter what tongue, everyone is born a child of wrath, dead in sin, at the whim of Satan, the world, and their own flesh. It was the condition of them 2,000 years ago, and it's the condition of us today. Now, I go into this because it is so important, when we think of the love of God, to know the depths of our sin Because only when we know how sinful we are and the depths of our sin can we truly know how loving God is, how great His love is towards us. Only can we know then the vastness, the heights and the depths of His love. As he goes on to say in verse 4, as we can read, it says, But God, being rich in mercy because of His great love, His great love with which He loves us, Even when we were dead in transgressions, He made us alive together with Christ. By grace, you've been saved and raised us up with Him and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. He knew our sin. He knew how sinful we were, more than we can know. He knew the depravity with which we were born. He knew the extent to which we were sinful, and yet He made us alive. He raised us from our dead state because of the great love with which He loved us. Romans 5.8 speaks to this love of God when it says, One will hardly die for a righteous man, though perhaps for the good man someone would dare to die. But God demonstrates His own love for us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Brothers, what love is this? It is a love unlike the world has ever seen. that God would send his very own son, the beloved one, his beloved son, to take upon punishment for our sin, to take the wrath that we deserved upon himself, and to make us alive through the cross. He was tortured. He was beaten by men. and he took upon that wrath because of love. What great love is this that God in Christ would give us all things in Christ, that he would raise us up as it says. We're sitting here today, but yet at the same time, we are united with Christ and we are raised in the heavenlies with him right now, in a sense. What great love is that that God would do that for sinners? How deep is his love that he would make us alive and would reward us with the reward that Christ had gained authority over heaven and earth. The cross is truly the ultimate expression of God's love for us. And we see this great love that it's so much higher than our love. It is a love that is unlike us. It is a holy love. See, because holiness, yes, it means purity. It means without sin. But also, Hebrews like to cut. It's something you are separated. You are separate, you are higher. So to be holy is you're totally separate from God. God is totally separate from us in the way that He loves, in the way that He does all things. He's totally transcendent and greater than we are. His love is so much higher than our love. He loves us with a perfect love, a love that redeems even His enemies. is a truly holy love. Think of your own love towards your family. Think of your love towards your spouse, towards your siblings, towards your parents, the love you have for your children. And think of the great lengths you would go to show them your love and to demonstrate your love for them. And then look to God and look at His love, which is greater than your love for any of them. And think of His love for us, for His enemies, that He would die for us. He loves them. He even loves our family with a greater love than we could ever love. Think on these things. Next, God's love, as we see here, it's more than just a feeling. There seems to be today a great misunderstanding of what God's love is. Many see God's love as just a good feeling towards us, kind of sentimental affection, kind of mushy in some ways, just filled with emotion. And yes, God is deeply affectionate for his children, but God's love is not just a feeling, it is way more than a feeling. It is an unchanging commitment to his people whom he has sovereignly decided to choose an eternity past to be holy and blameless before him. His love is not reckless in any way, shape, or form. His love is not like our love, which is oftentimes weak, unstable, and can change just like the seasons. It is a love that is full of power. It transforms sinners. It resurrects. It raises them from death to life. That's how great His love is. It is more powerful than the fiercest Leviathan and more enduring than the sturdiest of mountains. Again, God's love does not leave us in our deadness and misery as many today would like it to. You talk to people and they say, like, You hear people today who profess to be Christians saying, I know Christ. He loves me. And when you look at your life, what do you see? You see no fruit. You see no evidence of God's love in their life. You see no, no light. You see no love of them for God. Okay, but it's okay. God loves me. God loves me. He accepts me. I can still do these things. You know, nothing of the love of God. God's love transforms. It changes you. It changes us. When He loves you, you are not the same person you were before. He lifted you from death. He lifted you from your pitiful, hopeless state before, and He has brought you in His Beloved into life. He doesn't leave you the way you are. His love changes you. It brings them out of the darkness into the light. And His love involves repentance. It revolves repentance, turning from our sin, and it involves faith, turning to Christ. The love of Christ compelled him to go and die a brutal death on the cross so that we would be free from our sin, so we cannot go on and live in a way that would deny that work, that would bring shame to his name. When you are in your daily life, think upon Christ's love that he poured out his life for you on that cross. Think about that when you are in a dark place, when you are being tempted, because temptations do come as Christians. Think upon the great love of Christ that He loved till the end. He loved His own, and He loved them till the end, and He went to the cross for us. Think upon, look to Christ and see Him there. See Him on the cross in His love. And even after, You have stumbled, you have fallen, you have come short. Yes, confess to God, confess. Because He is faithful to forgive us and be reconciled to Him. But in that, look to His love. Let His love reconcile you to Himself, which does not change. It's forever. And let it compel you to live a life of holiness. So, What do we see when we've experienced this love of God? How are we now? How are we to respond? Jesus, in John 13, 34 through 35, he tells his disciples, a new command I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this, all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another. When we see the vastness of God's love towards us, towards us as sinners, and when we see how great it is, the depth of His love towards us, we cannot help but act. We must act upon that. And Jesus says here that the way we do that is in loving our brothers and sisters. We do that loving those in this church, our fellow members, those whom God has given us, our sisters and brothers in Christ. And by this, the world will know. By this, they will see that God has truly come down to love and save the world. He is the founder. Christ is our elder brother, even. He is our founder and perfecter of our faith. He is our great example. So let us look to the way he loved the church and let us act in the same way that he loved because love involves sacrifice. It involves laying down your own privileges for the good of your brothers and sisters and even for whoever your neighbor is. We are to love them no matter who they are. And this does not mean that it's always going to be easy. It can be hard to love. I mean, because we're still sinners. Even though we've been redeemed by Christ, we still have the flesh. And so, there will be times where the flesh comes out. And it's not always easy to love those. But look to your own self, and look to your own shortcomings, and look to Christ who loved you in spite of that. And He decided to love. From eternity past, He set His love upon you. So set your love upon your brothers and sisters in the faith. Decide to love them. Make it a commitment, even when it's hard. It's not always easy. But yet, we must choose to set our love upon them and be convicted that we will serve and labor for them in humility. For indeed, we were given two great commandments. What was it? The first one, right? To love Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind, strength. And then the second one, which goes hand in hand is to love our neighbor as ourself. These, these two commands sum up all of God's law and they involve our love and devotion to God, but also to our neighbor and who is more closer than the neighbors we have right here, our brothers and sisters. These are the two greatest, if we think, these are the two greatest commandments. When was the last time that we meditated and we thought about how we could obey these commands? I mean, oftentimes we'll be like, nope, I know that command, it's good. These are the greatest commandments that God has given us to please him and to obey him. How often do we think on this? We remind ourselves daily, how will I love God more with my heart, soul, mind, and strength? How will I love him more tomorrow than I did today? How will I love my neighbor more tomorrow than I did today? We do not often remind ourselves of these, but we need to. We need to, brother. May we love our brothers and sisters in this church and be known to those around us, to all of those around us, to our family members who maybe are lost, to those co-workers we have. to those who are outside that they may see the love of God in us and hopefully that they may come to experience it themselves. Pray that we would be the examples of God's love. And then this next point is the last, but the love of God, it should leave us, it should lead us to rest, to rest in Christ. Sometimes We can lose sight of these precious truths of God's love for us. Sometimes we can struggle even believing God would love us because we see our sin. It's a temptation for those of us who know these great truths of the depravity of man, our great sinfulness, to then look at us and see how could God love me? How could we please him in any way? We can become easily discouraged and have low spirits and hang our head low because we mourn over our sin and we know our weakness. We know that we are weak. But take comfort because Christ knows that you are weak. He knows your sinfulness more than you. He knows it. And look to Christ. Look to His love. Look to His great love, which is the same love that He showed the Son before eternity happened. Look to His love in election, before the world began. that He decided to set His love upon you. Look to His great love, which was displayed on the cross, the ultimate expression of His holy, sovereign love, His eternal love towards us. Look to that and lift your head and rejoice, rejoice in the love of God. Let it be on your mind all day. When you start the day, think upon the love of Christ. Be immersed in His love, the love which surpasses all knowledge. The love which calls sinners righteous and invites us to sit at the family table of God and to dine with him gives us the name of our father. We are adopted into his family. Nothing can separate us from this love. So let us be glad and praise Him for His great love for us. Amen? Amen. All right, I'll pray. Heavenly Father, we just thank You for this moment. We thank You for everyone who is here right now, God. For all those who are loved by You, God, we praise You and we thank You that before the world began that You loved us, God, and set Your love upon us. And you did not leave us in our sin, God, but you raised us from the dead, and you gave us life, and you seated us in heaven with Christ. And we look forward to that day when we will truly see you, God, face to face. because we will have new bodies and new minds, new souls to be able, new hearts to be able to love you, God, even more. I pray that day that we would rejoice for that day, God, and be with us now. Help us to love one another, God, and help us to love those even who are unlovable, God, and to be like Christ in that way. We thank you, God, for this day. Be with us as we go home. Be with us this week that we may honor you and please you even more. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.