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[0:00] Well, please take your Bibles and turn to 1 John 4. And I'm going to read a few verses in John 13.

[0:12] And then we're going to come over to 1 John. So if you would have your Bibles open to 1 John 4, that would be helpful. So just let me read a few verses in John 13.

[0:27] My children, I will be with you only a little longer. You will look for me. And just as I told the Jews, so I tell you now where I am going.

[0:39] You cannot come. A new command I give you. Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this, all men will know that you are my disciples if you love one another.

[0:55] And then 1 John 4, in verse 7. Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.

[1:07] Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us.

[1:19] He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love. Not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

[1:34] Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God. But if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

[1:47] We know that we live in him and he in us because he has given us his Spirit. And we have seen and testified that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.

[1:59] If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love.

[2:11] Whoever lives in love lives in God and God in him. In this way, love is made complete among us so that we have confidence on the day of judgment.

[2:22] Because in this world, we are like him. There's no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

[2:36] We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, I love God, yet hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.

[2:54] And he has given us this command. Whoever loves God must also love his brother. Let's hear God's word preached. Let's hear God's word preached. A new command I give you, that you love one another.

[3:21] As I have loved you, so you must love one another. And by this, all men will know that you are my disciples if you have love one for another.

[3:34] The Lord Jesus was alone with his disciples in the upper room on the night of his arrest. He was leaving them to return to his heavenly father just hours away from that.

[3:46] And before he did, he left them with a new commandment. Which if they obeyed, would mark them out as disciples of no other master than Jesus of Nazareth.

[3:59] Now what is new about this command to love one another? It was just the example that Jesus was giving them.

[4:12] And that is now to be the new pattern and standard by which our love for one another is to be measured. To love one another just as Christ has loved us.

[4:24] So last week we sought to answer the question, well, how has he loved us? And we saw that it was with a love that is undeserved, costly, and unending.

[4:38] And so from that we learned what our love for one another is to look like. It is to be undeserved. So nobody here ever needs to deserve love in order to receive it from one of us followers of Jesus.

[4:56] We love just as we've been loved, freely, graciously, whether or not others deserve it. Secondly, it's we love each other with a costly love.

[5:06] Jesus Christ laid down his life for us and we ought to lay down our lives for one another. However, he sacrificed himself on the cross.

[5:18] And so our love is to have that form of the cross, a cruciform love whereby we were willing to lay down things that we like and may want for ourselves.

[5:31] Time, money, pleasures, indeed a very part of our life in order that others might be enriched. We're willing to suffer and go without that others suffering might be alleviated.

[5:44] It was undeserved, costly, and then unending love. And because Jesus' love never quits, we must never quit loving each other either.

[5:55] Our love must endure all things, all offenses, all sins. You do know that we will live with each other in love forever and ever, don't you?

[6:11] It was ascribed to an Irishman, these words, To live above with saints we love, oh, that will be glory. But to live below with saints we know, well, that's a different story.

[6:25] Well, it is a different story. And it will be a whole lot easier to love one another when there's no more sin in you and no more sin in me. But the point of what we've read this morning is that Jesus didn't wait to love us until we were without sin.

[6:46] He loved us while we were sinners. And that's why we must love each other even while we are yet sinful. Yet sinning against one another.

[6:58] Isn't the love of Jesus something wonderful? It's to change the way we love one another. You know, John was right next to Jesus reclining on his breast that night when Jesus gave this new commandment.

[7:14] And John, the disciple whom Jesus loved, never forgot it. It's like he could thereafter not speak of the way that Jesus has loved us without reminding us that that's the way we're to love one another.

[7:25] And we saw that last week in 1 John chapters 3 and chapter 4. But, you know, John's not alone in that. The Apostle Paul does exactly the same thing.

[7:38] In Ephesians chapter 5, he begins the chapter this way. Be imitators of God as dearly loved children and live a life of love.

[7:48] Just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. That's Jesus' new command, isn't it?

[8:01] Paul wasn't there that night, but he had heard it. And he's now repeating it and applying it to us. His love for us is the pattern we're to imitate in our love for one another.

[8:14] His sacrificial love is to be seen in his followers. In his church. And yes, even in our marriages. Just verses later, in verse 25.

[8:28] Paul brings this new command right into Christian marriage when he says, Husbands, love your wives. How? Just as Christ loved us and gave himself for us.

[8:43] As he gave himself to the church. A love that was undeserved. That was self-sacrificing. And that was unending.

[8:57] That'll make any marriage sing. That kind of love will grab the attention of the world and say, Pay attention to this. Where do you find that kind of love?

[9:08] So husbands, get after it. That's the pattern of your love for your wife. And Grace Fellowship Church, that's the pattern for us.

[9:22] His church. His bride. Now this morning, there's another word I want us to think about, besides the three that we've looked at last week, that describe this kind of love that we've received from Christ.

[9:34] And it's the word supernatural. It's a supernatural love. Let's face the facts. If we are commanded to love as God loves, as Jesus loves, then we're being commanded to love with a supernatural love.

[9:57] Supernatural. When you put super in front of natural, it simply means above and beyond what's natural. Here's natural love. But supernatural love goes above and beyond what is natural.

[10:13] Now, you all know what natural love is. What's natural to fallen man. If you love me, I'll love you.

[10:25] Okay? Deal? As long as that is operating, we'll do well together, you and I. But Jesus asks us in Matthew chapter 5, If you love those who love you, what reward will you get?

[10:42] What are you doing more than others? Even tax collectors and pagans love like that. Natural love. You be deserving of my love and I'll love you.

[10:56] But don't ask me to love you when you're unkind to me. No, you'll get back from me what you give to me. Natural love. We see it. All the time.

[11:09] And my love may give, but don't expect it to give till it hurts to where it requires giving up something that I want for myself. There are limits to love, you know.

[11:23] Natural love. And my love will be sweet if all's well, but if things get too hard, well, I'm out of here. Natural love. Rising up to the height of our fallen natures.

[11:37] This is what's natural to us. But that's not how we've been loved by God, the Father or the Son or the Spirit. No, God's love.

[11:48] Listen to this. God's love is the love of God. A supernatural divine being. And that means by very definition, God's love is a supernatural love.

[12:02] It goes beyond what is just natural to fallen man. For it loves undeservingly. It loves self-sacrificially. And it loves unendingly. So if you're being honest about now, you're saying, well, I can't love others that way.

[12:19] And you're thinking of people in your life. I can't love that way. Maybe even those that are dearest to you. Some days on their bad days, I can't love that way.

[12:32] Well, you're right. Left to yourself, you can't. Because you are not supernatural. And left to ourselves, this new duty to love one another as Christ loves us is as far beyond our reach as bearing apples is to a branch that's lying on the ground.

[12:53] It doesn't have it in it. And you don't have it in you either. Left to yourself. But that's why John 15 is such good news to us.

[13:05] Something that Jesus said just minutes later on this evening. Remain in me, he says, and I will remain in you.

[13:17] For no branch can bear fruit of itself. It must remain in the vine and neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me. Oh, there is a way for me to keep this new commandment.

[13:30] There is a way for me to bear this fruit. Yes, it's if you remain in me. For I am the vine and you are the branches. And if a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit.

[13:44] Oh, but apart from me, you can do nothing. This fruit of supernatural love for each other can and will come forth from me as I remain in Christ and Christ remains in me.

[14:01] A mutual indwelling. Me and him, him and me. Making it possible for me to love with a love that's undeserved, self-sacrificing and unending.

[14:13] I think we need to come to terms with the fact that this love commanded to us in the new command is supernatural. It's as supernatural as walking on water.

[14:27] It is as supernatural as making the blind to see or the lame to walk or creating a son out of nothing. It's beyond us.

[14:38] It's not in us by nature as fallen creatures. And so that means if we're ever to love one another as Jesus loved us, we'll need Jesus in us.

[14:49] Jesus in us producing in us his own love that is supernatural, godlike, and divine. And that's the very thing that Jesus would later pray on this evening in John 17, 26 when he's talking to his heavenly father about his disciples.

[15:08] He says, I have made you known to them and I will continue to make you known to them in order that the love you have for me, father, might be in them.

[15:21] This divine supernatural love might actually be in them and that I myself may be in them.

[15:33] How is it that this love, this divine supernatural love that the father has for the son is to be in us, Jesus says. It says, I am in you. So it will be.

[15:45] Without him you can't love as he loves, but with him you can. And that's why Paul says, I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength. What does he mean when he says all things?

[15:57] He means I can do all that I'm commanded by God to do through Christ who gives me strength. Now Christ hasn't commanded us to walk on water.

[16:08] He's not commanded us to heal the blind, to create a son, but he has commanded us to love one another as he has loved us with a supernatural love.

[16:21] And what his mouth has commanded, his own grace will enable. That's the gospel again, you see. That's the good news. Jesus Christ is full of grace and that grace is in him for us and from his fullness have all we receive grace upon grace upon grace.

[16:38] grace. Morris Roberts defines grace as supernatural spiritual energy from God. Supernatural spiritual energy from God.

[16:53] That's what it takes to love with a supernatural love. It takes Christ to love one another as Christ loved us. Which is to say it takes Christ to live the Christian life.

[17:09] Because the Christian life is a life of love. Ephesians 5.1 says. A life of Christ-like supernatural love. How the church today needs to understand this.

[17:23] How I need to never forget this. Conversion to Jesus Christ is a supernatural thing. It's not this some natural thing that man has this ability to one moment be dead in his trespasses and sins and the next moment to be alive unto God.

[17:41] That's supernatural. That's the same power that raised Lazarus from the dead that must raise a man spiritually from death to life. Conversion is supernatural.

[17:54] And so is the Christian life that follows conversion. Every step of obedience to God it's supernatural. We need this supernatural spiritual energy from God to live the Christian life to love as Jesus loved.

[18:13] Real saving religion then is nothing less than the life of God in the soul of man. It's the love of God in the soul of man.

[18:25] And when that happens you see we can love as He has loved us. We can imitate God as dearly loved children and live a life of love because it's His love in the soul of man.

[18:42] It's His fruit. It's the fruit of the Holy Spirit. And those words flow off my tongue but I need to come to grips with that. If love is the fruit of the Holy Spirit then it will only be produced in my life by this supernatural being the third person of the Trinity the Spirit who dwells in me both to will and to do what pleases Him.

[19:09] So the very desire to love one another the very ability to love one is because He's working in me. That's the good news you see.

[19:20] We come to this new commandment and we wither under our own resources. But Jesus directs His disciples to look beyond to the vine the fruitful vine.

[19:37] And so yes we ought to be humbled at our inability to produce this love but then with humility we hold out our empty hands of faith and say more love more love Father more love Holy Spirit more love Jesus like your love teach me teach me is that not why I'm in you and you in me that I might bear this fruit of love.

[20:05] It's one thing to know the doctrines and the facts of Christianity it's an altogether different thing to know the Christ of Christianity it's one thing to have an outward form of godliness to be in the right place at the right time with the right people it's another altogether different thing to have the power of godliness which is Christ in you working in you by His Spirit to love Him and to love one another and that's why you must be in Christ and Christ in you if ever you're to love like Jesus and so I'm praying oh God don't leave me to myself I can't even love you as I ought to you the fairest of ten thousand you who are perfect there's nothing in you no offenses in nothing for me not to love you and yet I can't love you as I ought with all my heart and soul how am I ever going to love my brothers and sisters who are just like me yet flawed yet splashing me with their sins and me splashing them oh I need you

[21:19] I need you every hour I need you to love as I have been loved and thank you that I'm no longer that branch lying on the ground unable to bear fruit I am now attached and the living supernatural spiritual divine energy of God now runs in my veins now Christ in me and me in Christ we are able to live this life of love extremely good news so let's let's not separate the new command from Jesus teaching where this ability comes from now turn to first John chapter 4 John the apostle of love says the same thing in a rather shocking manner and if you turn to first John chapter 4 verses 7 and following I want to start at verse 12 and then we'll go back and work our way through it notice what

[22:30] John says in verse 12 first John 4 no one has ever seen God but if we love one another God lives in us and his love is made complete in us or made perfect in us he says it again in verse 17 he says it back in chapter 2 in verse 5 three times that if we love one another his love is made complete in us what how can God's love be anything but complete well I think John wants us to think of God's love as being a cycle a full complete circle with three phases if we could have the first picture we're going to look at this passage verses 7 to 12 God's love being made complete in us what does that mean how does that take place that's the language that John shocks us with three times in this little epistle his love being made complete in us next screen notice when urging us to love one another

[23:58] John begins with God that God is love alright verses 7 and 8 dear friends let us love one another that's what he's urging us to for love comes from God everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God whoever does not love does not know God because God is love that's where all love in the universe begins within that fellowship of love within the Trinity forever and ever God is love it's not just what he does it's what he is and ever has been and ever will be but God's eternal love did not remain shut up within the Trinity did it when God had created man and man rebelled against God and therefore was deserving of damnation God demonstrated his love by sending his one and only son to save undeserving!

[24:54] Sinners and that's the next step phase God's love was shown by sending his own son he says it twice that's the next two verses verses 9 and 10 this is how God showed his love among us he sent his one and only son into the world that we might live through him this is love not that we love God but that he loved us and sent his son as a propitiation and atoning sacrifice somebody to turn his wrath away from us and how would that happen by it falling upon him that's what he did he sent his son to show us his love but God's love was not done the cross is not all that there was to God's love he's still showing his love in his people and especially as they love one another next screen the same love is now being shown the love of

[26:08] God is being shown in our love for one another you see for God's love to be complete it must run full circle it must not stop short of its intended goal its telos its purpose its end no the circle must not be unbroken it must go all the way around notice how he says it in verses 11 and 12 dear friends since God so loved us as to give his son we also ought to love one another no one has ever seen God but if we love one another God lives in us and his love is made complete in us his!

[26:49] love is made complete it's only if and when we love one another that God's own love is made complete in us because then his love achieves the purpose for which he started it he didn't just send his son so that you would just bask in his love period end no no he loved you that that love might then go on and be given to others back to him and and to one another in the body of Christ notice it's his love that is seen in our loving one another for where God lives his love lives and is made complete in us so love starts with God and with God loving us but it's not to end there think of public transport in the big city London the underground maybe in the airport and you get on and there in the car there's a there's a diagram of the route and all the stops are marked along the way and they're all leading up to the end of the line down here that's the end of the it stops there it goes no further well dear

[28:04] Christian what John is saying is that God's love is not to stop with you you're not to be the end of the! line of God's love he gave it to you that you might then complete the cycle by giving it to others remember love is the great giver and God so loved that he gave and he gave it to us that we might then give it freely we have received it freely now we are to give it we're not to be graves of God's love but rather to be channels flowing to us that it might flow on through us to others and as it does with undeserved self sacrificing unending love God's love is made complete it's made perfect it's run it's full cycle what he intended for it to be and notice it's

[29:12] God living in you if we love one another verse 12 says God lives in us it's proof if you love with God's love it shows that God's living in you it's the only way in the world we can love one another as God has loved us is if the God of love lives in us and produces in us his own supernatural love so no one's ever seen God but God's love was seen in his son being given and God's love is still being seen in his people as they love one another so that's how we obey the new command of Jesus given in the upper room as I have loved you in the same way you must love one another we obey that by God living in us and producing the good fruit of love now only now are we ready then to consider

[30:16] Jesus following words in John chapter 13 and verse 35 as I have loved you you must love one another by this all men will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another so we come then to the distinguishing mark of discipleship to Jesus we've seen the new command of Jesus for his disciples and now the distinguishing mark of discipleship to Jesus there's a mark a brand just as a brand set apart certain sheep these cattle they belong to this farmer there is a brand a mark that identifies you as belonging to Jesus a disciple follower of him which if they see they will know oh she's one of

[31:16] Jesus disciples oh he's one of Jesus disciples and how will they know that well let me say how they'll not know it what are the tell signs it it's not some distinctive dress it's not a special kind of clothing or color of clothing or haircut that's worn that's not the distinctive mark of Jesus disciples it's not by a distinctive!

[31:44] symbol a cross around their neck and some jewelry that they're wearing or a fish on their donkey or on their car that they're driving a symbol oh that's how we know who the disciples are no according to Jesus the way people will know you're his disciples is by love by love loving one another and it's not just any kind of love for one another it's not that natural love that all men are capable of of only loving those who deserve it and loving without too much cost and only for a while while things are going rosy no it's the same kind of supernatural love that Jesus has for us undeserving love costly love that spends and is spent and sacrifices itself unending love that bears all and still endures you see it's a it's a love so radically different from mere natural love that whenever and wherever you see it or find it you can know for sure that person is a disciple of

[32:58] Jesus she loves like Jesus loves he loves just like Jesus loved us and by this love by this love all men will know that you're my disciples they'll make the connection there's something about you it's distinctively different in fact it's distinctively different from the world but it's distinctively like someone else oh yes it's it's Jesus it's the way Jesus loved so you you're connected with him you must be one of his disciples no one else loves like that other than Jesus and those in whom he creates this supernatural love now notice the distinguishing mark of Jesus disciples is not an individual isolated activity in other words it's not something you can do by yourself no it's something we do together one another in a local body of

[34:10] Christ brought together in a voluntary commitment of love to live together under Christ commandments the greatest of which is to love one another as he's loved us you see loving forgiving bearing with each other these are not things that you can do by yourself are they being patient being kind being faithful gentle with others are not done all alone but of necessity with others serving carrying each other's burdens all the one another of love they're impossible in isolation so Jesus new commandment is a call to active relationships in the body of Christ so that Christ like love might be seen flowing back and forth in the give and take of real unperfected disciples of

[35:11] Jesus in this world in such a way that they show they're his disciples but it's in community it can only be seen the sign can only be seen as we're working in concert with others so I ask you are you giving full weight to the corporate nature of the distinctive mark of Jesus disciples are you are you committed with a local body of Christ people to loving one another as he's loved us and are you pursuing love within that body as you've been loved that's where it's seen not at home not in the monastery in the inner cell no it's seen in the give and take of the real life and worship and full areas of all the areas of life in the body of

[36:15] Christ it's something we've all agreed to as members of grace fellowship I just want to remind you from our constitution the responsibility of members number four that the members must actively seek to cultivate acquaintance with one another why so that they may be better able to pray for one another love one another comfort and encourage one another and help one another materially as necessity may require loving one another can never be done in isolation from one another that means that Jesus disciples are living more and more in a counter cultural way today as we're being driven into our homes and not just by COVID it was happening before that we are going inward we are bent in and living to ourselves more and more we're on our phones you see but in personal personal relationships are suffering because of all the technology and all the other things that are driving us away from people and

[37:23] Jesus is saying how will the world know you're my disciples not as you go home and just live all by yourself but as you live in body life loving each other with the 26 one another rings that the New Testament lays out that's how count Tertullian was an early Christian apologist writing in 200 years AD and he was writing in defense of Christianity to the pagan culture in which they were living and he refers to what the heathen were saying about the Christians he says but it's mainly the deeds of a love so noble that lead many to put a brand upon us behold how they love one another they say when they themselves are animated by mutual hatred isn't that beautiful the world hating and being hated and they look over and they see a people who are loving one another in a way that far exceeds what is natural and they say that's the brand that's the mark of a disciple of

[38:43] Jesus as our own culture becomes more and more pagan characterized by hating and being hated what a backdrop on which the love of Jesus is to be made complete in us as the world sees us loving one another as he's loved us over 150 years ago J.C.

[39:05] Ryle commenting on Jesus new command in John 13 says this of all the commands of our master there's none which is so much talked about and so little obeyed as this to love one another as we have been loved by him Christ's cause in the earth would prosper far more than it does if this simple law was more honored there's nothing that the world understands and values more than true charity the very men who cannot comprehend our doctrine and know nothing of theology can appreciate charity it arrests their attention and makes them think so for the world's sake for the world's sake if for no other cause let us follow after charity more and more you see what he's saying I think we're seeing this lived out in the dear friends and missionaries that we support in West

[40:10] Atlanta West Atlanta their latest newsletter was telling on this score they're a white couple senior citizen white couple that means there's a lot of white showing up here and instead of retiring in ease and safe lifestyle after a lifetime spent in ministry to others they sold their life in suburban their house in suburban South Carolina and they moved right in to what we would refer to as the ghetto the inner city of West Atlanta it's very poor and it's very black they stand out like two they just stand out they're the only two like them in that neighborhood and every week they go out and purchase food items and go to their basement and take 40 sacks and start filling them six pieces of fruit six bars granola bars six this six that and then they hit the streets every week with their sacks their 40 sacks and they go to social gathering points maybe a grove of trees where people are trying to get cooled off in inner city out of the sun and they just go in there and they love on those people and they joke with them and they have fun with them and they share their tracks that the missionaries writing specifically for them and show the love and give the gospel of Jesus

[41:58] Christ and a most unusual thing has happened these folks have opened up and welcomed them they greet them with handshakes and hugs COVID-19 notwithstanding and let me remind you of the racial hatred hatred that our country is presently seeing it's in that context that this is happening there and they sense that these people love them in a way that goes beyond nature and indeed it does for it is God's love in them for these dear people one day a man in the group followed him after they were leaving and said here I want you to have this gave him thirty dollars I appreciate what you're doing in our community for our people my friends next week it was another twenty they go around the corner there's a group of people gathered in the shade of the trees and after they shared their packages and talked and gathered around in a circle of fifteen to pray they were ready to leave and a man comes up two men pulled him over and said here's a hundred dollars and another man came over gave him a twenty another man a twenty dollar bill another man a quarter what are they saying they're saying we're seeing something in you whitey that we don't always see and it's attractively different it's distinctively different it's not like the world and not only is it different there's a lot of different that isn't very attractive isn't there but this is a different that is alluring attractive and it is provided a bridge on which our dear friends are seeking to bring the gospel to see these folks brought into the kingdom of

[44:14] God to know him whose love is beyond telling that's it J.C. Ryle was right 150 years ago there's nothing in the world there's nothing that the world understands and values more than true love the very man who can't comprehend our doctrine know nothing of theology they can appreciate love you see it speaks the universal language it tears down every barrier social cultural racial educational political love transcends and by this all men will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another well you say well that's not love for one another that was love for the lost yes well that's true we're especially to have it for one another but we don't stay with one another we've been sent out into the world haven't we and when we go we disciples of Jesus when we go into the world it's not a different love that we're showing is it it's still undeserved it's still willing to sacrifice and it's still willing to go on and on and that's what is attractive and that's what brings glory to

[45:27] God and so Ryle says if for no other reason than for the world's sake that they might see and yes taste and see in your eye and hear in your voice and see in your hands and in your sacrificial giving of yourself to them that there's something here and as they hear of the Savior they'll say oh that's it that's where we've seen it before that's where we've heard it before the Father sent his Son and showed us his love and now you've just shown us that same love and so Jesus will pray that night may they all be one all of my people may they be one Father just as you are in me and I am in you may they also be in us so that the world may believe that you sent me you see when a people of God love each other like that it makes it all the more believable that God has invaded this world with a love in sending his Son it's true there's something supernatural going on here and there was something supernatural going on there and it makes sense and it comes home the gospel is given power may they be perfected in one to let the world know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me well there is another cause besides the world and Jesus mentions it there in the upper room he says it's to my father's glory that you bear much fruit and show yourself to be my disciple when by loving each other you are bearing that fruit of love and showing yourself to be a disciple of me my father's glorified

[47:12] I'm the vine but he's the gardener and when this vine is producing branches that are loving with divine love it brings glory to the gardener to the father that he's getting such fruit out of such branches so there is a higher cause even than the world coming to believe in Jesus and it is that God might be glorified that's the reason we draw breath it's the reason we get up in the morning it's the whole chief end of man isn't it to glorify God to enjoy him forever how Jesus is honored when his own supernatural love is seen in his disciples you can't produce it you can't fake it not for long at least the cost is too high love is a grace that's what we've been calling these things four graces of the Christian life what's a grace well it's something that God by his supernatural spiritual energy works in us love is what God is working in his people and indeed the demands of love are such that only

[48:24] God can enable it would anybody watching you and the way you operate in this body here conclude those people are disciples of Jesus and let's cry for more of his love God has been teaching you to love each other but I urge you to grow more and more to overflow with love to the salvation of sinners and to the glory of God maybe you're lost this morning and all of this just made apparent that that line of love you are below the line you're in the natural realm of love may I say to you lovingly you can never show this supernatural love until you've received it you can never give it until you've received it and until you've come to Jesus

[49:31] Christ and received Christ that sacrifice of love and trusted in him to save you until you tasted and received that love you will not have it to give it's the only way we have it to give it's because we've received Christ and the love of God in him come to him and he will shower you with his love let's pray we thank you Lord Jesus for your new commandment we thank you for not leaving us before you left this command to us and then not leaving us to ourselves but reminding us that through faith we are united to you and therefore have you living in us and we in you that this love might be produced in us remind us of that each day as we rise without you we can do nothing we can't love God we can't love you we can't love our neighbor we can't love one another so thank you that you've not left us to ourselves thank you for this divine energy at work in us oh help us to to plan and to pray and to make every effort to add to our faith this kind of love we ask in Jesus name and for his glory and for the glory of you our father we ask in

[51:00]  Jesus name amen we love because he first loved us so our love will grow as we contemplate his let's stand and sing about the love of God and notice how supernatural it is