Love Series # 3

“Love of God”

Fred Coulter – February 11, 1995

Today is quite a day. We just read an article concerning the demise of the auditorium. Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena California, which was originally suppose to be a house for God, is now closing because of financial situations. And before services began we reminisced a little bit about it. And all of those of us who have been longtime in the Church of God understood the beginnings of it, and all the things that went on there - the good and the bad and all that sort of thing. But I would like to read to you the dedication prayer by Herbert W. Armstrong, May 6, 1974. And I would assume that this was taken off of a tape recording because I know that Mr. Armstrong was not in the habit of writing out his prayers.

“Great God lifting up hands I want to thank You, Almighty God, from the bottom all of my heart for I know all these people are doing it the same way. They feel the same way toward You. Really this is not our gift to You it is Your gift to us, and we’re grateful that Your name is on it. And now we come to the time that I want to dedicate this in the name of the living Jesus Christ, to the honor and the glory of the great God. Almighty God, please grant that we may always use this building to Your honor and glory. That nothing will happen here that will be displeasing to You. I ask You, Almighty God, to honor prayers that go up from this building. I ask You to bless those who come in here to it. I ask You to bless every one who will speak in sermons or Bible studies from this platform. I ask You, Almighty God, to bless it and protect it in every way and to preserve it because You are the great Creator and You are the Creator Who preserves that which You create. So we ask You to preserve this, immaculate and clean and beautiful. And to keep it clean to represent clean and honest and forthright character. May it be an inspiration to all who come in. And we ask every blessing, Father, to people that come. And we give You thanks as far as we humbly can, for allowing us to have such a beautiful place at Your headquarters church to honor You. Thank You in Jesus name. Amen.”

And I think that perhaps that’s a more appropriate opening to the sermon that I’m going to bring today than the opening that I had. From the point of view that, that is a tremendous example for us to understand that the best intentions, unless you follow God’s way, are going to come to nothing. The auditorium is now closing its doors to any activities in the Ambassador International Culture Foundation. I would assume that they won’t even have church services there pretty soon. I don’t know what is going to happen to it but as I mentioned for years, that when I go to Southern California to the Los Angeles area, I stay many times with a friend of mine who lives directly across the street on Orange Grove from the campus. And I could look over there and see all of the buildings. And I remember when it was beautiful and filled with students, and on the Sabbath day the students would walk down through the gardens and see the flowers. And it was very, very inspiring. And now you drive by there, there aren’t any flowers. And you drive by there and all the apartments, where the people lived who worked at the campus, they’re all empty. And in some cases the drapes are all drawn back and you can see right through the building. You go down in the area where the cafeteria was, and the gymnasium, and the parking lot. Now the parking lot is all ruined because of the earthquake. And it is really a testimony, a testimony to the good intentions of men that have gone astray because of sin.

Now let’s go to Isaiah 66. I know that I give a lot of sermons beginning with Isaiah 66. You know there’s a reason for it. And there’s something that we need really to learn out of this. And there’s something we need to grasp in our own lives. Because today, I want to begin what is going to be perhaps one of the most important series of sermons I’m going to do (which is part of the series of 1st, 2nd and 3rd John), which is understanding the love of God. So here’s just as good a place as any to begin. Isaiah 66:1, “Thus saith the LORD, The heaven is My throne, and the earth is My footstool: where is the house that ye build unto Me?…” And you know you go through the Bible, every time someone builds a house for God they get in trouble, don’t they? They sure do. “…And where is the place of My rest?” Because anything you’re going to do for God, you have to realize, verse 2, “For all those things hath Mine hand made, and all those things have been, saith the LORD:…” (Isa. 66:1-2).

Now when they built the auditorium they got, supposedly, the best of everything. They even got gold overleaf. And at that time, believe it or not, gold was at $42 an ounce. And they spent thousands, and thousands, and thousands, and thousands of dollars to gold overleaf the walls, and to put gold ceramics up on the tile up underneath the roof so you would look at these pillars going up. And I know a lot of people would come along and look at that and almost break your neck looking up to that, and you can see the gold ceramic tile. Real gold up there.

And in building the auditorium they tried to make it with the colors, as near as they could as they found described in the Bible. And yet from day one that Solomon finished the temple… And you might take this as an instructive thing to read. Go back and read about Solomon. He started out with the best of intentions didn’t he? You read his dedication prayer. That’s quite a prayer. Very similar to what I just read that Herbert Armstrong gave when the auditorium was opened, only much longer. And God put His presence there, and God filled the temple with His Holy Spirit - with the visible cloud while the Priests were trumpeting long and loud, and all the singers were singing. And there’s every indication that that happened on the Feast of Trumpets. God came to His Temple.

Now right after the Temple was dedicated and all that was done, and Solomon was done and dedicating, God began to bless him. And bless him with more, and more, and more, and he became the wisest man in the entire world. He also became the richest man in the entire world. All the kingdom of Israel was the leading kingdom on earth, and they were bringing 666 talents of gold as tribute to Solomon every year. Gold was so plentiful in Jerusalem that it was said that silver was counted as gravel in the streets. Just stones to walk on. He had the best of everything. But what happened to Solomon and all of his best and good intentions? Then he got carried away and didn’t love God and didn’t serve God. And then he went after strange women. And then he got so obsessed with that, that he ended up with 300 wives and 700 concubines, and made leagues and alliances with those marriages. Then as the master builder he went across from the temple over on, what later was infamously called the Mount of Abomination, and he built temples to every one of the gods of the women he married and polluted Jerusalem with all of his wretchedness and pagan religions. So it may be true that Solomon was the first Mason because he surely left God after he built the temple. So we have something very similar to like that repeated down in Pasadena, and we didn’t learn the lesson.

“…All those things hath Mine hand made,…” (Isa. 66:2). God says in another place all the gold is His, all the silver is His, everything that you make anything out of. “…And all those things have been, saith the LORD: but to this man will I look,…” This is what God is interested in, this is what God wants, and as we will see because God can show His love to this kind of person. And this kind of person can receive the love of God back to them. Because we’re going to see that love is so great, and love is so fantastic, and love comes from God, that we don’t have it brethren, we just don’t have it. God has got to give it. Oh, we have to work at it once we begin to understand it. But unless we experience the love of God in our heart, and in our mind, and in our lives, and soul, and being, we’re just like this right here. Just like this auditorium that’s being shut down. This is why God says, “…to this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at My word” (Isa. 66:2). Then He shows if you don’t have this attitude, everything you do is as if it’s a great and giant sin.

Now people can be correct according to the law, but if they don’t have love what good is it? Is not Judaism a testimony of law without love? Yes it is. That’s why God has preserved it so we will know and understand. And I’ll have to say I’ll be the first to confess, in our past church experience brethren, we never learned of the love of God. We did not. We learned about the commandments. Yeah, that’s true. We learned about the Sabbath. That’s true. We learned about the holy days. That’s also true. But we also destroyed thousands of lives, and thousands of children, shattered emotions, and broke hearts, because we were all so keenly bent on authority, right? Remember that? And wasn’t that taught to our families, and didn’t we institute that in our families, and didn’t we create a lot of problems? And I include myself there, too. And I’m here the first to tell you that the administration of law and authority does not produce love. Now you may understand some things, which are right. But being right does not necessarily mean that you love. Because love is supreme, and love is so great, and love is from God, and the perfection of love is the whole reason why we were created and made, and put on this earth in the first place. Because of all of His creation we alone, we alone were made to receive and to give love, and to receive the love of God that He gives to us, and in turn to give that to other people.

Now what I’d like you to do, since this is part of the series in 1 John, let’s go ahead and take our 1 John study series please. Ok, what I would like to do is turn to the “Word Studies from the Greek,” page 19, please. Let’s turn to page 19 of the “Word Studies from the Greek -- First, Second & Third John,” please. I have a section there concerning love. And while you’re turning there let me mention, let me mention that in the first chapter of the book of James it says, “That the wrath of man does not equal or produce the righteousness of God…” (James 1:20, paraphrased). And you can put anything in there you want: wrath, authority, you have anger, schemes, devices, way of man… does not produce the righteousness of God. So likewise it doesn’t produce the love of God. And love is something that you come to understand when you realize how deficient you are as a human being. And I think the older you get the more you realize how deficient you really are. Now the apostle John was the one - we’ll just… I’ll pick up some things out of the paragraphs here that I’ve written - was the apostle that Jesus loved. And in fact on the Passover night, leaned back on His chest and asked Jesus who it was that was going to betray Him. And can you imagine the shock of the disciples the next day when they found out that it was Judas Iscariot? Can you imagine that?

Now John and his brother James were pretty zealous. When they first started out with Jesus they were rough fishermen, the sons of the Zebedee, and they left their father and followed Jesus. And during the course of the things that they were doing, and watching Jesus, and so forth, James and John got real mad one day because some people weren’t willing to except Jesus coming into their village. So they came to Jesus and they said, “…Now do You want us to call fire down from heaven upon them because they didn’t receive You? And Jesus turned and said, ‘You don’t know what manner of spirit you are in, for I did not come to destroy lives but to save lives…’ (Luke 9:54-56, paraphrased). So John had a long way to go to learn love. They were also called in one other place “The Sons of Thunder”, which probably meant that they were loud speaking, and whenever they speak there was a big booming voice going out, and they were very impressive. And matter of fact, so much so impressive, that James and John along with Peter went up to the Mount of Transfiguration, Matthew 17, if you remember that. They were close to Christ, and yet the apostle John did not write until late in his life. I’m sure he did a lot writing before that.

And remember when we went through the whole Gospel of John verse by verse, and how much we began to understand about the love of God, and the grace of God, and the things that are there. And how many years had we been in the church before we did that? Long time. Oh yes, we heard sermons on the Sabbath. And yes, we heard sermons on child rearing, and that you could beat them into perfection, if you just, you know, beat the sin out of them, not knowing at that time, being falsely taught, that children are perfect until they learn sin from parents. That’s not true. That is an absolute lie. And we based the whole doctrine of child rearing and discipline based upon that, didn’t we? Yes, we did. Did it fail? Yes, it did. It didn’t work. And I’m here as a testimony to tell you that it doesn’t work. You can’t command love by law. And John had to learn that. We all have to learn that. And I’m here to tell you today brethren, that the reason why things are going wrong in the churches of God is because most of them do not even have a clue as to what the love of God is.

Now someone just handed me a church news here, and right out of the whole thing they’re hell bent on condemning people that water down the laws of God. Because you see they haven’t come to the point to get out of the elementary things concerning the Gospel. The Gospel is not only a call to repentance. The Gospel is a true relationship between you and God the Father, and Jesus Christ, so each one of us can come to know the love of God. That’s what it’s all about. And in our lives and in the world today it says the world is like this, “…because iniquity shall multiply, the love of many shall grow cold…” (Matt 24:12, paraphrased) So even just the natural normal love that God built into human beings is so stifled, and squashed, and just crunched together because of sin and iniquity, that who knows how to love? Do we not have topsy-turvy marriages? Do we not have topsy-turvy everything in the society? And so perverse and so wretched that now, that the homosexuality, and every perversion under the sun is the ruling thing of the day. And how do we then, in coming to the Church of God, ever learn about the love of God, if all we are doing is being beaten up by condemning and guilt ridden sermons and fear to smash your face into the fact that you are a sinner and that you’ve got to strive harder to keep the law. And you got to be perfect because God is not going to except you unless you’re perfect in the letter of the law. Oh that’s just so much a lie, that’s all it is, it’s a lie. Because God the Father has reached down to call you. God the Father Himself loves you. That’s why He called you. Oh yes, we need to be obedient to the law, that’s true. But if you don’t obey from the heart, what good is it? What good is it? Every religion on earth is a testimony to some kind of law, or rule, or regulation to try and make you a better person.

And I hope that we’re really going to learn the love of God, and that we can all experience one of the most profound things that God the Father wants us to have. And that is to really feel, and know, and understand the love of God. Then we can begin loving each other. Then we can begin loving our neighbor as ourself. Not until then. People can even live and be married forty, fifty, sixty years and still never know each other. They can still be like passing ships in the night, never love each other. Men have to exercise their authority, and women have to exercise their picayunishness, and no one is ever willing to say I love you, just because you’re you. That’s what it’s all about brethren. And then to come into the Church of God where the love of God is supposed to be taught and all you learn is authority and anti-love tactics. They do not work. They will not work. That’s why God is doing what He’s doing to the church today. Because if in all the exercise of what we are doing, we don’t learn the love of God, we haven’t learned a thing.

Now continuing in the paragraph, “Perhaps…” (concerning the apostle John) he “…was able to teach and write about the love of God more deeply, and with more understanding, than any of the other apostles. In the Gospel of John, he wrote the most simple and yet most profound revelation about God the Father’s love. ‘For God so loved the world,…’” And we’re going to see that even to the wicked and the unkind, God is still steadfast in His love to them at the level that He has promised that He would sustain it. Do you understand that? “…That whosoever is believing on Him may not perish but may have eternal life…’” (John 3:16, AT). And then he wrote in 1 John 4:8 and 16 that “‘…GOD IS LOVE.’” That’s what God is, and God delights in love. Now God is also lawgiver, because love is going to produce law. But you see, law is only the fundamental expression of love. The deep spiritual love that God wants us to have is not the love which is phileoo, which means brotherly kindness, which means you as people generating love from you. You can have that love toward people. And there are some people that you love, and some people you don’t love, and some people you don’t like. But you see Christ came to change all of that within our hearts, and minds, and our soul, and our being. And we’re going to see that one of the hardest commands to follow, because I know there are people who say, “Well hey, hate is the only way to go.” But we’ll understand why God commands us to love our enemies. Now that’s a hard one, isn’t it? That is a difficult one, isn’t it? Yes it is!

Now the main verb for (come down to the third paragraph here) is “…agapaoo, which means a love greater than one’s own life, God the Father’s and Jesus Christ’s love to us,…” And in the noun form that is called agapee.And agapee means godly divine love. Now in the church we were with before, with the only thing we learned about love, was that love is an outgoing concern. Well, what do you mean? Never defined, never taught, never got into. God’s love for us is so profound brethren, that the whole creation and His whole plan of salvation, even after Adam and Eve our forefathers sinned, that God still loved us and is going to provide a way back. Now you think on that.

“It is most profoundly expressed by the love of God the Father for Jesus Christ and the love of Jesus Christ for the Father.” That’s why Jesus never did sin, though He had the capacity to sin by carrying the law of sin and death within His flesh. The reason He didn’t sin was because He loved the Father and the Father loved Him, and He was full of the Spirit, and full of grace, and full of truth. That’s why. He didn’t run around repeating the Ten Commandments in His mind, He loved God. And I’ll guarantee you one thing, the way you’re going to overcome sin the most, the way any of us are going to overcome sin the most, because sin starts in the mind, is if you love God, and if you receive the love of God back. It isn’t going to work any other way, and anything else out there is just playing church. That’s all it’s doing. We’ve got all this stuff. We’ve gone through heresies, we’ve gone through why we need to keep the Sabbath, and all that. Look, if we don’t understand that by now then where have you been? That’s why God is weeding all of this out.

So this is the kind of love God wants us to have. “Through the power of the Spirit of God true Christians are to develop…” Because this is something you grow into. You are “…to develop this profound and deep love of God for God and each other. We are to come to have God’s very own love in us. This highest expression of spiritual love can only come from God because “GOD IS LOVE.” And love is a gift. Love cannot come any other way. We as human beings do not have the love of God, which comes from His Holy Spirit, naturally within us. We do not. We cannot, as one church looked around and said, “Oh, we’re lacking love in this church.” Well, Jesus said the world’s going to know that they know us, that we are Christians if we love each other, so therefore let’s all love one another.” While the words sound true it’s fatally flawed, because human beings cannot from within their own selves generate the love of God. It isn’t going to work.

Now let’s, before we get into this, let’s understand some things. We’ll come back and go through this a little bit more. Let’s see what kind of love it is that we are to strive for and obtain, ok? Let’s go to 1 Cor. 13. Now there’s an awful lot in here, and we’re going to be coming back to 1 Corinthians 13 an awful lot, because this gives us the true value, and the true definition, and the true interaction of love.

Let’s come to 1 Corinthians 13:13, “And now abideth faith, hope [and love - that’s what it should read], charity, these three; but the greatest of these is [love] charity.” Now let’s think on that, because that is the most profound thing, “…the greatest of these is love...” God has called us to grow into that love brethren, to learn of that love. Not only to know the word of God, but to receive the Spirit of God in your heart and mind that you feel and you experience the love of God in the most profound way. And when you do, I guarantee it’s going to change your life. And when you do, I guarantee it’s going to change your prayers. It just will. So the greatest is love. So we’re going to talk about the greatest thing, the greatest attribute, and the greatest expression God can give to us. Because you see, not only is God looking to the one who has a contrite spirit and a humble heart, He’s also saying in that, that “The greatest thing I can give you is My love. I could give you a temple, hey, I’ve created the world for all of mankind.” As we will see in a bit. But is that the greatest expression of God’s love? No, because He made us with a mind. He created us with emotions. He gave us feelings, did He not? He wants us to know and feel His love.

Now let’s come to Ephesians 3, and we’ll be back here again, but I want us to understand how this is going to come. It’s not going to come because all of a sudden you say, “I’m lacking in the love of God, got to have the love of God, have to show myself friendly and loving.” No, it has to come from within with God’s Spirit. And that’s what repentance is all about - that you repent of your way, and ask God for His way. You repent of your thoughts, and ask God for His thoughts. And when we get close to the Passover we’re going to understand the tremendous and profound love that God had for us in sending Jesus Christ.

Here in Ephesians 3:16 it says, “…That He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man;...” You have to have that Spirit of God first, and you must be strengthened in it first. And when you do, it is to grow. And when you do, it is to develop. And when you do, it is to produce fruit. And yet all of that is from God. “…That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love…” Notice it does not say rooted and grounded in law. Law is all understood. “…Rooted and grounded in love,…” because that gives you the very basis for everything you see. Are you rooted and grounded in love? Are you growing toward that? Are you realizing that this alone can come from God? “…May be able to comprehend with all saints…” This is what God wants us to grow to. “…What is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ,…” Now the word “know” is ginosko, which means to experientially understand it from having experienced it. Have you experienced the love of God? Brethren, I want to tell you, when you do it’s wonderful. And I can’t say that I’ve experienced the ultimate of it. And I will have to say that after being, how many years in the Church of God, 32 years, 29 of them as a minister, and I’m just coming to really begin to understand it. Have we not missed something somewhere? Have I not missed something somewhere? Yes indeed! You can’t go back and undo what you should have done way back when. There’s nothing that can cover that except the sacrifice of Jesus Christ. And that’s how loving God is. Think on that. That you “…may be able to comprehend…and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge,…” (Eph. 3:16-19). There is no knowledge, there is no book you can go to. And how many people have studied the Bible and still never have come to the knowledge of the love of God, because they’re not willing to yield themselves to God.

You look back and you think of all the pride, and arrogance, and self-importance, and everything that the ministry in the Church of God has done. And you compare that with the love of God. And you look back, if you’ve kept your old sermons notes going way back for years, and years, and years, and years. What I want you to do is go back and I want you to count how many sermons that you heard on love. And I want you to count how many scriptures were actually read concerning the love of God. And then I want to think about that, and I want to ponder that, and I want to pray about it. Because the only way we’re going to get the love of God is go to God and say, “God I don’t know.” Because it is true, “…the way of man is not in himself to direct his steps,” (Jer. 10:23, paraphrased). It’s just not.

Now let’s go to 1 Corinthians 2. If you want to know about the truth of the plan of God, the great… And what I want you to do when we’re reading this, I want you to think about all of the stupidity that has been exercised in the name of God, in the name of religion, in all of the heresy, and all of the apostasy, and all of this sort of thing going on. It’s even said, “Well, you know it’s all right to work on the Sabbath now, because everybody sins a little bit every day.” That is so far away from God. That is so twisting and perverting of the Scriptures, it can only come from Satan the devil. That’s not the Spirit of God.

Now here 1 Corinthians 2:9. Let’s understand what is so important for us. “But as it is written, [the] Eye hath not seen,…” So this ties right in with Isaiah 66, doesn’t it? What are you going to do? What is the greatest thing that you can accomplish? How good can you see, how well can you hear, how smart are you? He says here, “…[the] Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him.” You got to love Him. Obedience is necessary, but you got to love Him beyond that, we’re going to see. “…Them that love Him.” So grand, it’s so glorious, it’s so marvelous that God would give us eternal life and the kind of existence that He has. Isn’t that wonderful?

And I know brethren, that as we get older… and we’ve got a lot of senior citizens with us. I talked to a man who’s 73, been in the Church 21 years, and I know that man has never truly experienced the love of God. And I tell you what, when you get to be that age you know down deep inside in your own heart and mind, and your own soul, and down to the very marrow of your bones, the most important thing you want to know in your life is, “Does God love me?” Because everything of youth is gone. Strength is gone, the eyes are gone, the teeth are gone. We may have false ones, we may have glasses, we may have hearing aids. The bones are decrepit and hurting. Now we may have replacement joints, or whatever. But out of it all when you get down to the innermost recesses of your very being, and the older you are the more this becomes true. Does God love me? Do you love God? Now that’s why so many senior citizens are taken advantage of, and bilked by smooth con artists. Because they think that this person is showing love to them, and they really need love. Do you not think that God wants that love shown to these people? Do you not think that God wants them to really grasp and understand what kind of love that He has for them?And that they can face the end of their lives in love and assurance to know that yes, they are safe in God and in Christ. Isn’t that the most profound thing we need to understand? Yes, because look, God has to reveal it to us. We have to love Him. He will teach us the greatest and most profound things, won’t He? Yes, He will.

“But God hath revealed them unto us by His Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God.” And the deepest thing of God is His love. “For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. [But] Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God [or, out from God]; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.” (vs. 10-12). That’s what He wants us to know. So this is the greatest.

Let’s go back to our study translation of 1 John, and let’s come to chapter 4 where we left off before. And I think this is going to be most instructive at this time when we see what is going one, especially what is going on in the world, and in the Church. You know the bottom line is, who cares what the world thinks. Are you ever going to please the world? No. But you can please God. Now let’s pick it up here in 1 John 4:5. “They are of the world. Because of this, they speak of the world, [that’s what we’re hearing coming in the churches of God] and the world is listening to them.” Now I talked to a man, that in their local church, in one of the biggest churches of God (I don’t think it will be the biggest one for very long), what they’re going to do is have an open house all during the month of March. And they’re going to invite all the public in, trying to increase numbers, try and get more money. See, if isn’t of God, what good is it going to do? And my comment to that individual was I said, “I guarantee you will hear very little about the Passover, and how to prepare for it if they’re going to have that all through the month of March.”

“They are of the world. Because of this, they speak of the world, and the world is listening to them. We are of God;…” Brethren, understand that. “…The one who is knowing God, is listening to us: the one who is not of God is not listening to us.” So it doesn’t make any difference if you bring them in, right? God has to call the individual. Can God call anyone He wants? Yes. Can God not call anyone He doesn’t want to call? Yes. Who makes the decision? God does. We can just be thankful God has called us, and not say, “Oh, why we’re better than the world. God has called us.” No way. “By this means, we are knowing the Spirit of the Truth and the spirit of the deception. Beloved, we should be loving one another, because the love is from God, and every one who is loving, has been begotten from God and is knowing God” (1 John 4:5-7, AT). Now the reason that that was inspired to be written in the present tense is this…