Extravagant Love – Part 1

12 July 2009

 

  1. Introduction – The Great Commandment:

·   Matthew 22:36  -  What is the greatest commandment of the law?

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind, you shall love your neighbor as yourself”

·   All the requirements of the law hinge on passionate love for God and for people.

·   Passionate = expressing or showing strong feelings and expressive action.

·   Passionate love for God is a response to experiencing His passionate love for us.

·   1 John 4:19 – “We love Him because He first loved us”

·   Christian life is designed to be a passionate life giving relationship – love affair of heart.

 

  1. God is the Initiator and source of Love:

·   1 John 4:16  -  “God is love, and he who abides in love, abides in God and God in him”.

·   The nature of God is love – it is core to who He is.

·   Love always seeks to find an expression – someone to express love to.

·   God designed us in His image – to receive love and to express love.

·   God loves you       - Not just tolerates you

- Not waiting for you to grow up

- Not waiting for you to get life right

·   God loves you uniqueness.

-          Your appearance, with all your blemishes, He loves you.

-          Loves you when awake, loves you when asleep, He made you for His pleasure and enjoyment and loves to accompany you.

-          Loves talking to you, touching you, watching you Revelation 4:11

·   Psalm 139:13-18  -  “How precious are your thoughts to me”

·   As soon as you were born God was thinking of a relationship with you.

           

  1. God is Passionate about People:

·   Song of Solomon is a metaphor – picture of the relationship and love of God for us.

·   Song 8:7  -  “Many waters cannot quench love”

·   Gods love for you is unquenchable – nothing can put it out or overcome it.

·   Song 4:9  -  “You have ravished my heart with one look of your eyes”

-  ravish = to fill with strong emotion, captivate, enthrall, make heart beat faster.

·   Song 6:4  -  “Oh my love you are beautiful as Tirzah” (beautiful city)

·   People carry wrong concepts of God or incomplete picture.

People see him as demanding, trying to discipline us, angry, distant.

·   He passionately loves us and wants to reveal that love to us.

 

  1. God Pursues us with Passion:

·   Genesis 3:9  -  “Adam, where are you?”

·   This is the call of God’s heart reaching out to people He loves.

·   Even when we sin God still pursues us to restore us.

·   No matter what has happened God’s love is not quenched or changed.

·   Luke 19:10  -  “Son of man has come to seek and save that which was lost”.

·   Seek = 2212 = to search for something very vulnerable and precious until finding it.

·   Save = 4982 = to rescue from danger or destruction, heal, deliver, make whole.

·   Throughout the Bible God is the first to initiate and pursue.

·   God has pursued you even when you didn’t realize it.

·   Romans 5:8  -  God demonstrates His own love towards us – while we were sinners Christ died for us.

 

  1. The Human Heart is never fulfilled without God:

·   Proverbs 20:27  -  “The spirit of man is the lamp of the Lord”

·   The Human spirit has thirsts:

i)                    Security – to be loved and accepted unconditionally

ii)                   Self worth – to be valued

iii)                 Significance – to have purpose and meaning

·   Proverbs 18:28  -  “You will light my lamp”

·   Only God can meet the deepest needs of the human spirit.

·   Without God we find substitutes, ways to fill needs without God.

·   They never satisfy us – we always thirst for more and more

 

  1. God wants to Reveal His Love to You:

·   Song 1:2  -  “Let Him kiss me with the kisses from his mouth”

·   Song of Solomon = revelation of the passionate affection of God for His people.

·   “Kiss of God”         = not literal, metaphor – picture

                                    = deep touch and impact of God’s love on human spirit

                                    = softens out heart and empowers the heart to love

·   Very few people talk to us to really know who we are – to connect and affirm that we are loved, valued and special.

·   “Kiss of God” = imparts to our spirit tangible feeling of love and value.

 

  1. How does God Communicate “Devine Kiss”:

·   Meditate in scriptures

·   Testimony of person

·   Song we hear

·   Book we read

·   Scene in a movie

·   Prophetic revelation

·   Impression on heart

·   Ministry of people

·   Act of kindness

·   “Deep calls to deep” – we feel the presence of God and our heart is touched and moved.

·   When did you last feel the Kiss of God and your heart was moved?

·   Passionate love for God is ignited and kept alive by constantly experiencing His passionate love for us in a tangible way.

·   Luke 15:20  -  “He arose and came to his Father, and when he was still a great way off, his Father saw him, and had compassion and ran, and fell on his neck and kissed him”.

·   John 3:16  -  “God so loved you … He gave His only Son”