As we have come to the concluding section of this series, on the attributes of God, it's fitting to see how this last attribute is in place is in its right place, as we are seeing the love of God. You see, when it comes to the attributes of God, we are seeing that God is unknowable. Is incomprehensible. We saw He is self-sufficient. We saw He is independent. We saw He is exclusive, meaning there is no one like Him. We saw He is glorious. He is wise, He is holy, He is immutable. He is powerful. And we saw He is angry. He is just. He has His justice and righteousness, and we could continue in this study. We could see that He is in accessible. We could see He is invincible. We could see He is indestructible. We could see He is omnipresent and omniscient. We could see He is immense or His immensity that He fills everything. He is limitless.

There is no limit to study God, and we need to study God. But after all of this, we see that God is love. And this is not the final attribute. This is not the ultimate attribute. This is not one attribute that is important over the other, and that I believe is the mistake with so many of Christians today. That we have skewed our image of God. It's like a caricature where, you know, a cartoonist draws the nose and the eyes and the ears of some persons. Enlarges his eyes and draws his eyes or his ears small. And it's a distorted image of the person. And that's precisely the rebuke that God would have towards us because God says that you thought that I was like you. And our understanding of God is too human, like what Luther would tell Erasmus that our understanding is not sufficient.

Why because we like to stress on few attributes, we enjoy to talk about His love, His grace, and His mercies, forgetting everything else. And that's one important thing we need to study from the start, that this attribute of love is not isolated, it is not out of its place. It is not by itself. It cannot be studied on its own, it cannot be favourite. You cannot bank on it and say God is love and God loves everybody. And so you can go to sleep. No, there are so many attributes that go with the love of God. God's attribute of love is not independent. It goes along with so many attributes.

You see, that is what makes God's love controversial. It isn't a simple topic. It isn't the fact that you can enjoy and say God loves everybody and make everybody happy about it. God's love is not something so fuzzy, and it makes you friendly and welcomes you and leaves you the way you are. Yes, God's love is welcoming, but it makes sure it changes you. God's Love demands some things from you. God loves God's Love demands that you love Him back. And there are so many lessons that we learn from God's love. So, there is a problem over here. If we just look at God's love and go back and say 'Praise the Lord'.

It's there's a big problem over there. Because loving God is the biggest commandment in the Bible. And if we have to study God's love, there needs to be a rightful response from us, towards God. There are important lessons we need to learn towards God and in our life and, and serve Him to do Him to walk in His ways as Moses would say because we love Him. So love of God is not as simple as it sounds, it might be diluted, it might be the most common word you hear. It might be something you remember every single Sunday around the table rightfully so that all things are right, but the love of God is demanding it requires of you.


Love of God is co-joined with other attributes
You see, first of all, let's try to look at the love of God in terms of His attributes. For example, the love of God is not independent. It is co-joined with so many other attributes. For example, if you were to ask Why does God love you? Why does God love you? What would be that answer? Why does God love you? You see this as being a pressing question in the Bible. Why is man that You are mindful of ? So why ? We are His children, but what made Him make us His children. Why would He make us His children? Why would He create us if we have to sin anyway? Can we have an answer to this question? Why did God love us?

Well, let's see the answer in Deuteronomy 7:7,
7 The Lord did not set his love upon you, nor choose you, because ye were more in number than any people; for ye were the fewest of all people:
8 But because the Lord loved you, and because he would keep the oath which he had sworn unto your fathers, hath the Lord brought you out with a mighty hand, and redeemed you out of the house of bondmen, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.


The love of God goes with His sovereignty
Yeah, that should be enough. It's written in verse eight, because the Lord loved you. Can you see a cycle over there? Can you see a cycle? If the question is, why does God love me? Verse eight says, because God loves me. That's the answer. Why does God love me? Because God loves me. What does it mean? It simply means God's choice of love is the reason why you are loved. God chose to love you. On other words, God's love goes hand in hand with His sovereignty. If you want to know why God loved you, because God is sovereign. It is His choice, it is His will, It is His purpose. And because God loved you, you are loved.

So even if the Bible tries to answer the question, it doesn't give you answers, like because you are lovable, or because God saw some future perspective or some potential in you. The bible doesn't give those kinds of answers. Even if the Bible wants to give the answer of why God loves you. It just reiterates the same thing because God loves you. It's like going back to the circle and say, God is sovereign, finished. You can't ask and know why God loves you. You can't know for certain if there is a reason why God loves you, you can't be certain if there is a purpose or what is the purpose, you can only know that God loves you because He chose to love you. It is His choice. It is His sovereignty. You see, love goes with his sovereign sovereignty. What about His anger?


The love of God goes with His anger
Can the love of God go with his anger? It's a paradox. How can God's love go with anger? You see in, in Psalms 89. Do not read it, but I'll just read it to you. It talks of David's children.

Psalms 89:30-33
30 “If his sons forsake My law
And do not walk in My judgments,
31 If they break My statutes
And do not keep My commandments,
32 Then I will punish their transgression with the rod,
And their iniquity with stripes.
33 Nevertheless My lovingkindness I will not utterly take from him,
Nor hallow My faithfulness to fail.

Psalms 89:30 onwards, He says, I will punish them, I will correct them, but I am not going to remove my steadfast love from them. So God can be angry towards a sin. But that anger is not anger absolutely. God's anger is mixed and it's salted. It goes, It rides upon love. You see, this is how the Hebrew writer says that it is because you are loved the father chastises you and disciplines you. It is because you are loved you can call God a father and if God is your Father, and if God does not chastise you, if God is not angry with you, if God does not punish you, then you can question He's loving. You see, it is a cycle. If God is not angry, then He could not be loving. And if God is only love, and He's not angry, then that love is false anger, false love. You see, love and anger are two things that always go together. It's unheard of in this world, but with God, His anger, his wrath is an attribute. And love is an attribute that goes together. What about his attribute of eternal, eternalness?


The love of God goes with His eternalness
He is eternal. He is endless. And then what about his love? It's written over here. If you can't read this, everything, but I'll just read it out Jeremiah 31, it says,

Jeremiah 31:3
The Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with lovingkindness have I drawn thee and He loves them to the end. And that's what the Lord Jesus would talk about His disciples that He having loved them, He loved them to the end. You see, God is eternal, which makes His love eternal.


God's love is sovereign and righteous
God is sovereign, His love is sovereign. God is righteous, He is holy, He is just which makes His love holy, righteous and just.


God's love is infinite and incomprehensible
Going ahead we see that God is infinite, which makes us love in finite because it's written about his love, that you cannot, you can't even compass its breadth, its length, its height and its depth as mentioned in the Ephesians. To know the love of Christ which passes knowledge and to comprehend with all the scenes, which is the width, length, depth and height.

God is eternal, His love is eternal. God is infinite, His love is infinite, God is incomprehensible, which makes us love incomprehensible. As we read that the love of Christ passes knowledge it cannot be understood, it cannot be known.


God's love is faithful
God is faithful, which makes His love faithful, which makes His love steadfast. In Isaiah, it's so beautifully written that though the mountains be shaken, and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed, says the Lord. Again in Psalms 89 we read that He will not remove his steadfast love. God is faithful, which makes us love faithful.


God's love is immutable
Finally, we see a goddess immutable, which makes us love immutable, which makes us love unchangeable, which makes His love steadfast, which means you can't give God reasons to stop loving you. You can give thousands of reasons for God to hate you, but that won't change His mind. God's love is immutable, just as He is immutable.


God's love is indestructible
We see that God's love is indestructible, just like He is indestructible. God cannot be destroyed and so His love towards us cannot be destroyed, which means as Romans 8 Paul would say that nothing can separate you from the love of God. God's love can not be separated from you. And King Solomon would talk about his wife. Solomon and his wife being a picture of the church you can say, the wife would say that your love is as strong as death. And many waters cannot quench it. That shows of how His love is indestructible, it cannot be finished, it cannot be diminished. You see, this is about God's love with all His attributes. He is holy, that's why His love holy. He is sovereign. That's why His love is sovereign.


God's love is powerful and wise
He is powerful. That's why His power will display His love. He is wise, that's why in His love you can see His wisdom.


God's love is glorious
He is glorious. And that's why it's written in John chapter 17 that Lord Jesus would say that, that Father, I want those who have given me to be with me where I am to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the worlds were created. And again, God's glory goes with his love.

God's immutability goes with His love, His indestructibility goes with His love. Just about every attribute goes with His love. God's love is connected with so many attributes. The best part about God's love is that you will have to go all the way up to 22 chapters, to see God's love as a word written in the Bible, but God's love is spread across the whole Bible. You can't say that Genesis 22 is the first occurrence of the word love because God's love can be seen right at the creation of God. God's love can be seen towards the end, even beyond revelation. So God's love is an attribute that takes along all the attributes. God's love is an attribute that makes all the attributes sense to us. God's love makes God accessible, approachable. It makes us to worship Him, praise Him, because God is loving.

Radical examples of God's love
You know, today, I just want to take a few examples of this love and talk about some of them some of the most radical examples of God's love, where God should not have loved, and it's written God loved. Some of the most radical examples of God's love. Let's begin by some things we have already seen in Malachi 1.

Malachi 1:1-2
1 The burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi.
Israel Beloved of God
2 “I have loved you,” says the Lord.
“Yet you say, ‘In what way have You loved us?’
Was not Esau, Jacob’s brother?”
Says the Lord. “Yet Jacob I have loved;

This is a beautiful study, just to look at the word 'Yet'. The three-letter word you find in an Old Testament. Every time it says 'Yet', it's a beautiful study. And this is one beautiful verse where God says, yet there was Esau to be loved, there was Esau your elder brother, yet I've loved Jacob. And God is not saying I have loved Israel. I'm not saying God is loved the prince. God has loved Jacob, which means the deceiver, a schemer, a worm and this is like the end of the Testament, God is going to drop His mic for three hundred years. He's not going to speak anything. And before He does that He wants to make this point that I have loved Jacob. And despite thousands of years of unfaithfulness, God's love, has been unwavering, it's been faithful.

One more example of God's radical love. Let's go to Ezekiel chapter 16. Ezekiel, chapter 16 and we'll read a couple of verses over here. Ezekiel chapter 16:3 onwards, and say,

Ezekiel 16:3-8
3 and say, ‘Thus says the Lord God to Jerusalem: “Your birth and your nativity are from the land of Canaan; your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite.
4 As for your nativity, on the day you were born your navel cord was not cut, nor were you washed in water to cleanse you; you were not rubbed with salt nor wrapped in swaddling cloths.
5 No eye pitied you, to do any of these things for you, to have compassion on you; but you were thrown out into the open field, when you yourself were loathed on the day you were born.
6 “And when I passed by you and saw you struggling in your own blood, I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’ Yes, I said to you in your blood, ‘Live!’
7 I made you thrive like a plant in the field; and you grew, matured, and became very beautiful. Your breasts were formed, your hair grew, but you were naked and bare.
8 “When I passed by you again and looked upon you, indeed your time was the time of love; so I spread My wing over you and covered your nakedness. Yes, I swore an oath to you and entered into a covenant with you, and you became Mine,” says the Lord God.

This is a beautiful expression of God's love. It's very gross. It's very gory, because it talks about a baby that is abandoned. A baby whose use navel has not been cut, a baby who is not swaddled and not salted and no one pitied and no one was there for it. It was lying in the open when God passed by. And God took this abandoned, helpless, dying babe, and made Israel His own. This is another example of God's radical love. What makes it radical is the imagery, the imagery of a baby that's abandoned, a baby that is unworthy or even the parents have abandoned.

Speaking about the parents, God says in verse 3, that your father was an Amorite, and your mother a Hittite. And God is trying to say Israel, your lineage was not something great. Look at Abraham, look at Sarah, look at their lineage. They come from places that were idol worshipers, and they were Canaanites, were Gentiles, and there was no reason to be loved. And so like your lineage, so like your life, your life was just like your lineage, and God has loved you.

One more example of God's radical love is a scene in Jeremiah. We'll read from Jeremiah 15. Jeremiah 15, and verse 5.

Jeremiah 15:5
“For who will have pity on you, O Jerusalem?
Or who will bemoan you? Let's continue reading in Jeremiah 30. Jeremiah 30 and we're reading from verse 12 onwards,

Jeremiah 30:12-15
12 “For thus says the Lord:
‘Your affliction is incurable,
Your wound is severe.
13 There is no one to plead your cause,
That you may be bound up;
You have no healing medicines.
14 All your lovers have forgotten you;
They do not seek you;
For I have wounded you with the wound of an enemy,
With the chastisement of a cruel one,
For the multitude of your iniquities,
Because your sins have increased.
15 Why do you cry about your affliction?
Your sorrow is incurable.
Because of the multitude of your iniquities,
Because your sins have increased,
I have done these things to you.

This is God's expression of His judgment against Israel's sinfulness, but it's not over. Let's read Jeremiah chapter 31:1
It says, at the same time, which means God is continuing His discourses, the same narrative, at the same time, says the Lord.

In verse 3, it says, The Lord has appeared of old and to me, saying, I have loved you with an everlasting bow. Therefore, with loving kindness have I drawn you.

You see, this is a narrative of a bruised person. Of a person whose bruises are incurable. Who's wounded. Who doesn't have medicines? Whose sorrow is incurable. That just, the hifunda way of saying that person is dying. And there is no one to pity him. And he has got these things upon himself. He's not a victim. He has reaped what he has sown, and he doesn't deserve the love of anybody, even his own lovers have forgotten him. And that's when God says, I have loved you with an everlasting love and have drawn you. You see the same narrative of sin of Jerusalem, that there is no one to pity you. We read the verse 15. And we read of the Lord Jesus Christ coming and weeping before that city, and being bruised inside that city. Being crucified outside the city, and after being raised up tells His people first go to that city. You see, this is God's love of a city that doesn't deserve God's love, God says that's the first place where the gospel should be preached.

Another example of God's radical love, it's in the same book. Let's go to Jeremiah 2:2. He says,
“Go and cry in the hearing of Jerusalem, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord:
“I remember you,
The kindness of your youth,
The love of your betrothal,
When you went after Me in the wilderness,
In a land not sown.

You know, what's striking of this verse is the fact that this could be the only verse in the whole of the Bible, where it's written that God is the recipient of kindness. Where it's written that God is saying, I remember your kindness. Israel was kind unto God. And I remember the kindness of your youth, or God is remembering the olden days, and He's saying that Israel was kind unto God, I remember the kindness, and then He says, the love of your betrothal. It isn't saying the love of wedding or marriage. And God is saying, I remember the love of your engagement. Well, probably because God would again say that, after marriage of first love would diminish, and they have not loved me like before. So God is not remembering when the love diminished or dwindled.

God is remembering the olden days, you know, the day when you first came to God. When you were firstborn again. And He's saying, I remember that love, that love was as good as it being kindness unto me. You see, that devotion was so strong, that God called it kindness. In the olden days, in those times, whenever two sides of the people agree their covenant, or agree to their sides and keep their terms of a covenant, it is said that each person is kind to each other. So that, according to the covenant, all what God required of them was to love. And when they loved, God said that you have been kind, or I remember, your kindness. You see, eventually an engagement happened, even a wedding happened and things didn't turn out to be well. So we continue reading now in 3:1. It says 3:1,

Jeremiah 3:1
“They say, ‘If a man divorces his wife,
And she goes from him
And becomes another man’s,
May he return to her again?’

That's a question that God is asking the people. That if a wife leaves her husband, goes after somebody else, even becomes that somebody else's wife. The question is, can that person come back to the first husband? That's the question that God is asking the people that a wife has left her first husband got married to a second husband, and it's absolute adultery and sinfulness. Now the question is, can that person come back to her first husband? That's the question. We'll read it again.

If a man put away his wife, and she goes from him, and become another man's, shall he return unto her. To be precise, the question is, can the first husband go after that wayward, adulterous wife? Should the first husband seek out that adulterous wife. Should that first husband love her once again? And the answer to the question is, that is the answer of the people they see, if that happens, shall not the land to be greatly polluted, if that happens. If the husband goes after her after wayward wife, then that is going to be a pollution, there is going to be a bad example, that is going to be a degradation of the society, it should not happen. That is not what should happen. And just to be clear, God is not seeing it, the verse started with seeing they say.

It is their version of how things should be. And in those days, when somebody would commit adultery, better than reconciliation, it would be more convenient to stone the person. So, reconciliation or coming back was out of question. And that's why they will see if they come back, it's a great pollution, it is degradation. It's a bad example to society. But now what does God say? God says in the next part of the verse, but you have played the harlot with many lovers, yet another 'yet' there. Yet return again to me, says the Lord. So they say, don't return. But God is saying, yet you should return unto Me. So the point over here was not about Israelites going. The point over here is that if we go away from God, God wants us back.

And God is trying to say that even by your own standards, even by your own understanding of how things should be, you would never accept that woman back. But God is saying, I want you back, despite your own standards, despite your righteousness, consider Me, I'M saying yet return unto Me. You have played the harlot, and return unto Me. Is there a better example of God's radical love? When the society says God should not love. When the society says the first husband should not love the adulterous woman, God says, That's exactly your story. You come back to Me. This is a perfect picture of whom we really are. We have gone away from God. We don't deserve to come back to Him, or He comes to us, and God is calling to return unto Me despite all logic, yet or despite all rational.

Let's look at one more example of God's love. In Hosea chapter one, Hosea chapter one, Hosea chapter one, and we're reading verse two

Hosea 1:2
The beginning of the word of the Lord by Hosea. And the Lord said to Hosea, Go, take unto thee a wife of whoredoms and children of whoredoms: for the land hath committed great whoredom, departing from the Lord.

You see, it's the same context over here. It's harlotry, Israel has sinned and has gone away from God, and God is telling Hosea go marry a prostitute, and have children of her have children of prostitute, and then in verse three -

Hosea 1:3
So he went and took Gomer the daughter of Diblaim; which conceived, and bare him a son. It's very rare, in the Bible, that a woman would be known by her ancestry. And that's one example over here that Gomer, the daughter of Diblaim, probably to show that it is not just that she was a harlot but coming from that kind of background. So, he said that you marry a wife of harlotry and children of harlotry. So, it shows that Gomer had all reasons to be not married. Gomer had all reasons to not get herself a husband. She was a harlot, she was a prostitute, and God tells Hosea to marry her. Now the question of you I would want to ask is when Hosea did marry a person like Gomer? Can you say he loved her? I mean, you're not talking of someone marrying and doesn't have love so but here is a forceful condition where he has to marry someone unlovable. And He is marrying Gomer.

So the question is, do you think Hosea loved her? What is your perspective on it? It's not there in the Bible. So you can say, what would you think about Hosea? Would Hosea have loved Gomer ? Hosea did marry her, but was there love in that relationship? Yeah. Yeah, I already said you can say, but what is the yes or no? What can you imagine about Hosea? Yes. Okay, God loved her. Okay, uncle is saying that Hosea was compelled to love Gomer. Fine, that is reasonable, you can say Hosea loved. But what is the proof that Hosea loved ?

Fine, let's take it that okay, Hosea married her and then had two children. Finally, what happened? Gomer departed from Hosea. Went and married someone else. And nobody's surprised, right? Nobody surprised, that's Gomer come on. Gomer is a prostitute. What are you going to expect? And Gomer did exactly that. Now when the commandment came the second time, what is the commandment? In chapter three and verse one. Chapter three and verse one,

Hosea 3:1
Then said the Lord unto me, Go yet, love a woman beloved of her friend, yet an adulteress, according to the love of the Lord toward the children of Israel

Now, the second time God's command came, it was not mere forcefulness to just get back Gomer. The commandment was to love Gomer, the way God loves. So just to be clear, yes, it was a very difficult decision. But God's point over here was I love you. And God would want to say that despite Gomer becoming an adulterous despite her becoming a slave, go yet love her according to the love of God. You see, this is what you call radical love.

When people are abusing God's love and people are taking God's love for granted, God's love doesn't fail. His love is steadfast. God's love follows sinners even to the doorsteps of hell because He says, He doesn't want anybody to perish. You and I cannot write off anybody. You and I cannot say that God's love has ceased for that person. God over here is saying 'go yet love or yet and adulterous according to the love of the Lord'. And you can read over your in verse three.

Hosea 3:3
And I said unto her, Thou shalt abide for me many days; thou shalt not play the harlot, and thou shalt not be for another man: so will I also be for thee. So this is one more example of God's radical love. We saw a couple of examples of God's radical love because God's love is always radical. It is always unending. It is like what the hymn writer would say, Your love will never let me go. And God never runs out of His love for me. That's God's love, whether it be like in Hezekiah, like a baby that is abandoned, and that there's nobody to be pitied. Whether it be like Jerusalem that is uncurable, bruised, and is uncurable having no medicines, and the sorrows are uncurable.

Whether it be like Jacob who is always in his old life, living an old man, always deceiving thousands of years God still saying, I love you. Whether it be like an adulterous Israel, that as loved with many harlots and that has gone after many lovers and God still says, Come back to me, or whether it be like Gomer, who is not surprising. Who is by nature an adulterous and who will always disappoint God. Always be a disappointment. Always peddle love of God with something else. And God still says, I love you with the love of God.


Shame associated to God in loving us
You see, one thing that's not covered in this topic of Hosea is the shame of Hosea. I mean, imagine what people would have talked about Hosea. When they heard first that Hosea is marrying Gomer, they would have thought he's gone nuts. And then when they heard Gomer left him, he would have become a laughingstock of the town. He would have been a joke, and people would have just laughed at him. But how did Horea take it? How did he take the shame? How did he take that sorrow? How did he take and swallow that hard-hearted command of loving a person like her? Like Gomer.

You don't have a reply to that. You don't have an expression to that. There is no record of that. Because this was a picture of God and Israel and the Church. And the picture of God loving us is always a shameless, selfless love, God doesn't take care of His reputation, or His respect when He loves us. So the question of whether God becomes a laughing joke, or whether what God is doing or is it rational, or whether God will sacrifice so much that His own son for unlovable people, is not even a question or not even a thought in the mind of God, the shame of God in loving us is not there in the Bible. God finds it not a shameful thing, just like the record of Hosea here. There is no shame for Hosea to do what God told him to do. Because it's a picture of God's love. God loves us, despite all shame that is involved in love. He loves us.


What does the love of God teach us ?
1. God loved us first
You see, we have seen God's love, now the question is, what's in it for us? What does the love of God teach us. As I told you, if we go away from here just being happy that God loves us, then this a serious problem, because God's love is related to the most important commandment in the Bible. And that is to love God. And we read in John that it is the order that matters, that God loved us first. That is why we can love Him.

You know, just to drive home this point, the importance of loving God, because God loved us, we need to look at one example from Deuteronomy, chapter one. Deuteronomy chapter one, and were reading verse 26. Deuteronomy 1:26-27
26 Notwithstanding ye would not go up, but rebelled against the commandment of the Lord your God:
27 And ye murmured in your tents, and said, Because the Lord hated us, he hath brought us forth out of the land of Egypt, to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us.

This is what happened after two years of joining, two years of journeying. Every single day, they lived a miracle. And God has brought them to the edge of Canaan. And the context here is God is telling 'go fight, go occupy Canaan'. And you see they lived a miracle, they saw God's power but when they came to the edge of it, they were hesitant. And that is our problem too. When God tells us to do something God tells us, for example, to share the gospel, we are hesitant. And what happens is we bring in our own strategies, our own plans, and we try to complicate things just like the way they did. They said before we go and fight, let's do a spying of 12 people. And it's even written that Moses liked the idea. And everybody was hesitant for that last and final step.

All they wanted to do is go and fight, and they didn't want to fight. They had become too lazy, and they wanted simplicity and just to overcome the thought of fight or fear of what they will face, they decided to spy the land. And we know what happens, they come back, and they tell in this verse, that God has hated us, that God will destroy us. Can you believe that? I couldn't believe it, when I read this, that this is the audacity of the people to say that God has hated us. And you see, this is the worst kind of extremity that we can, we should avoid. When God took them out of Egypt, took them through Red Sea gave the manna, gave them quail, gave them water from Marrah, gave them water from the rock.

And every single day they live the miracle and just because they saw giants, they said that God hated us. Just because they saw something that was too difficult for them, they forgot God's love and they came to an extreme position and says God hates us and God destroys us. Now you might say, Fine, this is not something that will happen to us. I agree, this is too far stretched. God forbid, something like this happens to us where we question God's love. But the question over here is fine, this is one extremity, but can we talk of another extremity?

Instead of saying God hated us? Can we just rejoice and say God loves us? You see, that was a problem with his people. They did not recognize God's love. They forgot God's love so conveniently, in a matter of two and a half years. And because they forgot God's love they because they forgot God's faithfulness, His goodness, His grace, His mercy, they come to a point and say, God hated us. And what happens at the end over here, God is so angry. In Hebrew, it is written that He swears in His anger, that none of them will enter into Canaan for the next thirty-eight and a half years, including Moses, everybody dies. That is a consequence of saying, God hates us. That's the consequences of not knowing God's love.


2. God's love makes us love Him and not hate Him
You see, this is an important attribute because this is the most important commandment. The one of the most important lessons we need to learn from this is if we can know God's love, God demands us to love Him. If we love Him, then there is no law against love. There is no sin that can be named against love. That's why when you do this one commandment, you have kept the whole law.

This is the most important attribute of God's love. You know, the problem of your is fine, we need to love God, but you know how difficult it is, how impossible it is. This is one thing that the Israelites didn't understand. When they're saying that God hated us, they had an overvalue of themselves, they thought about themselves too much that they thought that God hates us, they thought about themselves too much that they expected God to be showering favors and respect. That when they saw giants, when they saw problems, when they saw God's wrath, they will come up and say God hates us.

You see, the problem is, we are incapable of loving God, we are incapable of loving Him. I remember I once in the book of Romans, I took us a couple of prayers that were written by Puritans in the late 1500s, or 1600s. And one such prayer is written over here that I want to read out. It says,

O lover of the loveless, it is your will that I should love you with heart, soul, mind strength, and my neighbor as myself.
But I'm not sufficient for these things. There is, by nature, no pure love in my soul.
Every affection in me is turned from you. I am bound, a slave to lust.
I cannot love you. Lovely as you are, until you set me free.
By grace, I am your free man, I would serve you. For I believe that you are God in Jesus, and that through him and redeemed, and my sins are forgiven.
With this freedom, I would always be you. But I cannot walk in Liberty any more than I could first attain it of myself.
May your spirit draw me nearer to you and your ways. You are the end of all means, for if they lead me not to you, I go away empty.
Order all of my ways by your holy word. And make your commandments the joy of my heart, that by them, I may be happy and converse with you.
May I grow in your love and manifest it to mankind. Spirit of Love make me like the loving Jesus.
Give me his benevolent temper and his beneficent actions, that I may shine before men to your glory.
The more you do in love in me and by me, humble me more. Keep me meek, lowly, and always ready to give you honor.

You see what I liked so much about this prayer is that admission, the confession that it is insufficient of me to love you and I cannot love you because I'm bound I'm a slave to lust, and it is impossible for man to love God. That is why the order was important that God loved first, that's why we can love Him back.

You see how Paul would say that God has shed abroad our hearts the love of God. The word poured in our hearts or the word poured means is overflowing His love in our hearts. He has inundated us. He is flooded us. He has completely swallowed us in that love. That love has got poured in our hearts and when somebody receives that love, when somebody acknowledges that love, when somebody knows that love, it is only then and only then that person can love God back. It is only then he can do the first commandment.


3. God's love compel us to do His commandments
Another lesson we need to learn of God's love is if God says He has loved us, and God tells us to love Him, we must do His commandments. Because that is the only way people will know that we are His disciples. We must do His commandments, if we love Him. You know, I was recently conversing with a couple of people who were struggling, rightfully struggling, and they are in they're saying that they're not having delight to read God's word, not having delight to pray, and not having delight to go to church or maybe find the most flimsy reasons to skip church and make it sound like a valid reason.

And, and I tried asking the person, do you love God? Do you do love God? It's so easy to say yes. Because it's so difficult to say no, I mean, you know, love of God so much. How can you say you don't love God and the person so easily can say, yes? Just like the way Lord Jesus would ask Peter, do you love me? Peter said, Yes. Do you love me? Yes. Do you love me? And then Peter said, Lord, you know. You see, it takes time to come to the realization of how little our love is. If you say you love God, then how is it possible that you don't find delight in the Word of God? If you say you love God, how is it possible that you don't find delight in praying and spending time in his presence? If you say you love God, and how is that possible that you don't find it delightful to be in His presence with the saints in the gathering of the church?

You can ask every sin of yours to the question love. Do you love God? You see, this is what happened with Gomer. Gomer was, by nature, a prostitute. You can't do anything with her. You can't just stay, you can't be judgmental towards her and say, stop doing it. You won't help. She just be what she is. What she wanted is that somebody from nowhere should come up to her and love her. And that is what Hosea did to Gomer, love Gomer. You see, this is what God does to us. God loves us. And when we realize that love, we would pray like the hymn writer, let Your love like bands of love, bands and cords of love, keep me, hold me that I might not stray away from You.


4. God's love constrains us to do what we supposed to do
Another lesson we learn from God's love is that God's love constrains us to do what we're supposed to do. God's love compels us. Let's read that verse from Second Corinthians, chapter five. Second Corinthians chapter five and verse 14 onwards,

2 Corinthians 5:14-15
14 For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead:
15 And that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again.

The love of Christ compels me. You want to know the secret of Paul's Boldness, to withstand famine and withstand shipwrecks and bruises and persecutions. And at the end of the last verse in acts says that Paul spoke with boldness, that is the last word about Paul in the Bible that Paul spoke with boldness. What kept Paul going with boldness, you know, facing the Giants that Israel could not face and defeating the forces and principalities of power? What made Paul so bold, you would say the love of Christ compels me, constrains you.

You want to know how strong you are for the Lord, what you can do for the Lord, how challenging steps and actions you can do for the Lord. You want to question why you don't have boldness, and strength to do what God tells you to do. You need to ask how much you love God. You see, the love of God constrains me, it compels me, it can never leave me easy. It leaves me uneasy, so that I go out and do what I have to do. Paul say so beautifully here that because He died for me, I cannot live for myself. I need to live for God.


5. God's love makes us love one another
Finally, what the love of God teaches us is we need to love one another. This is what John would say, that if you cannot love whom you see, then how can you love God? If you have trouble in loving your brethren, then you can call into question whether you love God.

You see, this is the love of God. We began by seeing that God's love is inter-mersed, and it is co-joined with all of His attributes. It is not an attitude that stands aloof. You cannot skew God's image and say God is only loving, that would make you take God's love for granted and live a life of sin. You need to know that God's love goes along with all His attributes, especially His holiness and His wrath and His anger is also God's love. And then we saw that God's love is radical through several of His examples. If there was one more example we could have covered, and we didn't have time it was the example of Lord Jesus Christ dying on the cross because John would say, in this was the demonstration of God's love, and His own Son would die for us.

Ultimately, we are looking at some lessons we need to learn from God's love. The most important lessons we need to learn is we need to, we need to enjoy, we need to know this, we need to study this, we need to appreciate and worship the love of God so that we can love Him. Because it's the order that matters, first God loves me, then I love Him. And if we cannot know the love of God, if we do not know that surpassing knowledge of God, we will all fail. And then we saw that God's love commands us to be obedient unto Him to do His commandments. God's love constrains us to do the ministries to do what we have to do. And finally, God's love tells us to love one another.

In closing, can I just read two verses without any comments. I'll just read it. Ephesians chapter three. Ephesians chapter three and verse 14,

Ephesian 3:14-21
14 For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,
15 Of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named,
16 That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man;
17 That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love,
18 May be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height;
19 And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.
20 Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,
21 Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen.