# LOVING GOD MORE ## Introduction I welcome you to the first service this morning. If Jesus tarries His second coming, may we experience and enjoy many glorious services like this in the name of Jesus. Amen. Today is the last Sunday in the year that is coming to an end in less than 40 hours. Hence, today's service is extra special as it precedes the Cross Over service we are going to have tomorrow. The good Lord that started the year with us and has been with us throughout the year will see us through to the New Year in the name of Jesus. Amen. Just to remind us, the theme of this month is still 'Journey of Love,' and this will be the last sermon in that series. I pray that God will continuously give us understanding of His word and that we will be hearers of the word and doers of His precepts in the name of Jesus. Amen. ## Review of the Journey So far in this month's sermon series, we have so far looked at love as a key attribute of God. We were reminded of biblical fact that God is love. This fact more than qualifies God to invite us on this lifelong 'Journey of Love,' and all of us enthusiastically accepted the invitation and have embarked on the rendezvous. Furthermore, we were reminded of the characteristics of divine love such as: - It is steadfast and unchanging, - It is not carnal or natural, and - It is poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit. Subsequently we looked through the amazing benefits we get as privileged people from the love of God. Such benefits include salvation, redemption and forgiveness, and adoption into the family of God. ## The Greatest Commandment Today's message takes off from one of those responsibilities that we have mentioned above, and that is, Loving God. Loving God is one of the major precepts of God in both the Old Testament and the New Testament. As a matter of fact, Jesus teaches us that loving God is the first and greatest commandment: *"Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law? Jesus replied, 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments'"* (Matthew 22:36-40). It is also mentioned in the instruction God gave to His chosen race: *"Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up"* (Deu. 6:4-7). ## Our Imperfect Love In spite of the fact that this commandment is clear enough, our love for God has been less that perfect. Human beings throughout the ages have not loved God the way we should. Humanity's love for God has been tepid and fickle at times. A look at the Old Testament will lead us to the simple conclusion that the story of the children of Israel is one long love story with a lot of twists and turns. God chose the Israelites as His own people and expressed his love for them continuously and faithfully throughout their very checkered history. *"The Lord appeared to us in the past, saying: 'I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with unfailing kindness'"* (Jeremiah 31:3). Despite God's unfailing faithfulness, the Israelites rather than responding to this great love by loving God in return, many times turned their backs on God. Repeatedly they even went after and worship false gods. The same situation repeats itself in the New Testament. Here we have the image of and symbolism of marriage between Christ and the church - the body of believers. Despite that, you will notice in the New Testament many cases of followers of Christ falling out of love. Jesus knew about the fickleness of the love of man for God; that is why he warned his disciples that the hearts of many would grow cold (Matthew 24:12). ## Growing in Love for God However, brethren, we should not throw our hands up in despair and frustration and give up about loving God or use this fact as an excuse not to desire and do all we can to love God the way the Scriptures say we should. The perspective we should take is that we should have a growing love for God. Every day our affection for Jesus should increase and the love becomes perfect when we meet our Lord and Saviour in heaven. In effect, loving God more is necessarily a logical consequence of our spiritual growth. ## How do I get to love God more? Brethren, our desire and goal in our spiritual walk with God should therefore be to want to love Jesus more. We will do very well to learn from the Scriptures how we can do this. But before we get to that, we must understand one crucial point in the dynamics of the love of God for us. We can love God only "because He first loved us" (1 John 4:19). First, we must know that once we accept Christ, God poured His love into our hearts through the Holy Spirit: *"And hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us"* (Romans 5:5). Secondly, as we know the indwelling of the Holy Spirit produces in us the fruit of love amongst others: *"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law"* (Galatians 5:22-23). Therefore, the dynamics is simple and clear. God loves us and makes that love felt in our hearts through the Holy Spirit. The indwelling of the Holy Spirit in turn produces the fruit of love which makes us love God and our fellow human beings in return. ## Practical Steps to Love God More ### We need the Holy Spirit to love Jesus more With the understanding of the dynamics of love of God and loving God, we should marvel again and again at the extent to which God goes to make us what we ought to be. The lesson here is that we need the Holy Spirit to be able to grow in our love for Jesus. Therefore, we will do well to make efforts to: - understand the role and function of the Holy Spirit. - pray all the time for the in-filling of the Holy spirit. - live a godly lifestyle that avoids actions and conducts that grieve or quench the Holy Spirit. ### We need to be in the presence of God We also need to be in the presence of God all the time so that our love for Him can grow. As an illustration, when two people are genuinely in love with each other, they will always find a way to be and enjoy each other's company. When we want the love for God to increase, we must covet every and all opportunity to be in his presences. No excuses will do to justify why we are too busy and have no time to enjoy the loving presence of the Lord. We must develop the attitude similar to that of Moses who will not embark on any assignment no matter who sent him unless the presence of the Lord was with him: *"The Lord replied, 'My Presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.' Then Moses said to him, 'If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here'"* (Exodus 33: 14-15). ### We need to communicate constantly with God through prayers Relationship experts tell us that maintaining a loving relationship requires open and unscripted communication between partners. So also it is when we want our love of God to increase. We must constantly through prayer and supplication communicate with our loving Father. Brethren we must internalize the fact that we are talking with a heavenly Father who has our best interests at heart. Hence our prayer must be intimate and fervent. ### We need to ponder on the love of God in the light of His goodness In the last month of this year we have been hearing messages about the love of God for us, and now we are hearing about our love for God. Meditating, pondering and reflecting on what we have learnt so far should make us know more about this great love and endear God more to our hearts. How will our hearts not be filled with gratitude when we learn about the depth, width, breadth and height of the love of God, not in a theoretical sense but in the everyday goodness that we enjoy from Him. ### We need to study the Bible Without doubt, we need to read and study the Bible to increase our knowledge about the love of God. The Bible will illuminate, inform, teach us about what our reactions to the love of God should be. It will correct our errors and mistaken ideas that we may have picked up in the world. ### We need to associate with those who love God Lastly, if we desire to love God more, we must associate ourselves most with those who love God. We must at all times avoid company of scoffers and cynics who are in the habit of saying uncomplimentary things about God and the things of God. When we keep company of those who are ever ready to speak about Christ and for Christ, then we will be encouraging each other in love to love our God more. ## Conclusion As I bring this message to a close, we want to restate the essence of today's message. This is to let us realize that the love that our God has for us places on us a responsibility to love Him back. The responsibility to love God the way we should seems an enormous task for us in our world where we have to contend with various other matters competing for our attention and affection. We are however encouraged because God has in-dwelt us with the Holy Spirit which allows the love of God to blossom in our hearts. Our love for God should be an ever growing one which will reach full measure when we meet our Lord and Saviour Jesus in heaven. Hence, we should do all we can to set our affection on God every moment in our 'Journey of Love' here on earth. And so shall it be in the name of Jesus. Amen.