Well, let's be seated, and today for our New Testament reading, Pastor Jason will read for us 1 Corinthians chapter 13, and then he'll pray. 1 Corinthians 13. If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away. As for tongues, they will cease. As for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child. I thought like a child. I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, then I shall know fully. even as I have been fully known. So now, faith, hope, and love abide, these three. But the greatest of these is love. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, you indeed are a God of love. and you have loved us with a magnificent love. We thank you for this, Lord. We thank you for Christ. We thank you that you so love the world that you gave your son. And Lord, we rejoice in this. And Lord, we pray now that as we open up your word, To learn about you and to hear about Christ, we pray that you would direct our minds towards the scriptures. We pray that the spirit would take these words from our ear to our heart and that we would be changed. We pray that we would walk in the spirit, that we would discipline ourselves and walk in your truth, in your power. Thank you, Lord, in Jesus' name, amen. Well, we're very grateful that David Green is going to bring the word of God to us today. We've known and been friends with David and Karen Green since September of 1998, 26 years and counting. David was a pastor in Beverly for many, many years and was also the chairman of the New England Reform Fellowship Executive Committee. until he retired, they moved to Maryland, then it fell on me. What year was that, 2016? 13, it's been 11 years, my word. But this is my 27th Bolton Conference, and they were here long before me. So David, come and bring forth the word of God to us, please. Thank you. Well, it's a privilege to be back with you again here where we've spent some very happy times and know a number of you. Thankful for, as Laura's mentioned, the conference yesterday and on Friday. And the Lord blessed us, was with us. And I wondered if hearing, especially one of the sermons, if the people there would come today and say, we heard that yesterday. Well, actually doesn't hurt to hear it again. I think you'll hear some different things today from what I've hoped to present to you, the theme of God's love and what it does, has done, will do is inexhaustible. And the very fact that God has promised those that love him an eternity in his presence with his people, glorified, unable to sin, never thinking of it, wishing it, or being tempted by it, means there will be an inexhaustible future to learn about the one who identifies himself in John's gospel as God is love. So this morning, I want us to begin with thinking about something that's probably very familiar to you. And that is a question and an answer, and the question is stated in 17th century English, what is the chief end of man? Someone, a pundit said, it's his head. Well, it isn't really. It's just the top of his body. By end, it means, of course, purpose. And the answer is, man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever. Now that's, it's very interesting because if you do a study in the scriptures of the imperative to glorify, and of course, for you who are a little rusty about grammar, that means a command to glorify God, it's fairly rare. And we even can ask the question, what does it mean to glorify? What's that word about? And I think if you look at it, you'll find two basic meanings. It means, first of all, it's a synonym for praise. And then it means to honor. Because if a person glories, they boast about something. They are professing praise and honor for something. It's possible not to miss the self-honoring that goes on during an election series. But it's interesting that the Lord Jesus, when he wanted to summarize what God wants us to do, he didn't say to glorify me. That's what we want to do. That's part of it. But he went back to the Old Testament and quoted from Deuteronomy 6, that we are to love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, And with all our very, yeah, that's what I said, very. Because that's the word in Hebrew that's there. It's very striking because it's normally used as an adverb to intensify something. So it typically is translated with all your strength. But it means with everything that you have. And then it says, you're to love your neighbor as yourself. And that's quoted in all three of the Gospels. So what I want to do this morning is to think about this reality, this command, and whatever else we do as Christians, and I put it in the title, we must love at all costs. Because we have been loved at all costs. cost of the son of God and his life. And how serious is this? Well, the New Testament makes it very clear that loving your neighbor is a fulfilling of the law, caring for them. I've been struck for some time, and really the genesis of putting this sermon together, with the end of 1 Corinthians, where Paul makes three statements about love. It's very striking. He says, for example, let all you do be done in love, nothing without it. If that doesn't strike through your conscience with an arrow, I don't know what will. It certainly does mine. And then after, the one I want to emphasize, he says, my love be with you all in Christ Jesus. But in the midst of this, he puts this razor blade. It's terrifying. He says this, if anyone does not love the Lord, let him be accursed. The Lord is coming. We often speak about the absolute necessity of faith to be justified before God, and that's absolutely true. There's no way of being declared righteous before God than by faith. But faith alone is insufficient. There must be the fruit of faith. And when Paul writes that, and he's writing it to a church, if you remember the beginning of 1 Corinthians that was divided, They had factions, they had the Paul faction, they had the Peter faction, they even had the Jesus faction. And he addresses this as the first of their issues. And his whole point, of course, in the chapter that Jason read for us, In the midst of a discussion about gifts, spiritual gifts that are so helpful for the body of Christ, for individuals who have them, and for the opportunity to exercise them for the strengthening of his people, he puts this chapter about love. So if anyone does not love the Lord Jesus, let him be accursed, and accursed means damned forever. Cut off, without hope. So it's the question I'll ask here and we'll think about this for a few moments together and come back to it. Do we love God? And do we love our neighbor? And as Jesus went on to say, do we love our enemies? And do we realize that our enemies are not flesh and blood? Our true enemies that we are not to love and hate and fight are the world and its blandishments and lies, the devil and his hatred of us, and the flesh, this indwelling sin that is always there ready to come up like a boil that is ready to burst and spread its filth all through us. If we don't mortify that sin and fight against these enemies, And I want to suggest to you the greatest means of doing this, along with all that Christ has obtained for us, is a heartfelt affection and love for God in Christ and for one another. Now, let's think about love just for a minute in the scriptures. It may surprise you to know that, or think about it, and you may remember, if you're a regular reader of the Bible, I hope you do, I would encourage all of you to be reading through the Bible at least once a year, so that the whole picture is there, we have Bibles, there are lots of translations, we've got lots of helps available. It's God's word, it's his nurture of his people. But have you ever noticed when love first appears, the word in the scriptures? Not in Genesis one of the creation. It's not in two. And then the fall occurs in chapter three. It's all the way till chapter 22 before we even have the word. And here's the context. And God tested Abraham. And he said, Abraham, and he said, here I am, take your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go and sacrifice him on a mountain that I will show you. That's the first mention of love in the scriptures. preview of what was to come to obtain our redemption. I'm taking my son, my only son whom I love, and I'm sending him to die to pay the price for all the people that I'm giving him so they may be purchased and preserved and kept in my love and love for one another and an exhibit of love to the world. So that's the first mention of love, and it's very interesting also that the second time it's mentioned is not in connection with loving God. But in Leviticus, we have to wait till Leviticus chapter 19, in two verses, we're told to love our neighbor as ourselves. A concept that's repeated at least five times in the New Testament. And as I said earlier, summing up the law, to love your neighbor is yourself. To me, that's very striking. And then it's finally in Deuteronomy chapter six that we get the most important aspect of that love, which is to love God in the way that I described, of our heart, soul, and all our very strength, everything we have. All the time, without fail. And what does that do? Well, it does what the law usually does to us. It pierces us and says, I can't do this. I don't do this. And dear saints, it drives us back to God. That's what it ought to do. Don't let the commands of God drive you away from him. they should drive you to him, because if you love him, and I don't know how much you love him, and I trust every one of us here, I would hope every single one of you knows the Lord, and you have the grace of God, and you hate sin, and you love righteousness, and you wanna live for him because of what he's done for you, at least in some measure, not like you'd like to, perhaps. So the law of God comes, and we hear this commandment, And we say, well, what do I do? We go back to him, and we'll focus on this as we go forward here, God willing. But then, as I mentioned, the Lord gives, our Savior gives this further directive about what this love ought to be, not only to love our neighbor, to love God supremely, but to love our enemies, to pray for them. And picking up on Proverbs 25, Paul is very specific to say we ought to be pouring coals of fire on their head by doing kindness to them so that they feel like if they've done us wrong, we're not trying to exact vengeance because we know that the Lord says vengeance is mine. I'll take care of your enemies. I'll take care of those that don't repent. I'll take care of those that are never sorry the way they mistreated you or done things to you. You pray for them. because they need me just like you need me. So you pray for them and you commit their future to the Lord, not wishing he would tear them to pieces, but that he would save them like he saved you. Have you ever prayed for Mr. Putin that he would repent? Can we imagine that that would happen? Or the worst person that you can think of who's living Do we pray for those in authority that that might be the case? The Lord would have mercy on them. But then the real coup de grace, the real stroke for us believers is the way the Lord Jesus told his disciples right before he died how they were to love one another. You remember that? You're to love not just your brother and sister as your neighbor, and hopefully they're not your enemy, but you're to love them like I've loved you. And how did he love them? He loved them at all costs. The cost of his life, the cost of suffering, the infinite wrath of God on the cross that we deserved, every one of us, for any sin, for any failure, How many sins did it take to plunge our whole race into the mess that it's in? One. One act of disobedience. One act of rebellion. Oh, if we could only grasp, and we really don't grasp it except to look at the cross and to realize what happened there and who it was that was there and what was transacted there. And then we began to perceive how great and horrible is sin and how wonderful when we are delivered from the dominion of sin. That is, it controls us if we're the Lord Jesus' sheep. And we have defense against the power of sin. As I mentioned, our enemies, the flesh, the world, the devil. One day, praise be to God, deliverance from the presence of sin, no more, no more temptation, no more failures, no more grief, no more tears. In the meanwhile, we're to love fellow believers as Christ has loved us. And husbands here, you get a dose of that too from Paul in Ephesians 5. You're to love your wives as Christ loved the church, and gave himself up for her, and be devoted, not in an idolatrous way, of course, but because you love Christ and you love her, and you want to represent him to her. And the two of you, be able to represent, if your wife is a believer, the Lord Jesus and his power. So, the real question then comes, in light of all the scripture's directions about loving neighbor, loving God, loving our enemies, loving the saints in this manner, the question is, first of all, is it reasonable to have a command to love? Can you tell somebody, I want you to love this person? Is that a good way to start a marriage, a command? Not usually. Even though of course in many countries there are arranged marriages and there may or may not be any discussion about love. This is a family process or project for advancing some other aspect of offspring or something. Is it reasonable to command love? Well, as we go forward, I think that answer becomes clear if we see how God has loved us. But then that raises the second question of how do we do this? I mentioned going back to the Lord for his help. But I think our text in 1 Corinthians helps us at the end. Those famous words, now abide faith, hope, and love, these three. The greatest of these is love. What I'd like to suggest to you this morning, and you think about it, one of the great things about preaching to saints, particularly such as you all have the privilege of sitting under Laura's teaching, Jason's, and others, be encouraged and built up in the scriptures, test what is said. Go back to the scriptures to see if it's true. Let it resonate in you. You think about it. And here's my suggestion this morning. In order for love to flourish, it must be built on a foundation, like building any kind of house. If you don't have a good foundation, it's not going to stand, and it has to have, it's on a solid rock. And the solid rock for really loving God is believing in him and putting your hope in him. That's what Paul's really saying here, that faith, hope, and love abide Now, but the greatest of these is love. And another reason for him doing that, he doesn't say it here, but he implies it by what he had said earlier in this chapter, that all these gifts, which the church in Corinth had in abundance, they're gonna disappear. Times will cease, prophecies will cease, miracles, et cetera, but love's not gonna cease. One day, when we see the Lord Jesus, all believers, you won't need faith anymore. You will be there. And if you're hoping in Him, and the Apostle Peter tells us, among other places where this is told, set your hope fully on the grace that is to be revealed to you at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. So, when you set your hope fully, There, when you see him, you won't need hope anymore. Paul even says in Romans 8, we don't hope for what we see, we hope for what we don't see. And if we do, we look for it, we expect it, we long for it. That's what hope is. To long to see the Lord Jesus come and restore his creation and make it new and a new heavens. where only righteousness dwells, what the saints that are recorded in chapter 11 of Hebrews were looking for. Abraham was seeking a city whose builder and maker is God. So if we're going to build a foundation and expect, if we're going to hope to love, We need the faith and the hope that the scriptures tell us about and command us as well. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you'll be saved, Paul said to the jailer. And we've already heard this morning in Lars' prayer and the things we have sung. You know what the object of our faith is? It's our Lord Jesus. And we put our faith there because we have come to agree with God about ourselves. We no longer have an individualistic idea about our standing before God. We don't try to say, I'm okay, or I at least do this, or at least I don't do that. No, we come like the hymn says, just as I am, without one plea, but that thy blood was shed for me. And we trust God's word that when we agree with him about ourselves, that we cannot save ourselves, we cannot really improve ourselves, not for any length of time, not sufficiently to satisfy God and certainly not to make up for everything that we've done that we shouldn't have done or haven't done that we should have. We say, Lord, I trust you. And I believe your witness to your son that he is sufficient for me. And then your hope is going to be placed in him. It just follows. Because if you really believe, and that hope the devil will try to shake, it will. The world will say, why don't you put your hope here? A better education, a better house, better car, better job, more money, more vacation. Those aren't bad things. As long as they're not idols, they're wonderful. Thank the Lord for them. Use them well, but don't miss God's provision and his presence and the use of them and the receipt of them, the privilege to be his children in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. There's a wonderful summary of these things that Paul gives to the Romans. What a book Romans is. At the end of chapter 4, he says this, Christ was delivered up for our offenses. He was raised up from the dead for our justification. Therefore, begins chapter 5, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom, Christ, we have also received access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God." There's glory. See, the answer to that catechism isn't wrong. Glory's coming. It's already here in some ways, but Paul's talking about rejoice in the hope of the glory of God fully revealed. But not only that, he says. We rejoice in afflictions because affliction produces endurance, and endurance character, and character hope. And hope does not make us ashamed. Why? Because the love of God is spread abroad in our hearts through the Holy Spirit whom he has given to us. Memorize those verses, folks. They will hold you. They are magnificent. I walk when I'm home, usually most mornings, if it's not too cold, I can't walk in the real cold. And one of the ways that I walk is past a church building. And on that church building, up high in a nice plaque, as it were, it's in cement, it's carved like a tombstone, Romans 5, verses 8 and 9. and it reminds me of the beginning of Romans 5, and I repeat those, and I pray for that church, it's an AME church, African Methodist Episcopal, and I pray for the leadership, and for God's power to be manifested there, and grace, and to cleanse the leadership if it needs to be. At any rate, these verses to me, they just remind me of such in such fullness of this foundation for the love of God, faith which produces hope, which then by the Holy Spirit's presence with us pours out love for God and love for one another. Well, you see, it's this foundation on which we can build the practice of loving God because he has loved us. And that will happen to the degree, well, as I've jotted it down here, with this foundation of faith and hope, and with continual prayer for the Holy Spirit's help, we can express a grateful response of genuine affection to God. A genuine response of affection to God for all he has done for us. And that always means obeying Him as proof that we truly love Him, and that we love our neighbor, and that we love our enemies or are striving to and praying for them, and that we love one another in that sacrificial, giving, listening, patient, responsive love in the way that Christ has loved us. You know, the only person that really is ready to hear from you, every one of you, 24-7, is God your Father. He never gets tired of hearing from you. And if we don't pray in the way that we need to, to keep that contact, to maintain a communion with Him, the source of strength for us, strengthening our foundation of faith and hope, and building on it a love for him and for one another, it will drift. And we heard about this at the conference, you who were there. Excellent messages on how we can drift, we can backslide. But by prayer for the Lord to do what he's promised, and that's why the word is important, it's important for us to pray what he's promised to do. Lord, you promised to do this, and we heard this yesterday from the speakers, and I was so glad to hear it. That I'm unashamed to repeat, because the Lord's going to honor his promises, and he's always going to do his will, and as 1 John tells us, especially, if we ask anything according to his will, he will do it. So there again, our Lord Jesus Christ is our model, isn't he? In the garden, what did he say? I don't want this, it's coming. In my human nature, sinless human nature, that had lived from infancy without sin, by word, thought, or deed, that sinless human nature was repelled by what he was going to face. And he knew it, he'd known it all his life. He was the lamb who was prepared and kept. for sacrifice, that every time, three times he besought the Lord, not my will, however, your will be done. And dear saints, here's a measure of our love for God. Do we pray that prayer? Are we willing to say that? Even though we may know full well some of the things we want to do are not the Lord's will. And therefore, it's going to be sin. If we're sinning against something knowledgeably and we're praying about it, then, you know, the Lord's not going to hear that. If I regard iniquity in my heart, says the Psalms, the Lord won't hear me. Oh, He does hear you, but not here in the way of answering. He's not going to give you a stone. I mean, yeah, a stone if you're asking for it and you don't realize it. But if we're asking for the Lord's will, and it's His will that we be strengthened in our faith and our hope in Him and our love for Him and one another in the world, He will answer that prayer. It may be difficult. It may come with discipline. It may come with, well, leaving off other loves. You know, the Bible talks about other loves. It fully acknowledges that people can love People, things, ideas, practices, devote themselves to it. They can even love and then lose that love. Saul loved David in the beginning. And then when he became jealous, he spent almost the whole rest of his life trying to kill him. The Lord loves Solomon. Solomon loved the Lord. Then Solomon became attached to foreign women, and he was disciplined. The Lord Jesus, Mark tells us in chapter 10, and he's the only one that mentions this, and it's mentioned in Luke and Matthew, that when the man rushed up to him and said, good master, what must I do to inherit eternal life? Mark says Jesus looked at him and loved him and yet the man went away sorrowing because he had great possessions and wouldn't give them up to follow Jesus. We can love things that are even right to love and cross that line into idolatry, and they become obstacles to our loving God as we should, or obstacles to using those things, or thinking of them, or treating them as we ought. That includes people. Do you love your spouse more than you love God? That's a tough one. Do you love your children, your grandchildren, more than you love God? And how does that come up? That comes up when you need to have hard discussions about subjects, and how you do it, and willing to take a stand about the truth of the gospel in the face of very close relationships, and huge love and affection that has been expressed, and you feel, and it's not wrong. Oh, how the primacy of loving God and holding Him in honor at all costs, so important and so we need help. Well, as I've also jotted here, none of this love will succeed or grow to any significant degree of influence in our lives or others' lives without keeping our eyes continually turned to the Lord Jesus Christ who is God's love at all costs. That's especially present in John's gospel and in 1 John. The disciple who called himself the disciple whom Jesus loved. Don't you love that? Every one of you can say that who's a Christian. You're the disciple whom Jesus has loved and he will love you to the end just like he loved his own. So in closing, let me just Let us think a bit about how God has loved his son. The Trinity is the greatest mystery in the Christian faith. It's incomprehensible to us how there is Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. They are equal in glory and honor. They are each completely God. but the three comprise the one true God. Three in one, one in three. And one of the beauties of that, dear saints, in connection with our loving one another, and our being able to communicate with one another, is that we as human beings do not invent community or fellowship. It existed in God from all eternity. God did not need us. He was not lonely. He was not lacking anything. And so that eternal communion of the three persons of the Godhead is glorious and satisfactory. So why did God create anything? This has always been a good question. And I think that comes back to the answer of the First Catechism. He did it to glorify himself, to bring glory to others. so they could show his glory to others so they could glorify him and love him and enter into that communion that he has with Father, Son and Holy Spirit. Hear what Jesus said in John 14 verse 23. If anyone love me, he will keep my word and my father will love him and we will come and abide with him. And of course, how does he do that? He does that by his Holy Spirit. So every Christian, every true believer, regenerate person who has tasted grace, the whole Godhead is with you and you can have communion with father, son, and Holy Spirit. That's what Jesus said. My father will love him and we father and son will come and make our abode with him. That's the love of the father and the son. And when the Lord Jesus took on the son, took on our nature and became Jesus Christ. At his baptism, at his transfiguration, the father spoke. And what did he say? This is my beloved son. It's the one I love. This is my Isaac. And I've sent him into the world to pay for human sin, for all who believe. And then the Lord Jesus himself said this, and it's very striking. Why did the father, I ask this question, love Jesus so? And here's Jesus' words. For this reason, my father loves me because I lay down my life for the sheep. He loves him because he's willing to sacrifice everything. And so, therefore, true love for God and our Lord Jesus will compel us to take up our cross, our lives, where God has put us, individuals, as couples, as parents, as grandparents, as children, as workers, as neighbors, As those who enter into conversation in the store and wherever we may be, true love for God and our Lord Jesus will compel us to take up our cross and follow the Lord Jesus because he laid down his life for us. As John says in 1 John 3, we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers and the sisters. So we come back full circle. My question, do we love God? Do we love our neighbors? Are we willing to sit before the awesome urgency of God's commands and plead with him first in thanksgiving if you do in whatever measure you do love God and your neighbor and your enemy and your fellow believers but also to plead with him more grace to dear father more love for this person more patience and a more a clearer understanding of how you have loved me to do what you've done for me both in the world and in my soul. And so, Paul reminds us, if I speak with the tongues of men and angels, I have all the gifts and do not have love, I'm just making a lot of noise. If I have the gift of prophecy and I know all mysteries and knowledge and have all faith so as to remove mountains and any number of other things in ministry, we can do. and do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor and I surrender my body to be burned, I'm a martyr and I do not have love, it profits me nothing. May the Lord God, in his mercy and his grace, help us to fulfill these words that close the end of 1 John and at the end of Jude. Little children, brothers and sisters, keep yourselves from idols and keep yourselves in the love of God. Let's pray. Our Father, we thank you for access to you in this way of speaking, as it were, into the air, which is what unbelievers think we're doing, or if they think at all about it, makes no sense to them. But to us, it is our lifeline. It is our exhaling, as it were, because we inhale your word, your truth. We take it in by faith. It helps us to establish this foundation of hope on which, oh Lord God, blessed father, dear savior. and omnipotent spirit enable us to build on this foundation a love that will encourage us, actually be exhilarating for us, and more and more manifest your presence with us for whatever purposes you have with our lives, whether we're younger or older, whatever our situation, how we thank you that You have loved us, and you do. And you will perfect that work which you have begun in every one of the saints in this room until the day of Jesus Christ. So for this and all your other gifts, we give you great praise. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.