So I hope as you recited that by now very familiar passage from Nehemiah chapter 9, that you caught that last phrase of steadfast love. We've been talking about the steadfast love of God for the last several weeks, noting that that is a common very common, in fact probably the most common way of describing God's love, that he is covenantally bound to his people to love us and to demonstrate that love for us and he has showed it in multiple ways which we have already explored quite a bit. We're going to review just a little bit and then and then dig into the last part of this section from 1st John chapter 4 that we've been looking at the past few weeks. So if you would be so kind as to turn to 1st John chapter 4 once again, I will be reading again from verse 7 down to the end of the chapter. And I'd invite you, if you're able, to stand with me for the reading of God's holy and infallible word. Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God. And whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God because God is love. In this, the love of God was made manifest among us that God sent his only son into the world so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us because he has given us of his spirit. And we have seen and testified that the father has sent his son to be the savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the son of God, God abides in him and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love. And whoever abides in love abides in God and God abides in him. By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, for fear has to do with punishment. And whoever fears has not been perfected in love. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he is a liar. For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him, whoever loves God must also love his brother. God adds his blessing to the reading and hearing of his holy word. Please do be seated. So for the last couple of weeks, we've been looking at this passage and slowly working our way in to the heart of it and we will take the next step today towards that and Lord willing we should be able to wrap this passage up this morning. We began by taking a look at the whole idea of abiding which is something that John emphasizes throughout this little epistle again and again and has from the very beginning of abiding in and with the Lord. And in this particular section he's speaking about God's love and abiding in God's love and particularly as a means of confidence and knowing that you are in right relationship with the Lord, that you have safety in His presence. And we've taken a look at a couple of those things. But remember the background in which these statements are being made. John is speaking to a group of people who have been divided because false teachers are coming in and putting forth all kinds of heretical teaching concerning the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And some are claiming to have special knowledge that nobody else has. And they have had some success apparently in John's day of bringing division into the church and pulling some away from the orthodox faith that had been given through the apostles to the church and trying to say that Jesus was something less than fully God and fully man. Some of the teachings of the time were that Jesus was not man at all, that his body was something like what we would call today a hologram kind of thing, just sort of I'm not sure how you would even imagine that in that day. But anyway, it really wasn't genuine. He was just pure spirit than others that tried to deny full deity because they didn't like the idea of deity being corrupted by a fleshly body and those sorts of ideas. These were the the theological battles that were being waged during that time, and out of those battles came such things as the Apostles' Creed, and the Creed that came out of the Council of Nicaea, and the Creed that came out of Athanasius as he fought against those that tried to find fault with the the orthodox understanding of who Jesus Christ was as delivered by the apostles. Anyway, perhaps you notice, again, as I read through this passage, the emphasis upon, we know, we know, we know, we know. The false teachers were claiming false, were proclaiming false doctrines, but saying that they had knowledge that nobody else had. There's something bewitching about that, is there not? We like to know that we have something special, that people have to come to us for knowledge. And that is something that man cannot bear. Part of the reason that As I've talked with several of you, maybe I haven't talked with everybody about this. So I've been pulling back from certain things and activities in the community just because I was overloaded and it was taking a huge toll. But one of the things that you may, if you've been observant, you will have noticed that I do not any longer wear a pager. and there's a reason for that. Because my pager is set to scan so it gets everything and I know what's going on and every time that pager goes off I am on alert and it got to the point where I just mentally and emotionally could not deal with that anymore. But I have to tell you, taking it off and leaving it off is a challenge. And the reason it is, is because I got really used to everybody, including many of you, you'd hear some rumor of something and you'd call me and go, hey, have you heard about this fire? Have you heard about this accident? Have you heard about this? What's going on here? What's going on there? And I would have the answers. I'd be able to tell you. And there's something really exciting about being the answer man that everybody wants to go to. But I do not have the shoulders to bear that. Only Christ has those kinds of shoulders. It has been a great relief to not have that pager on. Talk to Chief Glazer back there. He'll tell you what it's like, and his wife. Talk to her, too. And that's the general response when you think about that pager all the time. It's like, no, not again. So now when people call me and say, what's happening? I go, I don't know. And it's liberating. It's like, I don't know. Maybe I'll call Mike. He knows. Wouldn't do that to you. But there's something bewitching about it. And yeah, it's been a little hard to go, I don't like saying I don't know. But as we humbly walk before the Lord, there are things that are truly His realm, His sphere, that are not ours. And resting in His sovereignty and resting in this particular passage, His love for us is absolutely liberating. Absolutely liberating. And that is what John is calling the saints to do. He's calling them to deny the false teachers that are claiming special knowledge that only they have, and to go after the faith once for all delivered to the saints, and rest in that faith, because you know that you are absolutely loved and kept by the Almighty God. And so we looked at the bookend portions of this particular passage, verses seven and eight, verses 20 and 21, speaking about the genuine nature of His love, because it comes from Him. He, as love, is never, that love is never exhausted. It is essential to His being, that steadfast love, that covenant faithfulness that He cannot deny. And the genuineness of that love that shows itself as it flows out to one another, as we saw the command there, beginning and end about loving our brothers, but also loving God himself and that when we are abiding in that love that he has shown to us, the effects of those things are also genuine. There is, you don't have to try to manufacture things to come up with your own, your own, political or theological party within the church to affirm yourself. You have new birth that is from him. You have new relationships with him and with each other that are based upon true knowledge of who God is as he reinforces that by his spirit. And that is a theme that is also repeated throughout this book and will be repeated again in our comments today. Then as we moved in towards the section, we looked at, this was last week as we spent our time thinking about the Lord's preemptive love. He did not wait upon us to act. He did not consult us to act. He was absolutely preemptive in the way that he revealed Christ to the world, in the way that that salvation that comes through the Lord Jesus Christ was executed and carried out in the fullness of time when he saw fit and in the manner in which he saw fit to carry out the plan that had been made from before the foundation of the earth to redeem us, God took the initiative and decided what the purpose was. It wasn't just so that we could congratulate ourselves that we were in the right party but rather that we were supposed to be living lives that were holy, putting aside the curse, and living as unto Him. And preemptive, we noted at the last point last week, had to do with His initiative, that while we were yet enemies, the ultimate expression of love, it's easy to love those who love you. Our God loved us when we were most unlovely, and continues to love us when we are unlovely. He shows the initiative, and we took a look at that word propitiation, which came up again during our family camp time as well. As we were singing one of the songs, I asked everybody, what does that word propitiation mean? The means of forgiveness, the means of that covering and reconciliation of Jesus Christ is that means. This this is the love in which we're to abide We're not to be looking for the love of another another God or the love of of others, you know, there's a We live in a very consumer-oriented society. I know you all know that. You've all probably heard many times in sermons that fact being bewailed, particularly because we look around and we see the idea of people never settling anywhere in a visible church somewhere, because it seems like we're always looking for greener grass somewhere else. We're looking for a little better, a little better love, a little more attention, a little more opportunity, a little more something. Fill in the blank. And so, in the American landscape, of course, the smorgasbord is out there. We live, there used to be a, one of those things like golden corral or whatever, it was a cross from Bob Jones University when I was a student there, it was called Duff's. All-you-can-eat place, we affectionately refer to it as Stuff's because of the behavior that was common when you walked in those doors. American church society is a lot like that. The smorgasbord is out there. and we can stuff ourselves on all kinds of various expressions and flavors of Christianity and never truly be satisfied. We can gorge ourselves on it, feel miserable about it, blame the church for it because after all we're miserable, but really it's because of our own discontent and wanting to just stuff ourselves on certain things and then finding out that, you know, there is such a thing as too much fried chicken. even to a southerner. But we get, we get that way regarding the church in American, American Christianity is often that way. And we're looking for a contentment of the love of a local body, which is certainly important. But we all too often, we're trying to find our satisfaction in people rather than God. That's the point I'm getting. And there is such a thing as too much. I started to say fried people. That doesn't work well. Too much fried chicken, too much of people and not enough of God. And we're out of balance. We need to abide in his genuine preemptive love. But there's another aspect of this love that John speaks of here. That's really cool. I've been looking forward to getting to this point. Verses 11 and 12, and then verses 14 through 18. 11 and 12. Beloved, if God so loved us, and how did he so love us? He sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. He made the sacrifice. If he so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. And then down to verses 14 through 18, and we have seen, did you catch that? Compared to what we've just heard? If you didn't, I will point it out again. If we have seen and testified that the father has sent his son to be the savior of the world, whoever confesses that Jesus is the son of God, God abides in him and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love. And whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have competence for the day of judgment, because as he is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear, for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. What word was repeated again and again and again in those verses? Besides love. Perfected, perfected. This is about the Lord's perfected love. Now what does it mean to abide in God's perfected love? The word perfected here, for those of you that are a more philosophical mindset, this is a word that you love. because this is a word that describes a whole area of discipline in philosophy. So I will break my usual rule about quoting Greek words and I'll quote, I'll give you the Greek word here. And it comes from the root word telos, telos. The full word here is telostai, but telos, which means, End or goal? End or goal? You know, when we, I was asked, we were talking about this with the kids in the Communicant class this morning. It was really cool. Because we were talking about glorification. And glorification is about the Lord making us perfect, finally, once and for all. Signed, sealed, delivered, no changes after that. Perfected. And I asked them what they thought that meant. And they came up with some good answers, like holy or purity. And that's part of it. But the idea of being perfect held up a stapler up there. All of you have staplers at home or in your office? Any of you have a perfect stapler? How many of you hate your staplers? It's not, those aren't, the staplers you hate aren't perfect. You hate aren't perfect. Why are they not perfect? Because they do not do what they were designed to do. Doesn't have to be fancy, doesn't have to be expensive, but if a stapler actually staples paper, actually goes through without bending the things into pretzels, You love that stapler. You cherish that stapler. You keep that stapler. Some of you have those old, some of the old ones that they weigh like a pound, you know, that were made back in the 50s, but those suckers will go through anything. They may be scratched, they may be dented, they may look ugly, they may not be ergonomically designed, whatever. but they are the perfect stapler because they do what they're supposed to do. That's the idea of perfection. You and I have lots of scratches and dents. And when it comes to our love for one another, there are times when we bend the staples with each other, do we not? But as we are sanctified in Christ, And He enables us to grow from grace to grace and glory to glory, to abound in love more and more, as Paul puts it, towards each other. Our love is more and more perfected as it becomes more and more conformed to what God designed us to do in relationship with one another in our love for our brothers and sisters and in our love for God Himself. The implications of this are huge for the way that we respond to one another and to God in love. When we respond to God in imperfect love, we give him second best, we are content with whatever ritual, we toss his way, see Lord, I did this, so therefore I'm loving you kind of thing. But God did not love us that way, we are to love sacrificially God and others as God did with us. That is what John is saying here. Let's see how this is developed, because this perfection that is spoken of regarding love means that this love has been brought to its end or goal. That's the meaning of this particular form of this Greek word. In verse 11, we do have a perfect example to follow, do we not? God himself, and in the Lord Jesus Christ. As we read there, that this is how God loved us. So we ought to follow that. That's our perfect example. God showed love to its nth degree by sending the Lord Jesus Christ to pay the penalty for your sin and mine. And when we go on to verse 12, it's not just an example to follow here. There's a, I'm gonna use the term expression here, in a broad sense. A perfect expression to believe. Verse 12a says, sorry, no one has ever seen God. And then down in 14 and 15, we have seen and testify God. that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. You take those two things together, and what do you have? Was John just kind of forgetting what he said up just a few sentences before? No one has seen God, but we have seen. The false teachers were claiming special knowledge based on whatever visions or revelations that they purported to have had. But John says, he, by we, he's speaking of the apostles here, of those that were in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ, who were witnesses of his crucifixion, ministry, crucifixion, and resurrection, and indeed, his ascension. He's saying, where are the witnesses to what is real? And while no man has seen God at any time, we have seen his Savior. And we know that that Savior was the perfect, absolute expression of who God is and what He has done. In the book of, in the Gospel of John, well, actually, let's turn back in 1 John first before we get to the Gospel. 1 John, just back to chapter one. Do you remember this when we looked at this a while back? that which is from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we looked upon and have touched with our hands concerning the word of life. The life was made manifest and we have seen it and testify to it and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father, was made manifest to us, that which we have seen and heard we proclaim to you." John is leaving it to no doubt as to the nature and the authenticity of the witness. And he's saying, you can believe what we're telling you because of what we have seen, how we've examined this, how we've been in the presence of the Savior of all mankind, and this is the Savior we proclaim to you, not the one that the false teachers are putting forward. Why is the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ so important? John, in his gospel, in chapter 1, verses 17 and 18, says, The law was given through Moses. Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God. The only God who is at the Father's side, He has made Him known. This is as clear a declaration as can be that the Lord Jesus Christ is one with the Father, just as He declared to be later on. as recorded in John 17. The only God who is at the Father's side, Jesus Christ. He's the one who's made him known. So Christ himself and those who have testified to him clearly, apostolic witnesses on the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, declaring, this we can't believe. Anything less, is suitable for the round file and not worthy of consideration. If we go on in verse 12 and then down to verse 16, we see the next aspect of this perfected love. God's love is brought to full and is shown in all of its glory as it has accomplished its goal, which is to redeem a people. We have a great expectation in which we can rest. 12b says this, if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. His love is brought to its fullness in us, brought to its goal. That is our redemption. A redemption that goes beyond, as we were talking about this with the young people during our class this morning, it goes beyond just a moment in time when we prayed a prayer. A lot of times we think salvation is just, you know, I prayed a prayer, so now I'm saved. And if we ask what salvation is, it's trusting in Jesus. Well, okay. that's a pretty important component of it. Beloved, I would contend, and I think I can uphold this pretty well from the Scriptures, that your salvation began before the foundation of the world, Ephesians chapter 1, with the Father's choice. And your salvation continued with His calling, with His granting you repentance and faith, His adoption of you, His justification of you, His ongoing sanctification of you. These are all components of your salvation. Salvation is not a moment in time. It is a life that is redeemed. And it continues on to its ultimate expression and finality when we are glorified with Him. That is our salvation. And when we look at the expectations, therefore, in which we can rest, it is really, as His love is perfected in us, He's bringing all things to the goal of the full redemption of not just individuals, but a people, a kingdom for the Son. So He abides in us. and perfects that love in us. In verse 16, similar kinds of thought there. We have come to know and believe the love that God has for us. He is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. What are some of the expectations in which you and I can rest in this perfected love of God? Not a half-hearted love, not a mere compassion, not a mere tolerance, for us, but agape, sacrificial love for us. First of all, you can expect His sanctification. He is not going to let you go. He's going to continue to minister to your heart and call you to repentance when you stumble and sin. He's not going to let you go. He will continue to sanctify you and make you more and more holy unto Him. You can expect to be sure surety in God, as verse 16 says there. We've come to know and to believe in this love that God has for us. You know, the world loves to try to tie Christians in knots and ask really silly or impudent questions. Some of you may have been at the receiving end of some of those, of unbelievers, go, well, what about this, that, and the other, and all of that. And it's like, you need to, and for some reason, we get intimidated by that, and we don't really understand that it really, it's pretty simple. The world longs for something that we possess and they don't have. And that is a surety in relationship with their Creator. Some people describe that as a God-shaped hole in every person's heart. Okay, if that image works for you, I guess that's great. But the fact is, is that without God, we are without hope in the world. We're lost. And the world spends its time and its energy spinning its wheels in a lost condition, looking for answers. But ignoring the one that's right smack dab in their face according to Romans chapter 1 His love Is sure and when we experience that we're going to talk about the Holy Spirit here in a minute to through the ministry of the Holy Spirit Alright, we may not be the world's greatest theologians and be able to give all these highfalutin answers that will satisfy the wicked. By the way, there are no highfalutin answers that will satisfy the wicked. You can be as erudite as you please and they'll never satisfy the wicked because they're determined to be wicked and they're determined to not believe. C.S. Lewis in The Last Battle, one of the chronicles of Narnia, describes, some of you may have read that, how many have read that? So I know a few. Well, there's these little dwarves that are in rebellion against Aslan the king. They only want to live for themselves. They're shoved into a little hovel, and Aslan comes among them, and he's teaching those who are following Him, it doesn't matter what I say, it doesn't matter what I do, it doesn't matter what you do, you can say anything you want to, they've made up their mind that this that they've got is all there is, and their law in life is this, and it doesn't matter what good things I give to them, they will trample it underfoot, they will say it's something else, and they're gonna deny it. And He develops that in the story. And the world is just that way. God could and does put all kinds of blessings in this world, for all to enjoy, and fallen man tramples it underfoot, and does not give credit to its source, and indeed is more prone to find fault with it than anything else. But you and I have a surety that God loves us, and we abide in Him. You know, if someone comes to me and says, can you prove that your wife loves you? What's the best that I can do? I can say, she does this for me. She does that for me. She says this to me. She says that to me. I can go down a list of things that are tangible that way. But are those really proofs? No, they're indications. How can I prove that she loves, I can't, you know, by scientific dissection, open up her mind and go, there's the spot right there. Love for Lynn. Yep. It's there. No, I can say all those other things, but anybody can say, well, she just does that because she wants you to do this or she wants you to do that. She wants you to clean out the whatever. Not that she does that. Okay. But that's the way the world thinks. The proof is in the power of the relationship that we have as our hearts are knit together in a way that goes beyond words. And those of you that have that kind of relationship know exactly what I'm talking about. It's not about proof. It's about the reality that we experience. The world doesn't know that. John is describing that here. And describes it as abiding in God and he in us. And we know that. We know that he loves us. And in that certainty, that surety that is ours, there is solidarity that we have with Him, also there in verse 16. We know and believe the love that God has for us. He is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. This reciprocal relationship. I know I've challenged you, and I'm sure if you've been in the church for any length of time. Others have challenged you as well about abiding in God. And a lot of the focus that we have is upon our responsibility and our desire and our activity, right? We don't often think about God abiding with us, but he does. And he does that by his spirit. In John 17, I mean, this shouldn't surprise us, Jesus prayed, there in the upper room with the disciples, that they, speaking of the disciples, may all be one. Just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that you have sent me. This solidarity with the Lord spills out into solidarity for one another, and then that in turn issues for the testimony of the reality of who Christ is, reality of what he does in people's hearts and lives and how he knits us together by his love and keeps us in his love. That's our expectation. Sanctification, surety, solidarity with God. That's a high and lofty expectation and yet John speaks of it almost, not in an offhand way, I mean he's being very deliberate about it, but there's not a lot of verbiage here. He just said, this is the way it is. God abides in you, you abide in him. If your love is perfected and you're dwelling in that perfected love and not just being content with a half-baked version of love, an imitation version of love. In this perfected love, The end of this love is not just to make us feel warm and fuzzy, but there is an end goal for this, and that is our glorification and ultimately being united with Him for eternity and everlasting life. In verses 17 and 18, this is spoken of really coming at it from the other way. By this is love perfected in us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is, so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect, and that is a love that is realized, a love that is perfected. It's the same word that we've been talking about. Perfect love casts out fear. Fear has to do with punishment, And whoever fears has not been perfected in love. In God's perfected love, this is our perfect escape from judgment. It's what we're to be abiding in, resting in His intention to save us not only from the perversity of this life, but from the judgment of the next. And what confidence that we are to have, John speaks of that here. the peace that we have for the life to come. Not to live in fear of judgment. Not to live in fear of what man may do to us. Not to live in fear of failure of relationships and all of that. These kind of fears that plague our lives. When there is fear, beloved, your love is not perfected. Let me say that again. If you're living in fear of whatever, Your love for God and your love for others still has some work to do. There needs to be more sanctifying going on because where love is brought to its end in a relationship, that fear goes away. For those of you that have been married for a while, and I trust that this is true of all of you, I, as I look around this congregation, I'm pretty sure it is. I'm pretty sure that you don't wake up in the morning going, I wonder if she's still gonna love me today. I wonder if he's still gonna love me today. Some of you have been through relationships where those thoughts may very well have been there. But for those of you that have been together a while, your love is perfected. It doesn't mean you can't improve things. It means it's been brought to its end. Of living for one another, confidence in one another, all those things are there. So that the fear of the relationship dissolving somehow is just not there anymore. Maybe it was when you were younger, but it isn't now. And that's all the more remarkable when you consider that the older that you get, The more weaknesses that we seem to come up with, the more challenges that we have in fulfilling our duties and the things that we would like to do with each other and all of that, and yet the love doesn't fall apart. Why? Because the love was perfected in bringing about the oneness of your hearts together. have that kind of love and recognize that we're abiding in God's love that is perfect. It begins with Him, it's perfected, it's shown by His providing of our Savior and working out our salvation. When we rest in that and abide in that perfected love, He brings our love for Him to ever greater levels of perfection. There's a reason why people talk a lot about things like assurance. Assurance and the need to talk about assurance comes about because our love is imperfect for the Lord. And we sin and we stumble. We wonder if He's still gonna love us. Doubts come in. But the more that we're sanctified, the more that our love for Him is perfected by His grace, the less fear we have about falling away. And that's the way it should be because the whole goal is to take us away from judgment, not leave us in that place of judgment. And that brings me to the last thought here as we wind this down and look at the very heart of this passage is verse 13. By this we know that we abide in him. What is the by this therefore? What is it referring to? It's referring to the perfection of God's love in us. By this we know that we abide in him and he in us because he has given us of his spirit. And this is all wrapped up with what God did in showing his perfect love in giving us the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse seven, remember it said, let us love one another for love is from God and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. So the knowledge is brought here, by this we know, that we abide in Him, because of what He has done for us. And if you look back also in chapter 3 and verse 24, same kind of thinking here. Whoever keeps His commandments abides in God, and God in him, and by this we know that He abides in us by the Spirit. whom He has given us. And here, again, the role of the Holy Spirit is brought to bear, as it is so often in this little epistle, that the Spirit of God is given to those who are truly His, and is that seal in our hearts that helps us to know that we truly are His. That connection that can't really be explained in words, but we know that nevertheless is very real. Just a few verses to kind of wrap up this thought. Romans 8, verses 38 and 39, a familiar passage, I'm sure, to most of you, where the apostle says, I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present or things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Only by the ministry of the Holy Spirit in your life can you declare that with confidence. Paul, I referred earlier to his letter to the Ephesian church, and in chapter one, verses 13 and 14, we read, in Christ you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, you were sealed with the Holy Spirit, the promised Holy Spirit. who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of His glory." This abiding that we're talking about in, this love that, yes, it's genuine, it's preemptive, it's perfect. He's shown it all the way to its end, what its goals are, and He's brought it about. This love that we are to abide in is guaranteed To live with the confidence of a guarantee is something that we like. Every time you go buy something at a hardware store these days, they wanna sell you an extra little extended warranty so you can have a better guarantee. You go buy a used car, they wanna send you an extended warranty so that you'll be more confident in the purchase because you have a guarantee. And those guarantees really aren't worth all that much. But the guarantee of the Lord Jesus Christ is the Spirit of God given to us, who, as God, never leaves us, never fails us, and is always abiding with us. In 2 Corinthians, Paul says in chapter one, it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, who has anointed us and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee. Beloved, abide in the guaranteed love of our Lord. Stick to it until the end, as hard as it may be. That means, to that end, the means to that end is God's love, and it endures. Abide in His genuine, preemptive, perfect, and guaranteed love. Find reason to hope with certainty. In the everlasting life, He is prepared for you. His child, His love will never fail. Let's pray. Thank you, Father, for your mercies. Thank you for your great love for us. Lord, let us abide in it. Let us not look for the love of any other God, any other pleasure, any other possession, any other position or power. Lord, let us be content with your love. Let us flourish in it, as you've promised us. Abide in us, help us to abide in you, and bring us home to glory. In Christ's name we pray, amen.