The God of Love

QUOTES FOR REFLECTION

“Love is when the other person’s happiness is more important than your own.”

~H. Jackson Brown, Jr. (1940-2021), inspirational author

“The happiness you feel is in direct proportion with the love you give.”

~Oprah Winfrey, talk show host and media mogul

“Happiness is only real when shared.”

~Jon Krakauer, writer and mountaineer

“We are not those who pay homage to stones, that are without sensation; but of the only God, who is before all and over all, and, moreover, we are worshippers of His Christ, who is truly God the Word existing before all time.”

~Melito, Bishop of Sardis (written c. 169-170) in his “Apology to Marcus Aurelius”

“Jesus is the Word, the Image, the Expression and Exegesis of God.”

~Hans Urs von Balthasar (1905-1988), Swiss theologian

“To receive God’s grace, the main thing you need is need—the main thing you need is nothing. But not many people have it.”

~John Gerstner (1914-1996), theologian and professor of church history

Question 8: Is there more than one God? Answer: There is only one, the living and true God.

Question 9. How many persons are in the one God? Answer: Three persons are in the one God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Although they are differentiated by their own individual, personal qualities, these three are one true, eternal God, the same in substance and equal in power and glory.

~Westminster Larger Catechism (1647)

“In space, astronauts experience the misery of having no reference point, no force that draws them to the center. Where there is no ‘moral gravity’…there is spiritual weightlessness. We float on feelings that will carry us where we were never meant to go; we bubble with emotional experiences that we often take for spiritual ones; and we are puffed up with pride. Instead of seriousness, there is foolishness. Instead of gravity, flippancy. Sentimentality takes the place of theology. Our reference point…is merely ourselves. We cannot possibly tell which end is up.”

~Elisabeth Elliot (1926-2015), missionary and author

SERMON PASSAGE

Galatians 6:1, 6, 13-15, 19-26 (ESV)

Galatians 5

1 For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery….

6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love….

13 For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. 14 For the whole law is fulfilled in one word: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 15 But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another….

19 Now the works of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, 21 envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. 22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. 24 And those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

25 If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.

Ephesians 4

1 I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love,