The Lord of Love
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December 27, 2015 |
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 Senior Pastor Dr. Jaerock Lee
"Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law" (Romans 13:10).
Every year when Christmas is around the corner, you get buoyed up by hope and happiness like a child expecting a gift. It is because God gave us His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, as a gift. He also made a promise with us that whoever accepts Jesus as his Savior will be saved.
It was love itself that the Lord was born on this earth, and everything He did on this earth was also love. Today, we will look at the kinds of love our Lord gave us in three aspects.
1. The Lord of love completely sacrificed Himself for us.
The fact that the Word became flesh and came to this earth in itself was already a great sacrifice. He locked His omnipotent and divine natures into the form of a low and obscure creature, and He lived on this earth just like men. For us, He lived such a harsh and poor life of hunger and thirst and often without sleep or rest.
Finally when the time came He took the cross. He managed all sacrifices in silence. People spat on Him and insulted Him. The thorns of the crown pierced into His head. Scourging caused His flesh to be torn apart revealing His bones. He was nailed through His hands and feet. But still Jesus did not try to avoid or elude the punishment. He didn't even care about the insult of being hung naked like a criminal and mocked by people.
Jesus is the precious Son of God. There were no grounds, no reason—nothing that He had done to suffer as much as He did and He was surely able to avoid it all. If He had wished, He could have immediately come down from the cross and stood before the people with His majestic and glorious appearance. He could have called for the host of heaven, more than 12 legions of them, and destroyed the evil people who stood against Him. But He silently took the suffering and died because His sacrifice was the only way that could save us.
For the saved people like us, Christmas is such a happy and cozy day. However, 2,000 years ago when Jesus was born, what was going through the heart of God?
He knew well of the future glory the Lord would receive, but He also knew what kind of terrible suffering the Lord would take prior to it. While He did not take His eyes off of Jesus for 33 years, He had to feel the sorrow of the things forthcoming. When Jesus was finally hung on the cross, God suffered so very greatly watching His Son, Jesus.
When His loving Father had to turn His face away from His Son, the Son was sad and lonely. But the heart of the Father was far beyond description when He had to ignore the suffering of His beloved Son although He could have helped. As you can see, God also made great sacrifices to the point of giving up His only begotten Son for us.
2. The love of the Lord is the love of giving up everything.
Jesus took all the sufferings and sacrificed Himself to the point of giving up His life while giving us only the good things. Those parents who truly love their children don't care about their wealth or their toil. While working so hard and giving up things they could have, they only think of how they can give the best of things to their children and how to help them lead a better life.
He was not born to lie in a good bed in a fine home, but instead He was laid in a manger. It was a sign that He was to become the bread of life to the sinners who are less than animals. He didn't look for a good house, good clothes, or good food. He walked around with no place to lay His head. He put on rough and shabby clothes, and He often starved and prayed. It was to redeem us from poverty and to make us rich.
He constantly walked here and there to places with no time to sleep or rest, in an attempt to show the love of the Father to and to plant the hope of Heaven in those people who had no hope. It was to save them from the problems of diseases, infirmities, and demon-possession. "My beloved sons and daughters that I formed in My own image, don't be poor and don't be sick!" Jesus showed this heart of the Father to the souls.
He gave up the glory that He enjoyed as the Son of God. He gave up His body, heart, time, and possessions—even His life itself. When He was hung on the cross and ignored by God, He couldn't even call His beloved Father, "Father" because it was the moment when He was carrying the burden of sins of mankind. In those moments He gave up the intimacy with His most beloved Father, so that we could be forgiven of our sins and dwell in the love of God. It was because, if we dwell in God's love, we can enjoy health, wealth, wisdom, honor, and all the blessings that we ask for.
And in the end He will present the dwelling place in Heaven to us. The Lord said in John 14:2-3, "In My Father's house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also."
Right now, Jesus is not eating anything. He is interceding for us. He is also preparing places for us in Heaven. In giving up all things, He allows for us to enjoy all the best things—this is the love of our Lord for us.
3. The love of the Lord was revealed as the perfect fruit.
Our Lord said in John 12:24, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit."
The sacrifice of innocent Jesus saved countless souls. Whoever listens to the gospel and accepts the Lord can receive the Holy Spirit and be saved. As these souls who have received the Holy Spirit and been saved follow the desires of the Holy Spirit to diligently walk in the truth, they can attain to the level of spirit and whole spirit. And they finally become God's true children, and they reach the most precious positions.
This is the perfect fruit that God desires. Jesus opened the way of salvation for all mankind, but not all of them will become the perfect fruit. They heard the gospel and were saved, but if they stop in the middle or strayed onto a wrong path, they will have nothing to do with the Lord again.
Those who walk the path till the end will be able to pass through the gates into salvation. But it is only those who circumcise their hearts who will pass not only one gate, but many gates, and they will eventually enter the 3rd kingdom of Heaven, or best of all, New Jerusalem (Revelation 22:14).
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, Romans 5:8 reads, "But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."
When we didn't know the Lord, He loved us first, and He bought us with His precious blood. Instead of the punishment of being burned in the fire and sulfur of hell, He prepared the eternal Heaven. And when we pray in the name of the Lord, He answers our wishes and hearts' desires. I pray in the name of the Lord that you will always remember the love that the Father and the Love gave to us, and surely come forth as His precious fruit.
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