[THE FOLLOWING IS A SERMON NIKO PREPARED AND DELIVERED FOR OUR HOME CHURCH]

“Love the Lord”

Good afternoon everyone! I would like to pray before I begin my teaching…

This Sunday the topic is on “Love the Lord” and it is found in Matthew 22:37 turn with me there if you please.

What does it mean to love the Lord? Part of loving the Lord includes obeying his commands. May I have a volunteer to read Deuteronomy 10:12 please. “Thank you” [God requires us to fear the Lord our God, to walk in all of his ways and to love and serve Him with all of our heart and soul.]

How come it is so hard for us to obey the command in Deuteronomy 10:12? It is because of sin, “which so easily entangles us”. Sin has come into the world and we are enslaved to it. But that’s not the end that would be a terrible end. No, but God loved us so much, John 3:16 “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.” God loved us so much He sent His only begotten Son down to earth to die to redeem us from our sins and we killed God’s Son. We sinful imperfect humans killed God’s only begotten Son and continue to hurt God by sinning all the time. Since we are so terrible to God we have a big punishment awaiting: HELL. But wait! DON’T STOP THERE! JESUS PAID OFF THAT DEBT FOR ALL BELEIVERS BY DYING ON THE CROSS. And we should love the Lord because He first loved us by sending His son down to earth to take the punishment for our sins. (1 John 4:19) How can we ever thank Jesus enough for taking the punishment for us? The best way to thank Him is to become believers. How do we become believers? We must repent of our sins, believe that Jesus Christ is God’s Son and that He came to earth to die on the cross because of our sins and then rose up from the grave. We must trust that He will come again and take us home to heaven and we must commit our lives to serving Him and give up our will to the “Author and Finisher of our faith”.

May I have a volunteer for 2 Kings 23:25 please. This is Josiah. “Thank you”… And like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to the Lord with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses; neither after him arose there any like him” Josiah is an excellent example of Matthew 22:37. In this passage it describes how Josiah was pretty God-fearing don’t you think, but you know what’s sad about that is that Josiah was the only one like him of all the kings.

Hezekiah trusted God so that there was no other king like him before him or after him. May I have a volunteer for 2 Kings 18:5-7a please. “Thank you”.

Is it a contradiction because it says Josiah was the only king so Godly, yet so was Hezekiah? It says that Hezekiah trusted God and kept his commands. It says that Josiah turned to the Lord with all his heart, soul, and might. There is some difference here, and I think we can learn from both kings about loving the Lord.

“Love the Lord” can cover a lot of ground. The Bible is filled with instructions about loving the Lord. Loving the Lord includes following all the ten commandments; thou shalt not steal, Thou shalt not covet, Honor your parents and so on. Loving the Lord also includes following all these commands of Christ we have been studying.

“Let your light so shine”, we should love the Lord by letting our light shine. We should not hide the wonderful news of the Gospel; the good news of Jesus Christ. It would not be loving to the Lord to be ashamed of Him or to hide the good news about Him.

Loving your Enemies is loving to the Lord. It might be hard to love your enemies but think, if you were going to hurt your enemy you might think “Oh now I can hurt that mean guy” No don’t think that. You might think that, but what would you think if you thought about it this way hurting that “mean guy” is hurting Jesus. You don’t want to hurt Jesus do you?

So, examples of loving the Lord, can include serving Him, talking about Him, teaching about Him, thinking about Him, not being ashamed of Him, obeying His commands, and wanting and loving to do all these things.

Loving the Lord often includes giving up your will. In terms of giving up your will, I actually just heard someone say this week about how a minister came and told him you can’t do this, you can’t do that, and don’t do this, don’t do that and so on. The man was like, “Then where’s my life?” While this may not be the best way of witnessing, it also showed the speakers’ heart. It’s not about your life, it’s about Jesus Christ.

We must give up our will to God, we must not keep our will for ourselves we must give our will to God. Giving our will to God might be one of the hardest things for us to do, it may be painful but we should do it anyway. We are being prideful when we do not give our will to God. May I have a volunteer for James 4:6, please. “Thank you” We should be humble not proud. James 4:6 says that God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble.

In closing I would like repeat about the same thing I said earlier. In order to love the Lord we must be believers. As it says in Hebrews 11:6 “Without faith it is impossible to please him; for he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.”

In order to be a believer one must repent of their sins, believe that Jesus Christ is God’s Son and that He came to earth to die on the cross for them because of their sins and then rose up from the grave. They must believe and trust that He will come again as He has said, no matter what people may say.

Jesus is coming back again at a time that we do not know. Jesus will come back again here to earth as He has said and take his children home to heaven, to a place where there is no sin, no not one. Heaven will be wonderful, and they must commit their lives to serving God and they must give up their will to serving the “Author and Finisher of our faith”. Let’s pray.