We are in our series Sweeter than Honey. And this series comes from Psalm 119:03 where it says, you, words are sweet to my taste, sweeter than honey to my mouth. And really the challenge I gave to everybody preaching in this series was pick a verse or two that has just been personally sweet to you and bring it to our church. Hopefully how the word of God has impacted you would come across to our people and just the Bible is just full of sweet promises and encouragement and life altering truths. And if nothing else from this series, if you just kind of got a deeper love of God's word, that would be a win. But we wanted each person to bring a few verses just to unpack for you. So I got a passage this morning, I'm up that has just been really sweet to me and I. It's a passage I come back to a lot. And let me get a little personal with you to help you understand why this passage has been and is sweet to me. And, and then maybe, maybe you can relate. But I can struggle with not feeling good enough. And I know what you're thinking. You're like, really, you, you're so godly and wise and handsome. I don't know if the last one has anything to do with it, but I appreciate it. But I can struggle sometimes with not feeling good enough. And let me give you a little bit of my background, just kind of how I'm wired a bit. And maybe some of you can resonate with this struggle as well. But I grew up the son of a football coach and we ate and breathed football from as long as I can remember. I was on the field with my dad running around as soon as I could be in a weight room. And I was started in that, I think from the sixth grade on. I don't know if we ever missed a week of workouts. Like even if we would go on vacation, my dad would find a gym and we would go get a workout in and it was just, that's just what we lived, we breathed, we ate it, we watched football, we talked football, we trained for football. It was just what it is. And I'm not complaining. This isn't like my gripe session of such a hard childhood. I had a great childhood. I had a great, loving, supporting dad. But as a coach, you're always coaching. And in coaching, part of the way you love is to help somebody improve. Like this is how you can get better and this is how you can get better at this. And this is what you need to work on. And this Is how you can improve in this area. And it's just kind of high expectations, high love and support, but high expectations and high drive and, like, constantly evaluate and constantly get better and strive to improve in all things. And that's kind of who I am today. How do you get better? How do we get better? How do I get better? Okay, it's good. Fine. How does it become great? How do we get better at this? And how do we improve? And just kind of that kind of drive. And with that mentality, I can often feel like I'm not enough. Like, if it's always, how do we improve and how do we get better? I can fall into wrestling with feeling like, well, I'm not good enough. I'm not a good enough husband. Like, I could have improved, and I could have done that better, and I should have paid more attention there. I'm not a good enough dad, and I probably didn't read as many books at bedtime as I should have. And we needed. We needed to play catch more. And I'm not as good of a dad as I should be. I'm not good of a pastor as I should be. Like, I feel like I don't know everybody's name. I hate that. And it's like, a good pastor knows his sheep, and I should know people, and there's so many people here I don't know. And you feel like you're just not a good pastor. You feel like often I'm not a good Christian. Like, I've been reading a lot of Puritans, and their prayer life puts my prayer life to shame. I should pray more. Why don't I pray more? And I could feel like a failure in my prayer life or my Bible knowledge. I should know more. Bible. I should. Why don't I have this whole thing memorized by now? Like, I should know more. And I just kind of get crushed under those challenges and expectations. My evangelism, when's the last person I led to cry? Like, you just have all these things, like, I need to get better at this, and I need to get better at this, and I need to get better at this. And it can all be a bit crushing. And maybe you've even felt that from me as one of your leaders. Cause I'll shoot it straight with you. And we've talked before. It's like, hey, we have a lot of members that don't serve anywhere. What's with that? Like, come on. Our giving compared to a lot of churches is bad. I'll just tell you how it is like we got room to grow in there. Attendance, like we're so spotty in attendance, like 1.8 times a month ain't great, you know, like there's some challenges. And I'm not saying that you shouldn't speak those challenges. Those challenges need to be given. The Bible's full of challenges and imperatives to be given that we should do that. And then the coach and athlete in me, I love that. Like, let's go crank it up. I mean, we're called to walk in a manner of the worthy of the gospel. So let's get going. Let's do better. Let's pursue Christ wholeheartedly. But sometimes, if I'm honest, it's really crushing. Like I'm my own worst critic. And with a critic, you can improve. And believe me, I feel like I've grown pretty thick skinned. You can come down and tell me anything and it's like, sure, you betcha. Let's get better. But with a critic, you're often critical and you can start to feel like you're letting people down. I'm letting my wife down. I should have done better. I'm letting my kids down. Why wasn't I there in those situations? Or I'm letting God down and why can't I get better at this? And you can feel like people are disappointed with you. My family's disappointed with me. The church is disappointed with me, the elders are disappointed with me. God's disappointed with me. And it's crushing. And I'm not telling you this so that you come down afterwards and give me compliments. I'm good. Okay, we'll see where we're going here in the text, but have you ever felt that way? That you're just not good enough? You're not a good enough Christian. You're not a good enough husband or wife. You're not a good enough mom or dad. Your quiet time's not epic enough. Your mission isn't devoted enough. You. Your giving's not generous enough, your serving's not sacrificial enough. It's just, just never enough. And oftentimes what, what the world does to somebody when they feel like they're not enough is they come alongside and they, they want to affirm them like, no, you're awesome. You're. You're perfect. You're so good. You're. You're, you're perfect just the way that you are. But you're not like you. You know it. And is there a greater comfort that we can find than lying to ourselves and thinking that we're perfect just the way that we are. And maybe if you could relate with any of those feelings that I felt. I have something I want you to taste like. There's a truth in scripture that is so sweet that I've come back to so many times just to chew on. It's more savory than brisket, right? It's better than ribs. And I got some passages that just have been so dear to my own heart that I hope to share with you. And what I told every preacher say, hey, pick one or two verses. So I picked three or four. Still a small chunk. It's just packed with flavor. So we're not going a lot of places in scripture. We're gonna be one place. We're gonna put the verses on the screen. They're gonna be up there the whole time. But it's great. If you have your own Bible with you, that's awesome. Or if your Bible's on the phone, I would encourage you to open it up. It's better if you see it in there, if you brought a pen. We're gonna look at words. We're gonna look at phrases we want to better like. We want to chew this passage up a little bit, mark things up, and we want to kind of get the flavor and the taste of this text. So you guys ready? All right. Romans 5, 6, 8. For while we are still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for a righteous person. Though perhaps for a good person, one would dare to die, to even die. But God shows his love for us, and that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Now, church, we can't miss the love story of the Bible. And often it can feel like we see the Bible more as a survival story. Like, I'm in this broken world. I'm in this broken body. I struggle with things, and I want to get out. And I'm in this condition, and I want to get to that place. How do I get to heaven? How do I get to paradise? How do I escape this broken world and get to a better place? Like, see it as a story of survival, but it's not a story of survival. It's a love story. Like, how does the Bible begin? Like, when you look at the overarching story of the Bible, how does it begin? In a marriage. Adam and Eve in the garden, in unbroken relationship with God? Well, how does it end? At a wedding. In a wedding feast. And the Bible is about God pursuing his people, reconciling his people, like redeeming them back to himself. Now here's a little bit of a risk. Do you remember this is a while back, but do you remember when we talked as a church about double imputation? Anybody nerd out with me? This was back when we just went through second Corinthians. That was our last book study. And in chapter five, last verse in chapter five, we looked at double imputation for he who knew no sin became sin so that we might become the righteousness of God. Now you could imply in there that he who knew no sin became sin so that us who know no righteousness become the righteous of God. And double mutation. We trying to understand what happened on the cross. Like what was the work that got accomplished on the cross? And what happened was our sin was imputed onto Christ and Christ's righteousness was imputed onto us. So he took a punishment that we deserve and we get a reward or righteousness that, that he deserved. Like that was the work of the cross. But listen, church, we can't just know the work of the cross. We also have to know the message of the cross. Look at verse 8. But God shows or demonstrates his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died on the cross for us. So what got accomplished on the cross? Did it accomplish anything? Yes. The forgiveness of sins, the imputed righteous to people who put their faith in Christ, our redemption, our salvation. Yes, it accomplishes something, but it also says something. The cross is declaring something and it's God saying, I love you. I love you. Like you get that? It's a message. It's a loud message. But the cross doesn't just declare God's love. God shows it. He demonstrates it. It was an action. He didn't come down and just say I love you. Like he didn't give lip service to his love. He put action to it. He showed and demonstrated his love. And his display of love is an event that happened in history. Like how we keep time is rooted in the death of Christ. Like people witnessed it. It was a real event with real people in real history. And we look back to it now and that was an event that declared his love. But this is important. The word demonstrates or shows is present tense. Now why does that matter? Because if you're an English person, you might be like, that's not grammatically correct because it says, but God shows present tense, his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died past, past tense for us. Why doesn't he say but God showed his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Those line up that, that matches. But he doesn't do that and he doesn't do that on purpose. Why? Well, well, here, here's. Some of you are like, I know the answer. Here's what happens. What Paul's saying is, is that God didn't just demonstrate his love for us 2000 years ago, it's a now love. So it was an event that happened in the past, but it's still present day, declaring, showing, demonstrating his love. It's a now love. It's not just I loved you and I showed it way back then. It's still speaking of my love to you today. And every time we take communion, which we're commanded to do, he says in the command, do this every time you get together. And when you do it, you proclaim the Lord's death until he returns. Well, when you take communion and we're proclaiming the Lord's death, what are we proclaiming? Well, we're proclaiming quite a bit. One, we believe that we're sinners in need of a savior. We believe that Jesus is our savior, but we're also declaring God loves us. It's a declaration of his love. And in a world where so much is competing for your passion, your attention, your desires, your devotion, like, we need that constant every time you get together, reminder, I love you. Don't forget, don't forget I love you. Don't forget that I love you. Don't forget that I love you. Don't forget that I love you. That's what communion is calling us to. But we use that word love pretty loose. Like, I love my wife and I love tacos, right? And I love football. And I love you, right? And I love America and I love. Like we just, we, like we love. We use that word so flippantly and then to turn and use the same word for God and the way he loves us. We're in danger of cheapening God's love because we just don't have a bucket for it. It's hard. Like, we know how we love and we know how we experience love. But God's love is what John says, it's a perfect love, a perfect love that casts out all fear. Like the capacity of his love is so much greater than ours. But you got to understand the love of God, it's so central to Christianity. And if you misunderstand the love of God, you will get Christianity wrong. And what Paul's trying to do in this text is help the Romans better understand the love of God. And there's some emphasis that's happening in these few verses that I think can help us do this. So let's look at this again. For while we were still what? Weak. Now you'll have some more opportunities to improve upon that at the right time, Christ died for the for one will scarcely die for a righteous person. Though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die. But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. So who's the us in this? Well, it's the weak. Or it could mean helpless. It's the ungodly. It's the sinners. Like, our condition is clear in this. And sometimes when you are feeling like you're not enough, or when you're feeling like you're not loved, the. The temptation, which we already mentioned, is to kind of come alongside somebody and affirm them. No, you're so awesome. Like, you're the best. You're perfect just the way that you are. But Paul does the opposite. He's like, let me just clarify some things. You are weak, helpless, ungodly sinner. Just clarify that. And our condition is really clear. But he ain't lying, right? It's like, that's true of us. We are weak. We are ungodly. We are not like God. We are sinners. We do things we know we shouldn't do. We don't do things we know we should do. We do things that we say we're never gonna do again, and then we do them again. We struggle with lust, we struggle with greed, we struggle with pride. We struggle with insecurity. Like, there's some brokenness. There's some brokenness in us. There's some brokenness in this world. Like, I don't have to sell that hard. There's a problem. And Paul's pointing that out. Yeah, we're weak, we're ungodly, we're sinners. Like, he shows us our condition. But stay with me here, because this is part of the recipe that makes this verse so sweet. If somebody gives you a gift or shows love to you, one way to measure the specialness of it is to understand how deserving or undeserving you are of it. So let's say you have a friend who. Who's just knows you're going through a hard time, and they send you some text messages that are encouraging, send you flowers at work, take you out to lunch, and the next week you kind of pass that and then you then in thanks, like, send her some flowers, send her some encouraging text messages, and come pick her up from work and take her out to eat. She might. She might conclude, like, yeah, that makes sense, right? That's what friends do. Like, I loved you in your hard time, and then you turned around and you encouraged me. Like, that makes sense. But what if it wasn't like that? What if the friend wasn't a very good friend at all? In fact, they were ghosting you. You found out. They kind of said some slanderous, hurtful things about you. They're not returning your text. And in that week, you still send flowers, send some encouraging texts, and go pick her up and take her out to lunch. She might be like, why are you doing this? Like, it doesn't make sense. Or, let's think of this. There's a married couple, and let's say the husband goes away for a week and he's gone and the wife is home alone with the kids. And just kind of a stressful week while he's out fishing. Or. And he comes back and he's like, how can I help? Let me take you out to dinner. Let me treat you. She might be thinking, yeah, you better, right? Like, this display of love totally makes sense. Like, this is how it should happen. Well, what if he wasn't gone all week? In fact, instead of being away all week, he was home all week and there was a lot of strife and fighting. In fact, she said some hurtful, unfair things that she's kind of ashamed of in the midst of conflict and a fight. And then in the midst of that, he says, how can I help? Let's go out for a nice dinner. See, one, it might be like, yeah, this makes sense. And the other is like, why are you doing this? And the point that Paul is making is that God loves you and you don't deserve. Doesn't make sense. You have done nothing to conclude, like, yeah, this is something God should do for me. This. This checks out. But Paul is saying God loves you and you don't deserve it. So if you feel like you're not enough, let me. Let me tell you in love, because you're not. You're not. You're weak, you're ungodly, and you're a sinner and you're loved. You're loved. You're loved more than you can imagine. But you don't deserve it and you didn't earn it. Like, don't be crushed by not being enough. Be freed in not being enough, knowing that you're loved and you can't be enough. Nobody can be enough to reckon or deserve the love of God. You can't do that. None of us can have a week, a minute of life where we just be like, I deserve that from God, all of its grace. We're weak, we're ungodly, and we're sinners. So why does God love you? I mean, now that we think about it, why does God love us Husbands? Let me just talk to you for a second. It applies both ways, but tends to play out this way more. If your wife ever comes to you and asks, why do you love me? Be careful. Like, how you answer that question has implications. Because there's things you love about your spouse, but it's not why you love your spouse. Because if you say, I love you because you're so fun and active and I love doing stuff with you, what happens if she gets older and is no longer active? Do you not love her? What if you say, like, well, I love your hair. Well, what if it grays and she cuts it? You no longer love her. I love your sense of humor, and I can just spend time with you all the time. What if she suffers a stroke and her personality changes? Do you no longer love her? And the answer might be, not always what we're looking for, but it's like, well, I love you because I love you. I love you because I love you. And love's not just a feeling. We made some vows, we made some commitments. We made some promises. It's an action. It's an expression. So why does God love you? Why does he love you? Well, he loves you because he loves you. He loves you because he doesn't love you, because you've performed a certain way, because you're this type of person or that type of person, or because you've done this or that. Now, there's things that honor God and dishonor God, but that's not why he loves you. He loves you before the foundations of the earth. He's loved you first, like we love because he first loved us. It was a preemptive love. It was a love before we've done anything, good or bad. He loves you because he loves you. And his love is more than a feeling. It doesn't rise and fall with your performance week to week. He doesn't love you more because you had a great week or love you less because you had a bad week. He. He can't love you anymore, and he can't love you any less. He has a devoted Consistent love. And get this. He made his declaration of his love at your worst. Look at that phrase in verse 8. But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us while we were still sinners. Like, when you were at your worst, God made a declaration, a display of his love in the midst of your sin. Like, why does Paul make sure to clarify the timing of God's love towards you? Because he doesn't want anybody taking credit for this. He doesn't want anybody to come to the conclusion of, like, well, yeah, it kind of makes sense for God to love me. I've kind of earned this. I kind of deserve this. He's like, no, no, no, no, no. He declared his love for you in the midst of your sin. You weak, helpless, ungodly sinner. When that's your condition, that's the moment. That's the timing of God declaring his love for you. He speaks into that moment, guys. He knows you. He knows you. There's no surprise. It's not like a couple that gets married. Then after their marriage, there's some things that come out. It's like, I didn't know that. I didn't know that. That's hard. God's like, I know everything about you. I know your thoughts. I know your actions. I know your heart. I know the things no one else knows about you. I know everything about you. And I love you. I love you. There's no surprises with God. You are fully known and fully loved. Isn't that what we're after? Because there's this fear in our human relationships. Boy, if they really knew me, they might not like me. But here's what's amazing. God really knows you. All of you. He knows every thought you've had and will have. Every action you've done or will do, every motive in your heart. He knows all of it. And in that moment, while we are still sinners, that is the perfect timing of God's declaration of his love. It's not based on you, it's based on Him. And notice what else gets emphasized here. For while we were still weak at the right time. Christ. What? For the ungodly. For one will scarcely. What? This is super pathetic. I'm giving you short words here. We're going to do good, okay? For one will scarcely die for the righteous person. Though perhaps for a good person, one will even dare to die. But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died. All right, now you look for repeating words. And there's an emphasis of death in these few verses. And what Paul's saying is like, hey, there's some sacrifice to the display of God's love. If somebody gives you a gift or shows you love. Another way to measure the specialness of that love is to know what it costs. What'd it cost? Cause that says something, that speaks to something. Like, if you have a friend who's, like, really wealthy and you've been wanting to go on a vacation, it's like, it's Gonna cost like, $4,000 to send you and your family this vacation. And they got deep pockets, and they're a generous person. They might say, like, on me, you guys go. And you're just like, that's crazy generous. That's really nice, right? That means something. But let's say you have a different set of friends, and they don't got those deep pockets, and they've been saving up for the last 10 years, every month putting something aside to go on this vacation that they can't wait for. But before they go, they find out that you've never been to this place and you've always wanted to go, and they take their money that they've saved up for the last 10 years and they send you instead of them. Isn't that different? Like, what did it cost you? The story of the widow's mite. Jesus is watching people give, and he sees people give a lot of money, and the widow doesn't give a lot of money. But he's so impressed by what the widow gave because it cost her so much. Like, there's a specialness in the gift or the display of love because of how much it cost. Sometimes you get a gift and you know the etiquette, so you don't ask, but you want to know what it cost, right? And it's kind of clear that it's a costly gift. It can get awkward, right? And the person giving the gift might even downplay, like, oh, no, it's not that big a deal. There was a sale, like, you know, I gotta hook up. You don't want to create that awkwardness. And then you receiving the gift is even more awkward. It's like, oh, no, you shouldn't have. You almost feel like, I can't accept this. It's too much. Would you act that way with God, though? Is this too much? Or do you think you deserve it? Because it puts us in this position where we are loved in such a radical way. Like, if you don't embrace this. This radical grace, you're screwed or, sorry, it's not good. I made that same mistake last service. I'm like, I gotta clean that. I even put something in my notes. Do you ever feel like you're not a very good preacher? But it's costly, right? You're like, God loves us. So extravagant. But we can't, like, act like we can't receive it. We need to receive it. Think about it. What is the cost of our salvation? It's the death of Christ. And the price is not just a life. It's. It's whose life it is that makes it so costly? It's the Son of God. It's the author of life and creation. It's the one who gives sight to the blind and raises the dead and heals the lame, walks on water. That. That's the one. That's the life. The most valuable life ever in human history. There is no more or nothing more valuable than Christ, which means there is no greater expression of love. Do you get that? God demonstrated his love to you in a way that there can be no greater expression of love given it is the highest expression of love possible. We need to be careful talking about salvation as a free gift from God. Is it free in the sense that it doesn't cost us? Yes. I mean, count the cost, or we're called and following Christ. But it's not free in the matter that it's cheap. It is the most expensive gift ever. It cost the life of the Son of God, and it was a display of his love. The Roman world that Paul is writing to is not used to the idea of. Of a God loving their people. Gods were someone you had to keep happy or appease. They don't love. They wield power. So if you want safe travels across the sea, you need to sacrifice to the sea God. If you want a good harvest, you need to sacrifice to the crop God. If you want children, you need to sacrifice to the fertility God. Like you're looking to appease and please them. They don't love you. They just. And then Paul comes along and he's talking about a God who loves. And this God doesn't just love people in a way that humans would like. Oh, yeah, that makes sense. He loves humans in a way that humans would be like. That doesn't make sense. And you see that contrast being made in this text. He says, for while we were still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. Then he gives this example that shows the extravagance of God's love. For one will scarcely die For a righteous person, though perhaps for a good person, one would dare even to die. So the difference, some commentators think the difference between a righteous person and a good person, like a righteous person would be a well respected, honorable person in society. Like, you don't know them, but they're a very dignified person. Like, okay, you're not going to die for that person. Now a good person might be somebody you know and you care about. Somebody might die for their kids or for their brother or their sister or their mom or dad. Like, we can understand that. As rare as that might be. Like, okay, I'll give you that. But that's pretty rare. But here's the contrast. God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. So nobody's dying for a righteous person. Yeah, I get somebody might die for a good person or a loved person, but God dies for wicked people, for weak, helpless, ungodly sinners. Who does that? God. God does that. His love is so big and amazing. Like he's hard to even comprehend. And notice this. It says that it's God showing his love, but it's Christ who's dying. Right. And the Holy Spirit is mentioned in verse 5. But the whole. When you think of God the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit, all of them are involved in salvation and declaration of their love. Don't think that Christ is this merciful, grace giving, caring person and God the Father is just this wrathful, vengeful person. It's God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit displaying or showing his love for us through the work of Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit. Now this love that he shows is so that here's a conclusion that might be made. And we know it might be made because Paul addresses it in the first verse of chapter six. It doesn't count as my verses, but here's what he says. What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means. So you can get this conclusion that God is almost okay with sin because of how radical his love is. But. But he's not okay with sin, hence dying the sacrifice, the blood of Christ, like, I'm not okay with sin. But he reaches with his love so far into sin towards sinners that you might conclude like, is he okay with sin? No, he's not okay with sin. But yet his love, like, penetrates and goes deep and it pursues sinners and rescues sinners. And Paul tells us that not only did Christ die for us and a declaration of God's love, but that Christ died for us at the right time. Now, it's interesting that he's talking about the timing of Christ's death when explaining God's love for us when we may take issue with the timing. Like, why not sooner? Like, why have you let so much go on in this world? So much pain, so much suffering, so much hurt. Like, why not sooner? But here's something that never happens to us in different kind of experience. Like if you're watching an epic movie, like, let's say the Lord of the Rings, I know you get bothered when I keep referencing this, but if you haven't seen it, repent and watch it all three. So it's like three movies of this epic adventure that just shows you friendship and devotion and sacrifice and hope and struggle. And it's wonderful. But you won't watch that movie and be like, well, why didn't they just destroy the ring in the first five minutes of the first movie? And then it's over, right? Cause you want the adventure, you want the epic, you want the struggle, you want the friendship, you want to learn and develop like you want all that. It's not about efficiency, okay? It's not about efficiency. And here's what we need to get. The point of creation and redemption is not how to save humans as fast as possible. That may be your desired goal. That's not God's. The point of creation and redemption is not how to save humans as fast as possible. Cause in a critique, we're like, why even make the apple? We don't even know him as apple. Why not make the serpent? Why didn't just right away just finish it, right? Why are we doing all this? But the point, hear me now. The point of creation and redemption is not how to save humans as fast as possible. The point of creation and redemption is. Is the glory of God. And that he would be known, that we would know his mercy, we would know his patience, we would know his grace, we would know his wrath, we would know his justice, we would know his glory, that we would know Him. And a God who demonstrates his love for us is a God. We can trust in his timing. But notice the phrasing around this right timing. It's not so much human history. There's another point that Paul's making. For while we were still weak or helpless at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. So what is he saying? The right time is our helplessness. That's the right time. Our weakness, our ungodliness, us being sinners. Why Is that the right time? Well, doing it, then, displaying his love for us in our weakness and our helplessness and our ungodliness and our sinfulness is the kind of love it talks about, the kind of love he has. It's an unconditional love, it's a sacrificial love, it's a grace filled, passionate, pursuing love. And he gets all the glory. Because if the right time is our weakness, none of us can say we deserve that, none of us can say we've earned that. God gets all the glory. But also, here's my question. I was wrestling with this. When it comes to this right timing, why declare your unconditional sacrificial love for us and then leave? And why make it so clear and so powerful that you love us, not just that you love us, that you are God, by raising from the grave beating sin, Satan and death. And then leave, then leave us in this broken world. Like why not the death of Christ, the resurrection of Christ and the return of Christ, like bang, bang, bang. Let's just get this on. Glory forever. Why not death of Christ, resurrection of Christ, return of Christ, glory. Like that sounds great, but instead we get the death of Christ, the resurrection of Christ. Why? What is he doing? Why declare your love in such a powerful, clear way and then leave? Because listen, this is key. The preemptive declaration of his love is the power of the Christian life. It's the key to knowing God. To go through life trials and struggles, patience, endurance, ups and downs. To know our shepherd, to know of his love, to know of his grace, to know how he's near to the brokenhearted, to know of his patience and tenderness, know of his justice. That's how we know God. And knowing that God loves you frees you from trying to find love here in all the wrong places. And knowing that God loves you, that he's already declared his love for you and it has nothing to do with you, it's not about you earning it. Like you get that preemptive declaration of his love emboldens you to live for him. Cause what does he say a few chapters later in chapter eight? What can separate us from the love of Christ? Nothing. So go at it. I got you forever. And knowing that you're loved by Christ, that He preemptively declared it, empowers you to resist temptation. Well, why do I have to try to satisfy myself with this when I already know for certain in the declaration by God on the cross that I have Him? It reminds me of when Jesus was led into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted, fasting for 40 days and then Satan coming to him to tempt him. Do you know what happened right before the temptation of Jesus was the baptism of Jesus. And you know what happened after his baptism? The voice of God the Father, audibly says, this is my Son, in whom I am well pleased. Can you imagine living your life knowing that God loves you? Do you enter each day that way? What if you did? What if you entered each day confident in God's love for you? Not that you're enough or that you're awesome, or that you have these special gifts or you deserve it? No, that's not true at all. You are a weak, helpless, ungodly sinner. But you are so loved. How would that change how you live? What you pursue, what you think is important, what you think you need and don't need. God declaring his love for us preemptively is the fuel for a true Christian to live a godly life. Put it this way, knowing how you are loved by God fuels living for God. So here's the challenge. Live like loved people. You're not enough. Don't get crushed by this pressure to be awesome and epic perfect. Have it all together. You don't. You're not gonna. God still loves you, and he's declared his love for you in the most clear, expensive, extravagant, powerful way ever. But God's love is not just something to prove to you in the text or to help you get it intellectually. The love of God is something to be felt. This is verse five, the one that comes right before our verses. And hope does not put us to shame because. Because God's what has been poured into our what hearts. Through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. That's our prayer for you. That the love of God would be poured into your hearts like there's something. It's not just an intellectual. I get it, yes. God. Christ died on the cross for me. But you would be born, blown away by the love of God for you in your life. This is Paul's prayer request in Ephesians, chapter three, where it's like that you would know the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge. How can you know something that surpasses knowledge? Because I want you to, like, not just know it, but know it. How deep it is and how wide it is and how tall it is and how long it is, how big God's love is that you would know it and you would be shaped by it. You'd be impacted by it. So in pursuit of that, let's be obedient because we need God to want God, like He needs to pour his love into our hearts through his Holy Spirit. And when that happens, another word for that is revival. Like we're woken up to the bigness and amazingness of God's love in a way that just changes us. We want that, but to pursue that, here's what we can do. We can be obedient to what he's asked us to do. And we could remember his love, his declaration of his love. We could rehearse it. And as we take communion as a church, this is a command of God to do it often and frequent. Don't forget, don't forget, don't forget until I return, don't forget, don't forget, don't forget. Because I bet, I bet you, like me, are prone to forget. And you can start to think, I'm not enough. I'm not a good enough dad. I'm not a good enough husband. I'm not a good enough pastor. I'm not a good enough Christian. I'm just not good enough. And you know what we proclaim whenever we take communion? You're right. You're not enough. You are a weak, helpless, ungodly sinner. And you are loved and you are forgiven and you are redeemed. And would we live in the freedom of the love of God. Amen. Let's pray. Father, I pray verse 5 for this room right now. That your love would be poured into our hearts by your Holy Spirit, that you would open our eyes, that there is nothing more precious or expensive than your declaration of love to us. Would we be blown away in a way that changes what life is about? It would be freed from trying to prove ourselves, impress other people, and we would have true rest in your love. Pray this in your name. Amen.