The Advent of Love | Sunday, December 20, 2020

I won't forget the wonder of how You brought deliverance, the exodus of my heart. And You found me; You found me. You freed me and held back the waters for my release.

Oh Yahweh, You're the God who fights for me, Lord of every victory. Hallelujah! Hallelujah! You have torn apart the sea. You have led

Into the promised land. Now I will not forget you. No, I'll sing of all you've done. Death is swallowed up forever, and the fury of your love. You stepped into my Egypt. You took me by the hand; you marched me out of freedom into the promised land.

Now I will not forget you. No, I'll sing of all you've done. Death is swallowed up forever, and the fury of your love. You're the God who fights for me, Lord of every victory. Hallelujah! Hallelujah! You have torn apart the sea

Another reason that it's going to be a great service is that after our time of worship and after a message from God's Word, I will be leading you in celebrating communion this morning. I want to encourage you to get some bread and some juice to partake together at the end of our time together. So make sure you have that ready before we reach that part of our service.

Also, before we cut over to our worship leaders, I want to ask you to send out an invite. You can send a text message or post an invite on social media for our service this morning. All you have to do is share the link live.ccchurch.com with your friends and family.

Now, over to Pastor Anthony.

Heavenly Father, we come before You now, Lord God. We are so grateful and thankful. We are grateful for the joy in our lives that You give us. As we remember this Christmas season, the birth of our Savior, God, will You fill us up with that joy, with Your Spirit? We love You, God. In Jesus' name, Amen.

Angels we have heard on high, sweetly singing o'er the plain, and the mountains in reply echo back their joyous strain. Gloria in excelsis Deo! Gloria in excelsis Deo!

Shepherds, why this jubilee? Why your joyous strains prolong?

What the gladsome tidings be which inspire your heavenly song? Gloria in excelsis Deo.

Come to Bethlehem and see Him whose

In fact, some of you who are watching this right now may have experienced the loss of one or more of these things, which pushed you to seek and ultimately find Christ. Perhaps you are watching today and are currently searching for something. The journey you are on right now may have begun with the loss of one of these four things: hope, peace, joy, and love.

I want to encourage you with something that Jesus said. It's recorded in Luke's Gospel, in Luke chapter 11. There we read in verse 9, "So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened." The advent of Jesus is the advent of joy, hope, peace, and, at the top of the stack, the coming of love as well.

The arrival of Jesus 2,000 years ago is truly the greatest manifestation and the greatest expression of love that we could ever comprehend at the core of the incarnation. Incarnation is a big theological word that gives voice to an even bigger theological concept, which has to do with God becoming a man. But at the core of the incarnation was and is love. For God so loved the world that He gave His Son. Jesus came to this world because of love.

Not only did Jesus come to this world because of love, but He came for a very specific purpose, a purpose motivated by love and meant to be a demonstration of God's love. Jesus came to the world to be a sacrificial lamb, to take away the sin of the world. That's exactly how He was introduced to those who would ultimately be His followers. When John the Baptist was baptizing early, before Jesus' ministry really began, and Jesus came to him to be baptized, John said, "Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world."

So, Jesus came to the world to be that sacrificial lamb. Why? Well, everything that Jesus did and does is motivated by and is a demonstration of a very special kind of love.

Of course, Tina Turner asked the question, "What's love got to do with it?" As it relates to the coming of Jesus, the scripture's answer is that love has everything to do with it. Everything that Jesus did and everything that Jesus does is motivated by and is a demonstration of a very special kind of love.

Now, what do I mean when I say a very special kind of love? When talking about love, we recognize that we use the word in both formal and casual ways in our culture. We may say that we love Chick-fil-A, or we love our house, or we may say that we love our spouse. However, we all understand that our love for a chicken sandwich is on a different level than our love for our spouse, hopefully. This understanding is intuitive, but it has also been demonstrated by science.

According to science, love can be broken down into three categories, each characterized by its own set of hormones released within the body. One form of love that science identifies could be categorized by the word lust, which is revealed in the system by the release of testosterone in men and estrogen in females. Another form of love identified by science is attraction, characterized by the release of dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin within the body. The third form of love that science observes is attachment, characterized by oxytocin and vasopressin.

We can see how these hormones affect our neurological system and our brains. Science recognizes that there are different kinds of love, something we understand intuitively because we experience these different kinds of love. The scriptures also acknowledge that there are category differences for love.

Some of you may know that the New Testament was originally written in Greek, specifically in what is referred to as Koine Greek. There are several different words translated into English as love, and each one identifies a different kind of love. For a really great resource on this topic, I highly recommend C.S. Lewis's book, The Four Loves. In his book, Lewis writes about these four different kinds of love and the four different words for love in the Greek language.

The four words are eros, storge, philea, and agape. Eros is an intense longing or lust; it is connected to our English word "erotic." Storge is a natural or instinctual affection. It is the love that mothers have for the little baby that begins to grow in their wombs immediately upon learning that a baby is developing within them. Philea is brotherly kindness or brotherly love. The city of Philadelphia derives its name from this word, as it is known as the city of brotherly love.

The fourth word, agape, is considered to be the highest form of love. It is the love that is most frequently used in the New Testament scriptures. The greatest description of this love is found in Paul's first letter to the Corinthians, specifically in 1 Corinthians chapter 13. There we read in verses 4 through 8: "Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud. It is not rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wrong. It does not rejoice about injustice, but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. Love never gives up. It never loses faith. It is always hopeful and endures through every circumstance. Prophecy and speaking in unknown tongues or languages and special knowledge will become useless, but love will last forever."

This is the highest form of love, and it is the love that is the very nature of God. In his first letter, the Apostle John tells us that God is love. When we read those words, "God is love," the word for love is this word agape. This agape is the very nature of God.

All four of these expressions of love are important. In fact, I am not sure that there would be any continuation of human life on earth if we did not have eros, storge, and philea. However, understand this: there would be no abundant or eternal life if it were not for God's agape love. The advent happened because of God's love. Jesus coming to this world was motivated by this love.

And a demonstration of God's agape love is that special kind of love I was talking about. Here's something to remember: earthly life depends upon earthly expressions of love—Eros, Storge, and Philea. However, eternal and heavenly life depends upon a heavenly agape love from God. There is no ultimate or abundant life without an abundant outpouring of God's ultimate love. Christmas is the beginning, or the entry point, of that love coming to this world. This love is most clearly seen in and through Jesus, beginning with Christmas and culminating in Good Friday and Easter.

We read in the Scriptures, "In this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God has sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." With all this in mind, I want to take some time this morning for us to remember, in a very material and tangible way, God's love, just as Jesus taught His first followers to do 2,000 years ago when He led them in the Lord's Supper, or communion as we know it.

It's been many weeks since we partook of communion together, so this is a great time just before Christmas. I hope that you have some bread and juice to use for communion. If you don't have anything in your home to partake of communion right now, I want to encourage you to pick up the elements at the store for communion sometime this week, prior to Christmas, and partake with your family some evening this week. You can even watch the end of this service again online on YouTube to lead through communion, unless you want to lead through communion yourself.

If you do have the elements of communion, then I want to encourage you to get them either right now or in a few minutes when our worship leaders lead us in another song, because following that song, we'll partake together. But before we do that, I want to highlight one more important point this morning about this love that God gives to us in and through Jesus Christ. Over the last few weeks, we have talked about joy, peace, and hope. I believe these things are all the results of God's love given to us in and through Jesus Christ. We have sure and steadfast hope because of God's love given to us in Jesus Christ.

Because of what Jesus accomplished on the cross when He died for our sins, we see the demonstration of His love for us when He laid His life down. Because of His work on the cross and His justifying grace, we now have a sure and steadfast hope in Him. Not only that, we have increasing joy, unto abundance, forever, for eternity, in Christ because of God's love.

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him would have eternal life in God's presence. In His presence is fullness of joy, and at His right hand are pleasures forevermore. The joy that we have, this increasing joy, unto abundance, for eternity, is a product of God's love. Not only that, we have peace—a peace that surpasses understanding—to guard our hearts and our minds in Christ Jesus because of God's love. All of these things are connected to love. As 1 Corinthians 13 says, the greatest of these is love.

The love of Christ, manifested for us in the incarnation, demonstrated for us on the cross, and given to us through the resurrection, is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. This love should compel us to share this great love with others. 2 Corinthians 5:14 tells us that it is the love of Christ that compels us. It should stir us to want to share the love of God with other people.

This is the great blessing that Christmas speaks to us about and the opportunity that Christmas affords us. It is an opportunity for us to share the love of Christ with others. To do evangelism, to be an evangelist, is to share the love of God with others that we have freely received.

As we finish up our time in the Scriptures this morning, I want to share with you a point I've shared before. The gift of God's love in Christ is meant to be shared with all people. I hope that you will make the most of this opportunity over the next five days leading up to Christmas to share the love of God. What your friends, family members, co-workers, and neighbors need more than anything else in their lives is the joy, hope, and peace that God's love in Christ Jesus brings.

Sadly, as we look around our culture, it's very clear that people are lacking joy, hope, and peace. Core to all of these things is the love of God in Christ Jesus. When Jesus came 2,000 years ago, the little baby born and laid in a manger came as an expression of God's love, motivated by God's love to demonstrate God's love so that you and I could have joy, peace, and hope in Christ according to His love.

It is my prayer that the love of God shed abroad in your heart by the Holy Spirit would be the very thing that compels you to speak that love to other people. You may not be getting together with family members and friends like you normally would at Christmastime. Maybe you're doing a Zoom call with family members. However you're doing Christmas this year, I do know that this is a great opportunity to share the love of God with them. People need hope right now. They need joy. They need the peace that God gives, and it's available to us in Jesus Christ. Since we have it abundantly in Christ, we should share it with others.

Father God, I pray that you would be working in my life and in the lives of my brothers and sisters. Enable us by your grace to be bold by your Holy Spirit to share the good news of your love that brings joy, peace, and hope to all people. God, give us boldness to speak up and to share this good news with others, because this is what people want and what they desperately need. Would you cause your church to shine brightly like a city that is set on a hill, a city that cannot be hid? May we let our light so shine before men that they would see our good works and glorify you, our Father in heaven.

Lord, I pray for my brothers and sisters that you would give them opportunities this week, over the next few days leading up to Christmas. Give them opportunities to share the good news of your grace, your love, your peace, your joy, and your hope with their neighbors, coworkers, family members, and friends. Make your love flow forth from our lives to others.

I ask this in Jesus' name. Amen.

I better not end up at the end of the service.