Loving The Unlovable

The love that Christ commands is not easy, even for people who are blessed with great natural warmth of heart. And it is not impossible, even for those of us who tend to be crabby and short-tempered. For Christian love is not a vague feeling of affection for someone. It is rather a condition of the heart and will that causes us to seek the welfare of others-including people we don't particularly like, and even people who have done us wrong.

Louis Cassels (1922-1974)

- We cannot love the unlovable - We must come to this realization first
- We must allow God's love (Agape) to be manifested through our lives and bodies.

1. God is Love (I Jn 4:8,16) - It is God's very nature.
1. God is the fountain and wellspring of Love (I've got a river of love flowing out of me)
1. Romans 1: Describes man as despicable and incapable of perfected love.
2. We love because He loved us (1Jn 4:19)
2. Believers are the sphere in which the Love of God operates.
   (Rm 12:1) I beseech ye therefore brethren that present your bodies a living sacrifice unto God - Ye are bought with a price, glorify God

1. Death, Burial and Resurrection of Self/Identification with Christ
1. Romans 6:3,4 - Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were (or are) baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
1. 3 parts of this Sanctification
1. The death of the old man (baptized or identified in Christ's death)
2. The burial (We are buried with Christ)
3. The resurrection of the new man. (Newness of Life in Christ)
1. Only a regenerated heart can truly love as God loves.
2. Union with Christ
1. Provides us with necessary power (The Holy Spirit).
1. Rom 5:5 - tells us, "the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given to us.."
2. A Fruit of The Spirit - Gal 5:5 - To dwell in God's love, allows us to exercise the love of God
3. Love is an evidence of God's full indwellment - 1JN 4:12 - Tells us that "If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us."
1. Charity is love in action for the glory of God (not the mossy love of today's standards)
3. Christian's Challenge
1. The tendency to sin remains imbedded in our flesh. (RM 7. Law of the flesh)
1. We try to resolve through OUR OWN energies and ways.
2. Daily crucifixion, Paul says "I die daily"