  
|
Knowing the Love of Christ
Ephesians 3:19 And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God. Our text has two phrases: To know the love of Christ and to be filled with all the fulness of God. ...to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge,.... The love of Jesus is beyond our total comprehension and is unfathomable: The old song, The Love of God, gives us some insight to its depth. Could we with ink, the ocean fill and were the skies of parchment made. Were every stalk on earth a quill and every man a scribe by trade. To write the love of God above, would drain the ocean dry. Nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky. The love of Jesus is unchangeable: Jesus loved His disciples until the end of His earthly life, and after spilling His blood on our behalf, He loves us even more, if that is possible. John 13:1 ¶ Now before the feast of the passover, when Jesus knew that his hour was come that he should depart out of this world unto the Father, having loved his own which were in the world, he loved them unto the end. In John 15:9-17 Jesus told us that His love is Divine: He said that He had loved us as His Father had loved Him. He commanded that we continue in His love. He told us to abide in His love and that we abide in His love by keeping His commandments. He added that that He had given these commandments that His joy might remain in us and that our joy be full. John 15:12 This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I have loved you. Loving one another as Jesus loved us? That’s not always easy. Some folks are quite difficult to love. Of course, if I stop and consider, I can be difficult to love also. What did Jesus see in me that He loved me enough to shed His blood for me? Yes, He died for the whole world, but He laid down His life for each and everyone of us individually. He knew all about each of us before we were conceived and while we were yet in our mother's womb (Ps. 139:15). John 15:13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Yes, we are His friends. He has shared with us all that He had heard from His Father. He chose us to share in His love that we might go forth manifesting His love and bearing fruit for the kingdom of God. Because of His great love for us, the Father is pleased to give us anything that we request in His name. As we share in the love of God, we must share that love with one another. Who and What can separate us from the love of Christ? Nothing! Paraphrasing Romans 8:35-39: Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? None of these can separate us from His love. In fact these things cause us to be more than conquerors , through the One who loved us. We can be persuaded with the apostle Paul that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Jesus manifested His love for us by His death on the cross: Paraphrasing I John 4:9-12: God’s love was manifested towards us because He sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. We didn’t love Him, but rather He loved us. Jesus came to make the one time payment for the sins of us all. If God so loved us, we ought to love one another. If we love one another, God dwells in us and His love is perfected in us. Romans 5:8 God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 1John 4:19 We love him, because he first loved us. And now the second phrase of our text. .....that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God. Fulness speaks of totality and completeness: We are complete in Jesus (Col. 2:10). As we learn of Him and grow in Him, we see just how big He is and how much more growing we have to do. No, I’m haven’t arrived yet, but I’m a whole lot farther down the road that when I started (see Eph. 4:13). John 1:16 And of his fulness have all we received, and grace for grace. 17 For the law was given by Moses, but grace and truth came by Jesus Christ. When we received Him, we received of His fulness and grace for grace, or abundant continuing grace, grace piled on top of grace. II Peter 3:18 instructs us to grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. Paul wrote in I Corinthians 13:4-7 concerning love, the love of God that we must manifest to one another and to a lost and dying world. The attributes listed here are Divine and come from Him. These are not things we can do naturally, but we can by the power of God’s Spirit. Jesus was/is longsuffering and I don’t read any place where He was ever unkind. He never envied another and never vaulted Himself above another and was never puffed up. He never behaved unseemly. He didn’t just cling to His own people, but He spread the good news of the gospel to folks of several races and cultures; He told us to preach the gospel to the whole world. He was not easily provoked, but He did get His dander up when people abused the house of God (John 2:16). He didn’t think evil thoughts and He rejoiced in truth, rather than in iniquity. He bore all things, believed all things, hoped and endured in all things. He is my example and I desire to be like Him in all that I say and do. Galatians 2:20 I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. Keep Looking Up! Don and Marie Spooner About Him! Ministries Your thoughts and Inquiries Contact@about-him.com Subscribe to this devotional? Subscribe@about-him.com
The purpose of About-Him.Com is to glorify the Lord Jesus
Christ whom we preach as the Almighty God manifest in the flesh.
It is our desire that everything presented on these pages increases your
faith in our God and Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ.
|