Awakening To Love

Awakening To Love (I Really Do Matter To God)

 Pastor Chuck Bernal – May 7, 2017

 You have never looked into the eyes of someone who does not matter to God. No, not even when looking in a mirror. When this truth grabs you at the deepest level of your heart, you will never be the same. You matter to God and He loves you more than you will ever know.  (Bill Hybels)

 Jesus told them this story: A man had two sons.  The younger son told his father, “I want my share of your estate now before you die.” So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.  A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything. When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, at home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger!  I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.” So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him.  His son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. “But his father said to the servants, “Quick! Bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. And kill the calf we have been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast, for this son of mine was dead and has now returned to life. He was lost, but now he is found.” So the party began.  (Luke 15:11-24 – NLT)

 FOUR THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT GOD’S LOVE FOR YOU

 God’s love is ___________________________________ (He loves me just as I am)

 The proof of God’s amazing love is this: while we were sinners Christ died for us.  (Romans 5:8 – Ph)

 Before the creation of the world, he chose us . . .  because of his love he had already decided to adopt us through Jesus Christ. He freely chose to do this . . . God is rich in mercy because of his great love for us. We were dead because of our failures, but he made us alive . . . It’s not the result of anything you’ve done, so no one can brag about it.  God has made us what we are. (Ephesians 1:4-5, 2:4-5, 9-10 – GWT)

You can’t ___________________________ it!

You don’t ___________________________ it!

 There is nothing you can do to make God love you more. There is nothing you can do to make God love you less. His love is unconditional, impartial, everlasting, infinite and perfect. (Richard Halverson)

 God’s love is ___________________________ (He loves me and He can never stop)

God is love. God showed how much he loved us by sending his only Son into this wicked world to bring to us eternal life through his death. In this act we see what real love is: it is not our love for God but his love for us . . .  We know how much God loves us because we have felt his love and because we believe him when he tells us that he loves us dearly . . . So you see, our love for him comes as a result of his loving us first.  (1 John 4:9-10, 16, 19 – LB)

 I can experience the ocean but I will never experience all of the ocean.

You can’t get _____________ from it!  (Unlimited in its scope)

You can’t ________________ it up!  (Unlimited in its supply)

God’s love is ______________________________ (He loves me and I can trust Him)

With God on our side like this, how can we lose? If God didn’t hesitate to put everything on the line for us by sending his own Son, is there anything else he wouldn’t gladly and freely do for us? And who would dare tangle with God by messing with one of God’s chosen? Who would dare even to point a finger? The One who died for us—who was raised to life for us — is in the presence of God at this very moment sticking up for us. Do you think anyone is going to be able to drive a wedge between us and Christ’s love for us? There is no way! Not trouble, not hard times, not hatred, not hunger, not homelessness, not bullying None of this fazes us because Jesus loves us. I’m absolutely convinced that nothing—nothing living or dead, angelic or demonic, today or tomorrow, high or low, thinkable or unthinkable—absolutely nothing can get between us and God’s love because of the way that Jesus our Master has embraced us.  (Romans 8:31-39 – Msg)

We deserve less than we could ever imagine, yet God loves us more than we could ever dream.

God’s love is ________________________________ (He loves “me” not just “we”)

May your roots go down deep into the soil of God’s marvelous love and may you be able to feel and understand, as all God’s children should, how long, how wide, how deep, and how high his love really is and to experience this love for yourselves, though it is so great that you will never see the end of it or fully know or understand it. And so at last you will be filled up with God himself.  (Ephesians 3:17-19 – LB)

In loving me you made me lovable. (St. Augustine)

AWAKENING PRINICIPLE 3:  God loves us ____________  _____    _____  ________,

 but He loves us too much to let us ________________ there

 God, if you are real, make Yourself real to me. Awaken in me the awareness that I am your unconditionally loved child.