we're diving into our second lesson this quarter God's love and Justice this quarter leads us deeply into an understanding of God's love the title of lesson number two is covenantal love and let's pray before we actually study the lesson Father in heaven we thank you for these lessons on God's love they are touching Our Lives deeply they have a profound influence in our lives and I pray that as we study this lesson coven ential love that you will move Upon Our Hearts as we are navigating through this lesson together and going over each day we
pray that the spirit of God that prompted the author to write the lesson that same spirit that prompted the Bible writers would prompt us just now open our hearts and Minds in Christ's name amen the title of the kind of intrigued me when it said coven ential love what is covenantal what what what's a covenant anyway a covenant is an arrangement between two parties we talk about the marriage covenant and at the marriage altar the man makes certain vows the wife makes certain vows it's it's an arrangement between the two of them uh a covenant
sometimes if you're in a homeowner Association there's covenants that you have to assign certain basic agreements in housing that have to be signed so so a covenant is this AG Arrangement and agreement between two people and it has terms of the Covenant now the interesting thing about God's covenant is this it is not based on human behavior God is the author of the Covenant God is the initiator of the Covenant God's it is based solely on the foundation of his love now we have responsibility as I will point out in the lesson and as our
author points out to respond to that but we don't determine the terms of the Covenant we don't determine the the specificity the specifics of the Covenant we can determine our response to the Covenant and receive the blessings of the Covenant um I like it what our author says in the introduction to the lesson Dr pekham puts this puts it this way scripture also teaches that God's love is not unilateral in other words his love flows from his heart but deeply relational it makes a profound difference to God whether or not humans reflect his love back
to him and to others so God establishes this Covenant of Love with us but God doesn't just establish this Covenant and sit back unaffected by our response to it our response to this Covenant can bring joy or sorrow to God you remember in Luke 15 it says there's joy in heaven over one sinner that repents in the book of Lamentations it says is there any sorrow like my sorrow all you that pass by so God is affected by our Behavior he's affected by the way we relate to others but that does not change the terms
of the Covenant God's love flows to us now in Sunday's lesson we talk about the Everlasting Love of God psalm 33:5 sets the tone for the lesson it says God loves righteousness and Justice uh our theme for this quarter is God's love and Justice so verse five God loves righteousness and Justice the Earth is full of the goodness of the Lord so God's covenant is based upon his what what's it based upon his love or his goodness God's love is his goodness Psalm 1 45:9 puts it this way we're studying that theme of God's love
and God's goodness God's love to me is his goodness revealed to me Psalm 145 and verse 9 the Lord is good to all and his Tender Mercies are over all his works the Lord is good to all even to poverty-stricken people even to people who are born with deformities even to a divorced woman whose husband had beaten her and abused her the Lord is good to all when it says the Lord is good to all in my understanding it means this that in spite of what happens to me in life if I look to God
his goodness will flow into my heart and heal my deepest hurt what it means to me is the poverty-stricken child the young man suffering with leukemia the woman who's been abused as they look to God in ways that are divinely mysterious God's love will be poured into their hearts and they will ultimately have a certain sense of Peace in their life because God will never break his Covenant of Love With Us God's love leads him to desire that every human being be saved and at times in life circumstances take place to lead people to depend
totally only completely upon God in the lesson on Sunday we look to two passages that actually the or the list three I'm going to look at two that have become two of my favorite passages in all the Bible you know people will say to me Pastor Mark what's your favorite passage in the Bible and I tease them often and say the one that I'm reading but these I would have to say are two of my favorite passages of the Bible second Peter chter 3:9 is really an incredible verse profound the Lord's not slack concerning his
promise this is second Peter 3:9 as some men count slackness but his longsuffering toward us this word longsuffering means he suffers long not only is he patient but he suffers long with the agony the heartache the sickness the suffering in our world he suffers long not willing that any should perish but that all should come to repentance why isn't Jesus come why is he suffering long because he doesn't want anybody to perish he wants everyone to be saved that's what love is love wants the best and the best is is salvation the best is eternity
The Best Is Yet To Come the best is living in heaven with Jesus and he doesn't want anybody to perish we look at 1 Timothy Chapter 2 verse4 a similar passage very similar you see the linkage in the Bible you see the in the Bible the interrelationship between passages 1 Timothy 2:4 and I read who desires well let's go back and read verse three for this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our savior who desires all men to be saved all men and women to be saved to come to a knowledge of
the truth what's God's goal for every single one of us God's goal for every one of us is to be saved to come to an amazing knowledge of the truth of his word that is why he's established this Covenant of Love we find it here in Deuteronomy 7: 6 to9 in Monday's lesson Monday's lesson sets forth the fact that God's covenant of love is not dependent on our Behavior we're looking there at Deuteronomy chapter 7 verse 6-9 some people have the mistaken idea that God only loves them when they do right that if they do
wrong God doesn't love them our Rebellion against God's will does not stop God from loving us it stops us from receiving the blessings of that love it shuts the door of Heaven upon us because of the fact that we are un UNCA incapable of living in a Land of Purity if we're impure of honesty if we're dishonest of of of peace and Harmony if we're angry so the reason that our rejection of God's love shuts the door of Heaven to us is not because he stops loving us but because we become incapable of living in
the land of Eternity Deuteronomy 7 verse 7-9 the Lord did not set his love upon you nor choose you because you were more numbered than any any other people for you the least of all people but because the lord loves you because he would keep the oath which he swore to your fathers the Lord has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of bondage from the land of hand of pharaoh of Egypt therefore know that the Lord your God he is God the faithful God who keeps the Covenant and
mercy for a thousand generations with those who love him and keep his commandments so here God's love reaches out to us in spite of our obedience but God's lovees will never give us the abundance of His blessings without obedience and that's what the Bible means when it says he keeps his Covenant in Mercy for a thousand Generations those who love him and keep his Commandments his love for us never changes but our love for him can change but if we love him and Obey him we receive the blessings of his love um last paragraph Monday's
lesson God's steadfast love is the basis of all love relationships we could never match that love God not only freely gave us existence but also in Christ he gave himself to us greater love has no man than this that he laid down his life for his friends last sentence under Monday's lesson no question the greatest expression of God's love was revealed when Jesus humbled himself and became obedient to the point of death even the death of the Cross now God's love is demonstrated to us in ways we cannot even fathom can't conceive his love for
us is so deep so broad so great he wants us to be saved so much but we can reject that love we can turn our backs on that love we can rebel against that love we find this in Hosea chapter 9:1 15 throughout the entire Bible we see the tragic results of rejecting God's love the tragic results of turning our back on God's love we come to the book of Hosea the ninth chapter the 15th verse and here the scripture says all their wickedness is in Gilgo for there I hated them because of the evil
of their deeds I will drive them from my house I will love them no more all their princes are are rebellious wow these are pretty strong words he hated them he love them but what's he talking about if you put everything in the context of the Bible it's not that his love changes but it is that they can no longer receive God's love they become incapable of receiving it you remember when the Bible says God hardened Pharaoh's heart did God actually Harden Pharaoh's heart you know most of the places in the Bible it says that
pharao hardened his heart by the choices that he made so the same thing here sometimes God's active will is God's permissive will God's permissive will so God gives permission for people to make a choice to accept or reject the his Covenant of Love if if they reject that his love is still there but he they cannot receive his love therefore they have placed themselves beyond that love Jeremiah 16 verse5 these texts will help us to understand this even more Psalms Proverbs Isaiah Jeremiah chapter 16 verse 5 if God's love is a is an everlasting love
and if we cannot change his love by our Behavior what does it mean when he says he'll love us no more Jeremiah 16:5 for thus says the Lord do not enter the house of mourning nor nor go to lament or moan before them for I have taken away my peace from this people says the Lord loving kindness and mercies so they reject the Covenant of Love turn their back in Rebellion upon him so they cannot receive the blessings the blessings of his loving kindness the blessings of his Mercy uh Romans 11 verse 22 Romans 11
verse 22 this is a serious section in our lesson Romans 11:22 therefore consider the goodness and severity of God on those who fail severity but toward you goodness if you continue in his goodness otherwise you be cut off so God's goodness constantly as the song says runs after us God's goodness flows to us but if we turn our back on his goodness and his love we cannot receive it and as the result of that for us the door of Love is closed not because he stops loving uh Tuesday's lesson points out more on this conditional
relationship uh that we have with God as you go down to example Jude 21 the last text in our lesson for Tuesday Jude 21 about this in Jude right before the Book of Revelation Jude 21 says keep yourselves in the love of God in other words keep yourselves in that love he loves you but you got to by your choices keep yourselves in that love looking for the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life so when the it's not that his love toward me changes it's that my choice enables me to keep myself
in his love um last paragraph Tuesday's lesson these and other texts teach that maintaining the benefits of a saving relationship with God depends upon whether we'll accept God's love which involves willingness to be vehicles of that love as well again this does not mean that God's love ever ceases rather just as we cannot stop the Sun from shining but can cut ourselves off from the Rays of the Sun we cannot do anything to stop God's everlasting love but we can finally reject a relationship with God and thus cut ourselves off from what it offers especially
the promise of eternal life The Sun Shines I can't stop the sun's Rays from shining but I can go in my room and hide under my covers and live in the darkness does that mean the sun is stopped shining no but does it mean that I don't receive the benefits of vitamin D out in the sun it sure does Wednesday's lesson talks to us about Mercy forfeited 1 John chapter 4 we're going to look at two passages 1 John 4 verse 7 and verse 9 1 John 4 verse 7 verse 9 beloved let us love
one another for love is of God and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God now verse nine it says in this the love of God was manifest toward us the God sent his only begotten son into the world that we might live through him now verse 19 we love him because he first loved us so God's love is revealed to us in ways that we cannot imagine the debt that we owe to God is so great and all we can do is respond to that love can we ever earn eternal life never
never but we can read reject the offer you remember the story that the Bible tells about the man that owed money and he owed a certain amount let's let's look at it in the uh lesson it's there are some new insights that I had here that are quite remarkable it says uh in the lesson Wednesday's lesson second paragraph after the question in the parable we can see that there was no way the servant ever could be repaid for what he owed the master according to Matthew 18 the servant owed his master 10,000 talents much is
10 thou how much did he owe how much 10,000 talents how much is that one talent amounted to 6,000 daer now what's what's a dinar a dinar is one day wage so one Talent is one days wage so 6,000 talents would be 6,000 days of labor but was rather one Talent would be 6,000 days of labor but that would be the person have to work 300 days a year and earn 300 dinari a year so it would take the average labor approximately 20 years to pay one Talent so 20 years to pay one Talent you
got it but wait a minute the debt was 6,000 dener and uh 6,000 dener would be 6,000 * 300 that would equal 20 but to earn 10,000 talents what would that be it would be 200,000 years now did you get that 10,000 talents with one talent aming to 6,000 denary 6,000 times 10,000 talents would be wow 200,000 years in other words the servant could never be pay the debt never pay the debt you remember this one for given servant refused to forgive a far small amount of a h hundred to Narry to his fellow servants
and the master had him thrown into prison over the debt the mass was moved with anger he rescinded his merciful forgiveness because this man this man who was forgiven so much when a guy wouldn't pay a hundred to ner he threw that man into prison look friend the servant forfeited the love and forgiveness of his m Master although God's compassion and mercy never run out one can finally reject and even forfeit the benefits of God's compassion and mercy the person that was forgiven so much of 10,000 talents would not forgive somebody for a mere hundred
talents you know there's a story that Cory demon tells that is quite remarkable cor to you remember was in a prison camp with her since sister Betsy and uh in that prison camp they were treated cruy they were always hungry they were cold they were shaking shivering her sister died in that prison camp and through a mistake in the records Corey was uh released from the prison camp she established a home for people who had experienced the horrors of war and particularly people who were in the prison camps of daau and ravensbrook and some of
those horrible places where the fires of the chimneys burn 24 hours a day and people were gassed and thrown into the burning fir some six million Jews were killed it was a terrible terrible situation with Hitler's Third Reich in Germany at that period of time but um after Cory get out she said she noticed that unless people forgave they would not be healed internally one night she was in Munich preaching on the love of God preaching on healing inner healing preaching on how we can be healed from our Brokenness and she noticed a man walk
up the aisle he was a short stocky man and she recognized him immediately he was one of the cruelest guards in ravensbrook a God that slapped a God that beat a God that would knock you on the ground and stamp on you a God that would deny you food that should be coming he was a cruel Wicked God and this guard reached up his hand and he put it out to Cory and he said will you forgive me and Cory said I wanted to spit in his face I wanted to slap him I wanted to
turn and run from that place because all those horrible memories came back then she remembered the concept of Ephesians 4:32 where it says that God has forgiven you be kind one another to one another compassionate to one another and forgive one another even as God for Christ's sake has forgiven you and she said if Jesus has forgiven me this great debt of like 10,000 talents how can I not forgive this man and she reached out and said I forgive you and she said when she did that a flood of just a flood of joy and
peace flowed over her is there somebody you need to forgive a wife that's betrayed you a husband that's betrayed you for somebody else children that have turned their backs on you is is there somebody you need to forgive another Elder in the church when I come to the generosity of God the amazing love of God and I see how much God has loved me and forgiven me Thursday's lesson makes so much sense to me you have freely received freely give in 1 John 4: 7-12 I read these verses 1 John 4: 7-12 beloved let us
love one another for lovers of God and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God he who does not love does not know God for God is love in this the love of God was manifest toward us that God sent his only begotten son into the world that we might live through him in this is love not that we loved God but he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins beloved if God so loved us we also ought to love one another who is it that God wants
you to reach out to touch with his love today who is it that you need to forgive today because you are forgiven who is it that you need to love today because you are loved who is it that you need to embrace today because you're embraced by God reach out in touch somebody with God's love today let's pray Father in Heaven thank you for your love and grace thank you for your goodness and mercy thank you Jesus that you love us with A Love That Never Dies we don't want to turn our backs on that
love we want to respond in Mercy and Grace to your love and we want to reach out in love to others in Jesus name amen
