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“Called
to Love God”
a sermon by
Thomas L. Jenkins
Text: Romans 8:26-39
“38For I am convinced that neither
death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things
to come, nor powers, 39nor height, nor depth, nor anything
else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God
in Christ Jesus our Lord.”
Dear Sisters and Brothers, one of the very important questions,
concerns, and type of guidance that we seek to have revealed to us from
God are our callings. I met
with a young man a couple of weeks ago, a student at Oklahoma Baptist
University, who wants, and therefore believes he is called to be a
military chaplain. However,
because of a little history of Asthma in his life, he was not accepted
into the military. So, the big question in his life right now is, “Lord, what
are you calling me to be?”
We mostly think of our callings as God’s will applied to certain
positions in our lives: being a Christian, a Presbyterian, a spouse, a
parent, our profession, a Sunday School teacher, a deacon, an elder.
With all this considered, our Holy Scripture passage from Romans
is revealing to us that the greatest calling, in all our lives, is to
love God.
“We know that all things work
together for good for those who love God, who are called according to
his purpose.” [vs.28] The purpose to which we are all called is to
love God. And, our amazing
reality, in Jesus Christ, “the
way, the truth, and the life,” is that our love for God and
God’s love for us are both already located in Him.
When we are going through very painful and extremely suffering times, we
all, probably, question ourselves about whether we have the right kind of faith, and know how to pray,
in order to win God’s blessings.
Religion throws these kinds of responsibilities back upon us. Well, real Christianity, however, is not a religion anymore,
in the sense that it does not throw upon us the responsibility to earn a
self-righteous personality with God in order to be loved by God.
God has come to us in Christ, and the great grace of God is that
God does for us what we cannot do for ourselves in and through Jesus.
And this is out of God’s love for us.
One of the most direct and clear teachings about how God applied His
love for us is that the heavenly Father sent to us and for us His only
begotten Son. And as we
begin to see this revelation from God, and start to learn about His
birth, death, resurrection, and ascension, we are being led by God to
believe and understand more of God’s personal relationship with us and
our personal relationship with God.
That was a teaching from God about the use of His love for us before our
salvation in Christ was accomplished and completed.
St. Paul is teaching us today one of the new ways God is applying
His love for us now that we have already been converted into new eternal
human beings just like Jesus of Nazareth.
Even as Christians, in this day and age, we still live in our old selves
that God, in His divine way, has already put to a first kind of death
and raised us up into eternal life. And God knowing that we are still
experiencing a lot of our present lives as the first kind of human
beings who were manipulated by the sinful power of Satan, He is applying
His love for us in some new ways. One
way of God’s love for us that we are being shown this morning, is that
God is deeper within us than we know and taking care of us through His
own prayer.
“The Spirit helps us in our
weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very
Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches
the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit
intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”
Dear Sisters and Brothers, you are all saints.
The real definition of a saint is not about some Christian who
has experienced more of God’s miracles than others, as she or he was
serving God. A saint is a
person who by God’s love and powerful ability is united with Jesus
Christ.
In Christ there are two loves. In
Christ God loves you. In
Christ you love God. Because
God created and accomplished this reality, is there anything that could
break it down?
“No, in all these things we are
more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that
neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor
things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in
all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ
Jesus our Lord.”
Let us pray …
Amen.
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