Scripture:  Luke 6:27-35

But I say this to you who are listening: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who treat you badly. To anyone who slaps you on one cheek, present the other cheek as well; to anyone who takes your cloak from you, do not refuse your tunic. Give to everyone who asks you, and do not ask for your property back from someone who takes it. Treat others as you would like people to treat you. If you love those who love you, what credit can you expect? Even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit can you expect? For even sinners do that much. And if you lend to those from whom you hope to get money back, what credit can you expect? Even sinners lend to sinners to get back the same amount. Instead, love your enemies and do good to them, and lend without any hope of return. You will have great reward, and you will be children of the Most High, for he himself is kind to the ungrateful and the wicked.

Jesus tells us to love our enemies: God is the source of love. If Jesus tells us to love our enemies – how much more are we to love one another?

My dear friends, let us love one another since love is from God and everyone who loves is a child of God and knows God. Whoever fails to love does not know God, because God is love . This is the revelation of God's love for us, that God sent his only Son into the world that we might have life through him. Love consists in this: it is not we who loved God, but God loved us and sent his Son to expiate our sins. My dear friends if God loved us so much, we too should love one another. No one has ever seen God, but as long as we love one another God remains in us and his love comes to its perfection in us. 1 John 4:712

Are You Listening?

Let us love, then, because he first loved us. Anyone who says ‘I love God' and hates his brother, is a liar, since whoever does not love the brother whom he can see cannot love God whom he has not seen. Indeed this is the commandment we have received from him, that whoever loves God must also love his brother. 1 John 4:19-21

Are You Listening?

Hate is the opposite of love;

Hate means to detest, disgust, extreme dislike

Whoever claims to be in light but hates his brother is still in darkness. Anyone who loves his brother remains in light and there is in him nothing to make him fall away. But whoever hates his brother is in darkness and is walking about in darkness not knowing where he is going, because darkness has blinded him. 1 John 2:9-11

Are You Listening?

Love is always patient and kind; love is never jealous; love is not boastful or conceited, it is never rude and never seeks its own advantage, it does not take offence or store up grievances. Love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but find its joy in the truth. It is always ready to make allowances, to trust, to hope and to endure whatever comes. Love never comes to an end. 1Cor. 13:8

There are things that will come to an end!

Singing in the choir-that will come to an end

Being an usher that will come to an end

Being a deacon or a deaconess that will come to an end

Sitting in a church pew that will come to an end

But love will never come to an end. Love is eternal!

Are You Listening?

Why do you call me, “Lord, Lord” and not do what I say? Everyone who comes to me and listens to my words and acts on them—I will show you what such a person is like. Such a person is like the man who, when he built a house, dug, and dug deep, and laid the foundations on rock; when the river was in flood it bore down on that house but could not shake it, it was so well built. But someone who listens and does nothing is like the man who built a house on soil, with no foundation; as soon as the river bore down on it, it collapsed; and what a ruin that house became? Luke 6:46-49

Love for Christians is not a choice, it is our way of life. It is a commandment!

I am guilty! I'm short on love for my enemy and I'm short on love for my brothers and sisters too! Father, forgive me!

If we say, ‘We have no sin,' we are deceiving ourselves and truth has no place in us; if we acknowledge our sins, he is trustworthy and upright, so that he will forgive our sins and will cleanse us from all evil. If we say, ‘We have never sinned,' we make him a liar, and his world has no place in us.

1 John 1:8-10

Altar Call

The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me because the LORD has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners…

Isaiah 61:1

Invitation:

Jesus says: Come to me, all you who labor and are overburdened, and I will give you rest! Shoulder my yoke and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. Yes, my yoke is easy and my burden light.

Benediction:

May the Lord bless you and keep you:

May the Lord make his face shine upon you

And be gracious to you:

May the Lord lift up his countenance

Upon you and give you peace.