We Study Romans 13: The Law of Love

Going to be in Romans 13.

We're going to continue our study in the book of Romans, Romans 13.

We're going to start in verse number eight, Romans 13.

Eight.

Last week we discussed what it looks like to be a Christlike citizen according to Romans 13.

We saw what it meant to be a Christlike citizen, to obey the laws of the land, to be a good follower of those that are in authority, to submit ourselves in the proper manner.

We also saw, though, that that didn't mean that we have blind obedience to everything that the government says.

We look at the Bible and we say that that's our final authority.

Ultimately, we worship Christ, not Caesar.

But I do believe that there's some clarification that needs to come from that.

I think that if a believer is following the word of God, we're going to be the best citizen that we possibly could be in a society because we're going to be following the rules, we're going to be helping others, we're going to be loving others.

And that's what this passage of scripture that we're gonna look at here this morning is all about, loving one another.

Now, we left off in verse number seven, it talks about rendering, therefore to all their dues, Christians should pay their dues, they should pay their tribute, they should pay the customs, they should honor those who need to be honored within the government.

Verse 7 says that we shouldn't know any man, we should not be in debt to any man.

And that kind of ties together with what's going on in verse eight.

He says, oh, no man, anything.

Now this is interesting because you could look at this and say, does this mean that a Christian can never go into debt?

Well, that's a discussion for another day.

But when we're looking here In Romans chapter 13, we see that it's tied to how we're dealing with those that are above us in authority.

So basically, don't owe the government a bunch of taxes, don't owe all of these dues, don't owe any man.

But then he says there is something that we are supposed to owe someone.

He says, owe no man anything but to love one another.

So actually, what the Bible tells us here in Romans chapter 13 is that there is one debt that needs to be paid, and love is the one debt that we never finish paying, and that is to love one another.

We can pay our taxes, we can pay off our mortgage, we can repay borrowed money within our own life, we can fulfill contractional obligations.

But as a Christian, we can never get to the point where we say, I, I've loved everybody enough.

I'm finished, I'm done.

I've paid off my debt.

The Bible says that that's something that is always going to be there.

We always should be pouring out love to those around us.

So there is a point in time in our life where we might say, you know what?

I've paid off all of my tax bills.

I've got my mortgage taken care of.

I got my car paid off.

I got everything paid off.

I'm debt free.

And I completely understand that.

And I completely understand the joy of that.

But at the same time, the Bible says that as a believer, as a Christlike citizen, as someone who is living a life transformed by God, we can never say, I've loved enough, I've done enough for other people.

We see that love is the one debt that we never finish paying off.

And so we're going to look at this week how to demonstrate our love and devotion to God through our love and devotion to others.

We're going to see that the Bible connects those two things together.

The way that I love God dictates the way that I love others.

My devotion to God is connected to my devotion to others.

And a lot of times within the Christian circle, we try to separate those two things.

We say, well, I love God, but I don't love people.

Or I want to serve God, but I'm not about to serve people.

And what we're going to see here, Romans 13 and many other passages, is that those two things are connected.

The way that we show our love for God is by loving other people.

The way we demonstrate our obedience to God is by devoting ourselves to other people.

And that's what this is all about here.

Romans 13.

He says, owe no man anything but to love one another, for he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law.

So the title of the sermon this morning is the Law of Love.

Let's go ahead and open up in a word of prayer, and we're going to dive right into the text here today.

Lord, I pray that you'd be with us as we study this topic this morning, this idea of love, this lifestyle of love.

And I pray that we can understand this type of love that we are supposed to show through the love that you have displayed to us.

Lord, we're thankful for your love.

We're thankful for your grace.

We're thankful for the opportunity to live with others and to serve one another as we serve you.

So, Lord, I pray that you get me out of the way, that your word shines brightly here this morning that it is understood and received and applied in our lives.

And so we just thank you for all that you do for us.

And I pray that there's someone here today who does not know you as personal savior, that today can be the day of salvation.

We just thank you for all that you have done and that you continue to do in our lives.

And we ask all those things in Jesus name.

Amen.

So the command Here in Romans 13 is to love one another, but we shouldn't owe anybody anything except for love.

And you might say, why do I owe someone else my love?

What have they ever done for me?

What did they do to earn this type of love and devotion?

We're going to talk about that here.

We're going to see what Jesus has to say about this type of love.

Because the Bible is our guide.

It's not the way that we feel because there's going to be times in our life, let's be honest this morning, there's going to be times in our life where we don't feel like loving somebody.

Naturally in and of ourselves.

We want to love people that love us.

We, we want to be devoted to people who are devoted to us.

And, and the Bible says that's a good thing, but that's what the heathen does.

We're going to see here this morning that the Bible calls for a different type of love.

This word love that's used In Romans chapter 13 is a word that you've heard before.

It's agape, it's sacrificial love.

It's a love that's not self seeking.

It's a love that looks at someone and says, you know what, I don't care what you give to me.

I'm going to demonstrate this to you.

We started out in Matthew chapter 22 this morning in our scripture reading, let's see what Jesus has to say about this type of love.

We see a young lawyer coming to Jesus here and we see that he's asking some questions.

And we know through the context of the text that he is trying to tempt Jesus in this.

And we know that the temptation is that Jesus might say that hey, there is this commandment that's more important than the other ones.

So you don't have to worry about the other ones.

You need to worry about this one.

So they're trying to get Jesus in a trap.

And Jesus answers in verse 37 when he's asked what is the great commandment?

Jesus says, thou shall love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul and with all thy mind.

This is Matthew, chapter 22, verse 37.

We know that.

We've heard that many times.

We all, I think, to some degree, understand that we're called to love God.

But now that's a whole message for another day.

What does it mean to love God?

What does it mean to demonstrate our love to God?

I think that all of us would say this morning to some degree that we love God.

But what does that truly mean?

Does that mean that we just go to church?

Let me ask you a question, and don't raise your hand or don't answer this out loud, but do you think someone could come to church and not love God?

I think so.

I think anyone could walk in these doors for whatever reason.

So going to church in and of itself doesn't mean that I love God.

It doesn't prove that I love God, even though it could be part of it.

There's a lot of other things that we could say that means that we love God.

But we all know that we can say something, but also in our hearts, not mean it.

We can say something, but not follow through with it.

I can say that I'm the greatest father in the world.

Like I'm number one dad.

I do everything perfectly.

But the true test of whether or not I'm a loving father is ask my children, right, to.

Don't ask me.

I can say what I want to say.

It's about what I do.

And so the Bible says here very clearly that the greatest commandment is to love God with everything.

He says this is the first and great commandment.

So.

So for obvious reasons, we know that loving God is the most important thing with everything that we have.

But then he says in verse 39 something very important.

And sometimes we look at verse 39 and say, okay, there's this great commandment of loving God.

And then there's like the secondary commandment that we're to love our neighbor as ourself.

But I want you to see what he says here.

He says, and the second is like unto it, meaning they're connected.

It's not like I can love God with everything.

And then, well, if I have enough time, I'll love my neighbor.

No, he says, the second is like unto it.

So there's the first and second, and they're connected.

They're connected together.

He says, the second is like unto it.

Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, that agape love.

Then he says something very picturesque.

He says on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

So if I had time and, and if I had the ability to build something, I could build like two pillars here, right?

And, and I didn't.

So obviously you've got to picture it in your mind's eye.

But let's say I have a pillar here, and that's love God with everything that we have.

And then on the other side over here, we have a pillar that says loving our neighbor as ourself.

And then we could tie a line between the two.

And he says, hey, that.

That hangs all the law and the prophets.

And you could hang all the law and the prophets on top of that line.

But do you see that if you knock down this pillar over here about loving God with everything, all those law and prophets would fall down.

But at the same time, if you knock down that pillar of loving your neighbor as yourself, all those things would come down.

You see, it's something that we do together.

It's in unison.

It's a having the heart of obedience to God.

A heart of obedience to God is that I will love my neighbor as myself.

Loving God with everything and loving our neighbor as ourself is something that Jesus says that it is connected.

The love of God and the love of our neighbor are inseparable.

I want you to see that here this morning.

That's the point of Romans chapter 13, because we're going to go back to Romans 13 and we're going to see something that Paul is missing.

You would say Paul's missing something.

Well, if we go to Romans 13 again, he says, what do we do?

We're to love one another and that fulfills the law.

Well, what does he say about loving God?

He goes on to talk about all these different commandments in verse nine, which we're going to talk about.

He talks about in verse 10, love worketh no ill against his neighbor.

Therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

Some might look at Romans 13 and say, well, Paul is missing something here.

He says to love my neighbor, but he doesn't mention anything about loving God.

What we're going to see is though, that loving God means to love my neighbor.

He's explaining that they're connected.

I want you to see a few other passages of Scripture that speak to this very thing.

Because what might happen in our flesh is that we say, okay, I love God and I'm supposed to love my neighbor.

But if you remember there in the New Testament, what was the first question that was asked after Jesus said, you know what?

You should love your neighbor.

As yourself.

What?

Well, then who's my neighbor?

Right.

We, as humans in our flesh, want to find some kind of loophole.

Like, okay, I know I'm supposed to love God.

That makes sense.

We, we all understand that now.

We all fall short of that.

But we all understand we're supposed to love God, but then we're supposed to love our neighbor as ourself.

Well, who's our neighbor?

Well, it's the person that lives on your right and on your left.

That's it.

You don't have to love anybody else.

No, that's not what it's saying.

It's whoever you come across in your life.

Because what happened was, was that they said, okay, who's our neighbor?

Then Jesus goes into that wonderful story of the Good Samaritan, and he challenges them.

He pushes them to say, it's not just about loving people that you're comfortable with.

Like, the Jew would love the Jew, but the Jew certainly culturally would never love a Samaritan.

That would be like, all right, we love God, but we can't love the Samaritans.

With the passage of scripture that Jesus is explaining in, in the Good Samaritan story is that the, the love of God crosses borders.

The love of God is more than just who I want to love.

It's about loving those that come before me.

So the question could be, who is my neighbor?

Well, your neighbor is whoever you come across in your life, those that might give you some level of frustration, those who might not love you back.

That's the understanding here.

In Romans 13, he says, you got to have that type of love.

I want you to go another passage of Scripture and the New Testament, it's Galatians, chapter five.

Galatians, chapter five tells us a little bit more about this type of love as we obey the Lord.

You know, I, I, I think all of us here today might know, but I'm going to explain it a little bit further, is if we love God, how do we show that love for God?

On the most basic biblical level, how do we show our love for God?

Well, the Book of John, the book of First John says to keep his commandments, to obey him.

So the way that I love God is not by.

And by the way.

We should sing loud.

Okay.

Brother Josiah mentioned this morning, make a joyful noise.

It doesn't have to be in tune, but make a joyful noise.

Okay?

We are to sing out.

But it's not just about, hey, singing out louder.

It's not just about being in church.

Every time the doors are open.

The Bible says that loving God is equated with our obedience to him.

If I love him, I will follow him.

If I love him, I will do what he tells me to do.

So Galatians chapter 5, verse 13.

And we're going to look at verses 13 and 14 here this morning to talk about this type of freedom that we have to love and this type of law being fulfilled through the love.

And he says in verse 13 of Galatians 5, for brethren, ye have been called unto liberty.

So as Christians, we have freedom.

That's a beautiful thing.

That's an exciting thing.

We're not bound by the law anymore.

We don't have to follow every little step to get to a place where we feel like we have access to God.

He says, no, you have liberty.

But this liberty is to be used for something specific.

Use, not liberty for the occasion of the flesh.

So don't use this freedom just to make yourself feel good.

Like, okay, so I have freedom in Christ.

What do I want to do today?

No, that's not what we are supposed to do.

The freedom is not about exercising our fleshly desires.

The freedom is to be free to serve God.

He says, but by love, serve one another.

So part of this type of love that Romans 13 is talking about is about serving one another, serving, sacrificing, giving, being there in time of need, doing things that needed to be done in the midst of a human relationship that could be different for different people.

Like you serving me might look different than you serving someone who's homeless.

Right?

I have a house.

You don't need to provide for me, a roof over my head.

But there might be someone who is in need of a place to stay at night.

It looks different in many different scenarios, but we see that it's about service.

Then he says in verse 14, for all the law, all of the law, everything that the Bible has ever talked about, for all the law, is fulfilled in one word.

Even in this.

Thou shall love thy neighbor as thyself.

He says, you want to be the right type of Christian.

You want to live the way that God has called you to love you.

You.

You want to obey God.

Obey God by as it says here, summarized all in this way, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

So is it about loving God, or is it about loving my neighbor?

Which one is it?

And I would answer that with, yes, it's about loving God.

That means that you love your neighbor.

And so that's what he's talking about here.

Romans chapter 13.

So go back to Romans chapter 13 with me.

We're gonna be back to our main text for just a moment.

Then we're gonna jump off and look at another passage, because there's so much to be said in the New Testament about this.

Romans chapter 13, verse 9.

He says for this, thou shalt not commit adultery.

Thou shalt not kill.

Thou shalt not steal.

Thou shalt not bear false witness.

Thou shalt not covet.

And if there be any other commandment, it is briefly comprehended in the same, namely, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.

He's summarizing what he said in Galatians chapter 5.

He now is going to list the commandments that demonstrate what love actually looks like.

He's going to demonstrate it through how we deal with other people.

Verse 9 talks all about the commandments that deal with our relationships with other people.

And I want you to think about it this morning this way.

Our faith is inextricably linked to how we deal with others.

The way that I show people what I believe in is linked to how I treat other people.

So if I say, hey, you know what?

I'm just full of God's love.

I'm just abounding in God's love.

I'm so thankful for the love of God.

I'm such a joyful Christian.

I'm just so grateful for everything.

And then you see me out at lunch, and I'm getting upset that my food isn't coming fast enough.

How could these people, do they not know who I am?

Do they not know that I have a schedule and a plan?

And I get angry and I get mad, and I don't show love to that person, okay?

At the same time, I understand why we're that way.

When we're in restaurants, we want our food, but that's our flesh coming out.

So if I say, well, I'm full of faith, I'm full of love, I'm full of grace, but then it's never manifested in my life.

I'm back to that place of where I'm saying something, but I'm not believing it.

I'm not living it.

So he says here very clearly, these things in verse nine will not come to pass.

I'm not going to commit adultery.

I'm not going to kill, I'm not going to steal, I'm not going to lie.

I'm not going to covet.

If I love my neighbor as myself, if I have the faith in the Lord to love him and to obey him and to love my neighbor, as myself, I'm not going to do any of these things.

So if I love my neighbor, I'm not going to commit adultery.

If I love my neighbor, I'm not going to murder him.

If I love my neighbor, I'm not going to steal from him.

If I love my neighbor, I'm not going to lie to him.

If I love my neighbor, I'm not going to covet what belongs to him.

So love isn't an alternative to obedience.

Sometimes people think, well, you know, do I need to love that person or do I need to obey God's word?

Well, it's yes, love isn't an alternative to obedience.

Love is the motive and the expression of our obedience.

So if I'm obeying God, my motive is going to be love.

So someone could hear Romans 13, verses 8, 9, and then eventually 10 and just say, well, if I just love people, I don't need to worry about God's commandments.

That's sometimes how people think.

They think, well, you know what?

If I'm just full of love and I'm loving my neighbor, I don't need to worry about all these rules and laws.

Well, that's partially true, but not completely true.

Because if I say, well, I love someone but I'm going to go steal from them, well, I'm not.

I'm not keeping.

I'm not, not consistent.

So the goal would be for us to follow these commandments, but at the same time, the motivation must be love.

It's not just about following the rules.

It's about being connected to God.

So our original thought was this.

Why is my love for others connected to my love for God Now?

Why does it matter?

Can't I just love God and not love my neighbor?

Well, let's go to see what he says in Romans 13.

He says, Love worketh no ill to his neighbor.

The idea would be that if I love God and if I am full of his love in my life, I won't do ill to them.

I won't sin against them.

I won't sin against my brother or sister in Christ.

Now, by the way, I don't see anywhere in Romans 13 where it links.

This is just to other Christians.

I see.

This is to all of our neighbors.

Like we're to not steal from unsaved people.

Right?

It's not just saved people.

We're supposed to live this way with everybody.

But even in the sense of within the church context, sometimes we have a hard time living, loving our own Christian brothers and sisters in Christ.

And that's A harder thing.

Like sometimes that's hard because we know someone.

Sometimes I don't know about you, but sometimes it's easier to be kind to someone who we don't know, because if we get to know them and we actually see who they are, we sometimes have some issues with them.

The truth is that sometimes the most difficult displays of the love of Christ will be within a family, will be within a church community.

But that doesn't mean that we just forget about the need for love.

It means that we have to strive more and more to come together and love people for a bigger purpose.

So now we're going to see, why does it matter?

How does my love for others connect to my love for God?

I want you to go to Matthew, chapter 25.

Matthew, chapter 25.

Jesus explains to us how our love for him is connected with those that are around us.

Now, in the context In Matthew chapter 25, it's talking about being ready for the coming of Christ, the kingdom of God, being a good steward of what we have before us in our life.

And we get to the place where there's the separation of the sheep and the goats, starting there in verse 31.

But, but I want you to see this connection that Jesus makes to when we are kind and gracious and loving to the least of these.

What does that mean in our relationship to him?

And he.

He says in verse number.

Let's see, let's see, verse number 35.

Okay, this is the.

The king, verse 35.

The king says, come blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you and the foundation of the world.

That's verse 34.

Now the first 35.

For I was an hungered, and you gave me meat.

I was thirsty and you gave me drink.

I was a stranger and you took me in naked, and ye clothed me.

I was sick and ye visited me.

I was in prison and you came to me.

So there's this explanation of these people meeting all these needs for the, the king, for the, for the Master.

And then he says, and then the people that are righteous answer him.

Verse 37.

Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, lord, when saw we thee in hunger and fed thee?

When did we do this and gave thee drink?

When, when do we do that?

When we saw thee a stranger and took the inn, or naked or clothed thee?

Or when saw ye the sick or imprisoned and came unto thee?

And the king shall answer and say unto them, verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.

So the idea would be the way that I treat the least of these is ultimately a display of how I think about the Lord, how I serve the Lord.

So if I see someone and I think, well, this is, this is typical in our flesh, I look at someone and I say, you know what?

I don't know if me doing something good for them will even be noticed.

Will it even matter?

And you know, is it worth my sacrifice?

Well, the truth is, is that that's not our job to decide.

Our job to decide is really this.

Am I going to obey God and am I going to treat the least of these with the same care as if Jesus was sitting there?

Now, I, I know that this is a, a thought exercise that we can't fully grasp, but if Jesus walked through those doors today, we, we know what we would do if we would, we would worship him, we would fall at his feet, we would give him anything that he needed.

But oftentimes we'll see other people and we think, well, that's not someone important.

That's not someone who's going to bring me anything back in my life beneficial, so I don't really need to care for them.

But what Jesus says is that when we treat people in need with love and grace and patience and kindness and compassion, that's us displaying to him kindness, grace, compassion, and that's us understanding what God has done for us.

Because I'm thankful for the fact that God didn't leave me in the ditch.

You say what, what are you talking about?

What ditch did he leave you in?

Well, I'm not talking about a literal ditch.

I'm talking about the, the sin that I was in.

I'm glad God didn't leave me there.

I'm glad God didn't look at me and say, well, is it going to be worth saving Him?

The truth is, is I could never repay my Lord for what he has done for me.

You could never repay the Lord for what he has done for you.

But yet he still extends that love, mercy and grace to us in, in those times because of his infinite holiness and his infinite love.

And though we can never be like Jesus, we can never be perfectly like Him.

We are all called to be Christlike and to follow that example.

Another passage of Scripture that ties all of this together is in First John, chapter four.

We know that the Bible tells us in First John that we love God, not because were good people.

Often I used to think that.

I used to think that when I was growing up that our church was like, the only good church.

I was like, if people aren't like us, you know, I feel sorry for that.

I used to think that, like, we were better because of our church.

And obviously I grew up and realized that, you know, that's, that's a flawed way of thinking.

But sometimes there would be that thing in my mind of like, of course God loves me.

Of course.

Course God loves these people because I love these people.

And I. I love myself.

But I want you to see that the Bible says in First John, Chapter 4, that we don't love him because we're good.

We love him because he first loved us.

That that's seen here in First John, chapter 4, verse 19.

We love him because he first loved us.

God made the first move by sacrificing himself for us.

And then it says in verse 20, if.

If a man say, I love God and hateth his brother, he is a liar.

Now don't get, don't get mad at the messenger.

This is First John.

This is not my opinion.

The Bible says very clearly here that if I say I love God and hate my brother, I am a liar.

For he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen?

And this commandment we have from him that he who loveth God, love his brother also.

I hope you see how many times in Scripture, in the New Testament alone, does it connect my love for God to my love for my neighbor, for my brother, for my sister, for someone who is in need.

And I hope that we can see here In Romans chapter 13 that I owe that to them, even though they haven't done anything for me, but I owe them that love because of what God has done for me.

So let's go back to Romans chapter 13.

And I want you to see this last thought here this morning.

And then we're going to kind of take some takeaways with us as application.

So.

So Romans 13, verse 10.

He says, Love worketh no ill to his neighbor.

So one could read that and say, well, you know what?

Me being loving just means I'm not going to do anything bad to people, right?

So if I love my neighbor, I'm not going to steal from him.

But I guarantee you, I'm not going to go talk to him.

I'm not going to go give him extra food.

I'm not going to do anything good for him.

And so sometimes people live a Christian life that way.

Well, I'm just going to keep my nose out of trouble.

I'm Going to not do anything bad to people.

And that's, that's good enough.

But what we see through other passages of Scripture, like Galatians, chapter five, where it says in love, serving one another, we see other passages of scripture, like in Ephesians, chapter four, that says, don't just stop stealing, but now make money and give to those that are in need.

Don't stop lying, but now speak the truth in love.

So there's a second part of the love that we have for people.

It's not just holding back ill will towards them.

So that's sometimes how it works within a church or within a family.

Like, well, I know I'm not supposed to hate them.

I know I'm not supposed to be mean.

So I'm just going to avoid them and I'm just going to just not do anything bad.

And that's better than the alternative.

It's better than doing bad to them.

But the Christlike way is not just to avoid the ill will, but to now infuse good into their life and do things in service to them and sacrifice to them.

And that can look like many different things.

It could be like putting their needs before our own.

It could be giving them things that they are in need of, speaking the truth to them, encouraging them.

So it could be a material thing, it could be a spiritual thing, it could be an emotional thing.

But biblical love seeks the good of the person rather than using the other person for our own good.

I want to say that again because I think that's so important.

Biblical love, this agape love, seeks the good of another person.

Like, I want good to come to them rather than using the other person for our own good.

That's what the world's way of love is.

The world's way of love is, I'm going to use this person and love them for my good.

Right?

That's.

That's what they teach with marriages, right?

What does this person bring to you?

How do they make you feel?

And I understand there should be feelings within a marriage.

But if I'm in a marriage or any relationship and I'm thinking, well, what has that person done for me lately?

I'm probably not in the right place that I need to be in my love for that person because it's all about me.

But a true love relationship is all about them.

How can I bring good to them?

Now, again, I'm not coming from a perch of perfection in this.

There's many times in my life where I have fallen in this category because love is sometimes Messy love is sometimes difficult.

With love comes a risk.

We understand that, right?

If I extend myself in love to somebody and sacrifice for them, there's always going to be a risk that I am hurt.

And I would say to you here this morning, that risk is worth it.

Because the Bible calls us.

It's not an optional thing.

The Bible calls us to display this type of love.

Love is not just something that God commands us to feel, though there's feelings with love.

I want to tell you that if you say, well, I love God, but I haven't once ever felt an emotion in a service or ever once felt an emotion when I'm reading the Bible, well, I'm going to tell you that that's probably a little bit of an issue.

I'm not saying that feelings should be removed from our Christian life or removed from our love relationships, but I'm saying that the feelings aren't the only motivation because there's going to be days when we wake up and the feeling is not there to love my neighbor, right?

My.

My say.

Say my neighbor said something about me, or maybe my neighbor just looked at me the wrong way and may.

Or whatever it is, it could be a lot of different reasons why I don't feel that love today.

But the Bible says that it's more than a feeling.

It's something that God commands us to do.

It's an action.

So therefore I had to make a decision to say, I am going to love this person not because of my feeling today or not because what they said, but because what God has said and what God has done in my life.

So biblical love isn't just refusing to hurt someone, though I think that's part of it.

That's what Romans 13 chapter, Romans, chapter 13, verse 10 says, Love worketh no ill to his neighbor.

Therefore love is the fulfilling of the law.

So you would say, what is he talking about with fulfilling the law?

Well, we know that we don't have to fulfill the law for salvation at all.

Like the law, we're free from the bondage of the law.

That's what Galatians talked about.

Remember it said, you have liberty now, but the liberty that comes with not fulfilling the law doesn't mean that I now can just like sin.

Okay, now, now that I'm not under the law, I can steal from someone.

Or now that I'm not under the law, I can covet.

No, actually the Bible says that the.

The law is God's morality.

The law is there to show us what the standard is.

So the ten Commandments are a good thing.

The Ten Commandments are not something that we should throw out.

I've heard people say that now that we're under grace, throw away the Ten Commandments, we don't need them anymore.

Well, no, that, that's.

That's showing us what we are to do as a believer.

We're.

We're not supposed to worship other gods.

We're not supposed to dishonor our parents.

We're not supposed to covet, we're not supposed to murder.

Those are all good things that God has called us to strive for in our life.

But now the freedom is that I don't have to do all those to keep my salvation, because all of us inevitably will stumble within the Ten Commandments.

Maybe if we had more time, I could walk you through each of the Ten Commandments and we could really have a true assessment of if any of us have kept all the Commandments completely.

And maybe some of you would say, I've kept every single commandment my whole life.

Well, praise God for that.

But then also look at what Matthew chapter 5 says.

Jesus says, okay, you think you've kept all the law.

I'm going to take it a step further.

If you've thought about that, you've now broken the commandment.

What was Jesus doing?

Was Jesus freeing us from the morality that's there?

No.

Jesus is actually showing us that none of us in the moral standard can meet the perfection that is the holiness of God.

So it's this idea that, yes, I am not supposed to just throw away this 10 commandments, but what I am supposed to understand is that it's through the grace of God.

So biblical love isn't simply refusing to hurt someone.

It's intentionally to seek their good.

Why?

Not?

Because I'm going to get saved through it.

Not because people are going to do good things for me, but because it's what God has called me to do and remember what hangs all the law and the prophets.

Loving God with everything and loving my neighbor as myself.

If I love God, and if I love my neighbor perfectly, I'm going to obey the law.

Now, we're not talking about the ceremonial dietary laws.

I'm not getting down that rabbit trail this morning.

But there are some things that we can look at in the Levitical law that you know are not necessarily tied to morals.

They were tied to dietary things and ceremonial things.

But I'm talking about the moral law.

I'm talking about the law that was given in the Old Testament and then validated in the New Testament, right here In Romans, chapter 13, we see that these things are important.

I'm not supposed to covet.

I'm not supposed to bear false witness.

I'm not supposed to commit adultery.

As a Christlike citizen, these are things that I should avoid.

But I don't avoid them just to stay out of trouble.

I avoid them because I love God and I love my neighbor.

And that's the heart of it.

We don't love others because they have earned our love.

We don't love others because they are good people.

We love others because God has given his love to us.

Romans 5:8.

But God commended or demonstrated his love toward us, and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.

If we are not able to show love to people at all, if we're not able to sacrifice to people for people at all, we have to go back and reassess our understanding of what Jesus Christ has done for us.

Now, I'm not saying that we'll be perfect, but what I am saying is that that desire should be in our hearts to look for opportunities to demonstrate the love that God had for us and that he has for us.

So.

So the progression that we have is this.

Think about it this way.

We have God's love for us.

That's the starting place.

What's God's love for us?

Let me just summarize it the best way that I can.

You have the Creator of the universe, the one who spoke everything into existence, the one who did not need us, but wanted to have a relationship with us.

He created mankind.

Mankind sinned.

We know that we are marred by sin.

If any of you struggle with thinking that there's a sin nature, you probably haven't had children.

Because I never had to sit my children down and go, hey, there's an alternative to telling the truth, guys.

You could lie.

You could tell me something different.

No, all of my kids understood how to lie.

Just like they figured it out.

You know, I come into the room and they've got, like, food all over their face.

And I'm like, did you eat that?

No.

No.

And I'm like, okay, well, you did.

And.

And that's the idea that all of us are marred by sin.

No one had to sit down and teach us how to sin.

Now, someone maybe sat down and taught you how to sin more effectively, but no one taught you how to sin.

That's in us because of the sin that was committed before us.

That's our flesh.

So God had all these people that he created ultimately to worship him.

To glorify Him.

And then we turn in our sin.

What.

What would I have done?

I would have been like, well, I'm done with you guys.

You've.

You've.

You've turned your backs on me.

But no, what does God do?

In his perfect holiness and his perfect love, he offers a way.

All the way back in Genesis, chapter three, we see the first mention of a sacrificial lamb that is to come, a sacrifice seed of the woman, Jesus Christ.

And God comes up with this redemptive plan to send his only begotten Son to this earth to live a perfect life, to humble himself and to go to the cross.

The only one who did not deserve death went to the cross for our sins, to bear the weight.

The Bible says in Second Corinthians, chapter 5, that he who knew no sin, he was never, ever even marred by sin, became sin for us.

Meaning he took on the weight of all of our sin and took that because he loved us.

If you ever want to go through a really grueling study, go through what Jesus was going through in the Garden of Gethsemane.

The word Gethsemane means the press.

Jesus was being pressed in his human, in his humanity, of what he was about to go through, but yet he pushed through.

And he says, nevertheless, Father, your will be done.

And he went to it for us, died on the cross, then conquered death through the resurrection, and then now offers us in grace, abundant forgiveness, abundant mercy.

And now all we have to do is trust in that and believe in that and accept that wonderful gift into our lives.

As John 1:12, I think says.

It says, as many as received him.

Did them be the sons of God?

We now can be children of God.

As Romans 8 says, we can cry out abba, Father.

That's the type of love that Jesus gave us.

Jesus isn't just like, hey, here's a.

Here's a raise at your work.

Here's a good day.

Because, like, when we're little kids, dear Lord, help us to have a good day.

What's.

What does that even mean?

I don't know.

I mean, good day, everything goes my way.

I don't know.

I know.

I'm not saying that we shouldn't pray for good days, but I think that we need to see it from the bigger perspective.

God's love is not just limited to me eating a good lunch or having everyone on my side.

No, God's love is the fact that he took me, that I should be in a place called hell, that I should be separated from him that I should have eternal death.

And the Bible says the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

That's the love of God.

And then we take.

So we start with the love of God, and then it turns to our love for Him.

Why should we love Him?

Why should I love God?

Well, I just gave you a bunch of reasons why you should love God.

And so we see God's love for us, and then we see our love for him, and then we see how that's tied to our love for others.

And our love for others would eventually be obedience to God.

And then it's a cycle.

We go back to understand God's love for us.

We go to our love for him, we go to our love for others, and we go to the fact that our love for others is obedience to God.

And that is a cycle that we're supposed to repeat throughout our lives as we grow in the Lord.

So Romans, chapter 13 down to verse 10 is all about.

As a Christian, as a Christian citizen, I'm not supposed to be known for all the things that I'm owing people like, oh, you know, I've got all these taxes, I'm not going to pay it.

I've got all these dues, I'm not going to pay it.

That's what he says there in verse seven.

We're to be living in a society not bound to all of the debts of this world, he says, but the one debt that you should have, the only thing that you do owe everyone, that you should be giving, is that love.

And that love just keeps coming and coming and growing and growing.

And we're called to exercise that in our lives.

Now we're going to come back next week and we're going to look at more of what the Christian life actually looks like.

Because I've heard people say, you know what, if you're, if you love God, it doesn't really matter the way you live your life.

And that is a very, very bad teaching.

Because the bad teaching is, is that God calls us, if we love him, to obey Him.

Now, does that mean we're going to be perfect?

No.

But it does mean that we're supposed to strive to, to a standard that God has laid out for us in our life.

Now, is everyone going to be on the same path of that standard?

No.

Someone who got saved yesterday is going to understand obedience to God a little bit differently than someone's been saved for 50 years.

Because we go through that process.

We go through that that refining process, as the Bible calls it.

And I'm going to tell you, and I said this on Wednesday night, and I think that all of us will understand this, that the refining process, sometimes there will be difficulties, sometimes there will be setbacks.

Sometimes there's going to be times where I do sin and that I have to go to the Lord for forgiveness.

Sometimes there's going to be times in my life where I go through a struggle, where I go through pain.

And that's not to say, well, God doesn't love me anymore, so I'm just going to do what I want to do.

No, the Bible is going to tell us that that's the way that we're supposed to live and not give ourselves over to the flesh.

Because the temptation, the battle, is always going to be whether or not we're going to yield to the Spirit and obey God, or we're going to yield to our flesh and give into that and do what we want to do.

That's the decision that, that we have to make multiple times in our day.

I can tell you there's been times where I've prayed through a situation, I've been prepared for a situation.

I said, lord, don't let me fall into this trap.

Don't let me give in to sin.

Don't let me have this problem.

And then I get to a place in my life where I have that problem, and I see victory.

It's amazing.

And then I think, okay, great.

God worked me through this.

And then the next step would be this.

Then the next trial comes 20 minutes later.

AM I ready and am I just as prepared to yield to the Spirit in that moment?

Or do I rest back and say, look, I had a victory today.

I'm good, I'm not going to try anymore, you know?

No, it's.

It's about each and every day, multiple times a day, turning ourselves over to God.

And that's what we're going to talk about more next week when we look into the end of Romans, chapter 13.

So, very simple message here this morning.

Our love for God is vital.

Our love for God is needed.

It's called for, it's commanded.

It's the greatest commandment.

But our love for God is connected to our love for others.

First John, chapter 4, Galatians, chapter 5, Matthew, chapter 22, Romans, chapter 13.

All these passages of Scripture talk to the connection that it is to love God and then to love other people.

And I hope that this morning, first and foremost, you have a desire to love God.

If you don't have a reason to love God.

We talked about the gospel.

That's the greatest reason to love God.

But if you do love God.

This morning, now I desire for myself and for you to come to a place in our life to understand the need for connecting the dots between loving God and then loving and sacrificing for my neighbor.

Am I loving God?

Am I devoted to God?

That's the first step.

But one way that I would say that we can gauge our love for God and our love for him and His Word is whether or not we're loving others and we're devoted to serve others in this process that we call the Christian life.

So I'm going to ask if you're able to.

To stand with me, every head bowed, every eye closed.

We're going to have an opportunity here to respond to the preaching of the Word of God here this morning.

We know that the love of God is a real thing.

It's a beautiful thing.

It's something that the Bible even says in Second Corinthians that it's an undescribable or indescribable gift, meaning we can't even explain it.

It's beyond our comprehension.

But what has the love of God meant to you in your life?

Is it enough to change the way that you deal with your neighbor?

Is it enough to allow you to forgive?

Is it enough for you to come to a place in your life where you're willing to serve someone who doesn't want to be served, sacrifice for someone who.

Who hasn't sacrificed for you?

Does the love of God change the way that you think about others?

I know it's hard.

And I'm going to tell you that in your flesh, it's impossible.

It's impossible to love someone who's just so mean to you and angry at you.

But the Bible says that there's more to life than what we feel.

It's about what we know, what Jesus Christ has done for us.

And when we stand in light of the great grace of who our Savior is, we no longer have to worry about the way that we feel, what people have done to us.

Is it worth it?

No.

I'm going to tell you here this morning.

The Bible says it is worth it to love our neighbor as ourself.

Why?

Because God has loved us abundantly.

And so does God's love mean something to you here this morning?

If it does, allow it to change.

You allow it to grow.

You allow it to refine you in that process.

But maybe you don't know the love of God.

Maybe you've never trusted in the gift of grace.

Maybe it's not something that you have ever come to a place in your life to realize that it's only by grace through faith that I'm saved.

Maybe you thought in your life it's about working.

I know I'm not supposed to commit adultery.

I know I'm not supposed to covet.

I know I'm not supposed to steal.

I know I'm not supposed to do all these things and I'm trying really hard, but I don't know if I could ever do do enough.

Folks, I'm going to tell you that none of us can do enough.

You're not saved by keeping the law.

You're saved by faith in Jesus Christ.

And then his love that you experience in that causes us to change and causes us to grow in our understanding of what God's morality really means.

So here this morning, don't try to save yourself.

Allow God to save you.

Trust in him and allow him to change you instead of trying to change yourself.

Lord, I pray that you be in this time of invitation working hearts and lives.

We thank you for all that you do for us.

We thank you for your love that you demonstrated through your son.

Lord, help us to live in light of that.

Help us to love others as you have called us to love in a way of obedience, in the way of sacrifice.

So we thank you and we love you.

In Jesus name, amen and.