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We sing in a thousand hands, high and loud from the ground we stand, high and loud from the ground we stand, for the good, the great, the good, the good, high and loud from the ground we stand. Lord, thank you so much for allowing us to be here. Thanks for the visitors and all the travels for them and hoping they can get home safely as well. Lord, we pray that you just bless this service and your word and thank you so much for this anniversary day. In the name of Jesus we pray, Amen. Turn to song number 208. We sing the song number 208, Grace Greater Than Our Sin, in the song number 200. God, please praise the Lord of the Earth. Praise God in sin, for sin in the dead. God, our God, who is God the Lord, where the Lord of the land was born, sing his praises. Praise the Lord in heaven, praise him, praise him, praise him, praise him, praise him, praise him, sing with us ever, sing with us ever, sing with us ever with this partnership with the Father, our Jesus. Praise the Lord in the game of God. Praise the Lord in the Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light With his rolling of hands in time, what a restful evening today. Praise to his last days. Praise to the morning and day within. To his grace, God's grace. Praise to his grace, God's grace. God's grace within his wings. Within his love, our love can be. Within our calling, his grace can be. Within his love, our grace can be. Within his wings, God's grace. Praise to him within his wings. Within his wings, God's grace. Praise to his grace within all of our sins. All right, well, welcome, everyone, to Faithful Word Baptist Church. It's great to see everybody out this morning. If you'd like a bulletin, just go ahead and lift up your hand, and one will be brought to you. Of course, as always, we have our service times there on the back. We'll be back this evening at 5.30 p.m., and then again on Thursday at seven as we go through the book of Genesis. We'll be in chapter number 34 this week. There's some soul-winning times below that, as well as the salvation, some baptisms for both the month and year. And of course, we're semi-celebrating the birthdays this morning. We've got a couple of September birthdays listed there, so take note of that. Typically, we have donuts the first Sunday of the month to celebrate those, or to honor those that are celebrating their birthday that month. There's no greater honor to be bestowed upon you than a wad of sugary dough. But we're gonna kinda pass over that this morning just because of the fact that we're having also our potluck meal after the service in honor of our sixth year anniversary. So if you were anticipating birthday donuts this morning, you're just gonna have to settle for brisket. I don't know what to tell you, okay? So maybe we'll, to me, you just leveled up big time, okay? But maybe we'll hit the donuts next week for those that were anticipating that, and still make sure those September birthdays are honored as they ought to be. But as I mentioned, we're having our sixth year anniversary this morning, so congratulations to our church on six years. Our church is still going strong, so it's been, just very quickly, just to let everyone know, it's been a real honor and pleasure to serve here with everybody in Tucson, and I look forward to many more years doing just that. So that'll do it for announcements. Let's just go ahead and sing one more song before we get into the preaching this morning. Rockford, please open up your handles to song number 146. We've seen song number 146, shelter in the time of storm, and then a song number 146. Oh, Jesus is the rock in the windy way, the windy way, the windy way. Oh, Jesus is the rock in the windy way, the shelter in the time of storm. The shame I did in that part of life, the shelter in the time of storm. Oh, can't tell them both those are right, the shelter in the time of storm. Oh, Jesus is the rock in the windy way, the windy way, the windy way. Oh, Jesus is the rock in the windy way, the shelter in the time of storm. And when you say a thing that must be, the shelter in the time of storm. All of us. All of us. All of us. All of us. All of us. All of us. Let's see that this time we offer you a play that will go around. As you have a play that goes around, follow more of what you may be, and as you reach to us in Deuteronomy 6, get ahead of Deuteronomy chapter number 6. Deuteronomy chapter 6, beginning at verse 1. Now these are the commandments, the statutes, and the judgments which the Lord your God demanded to teach you, that he might do them in the land where there need go to possess it. Thou mightest fear the Lord thy God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments, which I command thee thou. And thy son, and thy son's son, all the days of thy life and thy days may be prolonged. Hear therefore, O Israel, and observe to do it, that it might be well with thee, and that ye may increase mightily, as the Lord God of thy fathers hath promised thee the lamb that floweth with milk and honey. Fear, O Israel, that the Lord our God is one Lord, and thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shalt be in thy heart. And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them, when thou sittest in thy house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou writest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thy hand, and they shalt be as frontless between thy eyes, and thou shalt write them on the posts of thy house, and on thy gates. And it shalt be, when the Lord thy God shalt have brought thee in the land, which he sware unto thy fathers, to Adrian, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give thee great and goodly cities, which thou buildest not, and a house full of all good things, which thou willest not, and a rouse dig, which thou digst not, vineyards, and olive trees, which thou plantest not, when thou shalt have he in, and be poor. Then beware, lest thou forget the Lord, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage, and thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, who is servant, and shalt swear by his name. Ye shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the people, which are proud about you. For the Lord thy God is a jealous God among you, lest the anger of the Lord thy God be kidded against thee, and destroyed thee from all the face of the earth. Ye shall not tempt the Lord your God, as he tempted him in naphtha. Ye shall diligently keep the commandments of the Lord your God, and his testimonies, and his statutes, which he had commanded you. And thou shalt do that which is right, and good, in the sight of the Lord, that it might be wowed of thee, and that thou mayest go in, and possess the good land, which the Lord sware unto thy fathers, to cast out all thy enemies from reported, and as the Lord has spoken. And when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What meaneth the testimonies, and the statutes, and the judgment, which the Lord our God hath commanded you? And thou shalt say unto thy son, We were Pharaoh's bondmen in Egypt, and the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand. And the Lord showed signs and wonders, great in soil, upon Egypt, upon Pharaoh, and upon all his household before our eyes. And he brought us out from thence, that he might bring us in, to give us the land, which he sware unto our fathers. And the Lord commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the Lord our God, for our good, always, that it might usurp us alive, as it is at this day. And it shall be our righteousness, that we observe to do all these commandments before the Lord our God, as he hath commanded us. Let us pray. Dear Lord, I thank you for this church, Lord. Thank you for everyone that's here. Thank you for your precious word, for our deacon. I pray you with blessing for the Holy Spirit. Please show us how to solicit in whose holy name I am. Amen. All right. Mark, this morning we've been going through the book of Mark, passage by passage, not necessarily chapter by chapter, for several months now. So we're going to... Am I good? All right. So we're going to continue on in that. Of course, in Mark chapter 12, we had, you know, the Herodians are coming to Jesus with the Pharisees and questioning him about whether or not it's lawful to pay tribute. You have the, you know, the Sadducees coming, and they're, you know, asking about the resurrection and things like that. And then, of course, here in verse 28, you have another scribe that's coming to him and posing yet another question to him. And while the other two questions that were kind of posed to him were kind of, you know, they're trying to trip him up, they're trying to catch him in his words, you know, I believe that this guy in Mark 12, verse 28, the scribe that's coming to him, is actually being pretty sincere. I think he's probably a good guy, decent guy. He's just having a sincere question. And he asked this question in verse 28, says, And one of the scribes came, having heard the reasoning together, and preceding that he had answered them well, asked him, Which is the first commandment of all? So he's asking him, Jesus, what is the first commandment? Now, obviously, he doesn't mean the first commandment in the litany of what we call the Ten Commandments, because that would be pretty obvious, right? Thou shalt not have any other gods before me, right? That's a pretty, you know, that's a pretty basic trivia question to pose to a guy like Jesus. He's hearing him, answering him well. So what he means by the first commandment is, as it says in Matthew 22, verse 36, a parallel passage, Master, which is the great commandment of the law. Meaning, what's the most important? What's the first, the principle, the primary, what's the main commandment that we need to obey? What's the greatest commandment? What's the first commandment? That's what he means by that, when he says the first commandment. What's the most important commandment? He's not asking him, you know, what's the first, you know, what's number one, what's number two, and so on. And of course, it says in verse 29, And Jesus answered him, The first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind, with all thy strength. This is the first commandment. So in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, where the 10 commandments are actually listed, you'll notice that that's not what it says there, right? It actually gives us the litany of the 10 commandments in those passages. But Jesus here is saying that the first of all the commandments is, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind, with all thy strength. This is the first commandment. So what he's saying is that this is the most important commandment. To love the Lord thy God with all thy soul and with all thy strength. And then he goes on and says, I'm not going to cover it this morning, The second is like unto it, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, for in these hang all the commandments. I'm kind of paraphrasing there, I know. But he's saying that, you know, the most important two commandments is to love God, and then to love thy neighbor as thyself. Because if you endeavor to do those two things in your life, you're going to pretty much fulfill all the other commandments. You know, if you think about the list of the 10 commandments, you know, the first four are in regards to God. Thou shalt love the gods before me, thou shalt not make any grim an image, thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. So those first four, those kind of all pertain to God, right? And then you have the latter half of that list which pertains to our neighbor. You know, honor thy father and mother, thou shalt not kill, thou shalt not commit adultery, thou shalt not steal, thou shalt not bear false witness, thou shalt not covet, right? So those, you know, the 10 commandments are really broken up into these two commandments. You could group all the first four into love the Lord thy God. You know, if you love God, you're not going to take his name in vain, you're not going to make a grave an image, you're not going to bow down and worship it, you're not going to have any other gods before him, you're going to remember the Sabbath day, you're going to keep it holy, you're going to honor God in your life if you love him. And the second commandment, you know, love thy neighbor as thyself, is contained, you know, that contains that latter half. You know, if I love you as my neighbor, I'm not going to kill you, right? So how do I know Deacon loves me? Well, I haven't killed you, right? You know, I haven't stole anything from you. You know, we're not committing adultery with one another's spouses. You know, I'm coveting your stuff and things like that. You know, that's how you know I love you, right? Obviously, if somebody is doing those things, you cannot say of them that they love you, right? So that's, I'm just kind of explaining what he means by, you know, what is the first commandment and the second being like unto it. The commandment really, these two commandments, they sum up the Ten Commandments. And he's saying of this first one that to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul, mind, and strength is the first one, it's the most important one, as he says in Matthew 22 verse 38, is the first and great commandment. Look, we have to get this down in our Christian lives. We have to live lives that are blessed by God. We have to understand this commandment, to love God. You know, that is the commandment. And by the way, that's a commandment, right? It's not just a feeling. It's not just something that, you know, you just experience or whatever. It's not just a relationship. You know, we are commanded to actually love God. And love, you know, is a verb. It's an action. It's something that you have to do. It's something you have to purpose to do in your life. The love of God is not something that just comes naturally to us. The love of God is not something... I know when we're saved, the Bible says in Romans that the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts. You know, we have the potential to love God, and of course we do love God to some degree if we understand the Gospel, right? We understand that Christ loved us. But we need to learn to love God in our lives. If we're going to make it for the long haul, you know, we're here celebrating our six year anniversary as a church, and it's a great event. It's a great event that we've made it six years. You know, a lot of churches don't make it this far. You know, a lot of churches peter out five, six, seven years. Here we are six years in, and we're still going strong. You know, if we want to continue on as a church, if we want to continue on as believers, you know, who are blessed of God, of course we'll always be saved, you know, no matter what. But if we want to have the blessing of God in our lives, you know, we have to learn to love God. We have to make loving God the most important thing in our lives, okay? You say, well, I don't know about that. Well, Jesus said it's the first and great commandment is to love the Lord thy God, and not a little bit, right? He said with all thy heart, with all thy soul, with all thy mind, with all thy strength, right, to love God with everything that you have, that's what the greatest commandment is. It's the first one, it's the most important one. So I do want to talk about that a little bit this morning. This first commandment, the love of God, you know, it precedes these ten commandments that we're given. You know, you ask people, you know, what are the commandments of God? That's the list they're going to go to. But, you know, we won't perform a lot of those other things if we don't have this first one down. You know, if you don't love God, you're not going to remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. It's not going to be that important to you, right? Now, obviously, we're not celebrating the Sabbath. We don't honor or, you know, observe the Sabbath, rather, as they did back then, you know, being the last day of the week. We, in the New Testament, use the example that is given to us in the resurrection, given to us in the book of Acts by the early church, where they gathered together on the first day of the week being Sunday, right? So, my point is, though, that if you don't love God, you know, we're not going to keep these other commandments. And, you know, there's some pretty important commandments in there, right? Let's just focus on those first four. You know, we're not to, you know, have any other gods before him. You don't want to commit idolatry, okay? Now, obviously, literal idolatry is a thing. You know, we know about that here in Tucson, you know, with the Catholic Church, which is an idolatrous church, which is making graven images, which, by the way, is why in the Catholic Church, they split the last commandment into two. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, and thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's stuff, basically. They split that because they remove, you know, the second commandment, thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. The Catholic Church conveniently removes that from their Bible, from their teaching, from their catechism, and then that leaves you with nine commandments, so you have to split up the tenth, okay? My point being is that we know something about literal idolatry here, but obviously it's not something we're participating in as Baptists. You know, we don't believe in venerating or worshiping, you know, graven images. God repeatedly, if there's one commandment that God just harps on over and over in the book of Deuteronomy, especially where we were this morning, it's not having false gods, having false idols, making literal, graven images. God calls that an abomination. He detests that, and I want to go into all that this morning. We're not really guilty of that here, but, you know, in our lives, even as, you know, God-fearing, God-loving, you know, independent, fundamental Baptists, you know, other things could become a form of idolatry in our lives. You know, we could become idolatrists when it comes to money. You know, the Bible says that covetousness is a form of idolatry, that the love of money is the root of all evil, right? So if we make money and idol unto us, you know, we're kind of breaking that commandment, and I'm here, I'm just saying this morning that if we don't get this first commandment down, you know, we're kind of leaving ourselves open to that. You know, if we don't want to put God first and love God first, there's a real strong potential that in some way, you know, we're going to violate one of these commandments. You know, we might not fall for that latter half, you know, we're not going to go out and commit a murder and adultery and all these other things, hopefully, because there's real world, you know, consequences. You know, hopefully that's not the only thing keeping you away from being an adulterous murderer, but, you know, we're probably more prone to do the first half, right? The other things, those other commandments which pertain unto God, right? If we don't love God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, with all our strength, you know, we might find it easy to say, well, you know, what's the big deal about, you know, taking the name, the Lord's name in vain? What's the big deal about, you know, not being consistent in church? You know, I don't need to go to God's house. You know, people have all kinds of weird ideas when it comes to church attendance. You know, people think, oh, I go out into nature and that's my church. No, it's not. The church is the pillar and ground of the truth. The house of the living God, the Bible says in 1 Timothy, is the local church. This is the house of God this morning, okay? So, you know, if we're going to love God, we should be in church. We should be there to hear the preaching of the word of God. We should be there to participate in the worship of God, singing, you know, the hymns out, fellowshipping one with another, going out and serving God, right? It takes a lot of strength to go out and preach the gospel. But that's what we ought to be doing. You know, that's what we're commanded to do is to go and preach the gospel to every creature. You know, there's many other things that we're commanded to do in scripture and if we don't do them, you know, we might want to be checking our hearts out. You know, if these things are things that have kind of fallen by the wayside and we're not really fervent about them, we're not really excited about it, it's not really something that we're into or whatever, or it's way down in our list of priorities and there's other things that are coming before it, you know, the problem might be, it might not be that, you know, it's the church, it's the preacher, it's the other people there. The problem just might be your heart. The problem might be that your heart isn't right with God, that you don't love God. Now, no one would just come out and just blatantly say, I don't love God, right? That'd be a pretty bold thing to say. But, you know, here's the thing is that, you know, whether or not you love God is pretty obvious. It's obvious if you love God or not. You know, and the degree to which you love God, you can kind of tell sometimes, right? If you would, go over to, are you still in Deuteronomy? I think I had you there. Go to Deuteronomy chapter number six. Deuteronomy chapter number six. So that's kind of all introduction, right? Why should we want to have this first commandment down? Because if we don't get this one down, we're going to let these other things slide. You know, we're not going to be doing the things that we ought to be doing. And if that's us this morning, and look, I don't know. Maybe everyone here is just on fire for God and just zealous of the things of God and just loves God. You know, I hope that's the case. But, you know, chances are, you know, over six years of being a church, there's probably people that have been here for all that time whose love for God has waxed and waned over those years. And you might even be at a low point this morning, right? You might be kind of going through maybe a low season in your spiritual life where you don't love God like you ought to. Well, you know, you need to work on rekindling that. You need to work on getting that love of the Lord, you know, stoked again in your heart. Get that flame going and get that zeal back in your life. Because it's important. Look, it's the first commandment. It's the greatest commandment is to love the Lord thy God. And, you know, if we don't love God, we're not going to do a lot of these other things. Of course, everyone would probably say that, you know, that they love God. No one would just boldly come out and say, I don't love God, right? And I'm sure everyone here to some degree does love God. But sometimes I think we might conflate loving God with just kind of appreciating God. There's a difference between appreciating something and loving it, right? I mean, I appreciated the guy at Walmart yesterday, the employee who told me where the, you know, the aluminum pans were and housewares, where, you know, where section H was where I could find the canned heat. I appreciated that guy, right? I don't love him though. I don't even know his name. I didn't even take the time to read the name tag. I'm not going to write him a Christmas card. You know, hey, just, you know, I was there, you know, the last day of August this year and you helped me find the serving pans. I love you, man. No, it's just going to be, hey, I appreciated that, right? But, you know, and I'm kind of making a joke, but that's not really, you know, but that's sometimes I think people, if they really search their hearts, that's kind of the attitude they have with God. I mean, I appreciate the fact that I'm saved. I appreciate that I have a church to go to when I feel like it. I appreciate that I have a Bible to read when I feel like it. I appreciate that I have the opportunity to go out and serve God and earn rewards if I feel like it. You know, I appreciate that God's made some opportunities for me to serve him. You know, the person that loves God, you know, sees that more as an opportunity. They see that as an obligation. Hey, I love God. You know, I want to show God I love him. I want to be in church. I want to read my Bible. I want to open my mouth boldly and make known the mystery of the gospel. I want to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ unto the heathen. That's something that some people have because they love God. There's a difference between appreciating somebody and just loving them. You know, on our wedding anniversary, I'm not just going to tell my wife, you know, I appreciate her. That's going to be a rough anniversary right there. That's going to be a tough one. It's going to take more than, you know, a box of chocolates to smooth that over. You know, but do I appreciate my wife? Of course. I appreciate all the things my wife does for me, but you know, I also love my wife. Right? So you can see there's a difference there. So this morning, you know, the question is, you know, are you keeping the first commandment? Because if you're not keeping this one, you know, there's some other things that are probably not, you're not keeping either. You know, you're probably keeping those last five commandments all right. You're not killing anybody. You're not doing all these wicked things to your neighbor. Right? But what about the more important ones? And yes, they are more important. Because Jesus said it's the first commandment and the second is to love thy neighbor as thyself. He said the first one is to love the Lord thy God. You know, and it's more important because if people were conscious of the fact that there is a holy God and they wanted to please him, you know, they wouldn't do these other things to their neighbor either. Because man was made in the image of God. So, you know, you might be here this morning and wondering, do I love God? Am I keeping this first commandment? Well, you know, our love is measurable. You know, we can look at our lives, as I said earlier, and it'll be obvious to us. Maybe not to everybody around us, but it will be obvious to us if we're honest whether or not we love God. Because our love is measured by obedience. If you're there in Deuteronomy, go to chapter 10. I don't know if we looked where I had you go, but go to Deuteronomy chapter number 10. I took a big pull off of Americano right before I got up here this morning. You know, Brother Gabriel's kind enough to give me an Americano, so if I'm a little scattered and a little excited and a little more wide-eyed than normal, it's the Holy Spirit and the caffeine that's kind of kicking in, okay? So I'm just like flying through these. I don't even know where we're at right now, but I'm excited to get where we're going. Look at Deuteronomy chapter 10 verse 12. It says, And now Israel, what did the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all his ways, and to love him? So you see where that lands there, the love part? It comes after fear and walking in all his ways. You know, we can't say that we love God if we don't fear God. We can't say that we love God if we're not walking in all his ways. You know, it's interesting to me in the book of Deuteronomy where God is just reiterating all these commandments and just laying all these things out. You know, Moses is reiterating all the things that were told unto him in the mount before the children of Israel go into the promised land. He's kind of giving them, you know, a very long sermon, right, in the book of Deuteronomy. But it's interesting to me that that's the book, right? The book with all these commandments about don't do this and make sure you do that and observe this and don't forget this and all these things. Just so many commandments. It's also the book that probably, at least in the Old Testament, talks more about loving God than any other book. That's not a coincidence because if we love God, you know, we're going to keep his commandments. You know, that's how we know whether or not we love God. It's not just, well, I know I love God because, you know, I get a warm feeling in the pit of my stomach. You know, I have this, I just, just because I say so, whatever, because, you know, love is a verb. It's an action. There's things that you do for the people that you love. You do things for them, okay? You do things to please them, right? And God says, hey, you need to walk in my ways. You need to fear me and to love him. He goes on and says, and to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul, right? So we're told to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul, mind and strength. And then we're told in that same book also to serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and soul. So do you see how serving God and loving God go together? That's why I say, you know, it's kind of obvious sometimes if you're somebody that loves God. You know, over the years I've heard people, you know, just say kind of in conversation, you know, someone will come up in conversation and someone will say, well, you know, that guy loves God. He just loves the Lord. It's like, well, how do you know that? Did you ask him? Did you find like a book of poems he wrote to God? Like, you know, did you intercept a love letter that he wrote or something? Or did he take you aside and tell you that he loves God? No, it's because you can just sometimes you can just look at people and look at the way they're living their lives. Look what's important to them and you can just tell whether or not they really love God or not. You know, you could tell that. You say, I don't know about that. Well, I mean, you could probably tell that about some people's marriages, right? I mean, I get some people are really good about putting up a front and things and all that. But, you know, if two people are bickering and fighting and hating each other and, you know, and threatening divorce and all these other things, would you say they really love each other? You'd probably be a safe bet to say, you know, those people don't love each other. In fact, you could find married couples where you could very confidently say and accurately that they actually hate each other because of what? How would you know? Because of the things that they're doing to one another, the way they're treating each other, right? So we can say with some confidence that your love of God is obvious, at least to yourself, if nobody else. I mean, you know your heart. You know whether or not you love God. But if we love God, then we will be serving God. You know, we'll be keeping these commandments. We'll be doing these things. Go to Deuteronomy chapter number 11. Deuteronomy chapter number 11. Again, Deuteronomy is just a book full of commandments. And it's also a book that is just chock full of the love of God, our love for him, not his love for us. Because sometimes the Bible uses that phrase, you know, the love of God. And we have to determine is he talking about the God's loving us or is it the love of God that we love him? But in Deuteronomy, it's our love towards him quite often. Therefore, it says in verse 1, thou shalt love the Lord thy God. And so many people just want to put a period right there. Oh, that's easy. You know, just say I love God. You know, just tell people I'm a Christian. Every now and then, you know, I'll go to church on Christmas and Easter and God will know I love him. And that'll be good enough, right? And then I can tell everyone I love God, right? Nope. He says thou shalt love the Lord thy God and keep his charge and his statutes and his judgments and his commandments all way. All way. You know, that means you're going to have to do it all the time. You're going to keep these things. That's how you know you love God. And you say, well, what's the point of loving God? Well, one, it's a commandment. It's the first commandment. Are there any other commandments you would like to just throw out the window this morning? I mean, if we're going to throw out the love of God, it's like, well, what other what other commandments do you want to get rid of? You know, that whole thing about killing people, it's kind of old. You know, it's outdated. It's Old Testament, right? Thou shalt not kill. Have you seen the way people drive in this town? You know, obviously, we're going to keep these commandments. But it's funny that people, they throw out the love of God pretty easily, almost subconsciously sometimes. So what's the point? Why should I love God? Well, one, it's a commandment. And two, how about some incentive this morning rather than just being harped at? You know, obeying God leads to the blessing of God. You know, if you obey God, you're going to be blessed by God. You know, and this is this is kind of paradox. If we if we love God and we serve God, then he blesses us and then we love him more. Right. Because we start to realize how much God loves us when we see God start to do things on our behalf. And and we start to think about how God has blessed us in our lives. Look, I don't care how much you love God. It's it will never compare to how much God loves you. You know, God's not just up in heaven, like, love me, you know, obey love. You know, just like angrily demanding that we love him. It is commanded of us. But, you know, it's for our own good, good to love God. You know, God says, hey, you love me, I'll bless you. And by the way, if we choose not to love God and not serve him, you know, God will will chase in us. The Bible says he chases every son we receive it. Neither is there any son who we chases, if not. In fact, the Bible says that if we be without chastisement, then we are bastards and not sons, meaning we're not saved. You know, if you're a saved Christian and you opt out on the love of God and serving God, God is not just going to let you go scot free. Sometimes Christians get this in their head. Well, you know, I'm just not going to serve God. I'm not going to love him. I know I'm his child. He loves me, but I'm just going to do my thing and do whatever I want. It's like you got another thing coming. You're not your own. You are bought with the price as the price of a lamb without blemish, without spot. You know, you've been redeemed through the blood of Christ. You know, the Bible says you're not your own. Therefore, glorify God in your members. But obeying God leads to the blessing of God. If you look there in Deuteronomy chapter 11, verse 13, and it shall come to pass if you shall hearken diligently unto my commandments, which I command you this day, to love the Lord your God. So there it is again. If you keep the commandments diligently. And what were they again? What were those commandments? To love the Lord thy God. This is the first and greatest commandment. And to serve him with all your heart. So it's action that we take when we love God. And with all your soul that I will give you the rain out of your land in his due season, the first rain, the latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn and thy wine and thine oil. And obviously he's speaking to the nation of Israel at this time. Right? But we could apply this to ourselves on a personal level. You know, we want God to bless our lives. We need to love God and to serve him because that's part and parcel with loving God. That goes together. Those are the same thing. Loving God and serving God, you know, they are, you know, they're the same thing basically. Right? We got to make sure we do that on an individual level. But again, he's speaking to a nation. And he's saying, you know, if you if you diligently keep these commandments, I'm going to bless you. I'm going to give you abundance. Right? And I believe that's why our nation has been blessed. That we're still kind of living off this residual blessing to a large degree that, you know, those that came before us kind of ensured for us. Right? Because there was a Christian time. This is a Christian nation. People love God. But, you know, that's starting to kind of go by the wayside a little bit, isn't it? You know, people are actually coming quite hostile towards the Bible, quite hostile towards the things of God. I'm not ready to say that, you know, everyone out there just hates God. There's probably, you know, a lot of people that genuinely care about the things of God, respect the Bible, respect Christianity in this country. But, you know, we ought to be concerned when we see people wanting to throw the Bible out of public spaces. They don't want to acknowledge God, you know, and then and then things start to get a little tight and people start to wonder, wonder why this is happening. OK. Well, maybe it's because we as a nation have stopped loving God the way we should. Anyway, I don't want to get all political on this morning. You're probably getting enough of that throughout the week. But look at verse 22. He says, for if you shall diligently keep all these commandments, I command you it to do them to love the Lord your God, to walk in his ways and to cleave unto him. You know, that's the same language that the Bible uses when it comes to a husband and wife. Therefore, shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife and they twain shall be one flesh. Right. That's you know, he's saying the same thing. You got to love God like you're more than you would even love your spouse. You know, I can't be the husband I'm supposed to be for my wife if I don't love God the way I'm supposed to. So obeying God leads to the blessing of God. OK. Now, if you would go to First John, Chapter four, I'm going to kind of circle back to what I said earlier, where it says that where I said that the obedience of God or the love of God is obvious in our lives. That was just some kind of incentive for you to love God. Why should you love God this morning? Not just because it's a commandment. You know, God commands us to love him so that he can bless us. Think about that. God's saying, hey, you love me. You serve me. You cleave unto me. You serve me with all that you got and I'll bless you for it. I mean, does God even have does he really have to bless us? You know, even if God didn't bless us, would we still love him? I would hope so. I would say, well, I just love God because he's God. What's not to love? God is great. God is good. But the thing is that God is so good that even though he does not it's not even required of him. He's like, you love me and I'll bless you. Does it sound to you like God wants to be loved? Think about that. God wants us to love him so that he can bless us. But as I started to say earlier, you know, your obedience or your love of God is obvious. If you look at First John Chapter four, verse 20, it says, if a man say, I love God and hate this brother, he is a liar. You know, if we say I love God, but then we hate, you know, our brothers in Christ, our sisters in Christ. We're a liar. We don't love God. For he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? You know, and you could even expand this brother to beyond, you know, just your brothers and sisters in Christ. You could expand this out into the world. You know, if we're just cursing everybody, we're just mad at everyone, we don't love people in this world, the unsaved and saved alike, you know, those people are still made in the image of God. That guy that cut you off in traffic, that lady that gave you a dirty look at the, you know, the grocery market or whatever, you know, they're still made in the image of God. They're still your neighbor. That nasty coworker, you know, whoever, all those people that, you know, you have an axe to grind with, those people are still made in the image of God. They're still your neighbor. And if you can't love those people, can you really say you love God? Because those people are made in the image of God. God loves them. Sometimes we should think about, you know, the people that we're angry and upset with, or we have a dislike for, we need to realize that God loves them. That God still loves them. You know, and if we want to love God, then we need to love the people that he loves too. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians 8, if any man love God, the same is known of him. It's known whether or not you love God. You know, even if it's not obvious to people around you, God knows whether or not you love him. You know whether or not you're loving God the way you ought to. Go to 1 John chapter number 2, 1 John chapter number 2. It's obvious whether or not we love God through our obedience, through whether or not we're doing the things that God has commanded us. 1 John chapter number 2 verse 15, love not the world, none of the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Now again, as I said earlier, when it's the love of the Father, the love of God, it could be either one of two things, either our love for him or his love for us. In this instance, I believe it's talking again, like in Deuteronomy, our love towards him. If we're busy loving the world and all the things that are in the world, there's no room for the love of God. The love of God is not in him. If any man love the world, the love of God is not in him. Because Jesus said you cannot serve two masters, right? You cannot serve God and mammon. God and money basically is what that is. You cannot serve two masters for you either will love the one and despise the other or you will cling to the other one and forsake the other. And again, I'm paraphrasing. But we all know the parable. You cannot love God and mammon. You cannot serve two masters. And if we're busy loving the things of the world, caring about the things of the world, loving mammon more than God, then the love of God is not in us. God still loves us, but it's obvious that we don't love him. At the very least, it's obvious to yourself and it's certainly known of God. If any man love God, it is known of him. Verse 16, for all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and lust of the eyes and the pride of life is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away and the things in this world are going to perish. If we're busy loving the things of this world, you're loving something that will have no merit or have any eternal value whatsoever. That's why Jesus said to set your affection on things which are above. To lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt and where thieves do not break through nor steal. If we make our lives all about the things of this earth and we're just busy loving the things of this world, what are you going to have to show for it? Nothing. Our obedience is obvious through our love of God. The love of the Lord is obedience. If we love God, we'll keep his commandments. That's what Jesus said in John 14. If you love me, keep my commandments. Jesus. That's pretty basic. How do you know if you love God this morning? Are you keeping his commandments? That's really the test of it right there. Go to 1 John 5. Look at verse 1. Whosoever believeth that Jesus Christ is born of God and everyone that loveth him, that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him, saying you're going to love your brothers and sisters in Christ. If you love him that begat, which is God, then you will love those that are begotten of him. You're going to love other saved believers. If we have to drag ourselves to church, if we have to force ourselves to be around the brethren, we have to ask ourselves, do you really love God at that point? Because if you love God, you're going to love others that are begotten of him. Verse 2. By this we know that we love the children of God when we love God and keep his commandments. How do you know if you're loving your neighbor? How do you know if you're loving God the way you ought to? If we keep his commandments. For this is the love of God that we keep his commandments, and his commandments are not grievous. So why would anybody not love God? Because they're too busy loving the things of this world. And when they start to think about what it means to not love the world and love God, they just see a bunch of rules. They just see a bunch of commandments. They go, oh, what a downer. Right? Because the Bible commands things that are in opposition to your flesh. There's things that your flesh is going to absolutely hate about the Bible. There's going to be things that your flesh does not like about this church or the preaching that comes across this pulpit because we're preaching the Bible here. The world doesn't like to be told, hey, you shouldn't be a fornicator. That you shouldn't be an adulterer. That you shouldn't be a drunkard. That you shouldn't be covetous. These are the sins of the flesh. And there's pleasure and sin for a season. People live for the world. They live to be drunks. They live to be high. They live to be living in fornication. They just want to satisfy every craving of the flesh every moment that they get. And you know what? You can't do that and love God. The Bible's against those things. You can't walk in the Spirit and the flesh at the same time. These are contrary one to another so that you cannot do the things that you would. But the Bible says the commandments are not grievous. You're just sitting there and thinking, well, I like getting high. And I like getting drunk. And I like fornicating. And I like not going to church. And I like not serving God. And I don't want anything to do with a bunch of rules. People telling me what to do with my life. You know what? Then you think God's commandments are grievous and you don't love Him. That's fine if you feel that way but don't turn around and say you love God because you don't. And it's obvious that you don't. Because you don't want to keep His commandments. And you think His commandments are grievous. I mean, it's pretty on the nose, isn't it? It's not where you have to wonder what it means to love God. You keep His commandments. And if you find that to be such a drag on your life, then the problem is in your heart. The problem is you. Say, well, you know, I'll just find some other God to love. There is no other God to love. This is another thing that's just throughout Deuteronomy. Isaiah repeats this repeatedly. There is none else. I am the Lord. There is none else. This is who God is, whether you like it or not. This is who God is. He's holy. He's righteous. He's just. And He's good. And He's loving. This is the God of the Bible. This is the true and living God. I probably had you turn away from Deuteronomy. If you have something there, you can go back there. But I'll read to you from Deuteronomy 6. He says in verse 13, Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God, and serve Him, and shalt swear by His name. You shall not go after other gods. Not because there are other gods, but because those are false gods. Of the gods of the people which are round about you. Notice those gods are little g. For the Lord thy God is a jealous God among you. And jealousy today has kind of negative meaning. Because we don't use it the way the Bible uses it. Jealousy in the Bible is actually a good thing. We conflate that with envy today. We kind of make those the same thing. But jealousy is actually a good thing. It's good to be jealous over your spouse. It's good to be jealous over the things that are rightfully yours if someone's trying to take those away. And God is saying here that the Lord thy God is a jealous God. He says elsewhere, my name is jealous. He's a jealous God. And when God sees us as His people, He sees us as His people, He sees us as His people, loving the things of this world, loving other things more than Him, and counting His commandments as grievous, that makes God jealous. Because if you're saved, He bought you. You're His. You're His child. I've used this analogy before, but it would be like if I went home after work and my kids had each made their own little Play-Doh dad. I walked in and they had a little orange dad and a green dad. And a blue dad and all these different colored Play-Doh dads. And then I'm trying to talk to my kids. Hey, what'd you do today? And they just act like I'm not there. They just ignored me. Like I'm just not even in the room. And they start talking to this Play-Doh dad. They just put little eyeballs in it and whatever. And I'm just like, hey, what's up? You think I'm just going to walk away? Oh, my kids don't love me. You know what I'm going to do? I'm going to smash that stupid Play-Doh. I'm going to wad it up into a giant multicolored ball and I'm going to throw it away. And I'm going to say, I'm your father. I'm the one who pays the bills around here. I brought you into this world. I'll take you out. No, no. I'm going to say, hey, I'm your dad. I'm the one you're supposed to be loving. I'm the one that bought you the Play-Doh, that gave you the table, the plane, all that stuff. I'm the one that deserves the love that you're giving to this stupid piece of Play-Doh that doesn't even taste good. Why do they call it dough anyway? It's confusing. You think, oh, dough. Ugh. Right? No? Oh, OK. I'm the only one. I probably am the only one. Right? Well, you know, it's better to learn those lessons later than never, right? That's why I was hitting that espresso before the service got to get that Play-Doh taste out of my mouth. Just kidding. All right. Let's not descend into comedy routine here. But what was I going to say? There is no other God to love, and God's jealous of your affection. You know, God wants you to love Him. And God deserves to be loved. And He says in verse 15, for the Lord thy God is a jealous God among you, lest the anger of the Lord thy God be kindled against thee. Like, God gets mad. God isn't just this, you know, just this unpersonable force in the universe. You watch too much Star Wars if you think that. God is a person. Man is made in the image of God, meaning we are an expression of what He looks like. And God has feeling. And God has emotion. And God has personality. And God has a will. And God takes action. And God gets angry. God gets mad. And one of the things that makes God upset is when He sees the effects of God He sees the affection that is due Him being given to other things. This is why this is the first commandment. This is why this is the great commandment. Because loving God is important, and God deserves our love. And when we don't give it to Him, you know, He doesn't just take that idly. Well, I'll find somebody else to love. Well, there is no one else. This is who God is this morning. Go to Deuteronomy chapter number 30. I'll wrap this up. And again, in Isaiah, he says this over and over again. I am the Lord. There is none else. Well, I don't like God. I don't like what He's like. Well, tough. That's who He is. You know, and if you actually spent some time getting to know God, if you actually started getting time reading your Bible, serving God, learning about the things of God, you would probably change your opinion about God. You'd probably start to realize that God is incredibly good. You know, the earth is the Lord and the fullness thereof. I mean, every good thing comes from God. Every good gift is descended from above, the Bible says in James. You know, it comes down from the Father of lights. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from God. And, you know, there's people in this world, they don't know God, they're not saved, they don't believe in God, and yet they're benefiting from the goodness of God every day. Think about that. There's people in this world that are cursing God with the breath He gave them. And He's being patient and kind and long-suffering towards those people. You know, and God has just blessed us so immensely in our lives. God deserves, you know, our service. God deserves our love, our obedience. I will say this, though, as I begin to wrap up, is that, you know, loving God is optional. Why else would He command it, right? If loving God was just something that was automatic, then why would God have to command it? Why would, when Jesus was asked, you know, what's the first commandment, He'd say, hey, it's to love the Lord thy God with all thy soul, mind, heart, and strength. Why would God in the Old Testament just repeatedly say, love the Lord, love the Lord, love the Lord, serve God, obey? Because it is optional. It is something that people can pass on. You know, Paul prayed and said to the Thessalonians that the Lord would direct their hearts into the love of God, into the patient waiting of Christ. The Lord direct your hearts into the love of God. You know, your love of God sometimes needs to be guided and directed. And that's kind of what this sermon is about this morning, right? Let's put up some guardrails in our lives. That's what's so important about church and so important about the Bible. It kind of keeps us from just going off track. You know, we start kind of veering off the road in our spiritual life. You know, then you hit the guardrail of God's word. Oh, can't do that. You know, you're getting covetous thinking about the things of this world. Your love of God is waxing. You read the Bible, you know, where the love of money is the root of all evil. You read the parables of Jesus about warning about mammon and God and all this. Oh, then you hit this guardrail and you kind of go back. You know, you're contemplating adultery. You're contemplating sin of some sort in your life. And you come to the church and the pastor or the preacher gets up and starts ripping face on some sin. You know, it keeps you on track. And what that's actually doing is directing your heart in the love of God because loving God is keeping his commandments. That's what it means to love God. It's to obey him and keep his commandments. You know, all the mushy stuff comes later. Obedience precedes emotion. Emotion will follow obedience. You're in Deuteronomy 30. Look at verse 15. He said, See, I have set before thee this day life and good and death and evil. So when he's doling out the commandments, right, there's a lot of talk about the blessing of God. There's a lot of talk about if you do this, God will bless you as a nation, as a people. That's a blessing, right? That's good. What he's saying, I'm also setting before you evil, right? Meaning harm, meaning something that is bad, right? Death and evil. Because if we don't do these things, if we don't keep the commandments, God's going to curse us. God's going to punish us. In that, verse 16, I command thee this day to love the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways, to keep his commandments and his statutes and his judgments, that thou mayest live and multiply. Why should I love God? So you can live and multiply and be fruitful and abound and have prosperity and have the blessing of God. That's the reason to love God. But how does that play out in your life? Through obeying and keeping his commandments. That's how the love of God is manifest in your life. The Lord and the Lord thy God shall bless thee in the land where thou goest to possess it. Verse 17, but if thine heart turn away so thou wilt not hear, but shall be drawn away and worship other gods and serve them, I denounce unto you this day that ye shall surely perish and that ye shall not prolong your days in the land where thou passest over Jordan to go to possess it. You know what? That's exactly what happened in the nation of Israel, too. They got an adultery. They kindled the jealousy of God. They forsook God. They did not love God. And God ended up just punishing them repeatedly. Anyone who's read their Bible knows that. You need to love the Lord if you want to be blessed. And I'm just here to tell you this morning that it's optional. You don't have to love God, but you do have to suffer the consequences for naught. You don't get to choose the consequences. You make your choices, but whatever those results are, those aren't up to you. And God has forewarned us. God has told us that we need to love Him. He said this is the first and great commandment to love me. And if you do so, I will bless you. But if you don't, He's already warned us, I will curse you. He can say, well, I don't know that I want to love God and serve God who's just kind of threatening me. Well, too bad. That's who He is. And you can look at it that way. You can take it that way if you want. But the truth is, is that God wants us to love Him so that He can bless us, so that we can live and multiply. And that should make us want to love God and serve Him. And whether we love God or not, let me just close by saying this. Go to 1 John chapter number 3. 1 John chapter number 3. You know, hopefully you've got enough incentive this morning to love God. Hopefully everyone in here already loves God to the max. But the truth is, probably nobody in here can say that, self included. That, you know, if I were to measure the love of God in my life, it's just at the top. It's just overflowing. If we had a little beaker or whatever, thermometer, it's like bursting with love. Maybe it's close for some of us. I don't know. But, you know, we can always love God more. And if we're here and our love of God is waxed cold, if we don't love the things of God, if we don't love the people of God, you know, we need to address that in our lives. You know, how did this church make it six years? Because there's people here that love God. Because, newsflash, if I come in here on a Sunday morning and no one's here, I'm not going to keep doing this. You know, I'm not worried about that. I'm just saying. I'm using this as an example, right? If we're going to make it another six years, people are going to have to continue loving God. You know, it's the people that make up this church. And people are here this morning, I believe, because they love God. And not just because they heard there's brisket. All right? We're trying to keep that under wraps. Under tinfoil, specifically. But, you know, if you're here, hopefully it's because you love God. Well, you know, you're not going to be here six years from now if you don't love God. You're not going to be here six months from now. You might not even be here in six hours for the evening service. No, I get it. Some people have things to go. You can really lay out the guilt right now. But, you know, seriously though, we're here. We've made it this far because there's people here that love God. Let's keep that going. And, you know, maybe if we've been here for that length of time, you know, if we're an OG in the church or whatever, you know, and our love has begun to, you know, it's just like, oh, yeah, another day at Faithful Word. You know, that's cause for concern. We need to go home and ask God to search and try our hearts and to show us, you know, where our love lies. Okay? Because it is optional. You could choose not to love God. People do it all the time. But whether we do or don't, understand this, that God loves you. God loves each and every one of you more than anybody else loves you in this world. That, you know, that's a powerful thought. You say, nobody loves me. Well, God does. You know, hey, if there's no one else that's loving you, you know God does. But I'm sure we all have people that love us. Right? But no matter how much anybody else loves us, we have to understand that God loves us way more. Look at 1 John 3, verse 1. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us. What manner of love. He's talking about the type of love, the degree of love. We can't even begin to comprehend the love of God. That we should be called the sons of God, that we should be called God's child. How do you know God loves you? Because he says you're my child. You know, we who are parents, we think about the love that we have for our children. You know, well, God has an even greater degree of love than that. Right? And it's that same kind of love as a love that a parent would have for a child. That's the manner of love, that we should be called the sons of God. How much does God love us? So much so that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. And should be born again by faith. That's how much God loves you. He took us, a bunch of dirty, rotten sinners, if we're just being honest, who have broken God's commandments to some degree or another. And he said, you know what? I'll clean you up. You know, I'll wash you in the blood of Christ and I'll make you my child. And I'll reserve a seat in heaven for you. And I'll seal you with the Holy Spirit. And if you want, I'll fill you with the Holy Spirit and you can serve me and you can obey me and I'll bless you and you can be a blessing to other people. I mean, that's how much God loves us. And if your love of God has begun to wax cold, one, the warning is, you know, you're probably going to peter out in the Christian life. But if that's the case, the remedy, perhaps, is to sit down and just think about how much God loves you. Therefore, the world knoweth us not because it knew not him. You know, that's the manner of love that God has towards us. And it is optional for you to love God back. But either way, he loves you. And if you say, you know what? I'm going to love God this morning. I choose to love God. Here's how you're going to do it. Like Jesus said, Jesus said, if you love me, keep my commandments. And we need to do that. Why? Because this is the first and greatest commandment. Let's go ahead and close in a word of prayer. Dear Lord, again, thank you for the great love wherewith you loved us. And Lord, I pray that you'd help each of us to learn to love you more and more as we walk and obey your commandments, Lord, as we walk in them. And Lord, I pray that you would just continue to bless this church, Lord. Thank you for the six years that you've given us as a church body. Lord, I pray you'd give us many more and that they would be years that are blessed, that you'd help us to prosper, to be fruitful. And Lord, to be a church that loves you above all other things. We ask these things in Christ's name. Amen. All right, we'll go ahead and sing one more song. All right, so please open up your hymnals to song number 44. We'll be singing song number 44, We'll Work Till Jesus Comes. We've got another song number 44. We'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes, we'll work till Jesus comes Jesus Christ the God, for as he made for the seaside world, when we first stepped upon his presence, we were done for ever. Till word and earth, till Jesus comes, will word and earth, till Jesus comes, will word and earth. Till Jesus comes, will word and earth, will word and earth, till Jesus comes, will word and earth. And now we're singing the ecosystem. And now we're singing the ecosystem. And now we're singing the ecosystem. And now we're singing the ecosystem.