When I counsel with people, I often hear them say something like this. You know, Chip, I know God loves me, but I just don't feel it. He feels so far away, even though intellectually, I know he loves me. How do I get that sense of God's love?
Well, if that's you, stick around. We're going to learn how to experience God's love today. Thank you for being with us for this Edition of Living on the Edge with Chip Ingram. Chip serves as our Bible teacher for this global teaching and discipleship ministry, helping Christians develop an authentic faith. Today we're picking up where Chip left off last time in our series The Real God.
And we hope you've enjoyed and learned a lot from this study into the core attributes of our great God. and to help others learn as you have, Would you take a minute after this program and share this series with someone? You can do that easily through the Chip Ingram app or from wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for spreading the word on how our ministry is impacting you.
Alright, if you're ready, here's Chip with part two of his message, The Love of God. The second evidence is providence. And this is a It's not so much a thing. theological word is it that he shows kindness. It's God's Kindness to all men.
As Christians, sometimes we kind of get the idea that God loves us. but we get a little ticked off when he loves other people. We do. We really do. You know, it's the Us Four No More club.
Matthew chapter 5, verses 44 and 45, Jesus speaking, Sermon on the Mount, but I tell you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and he sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. The Apostle Paul. Same idea as he's speaking that classic Acts 17. And among all the intellectuals, he's giving his message.
on Mars Hill. And he says, verse 24: The God who made the world and everything in it is the Lord of heaven and earth. And he doesn't live in temples built by hands. And he's not served by human hands as if he needed anything because he himself gives all men life and breath and everything else. God gives all men.
The most evil people, breath and life and everything else. From one man, he made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth, and he determined the time set for them and the exact places where they should live. God did this so that men would seek him and perhaps reach out for him and find him, though he is not far. From each one of us. I would just remind you that the evidence of God's love is He shows His kindness to all people.
He loves not just those who are righteous. He loves the unrighteous. He loves the evil. Why? He's longing and creating and giving rain and joy.
Non-Christians have great weddings. Non-Christians have babies. Non-Christians fall in love. Non-Christians have great promotions. Non-Christians develop new patents.
They're scientists. They're artists. They have this creative DNA given by God and they experience the joys of life. And it's all intended so they would say, Ha! Who gives this all to me?
That they might reach out and touch him and find him. Why? Because they matter. Because he loves them. The third way that God expresses His love is through the Incarnation.
He's literally proactively pursuing you. Jesus' mission statement is in Luke 19.10. For the Son of Man came to seek and to save that which was lost. John 4, we have the woman at the well. And should we worship on this mountain or that mountain?
And she's, you know, had five husbands and is shacking up with someone now. And they have a spiritual conversation and Jesus breaks every cultural taboo. And he says, I've got living water for you. I've got life for you. It's not when you clean up your act.
She was totally rejected by her culture. That's why she was out during that time of the day. And then what does he say? The Father is seeking, literally, study the word, is pursuing those who will worship him in spirit and in truth. Jesus came He left all the glory of heaven.
Myriads and myriads and myriads and myriads of angels worshiping him. He takes on human flesh. lives on a dirty planet, is rejected by men, His life explains what the Father is like. Why? to pursue you.
We don't know what God is like. He's invisible. What's he like? How does he think? How does he treat?
How does he treat people that are desperate? How does he treat people that have been so wicked, so perverted, so sinful? I mean, especially then. Five husbands and living with someone? How what does what would God think of someone like that?
He would think I would love to give you some living water. I'd love to forgive you. See, what I know is You were looking for love in all the wrong places. You were looking to fill the hole in your heart with men, and you found that five couldn't do it, and probably the guy you have isn't doing it now. You were looking for significance, and you were looking for security, and you were looking to be whole.
What you didn't know is you were looking for me. But you just couldn't see me, and you didn't know about me. And I want you to know. I have a free gift for you that's available now, not if you do something, not because you will do something. Because I love you.
That's how God feels. And he pursues us. Many of you, and you know, I don't kind of know your background, but I think the very first time, do you remember the first time, like, Maybe it was junior high, or maybe it was high school, or some of you were advanced, maybe late elementary. I didn't really get into the whole girl-guy thing until late junior high. All I cared about was a basketball or hitting a baseball, and you know, girls, girls, girls.
About ninth grade, Girls, people, whoa, you know, pretty cool, you know? Up until then, it was, you know, how many hits did I get and how many points did I score? And then about ninth grade, Woo, you know? And do you remember the first time Mary told Sally? That told Phil, that told Bobby.
That Judy liked you? Do you remember that? Remember how good it felt? And then you kind of walk down the hall. Of course, no one does it.
You do it through the chain. And so then you walk by and then you see her. Ru ru ru really? And didn't it feel awesome to be pursued, huh? Do you remember some of you guys, gals, do you remember the first time you got on a sand lot and you started playing some sort of ball, baseball, basketball, this or that, and someone they're choosing up sides and you know, someone goes, hey, you, I want you on my team.
Remember how good that felt? You ever have someone come to you and say, I know you like your job here, I'll pay you $10,000 more. I'll tell you what. Man, you are one of the most competent people we've ever seen. We think you could be a great part of our company.
Do you remember how good that felt? Do you understand? that the God of the universe demonstrates his love for you, he's pursuing you. He made you for himself. You were the object of his love well before you came to Christ, and he's pursuing you.
That's why Jesus took on human, that's the incarnation. He took on human flesh so he could come and pursue you for relationship with himself. That's how much he loves you. Let's get this moving from our head down to our heart. The fourth way that he reveals his love is through discipline.
We don't really like this one so much. Hebrews 12, 6 says, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son. The word punished there literally has more, it's not the idea of a punitive idea nearly as much as it's the idea as he harshly corrects or brings about correction. for a desired result. I majored in psychology in graduate school and an undergraduate along with education, and I had to write a research paper for a thesis that I did.
And one of the theses that I did is I looked up All the things in terms of the effective role and responsibility of a father. in the family. And so I did all this sociological and psychological study about what a dad brings. And in my study, you know, you got to do all this empirical research and all these control studies and read all these papers. And it was really interesting the number of studies that have been done on juvenile delinquents.
and they do an interviewing process and they find out what made you feel loved growing up. You know what number one or two was in a number of the studies? I knew my parents loved me. when they discipline me. You see, when you have a mom or dad who says, Hey, what time did I need to be in?
I don't care. is lock the door when you get in. I don't care. When you talk back to a parent and you do things that are disrespectful and they just yell back at you, and now you have two kids acting like fools toward one another, they don't care. It's just unbelievable the families.
Here's how they parent. All they do is they just, here's 20 bucks, here's 100 bucks, here's 200 bucks, tell you what, go to the mall, do whatever you want to do, just get the heck out of my hair. And when they do things that are wrong, you know what? There's no consequences. And you know what, kids know?
If you don't care enough to confront me, If you don't care enough to do what give me what I need instead of what I want, You don't love me. And you know, God shows his love for you. is he will selectively correct you. And I don't like it and you don't like it. But it's an evidence of his love.
The fifth way he reveals his love is by the Holy Spirit. He supernaturally pours his love into our hearts. Romans 5, 5 says, and hope doesn't disappoint us because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit whom he has given us. This is that spirit. The moment you come to Christ, you do understand what happens.
You know, you are an unbeliever, like I was an unbeliever. You understand the gospel. You realize Christ died in your place for your sin. You repent. That means you have a change of mind and you recognize what's true about you.
And you say, with empty hands, I want to receive the free gift by faith of grace. The moment I receive Jesus Christ, put my trust in His work and His resurrection, the Spirit of God enters my life. Ephesians 1: I'm sealed with the Spirit. I'm adopted into God's family. I'm baptized into this thing called the church.
Spiritual gifts are deposited in me. I have an inheritance that'll never change. And I'm now a part of God's family, and the Holy Spirit takes up residence in me. That's why I'm his temple. And then what he will do, the Spirit of God, remember he says to the disciples, you can't take in everything, but the Spirit, when he comes, will lead you into all truth.
That's the last night. You remember at the very last night he said, I am with you now, but it's better that I go because I won't just be with you, I will be in you. And the Father will come, and I will come. And as just as I am in the Father, and the Father is in me, so we will come, and we will be in you. How?
By the Holy Spirit. And so the Spirit of God dwelling in us. Will take the word, and you've had it happen. He pours out the love of God. I remember late one night I was dating a girl that I was sure I was going to marry.
And her life was going this way, and she was a believer, and my life was going this way. And it just, it was a lordship issue, and it wasn't some big breakup. I just knew that, you know, she was convinced that we were supposed to, you know, after college, get married and, you know, she was an only child and live in this little town outside of West Virginia on the higher river and then live right next to her parents. And I felt the call of God on my life. And but man, I'm telling you, I loved her.
And I just, I mean, I was heartbroken. And so we you know, I said, you know, Lordship, I mean, lordship is doing what's right whether you feel like it or not. I mean, it doesn't have a whole lot to do with how you feel. Most of the best obedience in my life, I'm telling you, I didn't want to do. But I don't feel bad about it.
Jesus didn't want to do his either. In the garden, I don't hear Jesus saying, Father, thank you. This is the hour which we planned on for the foundations of the earth. I'm really excited about this one. Hi-thi, the Holy Spirit for me.
Hey, let's go. What I hear is, Father, if there's any other way, if there's a plan B in the mind of the Godhead, let's go with it now. Nevertheless, You demonstrate your love for God. What, what, how? Obedience.
John 14, 21. He that has my commandments and keeps them He it is that loves me, and he that loves me will love my Father. And then what happens? and we will come and we will reveal or manifest ourselves to him. You're listening to Living on the Edge.
Before we hear the rest of Chip's message, let me remind you that we are a listener-supported ministry. Your regular gifts help us create programs like this one, develop new resources, and encourage pastors globally. Prayerfully consider becoming a monthly partner today. Then go to livingontheedge.org to give a gift. Thanks so much for your support.
Well here again is Chip. And so we go our separate ways and one night You know, we've broken up, but I mean, like, I'm used to for like a couple, three years, home basketball game, hairs wet, come up the stairs, and she's always there, right on the rail. She grabs my arm. I feel like a special guy. Go over to the student union, get a coke, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da relationship.
Well, we break up for three or four or five months, and I'm praying. I'm going, oh, God, change your heart. Help her to see a vision for the world. And, you know, I'm crying and I don't want to see anybody. And I'm in my pity party.
And, oh, God, it's so hard to follow you. There'll never be anybody like this that's good ever, ever. You know, I'm not kidding. Also Whiny wimpy. And I was depressed.
A guy like me loses weight, you got problems. You know? And so And so, you know, I'm praying and I'm believing God's going to do something. He's going to bring her back to me.
So I come out of the locker room, hair's wet, you know. We lost another game. That wasn't good. And I come up the stairs and there she is. And I'm thinking, yes.
God, thank you so much.
So I come up the stairs. And then she's got that look like. There's something wrong about this. And I said, hi, and I said her name, hi, how you doing? And there was a sort of this little standoff-ish.
And then a guy came up the stairs. It was another guard on the team. Yeah. Ladies, you don't know, but guys, you know how you talk in locker room and you kind of know the score, where guys are at, what they do, why they do it, all that jazz? Man, this dude's a snake.
Okay. I mean he's a snake. And he walks right by me and he goes out the door and they go out arm in arm. And I remember walking across campus being as mad at God as ever. Boy, I mean, I was mad at me, man.
I was so mad, I told God: either you speak to me, you speak to me tomorrow, I cannot believe you would do this to me. And I went over and I went over and I said, okay. I'm good, okay? I'm going to read where I'm reading. You better speak to me.
I'm serious. I mean, literally, the words came to me. I feel like a beast inside. I just, I mean, it was so angry and so disappointed. And so I read Psalm 71.
He didn't speak.
Okay. Psalm 72, he didn't speak. I mean, I just, I figure you ought to keep reading where you are, you know. If you start jumping around, you'll try and make God speak to you. I open Psalm 73.
I'm telling you, I read Psalm 73 and I have never audibly heard the voice of God that could not have been the Holy Spirit pouring out his love more clearly, more powerfully in all my life. It was scary. The very thoughts that I had, the very phrases out of my mind, the things that I said, the very core issues, I read Psalm 73 and I wept like a baby in my room. God understood. And he had a plan.
You see, one of the ways God will love you is the Holy Spirit will be poured out, and the way He'll do it is that sometimes it'll do it through His Word.
Sometimes I was in India shortly, and I mean, it was such a dark time in the middle of the night, and spiritual opposition, and all this tsunami, and I couldn't sleep. And there's all the spiritual warfare going on in the middle of the night. I just started, I put on my tape player and I just started to sing. God, I just feel so alone and so far away, and this is so scary. And I just began to sing, and the Spirit of God just came into the room and poured the love of God, and I just felt like He put His arms around me.
I've been in an ICU before where I thought, oh, one of my boys is going to die. And I begged God and I pleaded with God. And the Spirit, you've been there. You've had these, haven't you? The final way is through his son.
Jesus reveals the nature of God's love for us through His Son. Jesus modeled compassion, Grace and truth. Right? Just the life of Jesus. He shows us the Father's love.
By how he responds to children. by how he feeds people. Bible, how he has compassion on Jarius's daughter, how he stops with the widow when it's her only son, and he raises him from the dead. by how he forgives. He reveals his love by his teaching and he explains.
I mean, if you want to know how Jesus feels about people, Luke 15. Why are you hanging out with those sinners and those bad people? And so he tells them a parable and he tells them the three familiar stories: lost sheep, lost coin, lost son. You know the story. And the picture is the Father waiting for the sun to return.
To do what? He goes out every day. Is he here yet? Is he here yet? Is he okay?
It's the picture of someone pursuing and seeking and searching, and the sheep comes back on the shoulders, and the coin is found, and there's a party, and the sun returns, and there's life. His teaching told us about the love of God, and his death demonstrated the extent of God's love. This is how we know what love is. Jesus Christ laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down. Our lives for one another.
But God demonstrated his own love for us, Romans 5:8, that while we were yet sinners. You know, there is no performance. We're his enemies then, right? While we're yet sinners, Christ died for us. Do you sense the need to kind of just get some of these truths soaking?
You know, you know, the my mom used to uh She was a school teacher, and so she had trouble trying to get dinner on the table. And when those crock pots were invented, like my mom went nuts. I mean, it was like, whoa. And she could put a piece of meat and potatoes and carrots and just like anything in the refrigerator and put it in this crock pot and then she would turn it on and it would simmer and simmer and simmer all day, sometime 10 or 12 hours. And then it was great.
And you know what? We'll take these truths from the 18 inches from here to here. You need to take these truths and these notes and some of these word pictures and you need to put it in a spiritual crock pot. And rather than trying hard to force it in, God, help me believe that you love me, please, please, please. Just put them in the spiritual crock pot.
In fact, and for me, I put them on three by five cards, and you know, I'll read them and read a verse, and then thank God that this is, you know, and so much of it, please don't get hung up on your emotions. We are so emotionally bound.
Well, I don't feel like he loves me.
Well, okay, get over it. I mean, you know what? I don't either. But what I The people that love me, I don't want one guy to say, oh, I really feel good about you, chip, but I can't help you. I'd rather the other guy say, I don't feel so good about you, but here's $100 to solve your problem, or I'll pull your car out of the ditch.
You see, we need to begin to understand it's not an ooe-gooey emotional love. It's an objective reality of how God actually thinks and feels that you actually possess. And when you get your mind renewed and you begin to respond in worship, I will tell you that then you will emotively begin to experience more and more the love of God as the Spirit of God pours it into your heart. But it's a journey. And it's a process.
An object's value is always determined by the price paid for it. To God you are worth the price of his Son's death in your place. God loves you. How do you receive it? You must respond to God's love.
in three specific ways. One, You receive it by faith in your heart. John 3:16, for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever, you need to be a whosoever. You need to be one of those people who receive it. John 1:12 says, Yet to all who receive Him, Jesus, to those who believe in His name, He gave the right to become children of God.
If there's anybody that has never received And jumped into the liquid ocean of love of the God I've described. Just receive him. Just say, Lord Jesus, I want you. I get it. come into my life.
The second thing to experience God love is we must believe. It by faith in our minds. You receive him. By faith in your heart, and then we must go through the journey that I've been talking about of believing it by faith in our minds. 1 John 4, 13 through 16 says, We know that we live in Him and He in us because He's given us of His Spirit.
And we have seen and testified that the Father has sent His Son to be the Savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in him and he in God. And so we know and rely on the love that God has for us. Did you hear that? We know objectively and we rely.
on God's love. How do you know and rely? How does it work? Let me give you three real specific ways. The way you begin to get this process operating, where it moves from here in your head to your heart.
is you saturate your mind in the truth. of God's love for you. I've put a very, very important passage, Romans 8. 28 through about 39. You know, it's the passage about neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things present nor things to come.
Nothing can separate you from the love of Christ. Nothing.
So, you saturate your mind with God's truth about this. And that's why I talked about whether it's three by five cards or being in the scriptures or praying these back to the Lord. Second, ask God to help you grasp His love for you. I don't know what you pray or who you pray for, but the Apostle Paul in Ephesians 3 gives us a great example. When he's praying for a group of people, what's he pray?
He says, God, I pray for this group of people right here. What do I pray? I pray that you will strengthen them in their inner man.
So that they could by faith grasp the extent of your love for them. What's he praying? God, I want you to do something to take it from here down to here. Have asked God. Pray for yourself.
Lord, help me grasp that you love me. Lord, I want to even feel it. Lord, help me to take all those messages and false kinds of loves and all the baggage that I have and wipe it away. Please help me experience and know your love. Do you think he'll answer that prayer?
You know for sure it's as well.
So you saturate your mind with truth, you ask him, and then third, refuse to seek love and cheap substitutes. This is the woman at the well. And it's all of us in here to some degree or another. And 1 John 2, 15 and 16 says, Notice the word, do not love the world. or the things that are in the world.
the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes. the boastful pride of life. It's not from the Father, it's from the world. But he who does the will of God abides for ever. And those are the three things that trip everybody up all the time.
There is a sensual lust, there's a desire for more stuff, and there's a desire for ego to be a somebody. But you know, what's behind those? What's behind those is this desire to be loved, to be significant, secure, to matter. And they're just cheap substitutes. It's the world promising you, you'll get loved if you do this.
You'll get loved if you act like this. You'll get loved if you have this much money. You'll get loved if your body looks like this. You'll get loved if you can just serve everybody all the time, be super, super Christian, who never says no to anybody and has an absolutely whacked out life, and they'll give you all these strokes and it'll feel like love. They're all cheap substitutes.
God says refuse them. And what seals the deal is after you receive it and believe it, we must bestow it by faith through our wills. See the way you really Get is to give. And there's a command. I mean, this isn't one of the options.
John 13, remember last night with the disciples? A new commandment I give unto you that you love one another. How? Just as I've loved you. How's that?
sacrificial, unconditional. By giving? And then there's a calling. Jesus laid down his life for us. We should what?
Lay down our lives for one another. And then there's a promise. I do not understand this people. I don't understand it at all. But when I willfully choose whether I feel like it or not, to give my time And give my money, and give my gifts, and give my attention, and give my care.
After I have Taking a drink. or taken my water bottle or backed up my truck. into the ocean of God's liquid love. and I begin to just spray it out radically to other people. All I can tell you is it creates a spiritual vacuum, and the more I give it out, the more God gives to me, and the more I give it out, the more I get it back.
And many of us are spending our lives seeking to experience God's love, and the catalyst or the action point. Will be when you stop asking who loves me, who didn't say hi to me, am I okay, and you start asking who needs a friend. Who needs some help? Who needs some love? Who needs a listening ear?
Who needs a phone call? Who needs a little money that We'll never know where it came from. And I'm just telling you, give. and it'll be given unto you. Good measure, pressed down, shaken together, running back into your lap.
So if you love with a teaspoon, you get a teaspoon of love back. You love with a tablespoon, you get a tablespoon back. You love with a gallon jug, you get a gallon jug back. Stick that tanker into the ocean and start going, woo! And your life might get downright scary.
When I taught this message. I literally stopped and gave people time to think. And I want to stop for you. Wouldn't it be a tragedy to fill our hearts and minds with all this information about God? and know that He loves us intellectually, and not take the time at this moment in your history and stop, and respond to the love of God.
What is God doing in your heart? If you are outside of Christ, if you've heard about His love and you've learned about the cross, you've heard about the payment for sin, you've heard about the resurrection, you've heard that you are the object of His love, Are you willing today to receive it? That's the first step. Are you willing to admit that you fall short? Turn from your sin and right now in this moment, Lift up the empty hands of faith and cry out and say, Lord Jesus, save me.
Forgive me, cleanse me. I believe you died for me. Do it right now. In your own words talk with God. And then tell someone today.
I prayed to receive Christ. I receive God's love. If you're a believer. Are you going to start believing that God really loves you? Are you going to get rid of some of that baggage and go into I mean a study and a commitment to believe in your mind, saturating your mind with the truth, getting involved in community, refusing to believe all those lies, get counseling, do whatever you need to do to begin to bank your life on the reality that God loves you?
And by way of application I would say I can't think of a better series that we offer to get a group of people together and meet in a coffee shop or a living room with a group of men, a group of women, or maybe as couples, and say, you know what, unless we get clear on who God really is, We're never going to get right with him or anybody else. And then do a little Bible study, hold one another accountable, and say, We're going to get to know you, God. Finally, You've got to bestow God's love. You may have a pretty accurate picture of him. And my challenge to you, especially mature believers, is let's get outside of ourselves and let the world know there's happy news, there's forgiveness, there's restoration, there's power.
Believers, let's lift our heads. And get involved with people that maybe we're uncomfortable with, and let's love them. They're not gonna know God is love unless we, His children, model it. Are you willing to do something radical? I mean, love them the way Jesus loved them.
Father thank you for this great study of who you are. may we grasp it with clarity. May we receive your forgiveness. may we believe on a daily basis accurately who you are, and then will you use us as instruments and conduits of the supernatural love of God Almighty through our Lord Jesus Christ. It's in His name we pray.
Amen. If you just prayed to receive Christ with CHIP, we have a free resource we'd like to put in your hands that was uniquely created for new believers. This tool will help you understand what it means to trust in Jesus and what to do next. Request this free resource by calling 888-333-6003 or by visiting livingontheedge.org and clicking the New Believers button. That's livingontheedge.org or call 888-333-6003.
Let us help you get started in your faith journey.
Well for Chip and the entire team, this is Dave Druy thanking you for listening to this Edition of Living on the Edge and I hope you'll join us again next time.
