Hello there,
I am excited for you to be joining us on this great occasion to share the word of God. It is my prayer that you prosper, be in health, even as thy soul prospers.
Today’s message will be coming from John 3: 16. In John 3: 16 Jesus says, “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” John 3: 16 is a very familiar passage of scripture. It is probably the most commonly quoted scripture in the world. So many people love this particular verse, because it is the verse that says God loves everyone. It is a blessing to know that God so loved us so much that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish, but have have everlasting life. How awesome is it to know that the Most High, The Creator of all that exists, God the Father. The LORD GOD JEHOVAH loves you. It warms my heart to know that Jesus Christ the SON of GOD loves us so much that He died on a cross to redeem us from our sins. Jesus loves you! It is wonderful to know that God loves us that way?! It’s a love so big too big to fully understand how He would sacrifice His only SON to save us.
The love of God is so big and so strong. The love of God Jehovah is Amazing and Wonderful. It is imperative the people know that God loves them. There are so many people who don’t understand why God loves them. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary that we witness to them the love of God. However, it is critical that we understand that having the capacity and the ability to love so big comes with A LOT of pain. I can’t imagine the heartbreak God feels, when we as a human race we live as though we don’t want Him in our lives. There are many of us who confess to be Christians, but we have not made God the head of our lives. Especially for those who were once saved, it breaks the Lord’s heart when we turn away from Him. In Hebrews 6:6, the writer describes the pain that God feels when we reject Him. He says it’s like crucifying Jesus Christ afresh and making Him open shame.
Sometimes I wonder do we really understand the shame, and the torture, and the humiliation leading up to the Crucifixion. The suffering that Jesus went through during his crucifixion was horrible and terrible. And the writer of Hebrews teaches that when the believer walks away from God, it’s like crucifying Him all over again. The writer of Hebrews says that when we reject Jesus, it’s like putting Him through all of that pain and torture all over again. When we reject Jesus, it’s like beating Him all night with a Roman scourge all over again. It’s like humiliating him with nakedness and shame. He says it’s like placing a crown of thorns on the Lord’s head all over again. The writer of Hebrews describes that it's just like spitting in the face of our Lord Jesus Christ.
It’s a heartbreaking, gut wrenching travesty for humanity to reject Jesus Christ who is the ultimate manifestation of the love of God. It’s like the betrayal a husband or a wife feels when their spouse has been unfaithful. Oftentimes, we as preachers make the appeal for backsliders to return to Jesus before it’s too late. We try so hard to bring the people back to God while there is still time. We try to lead them to Jesus Christ, the only one who can deliver us from death, Hell, and the grave. We cry out “Jesus Loves You!!” We tell you, “God is married to the backslider!” But I’m afraid that so many people don’t understand the urgency of what we are saying when we say “God is married to the backslider.” God claims to be married to the backslider in the third chapter of Jeremiah. If you’ll start at 12th verse, you will find where God commanded the prophet Jeremiah:
Go and proclaim these words toward the north, and say, Return, thou backsliding Israel, saith the LORD; and I will not cause mine anger to fall upon you: for I am merciful, saith the LORD, and I will not keep anger for ever. Only acknowledge thine iniquity, that thou hast transgressed against the LORD thy God, and hast scattered thy ways to the strangers under every green tree, and ye have not obeyed my voice, saith the LORD. Turn, O backsliding children saith the LORD; for I am married unto you: and I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion.
Brothers and Sisters, when God said He was married to the backslider, it was a warning. It was not an easy message. This was an exhortation to the nation of Israel to turn their hearts back to Jehovah. In this verse, Jeremiah was crying out to the nation of Israel to return to God. God was crying out to the nation of Israel that He was married to them. God was reminding them that they had an agreement. God is saying we had a covenant together. We are married. I am your God, and you are supposed to be my people. If you’ll go down to the 20th verse, you will find where Jeremiah cries, “Surely as a wife treacherously departeth from her husband, so have ye dealt treacherously with me, O house of Israel saith the LORD.” God told Jeremiah to cry out a warning to the nation of Judah, because they betrayed the love of God. Jeremiah was crying, because God’s own people had violated the covenant that God established.
For those of you who don’t know who Jeremiah is, Jeremiah was a young priest who lived in a town called Anathoth. Anathoth is a town located between Jerusalem and another city called Michmash. God called Jeremiah into the ministry in the thirteenth year of King Josiah’s reign, six hundred and twenty-six years before Jesus Christ our Lord. Jeremiah was called into the ministry as a priest, and God anointed him as a prophet. Jeremiah is the writer of two books that are found in the Old Testament. He wrote the book of Jeremiah and the book of Lamentations. The book of Jeremiah is filled with warning, prophecy and the prophecy of God’s judgment. In the beginning of the book of Jeremiah you will find God warning Israel, because they violated their covenant with God. They violated their marriage to God.
You will also find in the book of Jeremiah the prophecy concerning a famine that was coming upon the Judah. You will find Jeremiah complaining to God, because the people were mocking him and defaming his name. They were making fun of Jeremiah saying he was not a real prophet. They mocked Jeremiah saying God did not say the things God told him to say. He was complaining to God, because the people were rejecting the warnings of God. In the book of Jeremiah, you will find the prophecy concerning the coming destruction of Jerusalem. In the book of Jeremiah, you will find God pleading and warning the nation of Israel, because they had broken the covenant that God established with them.
In the book of Lamentations, you will find the prophet Jeremiah lamenting the destruction of Jerusalem. Jerusalem was destroyed the exact way God told Jeremiah it would be destroyed. In the book of Lamentations, Jeremiah is crying and weeping. Crying and weeping. Weeping and crying. Jeremiah cried and wept so much until many years later theologians labeled him the weeping prophet. Jeremiah is crying and weeping, because of the horror he saw when Jerusalem was destroyed. So, when Jeremiah said, “God is married to the backslider,” that does not mean that everything is okay.
Why did God pronounce warning and judgement on the people of Israel? In Jeremiah 1:16, God says that he pronounced judgement upon Israel, because they fixed their hands to do wickedness. God said, “...They have forsaken me, and have burned incense unto other gods, and they worshipped the works of their own hands.” God said that Israel had forsaken
They forsook the covenant they had with God. They violated the marriage that God had with His people. It is critical that we know that Jesus loves us. He loves each and every one of you, but it is equally important to know that God is a covenant God. God is a covenant God. I have come to tell you that Jesus Christ is a loving God, but he is also a covenant God. What is a covenant? A covenant is a sovereign pronouncement of God by which He establishes a relationship of responsibility. Because our God is sovereign and eternal, He is the one who establishes the covenants. Inside of the covenant, God establishes responsibilities for Himself and person/people with whom He has established the covenant. In the covenant, there is an agreement of the responsibilities between both parties. Oftentimes, inside of covenants, God establishes clauses for obedience and disobedience. The clause for faithfulness and obedience, is called blessings. The clause disobedience is called curses. Frequently, the curse for sin would be the penalty of death. Also, the wrath of God would cause people to die. To commit sin is a crime against God. That’s why the bible says, “the soul that sinneth, shall surely die.” Paul also said in Romans 6:23 that, “The wages of sin is death.”
Throughout the entirety of the bible, there are covenants known as the eight great covenants that God has established in the earth. The first covenant is known as the Edenic Covenant. The Edenic Covenant is found in Genesis 2:16-17 where it says,”And the LORD God command the man, saying Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.” The blessing was the authority to each of any tree in the garden except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and the curse was that Adam and all of his seed would die as a result of him eating from the forbidden tree. The second covenant is the Adamic Covenant. The Adamic Covenant is found in Genesis 3:16. In the Adamic Covenant, the serpent was cursed to crawl on his belly throughout the remainder of the existence of its creation, because he allowed Satan to use him. The Adamic Covenant is also the first time man was promised a Redeemer whom we now know as Jesus Christ. In the Adamic Covenant, the woman was cursed to be under the headship of the man, and she was to have pain in childbirth. Light occupation was changed into burdensome labor, and life would be full of sorrow. In Genesis 9:15-16, you will find the third covenant.
The third covenant was made to Noah. God had destroyed every living being outside of the Arc of safety, and made a covenant with Noah with the symbol of the rainbow promising never to destroy the whole world again with flood waters. The fourth covenant was the Abrahamic Covenant where God promised Abraham that He would bless all the nations through Abraham’s seed. The Fifth Covenant was the covenant God made with Moses when He gave him the Ten Commandments. In your own study time, you will find the clauses for obedience and disobedience to the Mosaic Covenant in the 28th Chapter of Deuteronomy.
The sixth covenant was the Palestinian Covenant where God gave conditions on how they should enter the promised land. The Children of Israel promised to only worship Jehovah, and God secures their land and punishes their oppressors. The seventh covenant was the Davidic Covenant where God promised David that his seed would be on the throne of Israel forever. The eighth covenant is the covenant that we are under. The eighth covenant is found in the book of Hebrews. The eighth covenant is also known as the New Covenant, because Jesus Christ secures to us eternal security and blessedness through his perfect sacrifice. Jesus Christ became the ultimate sacrifice. There is no more need for animal sacrifices. There’s no more need for peace and sin offerings to appease the wrath of God. Jesus Christ suffered the wrath of God for us. That’s how much He loves us, but the reality.
You know there is another writer who walked with Jesus who prophesied about the Bride of Christ. The apostle John prophesied about the Bride of Christ. John teaches us that the New Jerusalem is the Bride of Christ, and the New Jerusalem is where the saints of all ages will dwell for eternity. The reality is that God is still the same God He was during the days of Jeremiah He is a jealous God who loves us more than we can fathom. How do we know this? In John 3:17-18 Jesus said, “For God sent not his Son to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the only begotten Son of God.” The Apostle John also says in St. John Chapter 3:35-36:
The Father loveth the Son, and hath given all things into his hand. He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.
Jesus loves us! There’s no doubt about it. He proved by giving His life, and He has the scars to prove it. But He is a jealous God. In John 15: 13-14 Jesus said. “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you. I have come to tell each and every one of you that Jesus Christ loves you. However, the real question is “What kind of a bride do you want to be?” Jeremiah said that Israel was like a bride unfaithful to her husband, but the Apostle John proclaims in the book of Revelation that the New Jerusalem is called the Bride of Christ. What is the New Jerusalem?! New Jerusalem is a city that will come down from heaven where the saints of all ages will dwell for eternity. The people who are solely set apart for God. The saints are the people who only worship God. People who love talking to God and their only source of comfort is in God. Their sole dependence is on God. The saints are the people who deny themselves for the cause of Christ. Their whole identity is found in Christ. Yes, it is true, He loves you with an immeasurable heart. His love is so big and so high. It stretches so far and reaches so wide. He only requires to have all of you and never to share you with another god. What do you give more attention to than him? Who do you think of more than him? Have I made someone a god in my life? Have I made something a god in my life? Who do you talk to the most throughout your day? Who and what do you talk about the most? These are all questions we should ask ourselves. The bibles teaches us that we ought to examine ourselves to see if we are in the faith. We must examine ourselves to be sure that we are the saints of God. Sanctified and set apart. Holy unto God. Presenting our bodies a living sacrifice to God, holy and acceptable. Be sure that you have not allowed anyone or anything to take His place. He only requires the deepest form of affection a human can give, and that is life-long intimate worship. He wants it all for Himself. My question for you today is “What Kind of Bride Will You Be?”
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