{"id":191,"date":"2011-02-13T09:00:05","date_gmt":"2011-02-13T17:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/?p=191"},"modified":"2017-03-29T10:09:03","modified_gmt":"2017-03-29T17:09:03","slug":"love-takes-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/2011\/02\/13\/love-takes-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Love Takes Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

1John 3:1<\/strong><\/p>\n

Lavish.\u00a0 What comes to mind?\u00a0 Maybe a scene from someone’s Valentine’s Day.\u00a0 She comes home from work.\u00a0 There are some roses and a card.\u00a0 Nice.\u00a0 We’re going out to dinner<\/em> he says, so she gets ready.\u00a0 But then a limousine drives up.\u00a0 We’re going some \u00a0place special. <\/em> Lavish, wouldn’t you say?<\/p>\n

Yet Valentine’s Day can’t take the place of a consistent, giving love in a relationship. \u00a0Real love, love that counts for something is more than a lavish moment. \u00a0That love takes time.<\/p>\n

We’ve come here today to think about the love God lavished on us.\u00a0 Time and again, his love for us stands out.\u00a0 And now the Lord would have us think of the time he gives us in this life.\u00a0 How do we use it?\u00a0 You see,<\/p>\n

Love Takes Time
\n<\/strong>I.\u00a0 God’s time for us, his children (1a)
\nII.\u00a0 Our time to grow in His love
\nIII.\u00a0 Our time for people that do not know him<\/p>\n

<\/strong>The apostle John by now is an old man.\u00a0 He has <\/strong>seen so much in his years as Christ’s apostle.\u00a0 Some very wonderful things.\u00a0 But also he has seen how this world can treat those who follow Christ.\u00a0 Yet even with those painful memories of Jesus’ people put to death and mistreated, even with those continuing threats, John’s heart spills over with this: <\/strong>How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! (1) <\/span><\/p>\n

That love that made us God’s children.\u00a0 That love that counts us as God’s children.\u00a0 That love took time.\u00a0 It takes time. God’s time. His time for us, his children<\/strong><\/p>\n

I think about his time in a garden long ago.\u00a0 Our first parents Adam and Eve had made an awful decision.\u00a0 To stop trusting in God and believe a lie.\u00a0 Now instead of peace, they were afraid. Instead of innocence and joy they knew guilt.\u00a0 And instead of life, they faced death.<\/p>\n

And even though this happened long ago, it was like you I and \u00a0were there.\u00a0 For the tragedy of Adam and Eve became ours when the time came for us to be born into this fallen world.<\/p>\n

But we see something else in that garden.\u00a0 God’s time for us, his children.<\/strong> Think about it.\u00a0 When our Father had every reason to be done with us, he spoke a very special promise.\u00a0 A promise that would give hope.\u00a0 A promise that would offer forgiveness and life to dying sinners like you and me.\u00a0 A promise of God’s time for us his children.<\/p>\n

We know what that time would bring. 4 <\/sup>But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, 5 <\/sup>to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons<\/span>. (Gal 4:4,5)\u00a0 The life Jesus lived was God’s time for you.\u00a0 Every moment of every day, was time lived for you.\u00a0 It was time lived as we should live, but fail.\u00a0 The Son of God took our place in this life and then stepped up to suffer what we deserve.\u00a0 He stepped up to make it possible for sinners like you and me to be God’s children.<\/p>\n

But that love took time. It took God’s time, the Son of God’s time, to bleed and die for each of us. It took time, agonizing time for him to pay the price to\u00a0 set us free. \u00a0But that’s what we are in Him.\u00a0 Free from guilt, free from death. Free to live our lives in hope.<\/p>\n

But God’s time for you did not end there.\u00a0 God’s time for us reached right into our lives. It had to otherwise we would still be lost. \u00a0You see, we don’t come into this world as children of God.\u00a0 But look what God the Holy Spirit took the time to do for you. 23 <\/sup>For you have been born again, not of perishable seed, but of imperishable, through the living and enduring word of God<\/span>. (1Peter1) Sometime in your life the Spirit changed your heart to believe what you could not before. \u00a0He came to you in the word, the word with the water of your baptism, the word shared with you and gave you a new birth as a child of God.<\/p>\n

Now think of what his love takes time to do.\u00a0 This God over the whole universe has time to hear your prayers as if you were the only one speaking to him.\u00a0 He has time to be with you every step of life’s way and hold your hand as you go.\u00a0 And in time, he will bring you to another kind of life.\u00a0 A life where you won’t have to worry about time.\u00a0 About your time, or the time of those you love. \u00a0That’s God’s love for us, his children.\u00a0 A love that made us his children.\u00a0 A love that treats us as his children.\u00a0 Yes, a love that takes time.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Now we have this time.\u00a0 He gives us this time, 24 hours in every day. Here I’d like you to think about something.\u00a0 One of these days you are going to look back and wish you had spent more time with someone.\u00a0 I wish I had spent more time with my mom before she got Alzheimer\u2019s, before she drifted away into a fog.\u00a0 For love takes time.<\/p>\n

What about the Lord?\u00a0 Again love takes time.\u00a0 This is our time.\u00a0 Will we use it? This is our time to grow in God’s love<\/strong>.\u00a0 Think of what St Paul wrote to the Ephesians.\u00a0 And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, 18 <\/sup>may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, <\/span><\/p>\n

Well how does that happen? \u00a0How do we grow up in that love?\u00a0 How do we begin to stand in awe of God’s love for us in Christ?\u00a0 That love takes time.\u00a0 It takes time in God’s Word. For there we begin to realize how lost we were and what we really deserved.\u00a0 Yet God’s hand reached out to save us.\u00a0 It reached out to draw us near as his dear children.\u00a0 But that love takes times.\u00a0 It takes our time to be in this Word. It takes our time to come to Holy Communion where Jesus comes to us in such a special way.\u00a0\u00a0 So take the time.\u00a0 Our time to grow in God’s love<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Well that love, God’s love, gives birth to another.\u00a0 John says it this way in chapter 4:1, Dear friends us let us love one another, for love comes from God<\/span>.\u00a0 \u00a0But again that kind of love takes time<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Often we find ourselves pressed for time.\u00a0 The demand of this life can crowd out the people God has placed in our lives.\u00a0 Sometimes we have no choice.\u00a0 A soldier is deployed to the other side of the world.\u00a0 Some jobs require travel.\u00a0 But part of that press for time can come from the choices we make.\u00a0 How do we use our time? We say we love our spouse, our children.\u00a0 We say we care about our brothers and sisters in Christ.\u00a0 But what do our choices say?\u00a0 My choice to spend so much time on the internet, my choice to spend so much time on the job or doing my hobby or playing golf with my buddies. Could that be the reason we have little time for each other? Could that be the reason we have no time for a widow who has lost her best friend.<\/p>\n

Years ago, when Karen and I were first married, the Coast Guard offered tuition refunds if you took a college course.\u00a0 We were barely married when I signed up for a course to begin my master’s degree.\u00a0 So I would come home from work, eat supper and hole up in my room to study.\u00a0 What a great way to begin your life together.\u00a0 I finally wised up. No more of that!\u00a0 Because you see, Love takes time<\/strong>.\u00a0 Time to care, time to serve, time to listen. Time to help. That’s time well spent. That’s love that comes from God.<\/p>\n

But God wants his love, God wants our love to go out in another direction.\u00a0 And that love takes time too.\u00a0 Our time for people that do not know the Lord. <\/strong> Think about what John writes here. The reason the world does not know us (as children of God) is that it did not know him. <\/span><\/p>\n

When John uses the word know, he’s talking about more than just knowing that there are some folks called Christians who pray to Jesus and call God their father.\u00a0 Many people know that.\u00a0 John is talking about knowing Jesus as my Savior from sin and death who has made me his Father’s dear child.\u00a0 But how can they know unless someone tells them?\u00a0 How can your friend know? How can your boyfriend know?\u00a0 How can your apartment manager know unless someone cares enough, loves enough to tell them what Jesus has done for you. How can they know unless you invite them to a Bible class, or a worship service where can they can hear.\u00a0 For faith comes from hearing the message.<\/span> (Rom v10:17)<\/p>\n

But that love takes time.\u00a0 Our time for people who do not know the Lord.\u00a0 For God’s time was also for them.\u00a0 His time on the cross.\u00a0 His time to come out of his tomb in victory over sin and death. That time was not just for you.\u00a0 It was for them.<\/p>\n

So now he calls on us to use our time.\u00a0 For love takes time.\u00a0 And so here I’d like to encourage you to do just. <\/em>This next Saturday and Sunday… You see it in your bulletin.\u00a0 Look at it with me.\u00a0 On Saturday… On Sunday…(Outreach Seminar\u2026Mission Festival)<\/p>\n

I’m looking forward to seeing you there.\u00a0 It’s easy to say: I love God. I love Jesus. It easy to say we care about the lost. \u00a0\u00a0But remember: Love takes time.\u00a0 Amen.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

1John 3:1 Lavish.\u00a0 What comes to mind?\u00a0 Maybe a scene from someone’s Valentine’s Day.\u00a0 She comes home from work.\u00a0 There are some roses and a card.\u00a0 Nice.\u00a0 We’re going out to dinner he says, so she gets ready.\u00a0 But then a limousine drives up.\u00a0 We’re going some \u00a0place special. Lavish, wouldn’t you say? Yet Valentine’s Day can’t take the place […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermon"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":845,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191\/revisions\/845"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.livingwordpetaluma.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}