Peter was restored in love after his denials and after heading back to his boat. Jesus came to show Agape Love. The resilient love goes beyond the natural and reconciles us to God’s purpose. (John 21:1, 14)

Speaker(s): Pastor Steven Scibelli, Pastor John Love
Sermon 12039
5:00 PM on 2/7/2021

P. Love –

I think if I didn’t use the microphone, you could still hear me now, but better use it. How many of you were here this
morning for service? For those of you that weren’t here, raise your hands. No, I’m kidding! Don’t
do that! No condemnation! Great message this morning. Yeah, praise the Lord! As the service
ended, greeting people as they left the service this morning, some of the comments were just
great, especially in relationship to that story P. Schaller told us about the wives carrying their
husbands. I mean, I heard so many different comments from people. Some of these precious
wives are rather petite, and some of their husbands are a little bit bigger. Some said I’m not
carrying him but I have a big cart I can put him in and push him. Another woman said this is a
great time for all of our husbands to go on a diet. The classic one was that was a great
illustration but nothing new here. I’ve been carrying him all my life! I thought wow! Praise God!
Pastor also spoke about love and joy.

Think about it. If we have those two things in our lives, if our lives are characterized by love and joy, all I can think of is that makes us so resilient as believers. I love resilient believers. Resilient believers are that no matter the nature of the storm is that comes against them, no matter what the nature of the problem is that settles in in their
life, no matter what the challenge is that is sometimes greater than when we get them our
capacity to deal with them, there is something about resilient believers that they just keep going.
They just keep pressing on. They keep taking the next step of faith that is in front of them. I
thought of Joseph’s life. He was so resilient. The hatred by his brothers and then being sold as
a slave into Egypt in Potiphar’s house. You can see how God was with him in everything he did.
The false accusations against him by Potiphar’s wife. Then in prison, but what do you see about
his life? He’s just resilient. He just keeps going. Under girding everything he did in experience
he went through were these words, “And the Lord was with Joseph.”

That’s it. And as long as we know the Lord is with us and as long as we count on his love, and he gives us joy and that
joy becomes the strength of our lives. I read something interesting about POW’s, prisoners of
war. That many of them would give up and in many cases when they gave up, they lost their
lives. Those who survived the POW camps were those who realized you have imprisoned my
body, but you cannot imprison my spirit. They survived. They made it out because of that
resiliency within their souls. Think about all of the kind of like POW’s in the Bible. Joseph he
was. Daniel. And the interesting thing about resilient people is that maybe they can’t change
everything about their life but they can control what they can control. For instance, Daniel, he’s
a POW in Babylon. He’s been taken captive with his nation. What can he control? He decides
he’s going to control his diet, and he refuses to eat what the king puts before him.
Nebuchadnezzar says this is the diet I want all these captives to be partaking of.

Daniel says, no. I choose to trust God. I am purposing in my heart to do these things. He controlled what he
could control and as a result, he became resilient and he got through that captivity. Peter, he is
put in prison for preaching the Gospel and what can you do when you are in prison and being
persecuted, and arrested and behind bars? Well, you can pray. Not only does he pray but other
believers pray and what happens? God gives him a get out of jail free card! The list goes up.
Paul and Silas in Acts. 16. They are what? In prison in stocks and bonds and what do they
decide to do at the darkest hour? They wait until midnight and they decide we can’t control the
fact that we are bound and, in these stocks, but our bodies may be here but our spirits are free.
Let’s celebrate. Let’s sing. Let’s rejoice. Let’s worship God. And they do. What does God do?
He brings deliverance. Resilient people. Why? The love that God has for us and the love the
Holy Spirit imparts to our hearts, Romans 5:5.

The Holy Spirit sheds abroad in our hearts God’s love. We don’t have to produce it. We don’t have to say there’s people in the Body of Christ that I maybe don’t like so much but I know I have to love them, so I’ll grip my teeth and I’ll be as kind to them as possible, but I hope they get a flat tire when they leave church today! No, no. We just
say maybe I can’t love other people Lord but you can and I’m going to give you the opportunity
just to shed abroad in my heart your love for other people. And then the joy. Well, we know
God’s kind of joy. It’s unspeakable and full of glory. Jesus said as long as you learn that secret
principle of abiding in me, you are going to have my joy and my joy will be full. It will be full.
You’ll have the fullness of joy. And where do you get that but in the presence of the living God,
Psalm 16:11. In thy presence there is the fullness of joy. At thy right hand, pleasures
forevermore. We have everything we need to be the most resilient people on the planet, which
means we will be able to get through anything. We’ll be able to endure everything because God
has given us a spirit that overcomes, and with joy and love and men, our wives carrying us we
will be able to do anything! Amen.

P. Scibelli –

Turn with me to John, 21 if you can. And if you can’t have your wife pick you up! I’m not going to tell you what my wife said to me about that one! I didn’t think I was that big but she
said I probably would need a derrick to pull you! I don’t know what that meant! Wow! P.
Schaller, come here for a minute. Don’t we love P. Schaller? I just got to tell you. He is a great
pastor. Aren’t we glad that he is the pastor of this church? Do you remember the first time that
the love of God made himself known to you? Yes. Can you tell us? Yeah, I can. I was at a
college campus and I was turning away from the bad things and I turned to God with all my
heart and I felt the Holy Spirit filling me and that was it. I was in. God did it. He filled me with his
Spirit. All in. Yeah, I was all in. I remember for me it was 7:00 on January 6, 1976 and it was
actually – Lisa was born then.

Where’s Linda? That was the night she was born right? I was in
a state of mind I didn’t even care about somebody being born even one of my own children.
And drugs and alcohol and I just opened my Bible and I read Acts 9 and I said God, I don’t
know if this is possible but what happened to that man could I have a piece of that, a bit of
that? I sensed the Holy Spirit’s power in the room and the whole room felt electrified. Nobody
ever told me about being born again. Never heard that. I just knew that God was in the room. I
really didn’t know what to do after that either. I remember I said yes to God. I remember the
change. I remember I didn’t even know the Bible or read it much and I went out on the street
with a Bible. I started to talk to people about Christ. I didn’t even know what I was talking about.
I had no idea, but I knew the love of God had done something. It was God’s love. It’s amazing.
John. 21 these are two great verses. We could pass right by them easy. Vs. 1, 14. This is all
about a revelation, an illumination to Peter as Jesus is going to show himself to Peter. Vs.1.

The word is PHONERO. It means he made himself visible. He made his person visible. He
made his will known and a manifestation, a little bit of a different word. He revealed himself to
him. Vs. 2. He showed himself in a particular way. Vs. 14. Amen. We could pray for them (the
football players). I love what he says to Peter a little bit later on, 1 Peter 1:22. Peter writes a
letter inspired by the Holy Spirit, and he talks about two types of love. He talks about unfeigned
love and fervent love. Unfeigned love means love that is absolutely genuine. It us unfeigned.
It’s genuine. It’s real and it’s true. And before we met Jesus Christ before whatever anybody
thinks, anybody believes, they have never really known this kind of love, this genuine, true,
spiritual love. It wasn’t known to me. It wasn’t known to you before you got saved. It was at
salvation the Holy Spirit came in as we heard before, shed the love of God abroad in our
hearts. We knew all kinds of love. Love for this, love for that. Love for this thing. Love for that
thing. Love for this habit. Whatever it was.

Even for a person or a certain kind of friendship. I had a lot of friends and when I got saved, I had no friends. That was amazing. I had a lot of friends before I was saved. They were everywhere. When I got saved and I started to talk to
them about Jesus, I became what they would call their disappearing act. They wanted nothing
to do with whatever I said. You know what? In the beginning I thought about it but it was God’s
way of drawing us to himself. Isn’t it? Have you ever noticed that when people let you down or
something happens in life at the job or whatever it might be that God uses situations to draw us
to himself? Maybe without those situations we wouldn’t be drawn. One time I was arrested. It
was Kathy Ryan’s fault! I was put in a cell and in the cell was a young man I had ministered to
on the streets many times. I said to him, you know how much God loves you. He sent me into
your cell. That’s amazing! His name is Ronald Maribel. That’s amazing! That’s the kind of love
God has for you, Ronald. He was like, oh my God! Not you!

The cells were small too. You only have two iron bunk beds. God engineers situations in our lives, whatever it may be. You can kick against it. Paul is blind on the road to Damascus. Joseph is imprisoned and all kinds of
things happen to him, sold by his own brothers. Sold into slavery. Isn’t that an amazing story of
God’s love? They sell him and he said you didn’t sell me. God sent me to save all of you alive.
You didn’t sell me. You thought you sold me. You didn’t sell me. And sometimes when things
happen in our lives and even people have an objective towards us or against us, they don’t
realize that God’s hand is in the plan. Amen! And that he is going to use situations to draw us
to himself. I think when we were ministering for years in Uganda, I know some of you have
heard about the incredible genocide that took place in Rwanda where 1.2 million people were
massacred in 3 months. 300,000 people were murdered in one night. One night.

The Hutus against the Tutsis. Not to say anything about the tribes or anything but that was the way it was
then in the 90s. You know what was amazing? We sent out a mission team to a certain location
and on that team were Hutus and Tutsis together bringing the gospel. That was incredible. How
could that happen? It would only be God’s love. I was thinking of my wife. She was such an
innocent little girl when I met her. She didn’t do anything wrong. She wasn’t saved, but she
didn’t do anything wrong. And then there was me! It was so extremely opposite but what has
kept us since 1960—I always get this wrong and then she says in the car you got it wrong again! 1966, right? I got it right. Wow! Isn’t that amazing! 1966. How many years is that? 55
years. 55 years? Putting up with me? You got to congratulate her later. 55 years! And so, God
allows situations to happen. I don’t like this thing that is going on yet it is a way that he is going
to PHRONERO, just make himself visible. Make himself known.

With Peter this is going to happen. There are three particular things in this chapter that I want to think about tonight.
There will be a rap and I will be at the rap tonight because I would rather be with a few people.
Jesus already scored a touchdown! He came to earth. He touched down. That was the eternal
touch down! No matter how many touch downs. I like football but I’m saying he scored a touch
down and right after was the cross. Seven nothing it was over. No one else could score. The
first instance here and Peter is talking about unfeigned and fervent love. Unfeigned means
nothing but truth in it. It’s genuine and real. Fervent means it’s very hot. It’s intense. We talked
on Friday night about fanning the flame. Stir up. Remember that? Stir up the gift of God that
was in you. ANAZOPUREO. Again, life’s fire. Fervent love is love that is not just like laid back
and “oh I love you” and all of that. It’s really intense love. It’s loves that is stretched out. The
word that is used there is a stretched-out love.

This is a love that reaches out for people at the job, in the neighborhood. Wherever we are. Maybe whoever we come in contact with. Maybe in my natural I don’t want to do that but fervent love stretches itself out towards people. That’s
why I think it is amazing that God has put us in Baltimore, Maryland. Amen! Don’t you love this
city? I do. I do. For a person from Massachusetts, it’s got to be supernatural. No, I love it here. I
love it here. I love the snow is about an inch and then goes away in about an hour! Do you
remember those snow storms we used to have? I remember these three feet and the drifts
would be four feet high. One time I had to shovel my dog and I couldn’t even find him. The plow
went right over him and I had to shovel him out three feet down! Praise the Lord those are
gone! But Peter is going to and God is showing himself to the disciples but it seems like Peter
is the object of this lesson here in John. 21. Many people believe, scholars believe – I don’t know
if they are right or wrong – that’s what they say that John 21 was written a bit of time after the
first 20 chapters. It wasn’t written in progression but a bit after.

The first thing he is going to really have made known to him is I am taking you from the fishing business to fishing for men. I am going to minster to you in your eternal purpose. You are a fisherman but how would you like
him to say this, Luke 5 and then on, from henceforth you will never fish for fish again. Hello?
You are going to become a fisher of men. That’s going to be his purpose. How does God get us
into his purpose? We kick against it. Hello? I have. I’ve kicked against it. I said I will never be a
missionary. Pastor Schaller came to preach at…chapel, I got up in the second floor on the
balcony behind a pole, a large pillar, because I didn’t want to listen to him. I knew he was going
to speak on missions and I didn’t want anything to do with missions. I was street person
winning people. Drug addicts. Prisons and all that and that’s where I was staying. You’re never
going to get me to some dumb country overseas, especially Africa! I had made up my mind
that was never going to happen and God had made up his mind a billion years ago what was
going to happen.

How do we get from a temporal, natural, earthly purpose to that which is
eternal and supernatural? It’s only the love of God that can draw. It’s only God that can minister
his love to us that can change us. How did you get Hudson Taylor out of the slums of London
to go to China and spend 55 years in China? God’s love. He would interview people for the
mission field for China Inland Mission, and they would have many reasons why they would
want to go on the mission field, but the ones he chose were the ones that said I am loved by
God. I love God. And I love Chinese people. He said you’re going because that is the only thing
that would withstand that which you are going to face. How do we go from that which is natural
to that which is supernatural in the purpose of God and we can hear God calling us, but he is
unveiling us through his amazing love? That’s how it takes place. Sometimes we get so
intimidated. Oh my God! Oh my God! If I go to Bible school, you know what’s going to happen?
I’ll probably have to go there.

Do this. Do that. And we don’t realize that God will just love us
gently right through all of that from the natural to the supernatural, from that which of the flesh
to that which is of the Spirit. The thing that hurts me and at times hurts God by my decisions is
I’m afraid of that. But I think I read a verse in 1 John. 4:18 that says telling us perfect love casts
out what? Casts out fear. Fear. It’s gone. God says I want to take you Peter from just catching
fish and did he go back again? Yes, he went back again in John 21. There he was fishing for fish
again. Wow. Where is this Jesus? He rose from the dead. Peter was a little bit discouraged
about what had taken place with his own denials and what was really happening. He says in John
21:1 I go a fishing and because he’s a leader they say, we also go with you. And guess what
they caught that night? Zero. They got a big zero on their paper. They caught nothing. I found
that every time I have gravitated towards that which is natural, I’m going to fish, whatever that means in everyone of our lives, I come up with nothing.

Nothing that satisfies. Nothing that sustains me. Nothing that helps me to grow. Nothing that brings real pleasure only from God. He says I’m going to make you a fisher of men. You’re going to find yourself in Babylon one
day. You’re going to find yourself all over the place. And listen, it is natural he doesn’t even
want to be around Gentiles. I’m not eating with them! Remember? And if he did when James
and some of the hierarchy came up from Jerusalem, he backed away. He wasn’t living in
unfeigned love. He was living in hypocritical love and Paul rebuked him for it with a loving
rebuke in Galatians 2. I withstood him to the face that he didn’t walk uprightly according to the truth of
the Gospel. Peter was learning. He was growing in that love. And by the way, if Peter can learn
and grow in that love, so can we. Hello? Don’t take a look at yourself and try to figure out
yourself and try to change yourself. Did you ever try to change yourself by the way? Have a
good time. It ain’t going to work. It doesn’t work that way, and even if it did work a little bit, it
would deceive us into thinking that’s how it’s always going to work. “I stopped drinking.”

No, you didn’t. You stopped for a bit but your mind is still drunk. You’re still thinking drinking.
Sometimes we stop on the outside but nothing happens on the inside and all those things are
going on. That’s what happens when you put people sometimes in prison. Oh yeah, they stop
crime. By the way, prisons are a great place. It’s like a school of crime for people. You learn
everything that you did wrong and now you’ll do it right when you get out. You’ll rob and you’ll
know what you are doing. It’s a school of crime. You go in there and you get a master’s degree
in criminology! I was there 10-12 years. I know what I’m talking about. Wow. Interesting. And
then you have the masters of crime teaching the young people of crime. Peter is going to
change. What is going to change Peter? Can a leper change his spots? No. What can change
Peter? How is he going to go from a fisher of fish to a fisher of men? He’s going to make the
same change that all of us maybe God is drawing us in some aspect, some capacity, some
way into something taking placed that is not natural but supernatural.

A lot of our pastors in Africa, some of them came and they couldn’t even read or write. Did you know that? They
learned English by ABD, by P. Stevens and by people preaching. They came as poor farmers,
fisherman. Sometimes I would shake their hands and I would think this guy is not like working
at an office. His hand was like razor blades. It would cut you up just by shaking hands. These
were rough characters. These were men that maybe nobody would pay attention to and they
would come. And they would go from being maybe farmers, and there is nothing wrong with
doing that if it’s God’s calling. And they would come from these places and all of a sudden, they
would be preaching the gospel. They would be pastoring. They would be leading. They would
be moving on with God. That’s incredible. A change took place. From glory to glory he’s what?
Changing me from earthly things to the heavenly. I’m being changed. How is Peter going to
change? He takes a guy’s ear right off. You know he was aiming for the head.

He’s a bad shot. He took his ear off. He was probably going to part his skull with the sword. Is that the guy you
would choose if you were looking at it from the natural? Oh, he’s going to be the leader. Yeah, I
think I would. It meant to me he was going to defend Jesus even if he did it in the natural.
There is something about that. He’s going from the fishing business to the business of the
Gospel. Isn’t that amazing? Imagine if as a church all we were involved with was a business
that was natural? Of the earth and it wasn’t heavenly. I said to someone one time and they got
very angry with me. It took place in some country. I can’t remember where. They said what
does Greater Grace do for the poor? You know what my answer was? The poor you will have
with you always. Oh man were they upset. What do you do for the poor? We help the poor. We
have a food bank. We help people that need help will get help. I thought to myself, there’s no
evangelism in their ministry. There’s no Bible school in their ministry.

There’s no training in their ministry. I wasn’t judging them but I discerned something is not right. They don’t care about the soul. They care only about the physical body. Being changed. Peter is going to be changed.
His whole life was life was fishing for fish. Can you imagine? That’s okay. That’s what God
called him to do but he’s now going to become a fisher of men. The next thing that is going to
happen to Peter is really interesting. He’s going to go from human love to agape love. Don’t
raise your hand but that’s what I want in my life. Human love can be from the emotions. We’ve
all had human love before we got saved. We loved something. I love spaghetti. I don’t love it
with agape love but I do like it. I do like it. Especially my wife’s! But we are going from that
which is human love to that which is agape love, a self-sacrificial love. Sometimes if we are not
careful, that human love creeps into Christianity and can take us over. You know what agape
love does? It loves unconditionally. I got a good one.

Love your enemies. Pray for those who persecute you? I didn’t get any hallelujahs on that one. Pray for them. Love people that dislike you. Jesus loved Judas. He loved his own and he loved them to the end, John. 13:1. That’s incredible. He loved them right to the end. Wow. Each one of them. Doubting Thomas. James
and John, Sons of Thunder. Do you know what those are like? Kill everybody. They won’t
receive Jesus. Kill everybody. I’ve met Christians like that overseas. They’re so fundamentally
right. They’re so fundamental they fundamental love right out of the ministry. They kind of
eradicate it. And God wants us to go from this friendly affection. Even Peter kept saying, I have
a friendly affection for you. That’s why Jesus kept asking him, do you agape me? Do you
agape me? That’s where love really is in the church. The church has to be filled with agape
love, a self-sacrificing love, a love that has no end. A love that keeps going. We all fall short in
that. There’s no doubt about it but that’s the direction I want to go in, amen! That’s what I want
to be. That’s what is important to me, that I could have this love of Jesus Christ constraining
me. Holding me in on every side and prohibiting me from any other options.

Agape love. Peter, you want to lead. Christian, you want to be effective, we need to go from friendly affections and
friendly love, friendship love to a divine self-sacrificing love. Are you with me? Are you listening.
I read a lot about Richard Wurmbrand, how he loved his torturers. Can you imagine they are
coming every night to torture you, and God gives you a love for them while they are torturing
you. I couldn’t do that and God says you’re right you can’t but I can. Father, forgive them. They
know not what they do. Did you ever think about it? If you have time to read about it tonight or
the next day read about the seven sayings of the Cross and put them in the perspective of love.
Merciful love. Body life love. This is your son; this is your mother. It is finished work love.
Sacrificial love. I thirst. Into your hands I commend my spirit. Eternal purpose love. Study the
seven things Jesus said on the Cross in the context of agape love. It’s phenomenal.

Here he is. God the Son being murdered and he says forgive them. They know not what they do. Think
about that sometimes. God forgives us because we don’t even know what we are doing
sometimes. We’re just doing something but we have no idea what we are doing. We don’t know
who we are hurting. We don’t know what is taking place. We don’t understand the affects of our
decisions at times and God says, forgive them. They don’t know what they are doing. Forgive
Pastor Scibelli. Forgive Steven. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. Thank you. Thank you, God.
It doesn’t make me to want and keep doing wrong things but it makes me understand that that
love is called out from his heart is changing me. He’s going from friendship love to agape love.
Do you love me? Do you love me? You can’t feed sheep. Dr. Stevens said to me and it never
escaped my mind. He said, do you love to preach or do you love those you are preaching to?
He said God only anoints people who love the people they are preaching to not because they
love to preach. Maybe some day you’re not going to be able to do that.

You’re sitting there like – that can happen. It happened to me for a while. Brain dead. That lasted a few months or may
be a few years. I don’t even know. It depends on how you evaluate it. But this incredible love
for the Body. Love received from Jesus and it’s not sourced in me. Love is sourced in God.
Then I receive it and I love him with the very love he loves me with. Then I love myself. One of
the great problems in Christianity is people don’t love themselves so how can they love
anybody else. If you don’t like yourself, how can you love anybody else? You have to live 24/7
with yourself. Right? I love who God has made me to be. I hate the old sin nature. But I love the
new man in Christ, amen! Say to yourself, I love me. I love me. I love me in Christ. The devil
doesn’t like when you say that. He can’t stand when you say that. I love me. I love who you
have made me to be in Christ. That is the source of loving other people. Here we have this
human to agape love.

The third thing that takes place here is how do you get from doing my will
to his will. When you were young Peter, meaning young spiritually. You walked where you
would but when you grow older, another will carry you out of the house. Another will carry you
where you would not. I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to pray. I don’t want to read the Bible.
I don’t want to evangelize. I don’t want to make him supper again. I don’t want to clean this. I
don’t want to do that. I don’t wanna. I don’t wanna. So! He’ll carry you where you would not.
Hello? That’s what love does. I don’t wanna. I don’t wanna. Stay home and make popcorn. Put
my feet up and watch touchdown. Nothing wrong with that. I hope it doesn’t snow. I don’t
wanna shovel. I prayed, God, get the snow off of my driveway. I hate shoveling! It’s ridiculous.
That’s why I have a four-wheel drive jeep. I just leave it there and drive through it and my wife
says what about me, so then we shovel. Because I love her! But we go. We go. My will. I’m
doing what I want to do with my life. I got it all figured out. Really? You got it all figured out?
We’ll carry you where you what? You would not.

Moses, how are you doing up in the hierarchy of the Egyptian empire? Having fun? Guess what I’m going to do? Make you a stutterer. And you’re going to spend 40 years in the wilderness by yourself with Jethro, and then you are
going to spend another 40 years with a bunch of people that are going to be very difficult to
handle. What? I don’t want to do that? It doesn’t matter. I’ll carry you where you would not. Hello? I don’t wanna do this. I don’t wanna do that. I don’t wanna go to work tomorrow. Well, I
do, but maybe you say that. Monday morning. Monday morning. He’ll carry you. Love carries
people where they would not. It’s okay to say I don’t want to but say this in the sentence after it.
But God, by your love would you carry me there. Would you carry me through that trial, carry
me through that test. Carry me through that marriage. Carry me through this relationship. Carry
me as a Christian school teacher. Carry me as a principal, right P. Barry? Carry me! I don’t
want to do this. I remember the first time I did a class in Christian school. I did a Bible class in
1993. There were 34 students and within a half an hour, there were only 17.

I kicked 17 kids out of class for not having a Bible, chewing gum, or talking. I said no one talks, chews gum or is
in this class without a Bible. I realized maybe I was a little bit too hard. I wasn’t sure though. I
don’t know. Maybe. I was a head master for a Christian school for 300 students for a while.
Talk about that school was interesting. I had to bring the police in sometimes just to raid the
lockers. We got a much better deal going here P. Barry! Mine was a war. You know what I’m
saying! A kid pulls a knife on me right in the school hallway. Thank you, student. You get an A!
But God is saying this: I want to carry you into my will. You won’t go there with your own feet.
I’m going to carry you. This is the love of God. This is what happened to Jeremiah in Jeremiah 31. “I
have loved you with an everlasting love and with lovingkindness I will draw you. I will build you
again, O virgin Israel.” This is what happens in Hosea chapters 3, 11, and 14. God is carrying
Hosea and carrying the nation. This is what happens to Abraham in Genesis 12. Love is carrying
him, carrying Moses, carrying Joshua, carrying Ezekiel.

Ezekiel was bitter. He said I don’t want to preach to these people, 3:14-15. And he went up and God carried him up to preach. God will take people and that’s what will happen. Can you imagine living in Rome? Four million people
worshiping Caesar. Loves got to carry you. Loves going to carry us. We’ve got two people
going to Burundi. Burundi is on the other side of Rwanda. Listen to this story. I might have told
it and if I did, forgive me. I’m not losing my mind yet. We have two young people that were
orphans that came from the country of Chad. Chad is all desert and it’s all Muslim. They came
and they came to the orphanage in Uganda. Obviously they got saved. They went to Christian
school. They went to Bible school, and now they are missionaries to Chad. They got married.
And the two orphans from Chad got married and now they are missionaries to Chad. How did
that happen? God’s love did that. God’s love did that. God has those kinds of testimonies all
over the ministry in 80 countries. We see it time and time again.

This is the love of God. This is how he showed himself. He showed himself to his disciples by loving them. Let’s allow God to continue to reveal himself, show himself and let’s be receivers of that love so we will say not my
will but thine be done. I want you to carry me God. I don’t even want to walk that way. You’re
going to have to carry me in our relationships, in our friendships, in our ministry whatever God
has given you in your minsitry, in our prayer life, in reading the Bible, in being trained in the
Bible and in reaching the whole world. Reaching new countries and believing God. Agape love
is the only way it’s going to take place. He says and yet I show unto you a more excellent way.

Amen.

Please enjoy these sermon notes from the messages preached at Greater Grace Church in Baltimore. These notes are provided to aid in your study and understanding of the Word. Note that these notes do not represent complete, word-for-word transcriptions. Also, they may contain omissions as well as some errors in spelling and structure, etc., as we attempt to provide them as soon as possible. Our hope is that these notes serve as a way to help you search and connect with messages on related subjects and passages. Thank you for your interest in the ministry of Greater Grace.