Participants:
Series Code: IIWSS
Program Code: IIWSS025002S
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00:12 [uplifting music] 00:14 >>Eric Flickinger: Welcome to "Sabbath School," 00:15 brought to you by It Is Written. 00:17 We're glad you're with us today. 00:19 We are taking a journey through a fascinating subject. 00:22 We are looking at "God's Love and Justice." 00:25 What does God's love really look like, 00:27 and how does that interact with His justice? 00:30 That's the journey that we are on. 00:32 This is lesson number 2 out of 13, 00:35 and today we are looking at "Covenantal Love." 00:38 What does that look like? 00:39 We're going to find out in just a moment. 00:41 Let's pray. 00:42 Father, we want to thank You for bringing us together again, and 00:45 as we study this week's lesson, we ask that You will bless us 00:49 with a deeper understanding of not just the subject but of You. 00:53 And we thank You in Jesus' name. 00:55 Amen. 00:57 Well, we're grateful to have with us again this week 00:59 the author of this quarter's "Sabbath School" lesson, 01:01 John Peckham. 01:03 He is an associate editor of the "Adventist Review" 01:06 and also a research professor 01:08 at the Adventist Theological Seminary at Andrews University. 01:11 John, welcome back. 01:12 >>John Peckham: Thank you, thanks for having me. 01:14 >>Eric: So we're looking at "Covenantal Love," 01:16 and I want to kind of begin our dive into this 01:19 with two words, words that I think 01:22 many Christians are at least somewhat familiar with. 01:25 They've at least heard before. 01:27 They may or may not have a correct understanding 01:29 of these words for love. 01:31 One of them is "agape," and the other one is "phileo." 01:34 Help us to understand what these two words mean and maybe 01:38 some common misconceptions surrounding these words. 01:40 >>John: Yeah, yeah, most people 01:42 have probably been taught something like this. 01:44 You've probably been taught that 01:46 "agape" is a special kind of love 01:48 that only God has and all other kinds of love are deficient 01:52 in some way or merely human loves. 01:54 So often there's a dichotomy put forth between "agape," 01:58 that's God's love for us, which only gives and never receives, 02:01 according to some conceptions, 02:03 and "phileo" is like a friendship love. 02:05 It's a back-and-forth love, 02:07 relational love that humans can engage in. 02:11 But actually the Bible tells a somewhat different story, 02:14 and I want us to look at the Bible itself 02:17 so we can see this for ourselves. 02:18 So I want to invite you to read from John 14, and 02:21 in that verse you'll see God's love mentioned in that verse, 02:24 and the verb that's used throughout there 02:26 is the verb form of "agape" in John 14. 02:28 >>Eric: Right, so we're going to look at John 14, 02:30 verses 21 and 23. 02:32 Verse 21 says, "'He who has my commandments and keeps them, 02:36 "'it is he who loves me. 02:39 "'And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, 02:42 "and I will love him and manifest myself to him.' 02:45 "Jesus answered and said to him, 02:47 "'If anyone loves me, he will keep my word; 02:50 "'and my Father will love him, 02:52 and we will come to him and make our home with him.'" 02:56 >>John: So I want us to notice a few things 02:57 in those verses, right? So, first of all, 02:59 if somebody would think that "agape" is only 03:02 a divine love and never a human love, you're already running 03:05 into problems in this passage, right? Because we're talking 03:07 about a love that is reciprocal, love relationship, right? 03:11 "He who keeps my commandments, it is he who loves me, 03:15 and he who loves me will be loved by my Father." 03:18 And so you have not only humans engaging in this love, 03:21 which again is that verb form of "agape," 03:23 but also God responding, 03:26 that this is a back-and-forth, that God actually somehow 03:30 evaluatively loves in response 03:33 already in John 14, verses 21 and 23. 03:37 And so you have this condition in verse 23: 03:39 "If anyone loves me, he will keep my word; 03:42 and my Father will love him." 03:44 So this is a back-and-forth love relationship, 03:47 using "agape" all throughout. 03:49 So already there we see a misconception 03:51 that would be cleared up. 03:53 Then if we go to John 16, verse 27, we'll see another issue here 03:58 because, as I mentioned before, it's common for people to say 04:02 that the Greek verb "phileo" refers to a lesser kind of love. 04:07 It's a deficient kind of love. 04:08 Sometimes spoken of as "brotherly love," 04:11 but actually that's from a compound term, "Philadelphia." 04:14 That means "brotherly love," but it's the latter part 04:17 of that compound term; that is the "brotherly" part. 04:19 But some say, "Oh, this is a lesser kind of love. 04:21 It's deficient." Well, is that really true? 04:24 Well, let's look at John 16:27. 04:26 In John 16, verse 27, the verb that's used here 04:30 of love is "phileo," and just notice what it says. 04:33 "For the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved me, 04:38 and have believed that I came forth from God." 04:42 Now, that sounds almost identical in teaching 04:45 to what we read in John 14, right? 04:47 But here we have the "phileo" verb that is used. 04:49 And so immediately from this verse 04:51 you should know that whatever else "phileo" means, 04:54 it is not necessarily a deficient kind of love. 04:57 How do we know that? 04:58 Because God Himself loves us with that kind of love, 05:02 according to this text, and God's love is never deficient, 05:05 and actually what we find throughout the Bible 05:07 is that there is no unique term for God's love. 05:11 God's love is the greatest and most generous and perfect love 05:14 not because of the word that's used 05:16 but because God who is the one who gives it. 05:19 In fact, the root of "agape" can refer to anything 05:23 from the most generous, noble, wonderful kind of love 05:28 to something that we wouldn't even describe as love itself. 05:31 To give an example of this, kind of a sad example, 05:35 in the Old Testament translation into the Greek, 05:38 known as the Septuagint, 05:40 you have the common word for "love" 05:43 used in the story of Amnon and Tamar. 05:45 And if anyone's not familiar with that story, 05:47 you have this horrible story of one of David's sons, Amnon, 05:53 who claims to be in love with his half-sister Tamar, 05:57 and he says over and over again, "I love her. I love her." 06:01 But actually in the story it's really nothing more than 06:03 a rapacious lust, and then in the story he actually takes her 06:08 by force in a horrible, horrible example, 06:12 and he actually says, you know, "I loved her." 06:16 Obviously, this is nothing close to love, but the Greek word 06:20 that's used there throughout that story to translate 06:23 the term for "love" is "agape." 06:25 And the Hebrew term in the original Hebrew 06:27 is the main term for "love" in the Old Testament, 06:30 and it just shows you there's a broad range of these terms. 06:33 And it's not the term itself that is describing 06:36 a special kind of love. 06:38 The special kind of love is actually because 06:41 the agent who is God Himself, and it's His kind of love. 06:45 But there, again, there's all kinds of misconceptions 06:47 that come from a number of theologians in past ages, 06:50 who had a particular view of God 06:52 who can't enter into back-and-forth relationship. 06:55 And so they thought of God's love as just unilateral. 06:57 When they thought of "agape" love, they thought of love 07:00 that only gives and never receives 07:01 because God isn't supposed to receive anything, 07:04 but in the Bible there's actually a back and forth. 07:06 It's always asymmetrical because God is always the great lover, 07:09 the source of love. We don't deserve love, 07:11 we can never merit it, but we can respond to it. 07:13 We can enter into real relationship with God, 07:15 and that's what God calls us into and draws us into 07:19 throughout the biblical story. 07:20 >>Eric: You know, I--that's actually where I want to go 07:23 with my next question, this idea of God being a relational God 07:26 and not just a unilaterally-loving God. 07:30 What does that help us to understand--or how does that 07:32 help us to understand our responsibility 07:35 to reflect God's love back to Him? 07:38 >>John: Yeah, this is very important, right? 07:40 So whenever we talk about the back-and-forth relationship, 07:43 and even when we talk about that there's even 07:45 some conditionality in relationship, 07:48 which we'll talk about more and more extensively later, 07:51 we need to first emphasize the fact 07:53 that all love starts with God. 07:55 Right? So Jeremiah 31:3, God says, 07:58 "I have loved you with an everlasting love; 08:01 therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you." Right? 08:06 And so it's God who is drawing us into love relationship 08:09 before we ever love Him in the first place. 08:11 And 1 John 4:19 just says, 08:13 "We love...because He first loved us." 08:17 So all love begins with God. He's the source of all love. 08:22 We cannot just originate it in ourselves, 08:25 but He invites us to respond to Him. 08:27 And so this is a universal love that is given to everyone, 08:30 but I refer to it as a universally relational love 08:33 because it's love that calls everyone into relationship 08:36 because God will never force His love on anyone. 08:39 In fact, love itself, by nature, requires it to be freely given 08:44 and freely received. 08:45 Like, even if I could control someone else's mind, 08:48 I wouldn't be able to make them love me. 08:51 I might be able to make them think they love me, I might 08:53 be able to make them respond in all the ways, external ways, 08:57 that love typically responds, but would they love me? 08:59 No, because love must be freely given and freely received. 09:04 And so God pours out this love prior to any conditions, 09:09 unmerited, on all people to draw us all into relationship 09:14 with Him, but we have a choice whether to respond to that, 09:16 whether to enter into that relationship with Him. 09:19 >>Eric: So God is very relational. 09:21 He's looking for that back-and-forth between Him 09:25 and us, for it to be genuine, for it to be authentic. 09:27 I'm going to read a passage here in Deuteronomy; 09:30 Deuteronomy 7, verses 6 through 9. 09:32 And help us to understand this relational aspect, 09:35 this covenantal love from this passage. 09:38 It says, "For you are a holy people to the Lord your God; 09:43 "the Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for Himself, 09:46 "a special treasure above all the peoples 09:48 "on the face of the earth. 09:49 "The Lord did not set His love on you nor choose you 09:53 "because you were more in number than any other people, 09:56 "for you were the least of all peoples; 09:58 "but because the Lord loves you, 10:00 "and because He would keep the oath which He swore 10:03 "to your fathers, the Lord has brought you out 10:06 "with a mighty hand, and redeemed you 10:07 "from the house of bondage, 10:09 "from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt. 10:11 "Therefore know that the Lord your God, He is God, 10:15 "the faithful God who keeps covenant 10:17 "and mercy for a thousand generations 10:19 with those who love Him and keep His commandments." 10:22 >>John: What a beautiful passage, right? 10:24 And so I'll start kind of at the end 'cause 10:26 I want to make sure that I don't miss this point 10:28 and no one misses this point. 10:30 You have that beautiful phrase at the end of God 10:33 who is a faithful God, who keeps His covenant 10:36 and His faithfulness-- to how long? 10:38 To 1,000 generations of those who love Him. 10:42 And so you see, again, this is an asymmetrical relationship. 10:45 God's love is much greater than the love of His people, 10:47 but He calls people into relationship, 10:50 this covenant relationship 10:51 that He will actually extend far beyond, 10:54 even to the thousandth generation, but there 10:57 is that back-and-forth in this relationship. 11:00 Now, here also in this passage you have this relationship 11:04 between love and choice and love and election. 11:07 God's covenant people are especially chosen people. 11:10 They are elect. They're elect in a way that is unmerited. 11:13 They did nothing to deserve being the covenant, 11:16 chosen people of God. 11:17 The text says God chose them because He loved them, right? 11:22 And so, whereas there is often a common identification 11:28 of love and choice-- there are some people 11:29 that even say, "Love just is to choose"-- 11:32 that's actually a misconception. 11:35 It is true that love involves choice. 11:37 We saw that in the last lesson very clearly. 11:39 God loves freely, and He invites us to love freely. 11:42 Love involves choice, but it cannot be reduced to choice; 11:45 and here God's choice of His people 11:47 is already based on His prior love for them, 11:52 and this should reinforce two points for them and for us. 11:55 There could be a common way. 11:57 If you're part of God's covenant people, God's special people, 11:59 you could think, "Oh, I'm special. 12:01 Maybe I deserved this." Right? 12:03 And you see, first of all, you weren't chosen because you were 12:06 better than anyone else or you were greater than anyone else. 12:08 No, it's because God set His affection on you. 12:12 He chose you for special blessings. Why? 12:14 Because He already loved you, and you didn't deserve that, 12:16 either, nor could you ever deserve that. 12:19 This is entirely unmerited love that God gives for His people, 12:26 and He sets His affection on His people for that reason. 12:31 Not only that, there could be a misconception 12:33 that God is somehow partial. He's choosing this people. 12:36 Why do they get these special blessings? 12:39 And it is because God wants to bless all nations through them. 12:43 This is the reason for election all throughout Scripture. 12:45 In Genesis, the promise made to Abraham is, "I will-- 12:49 I've chosen you, and I will bless you to bless all peoples." 12:52 And so God is drawing the covenant people 12:54 into relationship to be a blessing to everyone 12:57 'cause He wants to have that same kind 12:59 of love relationship with everyone. 13:00 >>Eric: And I think He probably wants to use us to help 13:03 other people understand that love, too. 13:05 John, we're digging into something here really deep, 13:08 this covenantal love concept. 13:10 You've authored a companion book to this quarter's 13:13 "Sabbath School" lesson. Share with us a little bit about that. 13:16 >>John: Yeah, in that companion volume, 13:18 I get an opportunity to go deeper into the biblical text, 13:21 deeper into the understanding of what God's love is like, 13:25 deeper into some of the misconceptions 13:27 that are out there, and deeper into how we understand 13:31 that God actually loves us with a love that is much greater 13:35 than most of us have been taught. 13:38 I thought I knew what God's love was like 13:39 before I spent many years studying it, 13:41 and I'll tell you the picture that emerged 13:44 is more beautiful than I could imagine. 13:46 And we can only scratch the surface in the lesson. 13:48 The companion volume goes further. 13:49 We can even only scratch the surface in that. 13:52 >>Eric: Fantastic. 13:53 So if you would like to pick up that companion volume 13:56 to this quarter's "Sabbath School" lesson, 13:58 you will find it at itiswritten.shop. 14:01 Again, at itiswritten.shop. 14:03 We're going to be back in just a moment 14:05 as we continue looking at God's covenantal love, 14:08 digging into it more deeply and seeing God more clearly. 14:11 We'll be right back here on "Sabbath School," 14:13 brought to you by It Is Written. 14:15 [uplifting music] 14:19 >>John Bradshaw: So, what is God really like? 14:22 To hear some people tell the story, "God is a tyrant. 14:24 God is vindictive. God is hateful." 14:27 To hear some people tell the story, "God is a murderer. 14:31 God is masochistic." That's what some people say. 14:34 Now, why would they say such a thing? 14:36 Well, you look into the Bible and in Noah's day 14:39 God destroyed the entire world. 14:41 There may even have been billions of people 14:44 alive at that time. God wiped them out. 14:47 Well, was that a one-off? 14:49 In the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, 185,000 Assyrian soldiers 14:57 were destroyed by God's angels in a night. 15:00 What is the character of God like? 15:03 You don't want to miss "The Character of God." 15:05 We'll talk about creation, love, 15:08 the cross, and you'll know that God is love. 15:11 "The Character of God," 15:13 brought to you by It Is Written TV. 15:18 [uplifting music] 15:22 >>Eric: Welcome back to "Sabbath School," 15:24 brought to you by It Is Written. 15:26 We're taking a look at "God's Love and Justice" this quarter. 15:29 In this lesson, we're taking a look at "Covenantal Love." 15:35 John, I want to kind of delve into something that you unpacked 15:38 here in this lesson about God loving some despicable 15:43 characters, and perhaps we know some folk in our lives or we've 15:50 met some folk that might-- that we might place under 15:52 that banner, under that umbrella of despicable characters. 15:56 How does God deal with those folk, 15:59 and what lessons can we learn from that? 16:01 >>John: Yeah, it's important to recognize 16:03 that God loves everyone, 16:05 even those whom we might think are unlovable, right? 16:08 And if we're being honest with ourselves, somebody who knows 16:11 us in our worst moments, we're among the unlovable too, right? 16:14 We're not ever worthy of God's love. 16:17 But John 3:16, of course, probably the most famous passage 16:20 in the Bible, but no less profound, even though 16:23 we're so familiar with it: 16:24 "For God so loved the world 16:26 "that He gave His [one and] only ...Son, that whoever believes 16:30 in Him [shall] not perish but have everlasting life." 16:33 And that passage says God loves who? 16:37 He, God, He loves the world and everyone in it. 16:40 That includes you. It includes me. 16:42 It includes everyone that you meet and many people 16:45 whom we will never meet. 16:47 And there's a lot of people who, when they hear about God's love, 16:51 they hear that kind of teaching, they say, 16:53 "Oh, that sounds great, 16:55 "but that can't really be true of me, right? 16:57 "God couldn't really love me. I know what I'm like. 17:00 "I know that I'm unworthy. 17:02 I know that I have forfeited any right to God's love." 17:06 And that is true. 17:08 It's true of all of us, but it doesn't stop God 17:11 from continually loving us and calling out to us. 17:14 Let me just give you one example. 17:15 In the history of the nation of Judah, you have a number of 17:20 good kings, and you have a number of bad kings. 17:22 And whenever the kings went bad, 17:24 this--things went very bad for the nation of Judah. 17:26 And one king in particular by the name of Manasseh, 17:29 he was a horrible king, arguably the worst king 17:33 in the line of kings; and he had just done 17:37 every despicable thing imaginable, and nevertheless, 17:42 before Manasseh dies, God makes a way to reclaim him 17:47 and restore him and even provide forgiveness. 17:51 If God can do that for someone like Manasseh, 17:54 He can do it for anyone. 17:56 He can do it for you. He can do it for me. 18:00 >>Eric: You know, speaking of forgiveness, 18:02 there is an interesting passage, a story that Jesus tells 18:05 in Matthew, chapter 18 about the unforgiving debtor. 18:10 This might be a hard one for some of us to stomach and to 18:15 delve into because we've run into some characters out there. 18:20 Unpack this for us and give us a takeaway 18:25 that might be a little difficult pill to swallow 18:27 but one that we need to swallow nevertheless. 18:29 >>John: Yeah, yeah. 18:31 This parable illustrates what is a consistent teaching 18:34 of the Bible, that God bestows love on everyone freely 18:38 prior to conditions, entirely unmerited, 18:42 and yet we can reject love relationship with God. 18:47 Now, it's hard to do that. 18:48 God bears long with us, but you can finally reject Him 18:52 and cut yourself off from Him. 18:54 And we see this in this parable in Matthew 18, 18:56 where you have this man who owes his lord. 19:00 He owes him a great debt, a massive debt, 19:04 a debt of 10,000 talents. 19:07 Now, for our viewers, if you don't know what a talent is, 19:10 a talent was roughly equivalent to 6,000 denarii, and a denarius 19:15 was roughly amount-- about the amount 19:18 that an average day laborer would make in a single day. 19:22 And so if you think about this debt, 19:24 you have 6,000 denarii in every talent. 19:27 So an average day laborer to make 1 talent--let's say they 19:31 work maybe 300 days a year, given all the festivals, 19:34 it's probably going to take them 19:36 about 20 years just to earn 1 talent. 19:41 But he owes this man 10,000 talents--10,000 talents, 19:47 which would take him, like, 200,000 years to earn. 19:50 So there is no way--there is no possible way that he is ever 19:56 going to be able to accumulate enough money to pay off 20:00 this debt, and yet he still says to the lord, "Just give me 20:02 enough time, and I will pay you back everything." 20:06 And his master looks at this man, and he has compassion 20:09 on him, and he says, "I am going to forgive you that debt. 20:14 You owe me nothing." 20:16 This is amazing compassion, amazing grace. 20:20 Nothing in the story merited this. 20:22 Nothing--there was no condition-- 20:24 "Do this first and then you can receive this." 20:26 It's given to him prior to any conditions, entirely unmerited. 20:30 And we could wish that that was the end of the story, but sadly 20:33 it was not the end of the story because the same servant 20:36 goes out, and he finds another man, who owes him a small debt, 20:42 a debt that could be paid off in very little time, comparatively, 20:48 but he doesn't show this other servant 20:51 the same grace and compassion. 20:53 Instead, he takes this servant, and he says, 20:55 "If you're not going to repay the debt, 20:57 I'm going to have you thrown into prison." 20:58 And he has him thrown into prison, 20:59 from which, of course, he could never pay the debt, right? 21:01 This does no one any good. 21:03 And when his master finds out about this, he is rightly angry, 21:07 he is rightly furious, and he comes to this servant, 21:11 and he actually takes back the forgiveness 21:13 he had given him. He takes back this compassionate grace. 21:17 And this is a story that shows that even though God's grace 21:21 and compassion is given freely, without any cost, 21:24 without any prior conditions, we can reject it; 21:27 we can forfeit it; 21:28 we can turn our backs on it, as this servant does in the story. 21:34 And so many people struggle with this idea because we're 21:37 typically taught that God's love is entirely unconditional, 21:41 and it's true that God's love is unconditional 21:43 in the sense that God always loves everyone 21:46 and always wants to have relationship with everyone. 21:48 God's love is everlasting, and yet God's love also invites us 21:52 into relationship, and that relationship 21:54 involves the condition of responding to God. 21:58 So I use this kind of analogy to try to explain how God's love 22:01 can be unconditional, and yet there's-- 22:04 to enjoy all the benefits--there are involved some conditions. 22:07 And so if you imagine the sun, 22:09 the sun shines on everyone, right? 22:12 And I cannot stop the sun from shining. 22:14 I can shake my fist at the sun and say, 22:16 "Oh, you know, I hate you, sun; stop shining on me," 22:19 and it's not going to make any difference. 22:21 In a similar way, we can't stop God from loving. 22:24 We cannot change His loving nature. 22:26 God is always bestowing His love on everyone, and yet--I cannot 22:31 stop the sun from shining, but I could, if I chose, 22:34 lock myself in a windowless basement. 22:36 I could cut myself off from the rays of the sun 22:40 so that I would not receive them, and in the Bible, 22:42 we also can make a decision to reject God and His love. 22:46 It's very difficult because God will keep seeking us, 22:49 but you can finally make a final decision to reject Him 22:53 and therefore cut yourself off from relationship because, 22:56 again, love must be freely given and freely received, 22:59 and God will never force His love on everyone. 23:01 So we all have that choice, but God always gives His love to us 23:07 prior to any conditions and draws us into relationship 23:09 with Him prior to any conditions. 23:12 >>Eric: So we're getting a clearer picture 23:13 of God's love here. 23:15 What kind of an impact could that, should that make on us? 23:18 If we constantly keep God's love in our minds and in front of us, 23:23 what does that look like in--how would that manifest itself 23:27 in our interactions with others? 23:29 >>John: Yeah, I mean, this is a major teaching of 1 John; 23:32 1 John just teaches consistently that God is love. 23:37 And if you have received God's love, you also 23:40 ought to love others the way that He has loved us. 23:43 So if we're being honest with ourselves, none of us 23:45 deserve God's love; none of us deserve God's favor. 23:48 And if we recognize just how compassionate and gracious 23:52 and loving God has been toward us, how can we not be gracious 23:56 and compassionate toward others? 23:59 And 1 John 4 just says that if you love God, 24:04 you should also love others. 24:05 Another place it says if you claim to love God 24:08 and you don't love your brother or your sister, you are a liar. 24:12 And so, in fact, the fact of accepting God's love includes 24:17 that we will allow God's love to flow through us, 24:19 God's love to shine through us. 24:21 And in fact, the number one way that you can actually love God 24:25 in return, that you can actually reciprocate His love, 24:28 is by loving someone else because to love someone else 24:32 is indirectly to love God because God loves everyone. 24:35 Similar to the way that if you really want to do 24:37 something loving toward me, do something for my son, right? 24:40 I will appreciate that more than you doing something 24:42 directly for me because I love him. 24:44 When we show love to others, that is a way of loving God. 24:47 >>Eric: So let's say that there's somebody who's studying 24:50 through this right now, and they're getting a picture 24:54 of this, but they're still like, "How can God love me? 24:57 "I'm that despicable character. 24:59 I realize how far short I fall of the ideal." 25:04 What would you share with that person to encourage them 25:07 about God's love for them? 25:10 >>John: Yeah, I would share with that person the fact that 25:13 no matter where you've been, no matter where you are now, 25:17 God's love is exponentially greater than your shortcomings. 25:22 Again, if God could restore someone like Manasseh, and you 25:26 look through the biblical story, you look at some of the people 25:28 that God called to do some of the greatest things, you look 25:31 where they started, and you see where they ended up because 25:34 of God's love, there is hope for each one of us in Christ. 25:39 And the key is to recognize that it's not really about us. 25:44 It's not our merit. It's not our being good enough. 25:46 It is God and His love. 25:49 And so to take an example, someone might think, 25:51 "Oh, it'd be impossible for God to love me. 25:54 "It'd be impossible for me to walk with God. 25:56 I've gone too far. I can't turn around." 26:00 With man, this might be impossible, 26:02 but with God, all things are impossible. 26:04 And I think of that story when Jesus meets the disciples. 26:08 They're in the boat and Jesus meets them, 26:10 and He's walking on the water, and Peter immediately is like, 26:13 "Oh, I want to come out there with You." 26:14 Right? And Jesus says, "Come out." 26:17 And Peter does, and he's walking on water, which normally 26:20 would be impossible, but it was possible 26:23 as long as he kept his eyes on Jesus. 26:25 But in the story, he looked down, 26:27 he looked away from Jesus, and then he began to sink. 26:29 And that shows us the key all throughout Scripture. 26:31 Keep your eyes on Jesus. 26:33 Recognize His love and how much He loves you, 26:36 and don't wait to respond to Him. He's calling you. 26:40 He's calling each one, even now, 26:41 to be into relationship with Him. So don't wait. 26:45 He's calling you now, and He will make a way to not only 26:49 restore you to relationship with Him but to carry you through, 26:52 to even make it so that you can effectively walk on water 26:56 through His power. 26:57 >>Eric: And that's powerful and something that we need 26:59 to not just understand intellectually 27:02 but deep in our hearts 27:03 to embrace and to receive with gladness of heart. 27:06 Makes all the difference in the world. 27:08 And we are glad that you are joining us 27:11 as we're digging into this subject. 27:12 It is a fascinating subject, it is a deep subject, 27:15 and it is a subject that can materially transform 27:19 the relationship that we have with God, 27:21 and not just the relationship that we have with Him 27:23 but the relationship that we have with one another. 27:26 And as God's character, His attributes are manifested 27:31 in us by us spending time with Him and allowing Him 27:34 to work in our hearts, imagine the difference 27:37 that people will see, and their concept of God will change 27:42 as a result of their interactions with you. 27:44 We have an awesome opportunity. 27:46 We're continuing our study of God's love and justice. 27:49 We'll be back again next week as we continue our study 27:52 here on "Sabbath School," brought to you by It Is Written. 27:55 [uplifting music] 28:23 [uplifting music] 28:26 [Captions provided by Aberdeen Captioning www.abercap.com] |
Revised 2025-01-04