{"id":2911,"date":"2019-05-21T09:34:23","date_gmt":"2019-05-20T23:34:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/?p=2911"},"modified":"2019-05-21T09:34:33","modified_gmt":"2019-05-20T23:34:33","slug":"such-love-19-05-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/?p=2911","title":{"rendered":"Such Love  19-05-2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>SUCH LOVE<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>By Geoff Serpell<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>From a magazine sourced from 7<sup>th<\/sup> Day Adventist called \u201cSigns from the Times\u201d, a Kim Peckham wrote that you could be dead by now. That is, if you had lived 100 years ago. She says we are living so long now that we can receive greeting cards from Centrelink saying, \u201cHappy one hundred and first birthday, and here\u2019s another cheque. If you live much longer, we\u2019ll be a fiscal wreck\u201d The card comes with a gift pack of cigarettes. If you were a baby girl in 1850, you couldn\u2019t expect to live past 40. She also wrote if you go back to ancient times, the average life span drops to 28 years. During these times banks were very reluctant to give anyone a 30-year home loan. That is why most people then lived in tents. Life insurance companies disqualified you then for drinking water.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The point I want to make is, what are you doing with all that extra time? Let us return to this later.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Judas went out into the night; it was very dark! The sacrifice of Jesus on the cross was now a certainty.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>We have moved beyond this year\u2019s Anzac Day during which the ABC covers the dawn service, Melbourne Anzac Day march to the shrine, and the services conducted at both Gallipoli and at Villers-Bretonneux in northern France.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>William Barclay in his Daily Study Bible, states that \u201cThe greatest glory in life is the glory which comes from sacrifice\u201d. The supreme glory belongs not to those who survive a war but to those who lay down their lives. Lawrence Binyon wrote:<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>\u201cThey shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>At the going down of the sun and in the morning<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>We will remember them.\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>It was the obedience of Jesus which brought glory to God. Jesus gave the supreme honor and glory to God because he was obedient even to death on a cross.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The full and final triumph of Christ, after dying on the cross is of course the resurrection and ascension. Jesus laid down his farewell one and only commandment recorded in John\u2019s gospel, to his disciples as he washes their feet. Time then was short. He walked a lonesome road. The disciples must love one another as he had loved them, even including Judas.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>What does this mean for us and for our relationships with each other? Soon I will invite you to share with the one next to you, how you came to have your faith. When did you accept Jesus as your lord and savior?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Jesus loved his disciples selflessly. His one desire was to give himself and all he had for those he loved.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>His love was given sacrificially. Even to that cross.<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>It was given understandingly. Jesus lived with his disciples; he knew them through and through.<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>He loved them forgivingly. <span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>All the disciples from Peter down, denied Him and forsook him as craven cowards. He forgave them!<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>We are asked to approach our life and each other with his focus on love.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The kind of love with which we are to love one another is the kind of love with which Jesus loved his disciples. Today the media does not promote: \u201cGod First\u201d, it doesn\u2019t even promote \u201cothers first\u201d. We live in a world that suggests our needs and our wants must be met first.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Jesus\u2019 love for his disciples and friends was like the love of a father, the Heavenly Father, to whom he taught them, and us, how to pray. He referred to his disciples as brothers. He identified himself with people who were hungry, thirsty, naked, or a stranger or in prison. These examples of friendship, of fatherly love and brotherly love, from Jesus, he commands of us too.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>May I indulge myself by sharing with you a mini testimony?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>I was a regular attender of both Sunday School and Church during my childhood and during my teens.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>During my three month\u2019s service in 1957 with the Army at Puckapunyal, I had a few wake-up calls to deal with away from my sheltered homelife.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>My interest in the fairer sex had been awoken and I found that dancing was a good way to meet. \u201cTinder\u201d, the on-line dating service, was not around in those times.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>With all the good fellowship I experienced at Hampton Methodist church, I still had a few things to come to grips with, some unsettling things at home and a workplace in a bank with a less than inspiring atmosphere.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The Billy Graham Crusade came along in, I think 1959, in Melbourne and whilst attending with my mother and sister, I stood up and committed myself to Christ. Later at another crusade, I volunteered as a counsellor at the MCG.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>I thus had a personal savior in Jesus Christ and ever since have endeavored to do His work ahead of my own interests.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Jan and I have both just read \u201cThe Billy Graham Story\u201d by John Pollock.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>We picked the book off the bookshelf in the middle room. There is always some great books and good CD\/DVD\u2019s there. Between 1949 and 2003, Graham addressed more than 83 million face to face, it would be another billion he reached on TV and radio. 3 Million came forward as inquirers at his crusades. In 1954 he had audience with Winston Churchill, and he was friends with most American Presidents during his lifetime. Queen Elizabeth granted him an honorary knighthood in 2001. He passed away recently in his late nineties.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Our 2019 Friendship book reading for April 27 wrote of Graham, \u201che said we need to learn to say, \u2018I was wrong; I\u2019m sorry.\u2019 And we also need to reply, \u2018That\u2019s all right; I love you\u201d.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0 <\/span>When we learn that lesson, we might also begin to spread this attitude further afield.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>How did you come by your faith? Would you like to share with someone next to you, say 2 minutes each how this came about?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>We give Jesus the glory for he showed us how to love. We praise Him who loved his mother and father, brothers and sisters, and friends and into relationships even with those who were his enemies.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>How are we to show our love and also our faith with others?<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>As senior parents and grandparents as well as great grandparents too, who among us do not wish to eventually leave this world a better place? Somehow, we mothers and fathers need to lead our children and grandchildren to making Jesus as their best friend.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>For this to happen we and indeed everyone needs to stay kind and aim to encourage each other to be kind and caring for each other.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>With 25 million of us in Australia, one act of kindness by each other every day equals 9 billion acts of kindness a year.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Jesus opened the way of life for us to follow Him out of the shadows of death into His marvelous light. Glory to Him indeed.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>To assist us to become evangelistic, here is a prayer based on our Psalm today, from Eddie Askew, at the Leprosy Mission I wish to share with you: &#8211;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Lord, pressed by my own busyness<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>And self-created doubts,<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>I lose my grip on you.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The clouds draw in and shadow me.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>The mist wet blankets me in billows of uncertainty.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>My doubt shouts out for reassurance<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>And comes echoing back empty handed<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Yet still you\u2019re there.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>Your presence patient and dependable<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>And in its magnet field<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>I turn again to find you.<span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>True north<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>By which I orientate my life<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>And praise returns.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong><span class=\"Apple-converted-space\">\u00a0<\/span>Amen<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #000000;\"><strong>\u201cGod is Like\u201d<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SUCH LOVE By Geoff Serpell From a magazine sourced from 7th Day Adventist called \u201cSigns from the Times\u201d, a Kim Peckham wrote that you could be dead by now. That is, if you had lived 100 years ago. She says we are living so long now that we can receive greeting cards from Centrelink saying, \u201cHappy one hundred and first birthday, and here\u2019s another cheque. If you live much longer, we\u2019ll be a fiscal wreck\u201d The card comes with a gift pack of cigarettes. If you were a baby girl in 1850, you couldn\u2019t expect to live past 40. She also wrote if you go back to ancient times, the average life span drops to 28 years. During these times banks were very reluctant to give anyone a 30-year home loan. That is why most people then lived in tents. Life insurance companies disqualified you then for drinking water. The point I want to make is, what are you doing with all that extra time? Let us return to this later. Judas went out into the night; it was very dark! The sacrifice of Jesus on the cross was now a certainty. We have moved beyond this year\u2019s Anzac Day during which the ABC covers the dawn service, Melbourne Anzac Day march to the shrine, and the services conducted at both Gallipoli and at Villers-Bretonneux in northern France. William Barclay in his Daily Study Bible, states that \u201cThe greatest glory in life is the glory which comes from sacrifice\u201d. The supreme glory belongs not to those who survive a war but to those who lay down their lives. Lawrence Binyon wrote:\u00a0 \u201cThey shall not grow old, as we that are left grow old: Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.\u201d It was the obedience of Jesus which brought glory to God. Jesus gave the supreme honor and glory to God because he was obedient even to death on a cross. The full and final triumph of Christ, after dying on the cross is of course the resurrection and ascension. Jesus laid down his farewell one and only commandment recorded in John\u2019s gospel, to his disciples as he washes their feet. Time then was short. He walked a lonesome road. The disciples must love one another as he had loved them, even including Judas. What does this mean for us and for our relationships with each other? Soon I will invite you to share with the one next to you, how you came to have your faith. When did you accept Jesus as your lord and savior? Jesus loved his disciples selflessly. His one desire was to give himself and all he had for those he loved. His love was given sacrificially. Even to that cross. It was given understandingly. Jesus lived with his disciples; he knew them through and through. He loved them forgivingly. \u00a0 All the disciples from Peter down, denied Him and forsook him as craven cowards. He forgave them!\u00a0 We are asked to approach our life and each other with his focus on love. The kind of love with which we are to love one another is the kind of love with which Jesus loved his disciples. Today the media does not promote: \u201cGod First\u201d, it doesn\u2019t even promote \u201cothers first\u201d. We live in a world that suggests our needs and our wants must be met first. Jesus\u2019 love for his disciples and friends was like the love of a father, the Heavenly Father, to whom he taught them, and us, how to pray. He referred to his disciples as brothers. He identified himself with people who were hungry, thirsty, naked, or a stranger or in prison. These examples of friendship, of fatherly love and brotherly love, from Jesus, he commands of us too. May I indulge myself by sharing with you a mini testimony? I was a regular attender of both Sunday School and Church during my childhood and during my teens. During my three month\u2019s service in 1957 with the Army at Puckapunyal, I had a few wake-up calls to deal with away from my sheltered homelife. My interest in the fairer sex had been awoken and I found that dancing was a good way to meet. \u201cTinder\u201d, the on-line dating service, was not around in those times. With all the good fellowship I experienced at Hampton Methodist church, I still had a few things to come to grips with, some unsettling things at home and a workplace in a bank with a less than inspiring atmosphere. The Billy Graham Crusade came along in, I think 1959, in Melbourne and whilst attending with my mother and sister, I stood up and committed myself to Christ. Later at another crusade, I volunteered as a counsellor at the MCG. I thus had a personal savior in Jesus Christ and ever since have endeavored to do His work ahead of my own interests.\u00a0 Jan and I have both just read \u201cThe Billy Graham Story\u201d by John Pollock.\u00a0 We picked the book off the bookshelf in the middle room. There is always some great books and good CD\/DVD\u2019s there. Between 1949 and 2003, Graham addressed more than 83 million face to face, it would be another billion he reached on TV and radio. 3 Million came forward as inquirers at his crusades. In 1954 he had audience with Winston Churchill, and he was friends with most American Presidents during his lifetime. Queen Elizabeth granted him an honorary knighthood in 2001. He passed away recently in his late nineties. Our 2019 Friendship book reading for April 27 wrote of Graham, \u201che said we need to learn to say, \u2018I was wrong; I\u2019m sorry.\u2019 And we also need to reply, \u2018That\u2019s all right; I love you\u201d.\u00a0 When we learn that lesson, we might also begin to spread this attitude further afield. How did you come by your faith? Would you like to share<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sermons"],"rttpg_featured_image_url":null,"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Leighmoor.Master","author_link":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/author\/leighmoor-master"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/?cat=24\" rel=\"category\">Sermons<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"SUCH LOVE By Geoff Serpell From a magazine sourced from 7th Day Adventist called \u201cSigns from the Times\u201d, a Kim Peckham wrote that you could be dead by now. That is, if you had lived 100 years ago. She says we are living so long now that we can receive greeting cards from Centrelink saying,&hellip;","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2911","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2911"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2911\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2913,"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2911\/revisions\/2913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.leighmoorunitingchurch.org.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}