Derek Prince - The Ultimate Demonstration of God's Love
This is an excerpt from: The Cross At The Center - Part 2
We come to the third reason in this session, the sixth if we consider the first section, for making the cross central. I hope I've excited you. If I haven't excited you I haven't communicated anything. I am so excited at the moment I could be jumping up and down but I won't. Paul said if I'm sober it's for your sakes! Here's a double reason. The cross is the ultimate demonstration of God's love and our value to God. Okay, I'm going to say that again. The cross is the ultimate demonstration of God's love and of our value to God.
Let me deal with the first. John 15:13-14. Jesus is speaking to His disciples and He says: 'Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one's life for his friends. You are my friends if you do whatever I command you.' In other words, I'm going to demonstrate the greatest love, I'm going to lay down my life for you. So that's the supreme demonstration of one person's love for another, is the willingness of that person to lay down his life or her life, for the other person.
And then in Romans 5, Paul amplifies the nature of God's love and the extent of His grace. Romans 5, beginning at verse 6 and reading through verse 10: For when we were still without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man someone would even dare to die. But God demonstrates His own live toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Much more than, having been now justified by His blood [notice justified by His blood], we shall be saved from wrath through Him. For if when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His son, much more, having been reconciled we shall be saved by His life.
If you analyze that passage, Paul says four things about our condition when Christ died for us. He says first of all in verse 6 we were without strength. We could do absolutely nothing to help ourselves. We were totally dependent on God's mercy. He also says Christ died for the ungodly. We were ungodly. We had a nature and a way of life and a way of thinking and conducting ourselves which was totally alien to God. Then he says in verse 8 while we were still sinners Christ died for us. So, we were disobedient, rebellious, not in any sense seeking to please God. And finally, in verse 10 he says for if when we were enemies we were reconciled to God.
So, Paul uses four different phrases to describe our condition when Christ died for us. He says we were without strength, totally helpless, unable to do a thing to help ourselves. He says we were ungodly. I wonder if you can realize what that means. There was nothing in us that could attract God. Everything about us was alien to God's nature. Thirdly, we were sinners, we were disobedient, we were rebels. And fourthly, we were enemies, we were actually in opposition to God. When we were in that condition Christ died for us. Paul says that is the measure of God's love for us. It's very important, I think, that we see that because I find I'm always dealing with Christians who are not really sure that God loves them. There are none of them here tonight, I'm sure. Maybe there are.
Well, if you have doubts about God's love for you, those doubts will never be fully resolved until you've grasped the fact of the condition you were in when Christ died for you. And God will not allow you to come to peace on any other grounds because that's the only basis. You see that? You may be relying on the attitude of some friend or the help of some minister or the assurance of somebody that you're to be loved.
If I understand God's dealings, sooner or later, He'll remove that out of your life because He doesn't want you to base your understanding of His love on anything except the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. You may find in times of darkness you'll wonder what's happening, why am I suffering, what's going on. God will only illuminate one thing in the darkness, that's the cross and that's all you need to know. The trouble with many of us is we know too much and God wants to bring us to the place where it's sufficient to know that Christ died for us.