This morning I want to begin by reading three big passages of Scripture.  All Scripture is important but there are some that speak louder than others. Then, after reading these three loud passages, I want to ask a question that is significant.  A question that each of us need to process in order to be God’s mighty warrior. 

Matthew 22:36-40 "Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?"  37 Jesus replied: "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.'  38 This is the first and greatest commandment.  39 And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.'  40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

Wow! That is pretty loud.  Jesus what is the greatest commandment?  Love; love God and love each other.  Jesus did not hesitate, nor equivocate, nor procrastinate, nor vacillate, nor fluctuate, or even oscillate; Love is the greatest command.

John 13:34-35   "A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.  35 By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

That one is pretty loud as well.  As Jesus has loved us so we must love each other.  How much does Jesus love us?  Do you remember 13 billion light years?  As far as the heavens are above the earth – astronomers have discovered a black hole 13 billion light years away – that is how much Jesus loves us; enough to die on that cruel cross for us!  All men will know you are my disciples if you love each other.  This sounds pretty important.

Anyone want to guess the third passage?

1 Corinthians 13:1-3 & 13  If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal.  2 If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  3 If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing…  13 And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

If I can speak every language on earth and even to angels and I don’t speak love I have nothing to say. If I can tell the future and answer every question on Jeopardy and can even move a mountain, but I do it without love I do nothing.  If I give everything I own to the poor but do it for some other reason than love, I give nothing.  Love is greater than faith and even hope.  Wow, that passage sounds loud. 

Now, with those three loud passages before us, here is the significant question.  Why?  Why is love so important?  Why is love the greatest commandment?  Why is love how people should know we are disciples of Jesus?  Why is love greater than faith or hope?  Why love?

If we look at who we are, honestly, what would be number one in our thinking and practice?  What is our greatest command?  Don’t you think the number one thing in the way we actually think is going to church?  We might give lip service to other things being more important, but isn’t whether or not you go to church the bottom line?  How can you claim to be a Christian and then not go to church?  It is going to church that defines being a Christian.  What is the first thing we ask when we think someone is a Christian?  We don’t ask how much do you love God, we ask where do you go to church.  After all Hebrews 10:25 is also a loud passage.

Hebrews 10:25  Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another-- and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

Going to church is significant.  It has to be one of the greatest commands.  Why does Jesus say love is more important than going to church?

And what about doctrine?  Shouldn’t what we believe define who we are?  The people in the world should know us by the fact that we believe Jesus is the Son of the living God.  We should be known as people who have experienced forgiveness of sin by the death of the Jesus on the cross.  The world should know us as people who believe that Jesus rose again on the third day.  I agree with Paul.

1 Corinthians 15:1-4 Now, brothers, I want to remind you of the gospel I preached to you, which you received and on which you have taken your stand.  2 By this gospel you are saved, if you hold firmly to the word I preached to you. Otherwise, you have believed in vain.  3 For what I received I passed on to you as of first importance: that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures,  4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures,

The world should know that we are disciples of the one who defeated sin and conquered death.  What we believe, our faith, makes us who we are.  Why then does Jesus say that the world should know that we are his disciples by the love we have for each other?

And why is love more important than hope?  Isn’t hope what keeps us going?  Isn’t knowing that one day…

2 Peter 3:10-13   …the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare.  11 Since everything will be destroyed in this way, what kind of people ought you to be? You ought to live holy and godly lives  12 as you look forward to the day of God and speed its coming. That day will bring about the destruction of the heavens by fire, and the elements will melt in the heat.  13 But in keeping with his promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness.

We are people of hope.  Amen? We are people who look to the future.  We are people who know that one day we will walk with God on the new earth, our permanent home.  Isn’t that important?  Isn’t the most important thing knowing where you are going to spend eternity?  Why, then, is love more important than our hope of heaven?  “And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love;” Why? Why is love number one?

The answer may be the same as the answer was last week.  There is a war going on for our hearts.  Satan wants your heart.  He wants to sift it through the sieve of discouragement until we have no more desire to be his warriors.  He wants to dampen you until you quit. And love is the only thing that will keep our hearts pumping.  When Satan attacks our hearts love is best defense.  Love can keep us going when everything else deserts us.  Love is the best reason to get up in the morning and keep on fighting.  Love is the 4th weapon in our arsenal.  Do you remember the first three? 

Ephesians 4:1-2 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received.  Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love.

Yes, I want to be humble like Jesus. Yes, I want to be a gentle warrior for God.  Yes, I know that it is patience in the Spirit that keeps me humble and gentle.  But it is bearing with one another in love that keeps my heart thumping. It is what keeps my blood pressure up and my adrenaline flowing!  Our only hope of winning the battle over our hearts is love!

What is fascinating, is the verses right before our theme verses; skip back a paragraph. 

Ephesians 3:16-21  I pray that out of his glorious riches he may strengthen you with power through his Spirit in your inner being,  17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love,  18 may have power, together with all the saints, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ,  19 and to know this love that surpasses knowledge-- that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.  20 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us,  21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.

Paul’s prayer for the Ephesians was to know the love of Christ.  If they knew the love of God; its width, its length, its depth, its height then they would be filled with the fullness of God. If we want our hearts to be full of the power of God to be his glorious warriors; warriors who will never be defeated, who will never give up, who will never surrender, then we must be all about love. Love is the only thing that will keep our hearts on fire through every attack of Satan.

So, the question that hits me hard is, how do we learn God’s love.  If knowing God’s love, if being God’s love, if sharing God’s love is the best defense against Satan, how do I make sure I get it?

Although going to church may not be enough when the fighting gets furious, church is where we learn to love.  Isn’t that what our theme verse says?  We are to “bear with one another in love.”  How do I learn of God’s love, it is when my brothers and sisters and my mothers and fathers show me his love!  It is in the crucible of church that we learn of his love, demonstrated by each other.  Why did we have a shower for Leta last week?  It was said last week, “This was a demonstration of our love for her.” Church is where we learn love.

Although doctrine alone will not keep us faithful when Satan claws at our hearts, it is in healthy doctrines that we discover God is love. It is essential that we have an accurate view of God learned from Scripture so that we know he is love.  Why did we have Bible study class this morning?  Why are we meeting tonight to study 1 Timothy?  So that can have a faith in the God who is love!

Although the seemingly distant promises of going to heaven when we die are not enough to keep Satan from pounding down the door to our heart, it is knowing and trusting that God truly loves us and that we will bask in his love forever that keeps us going. 

Wow! It all plugs together and makes sense.  Love is church.  Love is doctrine.  Love is hope.  That is why love is the greatest commandment.  That is why love is how we are to be known.  That is why love is greater than faith or hope.  Love is the 4th weapon of God’s warrior!

I want to end my sermon with a story that gives us a hint of how love works. This story illustrates our theme passage.  Listen to it from NLT.

NLT Ephesians 4:2 Be humble and gentle. Be patient with each other, making allowance for each other's faults because of your love.

In a supermarket, Kurtis the stock boy was busily working when a new voice came over the intercom asking for a carry out at checkout register 4. Kurtis was almost finished, and wanted to get some fresh air, and decided to answer the call. As he approached the check-out stand a distant smile caught his eye, the new check out girl was beautiful. Instantly, he fell in love.

Later that day, after his shift was over, he waited by the punch clock to find out her name. She came into the break room, smiled softly at him, took her card and punched out, then left. He looked at her card, BRENDA. He walked out only to see her start walking up the road.

Next day, after work, he waited outside as she left the supermarket, and offered her a ride home. He looked harmless enough, and she accepted. When he dropped her off, he asked if maybe he could see her again, outside of work. She simply said it wasn’t possible. He pressed and she explained she had two children and she couldn’t afford a baby-sitter, so he offered to pay for the baby-sitter. Reluctantly she accepted his offer for a date for the following Saturday.

That Saturday night he arrived at her door only to have her tell him that she was unable to go with him. The baby-sitter had called and canceled. To which Kurtis simply said, "Well, let’s take the kids with us." She tried to explain that taking the children was not an option, but again not taking no for an answer, he pressed.

Finally, Brenda brought him inside to meet her children. She had an older daughter who was just as cute as a bug. Then Brenda brought out her son, in a wheelchair. He was born a paraplegic with Down’s syndrome. Kurtis asked Brenda, "I still don’t understand why the kids can’t come with us?" Brenda was amazed. Most men would run away from a woman with two kids, especially if one had disabilities. Just like her first husband and father of her children did.  Kurtis and Brenda loaded up the kids, went to dinner and the movies. When her son needed anything Kurtis would take care of him. When he needed to use the rest room, he picked him up out of his chair, took him, brought him back. The kids loved Kurtis. At the end of the evening, Brenda knew this was the man she was going to marry and spend the rest of her life with. A year later, they were married and Kurtis adopted both of her children. Since then they have added two more kids.

Because Kurtis fell in love with Brenda he was willing to make allowances for everything.  His love led him to do whatever it took make her life better.  That is how we treat each other in the church.  That is what it means God is love.  This kind of life is what brings us hope of eternity. 

You may be curious about the stock boy and check out girl? Well, Mr. & Mrs. Kurt Warner moved to St. Louis shortly after this where he was employed by the St. Louis Rams. He was Super Bowl MVP in 1999, becoming one of the select few to win both the League MVP and Super Bowl MVP in the same year. I guess you could say they lived happily ever after.  And that is why love really is the loudest commandment!