Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Love Quest International
Church Podcast, where we seek to love all nations, equip the
church, mobilize the equipped, and serve all.
We're super glad you're joining us from whenever and wherever
you're at in the world. Welcome to the family to get
your Bibles ready, get some water, get some coffee, maybe
some tea, and get ready to receive.
Let's get into it. What a great day to be in this
place. Looking good, good to see you.
Great to be here and we're excited today.
I don't know if you heard it's Resurrection Sunday.
I want to thank Pastor Terrence and Pastor Julia for the
incredible honour it is to be able to share on this Easter
Sunday. And thank you so much for this
opportunity, but also thank you so much for what you've done in
establishing, building and equipping a people in this
house. We thank you for everything you
put into us today. We celebrate.
We remember Jesus resurrected in John chapter 20 and verse one.
It says early on Sunday morning while it was still dark, Mary
Magdalene came to the tomb and found that the stone had been
rolled away from the entrance. She ran and found Simon Peter
and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved.
She said they have taken the Lord's body out of the tomb and
we don't know where they have put him.
Peter and the other disciples started out for the tomb.
They were both running, but the other disciple outran Peter and
reached the tomb first. That's John just claiming
victory in that way. He stooped and looked in and saw
the linen wrappings lying there, but he didn't go in.
Then Simon Peter arrived and went inside.
He also noticed the linen wrappings lying there, while the
cloth that had covered Jesus head was folded up and lying
apart from the other wrappings. Then the disciple who had
reached the tomb first also went in, and he saw and believed, for
until then they still hadn't understood the scriptures that
said Jesus must rise from the dead.
Then they went home. Mary was standing outside the
tomb crying, and as she wept she stooped and looked in.
She saw 2 white robed angels, one sitting at the head and the
other at the foot of the place where the body of Jesus had been
lying. Dear woman, why are you crying?
The angels asked her. Because they have taken away my
Lord, she replied. And I don't know where they have
put him. She turned to leave and saw
someone standing there. It was Jesus, but she didn't
recognize him. Dear woman, why are you crying?
Jesus asked her. Who?
Are you looking for? She thought he was the gardener,
Sir, she said. If you have taken him away, tell
me where you've put him and I will go and get him, Mary, Jesus
said. She turned to him and cried out
Rabbini, which in Hebrew is Hebrew.
For teacher. Don't cling to me, Jesus said,
for I haven't yet ascended to the Father, but go find my
brothers and tell them I am ascending to my Father, and to
your Father, and to my God and your God.
Mary Magdalene found the disciples and told them, I have
seen the Lord. Then she gave them his message.
That Sunday evening the disciples were meeting behind
locked doors because they were afraid of the Jewish leaders.
Suddenly Jesus was standing there among them.
Peace be with you, he said. As he spoke, he showed them the
wounds in his hands and his side.
They were filled with joy when they saw the Lord again.
He said. Peace be with you.
As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you his reason.
What a wonderful reality, what a wonderful and powerful truth
Jesus has risen and what a friend we have in Jesus, This
friend Jesus. You know, it's interesting.
Mary didn't recognize Jesus until he said her name.
Mary, dear friends and family members, and they say your name
like no one else says your name. And you know it's them.
You know that they are the ones who are calling your name.
My mum used to say Brett. Or she used to say Brett.
Where's the Rodway? Come here.
Has anyone else heard that or is that just me?
OK. Just I want to make sure there's
a few. Yeah.
Full name. Full name means yeah, yeah,
that's right. It means it means attention,
right. But Jesus, when he calls Mary,
there's this connection of how that name rang, how his
inflection connected with her heart, how she had heard that
voice, how she connected. Now that's Jesus, not a
gardener, not just somebody, but that's Jesus my friend.
In John chapter 15 we read in verse 12, This is my
commandment, that you love and unselfishly seek the best for
one another, just as I have loved you.
No one has greater love nor stronger commitment than to lay
down his own life for his friends.
You are my friends if you keep on doing what I command you.
I do not call you servants any longer, for the servant does not
know what his master is doing. But I have called you my friends
because I have revealed to you everything that I have heard
from my father. You know, there's a difference
between somebody who gets instruction to do a thing if, if
there's a, a boss who is instructing it, maybe hey, go,
go clean that table. All I know is go clean that
table. I'm, I'm, I'm responding to the
request. I'm responding to that action.
But when I'm a close friend, he says, see if I can get all of
these things working. Well, my plan is to have ten of
these around the city and then we're going to bring all that
money in and then we're going to be able to develop this this
real estate over here. And then I can then from there,
I can give money back into the community, but also take care of
my parents. And I can do this and I can do
that and I can do the other. Now I've got a whole story of
the why. And So what Jesus is saying here
is I'm no longer just telling you go do this thing, but rather
he's saying now I can trust you my friend.
I can trust you, my friend, I can share with you all the
things the Father has shared with me.
I can trust you with this great plan and you will be my friend
Jesus. Jesus is a friend who
understands. In Hebrews chapter 4 it says so.
Then since we have a great high priest who has entered heaven,
Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to what we believe.
This high priest of ours understands our weaknesses, for
he faced all of the same testings that we do, yet he did
not sin. So let us come boldly to the
throne of our gracious God and there we will receive his mercy
and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.
You see, Jesus is a friend who understands.
He understands your situation. He understands the challenges.
He grew up and he had to work. He actually had to submit to a
mum and dad and and and do the chores and he had to engage with
people. He had to he had to work through
the difficult situations as a Carpenter.
He probably hate people who are wanting a thing a certain way.
And now I want my table to look like this.
No, no, I want to look like this.
No, no, I'm going to change my mind.
I want to look like this. No, I think change that leg do
this anybody. It's I see some nodding heads.
Yes, we've we've had clients that have maybe have changed
their mind a few times. You see, Jesus understands the
weaknesses of humanity because he came to earth as human.
He came like you and me. God made flesh, Emmanuel, God
with us, God who engaged with us.
And so he understands the difficulties.
He understands what it means to be hungry.
He understands what it means to be tired.
It tells you in the Gospels he was tired.
He's like, OK, that's a long day.
And then the disciples said, we've got more people who want
to be prayed for. Let's go, let's go, let's go.
He understands our weaknesses. He understands the temptation.
There's a whole section in the gospel where Satan comes and
tempts him and says, OK, get some food for yourself.
You've been, you've been fasting for 4040 days, you must be
hungry. Just make some food.
Jesus didn't say I can't do that.
He said no man shall not live by bread alone.
Well, OK, OK, all right. Then Satan comes and he says,
hey, look, look, why don't I show you everything out here?
I can give you all of this glory, all this riches.
We can just jump straight to it. You can have it all.
Just worship me. No, you shall worship the Lord
God and only him. And then he, he tempts him with
scripture. He says, hey, you can jump off
here. And the Scripture says you
won't, you won't get hurt if you fall.
And Jesus says you shall not tempt the Lord your God.
He was tempted. He was, He was enticed with
resource, He was enticed with glory.
He is enticed with the flesh, He was enticed with food.
He was enticed by the enemy, but he was without sin, and that's
why he understands US. Jesus understands the challenge.
He understands the tiredness. He understands the walk.
He understands disappointment. He was rejected.
One of his own 12 betrayed him. If you've ever been betrayed,
Jesus understands. If you've ever had people walk
out of you, Jesus understands, he said to the thousands who'd
kept coming to hear his word, He said, Hey, if you want to be
part of me, you've got to take my body and my blood.
You've got to be part of me. You've got to engage with me.
It's a deeper walk. And they left him because it's
too much. He was abandoned.
But Jesus was not without. He was.
He was without sin, but he understands you.
Jesus, a friend who fights for us.
Jesus fights for you. In Romans 8 it says no.
Despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours
through Christ who loved us. Overwhelming victory.
I like that. Overwhelming victory.
Jesus fights with us. He fights for us.
He's a friend who's got your back and your front and your
sides. Not just you're 6, you're 12,
you're 9, and you're three. OK.
And for those who do digital, I can't help.
You only know the analogue, OK? But he fights for us.
He's a friend who fights for us. Have you ever thought about God
and thought, does he just want all from me?
No, no, no. He came that you might have full
life, a full life to fight for you.
Jesus, a friend who hears us. I love this because he's a
friend who doesn't just hear what we think we want, he hears
what we need. In First John Chapter 5, it says
this is the remarkable degree of confidence which we have, which
we as believers are entitled to have before Him, that if we ask
anything according to His will that is consistent with His plan
and purpose, He hears us. You ever wondered if your prayer
was hitting a ceiling? You ask if God was just not
getting through. The scripture says He hears us.
He hears us in our cry. He hears us in our desperation,
that He hears us when we're calling out.
He hears us. In that quiet but hopeful call
on His name. He hears us.
He is the God who hears. When we pray, when we come to
Him, He hears our cry. He understands and He hears us.
In that quiet moment when no one's around.
You're with your thoughts and you call out to God.
He hears you. He hears.
Our concerns. He hears our fears, He hears our
hopes, He hears when we call on him.
Verse 15 And if we know, if we know for a fact, as indeed we
do, if we know, if we know that He hears us and listens to us in
whatsoever we ask, we also know with settled and absolute
knowledge that we have granted to us the request which we have
asked from Him, there's a knowing we can have in God, a
faith that knows, a cry that knows, a calling out of the
heart that knows. He hears us, perhaps.
You've thought, but I don't know that he hears us because it
didn't turn out the way I was thinking.
He hears us. He hears us.
Jesus is a friend who hears your call, hears your cry of heart,
cares for you, He hears us. And Jesus is a friend who prays
for us. The other part of the way I
could have written this is Jesus is a friend who intercedes for
us first John 2 verse one, it says, my dear children, I'm
writing this to you so you have that you will not not sin, but
if anyone does sin, we have an advocate who pleads our case
before the Father. He is Jesus Christ, the one who
is truly righteous. He himself is the sacrifice that
atones for our sins and not only our sins, but the sins of all
the world. That's pretty encompassing.
It's a big place in the world. I haven't been everywhere yet.
It's a pretty amazing place, the whole world.
But he's an advocate for us. He's positioning us.
For those who are here in the 9:00 AM experience, they will
remember Elder John had four men up here representing.
There's the Father, there's Jesus the Son, and then those
who know him and those who are yet to know him.
And it was looking through Jesus, our advocate, the one who
advocates, advocates on our behalf.
He speaks on our behalf to the Father.
He speaks in a way that advocates our position, but He
can advocate because He has atoned for our sin.
He has made the way available through his death and
resurrection to deal with the sin problem in our life, to deal
with that thing that separates us from God, to deal with that
missing the mark that has created a gulf between us
knowing Him, knowing Almighty God.
Jesus is the advocate. Jesus is the one who stands to
advocate on our behalf. And here he's talking to those
who believe. He says we have an advocate who
pleads our case before the Father.
He is Jesus on our behalf. When we have sin in our life, He
stands and he says my blood was shed for this one.
So forgiveness is our legal duty.
Forgiveness is the right of those who have received Him.
His blood was shed, His blood atoned and makes way so we can
have relationship with Almighty God in a few minutes.
If you're here today and you haven't made a decision for
Jesus to receive him in your life and the complete work that
he did at the cross, I'm going to give you an opportunity to
respond. You see, Jesus is one who
advocates on your behalf. He is one who is moving on your
behalf. He's representing you to the
Father. Jesus said I am the way, the
truth and the life. No one comes to the Father but
by me. One way Jesus.
Jesus is a friend who loves us. Jesus is a friend who loves us.
In Romans chapter 8 it says, and
I am convinced, that nothing can ever separate us from the God's
love. Neither death nor life, neither
angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries
about tomorrow, not even the powers of hell can separate us
from God's love. Nothing can separate us from his
love. It's so encompassing, it's so
great, His love for you. No power in the sky above or in
the earth below, Indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be
able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in
Christ Jesus our Lord. Nothing, nothing can separate
you from the love of God. You see, God so loved us that he
sent his Son while we were so far away from Him, while we were
still rejecting Him, while we were yet sinners, Christ died
for us. That's the kind of love.
It's the love that comes first, the one who loves first.
In a simple way, it's like a couple who are dating and it's
the awkward tension of who's going to say it first, Right.
And so sometimes you you hear stories.
It's not what I did, but you hear stories of people say I
love you. Pardon.
Oh, no, I didn't say anything. I was just just just testing the
waters. Just just check.
Just checking because I don't want to be the first one, you
know, How will that go? I love you.
Thank you. Right, Elder Stacey knows that
one now. But Jesus, confident,
declarative, certain, with full strength, the voice declares to
you, I love you, I love you, I love you.
Before you respond, before you have a chance, in fact, while
you are away from me, I want you to know I love you.
Jesus, the friend who loves. I listened to a message from my
grandfather. It was actually just a few weeks
before he passed away back in 77.
I was not yet 2 and he was actually sharing a message on if
I had but one sermon to preach. He was 57 years of age, had been
in ministry for 38 years, and there's this one line that
captures my attention, He says. I have just begun to understand
the throbbing heart of love that God has for US. 38 years in
ministry, 38 years studying the Bible and saying there's this
incredible love. I want you to know this love.
I want you to get a revelation of the great love of God, the
great heart of God for you, this great heart that says I love
you. I want you to be with me.
I want you to know me. Are we sometimes too glib, too
too quick, too quick to roll over these parts in the
scripture where he talks about His love for us?
This great love, this great love that that he poured out in our
hearts? This great love that He calls us
to the great love of a father's heart who so wanted to be in
relationship with you, so wanted to connect with you, so wanted
to be your father that he said Jesus at the right time.
He said Jesus because he wanted you he wanted you to know him
and he wanted to know you. The great love Scripture says
it's too wide. It's too high.
It's, it's too deep, it's too long.
You, you can't even try to comprehend this love.
You can't even get to the edges of the love of God.
It's too big to understand. This is the love of God that's
been poured out for us and nothing can separate us from
this love. No physical person can hold you
back. No, no demon can hold you back.
No, no, no obstacle can hold you back.
This love of God to Jesus, a friend who loves but but his
love is so great. You might think, oh, but I've
done too much. I've, I've strayed too far.
That's a lie. You can't get too far from his
love. I just told you.
You can't get to the fringes of his love.
You can't get you can't get away from his love.
Perhaps fear has held you so long.
It's been too long. I've been away too long.
There's there's too much that's gone through.
Nothing, nothing, nothing shall separate you from the love of
God. Nothing, nothing.
Today, if you have yet to know this love, if you have not yet
made Jesus your Lord, today that love is available for you and
you believer. If you know Jesus, but you've
been sitting on the fringes, today, that love of God is
calling you in deeper, calling you higher.
It's time to upscale your love. Upgrade that love to receive His
love, to walk in his love to actually stop trying to do
everything in your own strength and take the time to be loved.
To receive the love of God, to let the love of God embrace you,
to allow him to work in you. John chapter 3 and verse 16 in
this part of the the the gospel or good news according to John,
a man named Nicodemus had come to see Jesus and understand what
are you here for? I've heard your message.
I've heard you speak. There's something there, but I
just need to understand what it's all about.
And Jesus says to him as part of his response.
For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son,
that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have
everlasting life. For God did not send his Son
into the world to condemn the world, but that the world
through him might be saved. Motivation was God's love.
The mission is to save a world that's separated from him.
The mission is that the world through him would be saved, not
condemned. No, that's that's not God's
work. God's work does not condemn.
God's work is to salvation, to relationship, to hope.
In John Chapter 11 and verse 25 Jesus is talking to Martha and
this is the the story about Lazarus who had died and was
about to be resurrected. And in their discussion, Jesus
told her, I am the resurrection and the life anyone who believes
in me will live even after they die.
Jesus is the resurrection. You know, he is a friend.
But more than that, you know, it's interesting.
It's John 15 where he talks about him being a friend.
It's in John 20 we that we read at the beginning of this
experience. And Jesus says to Mary, go tell
my brothers. Go tell my brothers.
Go to my brothers family. I did that work.
The cross my blood was given. And now in atonement and in my
resurrection, go get my brothers.
They're family now. They're family now.
Here he is saying to Mary, These are my brothers.
Now we're we're, we're. Of one blood, one blood, one
blood. He said he is my.
Brother. And now today.
Today if. You've received Christ.
We're of one blood, the blood of Jesus, if you've.
Received Christ today. We're of one family with one
father. You are my brothers.
And my sisters. Today, if you have.
Not yet made. A decision to.
Receive Christ. This is an opportunity to pray.
And make a step, a decision. That Jesus.
Will be Lord. Of your life.
It is a. Decision to.
Believe God. It is a decision to accept what
Jesus did at the cross for you and to now walk a life in Him,
with Him, empowered by Him, graced by Him, loved by Him.
And so just in the moment, I'm going.
To give you an opportunity if this if you've never made a
decision to accept Jesus, we're going to pray a.
Prayer together all. Of us.
And I invite you. To pray this prayer.
To make a step. To make a decision to move
toward God. To respond to the love of.
God, that's been poured out for you.
To respond to this. Powerful life.
Changing. Encounter with Jesus.
And today if. You've made a decision before,
but you feel like you've drifted.
Your heart is far from God. Other things.
Have caught up your. Attention, I invite you to make
a decision today. To step towards him to
rededicate. Your heart to come.
To the Lord. Respond to His love.
Respond to His working in your life.
And so we're going to take a moment to.
Pray again, everybody who's in this room, please pray with me.
And for those, if it's your first time and you want to pray
this prayer and make this decision, I invite you to pray a
lot with us. Father God, thank you for.
Sending Jesus. Thank you for your.
Love that's been poured out for me.
Today I make a. Decision to follow you I.
Receive. Everything that you've done for
me. That you have paid the.
Penalty for my sin. And I received.
Jesus. As the Lord of.
My life. And I step into.
This new relationship with you. Thank you, Father God.
By the blood of Jesus, I am saved by the blood of Jesus I am
saved. Thank you, Lord, Amen.
So if you've. Made that decision.
For the first time, I'd like to invite you to just in a moment,
put up your hands. The reason for that is twofold.
First of all, so we can celebrate with you and encourage
you. And the second is so we you make
a step of faith by putting up your hand.
There's a statement of faith that yes, I received what Jesus
has done for me. So if you've made that prayer
for the first time today, would you raise your hand?
Thank you. And if you, if you.
Prayed this for the first time but you weren't comfortable
putting your hand up. Come and see us just at the back
you'll see some tables. It's our our first time
attendees area. Come back there, we have some
material for you. And if you're searching, but you
weren't ready to make a decision today, we have some material
that will encourage you and give you some more information on
your journey that you're going through.
So be a part of it. You know, and God is so good.
And I tell you today, His love cannot be contained.
His love cannot be blocked. His love is available for you.
So let's pray together. Lord, thank you.
Thank you this day, Resurrection Sunday, we're so excited, Lord,
that you are at work. Thank you, Lord, today that we
remember you, remember all that you've done.
Lord, we remember the power of your resurrection.
We remember that you've atoned for us.
Lord, we remember that you're at work in US.
And Lord, we praise you so much. You're a great God with a huge
love for us. May we get a revelation of the
love of God and may that revelation of your love pour out
through us to show shine light to those around us.
Lord, we praise you today, we rejoice in you today, and we
thank you for this great day. Hallelujah.
Amen. Give the Lord a shout.
Hallelujah. Thank you so much for tuning
into this. Week's sermon, we pray you were
challenged, equipped and encouraged.
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drill. You know the motto, get your
love fixed man and we'll see y'all real soon.