The Great Commandment (1 of 6)

Mike Connell

Page 8 of 10
The first time I kissed Joy was a long time ago, but I remember where we were, I remember it exactly. Didn't you remember yours? Young people, you don't know anything about this, that's okay. One day it'll happen, it's alright. Don't be in a hurry, because kissing's like drinking wine. Once you start, it's hard to stop. [Laughter] That's what it says. Your kisses are sweeter than wine see, now have you ever had a sweet wine? Well, you want more. Now some of you don't know about that, but I can tell you now from experience [laughs] once you start you want more, and you have just a little bit first of all. Oh, well that's a nice wine, I'll have a bit more of that and then something changes once you've had a few wines, have you noticed? Well you've probably seen people like that, but Lynney knows, isn't that right? Yeah, you have a few wines, you know, it's [Laughter] well life cheers up! Life gets very, very cheery. The first one you have, if you haven't drunk much wine, it's whoo! I feel whoo! Ha! So you say hey get me another one, and then you start to loosen up. [Laughter]

Now you've forgotten about all the problems, yeah, it's good. The jokes are flowing and you're laughing and there's a whole new area of - you know, all that control is all starting to go now, and stuff's starting to come out, so when people drink often they'll talk loud and they're all over the place and they'll laugh a lot, or they cry and get angry a lot - whatever's in their heart will come out one way, but that's what the drink does. It says now love or kisses - his kisses are sweeter than wine, and they're better for you too. Now what is it talking about? Now this is picture language, it's trying to give you something that you do know, so that you can understand something you don't know see, so it talks about kissing and wine, and when they go together it's a bad mix. [Laughter] Too much wine and it'll be [laughs] lots of kissing, that's for sure see, so he says your kisses are sweeter than wine. See, so there's something about kissing you can never - it's like eating chocolate, you can't stop with one see, once you've had one. So when the Bible's talking in this verse about kisses and about the kiss of God, it's talking about a touch of God's spirit coming into our spirit, and we feel His love and acceptance and it ignites something in us, just like kissing does. Well you know what kissing ignites in you, well this is the same, it ignites something, we get touched by God you know. Here it is, the kiss of God, the touch of God's spirit. What it does is it softens your heart when God touches you, it melts your heart. If you've been hard or disappointed or angry, and then God starts to touch you with His love, most people just cry. They cry or they become soft.

I've seen people when we have encounters with God, and the presence of God fills the place, the love of God was so tangible you could feel it filling the whole atmosphere, and when it was like that no one wanted to go. They wanted to hang out and it changed. We were in a Bible school and had people from all these different cultures and races and nations, and when God set them free of demons, then they felt His love, the whole environment and culture of the college changed. The nations united when they experienced the passionate, consuming, delivering love of God, see, kiss of God. That's what he said, he said this is better than wine see, because wine will just leave you with a hangover. It'll pick you up and then let you down. He said when God touches us and keeps touching us in our spirit, then our lives ignite with fire, we become free, we become overflowing.

Later on in the year I've got a guy called Jason Westerfield coming here. [Yahoo!] Now you're going to enjoy Jason. You're either going to love him or hate him, it'll be one or the other, but the one think you'll have to admit, he's freer than you are, see and so when people get uptight I like to bring someone in who's really free, because when you have someone who's really free you feed off it yourself, it opens your own heart. He's just a passionate lover of God, and God's presence comes. It comes anywhere, out in the community, in the coffee bars, all over the place - wonderful what God does, the miracles God does. It's going to be great. Look him up on the internet and you'll find some of the stuff he's been doing, it's great. He's coming here to stir us up to love God a bit more.