So Jesus revelation that we could experience the love of the Father, is deeply connected to our relating with people, and overflowing and interacting with them. You just can't have one without the other, so right now just as we finish, let's just close our eyes, want to just bring your attention around one of the greatest, the most practical gifts of all, and I'm going to just get you to - it'll take about one and a half minutes and then we'll finish. I want you just to meditate for a moment, on how great you are loved by God, how valuable you are. The Bible says see what manner of love the Father has, and while we were sinners Christ died for us. I want you just for a moment, just to allow your mind if you can focus for a few minutes more, allow your imagination just to picture what I describe. As you picture it, allow your heart to arise in response.
I want us just for a moment to just travel back in time 2000 years to a small place, a hill outside Jerusalem, where there was a man crucified, because He loved you. As you kneel in the rocky hard place, and look down you can see how they've dug a hole out in the ground, and the post, the wooden post that He's hanging on has been inserted in the ground, and some rocks pushed into it to keep it stable. You see the dark stain in the dust, the blood of Jesus Christ which was shed for you, because He loves you. As you look up, you look at the cross, you can see the blood running down it, freshly running down it, still running down it. This blood was for you, to cleanse you of every failure, every mistake, and make you perfectly acceptable to the Father in heaven. If you lift your eyes a little more, you can see His feet, huge spikes, spiking them to the cross, so He can't move them, and if He tries to move them, nerves just shriek with pain. This blood was for you.
Begin to look up His body, His legs, His torso, you realise that a cruel whip of a Roman soldier has literally lacerated and torn deep welts, deep gashes in His legs, His back, His sides, stripped the flesh off and cut it right open, some places to the bone. He did this because He loved you and me. His blood was for you. If you look towards His arms, you can see huge spikes holding His wrists to the cross, right through the nervous area. Of course in that position He has cramps in His body, and so He has to pull Himself up on those spikes to try and breathe, and then drop back down again, so it goes on for hours, terrible, agonising pain, struggling to breathe, and gradually the lungs filling with water and blood. This was for you, because He loves you. You can't get more tangible than that. As you look at His head, you see a crown of thorns, huge, deep, long spikes beaten in, and you can remember when you had a little prickle and how that hurt - what must this be like? The mockery, the abuse, the hurt, the pain, and as you look in His eyes, there's no accusation, no condemnation; Father, forgive them, they didn't know when they sinned what it would cost to redeem them.
That's how much He loves you. God so loved you He gave His only Son, Jesus Christ. He practically and willingly gave up His life on the cross so you could be joined back in relationship with God, discover that relationship with all it's depths, discover the purpose it has for your life and live a life rooted in the love of God for you. If God was willing to do that for us when we didn't even know Christ, and walked in hardness of heart and sin, how much more now will He give you everything you need? Father, release Your love, a revelation of Your presence and love into the heart of this church, that it will overflow in love and unity for one another, will overflow to connect with our community in a greater dimension.