 Okay let's pray. Father God, we come before you this morning. Lord, we thank you for the weekend that has gone by, we thank you for the rest, for the refreshing. Father God, we just want to thank you for your word, for your work in our hearts, Lord. And Father God, we thank you for ministering to us through your word and through your spirit, Lord. We thank you, Master. Father God, we just want to thank you for this week ahead, for this new week and we thank you for all the possibilities. We thank you for all the, Lord, everything that you have in store for us, Lord. And I just pray that each one of us, God, that we will be so diligent to discover and to move in the direction that you're pointing us to Lord, may we discover the things that you have in store for us, Lord. And the things that you're feeding us into, God. We pray that we'll be diligent to just follow you. Yes, Lord, we come at this week into your mighty hands, Father God. We thank you that you've already gone before us. You've prepared certain things for us, God. And so, God, we, as we follow you, God, we do so with willing hearts of Father God. Oh, man, this mute. Sorry. So, God, we just do so with willing hearts. Thank you, Father. Thank you, Lord. Thank you. Thank you, Master. You pray that, Lord, you will empower us to do whatever you call us to do this coming week. You just come at everything into your mighty hands. So, you know, if you have some big things to carry out this week, maybe some tasks that need to be done this week, can we just place it before the Lord? Let's just place it before the Lord and say, oh, God, we commit this. And we thank you for the ideas. We thank you for the empowerment. I just want to read from Proverbs 16 and verse three. Commit your works to the Lord and your thoughts will be established. Like, that's the promise. So, let's just commit, you know, everything big, small, whatever tasks that need to be done. Maybe you've got a list of things to do. Maybe there's one big thing to do, you know, whatever it is, let's commit it to the Lord. And the promise from the Lord is that, you know, He will establish our thoughts. So, right at the thought level, He'll make it strong, whatever, you know, ideas, whatever, we'll establish it and our thoughts will drive our actions. So, we're grateful to the Lord for that. So, let's commit it to the Lord, right? So, let's just place it before Him. Father God, we come before you and we commit to the Lord everything that we need to do. God, just put it in your hands and say, oh, God, that you would take care, that you would protect, that you would ensure that it's done well. God, that you would enable us, God. Yes, Lord, lead us, God, guide us, God. And yes, Lord, Father, we ask that you will establish your thoughts, Lord, establish our thoughts, God, even as you promised in your Word, that our thoughts will be established, made firm, made strong, so that we might carry out every task that our actions will be firm and strong and clear, Lord, even as you give clarity to our thoughts, oh, God. Yes, Master, we thank you. We give you all the praise. We give you all the glory. In Jesus' matchless name, we pray. Amen. Amen. Okay. Praise God. Good morning. Welcome, those of you who joined in a little tuned in late. Okay. So we'll have, we'll just go through some of the material that, you know, that we, from our notes, right? We're on page 41, if you're following in the notes, some keys to effective preaching, okay? The section before that talks about 10 things, 10 simple steps for preaching confidently or speaking confidently. It's more from our public speaking, you know, perspective. It's by Alan Morton, a known, at least he was, I'm not sure if he's still there. 2005 actually is when this article came out and so some very practical steps, or practical hacks to public speaking, you can go through that on your own. But I just wanted to go through the next section, which is keys to effective preaching, some of the things for us to keep in mind, right? See, what happens is many times we get into the flow of things and we prepare and, you know, get into the things. But then some of these basic things, some of these fundamentals are quite important. You know, some of these basic or the first steps are very, very important and sometimes we forget, right? And I remember playing, you know, badminton over the weekend, not this weekend, one of the weekends. And then I remember my tennis coach telling me, I used to play tennis when I was in school. So my tennis coach telling me, you know, after you played the shot, you know, come back to your position, come back to the ready position. You know, you played it, don't just keep admiring how beautifully you hit the ball over the net and, you know, how deep it went or how the angle at which you don't just think about it. Come back, be alert and come back to your ready position. And I was, as I was, you know, this is many years ago, right? So as I was playing badminton, I just remember that, you know, kind of saying, remember that this thing coming back to me after you hit the shot, come back to ready position, be alert, you know, because you're going to get ready for the next. What the opponent is, you know, placing the ball, placing the, you know, the shuttlecock. So come back to the ready position, be alert. So things like this, right? So some very basic thing. It's a very basic step, but then it's very, very important. So we're going to look at some keys to effective preaching. And I know that some of us are already in the, you know, doing this regularly, preaching, sharing the word in various settings, but here are some basic things. Maybe it's new for some of us, but, you know, let's look at it, right? Okay. So first thing is, of course, to pray. I'm on page 41. Maybe I'll just project this as well. Just give me a minute. Is it coming up? Yeah. I think it's there. Okay. Right. So one of the things, the first thing is, of course, to pray. Right. Because it's unlike any other, you know, any other arenas in which we might speak. When it comes to preaching, you're handling the word of God. And the objective is that, you know, many objectives, of course, that people will grow in the word. It could be people getting saved. If you're preaching the gospel, that people would get saved. The destinies will change and so on. So it's not just a physical act. It's not just, you know, dispensing information, but it's good. You're doing something much deeper. You're affecting the destinies of people and it's a spiritual act. It's going to affect people in the spirit. And it's not just you alone. And the transformation is from the spirit of God, right? From the Holy Spirit is the one who's going to affect that change or write in their hearts. And so we need to pray. We need to pray as part of the preparation and never forget that. So our preparation, our teaching and everything, we receive from him, therefore the importance of prayer. Right. We pray for, you know, some things like we pray for the elimination of God's word that God will give us the understanding. He'll give us the insight. He'll give us the burden for the people and that our hearts will be right as well. Right. So we pray for even things like the application, the illustrations, everything. Right. Cover the whole thing. Don't let anything be undone. You know, how you want to start, how you want to, what you want to share, some illustrations. Even if it's humor, just check with the Lord, ask the Lord, Lord, can I use this? What can I use? Right. Let everything be covered in prayer. The second thing would be to pray for the utterance, for the delivery, the way you say it and what you want to say. Just ask the Lord, Lord, you give me the words, you give me utterance. Right. Paul asks in one of his episodes, he writes and he says, you know, pray that, that the Lord will give me utterance. Right. That. So this is something which is scriptural. So you pray and we ask the Lord, Lord, you know, even beyond what I've prepared, not give me utterance, give me some prophetic utterance, give me some insight into the hearts of people. Right. And we ask the Lord. So we pray for that as well. And we pray for our audience, pray for who's going to be listening. Right. It could be people who know the truth. It could be people who are yet to come to the saving knowledge of Christ. So pray, pray that the Lord will draw them. Pray that the Lord will, you know, go before and prepare their hearts. Pray that, that all kinds of confusion and all kinds of blockages, barriers will be taken away. Right. There are so many things which so many spiritual things that are affecting them, the powers of darkness, attempting, distracting, accusing and really creating hindrance. So it's, it's good to pray and come against all that, that the atmosphere will be completely clear of all these disturbances and barriers and so on. Right. So we pray for the audience, pray that they will be attentive. Right. Pray for protection. Again, this is protection from distraction, accusation for the meeting. Right. So maybe it could be the physical arrangement of the meeting. You can pray for everything, pray for the power, pray for the physical arrangement, pray for those things. You know, sometimes we realize that it's like there could be one small thing which can offset the whole thing. You know, it could be one, maybe an issue of power, maybe an issue of equipment failure. We'll cover all that. Right. But it's, it's good that we pray, preempt and pray, preempt and pray and say, Lord, you know, we want this to be going smoothly. So we come at this into your hands. Right. I remember like, you know, when we are setting up Bible college for one of the earlier venues and then that's when I realized, you know, we should pray for our vendors, pray for those who are, you know, not just for those who are teaching me and preaching and those who are serving the team, but also those who are, you know, when the vendors and who are taking care of other things, external things of the project. So this was a man who was doing our fall ceiling and also, I think he was in charge of some kind of fixtures. So he was fixing a leak actually. So there was a fall ceiling, there was a high roof and he was fixing and that roof was very old and it was water had kind of seeped in and it made the whole thing weak. So he fell right through. It was a very tall ceiling and he fell from the ceiling. He fell through the fall ceiling, broke that and fell and thankfully nothing happened. Nothing happened. No bones broken. Nothing happened except for those, you know, those tiles which are broken and which we, anyway, we replaced those and also the fall ceiling, we replaced those. But the fact is that, you know, that these people need to be analysis, really thanking God for that and saying, God, thank you for preserving his life. Thank you for, you know, thank you. Nothing happened. He was a couple of injections. He was fine, you know, something to take care of the pain and he was fine just getting back. I think in a couple of days he was back to normal. So things like that, you know, pray for everything. You know, whatever the Lord would bring to mind, you know, you can pray. Okay. When you're praying for protection, you know, one of the things is that Satan accuses. Satan is an accuser. So when you're when you as a teacher or you as a speaker, when you when you are preparing yourself, you know, there's a lot of accusation that comes to your mind, right? Things like, you know, you are not worthy. You are not qualified. How can you teach this? You are a hypocrite. All kinds of accusations. I remember, you know, all kinds of distractions would come in the earlier days when I would just step up to the mic, you know, this was my early days of just getting into church and ministry. And so I remember just stepping up to the mic to just start the worship time. Right. So and then suddenly I would remember, Hey, did I switch off the gas stove at at home? Did I lock the car? All kinds of thoughts. Till then, you know, everything is clear. I'm just stepping up and all kinds of distracting thoughts. Then I then I realize that, Hey, it's not it's not me. It's it's something else. It's it's the enemy trying to distract. It's Satan trying to distract you. So don't don't worry about that. So then I, you know, I came to, I just made a decision, right? Okay, if these thoughts come, I'm not going to worry about that. And it's it's happening right there just before starting to minister. So I just decided it's fine. If the gas is on, if the stove is on, it's fine. By the time we go back, the whole cylinder will be empty. It's okay. Or, you know, even if the house is open and I didn't lock the car and things are missing. It's fine. It's okay. You know, I just made up my mind and said, that's okay. Fine. And then these things would stop. It just, it just stopped. So you realize that it's an attack from the enemy to accuse you to, you know, sometimes the accusation is, you know, this is very, very practical, you know, things like, hey, this, this passage doesn't make sense. Or this, this seems very irrelevant. It's too simple. This message is too simple. Why do you want to preach this? People will not be interested. This is not going to help them. And of course, you know, the Holy Spirit will lead us. Holy Spirit will speak to us. But his voice or his leading is, is gentle. It's not accusing. It could be convicting, but it's not accusing. Right. So we get to discern and decide, yeah, whose voice is it? And if it's the voice of the accused, it is regard. We discard that. And Satan will also accuse the audience. You know, these people are not interested or they hate you or, you know, from the audience perspective, you know, they don't esteem you, you know, they don't care about you or all kinds of things. So you, you realize and then you, you pray against that. You declare that and you say, okay, I'm a child of God. I'm a servant of the most high God. And this is my call. God has called me to this. God has given me this privilege and opportunity to handle his word and I will, and I will share no matter what. It doesn't matter. And I'm going with love of God in my heart. Love for God, love for his people. And I will love these people, you know, as much as God loves them. And you just, you know, declare that, proclaim that and you keep going. Okay. Okay. The second one is to, when you're making a statement, when you're making an important point, you know, when you're delivering a truth and making a very conclusive statement and saying, this is so, we need to back it up with scripture. Because this is what the word of God says. Like when we make a statement. And why is that important? Because your reference point, our reference point, our plumb line is the word of God, right? And so it's good to, you know, it's good to share with the audience. This is why I'm saying this. I mean, we don't have to crowd our message or completely, you know, completely fill our message with, you know, it's like shooting scripture. You know, we just start off with shooting people with scripture bullets. But really backing it up and giving a foundation and saying, you know, and this is the reference point. Making a very important statement and it's to make the distinction that it's not an opinion, that it's not a popular idea. It's not something that's, you know, it's not something that's cultural or traditional, but it's actually scripture. Right. So you back it up with scripture and share that. Some practical things is, you know, to avoid, you know, you don't have to go there. I'll read it for you. You know, it doesn't matter. The minute we say it, you know, some people want to read it in their own Bible. No matter how much you say, you know, they want to read it. They want to see it. Actually, I'm like that. I love the PowerPoint and, you know, whatever's there on the screen. But I'd like to really read it there in the word so I can, I can see it. You know, I don't know. It's just to have it. You want to turn. I want to see it. So they could be, I'm sure there could be people like that out there in the audience. So, so when you say don't turn, you know, they first of all feel a little guilty for turning and they will turn anyway. They are very curious. Why is he saying or why is he saying don't turn there? So, I mean, it's, you can avoid that. Right. Okay. It's good to have both heat and light in the sense both the content, you know, in terms of, in terms of insight and application and also the heat in the sense of this burden and application. Right. So having both. So when we say if a teaching has heat, then and doesn't have enough light, then it can become a little bit boring, you know, because it doesn't have enough light. Because it doesn't have the insight. It doesn't have the scriptural insight or revelation. And of course, if it has a lot of application, a lot of interpretation, explanation, but it doesn't seem to come with that burden or heart, then it would also become, you know, it might seem very academic in the first, at the first, it might seem, you know, yeah, I think it might seem a little academic. Right. So we can have both. We need to have both. Okay. Third thing, for us to include humor, because then, you know, we looked at this when we were considering the sermon preparation, right, as one of the elements you could, you know, look at humor. Humor helps us just like illustration. Humor helps us to, you know, teach some of those things, bridge some of those difficult things, et cetera. Or if we are, you know, teaching something, you know, which is very, very, very, very convicting, very serious. And well, it helps to kind of change the atmosphere or break the ice even. Right. And it does all this, but we should use humor sparingly and also in line with your personality, you know. Well, God has given you a personality. Sure. Like some of us are very, very exuberant. Some of us are not. So in line, use humor in line with your personality, right? Let it not be something out of place that people can't relate to and you yourself, you know, for you, it's a put on rather than something that comes naturally, right? So we can use humor. Fourth one, plan on a good level of content. Now, this is where it helps when it's a, especially, you know, when we're looking at our presentations and we're saying it's 12 minutes. So I have this content that before me, I want to be able to share this. Now, how can I do that in 12 minutes? So, you know, so to kind of map it out and say this is what I'm going to say for, you know, as far as the introduction goes, and I'm going to use this, you know, these 12 minutes in this way, maybe I'll split it up as six sections, two minutes each or four sections, three minutes each, right? Or maybe it's good to have, you know, maybe for 11 and a half minutes and then use the rest for just winding up, right, those last 30 seconds or even the last 60 seconds just to wind up, to review, to summarize and wind up. So, plan it, well, okay. So we can plan it in sections also while we plan it, but not to be really so watertight that we don't love, you know, especially I'm just talking about if there is a 30 minute, 40 minutes, or you're going to be speaking for an hour. We can plan it and also leave some space for the Spirit of God to give us insights and something that is, you know, that the extempore that happens there, you know, and the Lord will drop some thoughts and you can give some space for that as well. Okay, some things to, here are some practical things. Prepare well in advance because otherwise there's a lot of anxiety and if you're constantly making changes, you know, it's a cycle of anxiety, it's a cycle of, you know, not being able to concentrate and et cetera. Okay, one of the things that we can do is also check with someone else, right? If there's someone more experienced, if there's someone, you know, maybe someone in your team who's like a leader, you can check and say, okay, you know, how does this look? Do you think I can share this? Do you think it's okay? Theologically, you know, is it sound? You could check, right? I know that, you know, we may not always be able to do this, but if there's an opportunity, maybe in the early days of, you know, us preparing and just getting into this, you know, we can use this opportunity, right? Then check with people, check with someone senior. It's always good to have notes. Some people don't believe in notes or outlines. Their mind is very sharp, they have a good memory and it's all there, but I mean, it's good to have some teaching outline or notes so we cover the entire thing, right? We don't leave out anything that God wants us to convey. So we cover it, right? And, you know, have it as an outline. And sometimes, you know, certain things happen and we, certain, I don't know, something untoward happens or, you know, and our mind goes blank suddenly and you want to get back and an outline will always help. A teaching note, if you have that, it will always help you, right? Okay. It's good to look around the room, make eye contact with people and not just rest on one person or one group just because, you know, they are nodding their head, they are very attentive. It happens, right? It's just natural that, well, certain people are very expressive, very attentive and the audience some are not. They have all kinds of mix of all that and our natural tendency is to be drawn to those who are very attentive and who are responding and you know that they are actually receiving the message well, so we naturally turn to that and then we tend to ignore or neglect the rest of the audience. So, irrespective of what the response is, you know, sometimes it could be, you know, just a very expressive face, right? But that's okay. It's okay to look, to share, to go through maybe very indifferent expression, maybe an angry expression but, you know, keep going and make eye contact with everyone. Yeah. The other thing is a voice, you know, as much as our content is important but while we are delivering it, you know, the way we say it really helps. I think I've shared with you, right, after the message, how a person came and shared saying, you know, your voice should go up and down. There should be, you know, it should have, you know, there should be variation in the pitch otherwise, you know, you're putting me to sleep, right? So, there, when you're emphasizing certain things, you know, it's good to vary the pitch, whether it's sharp or loud or fast, I mean, loud or soft or fast or slow and so on, right? So, and the thing is that not all of us are maybe aware of it when we speak it, you know, not all of us will. Maybe we speak very less, you know, first off and we are not expressive in our speaking, you know, we may not emphasize certain things, we may not like, you know, we may, there may not be variations in our pitch and so on. So, it's good for us to put these in practice even as we are having these conversations with people, you know, normally when we're talking, if you're excited, show that you're excited and let your voice show it and, you know, I do these voiceovers, right? So, in the voiceovers, you know, I try to smile at some of those, some of the things, you know, if I'm saying, welcome to all people's church and I've noticed that when I actually smile and read out a script, it's very, very different from when I don't smile and read out the same thing. There could be even, you know, inflection in my voice, I could be saying things, welcome to all people's church, but when I smile it and when I smile and say, you know, there is, I mean it, right? It seems so much better. So, that's the thing. So, the message becomes part of you and you have, you carry the burden and you and the message are one and when you begin to speak it out, when you begin to say it, then it becomes, you know, your voice shows it and it's good that it comes out in a natural manner, right? And, yeah. So, here are some things to keep in mind. Use clear words, right? And find ways to emphasize certain words that you're saying. Just a minute, please. Shut down the window, okay? Find ways to emphasize certain things, right? Certain words, make some, you know, some statements, right? You can pause for emphasis and, you know, that will help, that what is, what you're showing is that what you're saying, what you're conveying is that something is important, right? When you say God is a good God, right? So, people are noticing what you're saying, you know, rather than saying God is a good God. It depends on the content again. You know, we're not pausing at the wrong place. You're not pausing at good morning. You know, that's the wrong emphasis and wrong pause. So, just an example. So, you know, use pause, use repetition as well, right? Not for the sake of repeating or when we keep repeating that we actually wear down the audience. The listener just, they get weary. You just go over it over and over again. You're like, please move on. I'm tired of listening to it over and over again. So, we need to repeat and a repetition helps, a recall, repetition helps for emphasis, repetition helps for, you know, maybe they didn't notice the first time, but then they notice it the second time when you say, and what you're saying is important, right? So, you can use repetition as emphasis and gestures, of course. And we're going to talk about gestures, you know, to use your, the rest of your body, to use your hands, to use your, you know, if there is space to move around, to walk, to move around and gestures help us. You know, actually, we, all of us use gestures. You know, it's very difficult to, you know, if you just put a, you know, tie your hands and ask you to read something which is very animated, it's very difficult. You know, you will at least nod your head, right? You, it's very difficult to not do all that because if you're not, you know, moving your head, moving your hands and your speed changes, right? Your speed changes. You're not able to, you know, it's very difficult to express certain things. So, so use that, use your hands, move around, just to clay, maybe you wave your hands around, whatever. Now, normally they say the bigger the audience or the larger the audience, your gestures need to be, you know, so much kind of magnified and you need to do that. So we can practice this in our normal conversations. They become part of us. And then, you know, when we're speaking, it just becomes part of us, right? Postures. Don't slump or cover, you know, be relaxed but be firm, you know, authoritative, be confident, right? So gestures can be varied, appropriate and undistracting, you know. That's the thing, that we don't distract people from it, you know, because if it's too dramatic and too showy, then people are distracted. And also, you know, some nervous gestures, like, you know, sometimes we fiddle with our button or we put our hands in our pocket and we are just, you know, taking some stuff out, putting it back or maybe you have a pen, you're constantly taking that, clicking the pen, putting it back. Be aware of that. Be mindful of that and avoid that when you're speaking. Yeah. Here's a question from, say, is there a difference between Bible study teaching for a church? Do you agree there's a difference between mid-week Bible study and a sermon? How we can effectively conduct and coordinate a Bible study teaching? Okay, yeah. So, you know, one is less formal, right? Now, it again depends, you know, even if it's a sermon, if it's a smaller gathering, I guess it depends on the size of the gathering, one. And also the kind of setting it is, you know, it could be a very formal thing. You know, there are churches where it's very informal, right? And there's a lot of interaction, people asking questions, people, you know, answering from the audience. So it depends on that. But yes, there is a difference in the way we, you know, when it's a Bible study or when it's a sermon in a church. You know, the basic difference is, okay, there is a lot more interaction, there's a lot more discussion that's happening. So it doesn't make sense to be very, very formal and then just addressing the crowd and just, you know, preaching something. It doesn't make sense, right? Whereas if it's a, let's say Sunday morning service and there's a congregation of, let's say, 100, 200, whatever, then it doesn't really, the structure really doesn't help us to have a very informal discussion and that, you know, considering the time, considering the content that you want to convey, et cetera. So we just go with, you know, sharing the message and, you know, keep going. So there is a difference. So, yeah, a session to conduct and coordinate. Okay, maybe there is something on teaching which is coming up later. So we could look at that also. Yeah, before we wind up. Yeah, thank you for that question. Okay, gestures, facial expressions and even the, you know, the physical things like maybe, you know, if there's a podium, you know, sometimes we just tend to just lean heavily on it or, you know, maybe shake it or, you know, be mindful of that. And so people will, if there's family there, they will always come back and show, they tell you that you shouldn't do that. Why did you shake that? I remember one Sunday after service and my family is my greatest critique and they're going back, you know, my wife and daughter are there and then they just bombarding me. Why did you say that? Why did you say that? You know, and why did you keep shaking the podium? You know, you almost tilted it and, you know, all kinds of, so these are good things, right? There's good feedback coming so we can be better. So you can always improve. You can always, you know, have some people in the audience and say, you know, just let me know. You know, if there's anything that I said that distracted you. I remember I was, in one of the messages, I was, I think I was a little preoccupied with something. So I said Jehovah Jaira, but what I really meant was Jehovah Rafa. So I just kept saying Jehovah Jaira and I was giving an explanation for Jehovah Rafa, right? And then I, it was a smaller crowd. So yeah, right. So it was a smaller crowd. So I just went back and I had all their numbers. So I went back and I just put it on the group and to them personally, I said, really, you know, I just want to apologize for this. I'm sorry if I distracted you guys from the, from listening to it because it's, you know, it's a, it's a glaring mistake. And so, you know, I, right. So then I made a mental note, you know, to be, to be there, to be ever, you know, to be present there in the moment and not think of something and not be preoccupied with it. So, yeah. So anyway, so expressions, you know, official expressions, even the physical things like, you know, podiums, et cetera. And you can decide, you know, if it's going to be like, say you was asking about a home setting or a Bible study or teaching kind of setting, then, well, don't have anything between you and the audience, right? Don't have a table. Don't have a, you know, if there's, you don't need to have something like a stand or a lectern. Just move it away so that you can just move freely among the, among the group, among the audience and, you know, it can help, right? Okay, so I guess we, what we'll do is we'll stop here, right? We'll stop here and then we'll get back to this a little later. Okay, so we're 0.7, okay. Okay, so today, so we'll continue a little, maybe the first one, Abraham. So Abraham, if you're ready, you could go ahead and present your sermon. 12 minutes, you can go ahead. Abraham, yeah, okay. Yeah, we can hear. Yeah, is it okay? Okay, okay, so, wow. Okay, let me get my PPT ready. Okay. PPT, PPT, PPT. Okay. Yeah. All right, so is it okay to start now? I'm ready now. My time starts now. Thank you so much. Let's pray. Precious Father, we thank you for this very hour. Father, our hearts and minds are open to receive your word. Father, grant me the utterance that even as I show your word, it will make impact in the life of those who hear this word, in the name of Jesus, amen. This morning, I want to share on some few steps about God's love. And we are all here today because of God's love. When we talk about Christianity, Christianity is not a set of activities where prayer, fasting, and going to church becomes a normal routine where we lose the essence of the things that we do. The essence of who we are and what we do is centered on God's love. If we are not conscious of this love, we might not be able to love other people the same. In fact, the Bible shows us that we should keep ourselves in God's love. Whenever we talk about love, there are two aspects of love that I want to bring to your attention. The first one is love from the highest to the lowest. And you can see that love between a father and a son, where the father expresses kindness, patience, and all those stuff that we find in 1 Corinthians 13, 4 to 8. Then the other aspect of love is love from the lowest to the highest, where we find Jesus showing us that we should, if you love me, obey my commandments. So the love that a son expresses towards his father is to love and obey his father by obeying him. Now, when we look at John 3.16, the Bible says, For God so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. This verse shows us three important things. The first one is the purpose of God. That is the reason. The reason is because God is a being of love. The word used there is for God so loved, which means God a being of love. Then the second thing is will. That is a desire. God had a desire and his desire was to give us eternal life. Then the third one is plan. The plan in order for us to get eternal life is to send his son, Jesus, to die for us. When we focus on John 3.16, the main purpose of who we are now in Christ is because God is a being of love and his purpose for saving us is also because of his love. This makes love ultimate. In fact, we find from 1 Corinthians 13, which says, if I give all my possessions to the poor, if I surrender my body to be bent and do not have love, it profits me nothing. The word nothing really means nothing. So this should help us to understand that love precedes everything we do. And my message today is God's love towards us. I want us to look at God's love towards us so that we can love other people the same way. Now whenever we look at love, we know that there are five love languages, but the language of God's love is giving. Giving is what sets God apart. His ability to give is beyond comprehension. We can find that reference from Romans 5 and 7, which gives us an example that a good man, someone might be willing to die for a good man, but for a bad man, it will be difficult to get someone to die for the person where the Bible shows us in this it that God proved his own love towards us that whilst we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. My main text for today is based on 1 John 4 verse 10, which says, this is love, not that we love God, but he loved us and he sent his son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sin. I read again, this is love. 1 John 4 verse 10, this is love, not that we love God, but he loved us and he sent his son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sin. Now the word that differentiates the love of God is the word not that we love God. This word expresses the kind of love that God has towards us. It expresses the unconditional love of God. The love which is independent of actions or circumstances. This is an everlasting love. That love does not change because of what you do or what you don't do. That is what we call the agape love. That is selfless and sacrificial love. That is the love without conditions. Love without limits. We have other forms of love, which we have the romantic love, we have the friendship love. We also have love which exists between family members. But the statement that I want to emphasize is not that we love God. This statement shows us that man was in the state of rebellion. Man was in the state where he had no value for God. Man was in the state where he thought God had abandoned him. He was in the state where he thought that God never cared about him. But even in the state where we thought that was the end, the Bible says that God loved us and God wanted to express this kind of love towards man. And he wanted us to know that even in that state, I am a being of love and I love you. And this happened because Jesus gave us his son to die for our sins. But a big question here is God could have sent an angel to die for us. God could have done something else in order for us to receive salvation because God is supreme. In his sovereign, he can do something for us to receive salvation. So why Jesus? The Bible shows us that Jesus is the fullness of God. He is the fullness of the love of God. He is the image of the invisible God. Which means that if God had given us an angel, that would have been less of his love for us. If God had done something else in order for us to receive salvation, that would have been less of his love for us. So an angel wouldn't have quantified his love for us. Jesus made this statement that he said, no greater love than this, that a man laid down his life for his friends. We also find in John 17, 23, which he says that, that the world may know that you have loved them, even us, you have loved me. Jesus wanted us to know that the love that a father had towards him is the same love that he had towards us. It means that God loved us so much that God gave us himself. And the Bible says that this is the greatest kind of love that any man can receive. The Bible also shows that behold, what manner of love that a father has bestowed upon us that we should be called the sons of God. Brothers and sisters, we have been loved that much. So we need to reciprocate this love by expressing this same kindness to other people. But the key question here is that what is our response towards God's love? If we have been able to establish the fact that God's love is beyond what I did yesterday, is beyond what I'll do tomorrow, is beyond what I'm doing, then what should be my response to this kind of love? Many people are living for themselves because they are taking the love of God for granted. Many people have not considered the love of God. Many people don't even know the love of God. But we find in 2 Corinthians 5 verse 13, which I read, it says, for the love of God constraints us because we have concluded this, that one died for all, that all died, all have died, that all died for all, that he died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves. But for him, who for their sick died and raised again. The key point here is that for the love of God compels us. The love of God regulates us. The love of God controls us. The love of God shows us how to live, how to act, how to think. Because they have concluded this matter. The reason why the love of God was compelling them is because they have concluded on the matter that Jesus died for them. And because of this, they will live their lives for Jesus. But interestingly, the word used there means crino. And that's the great meaning of the word concluded. It means crino. It means to separate. It means to pick out. It means to choose. It means that these people came to their point where they considered option A and considered option B. And they made a choice. The Bible says that I have said life and death before you, but choose life. In other words, we have a choice to make. And this choice can only happen if we come to a conclusion that this is who I'm supposed to be. This is who God has done for me. And this is how I'm going to respond to this. So there's a conclusion to make as children of God. There's a conclusion to give us what we deserve and what we want. The other word for crino means logisomine. It means to recon. It means that these people recon that their life here on earth is for Christ. And so nothing else will move them. Nothing else will cause them to live another life that is not in the scriptures. So love has nothing to do with other people. Love has to do with who you are. Love has to do with our essence, our being. So we are not supposed to limit God's love to what people do. We are not supposed to limit God's love to what people say about us. We are too nice to work in unforgiveness. We are too nice to be selfish. And the fact is if you forgive someone you are actually forgiving yourself. If you love someone you are actually expressing who you are. So who we are is actually for us to love like Jesus. Because Jesus gave us another commandment that you should love one another even as I have loved you. It means that you love that is selfless. Love that has no condition. That has no condition of what my mother did to me yesterday or what somebody said to me yesterday. Those things doesn't matter. What matters is that the love of God the love of God is greater than all these things. So we should love people beyond their mistakes. We love people beyond the things they do. We should see Christ in everyone and Christ in every situation. We should focus on the good things in other people. This is the only way that we can love other people like Christ loved us and Christ loved the church. Thank you so much. God bless you. Thank you so much. Thanks Abraham. Good to see you finally. You were just a DP on the screen. Now we know what you look like and what you sound like. Good. Thank you. Just a quick question. Did you want to put the PowerPoint because we just saw your video and not the PowerPoint. So I'm not sure if you wanted to put the PowerPoint. Did you? No, I didn't want to put it. You didn't want to? That was just for your reference. Okay. Good. Very nice. Thank you. We'll come back for more feedback. So we'll take a break. We'll come back at 10.04. Okay. 10.04. We'll come back and then we... Yeah. Thank you. Thank you all.