How Deep Is Your Love?

Matthew 22, verse 37. We should all know that. Christ says, and I read from the New Living Translation, Matthew 22, verse 37. Jesus replied, you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind. Pretty loaded statement. Just how deep? Just how deep is your love? Very deep? How deep is your love? And God asked the same question. You might remember older people called it courting. We called it dating. Dating each other. I so remember an older gentleman who's in the church in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. Him and his wife. His wife was such a backbone to our church there. And he's in his 80s, mid 80s, maybe in the late 80s now. But he told me about dating her. And he was a little bit older than her. She was but a teenage girl. And he wanted to take her out, as he said courting. But he was working, as you did in a farm area, which is outside of Chicago. I think you said you're from Chicago. So welcome. But it's nicer weather here, isn't it? Now you know why we're all here. But he took her out to a drive-in movie. Do they even have those here? They do up in Tennessee. Anybody have those around here? There are some around here? Okay. He took her to this drive-in movie, which was something to do back in the 19 early 50s. And so he was so excited. But he had to work real hard at the farm to get time off to go take her to this movie. And she, of course, had to went to school and work too. And so they went to this movie and they were really excited, went out to eat, and then they went to this movie, his very first time to take her out. And so her father said, make sure she is in when the movie is over. And it was a mistake that I wonder if the Everly Brothers got one of their songs from. Because he said as they were watching the movie, they both fell asleep. And they woke up around 3, 30, or 4 o'clock in the morning and realized what they had done. And he had to then drive her home, just knowing he was going to be in trouble. And they look back at that now after they were married years later. And then they were married for over 50 years. She died. And that so sticks in his mind. And he said, he just remembered how calm she was when he was just hand shaking as he realized the mistake they had made. We can all remember certain details of our relationships with our mates with an individual times and ask the question, how deep was your love? Do we really know how to love very deeply? Jesus Christ told us that we are to love very deeply our Maker.

Remember those goofy love letters you would write? I might have mentioned this before. I found some that I wrote Mary, like in my 20s. Look at it now. I wondered how in the world she ever married a jerk like that. You do goofy things when you're in love. You stay up too late. We used to drive. I used to she used to live another state away. And so we had very little time to date. When we did, we'd stay up till two in the morning, talking and sharing. We just didn't want to go to bed. Didn't want the date to end. Or you call someone. Remember goofy things? You hang up. No, you hang up. No, you hang up. Love made you do silly things. It still can't. But I make three statements to date as I want to clear this road to date about love. Number one, I hope you are not head over heels in love with God. I hope you are not madly in love with God. Third, I hope you are not crazy about God. Those are some words used to describe relationships. Like you to turn, if you will, Ephesians 3. Ephesians 3.

Verse 16, and I read this from the New Living Translation because I like the way it's put. Paul is telling the church at Ephesus. Verse 16, I pray that from his glorious who? God. From his glorious unlimited resources, he will empower you with inner strength through his spirit. Are we using that spirit, brethren? We realize how powerful that spirit is. Verse 17, then Christ, when we use this inner strength, Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God's love and keep you strong. And may you have the power to understand, as all God's people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God. Do we understand the height, the width, the length, and the depth of God's love in our lives today? Is it important? Is it important? How deep is your love?

The writer of Psalms 92 actually wrote, Psalm 92, actually said, Proclaim your love in the morning and your faithfulness at night. Do you talk to God in the morning and also in the evening? That's what he's telling us to do. Because if you're married, it's not very hard in the morning. Say good morning. You leave the house. I always say something to Mary. Usually that I love her. Or something in the evening also. Re-shuring word. Maybe you kiss your wife goodbye, your mate. Say I love you. How often do we say it to God? Is it something we've never said to God? We may think it and read it, but do we actually say the words, I love you? I agape. Agape, the Greek word. You.

I'm very thankful when I'm gone to come home to my wife at night. Are we thankful as we go about our day and get very tied up in things? Are we thankful to come home to our God and take a little time to thank Him for bringing us back home?

Like you'd turn another time to Romans, those who are owning the book of Romans, it is a gift. It's a blessing to have the book of Romans the eighth chapter, which is so powerful. It further reminds us here in Romans 8 and verse 35. I want these words to sink in. That's why I'm reading them from the New Living Translation. Jurists may say something just a little wording, a little different, but I like it because in verse 35 it says, can anything ever, I love that word, ever separate us from Christ's love? From the agape, agape, the love of God, the love of Christ. Can anything ever separate? Does it mean He no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity or persecuted or hungry or destitute or in danger or threatened with death? No! Despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ who loved us. And verse 38, for and I am convinced, here He says it again, that nothing can ever separate us from God's love. Neither death, nor life, neither angels or demons, neither our fears, for today, nor our worries about tomorrow. Not even the powers of hell can separate us from God's agape. That is pretty deep love. That's about as deep as you can get when it comes to love. God has it. Christ has it. Are we working on it? Do we have it? Do we have a little bit of that? That's why the question, how deep is your love? You know, some of the latest research into this crazy thing called love that the world looks at, psychologists, sociologists, it may be able to teach us about ourselves and about God and His love and our love towards Him.

I want to go through this today to help us have maybe a better understanding, because there are some comparisons to the love we have for individuals and the love we have for the entity called God. A great deal of comparisons can be made. These stages of love, as they call them, these researchers, they connect the mental, the physical, and they even say spiritual, of people. And they recognize that there are actually four stages of love. And so I want to give you those four stages and compare them to the spiritual relationship to help us, because we can all understand, we all have emotions, even when I was a little child, when you have your first big crush on somebody. Some girl, little girl down the street, somebody on TV, or even a teacher. You have. It's this crazy thing called love. Well, the very first stage that they mention is called the crush, the crush stage. And it's when you are smitten. Hmm. And they profess that most of this is brought on by the eyes, as they attach a something of the body to each of these stages, because it's what kind of motivates or keeps us there. And this is motivated by the eyes. You have this crush. It's a split-second attraction. For those of our people here who have been from New York, it's like falling in love in a New York minute. It's something that just happens like that. But it's not true love. It's not really true love. And most of us realize that, don't we?

It takes place in the Bible. I want to go there. You will. I'd like you to see an example of this crush and these eyes, like you turn back to Judges. You probably know the guy I'm going to, because he's a little bit more than you do. This is him. And in Judges 14 and verse 1, Judges 14 verse 1, it said, One day when Samson was in Timna, one of the Philistine women caught his what? Eye. That's right. Caught his eye. When he returned home, he told his father and mother, a young Philistine woman in Timna, caught my eye. I want to marry her. Boy, he's talking about a fast courtship. Kind of a visual thing. And then what did he say? Get her for me. Sounds romantic, doesn't it? Go get her for me.

His father and mother objected. Isn't there even one woman in our tribe among all the Israelites you could marry? They asked, why must you go to the pagan Philistines to find a wife? But Samson told his father, what? Get her for me. For she looks good to me. Talking about the eyes. The eyes. You also see it in chapter 16 and verse 1. He said, One day Samson went to the Philistine town of Gaza and spent the night with the prostitute. A visual thing, not true love.

That stage is described in the Bible because, and I want to bring this out now. There are actually four words used in the Greek. One is very obscure. But they are actually used in the Greek for the word love. They are Eros, where we get erotic, romantic love. There is Philio, which we understand is brotherly love. Kind of like where the city of Philadelphia got their name. Philio, which is a brotherly love that you can have for a best friend or like a brother. And then, of course, there is Storge, which is actually Philio Storge, which is a type of family love. It's a relationship between family members. Something you might have towards a wife, a daughter, a brother, or sister. And then there is Agape, or Agape, tomato, tomato, potato, patata. Agape, or Agape, and that is true, deep, godly love. And you find that mentioned so many times in Paul's writings, in John's writings, when he's describing the type of love that God has towards us, and the type of love that we should have towards God. That's what's translated in Matthew 22, the very first verse we read. But here we have Samson. I'm not Samson. Yes, Samson. Samson in Judges. And Samson has that first stage of love. It's not really love, it's Eros. It's attraction. It's done by the eyes.

Not something you want to base a relationship on. Not something that's going to last very long. Eros, the eyes, the crush, the very first stage. It's interesting because even in spiritual analogy, when someone first learns about the truth of God, sometimes they, oh, they get excited, they come on very quickly and say, oh, this is it. And then they try to tell everyone. I remember when I first had a true understanding when I was working, I got up and I was reading the Bible, and these guys that I worked with, I just thought, man, this is such an amazing stuff. This is just, they got to know this stuff. They're going to be as excited as I was. I just got to tell them that you can imagine working during that day. I didn't want to hear any of that.

Jesus Christ describes it in Luke when he talks about the parable of the sower. Now he sowed seed and he sowed it in stony ground where there wasn't much dirt. The roots couldn't go very deep. You remember we talked about roots. Roots didn't go very deep. And so they just kind of dry up or among thorns.

The type of love that God really does not want his called out ones, his family to be. The second stage, they actually call the obsession, the obsession stage. And they say it is motivated by the head. And that it follows along after the Eros stage, but it is also part of the romance, erotic, Eros kind of love. It's what people really refer to in the movies and songs about falling in love.

The amazing thing is that scientists have actually found out that it is a chemical reaction that happens in the brain. And a chemical is released called phenylethalamine, as I gave a sermon one time here and showed that phenylethalamine exists also in chocolate. To eat chocolate, you kind of remember, hmm. But it's actually a chemical reaction where you become infatuated, self-centered, because it is about you. And this is the most dangerous stage in a relationship. You see it all the time where someone is infatuated. Is infatuated, becomes a stalker, actually goes crazy and can kill someone, because they are so obsessed.

It's actually the Connecticut University did a study, years study, on this. Thousands of people that they interviewed for years to find how this love and obsession stage worked. And they found that this obsession stage took place somewhere in a relationship, anywhere from nine months to three years. And the average was 18 months to two years in the average person.

That you were so obsessed with this person. And this type of love can actually render, as the courts are arguing now, someone mentally incompetent. As one sociologist said, there's not much difference between being in love and being insane. Because you will do things that you would not normally do. You would act the way that you would not normally act. As I got a chance to look back and read the letters I wrote to my wife. And you look back now and say, what was I thinking? Why was I ever goofy?

Then you start questioning your wife because why would a woman that's so smart buy that? Well, she did, thankfully. But you see, it's a very selfish kind of love. Now you may say, well, what's so bad about that with God? It doesn't stay that long. It's not true love. It's not lasting love. Why do you see marriages falling apart after, well, I just fell out of love after a few years? Hmm. 2 Samuel. You'll turn there. 2 Samuel gives an incredible story of David's son. And it shows this obsession stage in 2 Samuel chapter 13. And verse 1 says, Now David's son Absalom had a beautiful sister named Tamar.

And Amnon, her half-brother, by David, but another wife, fell desperately in love with her. Amnon became so obsessed with Tamar that he became, what? Ill. She was a virgin and Amnon thought he could never have her. So what did he do? You can read the rest of the story.

Most of you know the story of how that came about. But it comes down to verse 14, to where he actually forced her to lay with him. And took her virginity from his half-sister. Became intimate as he had dreamed about. And what happened? Verse 14. But Amnon, when she said, You will just speak to the king about it, he will let you marry me. But Amnon wouldn't listen to her.

And since he was stronger than she was, he raped her. Then suddenly, Amnon's love turned to hate. And he hated her even more than he had loved her. And he said, Get out of here! That's crazy. Crazy. Not the kind of love you want to base a relationship on. You know the story of David, I mean, Samson and Delilah. And you read that story, and so she wants to find out what's the secret of his strength. And so he tells her, plays a game with her, and what? He should be able to figure real fast, Okay, I told her one thing, and here they come in and they do that.

And she does it four or five times, and he never gets that. She's the one that's turning the Philistines on him. Why? Because he's crazy. He's madly in love. That's why I said, let's make sure we're not madly in love with God.

Spiritually. Spiritually. Comparisons are, spiritually we sometimes get obsessed. I've known many people. I did this very same thing. Can't say I didn't. I started staying up studying. I became obsessed with studying the Bible. I was not really balanced. You kind of, you think everybody's like you. I've met men in the church. I've met very few women this way, but more men, that actually would just want to talk Bible all the time. And I love talking the Bible, but there was no balance. And pretty soon, even at church, people were like, you know, talk about something except the intensity in which, oh no, you're wrong. Maybe talking about, oh no, no, this is how it is. And they get so controlling. You've met those people in the church before. That happens. They're not real balanced. I had a very good friend that I had to tell him, take a little time to be more balanced. Work on your communication skills a little bit. Not just your doctrinal skills, because he would turn more people off. Than he would, they didn't really want to talk to him about it, because of the way that he was.

It wasn't true love, this obsession stage. You need to be balanced. You've got your life. You may have your wife. You may have kids. Make sure. It's great to study the Bible. That's good. And it should be first. But it shouldn't be first, second, third, fourth, and fifth.

We have to live lives. That's what this is all about. The third stage was called the apathetic stage. It happens in a relationship when someone gets married. Or they may be in a relationship. Even people who have lived together for years, they found this to become. That actually what happens is, they go through that romantic stage. And then they become obsessed. And then the two or three years go by. And all of a sudden, that person, they just don't have the same feeling. Because it's all been built up in your head and in your eyes. And so then, after quite a few years of marriage, they decide, well, I don't really want to get out. I can't afford to get out. Or I don't want to end this relationship. Talked to a young girl one time who was in a relationship with a guy. And she just said, oh, it's been in so long. And it's not the guy I want to marry. And I don't do it. But it's just going to be easier if I just go along.

Apathetic. Some people will stay in a loveless relationship. Look warm as they compare their mate to like an old coat. And it just keeps them warm.

The psychologists and sociologists compared this to skin. They use a skin reference because they just, it's comfortable. Like an old coat. Like an old pair of jeans. But it isn't true love. Some people say, well, let's just wait until the kids get grown. And then we'll do something else. That's not the type of love. What is that type of love? You're going from Eros down to Filio in Storge. More of a family. Brotherly love. Some people say, well, no, I don't really have much in the relationship. Other than we're just good friends. That's not what a great marriage is about. And just feeling that way spiritually. That's not what God wants out of this relationship. Because you can have people who have walked with God all these years and they were on fire. And they were obsessed. But then they got to where they kind of lost their zeal and it became old hat, as they said. And so then they come to church out of obligation. They study their Bible. Well, I guess I should instead of, wow! There's a balance. This is a stage of love. That's not true love. This is what God talks about in Revelation 3 and verse 16 when he's talking to the church and he says, what? That's a lukewarm attitude. If you have it, I'm going to spew you out of my mouth. He said, I'd rather you be cold. Not lukewarm. I'd rather be cold.

And then we come to the fourth stage and they call it true love. They call it true love. I call it a guppity. True love, I call it agape. True love, agape. And of course, they tie the heart because it is a matter of the heart, this love.

See, agape is true love. It takes time. It's not something like the very first. It's not something that's going to wear out after two or three years the obsession stage. Well, I'm kind of used to each other by now. That's not how it is. Look at all those who lived with agape, like Abraham, like Isaac, like Jacob, like the founding fathers of the church. They had still a zeal, still had a love for their brothers and sisters in Christ, but they had this because it was built out of agape. See, agape takes time. True love takes time. As my parents, who have been married 50 years before my father died, it took years after year after year that you began to see the wealth that you have in front of you. And a lot of people in the church, they never see that far. They never see this Bible and how valuable it is in a relationship with God because they don't stay in it long enough. They say, oh no, there's some problems there. I'm just going to leave. And they lose faith. They lose faith in God. But agape, true agape, and it's interesting because just like the physical relationship and love, it all starts with eros, right at the top, and it's like building a building. And then you have this beginning, and then you're going to have a leg there of storge, filio. And it pictures this building as your relationship. But you see, without a firm foundation, without a great foundation, something to support all these things, the relationship will not stay. You need agape. Agape is your foundation. Agape is your support. It is where you will build this relationship with God. Brethren, agape is what we are to become.

You have agape. Can you define it? What is it? Have you seen it? Seen it in other people? Sure we have. John tried to encapsulate it. And I want to turn there. Want to turn there in 1 John, for people who own 1 John. Turn back to 1 John.

1 John 4. And verse 7.

It said, dear friends, let us continue to agape. Every time in 1 John, over 40 times, the word love is used in those chapters, in those verses. Every single time it is speaking of agape. Not brotherly love, not eros. Every time it's speaking of agape. Agape. It said, dear friends, let us continue to agape one another. For agape comes from God. Anyone who agape is a child of God and knows God. But anyone who does not agape does not know God, for God is agape. God showed us how much He agape'd us by sending His one and only Son into the world so that we might have eternal life through Him. This is real agape. Not that we love God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as a sacrifice to take away our sins. Dear friends, since God gape'd us that much, we surely ought to agape each other. No one has ever seen God, but if we agape each other, God lives in us, and His agape is brought to full expression in us. It's why we have the Holy Spirit. It's what we will exude. When somebody wanted to find God as just God is love, then all you'd have to do is just love, love. That's not true. God is agape. It's an attribute. It's a part of His character. It's a great deal of His character. It's what you see. It's what He is. It's what comes from Him and what must come from us.

Agape is not a natural love. You might even say it's a supernatural love. Very few people produce this kind of love. We see it occasionally in the world because some people are attuned to seeing it and raised and saw a little bit of it. And they may exhibit it. We need to not just exhibit it, but it needs to be who we are. It's what makes us who we are. It's when people see, boy, that's an impressive part. I don't agree with their religion. But, boy, they sure seem to have their act together.

To have more agape, we have to set ourselves aside and allow God's nature, God's spirit, to say what we should be saying, thinking what we need to be thinking about.

When we allow agape to direct and guide us, yield, surrender ourselves, and quit doing what we want to do because sometimes we say things that we shouldn't say. And you say, boy, I don't know why I said that. Boy, I wish I hadn't said that. Why did I even think that? We need to let God guide our thoughts and catch it. Surrender. See, that's true love. That's agape. Surrender. When you marry someone, you no longer think, well, I'm going to do what I want to do. Well, me and the guys are going out bowling on Monday night. And Tuesday night, we're going to do something else. Then Thursday night, the ballgame's on. When we get married, we become one. Just like God and Christ are one, we become one with the mate.

And we don't just think of ourselves, we think of them. That's agape.

In the Old King James, God's love, agape was translated charity. You read it in 1 Corinthians 13 in the Old King James, and it says, charity. Oh, matter of fact, one of our songs has that in it. If I have not, charity I am is nothing. Well, it's an Old English term, which means unconditional love in action. It means a gift of love with no strings attached. That's what it is. If I do something for Mary, it's not so, well, she'll do something for me then. That's not agape. That's not agape. God does something. He gave His Son to die for us so we could have forgiveness, eternal life, and He didn't even know us yet. We weren't here, but He said, do it in.

Agape loves the poor. Agape loves the needy, the maimed, the ugly, the ones frowned on by society. That's agape.

Others, not like us sometimes, where we show we care about those people.

Christ said, do for those who cannot do for you. Paraphrase that. Do we want to do that? You might say, well, yeah, if I had a whole bunch of money, I could do that. How many times a day do we have a chance to say something positive to someone? How many times do we have a chance to exhibit agape every day to everyone we meet?

Even if the people hate you, despise you, it's called unconditional love. It's called agape. It's godly. 1 Corinthians 13 says, agape suffers long, does not envy, not boastful, not proud, not rude. Let's turn over there. Really plan on going there. We'll do that real quick. 1 Corinthians 13 is known as the love chapter, the Lou chapter, the agape chapter. Read it from the Lou living translation. Said, if I could speak all the languages of the earth, well, I can barely speak English, as most of you can tell, and of angels but did not love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy and if I understood all of God's secret plans and possessed all knowledge and if I had such faith that I could move mountains but didn't love, didn't agape others, I would be absolutely, positively, nothing.

I added absolutely and positively. If I gave everything I had to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it. But if I didn't agape others, I would have gained nothing. Well, you might say, well, wait a minute. If you did that, isn't that agape? Not if you wanted to be seen. Not if you like, oh, I gave this over here. Oh, did you see what I did last week? I went over there and I paid these people's bills. That's not agape. That's not agape.

Verse 4, love is patience. Agape is patient and kind. Agape is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. Don't we want our way most of the time? I do. I have to fight that. If I watch TV, I want to watch it. I want to watch. I don't care about HGTV.

But that, I'm getting my way. It's not irritable. It keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice, but rejoices whenever the truth wins. Agape never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance. And it says, prophecy and speaking in unknown languages and special knowledge will become useless. But agape will what? Last forever. It will be part of our character. It will be who we are. It is to be. Our destiny is to be known by agape, just like our father and our elder brother. As I wrap this up now, five minutes, there was a book written how many years ago? I read it five or six years ago. Didn't keep it. It got a little information out of it. But it is actually by Dr. Gary Chapman. It's called Five Love Languages. Maybe you've read a part of it or whatever. And it's interesting. I don't recommend the book. Otherwise, I would still have it. But he wrote in there, as he did this research, that the number one emotional experience reported by people is the feeling the presence of God is in their life. Number one. And it's interesting. The number two emotional high is being in love. It's a high. It's a high, just like loving God is a high as we start out. And so is romance. It's a high. But what happens? We fall out of love. We fall out of love because it's not agape. It's eros.

Yet you look at the one statistic. If we are so excited to obsess and we have all this stuff, and it's a number one emotional experience reported by people in the world, then why yet over 50% of all marriages end in divorce? Because it's built up here. It's not built down here. And this amazing statistic comes from the Pew Research, and I think it's 2008-2009. It actually says that 90% of Christians admit they are not practicing Christians. Was that jealous?

Their relationship with God is not agape. Their relationship with God is not built on agape. 90%! Spathetic! Could that be the reason why the world's in the mess that it's in?

How many people over the last 20 years do you know who have walked away from the truth? I know too many. They just kind of fell out of love with God. Or they went after something new. Oh, but this guy has truth that the United Church of God doesn't have. Without agape in our lives, we will lose our way. We will lose His way. We will lose and become like the rest of the world. We must build our relationship with God. With agape. One of the best examples that God shows, and you can read it. I've actually had sermon on it here before. It happens in Luke 10 about the Good Samaritan. Because like the Samaritans that Maurice was talking about, they were despised, looked down upon. Yet Christ brought it and said, well yeah, they may not have all of this and this, but guess what? They got a lot of this. They had some heart. Because that's what true love is about. It's from the heart. That's why when Samuel went to make the next king and he saw the brothers of David, and he goes, yeah man, look at him! Look at that beefcake. Boy, he's the king. No, that's not him. Well, it's got to be Eliab. No, not him either. And then it's this little bitty squirt back here in the back.

Anybody detail Samuel, you remember? Man looks on the outside. God looks at the inside, at the heart. That's why you're here. That's why I'm here. Yeah, I didn't call Brad Pitt. George Corney.

He looks at the heart. That's why he called you. Because he can use the heart. He can turn the heart. You have a heart like his, he can turn you into him.

Agape requires total surrender. Surrender to God's nature. Do we just let go, or have we totally surrendered? Surrender's big. That's what he wants. He wants us, because then he can use us as long as we surrender. How deep is your love? Deep enough? For God? From the crush to obsession, from apathy to true love. We must be preparing now for our future destiny. Peter actually mentions it in 2 Peter 1, where he says that we are now partakers of the divine nature. We have two people here. A week ago, they weren't partakers of the divine nature. Now they have God's Holy Spirit in them, guiding them, directing them to the kingdom of God. They just have to use it.

It will teach us this. Teach us we need more of this.

Lessons are learned over time. Hope we learn those. Incredible pictures on the internet of this lady who, after over 50 years of marriage, she's a widow. And once a week, her and her husband would go to steak and shake and have lunch. And so now, since he's died, her love was developed so long. Oh yes, it started with Eros, or Ophelia, to orge the family. But over time, you begin to, in 50 years of marriage, right? Roberto? Lita? 50 years of marriage. You accept things. You accept things about your wife that you love, your husband that you love. And you begin to say they're not a big deal. It's kind of like God's showing you something about, boy, I don't know if I like that, but you will. You will. It's like building that relationship. And she loved her husband so much, he became a part of her. And that's what God wants us to be, a part of him, as he gives us a part of him in us and his son. That now, every day, she goes to steak and shake and she takes a picture, and she has lunch with her husband, and she spends the entire time talking to her husband about what they used to talk about. That's a sweet story. Of course, I don't know if she eats steak and shake every day, how long she'll be alive. But I love the story, true story of a man with Alzheimer's. Married over 60 years to his mate, but he couldn't remember his children now as he was put in a home. Can I remember his children, his home, or anything else about himself or his life? But whenever his wife comes to visit him, he says, look, my beautiful wife. It's the only thing he remembers, my beautiful wife. My beautiful wife.

We have a beautiful God that wants us to remember Him forever, because He wants to live with us forever for eternity. And the only thing that makes that possible in our lives is agape. We turned there earlier, Romans 8. But I'll finish because it says, 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 agape of God that is revealed in Jesus Christ through our Lord. Brethren, praise God that we can have agape, and agape exists. And there God is agape, and that is our destiny. How deep is your love?