The Most Powerful Sentence Ever Written

What is the most powerful sentence that has ever been written? What is the most powerful sentence that has ever been uttered? When people begin to think about the great statements of the ages, they often quote from some of the great speeches of all time, speeches that have turned the tide of human history. Patrick Henry's famous line during the American Revolution, I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death.

Or you might think of Lincoln's Yettisburg address, the closing line, that government of the people, by the people and for the people, shall not perish from the face of the earth. Or Churchill's stirring speeches to the British people during World War II, especially the line, We shall never surrender. Or what about John Kennedy's, that's not what your country can do for you, but as what you can do for your country. And perhaps the most famous, often quoted, lines in recent times has been by Martin Luther King, his famous, I have a dream speech, especially the concluding sentence, Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, we are free at last. As powerful as these quotes are, they are by no means the most powerful statement ever spoken.

So once again, I ask you, just for the fun of it, maybe you could write this down. If you don't write it down on paper, you can write it down in your mind. So I ask you, what is the most powerful, relevant, life-giving and sustaining statement ever uttered? This sentence consists of three words.

Shouldn't give you a clue. Consists of three words with the longest word in the sentence having only four letters. The others have three and two. Three, two, and four. See, three, two, and four. That's five and four is nine letters.

The most powerful statement ever uttered is, God is love. That's it. That's what I believe with all my being. The most powerful statement ever written, ever uttered, ever read, ever thought about. God is love. That is, the hopes, the dreams, the goals for all humankind are wrapped up in this three-word statement.

God is love. Inheriting the verb is, is we find the existence of God in his chief characteristic. God is, and is basically means to be, to exist. God in his existence is love. That is God's chief characteristic. God's chief characteristic is love. And as we have noted, the verb is means to exist. The hallmark of God's character is love. His state of being is love. John the Apostle of love states twice that God is love. So let's look at that. Read it from Scripture in 1 John 4 and verse 8. 1 John 4. In this one chapter, it is repeated twice. And once again, when you talk about something is something, it means in its state of being.

In 1 John 4 and verse 8, He that loves not knows not, for God is love. He that loves not knows not God, for God is love. All of his actions are based on love. You look at verse 16, you'll find similar. In verse 16, And we have known and believed the love that God has to us. God is love. And he that dwells in love dwells in God and God in him. In other words, everything he does is for the benefit of others.

His essence is what we might call his substance. Substance implies that you can grasp it, you can weigh it and view it in the empirical sense. But with God, that is not the case. God is spirit. His chief characteristic is love. But what is love? How would you define love? So let's notice a dictionary definition of love. One dictionary definition of love is a strong, positive emotion of affection or pleasure. That really tells us very little about the kind of love that God has for us. Psychologist tells us that there are three components to love. Passion underlies physical desire, sexual behavior, and arousal.

That's the physical side. Let me read that again, perhaps better. Psychologist tells us that there are three components to love. Passion underlies physical desire, sexual behavior, and arousal. This is the physical side. Intimacy is the emotional aspect, closeness, connectedness, and warmth of friendship. And commitment is the decision-making part, the choice of love. Are couples willing to work it out? You hear the expression, oh, they fell in love, almost like you fall in a hole or you fall in a well. You really don't fall in love in that way. You may have those other components of the physical desire, the desire for intimacy, and you're somewhat committed.

And then, of course, you also hear the other side, I'm falling out of love with you. But what I like here is what it says about choice. Its commitment is the decision-making part. Choice of love are examples, are couples willing to work it out? Love, to a large degree, is a choice. Now, with God, God has already made the choice in eternity that God is love. He's always been love, He is love, and He always will be love. For us, it seems to wane in and out, and we let emotion oftentimes rock us back and forth. The Greeks defined love, or defined love, in four dimensions.

One is agape or agape. That's the spiritual love, it's unconditional love, spiritual love. So agape or agape, depending on how you pronounce it. Filio, love is the love attraction guided by our likes, good or bad. We generally think of filio, love, or some call it Philadelphia, love is love for one another in the physical sense. Now, this other one we probably haven't heard much about is spelled S-T-O-R-G-E, storage.

It's a physical show of affection, the need for physical touch. Human beings have a great need for physical touch. You might have read, if you've taken child growth and development classes, that they found out that in the founding homes, back in the 1800s and of course earlier than that, having a child out of wedlock put you in a class of an outcast, and the babies that were born, oftentimes the mothers who found themselves, or women who found themselves pregnant, would be sent to what they call a founding home. And in these founding homes, a baby would be born, and it received no storage love, no touch, no show of affection.

Some of those babies died from just purely lack of human touch. There's something about human touch, so basically speaking, the general routine is when a baby is born, they might clean it off a little bit, place it on mother's stomach, and the love, the nurturing, the affection begins and continues, and they develop that bond. To not have that bond, even if the infant survives, causes grave emotional distress, and could cause that throughout one's life.

And the other is eros, having to do with sexual attraction and love. But one we focus on so much, of course, in the Bible is the agape love. When the Bible states that God is love, the Greek word that is translated as love is agape. God is agape. Christ, Himself, states in the John 3.16, which so many people can quote, For God so loved the world.

It didn't exclude anybody. For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, who several believes in Him, should not perish, but have everlasting life. So now let's go back to that most powerful statement ever written in my view. God is love. If God were not love, you wouldn't even be here today. You would never even been created. What does this mean for you and every human that ever lived? Perhaps this is best explained by the scripture of reference that used to be waved at the end of the end zone of football games.

It is that God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. We're focusing on God so loved the world. This means that God so loved every person who ever lived, who is alive, or who ever will live, that He was willing to give His Son as a sacrifice for sin so that all humans may have the opportunity for eternal life.

That is love to the utmost. And of course, it says about Christ in John 15, Great a love hath no man than this, and he lay down his life for his friends. It is through God's love for us that we can have eternal life. This means that we do not have inherent eternal life abiding within us. We do not have an immortal soul.

We were created physical beings, mortal, subject to sin and death. What else need I say in Romans 6, 23? The wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. So we were created physical beings, subject to sin and death. God did not creed us with immortal life, but He has provided a redeemer because of His love and because of His divine favor, carous grace.

He created us so that we might be partakers of His divine nature, of His very essence, of His very being, so that we can live forever. God created us for the very purpose of sharing His divine being, His nature, His essence with us.

He did not have to create us. As we've heard so often, love is an outgoing concern. And love that is not shared generally fades away. You can read about all the narcissism and all of that. And it really provides no lasting benefit to the person who is enveloped in narcissism of love only of self. And I should never forget one of the things that our old high school principal told us. He said, the only lasting thing you'll ever get out of life is what you do for other people. And so God has given us a gift to which there is no end. He created us to become partakers of His very being.

But not only His divine essence as we live in the flesh, but that we might be born of His very divine essence, which is spirit. God created us in His likeness and in His image, as we read about in Genesis chapter 1, but not of His essence.

Man was created from the dust of the ground. That's the substance that you can weigh. You can see it. You can observe it empirically. But what God is cannot be measured in that way. So He created us in His likeness, in His image, but not of His essence.

We are created physical beings, but with the potential of being spirit beings. So God made it possible for us to receive His very spirit so we can receive the begettle, the very life essence of God. Do you know what 1 Corinthians 15.50 says? 1 Corinthians 15.50 says, Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God. It is a spiritual kingdom. This spiritual kingdom is going to rule over physical beings in the millennium.

So human beings must go through a begettle and birth process just as Jesus did. I don't know how much we focus on the fact that He was the forerunner. He was the captain of our salvation. He went before us. He was begotten and became a human being.

We are joint heirs with Jesus Christ. He is not ashamed to call us brethren. He has gone through the same process that we go through. So we have to go through the begettle and the birth process just as He did.

Now listen to this. Can you imagine the silliness of thinking that an immortal soul could be begotten and born into the family of God? The soul has no awareness, apparently, of the body because... Has your soul ever talked to you? And the body has no awareness of the soul. The soul has no awareness of communication with the body. And the body has no awareness of communication with the soul. Now if a soul was all it was cracked up to be, to use the vernacular, it would seem that as we grow older and dementia sets in, or maybe even Alzheimer's, that the soul would do something, but the soul does nothing. Apart from the brain, the soul doesn't do anything. And you know why the soul doesn't do anything? Because there ain't no such thing. But listen to this. Every religion on the face of the earth, except those that are true, the religions that are true, they begin with the assumption that humans have an immortal soul. So all their talk about an immortal soul, they already assume it exists. So why bother? They go from there. And of course there are questions like, well, if souls do exist, how do souls get into the human being? Are souls created by God and then placed in? If a soul, would God be so cruel as to say, okay, I'm going to create these beings, I want them to be in my family, but also going to create an immortal soul and put it in the human being, though he doesn't know it's there. And in order to save this soul, I'm going to have to give my son. He's going to have to die on the stake so that soul can be saved, which doesn't really even exist. The illogic of it is just absolutely mind-boggling. But since no one even questions it, how would such a myth be perpetuated and transmitted generation through generation for thousands of years? So once again, humans must go through a begettling birth process just as Jesus did, but souls don't do that because they don't even exist. Think about the mythical immortal soul that no one has ever seen, that has no communication with or bearing upon humans. Think about it being begotten and born in the family of God. Well, some talk about, well, when you die, the soul flies off to heaven. And then they talk about, well, I know daddy or mother is with me today. They're looking down on me.

And so I'm comforted by that. And the emotional sway of that fact holds great sway over people, especially at funerals, that the soul is looking down on us. And then they talk about, well, on the resurrection, the soul is reunited with the body and they come back together. Yet the body never knew it was there to begin with. What we just talked about refutes the notion of humans possessing an immortal soul. This gets down to the real meaning of the highest form of love. Remember the powerful statement, God is love. If eternal life was already abiding there, why would God create humans in the first place? Why would He require His Son to die to pay for the sins of the world? Once again, love is outgoing concern for others. And that means you're willing to give up self. Now, Christ states, and we've already mentioned this in John 15, 13, I quote, "...greater love had no man than this, than a man lay down his life for his friends." So for us to have eternal life, it required the death of the God of love, for God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son. Once we receive His Spirit, we instantly become begotten sons and daughters of God. And God can speak of us in terms of as if we already exist. We do exist in the begotten state. Look at 1 John 3, verse 1. 1 John 3, verse 1. Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God. Therefore the world knows us not, because it knew Him not. Beloved, now are we the sons of God. I gave a sermon a few weeks ago in which I emphasize to say to yourself, I am a child of God. I am a child of God. As a child of God, God loves us, cares for us, looking out for our best interests, years in advance. Now if we were to put this in human terms with our children, we would do anything for our children. Will God do anything for us? Yes, He will. We don't always get well immediately when we're sick, and some who are sick don't ever get well at all. They die with the hope of the resurrection, which hope, which promise is sure if they die in the faith.

So once again, verse 2 here, Beloved, now we are the sons of God. I am a child of God. And it does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. Now no man can look upon God as just a normal physical being.

That the resurrection will be born in the family of God as glorious, radiant spirit beings. Now I use that term very often, glorious, radiant spirit beings.

Something that is radiant is giving off light. A radiator might cool, or it might give off heat, but it can help cool, but at the same time it's giving off heat. You are the light of the world. Glorious. You have the very shining radiance of God. Remember when the tabernacle was raised up in the wilderness, and Moses went in to the tabernacle, and his face shined as bright as the sun, so that they could not look on the face of Moses. The same thing happened with the dedication of Solomon's temple, because God's glory, his presence, filled it. We will have that glory. Jesus Christ has been raised to a life-giving spirit. You begin to understand how powerful the statement is. God is love. So once we received his Spirit, we instantly become begotten sons and daughters. Now look at Revelation 1.5 forward there, a page or so. At the resurrection, we're born into that family, and here's what it says about Jesus Christ and from Jesus Christ. Now let's read 4 and read into this. John is telling what he saw and what he's supposed to do. John, to the seven churches which are in Asia, Grace be unto you, divine favor, and peace from him which is, which was and which is to come. That is eternal. And that is verse 4, speaking of God the Father. We generally overread this. We'll see the connection in just a second. We'll read it again. John, to the seven churches which are in Asia, Grace be unto you, and peace from him which is, which is, which was, and which is to come, and from the seven spirits which are before the throne, and another being, and from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the firstborn, prototichos of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth, and him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood. The Apostle Paul adds, so if we go to Romans 829, and this states more profoundly and dogmatically than what I've already alluded to and paraphrased, is Romans 829. Romans 829.

For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate so to be conformed to the image of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. If he's the firstborn, then of course there are others to come. We are joint heirs with him. And then we go back to Romans chapter 1, where the culmination of this begatal birth process, and as we've already talked about, the foolishness of even thinking about even if such a thing existed as an immortal soul, that it would be begotten and then born.

In Romans 1 and verse 3, concerning his son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh. Of course, the genealogy of Jesus Christ was given in both Matthew and Luke. And Jesus Christ was a descendant of David. And David, to some degree, was a type of Christ, and declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, how? By the resurrection from the dead. By whom we have received grace, divine favor, apostleship, for obedience to the faith among nations, for his name among whom are you also, the called of Jesus Christ. God expects us to show the kind of love for one another, sacrificial love that he has shown to us in creating us and in ordaining and implementing through Christ, the great plan of salvation. Christ states in John 1335, By this shall all men know that you are my disciples, if you have love one to another. Now, we go back to 1 John 4, because there are so many people think that they can make God over in their own image, that they say statements like, the God I serve wouldn't do this, the God I serve wouldn't do that. But, you see, if God exists, he has a means of communicating with us. There will be no purpose in God existing if he didn't reveal himself to us and speak to us. So he reveals himself to us through three principal means, through his spirit, through his word, and through his son. So we now are back in 1 John 4, and we read 16, and we're going to pick it up in 17. Herein is our love made perfect. See, we're to become perfect in love as God is perfect in love. So how is it made perfect?

Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment.

See, to have boldness in the day of judgment means this. It means that you are not plagued by some kind of guilt. You don't have any guilty conscience. You're just totally free. The slate is clean. Because as he is, so are we in the world.

There is no fear in love, for perfect love casts out fear. Because fear hath torment. He that fears is not made perfect in love. We love him because he first loved us. And that love began, this God is love, in eternity. Before there was a spiritual creation of any kind, before there was a physical creation, that was already God's state of being. We love him because he first loved us. If a man say, I love God and hates his brother, he is a liar. For he that loves not his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen? We're made in the image of God.

And this is the commandment we have from him, that he who loves God loves his brother also. You can't have one without the other.

That is a very weighty thought that's easily passed over.

There's a chapter break here because the person doing the chapter has got tired.

Whosoever believes that Jesus is the Christ is born of God. Now that is, should be begotten of God, not yet born. And everyone that loves him that beget loves him also that is begotten of him. So God is the one who begets us, and if we don't love the one who has been begotten by him, we can't love God. By this we know that we love the children of God when you love God and keep his commandments.

For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments and his commandments are not grievous. One of the things that's making the rounds, and even in nominal Christianity and also in secular circles, is this thing of just be a good person. Just be a good person. That's all that God requires of you. No, there's much more to it than being just, quote, good person. So how is goodness defined in the Bible? Righteousness. How is righteousness and goodness defined? It is not defined by what I think. It is defined by what God thinks. So we see here the biblical definition of love. If you want to love God, you have to keep the commandments. If you want to love God, you have to love your brother. And it all is, it has to be a package. All the elements are put together.

Now there are those who labor in the shadows, like we have among us in every congregation. Those who labor in the shadows, helping others in the individual sense. There are those who labor in the macro sense, who have the vision to prepare for the future.

There are people who have various gifts. I think one of the mistakes, perhaps, we made in the church, and there's a good and positive sign, almost a thing to everything, good and positive outcome to almost everything.

Everybody can't be a preacher, and everybody can't be a warm, loving, compassionate, encourager of the sick. It's just not their gift. Now one of the things, but don't get me wrong, it's helped us a lot in a lot of ways.

Through the years we developed the spokesman's club, and everybody views themselves. I shouldn't say everybody. Well, I'm going to be the next major evangelist kind of thing. It ain't going to happen, unless you have the disposition and the gift, and so many things have to come together. I've often said that there are people, and some of them have long departed in the Big Sandy area. I've been here 52 years, on and off, that have a higher reward than the kingdom of God than I will have, and they've never given a sermon, and they never will in this life.

Now we look at Romans 12, and it tries to get us to understand this.

In Romans 12, and we'll start in 5, verse 5. So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another. How are we members one of another? We all have that same essence that God and Christ have in them. We have that essence in us, the Holy Spirit. Having then gifts differing according to the divine favor that is given to us, whether prophecy. Everybody doesn't have that gift. Let me read it again. Differing according to the divine favor that is given. Let us prophesy according to the proportion of faith, or ministry. Let us wait on our ministry, or he that teaches on teaching, or he that exhorts on exhorting. He that gives, let him do it with simplicity. He that rules with diligence. He that shows mercy with cheerfulness. Let love be without dissimulation, that is jealousy. Abhor that which is evil. Cleave to that which is good. Be kindly affectionate one to another with brotherly love in honor, preferring one another. You know, as you see things along the way in the church, I give one personal example here. My first visit to a worldwide Church of God service, July 1969. July 1969, Field House. We walk in, never attended a service before. As cold turkey as you could be. And we walk in and we begin to look around, and all these children are on the floor. They got cookies and toys. And you say, now is this church picnic, or is this church? Well, it was church. And so I started then thinking, why aren't these children being taught during this time? And so I began to, whatever word you want to use, lobby for. Started with Kermit Nelson, who was my immediate supervisor at that time. And just went from there. We need to have Sabbath school. We need to make the most of our time. We're teaching the children, by our example, that this is not for them. And so we had the first meeting, Imperial School, over there, one of those classrooms, in the winter of 1975. And we invited Imperial School teachers and parents, and now everybody could attend. And some of them began to say, well, my child takes their nap at that time. And my child gets hungry, and my child does this, and my child does that. And it was more along those lines, but continued to persist with it. And so, having, of course, we had the faculty, we had senior students, and all of that. So we developed a program, a plan. Guess what the beginning age was? 18 months. 18 months through high school. And in January of 1976, we launched YES, and it spread all over the nation. Now, I can tell you other stories about it, but I won't at the present time. We had Sabbath school going here until COVID hit to some degree, as long as we had students. But there are so many different things, so many opportunities that are out there, and you need vision. Everybody doesn't have vision. You know, I could give you examples about the college. We don't need a college, we just need to preach the gospel down, so the Lord can come quicker. Short-sighted. You don't know how long. Can you literally preach the kingdom down? Well, it says, and this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all of the world, then the end shall come. Well, let's get that done, and it'll be all over. That's not exactly what it means. And so, I got one letter that says, let's forget about buying airplanes and raising up colleges and doing this and that and the other. Let's just preach the gospel. Yeah, let's just preach the gospel.

I told a story to Mr. Welch this morning with regard to 1978. I got a call from the vice president. We want you to come and be the deputy vice president of Ambassador College. We just consolidated Big Sandy into Pasadena, the school year of 77-78. And I went out there, and before you know it, there was a meeting saying, let's take the college back to Big Sandy. And they made a plan to do it. In fact, Mr. Armstrong made a tape that we're going to have a college in Big Sandy, and we're going to have the church headquarters here.

He complimented his son, telling him, comparing him with him and David and Solomon. Most people have forgotten that, but it's played in all churches. And before you know it, that move back to Big Sandy was canceled, and they were not moving back to Texas. The point I'm trying to make in this is that you have to have wisdom. You have to have knowledge. You have to be aware of what you can contribute, what you cannot contribute.

And there are times to speak up, there are times to be silent. And like the saying goes, have the wisdom to know which is which. So there are so many things that transpire in the life of a church, in the life of the ministry, it's difficult to even begin to enumerate all of those things. But what God always wants, He wants us to show unfeigned love, one for another. That is, love in which there are no ulterior motives involved. And we're familiar with the love chapter.

Several times I've read those first three verses, and saying we need to become love as God is love, because that's what it's for. God is more interested in what we're becoming than what we are doing. But doing is most often the key to what we are becoming, because generally speaking you're going to become, in some way, what you're doing.

Because of God's great desire to share His being and bring us into His family relationship, we exist. And here we are today. So we were created because of that powerful three-word sentence. I believe the most powerful three-word sentence ever written, ever uttered.

God is love. The world has lost sight of this greatest of all truths. But you don't have to walk in darkness and be bound by fear, ignorance, superstition, and the dog was a man. Now back to the story of... So there was a big to-do, we're going to move back to Big Sandy. And so that was on. I came back here for unleavened bread and then went back to Pasadena. When I got back to Pasadena, the vice president called me in and said, Now Dawn, curl your toes real tight.

Now hold on to your seat. My father has negated this move back to Big Sandy. And then there was another meeting in which they said, Ambassador College has served its purpose. We're closing the doors. There will be no more Ambassador College. And I said something like, Ambassador College existed for no other purpose than for young people to meet future mates.

And I said, every one of you, every one of you sitting here today, you met your mate here on this campus. And when I spoke up, I said, well, it's a mighty expensive dating service. But you can tell virtually every institution that has survived, even in the Old Testament, you see the school of the prophets. And all the way through, Mr. Welch and his sermon talked about the desire for education. You see, there is no vision.

The people perish. And we all have different gifts. The world has lost sight of the greatest truths. But we don't have to walk in darkness and bound by fear, ignorant superstition, and the dogmas of man. You can know the truth, and the truth can set you free. If the Son therefore shall make you free, you shall be free indeed. You can come to know the love that God has for you and live a life that you never dreamed of. Today, the peoples of the world are vainly searching for the keys to love, joy, peace, and happiness. The reason that the world is in the condition that it is in is because they have thrown away the key to love, joy, peace, and happiness.

They don't know that God is love. As the Apostle Paul writes in Romans, and when they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those things which are not convenient. But you don't have to go this way. You don't have to go to the way of the world. You can come to know the greatest of all truths. God is love.

He wants to share His eternal Godhead and power with you. Therefore, He is love. The Apostle Paul writes, Eye is not seen, ear is not heard, neither has it entered into the hearts of man what God has prepared for those who love Him. Paul describes what God has prepared for us with these words, for as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For we have not received the Spirit of bondage again to fear, but we receive the Spirit of sonship, whereby we cry, Abba, Father, our spiritual Father, to whom we dedicate this.

The Spirit itself bears witness with our spirits that we are the children of God. And if children then heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ, the Scripture of the day that we might be glorified together. Indeed, I believe the most powerful statement ever written or uttered is, God is love. It is the key to life, eternal life, and our eternal inheritance, as heirs of God and joint heirs with Jesus Christ.