FORERUNNER CHRISTIAN FELLOWSHIP
FEBRUARY 24, 2013 – AFFECTIONS CONSUMED WITH LOVE - STEPHEN VENABLE
I.
LOVING WITH ALL OUR HEART
A.
God’s Passion for God (John 17:1-5, 24-26)
1.
We are invited into the very passion of the Godhead. He beckons us to behold and embrace the
consuming zeal God has for His own renown and the immeasurable love He has for Himself.
2.
Out of the interior life of the Godhead flows the charge for those made in His image to love Him and
glorify Him with the entirety of their existence (cf. Col 1:18, 1 Cor. 10:31, etc.)
“Jesus answered, “The foremost is, ‘HEAR, O ISRAEL! THE LORD OUR GOD IS ONE LORD; AND YOU SHALL LOVE
THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND, AND WITH ALL
YOUR STRENGTH.’” Mk 12:29-30 (quoting Deut 6:4-5)
“Now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require from you, but to fear the LORD your God, to
walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve (worship) the LORD your God with all your heart and
with all your soul…” Deuteronomy 10:12 (cf. Deut 11:13, 28:47, 30:6,10; Josh 22:5)
3.
B.
It is not a question of whether our ultimate purpose is to glorify God or to love Him. Our love for God
is the relational context through which we seek to magnify Him in all things.
Looking at the Heart
1.
The Heart and the Affections
a. The four facets of existence considered above are too interconnected to view them in isolation.
We were created as a unified identity and our life cannot be reduced to compartments.
b. However, Scripture and experience reveal that the affections lie at the center of our identity.
There, at the core of who we are, they wield an unrivaled influence over all the other areas of
human existence.
2.
Describing the Affections
a. Our own lives are a mystery to us, and thus we cannot speak of the affections in a rigid,
formulaic way. A functional understanding of the affections can be stated as: the fiercest
passions, strongest convictions, deepest desires and highest ambitions a person possesses.
b. While what we consciously feel hour by hour is very important, our affections go well beyond
the surface of our emotions. They are the deep, hidden currents within us that steer our life. The
affections determine what ultimately drives an individual, how they define success, where they
derive joy, the criteria for decision-making, and how they relate to the world around them.
c.
3.
This epicenter of the interior life is, by its very nature, hidden to our sight (cf. 1 Pet 3:3-4, Rom
7:22, 2 Cor 4:16, Eph 3:16, Col 3:1-3). Sin radically dulls our perception of its existence and
importance. Effort and revelation are needed to discern the dominant role of the affections.
The Reaching of the Heart and the Battle for the Affections
One of the main ways the prominence of the affections can be seen, and its force felt, is in the
mysterious restlessness that haunts all of humanity. This inescapable, unshakeable angst, and the
voracious yearning for captivating love, unending beauty, and epic purpose that accompanies it,
provides a window to look upon the interior landscape of man. It is there, in these hidden recesses,
that the battle for this generation is raging.
C.
The Importance and Purpose of the Affections
“Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life.” (Proverbs 4:23, NASB95)
1.
Our affections (i.e. the depths of our heart) were created to be directed entirely toward Jesus,
governed by Him, consumed with Him, and discharged upon Him.
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FCF – Abiding in Love Series – Affections Consumed with Love
2.
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To steward our affections, therefore, is a charge we must fulfill with all sobriety and attentiveness.
We must frequently examine our affections, understand how they function, and ardently seek to
have them absorbed with Jesus. The question of how we abide in love must shape our lives.
A garden enclosed is my sister, my spouse, a spring shut up, a fountain sealed. Song 4:12
3.
II.
There is nothing that brings more honor and pleasure to Jesus than when His people are truly
enthralled with His beauty and consumed with love for who He is at the deepest levels of their being.
THE WAY OF LOVE
A.
From Vision to Authenticity
For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also… Matthew 6:21
B.
III.
1.
All of this must lead to asking the question, “how does this happen?...“how can my passions, longing,
convictions, and motivations actually be given wholly to this Man?”
2.
These words of Jesus reveal an important principle. Our heart will abide wherever it is that we find
our greatest treasure. For this to happen, we must actually see His matchless, incomparable worth.
The Knowledge of Jesus
1.
It is only by gaining knowledge of something that we can esteem its value. The more we know, the
more accurately we can see what it is worth.
2.
Yet because we are speaking of Someone and not a thing, this knowledge cannot be only cognitive. It
must be relational knowledge – a knowing that completely breaks down the modern divide between
truth and experience. We must actually encounter and know a Person.
ONE NEEDFUL THING
A.
Seeking and Finding
One thing I have desired of the LORD, that will I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days
of my life, to behold the beauty of the LORD and to inquire in His temple. Psalm 27:4
B.
1.
The one needful thing that David pursued and that Mary of Bethany embodied was a very specific
posture of the heart focused on gazing and listening. The ideas of hearing and seeing are
consistently connected in the Bible. To listen is to behold, and to gaze is to hear.
2.
This corresponds to the quality Jesus consistently sought from those who followed Him: ears to hear
and eyes to see. Wisdom Himself beckons us to be those who listen and behold. It is this posture of
heart that is the primary (not only) doorway into the deep interior encounter where the true
knowledge of Jesus is unfolded to our heart and our affections are conquered as a result.
Abiding in Love and Abiding in His Word
“If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you…” John 15:7
“Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another
with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God.” Col 3:16
C.
1.
The act of inclining our ear to the oracles of God is the path to living understanding. We are to
treasure His word, rejoice in it, and eat it (cf. Ps 19:8-10, Ps 119, Is. 55:1-3, Ezek 3:1-3, Jer 15:16)
2.
The act of doing this is referred to as meditation in Scripture, and it is absolutely vital to possess a
revelation of its significance and a vision to practice it. (Gen 24:63, Josh 1:8, Ps 1:2, 4:4, 19:4, 63:6,
77:6, 77:12, 119, 104:34,143:5, 145:5, Mal 3:16, Phil 4:8, 1 Tim 4:14-16)
3.
Supplication primarily impacts our outward circumstances, intercession primarily impacts others
(people, nations, issues), but it is meditation that primarily impacts our interior life in God. Practically
this largely consists of slowly speaking and singing small biblical phrases with love and adoration.
The Living Word (Luke 10:38-42)
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FCF – Abiding in Love Series – Affections Consumed with Love
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1.
Meditation rightly looks to God and His ways as its object (Ps 145:5). We behold the Father, Son, and
Spirit and listen to all they have revealed. Yet there is a special place that Jesus holds in meditation.
2.
Through the incarnation, Jesus is the height of the revelation of the knowledge of God. This is
primarily expressed through His identity as Word and Light/Image. (Mt 11:27, Jn 1:1-18, 14:6-8, 2 Cor
4:6 Col 2:2-3, 9, Heb 1:1-3, etc.)
3.
If we desire to relate to Jesus, we must be those who listen and behold because that is who He is!
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