Intro– For some of the people, the anger seethed just below the surface.  For others, they knew there had been deep hurt and terrible atrocities committed, but the events surrounding the war did not affect them as much, so they were able to let go of the hurt and try to move forward.  They saw no other options for hope in the future, except in forgetting the past.  We spent some time in Bosnia last year, and heard stories from Bosnians, and some Serbs, in the aftermath of a terrible war which devastated their land and people.  This war was complicated by history, by religious differences and cultural alliances which had been formed, but everyone was deeply affected by the war. We spoke with young men and women, who had spent several years of their childhood in the basement, never having gone outside or even having left their basement because of fear of being killed.  A few years ago, there was a conference sponsored by the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students.  During this conference, the Christian representative from Serbia, Croatia and Bosnia all met together.  At first it was very awkward, but as these men repented of the sin of their people and pronounced forgiveness over each other, God molded their hearts together as brothers in Christ.  They wept together, prayed together and cried out to God to heal their people and their land.  How were they able to do this?
Imagine if you were in one of these three people groups, having lost several people in your family to bombs dropped by the other side, and then being thrust into the same room with representatives from these other groups.  How would you respond? 
Because the USA has been the world power for most of my lifetime, I’ve never had hate imprinted on my heart as many people have towards other groups who have severely wounded them or their forefathers.  It could be rival gangs in a city, or rival people groups in a country.  The hate could be passed down for generations, or it could be relatively new pain.  The fact is that we live in a fallen world, and in this fallen world, we will be sinned against by others, sometimes in a big way.  How is peace possible?  How is love possible in a world like this?  It is a difficult proposition!
We are in the midst of a sermon series called “Prayer Evangelism.”  The premise is that God has called His people to go into the marketplace and to be agents of transformation in our culture.  Three weeks ago, Rev. Bill Fuller outlined 4 biblical steps to us being who God has called us to be.  The 4 steps are:  1. Bless others by speaking peace to them (Luke 10:5); 2. Fellowship with others (Luke 10:6-8); 3. Meet their needs as others share them with you (Luke 10:9a); and 4. Share the good news with them about the Kingdom of God (Luke 10:9b).  This morning, we are unpacking this 3rd point further.  The theme is We are called to selflessly love others with the love which God has given to us, so that they can know the reality of God and the truth of the gospel.

I. God’s love has been poured into our hearts, as we have the heart to receive it.
Some Christians, when they hear a preacher speak about calling us to love more fully, they try to will themselves to love more.  They say to themselves, “I’m going to be more loving... I’m going to be more loving...” and this may be their desire, but it won’t work like that because agape love, which is the Bible’s Word for the selfless love we are called to have and give away, does not originate in my heart or in your heart.  Agape love originates in the heart of God!  All we are able to do is to receive the agape love of God by faith, believing that He does love us, as the testimony of His actions show us.  Even though I have been a born again Christian for about 40 years now, I am still stunned by the love of God poured out on me.  Listen again to this passage of Scripture, and take this into your heart as well as your mind:  1 John 3:1, “How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!”  The old KJ version says, “Behold!  What manner of love the Father has bestowed upon us that we should be called children of God!”  The part I like about this translation is the call to “Behold”, which means we are to gaze at, to fix our eyes upon the incredible love of God for us.  We become like what we worship and gaze at like this.  If you want to grow in the Love of God, you gaze at it, you worship Him for His love for you, you sing about His love for you, and you pray that the Spirit of God would make this love real to you.

I also want to remind you this morning that the kind of love we are talking about is not primarily an emotion.  When the Bible says, “God so loved the world...” , it does not mean that God had a warm, fuzzy feeling towards the world which had rebelled against Him.  God sent His Son– He chose to act in a loving manner towards His creation, to fulfill His plan.  Our emotions are important– God gave them to us; but our emotions will follow our commitment, our mind set.  God is love.  He is holy also, but His holiness in no way compromises His love for us. 
I was speaking to a non-Christian guy one time and he was challenging me to explain why Christians spend so much time together, instead of investing their energy in doing good to others as Jesus told us to do.  I told him this, although he couldn’t understand it because he was still blinded to the truth: Worship is our primary calling as Christians.  We worship God first!  As we worship Him, we become like Him and gain His heart of love for others.  As we gain His heart, then we go out into the world to make a difference in the lives of others, as His Spirit leads us.  Now, on one point this non-Christian guy was accurate– he saw a lack of caring for others in the church.  There has been a disconnect somewhere, but I believe the disconnect is in this area– we have not gazed upon the love of God and been utterly transformed by the love of Christ for us, so that we are willing to be used by Him and to allow His love to flow through us to others.

Pastor Rittenouse and his family were traveling down the highway on vacation when they saw a suitcase fly off of the top of a car going in the opposite direction.  They stopped and picked up all the belongings, but the only clue as to the owner was a twenty dollar gold piece with the inscription “Given to Otis Sampson at his retirement.”  After extensive correspondence Otis Sampson was located.  He wrote a letter to the pastor asking him to discard all the belonging s except for the gold piece, which he described several times as “his most precious possession.”  Pastor Rittenhouse did so and wrote a cover letter back which he sent with the gold piece, telling Otis Sampson about his most treasured possession, Jesus Christ.  A year later, the pastor received a Christmas package and in it was a twenty dollar gold piece.  Mr. Sampson wrote, “You will be happy to know we have been born again and are now active in our local church.  We want you to have this gold piece.  I am 74 and my wife 72. You were the first one to tell us about Jesus.  Now He is our most prized and treasured possession!”  It must begin with the Love of God, which He has poured into our hearts!  When you know that you are loved, you re-focus that love on others!

II. God’s plan is to pour His selfless love through us to others.

Somebody said it this way: “God’s plan is for Christians to be rivers instead of reservoirs.  Reservoirs try to hoard water and give water away hesitantly, calculating what it will cost them because of their limited resources.  Rivers give freely because there is an unlimited supply flowing into them so they know they will be completely refilled.”  If I am the source, there is an incredibly limited amount of grace I can give to others.  Once I give away what I have, I have no more.  But if God is the source, and if I am plugged into that source by faith, I will never run out of grace.  In fact, as I give more and more away, I am filled up even more fully than I was before I gave myself away.  This is a biblical idea.  The key is being plugged into the source, God; and then choosing to give away what is pouring into you.
And the other key thought in our text this morning is this:  we are to give away what God has poured into us to those who are not able to repay us or give anything back.  This is un-American in many ways.  Every TV commercial tells you to hoard more and more so that you are secure for the future; and that our happiness is dependent upon having more than enough.  Love your best friend only.  Treat someone nice who can repay you by treating you nicely.  These are American ideas, that some Christians would call biblical.  But Jesus tells us to act in almost the opposite manner.  In His famous sermon we call the Beatitudes, Jesus tells His hearers some very radical things!    “Give to anyone who asks...  We are called to love those who hate us!  Do good to those who have done wrong to us.  And lend to others without expecting any repayment.  If we do these things, our reward will be great!!  As we act in these ways, we will be called sons of the Most High, because we are acting according to the character of our heavenly Father!  The Lord God is kind to ungrateful and even evil men.  We are to emulate His actions. 

In our small group last Sunday evening, someone asked how we should respond if we are trying to bless a person and ask if we can pray a blessing on them, and the person tells us “no, I don’t want you to do that.”  What should we do in that case?  I commented to the folks in our small group the way I would respond, “That’s fine, I will pray for you on my own time.”  Then someone said, what if they tell you not to pray for them at all– this is when the jokes started flying– “Can’t stop me!!  Because you said that, I am going to pray twice as much for you!”  We were jesting, but, according to our text today, this isn’t a jest.  We are to bless those who hate or reject us.
One of the things I read most days are the Sports Boards.  There is a page for just about every college team in the country where interested folks psycho-analyze every play from the last weekend’s game.  Once in a while, you get a non-sports topic, which I rarely read, but this one caught my eye.  There was a doctor who was offended because the AAA lady on the phone ended the conversation by saying, “God bless you!”  He said the woman’s comment offended him.  The next 100 responses to this were asking him why it offended him and telling him to lighten up because her intent was to be nice and courteous, not to offend or convert him.  The fact is this: we cannot tell how others will respond to us, but you know what– it doesn’t matter.  I have already decided I am going to seek to bless others no matter how they respond.  If a person asks me not to pray for them out loud, I will honor that request, but the person who asks me to leave my faith at the doorstep on the way in, I can’t do that, because it is who I am.  I have defined myself by the fact that I belong to Jesus Christ!  Now, I will ask myself the question, “What does it look like in these circumstances to love another person?”  In some places, love means quietly praying.  In other circumstances, and more often than not, love means acting in a manner which should bless another person.  Love is an action, not a feeling!

Jesus expects us, because of who we are as His children, to agape love those around us, even those who are persecuting us.  Who are you?  If you know Christ, you are a child of God, who has received more love than you know what to do with.  Jesus tells us to give this love away to others.

III. We show the love of Christ in us by meeting needs of those around us as God supplies the resources.
In this last point, I would like to help us see how we are to meet people where they are.  The biblical principle is to be filled with the compassion of Christ for others, and then to act out of that compassion to love others.  If we don’t have the compassion of God, we cannot give it away to others, so we started the sermon by speaking about the compassion which originates in the heart of God.  We show that we belong to God by emulating His character, which is to love others, even those who despise or reject us.  This brings us to our last point– what does this look like in our day to day lives?
The truth about people around us, despite the false front they put up is that every person has needs.  Everyone here this morning has needs– physical healing, emotional healing or strength, restored relationships, financial provision, spiritual renewal, etc.   People who are more secure are able to say in the right context, “I have a need.”  We say to the Lord, “I need You to work in my life!” and we say to one another in this body, “I need the Lord to work in this way in my life...”.  We have different perspectives on need, because of our experiences of normal, but we all have needs in this world, and God knows this.  If we had no needs, we would not trust in the Lord or in any other person!   How about people who live and work around you?  What are some of their real needs?   You need to prayerfully discern this; but, as you fellowship with them– last week’s sermon– you will know their needs.

I will tell you a little of what I know about my neighbors, things I have either observed or found out as we have tried to pastor our neighborhood:
*a woman who knows Jesus, but is going in for hip replacement in a couple of weeks.  She and her husband are committed to a local church, but we will also seek to take over a meal and pray with them.
*a man who is in the hospital this week because of serious surgery– they are committed to a local Baptist church, but we have told her we are praying for her husband, and will seek to touch base with them to see if we can mow their lawn or whatever.
*a family whose 20 something year old daughter has serious epilepsy, so they are difficult to connect with, as they are rarely outside.  They aren’t churched, and so we ask about their daughter every chance we see them and have prayed for her and are looking for ways to minister there.
*a neighbor who is facing surgery on her back.  We have prayed over her, but at this point, she has not been healed.  We are asking the Lord for His mercy and healing in her life.
*a couple a few doors down who lost a grown daughter last year, and are trying to sell a business.  We have interacted some with them and are asking the Lord to show us how to bless them and serve them.  The Lord can help them sell their business and deal with their loss.

I don’t know these things because I am a gossip.  I know these things because we have purposed in our hearts to bless our neighbors and to interact with them in every way possible.  Almost everything we know, we know because the people shared these things with us as we have fellowshipped with them on different levels.  Remember, point #2 last week was to look for ways to fellowship with others– which means eating a meal with them and having them into your house to eat with you, so that you can develop real relationships with people.  Again, you might do this at work, at school, in your civic club, in your country club, in a sports team or someplace else, but all of you can do this. 
How do we meet needs?  We ask.  We offer to pray, because few people in Florence will turn down prayer, and because we believe our God answers our prayers.  But after that, take a meal over.  Find out something they enjoy and invite them to do that with you.  If they enjoy fishing, invite them fishing.  If they enjoy flowers, invite them to the flower show, or buy some flowers from the flower show you think they might enjoy.  Serve them any way you are able.  When we lived in Wilmington, there was one family we prayed for a lot, because they were lost as can be.  They were seriously devoted to New Age religion.  We prayed for an opportunity to serve them and God brought a hurricane.  One of their trees blew down in their back yard, and I have a chain saw, so brought it over and the father and I cut it in pieces and dragged it out to the curb.  I have to be honest with you– we didn’t really like these folks much.  They would have parties and invite all of the other neighbors, except for us, because we were Christians.  One of their older boys picked on Daniel, who was young when we lived there.  But we needed to show love to them, by our actions.  God is the only One who can change a heart, but we’re the vessels He wants to use.