Christ Revealed in His Own Word #43
Genuine Love for God
Wednesday Evening, September 11, 1996
Brian Kocourek,
Pastor Grace Fellowship
The last two
Sundays we spoke about how brother Branham said, “We should never pray to change
God's mind; we should pray to change our mind. God's mind don't need any
changing.” Brother Branham goes
on to tell us that this attitude that will accept God’s will above our own will
is how we express our Love for God. He
then goes on to illustrate how this love works in paragraph. [36]“I been this week down in the country
staying with some very dear friends. I asked some of them at the table
yesterday when we was eating... (We always set around and have like a little
study on the Bible). Talking about love;
there's a certain person said to me; he said, "I believe you're an
antichrist." I said, "If that
would be pleasing to my Lord, that's what I want to be. I want to be whatever He wants me to be. I love Him. And if He should
cast me into hell, I still will love Him, if I go with the same spirit that I
have now." He looked at me kinda strange. I seen four or five of them
there, young men, young wives, fine women. I knowed how them boys loved their
wives, so I said to them; I said, "Here's
the way to test it. If your wife before you were married... Now, you go
back, and say -- this married life, you only been dreaming you were married.
You really wasn't married, but you dreamed you were. And you woke up, and you
went and talked it over with your girl friend, and you said, 'You know, I
dreamed that we were married, and we had children, and we were living happy,
and waiting for the coming of the Lord and everything." And then, this
girl would say to you, 'You know, I love another man better than I love you. I
could be happier with the other man.
‘Could you from your heart love her well enough to say, 'God's blessings rest
upon you, my dear. Go with this other man.' Now, check that, each of you men or you women. See? Well, if your love is correct you'd do that, for
you are interested in her welfare. What... You know you could have her;
you could live with her, she's your wife -- she will be, she'll marry you, but
she won't be happy. She'd be happier... And then, if you love her, then you
want her to be happy. Therefore,
whatever the will of God is, let God's will be done whether I'm happy with it
or not. I want to live so He will be pleased with what I do. Therefore, check your objective and your
motive by that, and you will know whether you love God or not." What if He'd say, "You've served Me,
but I'm going to cast you away"? you’d say "I love You anyhow."
[38] Therefore, if the churches
would see that and could believe it in that manner, it wouldn't be one trying to jerk the football away from the other
fellow when he's running with it. He'd
be protecting that one (See?), when real true motive and objective.
Wouldn't be one trying to say, "Hey, I got this too, I--I... This is me;
this..." See, God can't use a man like
that.
There's so much impersonation follows it, and that's Satan; and the people can't realize that. They're
trying to take the ball from somebody that's been give it. Let God raise
up a certain ministry and watch how many goes after it. See, see? [39] Now, genuine love for God, "No matter
what part I am, Lord, if I can only say a word for It to help protect It, let
me do that." See? That's the same thing would be about your wife. If
you really love her (See?), it's not a
Phileo love, it's an Agapao love, a genuine love. If she could live with
somebody else happier... You're not married now, 'course, you can't...?...
Now, tonight I would
like to begin our examination of this Love that Brother Branham is talking
about here. Notice he said, “it's not a Phileo love, it's an Agapao
love, a genuine love.” So then in order to understand
what it is that Brother Branham is explaining here we must know the difference
between Phileo love and Agapao Love.
You see, this is where so many people today make a terrible mistake.
They think all love is the same and it is not. In fact that is the biggest
criticism we receive who identify with Brother Vayle is that we have no love,
and we do not have the right Spirit. And so we see men come in with a seductive
message and because it is so sweet and nicey, nicey in it’s presentation, the
people get caught up with the presentation and not the truth. The same thing is
going on in the political world. Mr. Clinton talks about feeling your pain even though in actuality he could care less, and
because he talks nice, and he uses seductive words, the gullible people swallow
his pitch, “hook, line and sinker”. But we know that this is the hour for
seduction and gullibility anyway, for we have ample scriptural proof of this.
But the thing of it is, is that this gullibility is a condition of the people
today and it doesn’t matter if it’s in church politics or government politics.
Gullible people are marked by error and ignorance because they want it that
way. It is not forced upon them. They love to have it so as we read from
various scriptures on Sunday morning. [Hosea
4:6-12] Read.
[2 Thes 2:10-12] KJV (read) AMPLIFIED And by unlimited seduction to evil and with all wicked deception for
those who are going to perdition, perishing because they did not welcome the
Truth but refused to love it that they might be saved. Therefore God sends upon
them a misleading influence, a working of error and a strong delusion to make
them believe what is false. In order that all may be judged and condemned who
did not believe - who refused to adhere to, trust in and rely on - The Truth,
but instead took pleasure in unrighteousness.
WUEST translations says, this deception is geared to the gullibility
of those who are perishing, this gullibility being caused by the fact that they
did not accept the love for the Truth tot he end that they might be saved.
Now Webster tells us the word gullible
means “one who is easily tricked, credulous.” They are marked by
credulity which means they are not only too easily led into false hoods, but
they become convinced of it with very little or no proof at all. And we find
the reason for this is because they do not want the Truth. They actually hate
the Truth.
[2 Timothy 4:3] KJV first and then AMPLIFIED
For
the time is coming when the people will not tolerate or put up with sound and wholesome instruction, but having
ears itching for something pleasing and gratifying, they will gather to
themselves one teacher after another to a considerable number, chosen to satisfy their own liking and to
foster the errors that they hold. And these people will turn aside from
hearing the Truth and they shall wander off into myths and man-made fictions.
[2 Timothy 4:3] WUEST For the time will come
when they will not endure our
wholesome doctrine in that they will
hold themselves firmly against it,
but, dominated by their own personal
cravings, they, having itching ears shall also avert the ear, and as a result,
they shall receive a moral twist which will cause them to believe that which is
fictitious.
Now, you might be
asking yourself how this has to do with these things that brother Branham is
telling us about love? he is telling us
that if we have the Real true Agapao Love our motives will be right and one
won’t be trying to take over what God has given to another. And he even brings
it down to the marriage and tells us if our love is Right, it will have the
correct motives and be guided by right principles. In other words, it boils
down to intent, motive and purpose. If our Real purpose is to see the Word of
God flourish in His People, we won’t care by whom it comes, and when we see God
using a Brother to bring forth this in the people we won’t be jealous and try
to gain some of the attention and focus off of this channel, but we will simply
recognize what God is doing and by whom He is doing it and we will get out of
the way so that the work can go on unhindered.
But that has not
been the case with man. Man is jealous and because of this jealousy they won’t
allow others to go in, and since they won’t go in themselves, they will try and
prevent those who would like to go from going. [ Matt 23:13] Therefore they end up holding back from the people
that which could help the people. [Romans
1: 18] Jealousy, that is all it is. And jealousy is the opposite of True
Love, or Agapao Love. And so we must
check our motives in every thing that we do.
Now the second
thing here that we must be able to see is that these men who hold back the
Truth do not right out deny it. Brother Branham never said those men try to
stop the ball from moving, they just try to pull it away from the one who has
it and run with it themselves. I have
seen a lot of that around Brother Vayles ministry. Many have come and gone who
felt like they had to step in a grab the ball away from him and run with it
themselves. It boils down to motives. Brother Branham is not telling us that we
are not in the game. But our function in the game is to support the one with
the ball. Not fight amongst ourselves over who gets to run with it. But help in
whatever way we can without interfering with the carrier. And so we see how he
is using this illustration because it has to do with motives and so does the
subject of Love.
Now the best way
to suppress down or hold down the truth is to place the wrong emphasis on it or
to make other things Truth as well. Just like the best way to hide a diamond is
to place it in a room full of counterfeits, because who wants to take the time
to have to examine every single one in order to ascertain the real. And yet
that is exactly what we are supposed to do. We are commanded to “Try the
Spirits to see whether they are of God.” And yet how many people will do this.
Now, the same
thing applies to love. I think common sense will tell you that love for your
family is different from having a love for some thing. Love for money and love
for things, is a different kind of love than love for family. And love for God
is an even greater thing than love for family although you can love God with
Phileo type love as well as an Agapao type love. But what really matters is not
the phileo love but the Agapao love. And Brother Branham points that out when
he says, "Here's the way to test it. And then he goes on to
describe a way in which you can test your own motives to see whether they are
selfish or not. In paragraph [39]he
says, “Now, genuine love for God,
"No matter what part I am, Lord, if I can only say a word for It to help
protect It, let me do that." See? That's the same thing would be about
your wife. If you really love her (See?), it's
not a Phileo love, it's an Agapao love, a genuine love.” And notice he
calls Agapao love a genuine love. Webster tells us the word genuine means being
of the original source. That which is real and authentic, and not just put on.
Now we can find
the definitions of these two words, Phileo love and Agapao Love , in Vines Complete Expository Dictionary of
Old and New Testament Words.
Agapao love is
used in the New Testament to describe the attitude of God toward His Son and
sons. And since we were in Him before the foundations of the world, and for
much longer than we have been on this earth in a manifested form, then we
should be able to see that this Love was predestined to us, and therefore is
not the result of something we have done that caused God to respond favorably
to us. This Love then is completely selfless. For had God’s love been merely a
response to us then it could not be a selfless love but a selfish love.
Therefore, this Agapao love is an expression
of will. Let me repeat that, Love, Agapao Love is an expression of the
will. And since we know that the will is defined as a particular desire or
purpose, then we can see that this form of Love has to do with expressing God’s
Will, and or purpose that He alone had within Himself and that He alone chose
to express.
The scriptures plainly
state that while we were yet sinners, He loved us and manifested His Love and
desire for our welfare before we ever asked for His help, or ever showed any
signs of seeking His help. Therefore this love is completely void of any
selfish desire and could never be political in it’s nature.
Now compare this
to Phileo love which is based upon already established affections and
relationships. Phileo love therefore is somewhat selfish in nature because it
wishes to reward and preserve based upon what this relationship has done and is
doing and can do for me, whereas Agapao is already set in motion by the Divine
and Eternal Will and Purpose of the Father and therefore only looks out for the
welfare of the benefactor regardless of the response the benefactor may have in
return.
Therefore you can
see that this Agapao Love is also used to convey His will and desire to His
children concerning their attitude toward one another. It expresses the
essential nature of God in His relationship to His offspring. And since Love
can only be known from the actions that it prompts, God’s love then is seen as
a gift to us, whether it be the gift of His Son or the Gift of Life. This
expression could not be shown through
complacency, nor is it an expression of affection, and it certainly is not
drawn out by the excellency of the object of its love, Because He loved us even
before we ever loved Him. Love therefore is an exercise of the Divine will in a
deliberate choice, made without assignable cause except for the fact that the
very Nature of God must find expression. Therefore this love does not have it’s
impulse from feelings, and it does not always run with our natural
inclinations, nor does it spend itself only upon those for whom some affinity
is discovered. Love seeks the welfare of all, it works no ill to any, it seeks
opportunity to do good to all men, and especially those of the house hold of
faith.
Vines says, “In respect of Agapao as used of God, it
expresses the deep and constant “love” and interest of a being towards entirely unworthy objects, This expression thus
produces and fosters in return a reverential “love” in them towards the Giver,
and practical “love” towards those who also are partakers of the same, and a
desire to help others to seek the Giver.
While Phileo love
merely represents a tender affection, Agapao love is an unselfish love that is
ready to serve. While phileo love conveys the thought of cherishing the object
above all else or of manifesting an affection characterized by constancy, from a
motive of higher veneration, it therefore may come forth from an undo desire to
preserve it, forgetful of the real objective of life whereas the Agapao love
considers the real true purpose of Life. And this is what Brother Branham is
trying to illustrate to us through his examples of the husband who truly has an
Agapao love for his wife.
For years you
have heard me say that Love is actually an outward expression of your revelation. I take my stand based upon
the many examples of love that I see in the scripture where this Agapao love is
expressed through some out ward manifestation of charity. Whether it be in the
form of God sending His own Son, or any other expression that we see where His
love is extended toward us as sons.
[1 Cor 13:1-14:3] ESP 13:13 Notice how this word agape is used as the word charity because
it has to do with expressing a self sacrificial nature in the attempt to better
someone else’s welfare.
We see this self
sacrificial nature in the following verses of scripture...
[John 3:16] For God so Loved the world that He gave His only begotten son...
[Gal 2:20] Jesus Loved, therefore He
gave Himself
[2 Cor 12:15] Paul said, I will be spent for you because of Love
[John 21:15-17] three times Jesus asked
Peter to acknowledge his Love, 2 times agapao, 3rd time
phileo was used.
If you Love God
you will also love your brother [1 John
4:21]
Our Love then is
to also have an outlet just as God’s did.
we are commanded
to love one another [John 13:34]
[James 2:8] the royal law is to love thy
neighbor
[Gal 5:14] love one another fulfills all
the law
[Romans 13:9] ten commandments fulfilled
in loving one another.
[Eph 1: 15]
[1 Thess 1: 3]
[Hebrews 6:10]