All Christians, to a greater or lesser degree, know that God loves them. But some have little to no understanding of God's love, no felt experience or inner feeling of it. Some have described it this way: “I know in my head that God loves me, but it hasn’t sunk the 12 inches to my heart.”
I know for myself there were many years of "head knowledge," knowing many Scriptures, pastoring two churches, and still not truly experiencing the love of Jesus and gospel freedom in my heart. This lack of experience kept my spiritual life lukewarm. As a result, my ministry was inefficacious.
Likewise, some people come to Setting Captives Free who are biblically knowledgeable with sound doctrine but cold hearts. They can answer questions correctly; they know Scripture well, agree with the teaching, but their answers are lifeless - void of Holy Spirit unction and power. These people are usually eager to do right and often involved in numerous church activities like Bible studies. Frequently these folks are also pursuing degrees in biblical studies. Yet despite all their knowledge, when they examine their lives, the freedom they desire seems to elude them.
Question 1. What is your current experience of the love of God? Please share.
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Sue gives an excellent answer to the first question:
"I believe I do know much of God’s love, but I also know I have not nearly understood the full height, depth, length and width of it. He does reveal it to me more and more as I spend more time in study and prayer, and basking in HIs presence. Also since this study I realize it is at the cross that I truly see the depth of his love, as I see what His love for me cost him."
And check out Molly's amazing answer here:
"Well first of all you described me in the paragraph above. there are times when going through this course, I have recognized that I am that person at times. Now, going through this course has helped me to understand more about the love of Jesus, and it is really helping me to be able to apply what the cross means in the area of eating. I know that God loves me because he saved my soul but going through this course there have been some times where washing brought me back to a place of intimacy that I once knew when I was newly saved, and this has been wonderful to rekindle my relationship with God. It's almost like I am being born again - again! That's the best way I can describe it, even though I know that I am being sanctified and this was an area that I was unaware of couldn't quite pinpoint the sin and going through Setting Captives Free of course has helped me to name the different sins associated with the way that I eat. Gluttony idolatry laziness and other sins have been shown to me because God loves me and he disciplines those he loves. I am so thankful for his love for me and whether I eat or drink or whatever I do I will do all to the glory of God! He is worthy."
During my time of lukewarmness, I would have told you that salvation is not a feeling; it’s faith in the facts of the gospel. I would have told you that our feelings and subjective experiences are unreliable; rather, it is the objective facts of the gospel and our God-given faith in it that saves us.
And it is indeed believing the gospel in our hearts and confessing with our mouth that saves us. “For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved” (Romans 10:10).
But this objective reality, our faith in the facts of the gospel, is only half of the experience of salvation. The other side is that God has given us the Holy Spirit, and one of His roles is to magnify the love of God and make it real and personal to us. People who experience this Holy Spirit applied love can echo the apostle Paul’s statement of the personal nature of it: “I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Galatians 2:20).
Pastor Timothy Keller words it this way in his God's Word for You commentary on Galatians 4:
"Verse 6—“God sent the Spirit”—parallels verse 4—“God sent his Son”. The Son’s purpose was to secure for us the legal status of our sonship. By contrast, the Spirit’s purpose is to secure the actual experience of it.
This is not like the work of the Son. The work of the Son brings us an objective legal condition, that is ours whether we feel it or not. But this work of the Spirit is not like that at all. The Spirit brings us a radically subjective experience."
It is this personal experience of the love of Jesus, the heart-felt understanding of Christ's love to us as individuals, that thoroughly changes our hearts and our lives. It is the rest of the story of salvation, not merely the objective reality of it, but also the felt experience of it. One saves us; the other sets us free.
Our lesson today will explore the work of the Holy Spirit in our hearts, and most importantly, how we may receive His supernatural work so that our hearts experience the love of God in a very personal and liberating way.
Our study has often noted how the Holy Spirit is intimately connected with Christ's work on the cross. Let's see that again in the following passage of Scripture:
“And hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured out into our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us. 6 You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. 7 Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person, someone might possibly dare to die. 8 But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:5-8 NIV).
Question 2. According to Romans 5:5-8 NIV, what does the Holy Spirit do for us?
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