AFFECTED BY CHRIST'S AFFECTION
- It is contagious
- It is one-of-a-kind
I include all of you in my prayers a lot. I do. And I don’t pray for you on a regular basis because there’s a problem or because I’m concerned about what is happening or where we as a congregation are headed. I pray with joy in my heart when it comes to you; I thank the Lord in my prayers because of the fellowship we share in the gospel of our Lord. We have a special bond, an unbelievably strong connection based on our mutual faith in our Savior. And I’m confident that just as our Lord has created in you a heart that loves him and a life that lives for him, he will continue to strengthen you and build you up until the Last Day.
It shouldn’t be a surprise that I pray for you a lot. I’m your pastor after all! I’ve been appointed to be a shepherd of your souls. We don’t have an employer/employee relationship. We don’t have a parent/child relationship. We don’t even have a friend/friend relationship. It’s more than that. I have a vested interest in and am held partly responsible for what you believe and what you do and where you will end up. And I know that you have that same interest in my spiritual well-being. And so on those days when my job of spreading the gospel isn’t all that easy as well as on those days when spreading the gospel seems to be working out just the way I planned, it is a comfort to know that you believe in the same gospel with me and together we are recipients of God’s grace. You are my spiritual support group. And God himself knows how much I care for you. He knows how often you are included in my prayers.
And this is my prayer: that your faith will be strengthened by the words of God that I speak, that your love for others will continue to increase, and that you will be able to recognize every false teaching and fend off every temptation that this world throws at you so that you will remain steadfast in God’s promises and will be seen as innocent and holy in his sight on Judgment Day because of the forgiveness earned for you by your Savior. I long to see you in heaven one day. I look forward to that.
And I feel that way about you because I’ve been affected by Christ’s affection. Christ has shown me an infinite amount of love and so I can’t help but show love to you! It is natural for a child of God the Father to want to show love for his brothers and sisters who belong to that same family. It was natural for the apostle Paul to feel this way too. Because he was also affected by Christ’s affection. And in his letter to the congregation in Philippi, he says some of the same things to those Christians that I have just said to you. “I thank my God every time I remember you. In all my prayers for all of you, I always pray with joy because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now, being confident of this, that he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus. It is right for me to feel this way about all of you, since I have you in my heart; for whether I am in chains or defending and confirming the gospel, all of you share in God's grace with me. God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus. And this is my prayer: that your love may abound more and more in knowledge and depth of insight, so that you may be able to discern what is best and may be pure and blameless until the day of Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through Jesus Christ—to the glory and praise of God.”
Paul obviously had a heart that was filled with affection for the Philippians. And his affection for the Philippians was modeled after Christ’s affection for all people. And my affection for you is modeled after both Paul’s and Christ’s. It’s an affection that not only feels, but acts. It’s an affection that is not only in the heart, but is also in the mind. It is an affection that is based on unselfishness and self-sacrifice. And it’s contagious. When we hear about Christ’s affection for us in the Word, we catch it. When we read about it in our Bibles, we catch it. When we experience it in the Lord’s Supper, we catch it. When we witness other Christians displaying Christ’s affection to those around us, we catch it.
But it’s also something I don’t do well. Yes, I have a special place in my heart for this congregation and each of you as individual Christians, but the love I have for you is not always that constant. It’s up and down. It’s fickle. It’s unreliable. Because whether you want to believe it or not: I’m plenty selfish! And sometimes I care more about my wants and my feelings and my life than I care about yours. I’m not proud of it, but it’s true! My care and concern for each one of you does not always take precedence over the care and concern I show for myself. I’ve certainly been affected by Christ’s affection but I am also still infected with sin. Sometimes my sinful selfishness gets the best of me no matter how hard I strive to show Christ’s love. And I would guess it gets the best of you on occasion as well.
You love your children and your spouse and your parents and your friends and your congregation because you’ve been affected by Christ’s affection just like I have. But you also know all too well that the love you show for those people in your life is sporadic at best. There are days you do pretty well but then there are those days in which you don’t care about anyone but yourself. There are those days when you are selfish to the core and you don’t care! In fact you like it! There are times when we know we are being selfish but we have no intentions of stopping anytime soon. Because love is hard and selfishness is easy. Love is work and selfishness is all natural. The affection of Christ may be contagious, but the selfishness of the sinful human nature is hereditary - and so there will always be a constant battle between those two as long as we live in this life. Unfortunately, we don’t mind when sin wins every once in a while.
And in reality, sin wins more than every once in a while, doesn’t it? Selfishness has gained the victory over our love on many of the battlefields in our hearts over the years. But no matter how many times we have succumbed to selfishness and no matter how many times we have let sin gain the upper hand on the affection of Christ we have shown to others, Christ’s affection for us has never once wavered. Arguably, the greatest characteristic of Christ’s affection is that although it affects us, we can never affect it. We can never change Christ’s affection for us or diminish Christ’s affection or dampen Christ’s affection. Because Christ’s affection is one-of-a-kind. There’s nothing quite like it. Because every other love changes. Every other love is influenced by something. Every other love has limits. Christ’s love for us does not.
A father on this earth may love his children so much that he humbles himself for his them and get down on his hands and knees and play games with his children that a grown man wouldn’t normally play. But a father’s humility for the sake of his children is nothing compared to the humility Jesus displayed for the sake of those who belonged to him. He went from throne to barn, from glory to poverty, from an eternity of perfection to a world of sin. God stopped showing himself to the universe as God for a time - so deep was the affection Christ had for you.
A good friend may do his or her best to back you up and make every effort to never let you down. They may be dependable and trustworthy and always willing to go the extra mile whenever you need help. But a friend’s dedication to you is nothing compared to the dedication of the Lord. Jesus woke up every morning on this earth knowing that the devil would attack him again, knowing that his enemies would try to trick him again, knowing that his own disciples would doubt him again. Jesus took shots from every angle for his entire life from both earthly adversaries and supernatural ones, and he survived. And not only did he survive, he did it perfectly. He never faltered. He never gave in. He never gave up - so great was the affection Christ had for you.
A mother may very well sacrifice a lot of things for her children. She will sacrifice her time when they are sick, sacrifice her money when they are in need, sacrifice her job to spend just a few more days with them, sacrifice her sleep to make sure they are provided for, sacrifice everything she has to make them happy. But a mother’s sacrifice is nothing compared to the sacrifice Christ made on your behalf. He sacrificed his reputation so that you could be called by the name of God himself. He sacrificed every earthly pleasure so that you could enjoy every heavenly treasure. He sacrificed his body so that yours would be spared. He sacrificed his relationship with his Father for a few horrendous moments on the cross so that your relationship with his Father would forever be secured. Jesus sacrificed his life for you before you ever knew who he was - so passionate was Christ’s affection for you.
A brother or a sister may very well stand up for you when others will not. Your spouse or your parents or your children may look after you and take care of you and be there for you when no one else would bother. But the care and concern of your family is nothing compared to the care and concern that Christ shows to you. He defends you from every evil. He guards you from all temptations. He constantly watches over you so that no spiritual harm will befall you. In fact, he never sleeps. He doesn’t want to sleep because he wants you to be safe. He wants you to be blessed. And so he has made it his goal to take care of you for as long as you live in this world. He’s more than just “on call” 24 hours a day 7 days a week; he’s already there 24/7. He’s holding you by your hand and leading you every step of the way - so complete is Christ’s affection for you.
Christ’s affection is one-of-a-kind. It is all-encompassing, playing an integral part in every aspect of your life. Christ’s affection is completely self-sacrificing, leaving nothing undone. Christ’s affection will never leave you even if you leave him. That’s a love you can count on. That’s affection that affects us.
If Christ cares for us that much and then he asks us to show that same kind of care for others, how could we not? How could we look our Savior in the face and tell him that we don’t want to do that today? That it’s not worth it? That everything he did for us wasn’t really enough to motivate us to want to do the same? It’s unthinkable that we would say anything like that to our Lord because any Christian who has come into contact with the affection of Christ will be affected to act like him and care like him and love like him. No Christian will be able to perfectly emulate Christ’s love, but every Christian will be moved by Christ’s love. Christ’s affection is that powerful. Christ’s affection is that effective.
It affected John the Baptist. Today is John the Baptist Day - the 2nd Sunday in the season of Advent when we look back at what John did to prepare the way for the Savior. John the Baptist was affected by the affection of Christ. That’s why he dedicated his life to preaching and baptizing all that would listen. That’s why he lived out in the desert, unconcerned about the niceties this world had to offer. That’s why he was beheaded by King Herod. Because he longed for the people with the affection of Christ. He wanted them to repent. He wanted them to believe. He wanted them to be saved. And he was willing to say whatever words of God that needed to be said in order to make it happen.
This same love for sinful souls was alive in the apostle Paul as well. “God can testify how I long for all of you with the affection of Christ Jesus” he wrote. This is the same affection I have for you. And it’s the same affection I pray you have for me and for all people. The affection we show towards each other may never be the ideal kind of love and it may never be as constant as we’d like it to be, but Christ’s is. Christ’s affection for us will always be as strong as it always has been. And I pray that Christ’s affection will always continue to have a profound affect on us.
Amen.
“To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood, and has made us to be a kingdom and priests to serve his God and Father - to him be glory and power forever and ever! Amen.” - Rev. 1:5-6
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