Shave Me Some of That Love | The Love of God

What you need:

• 10-12 bottles of foam shaving cream (get the cheap big cans from the dollar store) – cover at least 2 of them with a piece of paper to hide the manufacturer label and write “LOVE OF GOD” on the paper with a bold marker
• 10 clear plastic cups

Lesson:

If someone were to ask you what God is what would you say?

Use the list below to help answer this question in addition to whatever the kids supply

• The creator and ruler of the universe and source of all moral authority, the supreme being
• Someone worshiped as having power over nature or human fortunes, a deity
• To some people who have embraced materialism and humanism the answer to the question would be nothing. Just the imaginings of human beings.
• God is holy – the holy as I am holy
• The way, the truth and the life
• The Lily of the Valley
• The creator
• The Father, the Son, the Holy Ghost
• He is a spirit
• The Alpha and Omega the beginning and the ending
• A rock
• I am

1 John 4:8 says… “He that loveth NOT knoweth not God”  OR If you don’t have love, you don’t EVEN KNOW GOD! The reason so many people don’t know what God is is because they don’t love him. You cannot know God if you don’t love God. BUT WHY?! The rest of the verse continues on… “for God IS LOVE”.  

God is a whole lot of things and it is difficult to pin down one thing that encapsulates God but it is always safe to say, that God IS LOVE. THAT’S WHAT HE IS AND WHO HE IS IN A NUTSHELL.  Everything else that God is comes out of His love.

Today we are going to be talking about the love of God.  Many people struggle with the fact that God can really love them because they don’t even really love or even LIKE themselves.  But GOD loves you! Unconditionally. No matter what you ever do, it will never diminish the love of God for you. It doesn’t mean God is OK when you do goofy things or sin against Him but He DOES still love you.

But HOW much does He love us? We use the term “love” so casually all the time to the point where it doesn’t even mean anything any more.  We say that we LOVE ice cream. Or I just LOVE your dress (well, you might say that if you were a girl… guys don’t say stuff like that) But do we really LOVE those things or just really like them?

This is the love of God

HOLD UP CAN

But if I leave it inside of here you can’t really see it… to really SHOW you the love of God I need to get it out in the open. So I found a container roughly the same size as the love of God.

HOLD UP A CUP

When you first hear that God is love you may be a little confused and think, “What does that mean, He IS love?” To put it in very simple terms, it means everything God does is based on love.  Every action He takes, every move He makes, every word He says is based on love.

The Bible says in 1 John 3:1 – Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.

This verse says that if you are trying to figure out what kind of love God has toward us, just think He loved us so much that we should be called the sons of GOD!  He wants us to become a part of His family.

PUT SHAVING CREAM INTO THE CUP UNTIL IT IS FULL

That’s pretty cool!  God isn’t content with us just being a friend, He wants us to become like one of His KIDS! But how BIG is His love for us really? Some of think that because we have made mistakes that He couldn’t love us – But He does!

Some think that we just aren’t good enough for God to love us. Actually you are right… NONE of us are good enough BUT… We don’t get good to get God… we get God to get good

PUT SHAVING CREAM INTO ANOTHER CUP UNTIL IT IS FULL ALSO

God wanted us to know just how much He loved us so He wrote to us in Ephesians 3

• 17 That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in LOVE
• 18 May be able to comprehend (OR UNDERSTAND) with all saints what is the breadth (HOW WIDE), and length, and depth, and height;
• 19 And to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge…

So God planted us like a flower but instead of being planted in dirt, He planted us in love so we can understand how WIDE

PUT SHAVING CREAM INTO ANOTHER CUP UNTIL IT IS FULL ALSO

Note: If you run out of shaving cream, just pull out another bottle from where it is hidden out of sight.

how LONG

PUT SHAVING CREAM INTO ANOTHER CUP UNTIL IT IS FULL ALSO

how DEEP

PUT SHAVING CREAM INTO ANOTHER CUP UNTIL IT IS FULL ALSO

and how WIDE

PUT SHAVING CREAM INTO ANOTHER CUP UNTIL IT IS FULL ALSO

His love really is… But that’s CRAZY! How much love of God is in here?

And just when we think we understand just how big His love can be. He wrote the ULTIMATE message to us about His love toward us in John 15:13.  John 15:13 Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. There is NO greater love than for someone to lay down their life for another and Romans says in chapter 5 verse 8 that, God did exactly that for us!

But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. God paid the ultimate sacrifice for us by giving His life so that we might live.

PUT SHAVING CREAM INTO ANOTHER CUP UNTIL IT IS FULL ALSO

There is only one thing big enough to measure the love of God. Only one thing you can point to and say, “God loves me THAT much” and the is CROSS on Calvary.

John 15:9 – As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you: continue ye in my love. As God loved the man “Jesus” – THAT is how much God loves you!

God loves you NO MATTER WHAT… No matter who you are, what you have done, what you have said, what color your skin is, and even if you don’t love Him!  He loves you no matter how good or how bad you are and even if you may say, “I am not a part of your church” tt doesn’t matter! GOD LOVES YOU!

And just when you think God’s love has run out… just when you think there just can’t possibly be any more love than this in the whole world… God shows you that He hasn’t even really begun yet.

PULL OUT ANOTHER 10 BOTTLES OR SO