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Colin Smith: Keep yourselves in God's love. Does that mean that it is possible for a Christian to slip out of the love of God? And if it's up to me to keep myself in God's love, how am I to go about doing that?

Steve Hiller: Welcome to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith and some huge questions you just threw out for us right there. We're not going to answer them quite yet, but we will in today's message as we do look at what it means to remain in God's love.

Colin Smith: And what a marvelous truth this is. The love of God. And the Bible speaks about God's love in different ways. There are general ways in which the Bible speaks about God's love: God so loved the world. There are particular ways in which it speaks about God's love for his own children: he disciplines those who he loves.

But whatever aspect of the love of God we're talking about—and we're going to distinguish some different aspects of the love of God—we are talking in all of them about the love of God. And God demonstrates his love for us in this: that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. We're going to delve into a marvelous sea of God's truth, the depth of the love of God for us. It's immeasurable. To all eternity we'll be trying to fathom the breadth and length and depth and height of the love of God in Jesus Christ.

Steve Hiller: Well, with an introduction like that, I don't want to wait any longer. So let's get right to it. Open your Bible to Jude; we're really drilling down on verse 21 today as we begin the message, "Remain in God's Love." Here's Pastor Colin.

Colin Smith: Well, I think that many of us have made a commitment in these last days to get ourselves in spiritual shape. We all know the lethargy that comes upon us when the body is out of condition, and we've been using that analogy really to say that there is a similar kind of lethargy that can come over our inner life, our spiritual life, can come over our soul when we get out of spiritual shape.

So we've identified that it's time to get into God's gymnasium. Jude the apostle is our coach and our trainer, and we've been seeing at the end of this letter of Jude, just before the book of Revelation at the end of the New Testament, that he gives to us seven workouts for a healthy Christian life.

Now we've been learning the first two: build yourselves up in your most holy faith, and then last week, pray in the Holy Spirit. Today we come to the third of these seven workouts. You'll find it in Jude and verse 21 if you will open your Bible there. Keep yourselves in God's love. Keep yourselves in God's love.

Now immediately when a Christian looks at that phrase in the Bible, there will be some very obvious questions that come to our minds. Keep yourselves in God's love? Does that mean that it is possible for a Christian to slip out of the love of God? And if it's up to me to keep myself in God's love, how am I to go about doing that?

Well, we're going to face these questions head-on this morning. It's important that we understand that the Bible talks about God's love in several distinct ways. If you can think of it this way, there is a whole spectrum of the radiance and brilliance of the single statement: God is love.

If you want to follow this subject further, I found great help in reading Don Carson's book, *The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God*, where he makes this point. I found it very helpful just to clarify that indeed when we say "God is love," there is a whole spectrum of meaning, a spectrum of color that radiates from that single statement.

Let me set out just five dimensions of the love of God for us to consider this morning. The first is that the Bible speaks of what we might describe as his providential love. That is that God is kind and gives good gifts to his enemies as well as his friends. You remember the Lord Jesus spoke about this providential love of God when he said that God makes the sun to rise on the just as well as the unjust, he sends the rain on the good as well as the evil.

It is a remarkable thing that God gives wonderfully good gifts to incredibly wicked people. God loves his enemies. If I say to my wife, as I happened to do this last week, "I feel like buying you a gift. Let's go and hit the shops," that may be an expression of love, but there's nothing very surprising about it.

But if you said to your worst enemy, "Hey, I want to buy you a gift. I just feel like doing that and why don't we go and hit the shops and you choose?" If you said that to your worst enemy, that would be truly remarkable. Now here is the amazing dimension of God's providential love, that he gives good gifts to his enemies as well as to his friends. One day God's enemies will come under his judgment, but right now, while being his enemies, they receive good gifts from the hand of the God they despise.

Secondly, we may distinguish God's saving love. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life. In other words, the Bible tells us that in addition to a general kindness to all whether they be good or evil, God reaches out specifically in Jesus Christ incredibly offering to all people in every culture, of every background, and whatever we have done, an eternal salvation which may be received through faith in his Son Jesus Christ.

And whoever believes—whoever—is no longer God's enemy but rather his friend. And God says to all men and to all women and to you this morning, whatever you have done, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. That is love. Saving love.

Thirdly, we may distinguish God's covenant love. This is God's firm and unshakable commitment to his own people. Now notice that this is different from the first two. You see, if I can make it specific, Hitler and Stalin received God's providential love. They received good gifts from him. Hitler and Stalin were included within the offer of God's saving love. "Whoever believes in him." That offer is extended to all in the course of their lifetime, whatever they have done.

But we have no reason to believe that these men knew anything of his covenant love. This is the love that God sets upon his covenant people, that is those who have been redeemed by his grace. Those who have been raised to spiritual life through faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and obedience to his commands.

In the Old Testament, of course, this community was Israel, the community of faith, and God bound himself to these people in an unbreakable covenant of love. I will be your God. You will be my people. You will be holy as I am holy.

And God's people, as we know, broke that covenant in all kinds of ways, but God could not give up loving his own redeemed people. The book of Hosea describes this for us very powerfully through the story of a man whose wife was consistently, persistently unfaithful. And God used that as a picture of the tearing of his own heart on account of the unfaithfulness of his own redeemed people to him.

But then in the book of Hosea, God says these incredible words: "O Ephraim," speaking of his own people, "how can I give you up? I can't stop loving you," God says, "because you are my covenant people." Now you see the distinction? The providential love in which God gives good gifts to incredibly wicked people.

We sometimes ask the question, "Why do bad things happen to good people?" Here's another question: why do good things happen to bad people? That's God's providential love. His saving love that is offered to all so that in the course of a lifetime all, whatever you have done, have an opportunity of coming to repentance and faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

His covenant love that embraces his redeemed people, a love of which he says, "I cannot give you up." Fourthly, his disciplining love. This is again a love that is particularly directed towards his own people. It is the love by which he forms the likeness of Jesus Christ in his own children.

We read about this in Hebrews chapter 12. The Lord disciplines those who he loves and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son. So endure hardship as discipline because God is treating you as sons. Again, this is something that is unique to God's own redeemed people. The wicked do not experience this love.

The Bible tells us of the wicked, what God does with them. Romans chapter one is he gives them up. That's why they ultimately end up in hell. But with God's children he does not do that. He allows the wicked to go their own way, he honors their own choice, he gives them up, Paul says in Romans, but with his own children he distinctly intervenes to prevent them from going astray.

He disciplines those who he loves. That's one of the privileges of being within this covenant community of God's people, that he disciplines those who he loves. He does not regard us as outside of his family but in his family, so that is why the Bible says judgment begins with the house of God. Wonderful thing really to be under the disciplining love of God.

And then fifthly, what I describe as best I can as God's affirming love. We're referring here to the joyful affirmation that the children of God know when they're walking in fellowship with him. The ways in which by the Holy Spirit God says, "I love you." That relational intimacy, that affirmation in which, as Paul puts it in Romans, the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts, it floods our souls by the Holy Spirit so that we come to know and feel that we are truly loved by God.

This is of course what Adam and Eve knew in the garden. They walked with the Lord God in the cool of the day. There was no need for saving love then, no need for disciplining love then, no particular aspect of providential love then of course because there were only Adam and Eve in the garden and all things were provided for them.

But the Lord God came and sharing their work, sharing their relationship, sharing their very lives, they experienced by walking with God in the garden in the cool of the day the affirmation of the love of God. And guess what? They found a way of getting out of it, didn't they? They did. And there begins the whole of the Bible story.

Steve Hiller: You're listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith and a message called "Remain in God's Love." It's part of a larger series in the book of Jude called *Keeping Yourself in Spiritual Shape*. And we'll come back and we'll continue to look at God's providential, saving, covenant, disciplining, and affirming love in just a few minutes, so I hope you'll stay with us.

Well, Open the Bible is a listener-supported ministry. It really is your generosity that allows us to continue bringing you Pastor Colin's teaching each day. Whether you listen on the radio, through the app, or online, it's all made possible through your generosity. And thank you for helping us finish 2025 strong. I want to ask you to help us continue the momentum here in 2026 with a generous gift of any amount.

You can give online at openthebible.org or when you call 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365 or openthebible.org. Well, one of the things that my family and I love to do is to go hiking. And Colin, I think it would be a lot of fun to go on a hike with you, and right now we have an opportunity for listeners to join you on a hike.

Colin Smith: Yes, I am inviting you to join me on a hike through the Bible, and it is going to be a gentle, easy pace of a hike. Each week, you'll read a chapter of the Bible and a chapter of my book, *Hike Through the Bible*, and in one year, you'll have read 50 chapters of the Bible.

You'll have grasped the big picture of the Bible story, and most of all, you'll have grown in your love for Jesus Christ. Now there's a *Hike Through the Bible* podcast to help you on this journey. In each episode, I read a chapter of the book and then I discuss it with some friends. So get started now. You can subscribe to the *Hike Through the Bible* podcast for free wherever you get your podcasts, and you'll find more information at openthebible.org/hike. That's openthebible.org/hike.

Steve Hiller: Well, thank you, Colin. And I think a lot of us are looking forward to taking that hike with you. Let's get back to the message.

Colin Smith: So is it possible to slip outside of God's love? Is it possible for a believer to slip outside of God's love? Well, you see, that's actually a more complex question than it first meets the eye. If you're talking about God's covenant love, the answer is certainly no. If you're talking about God's affirming love of this walking in fellowship with God, the answer is certainly yes.

These distinctions are important, and it's useful, I think, for us to bear them in mind when we come to oversimplistic statements. You see, folks say things like this: "Well, of course God loves everybody just the same." Well, is that true? Well, if you're talking about his providential love, then it is self-evidently true.

If you're talking about his saving love, that is equally offered to all. It's not offered more to people who've lived a more conservative moral life than those who've kicked over the traces. It's offered equally to all. Wonderful thing. But if you're talking about God's covenant love or his disciplining love or his affirming love, it is certainly not the case that God loves all people the same.

When people say "God's love is unconditional," is that true? Well, it's certainly true if you're talking about his saving love. It's certainly true if you're talking about his covenant love or his providential love. But when it comes to God's affirming love, there is a condition. "You will remain in my love," said Jesus, "if"—that's a condition—"you obey my commands."

So it is important if we're to avoid confusion, and there is great confusion over this theme of the love of God, that we must give proper weight to all that the Bible says about the love of God. The love of God is free, unchangeable, unconditional, unmerited, and unearned. But at the same time, Christ calls us to remain in his love and makes it quite clear that to do that we must obey his commands.

Now I hope to show you in the time that we have this morning why we need that integration of God's full revelation in scripture, because God addresses it at particular points in particular ways so that all of us need every part of this incredible spectrum of the glory of the love of God.

Now then, let's come to this third workout. If we're to keep ourselves in spiritual shape, Jude says, whatever you do, keep yourselves in the love of God. Now, how are we going to do that? I want to suggest three simple exercises in this third workout. We'll spend most of our time on the first and then more briefly on the second two. The three exercises are simply: remember, obey, and reflect.

Number one, remember. How are you going to keep yourself in the love of God? Number one, remember. When you are tempted to doubt God's love for you, call to mind the unchangeable and indisputable and overwhelming evidence of God's love for you in the Lord Jesus Christ. That's where you begin.

So you're struggling with some overwhelming difficulties as you've come to church today. You wonder how you're going to face this coming week. You've said at the back of your mind, "I don't know if God really cares about me at all." I'm saying to you from the scriptures, begin here by calling to your mind intentionally the overwhelming and indisputable evidence of God's love in Jesus.

God demonstrates his love for us in this: that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Now some of us desperately need to work this into our minds and into our souls. We have been plagued with a psychology that we've kind of grown up with, a way of thinking that says that I will only be loved by God if I earn that love. Some of us really think like that, and we find it very, very difficult to get away from that.

Now I want to speak directly to that this morning. Remember the love of God. Let me try and make it a little more personal by taking an example. We're going to have two imaginary characters this morning. Here's the first. We'll call them Bill and Ben. We'll have Bill now, we'll have Ben later, okay?

Bill's in high school. Imaginary character. Bill has been brought up in an evangelical church just like this, where he is taught that God loves him. He believes this and he has put his faith in Jesus Christ. Bill's a perfectionist. And he's rather shy, timid by nature. He's had throughout his high school career a string of straight A's in his school report. That's what he aims for, Bill.

And when he doesn't get it, he's pretty disappointed with himself. He's a sincere lad and he genuinely wants to please God. He has many fears, though, and he sometimes wonders if God can really love him. When it comes to the communion service, he sits and wonders if he should really take the bread and wine because there are, after all, many things in Bill's life that are not really as they should be.

His thought life is one of them. He really struggles with that one. And then last week, when he was at school, there were some kids who really got on his case and he lost it. He let out that afternoon a string of foul language, and he felt so ashamed. A Christian doesn't behave like that, Bill said to himself. In fact, sometimes Bill has wondered if he's really a Christian at all.

Bill needs to remind himself of God's love by grasping God's unconditional love to him as he is. Bill, you do not earn the love of God with your straight A's. You do not earn the love of God by achieving victory over every temptation. Bill, God does not stop loving you when you fail. God loves you, Bill, with an everlasting and an unchangeable love.

Now you may be a little older or younger than Bill, but essentially that's what you need to get into your mind because you struggle with the same thought pattern as he does. How are you going to get that into your mind? Here's three ways to remember. The first: the Lord's Supper. Let's begin there.

You see, at the very center of Christian worship, God has given us an exercise to keep you in spiritual shape. We come to a table where we receive bread and wine that direct our attention, if we follow God's signposts, to a cross where the body of Jesus was broken and the blood of Jesus was shed for you. "This is love," the Bible says, "not that we loved God, but that God has loved us and given his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins." And God uses the supper to tell you that he loves you.

Steve Hiller: Really some great things for us to think about today. God's love is more wonderful and more complex than we might first imagine. You're listening to Open the Bible with Pastor Colin Smith and our message today, "Remain in God's Love." It is part of a larger series called *Keeping Yourself in Spiritual Shape*. Seven workouts for a healthy Christian life.

You know, if you want to grow in your faith, it's going to take some work, but it will be worth the effort. In this series, Pastor Colin is giving us seven spiritual workouts from the book of Jude, and together they're helping us get our lives into better spiritual shape. If you'd like a copy of today's message or the larger series, call us at 1-877-OPEN-365. That's 1-877-673-6365, or you'll find ordering information at our website, openthebible.org.

Well, what if you could go on a hike with Pastor Colin and go all the way through the Bible story, see how it all fits together and how it all points to Jesus? Well, now you can with the new podcast, *Hike Through the Bible*.

Colin Smith: Yeah, and this is for everyone who wants to understand the Bible better and for everyone who wants to love Jesus more. In each episode, I'll read a chapter from my book, *Hike Through the Bible*, and then I'll discuss it with some friends. A new episode releases every week, and so you can take this hike at a gentle pace.

In a year, you'll have covered the entire Bible story. I really hope that you'll join me on this journey, and it's not too late to get started now. So you can subscribe to the *Hike Through the Bible* podcast for free wherever you get your podcasts, and you'll find more information at openthebible.org/hike. That's openthebible.org/hike.

Steve Hiller: Well, thank you, Colin. Thank you for listening today. For Pastor Colin Smith, I'm Steve Hiller. I hope you'll join us next time. This program is a listener-supported production of Open the Bible.

Colin Smith: At Open the Bible, we're grateful for like-minded organizations committed to sharing the gospel around the world. And to that end, I'd like to commend the work of Global Fingerprints. You know, in the book of James, God calls us to help orphans in their distress. That's a clear command, but it's not always clear how we should obey it.

And this is where Global Fingerprints comes in. Through Global Fingerprints, you can sponsor a vulnerable child to help meet their physical needs and ensure they hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. I want to commend Global Fingerprints to you. They're focused on equipping the local church to care for children, and where there is no church, they help to plant one.

If you'd like to help a vulnerable child, you can find more information on Global Fingerprints at our website, openthebible.org/gf. That's openthebible.org/gf.