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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Weston Fargo

Love, The Only Reason Why

Well, iShare is a ministry out of the Pacific Union Conference, and it basically stands for I Seek to Help Advance Revival and Evangelism.

I seek to help advance revival and evangelism.

And once a year we hold a conference, an annual conference, and at this conference we have various engaging speakers, seminars, discussions, and it's a great opportunity to come, to network, to learn more about the Bible, to learn how to share the Bible.

Maybe you're praying for a revival in your life, in your community.

This is a great opportunity to come And to learn more about the Bible, to learn more about how to share the Bible with those around you, it's actually our next conference is coming up in August.

So it's coming up fast and it's going to be right around the corner in Ontario, at the Ontario Convention Center, August 14th and 15th.

And I just wanted to tell you about it because registration opens up in a couple weeks and we're expecting well over 1, 000 people in attendance.

I currently volunteer as the programming director, so I know we have some really exciting stuff for you guys.

Not sure, Tina in the back there, if you have any questions.

We have been doing the programming for iShare, So we're really excited about it.

A lot of really exciting things going on in our world today.

I believe we live in such an exciting time of Earth's history.

A lot of positive things, but of course with the positive comes the negative.

You don't have to go far but to turn on the news or the radio to find that out.

Sometimes we become somewhat desensitized to it all because it happens so often or the way media portrays certain things, we become somewhat desensitized.

Just the things we see, the things we hear tend to go in 1 ear and right out the other.

I was just recently with a good friend of mine.

And of course he knows that I'm a preacher, and so he's like, oh, well, you haven't heard the 1 about the 3 guys who went hunting, have you?

One's a preacher, one's a lawyer, and One's a doctor.

And so rifles in hand, they walk out into the field.

And as soon as they get out into the field, they see a massive deer running across the field.

And a gunshot is heard, and the deer goes down.

And so they look at each other to see who shot the deer, but they don't know.

And so they walk over to the deer, and they see, sure enough, the bullet pierced the head of the deer.

Gamekeeper looks down, takes a quick glance.

The lawyer and the doctor, they look at each other, the preacher, why the preacher?

Oh, the bullet went in 1 ear and right out the other.

And so my friend was telling me this story and it was somewhat humorous, but I pray that that would not be our experience here today.

I'm praying the message would leave a lasting impression, amen, and that it would be a heartfelt message, not just 1 that pierces our mind, but that pierces our heart as well.

The title of today's message is up on the screen, Love, The Only Reason Why.

I wanna talk this morning about the importance of love as the basis for decision making, the basis for our very Christian experience.

With your permission, I just want to bow our heads for 1 more word of prayer, and ask the Lord to be present with us.

Dear Lord, I pray as we talk about this concept of love, as we talk about your character, dear Lord, that you would show us something about our very own character, how we could be more like you.

William Kyle Carpenter came from a place called Gilbert, South Carolina.

Has anyone heard of Gilbert, South Carolina?

Now I take it we all currently live in Southern California.

Maybe some people have traveled in from afar.

But can you imagine living in a location with only 600 people?

You and your family decide to take a vacation, and you dramatically, exponentially decrease the population size of your hometown.

Kyle came from Gilbert, South Carolina and at a young age he decided to enlist in the Marines.

And shortly after enlisting he was sent out to work in Afghanistan.

And there he would experience, you can imagine, experience all the perils of warfare, the casualties, the injuries, the various dangers, the 115 degree temperatures.

But while he was there he actually also made a friend, a very close friend in his platoon.

A bond that was forged in the battlefield.

And I was listening to an interview with Kyle, and he was saying how there's nothing like a friendship that's forged on the battlefield, nothing like a friendship where you have to trust the other man with your life.

1 night Kyle and Nick and the rest of his platoon, about 12 men total, were sent on a mission into enemy territory.

And they were on their way into the territory.

They had entered into the territory and they decided to camp out for the night.

And so they camped out, they built a barricade, they camped out, these 12 men, Kyle and Nick were to be on watch that night.

And watch, it went smoothly the whole night through, nothing necessarily took place.

But morning came and they were awoken by automatic rifles firing directly at them.

Kyle and Nick, with the rest of the platoon, took cover behind barricades.

When all of a sudden, a grenade flew over the barricade and landed right beside Nick, Kyle's best friend.

Kyle, without hesitation, without thinking twice, thinking, acting instantaneously, leaped to his feet and jumped on the grenade in an attempt to save his best friend's life, his fellow Marines life.

Over 2 years in the hospital, 5 months of which he found himself in a coma, over 40 surgeries later, he alongside the rest of the platoon that witnessed this, were there to tell the story of Kyle risking his life to jump on that grenade to save the life of his friend.

Question I have for us this morning is very simple.

How can we get to the point in our own experience where we would act when faced with the opportunity to make a moral decision, when faced with the opportunity to make a selfless decision, we too would act instantaneously To have the experience of Christ where our constant thought is not necessarily on ourselves, but on those around us.

I want to introduce you to the 3 most profound, what I believe to be the 3 most profound words in all of scripture found in 1 John chapter 4 verse 8.

Most of the verses will be on the screen.

It says this, He who does not love, excuse me, He who does not love does not know God.

I'm told sometimes it's easy to think about things in the form of an equation.

Some of you are like, I've had enough schooling.

But if I were to ask you 4 plus 3 equals, you would tell me 7.

And if I were to ask you 5 plus 5 equals, you would tell me 10.

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Love, The Only Reason Why

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