This sermon reflects on the concept of love, highlighting the depth of God's unconditional love for humanity despite our flaws and shortcomings. It emphasizes the transformative power of God's love, using the analogy of the lost sheep to illustrate God's relentless pursuit of us. The speaker expresses gratitude for God's mercy and grace, acknowledging the wonder of being chosen and redeemed by God's love.

I am envious of her. I can't figure that, I couldn't figure that out. How could you be envious of a person who is going to be your spouse? How can you be envious of somebody whom you are going to promise to love until death do us part? My dear friend, I couldn't figure that out. I should have asked him really, but I was just too shocked, because with great agony he told me this, he didn't tell me that playfully. With much agony he said, oh, he was saying my nature, I've been a hypocrite, and moreover he said to me, Joe, what more have you seen in me? Tell me, don't spare me, rub it in, I want to know the truth. Well, my dear friends, but when we look at human nature, that means our nature, and we see the selfishness there. Love suffereth long and is cut, love never faileth. My categorically, no, there's nothing hypothetical about it, a categorical no, love never faileth. What a marvelous thing this is, yes, the love of the cross, when it is brought to bear upon you and me. My dear friends, we fall to wondering, why should God love a wretch like me? What is this love, and how ill I have requited this love all these years, yes? We have to come to ourselves at some point, you know, we have to face home truths, there's no getting away from home truths, or however much we dislike them, but these are home truths. Now, in the 15th chapter of Luke, you see this love in action, fourth verse, please, What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he lose one of them, does not leave the ninety and nine in the wilderness, and go after that which is lost, until he find it? And when he has found it, he layeth it on his shoulders rejoicing. And when he cometh home, he calleth together his friends and neighbors, saying unto them, Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost. I have found him, and I thought he was just lost, lost. You know, my dear friends, when I saw the piles of baggage, luggage, baggage, in London Airport, one of the terminals, you know, I thought, shall I go scouting up along this huge pile to see if somewhere my suitcase can be found? My wife said to me, no, that's not possible. It appears they have had difficulties, over baggage, and you know how just, with so many travelers out of London, my, it comes to millions of pieces of baggage. Well, well, well, how to find such baggage? Anyway, you say it's lost, it's gone, irretrievable, the matter is closed, the chapter is over, forget it. Now, God never says that. God should have said that about me. How wonderful that he did not say that of me. I say, you know, my own classmates and my friends, my sports buddies who played games with me, hey, they, some of them were such excellent fellows in comparison. I could see what sterling fellows they were. And yet, should God care for me? Should God retrieve me, pick me out of the mire, and give to me a life with some meaning and purpose? What is man that you are mindful of him? Or the son of man that you visit him? Let us pray. Loving Father, what is man? What is man? Strutting around for a fleeting moment, talking big, pure hot air, and resisting your love. What is man? We come to you. Help us, Lord, to yield to that love, to seek you with all our hearts. Because you are seeking us. Oh, Lord, we thank you again that you died in our place to pay the ransom for a wretch like me. We thank you. So bless these dear people, every one of them, the boys and the girls, the children. So help us to get into irretrievable situations and see that the cross of Jesus, the love of Jesus, prevails. So help us in Jesus' holy name. Amen. This program is brought to you by the Layman's Evangelical Fellowship International, an interdenominational missionary and prayer group working for revival around the globe. We invite every lay person to become God's ally in changing his or her corner of the world. Please write, and if you have a problem or concern you would like to share, please do let us know. You can email us at post at lefi.org or visit our website at www.lefi.org. Our mailing address is LEFI P.O. Box 14, South Lyon, Michigan, 48178. You can also call us at 248-486-6326. Until we meet again next week, may God bless you.