If you keep (continue) my commandments, you shall abide (rooted and grounded) in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandment, and abide (rooted and grounded) in his love. John 15:10.
The love of God for man especially his blood bought children is everlasting and unfailing (the Lord hath appeared of old unto me, saying, Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love: therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee. Jeremiah 31:3) provided they will also love him unconditionally through thick and thin in obedience for their continuation in his love. Note: those who are planted in the house and court of God, but are not rooted and grounded in practical obedient love before him shall be rooted out of his house just as the house of Eli and his generations after him were banned from discontinuation in the priesthood, and at the end shall be as workers of iniquity. Matthew 7:21.
But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, by grace ye are saved….this salvation, which many prophets and kings have desired to see those things which you see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which you hear, and have not heard them (Luke 10:24), if taken for granted, and its principles and doctrines are made light of against shall become eternal curse, instead of eternal blessing you are called to inherit.
As a new creature in Christ Jesus, you can know more than your spiritual teachers through diligent search of scripture of a ready mind and prepared heart to walk with God (Psalms 119:99) as you labor to grow and to increase on the three major parts of your ministering to the Lord that you might be deeply rooted and grounded in his love: (a) your conscious growing in obedience to the word of God and to the voice of his indwelling Spirit: (b) your conscious growing in your personal devotion and fellowship with God: (c) your conscious growing in service – spiritual stewardship.
Many people in the kingdom do not realize that obedient lifestyle is a ministration to God just as your praises and worships glorifies and honors him. Obedient honour and glorify God more than the rest and is more desirable to him than any of our high praises, worships and stewardships in the administration of spiritual gifts: but none of those three should be neglected, none should be sacrificed for the rest, but the first should come first as each one of them has its proper place in our relationships with God.
I want you to see everything from the Garden of Eden in the first relationship of God with man who was so much loved to be created in God’s image, and after his likeness with dominion over everything that was made. Moreover, I want you to understand that the love and care of God for man was not without condition as he gave him a warning not to eat from the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, that the day he should eat thereof, on that day shall he die. Genesis 2:17.
Satan argued against the word of God before Adam and Eve in the Garden: he disputed and disagreed before them that the love of God for them was partial and incomplete to have restrained them from enjoying the tree which should make them to become wise, and to open their eyes for them to be like God, knowing good from evil. They put up –tolerate Satan with no resistance, thus they occasioned their own fall and death according to the word of God. Note: the love which is not deeply rooted and grounded in the practical obedient love of God is easilly known by its love and affection shared with other things which are disallowed by him. 1 John 2:15-17.
The continuation of anyone in the kingdom in the love, goodness and mercy of God depends on his unconditional and unflinching practical obedience to God’s will, word and purpose; otherwise, he will abuse the love of God as the first Adam once did in the Garden: it is individual’s priority to build on God’s word and executing it.
If there is anything that God cannot put up with anyone, it’s the rebellion and disobedient to his word. To abide in the love of God, we must accept and act in accordance with his rule, obey his decision and observe his precepts. If the word of God abides in you (all therefore whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do; but do not walk after their works: for they say, and do not. Matthew 23:3), but you are not abiding in his word (if you keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love. John 15:10), it means that you are not establishing (wherefore I will not be negligent to put you always in remembrance of these things, though ye know them, and be established in the present truth. 2 Peter 1:12) yourself to be rooted and grounded in his love as our Lord afterwards spoke to condemn the hypocrisy of the Pharisees that they have not the love of God in them. John 5:42.
There are many deceivers in the world today, you must do whatever it takes to go away from whosoever (God is no respecter of person) be it a wife, a husband, a father, a mother etc that seeks to remove you from the entire truth.
If Adam had refuted Eve, it could have been a different testimony today, but as some of you will prefer loosing respect and honour for God who is above all than to lose your marriage, he foolishly brought death upon mankind in his failure to be rooted and grounded in the love of God above natural inclination- I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel, which is not another; but there be some that trouble you, and would pervert the gospel of Christ. But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed. As we said before, so say I now again, if any man preach any other gospel unto you than that ye have received, let him be accursed. Galatians 1:6-9.
The first and the greatest commandment to love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind and soul is the sum of your being deeply rooted and grounded in the practical obedient love of God. If you have truly known and understand the love of God for you, he must be obeyed, even if it means of loosing other things, people and everything, including your own life, none of those things should separate you from growing deeper in your love to please him above any other.
To be rooted and grounded in the love of God is to accept and submit to his word without resistance and protest, ignoring and turning away from whosoever will remove you from being deeply rooted and grounded in his love by their sweet, appealing, false and deceitful gospel and doctrine, but obeying God in all things, laboriously bringing every thoughts in you into captivity to his obedience as the key to be rooted and grounded in his love, otherwise, they will (false teachers, pastors, apostles, prophets, evangelist and brethren) deceives you from being rooted and grounded in his love, to remove you from his love to the fear of man.
While the first Adam failed to be rooted and grounded in the love of the Father, the second Adam – Christ came and brought back the love of the Father and shows us what it means to abide in the love of the Father on earth, and he was obedient, even unto the death on the cross, – for I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me. John 6:38. Note: to be living and walking contrary to the will, demands and purposes of God against his word is to abuse his love under the false pretense and covering of his everlasting love. Christ says, if you keep (continue) in my word, you shall abide (rooted and grounded) in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands to remain (rooted and grounded) in his love.
Adam would have been so pleased to continue in his fellowship and taking care of the Garden after the fall contrary to the thoughts and the ways of God. The love to reverence and honor God by your implicit obedience to his word and to the voice of His Spirit for whom he is should not be confounded for the love – zeal for worship and the love for service or stewardship. You can worship and praise and serve God, but perish and send away from his presence to the everlasting fire reserved for Satan and his angels, just as Satan, the first worship leader was by his transgression cast out of Eden the mountain of God, and the first man, – Adam was removed from the Garden of Eden to till the land from whence he was made.
After the fall, Adam continual stay in the Garden was cut short to an abrupt end: his continuation of having and enjoying the cool of the day’s fellowship with God was denied. The acceptance of your person, worship and service (stewardship) before him is strictly based on your increasing strong and firmly fixed loyalty to his word, rooted and grounded in it – this is to be rooted and grounded in the love of God. To occupy and to engage for God without being rooted and grounded in the practical obedient love is altogether the vanity of those who seek after the second death in their vain imagination of a deceived heart of king Saul to whom the prophet answered that to obey God is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams. Worship and stewardship should come after practical obedient to God’s word, lest your worship becomes vain and your stewardship or service is not acceptable – this is to be deeply rooted and grounded in practical obedient love of God.
Your eternal salvation in Christ Jesus is a personal gift of God for you as the Lord becomes the author of eternal salvation to those that will obey him. Hebrews 5:9. It is therefore in your hand and it’s up to you (not up to your wife, husband, pastor, friends, children, mother etc) to get to heaven as you zealously keep yourself rooted and grounded in the practical obedient love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. Jude 1:21.
Lot did not leave his salvation into the hand and decision of his wife as Adam foolshly did: Lot’s wife lost her life and soul (Luke 17:32), but the husband saved himself by not compromising divine practical obedient love of God in exchange with sentimental or erotical – marital love, bond and affection.