and is including in an upcoming book designed to be a training manual for pastors.
He'll be breaking it in in the Philippines at a Baptist seminary.
He includes an analysis and questions in the book, in light of cognitive therapy, and other topics be specializes in.
I have to say:
-I didn't preach from a manuscript (so read it in oral style)
-I wouldn't preach it this way if I did it again (Cheese alert). It may come off a little Osteeny (lol. I was ahead of my time ).
-It's kind of an unusual sermon for me. Though I was usually inductive back then, this is more of a "textual" (Genesis 29:34-35) sermon than exegetical/expository. Very risky (eisegesis), but must be done sometimes.
Your mileage may vary.
-I have reformatted it a bit from the book.
Thanks for the press, Pete!
I'm honored he remembered...and re-membered..
a sermon that I had forgotten.
First. let me return the favor .Here's some press for Pete>
Pete's bio:
Peter H. Kuiper, LCSW
Clinical Therapist, Licensed Clinical Social Worker
Specializes in counseling couples and individual adults using intensive counseling format.
Pete is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with over 40 years of experience in the Christian Mental Health field, including experience as a special education teacher, therapist, and administrator. Pete received his bachelor's degree from Calvin College and his Master's in Social Work from Western Michigan University. In addition to a variety of outpatient settings, Pete was a program director in several inpatient psychiatric hospitals, both for Rapha Treatment Centers as well as New Life Clinics. It was in the inpatient setting where Pete developed his passion for an intensive approach to therapy. He has seen first-hand the potential of powerful breakthroughs and lasting results in utilizing this modality of treatment. For the past 15 years he has been doing Brief Intensive Counseling in the beautiful mountain town of Buena Vista, Colorado. It was there that he co-founded CrossRoads Counseling of the Rockies.In addition to his full-time therapist role, he also teaches a daily cognitive therapy group. Pete frequently receives feedback from clients saying his material is helpful because it is practical rather than just theoretical, and that his examples and illustrations make it easy for them to make personal application.
He and his wife, Marty, have been married for over 40 years and have two married sons and seven precious grandchildren (pictures available upon request!). link
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Worship leader has just read Genesis 29:34-35...
He Doesn’t Love Me Anymore
I had a great day last Sunday.
My wife came up to me and said,
“You know, you’re more handsome than Brad Pitt.
…and you can preach better than Billy Graham,”
I had a great day.
And then some of you came up to me after church and said,
“You know, you’re more handsome than Tom Cruise,
…and you can preach better than Wesley.”
I was having a great day.
And then I was greeting some of the first time visitors,
and some of them knelt before me and said exclaimed,
“You know, You’re more handsome than an angel,
and you can preach better than St. Paul.”
I was having a great day..
And then..
I woke up.
And I think I’ll settle for being a little more handsome than my high school photo,
and a little better preacher than I was last year.
So it is with all of us.
People want to take a number and stand in line just to tell us how wonderful we are
—in our dreams.
I met a girl one time who I just had to impress.
And I did something I had to do
—I bought a sport coat, and I put on cologne.
But something must have worked…
because she married me.
Have you ever done this—said,
“If I just do this,
or say that;
if I adjust this
or perfect that,
then maybe they’ll love me?
A little less weight, a little less gray,
a little less belly you might say,
a little more hair and a little more style,
that’s what it’s all about,
“ someone love me.” . . .
Primping and preening: it’s about
“someone love me.”
You know what, that’s what graffiti is all about.
It’s undecipherable, all those scribbles and scrawls,
you don’t know what it means.
I’ll tell you what it means:
Someone
Anyone...
love me.
That’s what gangs are often about:
Someone love me.
That’s what
teenage rebellion,
teenage pregnancy,
teenage suicide
are often about:
Someone love me.
That’s what
pre-marital,
extra marital,
post-marital affairs
are about.
Someone love me.
What won’t we do to get someone to love us?
Sell someone a line of goods,
sell ourselves short,
sell our bodies to another,
our soul to the devil?
Because how deep is that cry,
deep inside,
“Someone, please…………… love me.”
And probably the hardest words pastors and counselors have to hear on a regular basis:
he doesn’t love me.
she doesn’t love me
any more.
Especially if it’s a husband saying this of a wife,
or a wife claiming this of a husband.
Have you ever had to say it,
pray it
admit it?
There’s a woman I know of,
her husband was really ignoring her,
and not giving her the attention that she should have.
What could she do but resign herself to the inevitable?
What could she say, what could she pray, but
“He doesn’t love me.”
In spite of this relationship
which was less than perfect,
she had a baby,
and she said,
“Aha…, this should do it,
this should make a difference,
this should win his love.”
Have you ever found yourself saying something like this?
“Surely now that I’ve done this,
I’ll win his love.
Maybe since I’ve done that,
surely he’ll respect me now.”
Surely he’ll give me more attention now,
surely he’ll change his mind now.
“Surely he’ll love me now.”
Ever said that
?
You do what you need to—
you get a hair cut,
you get a suit,
get a dress,
you get religion.
And/or…
You do what she did:
you get pregnant.
That’s what she did. Had a baby.
Didn’t work
Had another one, and said,
“Surely he’ll love me now.”
Didn’t work.
Had another baby.
Didn’t work.
You feel like you know that woman?. . .
You know her name:
Leah.
And most significantly, you know and can relate to her situation,
her heart crying out:
someone love me.
And you know the bondage of needing
someone to love you,
and doing something
in hopes that
it’ll work………….and it doesn’t ever work.
And she had still another baby,
a fourth.
But this time
Leah discovered the secret of getting free of that bondage of needing
people to love her,
or to make her feel significant.
Verse 35. What does it say?
This time I’ll win him over?
No.
This time will be the charm?
No.
This time the baby will endear my husband to me?
No.
This time I’ll leave that macho idiot a lesson ………..
as I leave him at home with four screaming kids and I go to the mall?
No.
This time
it will be different.
This time
I won’t be bound by what he thinks.
This time
I’ll give up my longing to what I can’t control anyway.
This time
I won’t waste my time.
This time I’ll choose that path to inner, hilarious freedom.
This time
I won’t seek the praise of another.
“This time
I’ll praise the Lord”
Wow.
Do you hear that?
Do you sense her posture,
her demeanor,
everything about her
change?
“This time,
I’m free from what others think.
This time
it doesn’t really ultimately matter if my husband loves me.
This time
I know where my acceptance lies.
This time
I don’t have to praise another so he can praise me back.
This time,
I’ll praise the Lord.”
And she stopped having children,
She didn’t need to.
And wouldn’t it be wonderful
if that dream I made up really came true?
And People came up to us on the streets and said,
“Aren’t you wonderful?”
But even better, if that never happens to us,
we might learn that attitude deep in our souls that says
“I don’t need the praise of another;
I need to
praise
the Lord.”
A burglar broke into a home.
He didn’t want to turn on the lights,
so as he used a flashlight .
He heard something that scared him and stunned him.
It was a voice that said,
“I see you. And Jesus sees you.”
He was frightened, and began to run,
until the beam of his flashlight revealed the source of this voice,
and to his
shock..
relief..
and amusement,
he saw..
a parrot in his cage, saying
“I see you, and Jesus sees you.”
But then focused the flashlight beam beneath the cage,
and there was:
a snarling pit bull.
And the parrot said,
“Sic ‘em, Jesus.”
Jesus
sees
you.
You can’t hide from him.
He’s caught you red-handed.
And we’ve all burglarized the kingdom.
And he sees us in the light
. And because he does, he has every right to sic us, to get us.
But does he do it?
No.
He looks at us..
and loves us!!
Incredible.
He made it himself,
from popsicle sticks and pieces of sheets.
That’s how this little boy made a sailboat.
And he loved it.
It was his most incredible, precious possession.
One day as he was playing with it on the river his family lived next to,
it floated away from him beyond his reach.
Devastated.
His heart sank.
What does he do?
He follows the stream
down to the next town,
where he finds his boat
in the window of a pawnshop.
“That’s my boat, sir, give me back my boat!”
“Sorry son, I paid someone for this boat.
You’ll have to buy it back.”
So the boy hurried home,
got all his money from his piggy bank
and returned to the store.
As he walks out of the store with the boat under his arm, he says,
“I love you two times over.
First I made you,
t hen I bought you.”
And Jesus…………..
loves us two times over.
He made us,
and through the cross,
he bought us.
But like Leah,
do you ever feel
“He doesn’t love me any more” is true of..
Jesus?
You know what?
It is
true of Jesus!
He doesn’t love you any more,
he can’t love you any more,
he won’t love you any less or more
depending on what you do or don’t do.
He doesn’t need to love you any more,
he already loves you
with an undying love that died for you.
He already loves you
with a perfect love;
he always and already loves you,
more than you can ask or imagine or dream or pray,
he’s
absolutely,
unconditionally,
habitually ,
in love with you,
and
you can’t do anything about it.
He doesn’t love you any more than that.
He sees you and your intrinsic worth:
he made you, and he bought you.
He doesn’t need to love you any more than that.
He can’t possibly love you any more than that.
So, along with Leah,
have you come to realize that
someone can’t be made to love you?
You know, someone can’t be made to love you!
But hear this, ]
and feel free to shout “Amen” if you really believe it:
someone can’t be made to love you,
but someone who made you, loves you.
someone can’t be made to love you,
but someone who made you, loves you.
Someone who made you, and sees you as you are,
died for you.
Someone who loves you two times over,
can’t love you any more.
Jesus bought you, saught you, caught you.
So..along with Leah,
are we grasped by the Holy Spirit with crazy good news?
How about this?
Have you ever twisted someone’s arm to win them?
There is Someone who had his arms twisted, to win you!
More than his arms were twisted,
he had nails in his arms and his feet,
and he was speared.
Why?
Because he loves you.
He can’t possibly love you any more than this.
The cross shows me, he absolutely cannot love me /you/us any more..
any more
than that.
He doesn’t love you any more than that.
Toledo Times; Three random want ads.
“Wanted: 57 Chevy.”
“Wanted: housekeeper, 10 hours a week.”
“Wanted: someone, anyone, to love me.”
Like Leah
have you ever placed a plea, a prayer, an ad like that?
When you’re looking
for someone to love you,
does Jesus cross your mind?
He’d better cross your mind, because hear this:
Jesus loves you so much,
he didn’t mind the cross
He doesn’t love you any more than that.
That’s already a love that no height,
nor depth,
nor principality or power
can separate us from.
He couldn’t
love us any
more.
There is a heretical,
unchristian,
unacceptable,
almost unforgivable
theological position
that some of you are holding.
Right now,
if it is your position
that you are unlovable,
I have a command from no one less than the Lord God:
fall on your knees and literally change your position.
Don’t talk about a precious creation of God like that.
He loves you and knit you together in your mother’s womb,
and God in Jesus Christ loves you.
So can you learn this lesson from Leah?
Someone already loves you with a better than perfect love.
Someone can’t love you any more.
Someone is unconditionally in love with you.
And he need not love you any more.
Because he looks at you, and loves you.
He made you, and he bought you.
He doesn’t love you any more.
You can’t earn it. Can’t turn it away.
Can’t win it. Can’t sin it away.
Cannot outspend it, He’ll always extend it.
Don’t wrestle for it, just nestle in it,
Don’t try to win it with a religion of good works,
for religion is not good enough and never works.
Jesus Christ loves you and he can’t possibly, can’t even, doesn’t need to,
doesn’t have to
love you any more.
He already loves you
with a love that surpasses understanding.
. So if that’s true,
like Leah,
can we say with nthusiasm, with encouragement, with conviction,
“This time
I’ll give up
trying to please everyone and their mother.
I’ll hang up
my efforts to earn anybody’s love.
I’m fed up
with my efforts to meet others’ approval to be a legitimate person.”
That dream I told you about
—let’s turn it into a nightmare for a moment..
One day,
without warning,
your spouse, your best friend, your child, your fiancé
—one day, they look you square in the
eye and they say,
“I don’t love you.”
They even say,
“I hate you, I never want to see you again.”
I can’t see you anymore.”
They walk out of the door of your life,
and as the door slams,
and it’s like a prison door,
and all you can hear is the refrain of the door slamming..
and the words:
“I don’t love you.”
So you go to work or school, wherever you go on a regular basis,
and expect to find one friend,
but everyone in unison looks at you and says,
in unison ..
“We don’t love you, be gone.”
You’re frantic.
And so you go to the one place—it’s Sunday morning—
where you can expect friends.
You come here to church.
You see friends you’ve prayed with,
people you’ve wept with,
people you’ve been through the crucible of life with,
who’ve baptized you and blessed you,
and here, one by one,
they march out that back door,
they storm out,
they look at you
and turn and scream and say,
“I don’t love you anymore!”
Now if this should happen to you, and it should not,
……….but there’s no guarantee it will not in this life..
can we,
like Leah,
say,
“This time,
I know where my ultimate acceptance comes from.
this time,
I know from where and who my affirmation comes,
this time
I know it is who loves me,
this time I won’t be bound by others.
Someone loves me.
This time,
someone can’t be made to love me.
But someone who made me loves me.
This time
I can forget twisting someone’s arm to win me,
because Someone had his arms twisted on the cross to win me.
His name is?
Jesus.
And if my position is that I’m unlovable,
in the name of Jesus I’m going to cancel that position,
change that position,
get on my knees in a new position and repent and say
“Jesus, you love me.”
No matter what anyone thinks,
no matter if my husband or wife walks out of my life forever,
no matter what happens,
I’ll celebrate that there is one who looks at me,
and loves me.
There is one who’s name is Jesus,
who doesn’t
love me any more
than perfectly.
And we can say,
“This time
I won’t even bother seeking the praise of another.
This time
because He can’t possibly love me
any
more..
this time
I’ll praise the Lord.”
.
