First Love 1 – The Expectation Trap

Pastor Chris FluittSermons

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Do you remember your first love?  Do you remember how you felt?
It’s kind of hard to forget right!?  First Love is intense. It is at times irrational. It is powerful.
Over time it appears that this intense first love dwindles. Could it be that we are no longer operating from love, but from expectation?
There is an expectation trap. 3 negative things happen when our motivation is expectation instead of love.

  1. We are robbed of giving love
  2. We are robbed of receiving love
  3. We fall victim to deal keeping

God is our example when it comes to love.  He always kept love first. He never was motivated by expectations, but by love.

It is time that we return to our First Love.


First Love 1 – The Expectation Trap from Redemption Church on Vimeo.

First Love 1 – The Expectation Trap

Sermon notes by Chris Fluitt

Redemption Church Plano Tx

**Vid bumper
Welcome
Love is central to life. It is central to happiness. It is central to Faith. We are quick to say love is important but our lives don’t always reflect this truth.
We remember our first love. We remember our first crush. We remember our first song & dance. Our first memories are often the ones we hold most dear.
1 First Love is intense
When you first fall in love it can be an intense experience.
When you fall in love you don’t always think rationally.
I’ll share a little of my experience of when I met Sarah. We met and went on a few dates, and somewhere in there I just fell head over heels in love.

  • Time
  • Money
  • Tried new things
  • The center of my lifestyle changed

It was intense! I could not imagine not seeing her or talking to her.
I would drive from Richardson to Allen Tx in the morning so I could drive her to work in Mckinney. Why did I do it? To spend that little time with her. I would then stay in Allen and work in a nearby Café so that I could have Lunch with Sarah and see her for 30 minutes. I would go back to the Café and work so that I could be there to pick her up from work and drive her home. It was intense. It was not rational. But baby it was worth it!
First Love is intense.
 
When a man loves a woman lyrics
When a man loves a woman              Can’t keep his mind on nothing else
He’ll trade the world                               For the good thing he’s found
If she’s bad he can’t see it                     She can do no wrong
Turn his back on his best friend          If he put her down
 
When a man loves a woman              Spend his very last dime
Trying to hold on to what he needs  He’d give up all his comfort
Sleep out in the rain                                                If she said that’s the way it ought to be
 
Too often we forget how it felt when we first fell in love. That should not just be a distant memory. That same love we felt should still be in our hearts. That willingness to put them first..
Whether it is a romantic love.. A family love.. A friendship love.. A God Love. It is important that the Love we felt AT FIRST stays in our hearts.
The love we give and receive is really a gift.
2 Gifts of Love
{The Box}
When we first fall in love these gifts start to flow out of us. They are expressions of our love.

  • Time
  • Serving each other
    • Cooking
    • Keeping house (dusting, dishes..)
    • Helping with the baby
  • Words of affection
  • Giving Gifts
  • Physical touch

 
A great book to read about showing love in your relationships is “the 5 love languages” by Gary Chapman.
 
When you intensely love someone… with that first love kind of feeling… You operate from Love.  And it feels great!
Giving & sacrificing might feel like a loss in other situations… but when they are done out of love it is triumphant.
 
This Love First way of living does not always come natural..
Somewhere along the way something happens and we may stop operating from Love. We may start operating from..
3 Expectations
When we did things out of love it was an opportunity.
When we do things out of expectation it becomes an assignment or job.
{expectation box}
Expectations can be a burden…

  • Keeping house
  • Cooking
  • Time
  • Money
  • Intimacy
  • Cultures ever changing expectations

 
2 people enter a relationship. They walk the aisle and before God and everyone declare their Love and say I Dos. We read the scripture about them becoming ONE FLESH yet they walk down the aisle and into their new life with 2 separate sets of expectations.
Here are some problems with operating from expectation instead of love..
4 Robbed of giving love
-A chore     (I don’t want to be faithful to your expectations… I want to be faithful to you)
5 Robbed of receiving love
–no reward
6 Deal keeping
 
7 Expectations aren’t bad.
Everyone is going to have expectations.  Dreams, desires, hopes..  But your expectations can never reward you like love rewards you.
 
 
8 Keep Love first
What if Jesus would have operated toward us from the Expectation box? Have we ever fulfilled His expectation of us?
Thankfully Jesus has only been motivated by His Love. Love is always first with God.
He commands that we keep love first in our relationships.
Ephesians 5:21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.(NIV)
-Not based on how you feel about them, or their track record… but reverence for Christ
Ephesians 5:22 Wives, submit to your husbands as to the Lord.(NIV)
-Serve out of love.  Put Him above your expectations.
Ephesians 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her(NIV)
-Give yourself up out of love. Put Her above your expectations.
This is an intense love. This is a first love kind of love.
 
Now we have focused on romantic relationships today. But these instruction relates to all your relationships.
-Parent Children
-Friendships
– with God
Love is central to life. It is central to happiness. It is central to Faith. We are quick to say love is important but our lives don’t always reflect this truth.
 
9 Return to your first love
In the book of Revelation there is a message from God to the Church of Ephesus. It starts with glowing praise.
Revelation 2:3 You have persevered and have endured hardships for my name, and have not grown weary.(NIV)
Then this happens…
Revelation 2:4 Yet I hold this against you: You have forsaken your first love.(NIV)
They lost their first love. They stopped placing Love first.  They lost that intense passion.
Your marriage can forsake the First love…
Your parenting can lose track of Love…
Redemption Church can I tell you that we, the Church of Jesus Christ, could forsake our first love.
 
Here is what I want you to know…
10 If we are operating from some other motivation than love, we have lost our first love.
 
Here is what I want you to do… It’s what God told the Church of Ephesus to do.
Revelation 2:5 Remember the height from which you have fallen! Repent and do the things you did at first… NIV)
11 Remember & Repent
{Place expectation box in love box}
When it comes to your relationships…  Marriage, Family, Friends, & God..
Remember when you use to operate from Love.
Repent. STOP OPERATING FROM EXPECTATION & START OPERATING FROM LOVE.