Love. What it is - and what it's not. From the One Who is love.
God’s love is enduring, selfless love. Love is God’s greatest gift, "a more excellent way".
Spirituality without love is mere noise. We must have this vital ingredient: Love.
Agape love. God is love. That’s who He is. Love, truly unconditional, and sacrificial. Romans 5:8 says God commended His love toward us while we were yet sinners.
Love is more important than all mysteries, all knowledge, all faith. Amazing spiritual power and blessing will fall short without love.
Love is more important than acts of generosity. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
Love is more important than gifts we can give.
Love is a verb. It’s a doing word… Paul shows how we can live out a life of love with others in our life.
He says: “be patient,” “be kind,” “rejoice in the truth,” “bear all things,” “believe all things,” “hope all things,” “endure all things.” He tells what love should not do: “Not to envy,” “not to boast,” “not to be arrogant,” “not to be rude,” “not to seek its own way,” “not to be irritable,” “not to be resentful,” and “not to rejoice in wrongdoing.”
(4) Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
BE PATIENT. Love is patient. Go the distance with people. Go the extra mile. Put yourself in the other person’s shoes.
BE KIND. Do the kind thing. Be gentle. Be tender.
LOVE DOES NOT ENVY. Avoid being self centred. Be content. Be grateful for your blessings.
LOVE DOES NOT BOAST. Love is not arrogant. Love is not proud or disrespectful. Keep humble. Love doesn’t brag. It’s humble. It doesn't boast. It doesn’t brag and show off. Love does not have to have the limelight or crave the attention. Love gives because it loves to give, not for want of some praise it can have from showing itself off.
(5) Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
LOVE IS NOT RUDE. Be gracious. Be courteous. Be considerate. Love does not dishonour other people.
LOVE IS NOT SELF-SEEKING. Love does not insist on its own way. Think of others first. Don’t be greedy and selfish. Love is not selfish and love is not demanding. Learn to keep humble in your relationships and interactions with others. Let go of pride. Instead of looking out for your own needs, look out for other’s needs.
LOVE IS NOT EASILY ANGERED. Love does not insist on its own way and is not easily provoked, easily annoyed. Love is not hypersensitive. Not touchy or resentful. Learn to manage your emotions constructively.
Love thinketh no evil - you could put it… LOVE KEEPS NO RECORD OF WRONGS. Love does not hold grudges. We do not store up in our minds all the wrongs committed against us. Don't be resentful or bitter. Extend forgiveness. Let go of hurts from the past.
(6) Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
LOVE DOES NOT DELIGHT IN EVIL. Love finds no joy in wrongdoing. We will not be happy to see others sin. We will not want to see others stumble but will want to help others grow spiritually. We will not want to watch or read evil things. Turn away from gossip.
LOVE REJOICES WITH THE TRUTH. Find something praiseworthy to say. Live out your love in truth in relationships. We can know a joy in truth and righteousness.
(7) Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
LOVE - bears all things - ALWAYS PROTECTS. Bears up under difficulty.
LOVE ALWAYS TRUSTS. Trust is believing God’s promises.
LOVE ALWAYS HOPES. Love has an expectancy. We can expect God to work in our situation.
LOVE ALWAYS PERSEVERES. Love endures through challenges. Be persistent. Persevere in prayer. Stand by your loved ones during difficult times. Be faithful to God and others.
Love endures all things. Love remains stedfast.
(8) Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
LOVE NEVER FAILS. Love keeps on giving. Don’t give up. Love never ends. It always overcomes.
(13) And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity. Love is the greatest virtue. Make love a priority. Live it out in your daily life.
1 Corinthians 14:1 Follow after charity, and desire spiritual gifts, but rather that ye may prophesy. It’s saying pursue this kind of love.
[0:00] 1 Corinthians 13. A message of love.
[0:11] And really love is the most important quality that we can know, isn't it?! That we can have in our lives. Yet I think the meaning of the word love has got lost somehow, corrupted in our culture.
[0:23] Love is used for other things that are really not the love that is God's kind of love. And that's what we want to look at today. We've heard about the more excellent sacrifice.
[0:35] Now, the more excellent way, which is love. The more excellent way. So we're going to look at what they call the love chapter. And really it's the most comprehensive description of love from God's perspective, isn't it?
[0:50] Of what love is and what it is not. And Jonathan Edwards, the old time preacher, he preached to exhort his church to a life of daily love with one another.
[1:01] And he preached 16 sermons on 1 Corinthians 13. On these 13 verses. 16 sermons in the year 1738. But we're just going to have the condensed version tonight.
[1:12] One sermon. But there's a lot we could say. Really there's much we could say about all of these lovely verses. And really love speaks to us of what is dear, what is precious.
[1:23] And we're talking of God's love. It's that awesome love that is his precious, undeserved love, isn't it? His relentless, enduring love.
[1:33] His selfless love. Love that keeps no record of offense. Love that loves no matter what. And it says in 1 Corinthians 8 verse 1 that knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.
[1:47] Love edifies. Love builds up. And so love is really so precious. We can have all kinds of knowledge but lack the love. Then we're missing out on what is really critical.
[2:00] Love. And love really is more important than any spiritual gift, any endowment of ability that we could know. Love is the most excellent way.
[2:13] And really love is God's greatest gift, isn't it? And so we're going to pick it up there from 1 Corinthians 12, 31. Paul writes, of course, the context of spiritual gifts.
[2:25] And he tells us here, verse 31, but covet earnestly the best gifts. And yet show I unto you a more excellent way.
[2:38] He says that we should covet earnestly. We should desire these gifts, the best gifts. And he says really the most excellent way, the more excellent way is love.
[2:48] Paul goes on to tell how we may have this kind of love and what it looks like. The kind of display of love. There's all kinds of displays of spirituality, but without love, they're vain.
[3:02] And we see that there as we get into 1 Corinthians 13. And Paul says this, Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal.
[3:16] So the Corinthians had this time when miraculous things were going on. Yet for all of this, they were missing out on the more excellent way. They were getting prideful, fleshly, carnal.
[3:28] Yet for all of these things that they had, these miraculous wonders, they were missing out on the more excellent way. And that's what Paul was chiding them about.
[3:39] Love was missing. Without that, it was just noise. And we can make that mistake too, where love is that vital ingredient. And when it's missing, everything falls flat.
[3:50] Now I know you ladies, while we won't be sexist, you men that make cakes, if you're making that cake and you're missing that vital ingredient, it makes the cake useless, doesn't it?
[4:03] When that vital ingredient is missing, everything fails. Imagine a cake without the main ingredient. This was what was happening at Corinth here in this church.
[4:15] Their missing love was lacking. And so he's exhorting them that way. Let's learn about God's kind of love here as we go through some of the qualities that Paul tells us of. What he's talking about is love, agape love.
[4:28] Really God's special, ultimate, perfect love, isn't it? God is love. Love. It's who he is. And this love, this love is God's kind of love.
[4:43] It's truly unconditional, sacrificial. And Romans 5.8 tells us God commends his love towards us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
[4:54] He loved us while we were his enemies. He loved us so, to extend his love gift to us. And verse 2 we read on, Though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I can remove mountains and have not charity.
[5:13] Until next day.