Love Together

Right, good morning, church. Glad to be here with you opening up God's Word today. We are going to be in 1 Corinthians 13 today, 1 Corinthians 13 As we are continuing in our sermon series that we're calling Together. And we're looking at, throughout this sermon series, what it is that the Lord calls us to do and more specifically who He calls us to be as a people who He has brought together as the church. What does it mean to be the church? And so today we're looking at 1 Corinthians 13. You might be familiar with the chapter. And so it's a chapter that we are going to see that the Lord is calling us to love one another. Over the years, some have had the hardest time of giving a definition of love. It's one of those things that maybe you can experience it, but it's hard to figure out how to define it. And I don't just mean romantic love, but I mean any love at all, love in general. How do you define it? How do you put it into words? Typically, people try to describe the feeling that they feel on the inside and call that love. Others try to actually explain away love and say that love isn't real. It's just a psychological thing that happens when certain neurons fire in your brain and blah, blah, blah. You know, all these things, and they try to explain it away. And others might say something along the lines of, "Look, I don't know how to describe it. You just know it when you experience it." Well, my friends, I've got news for you. If you are a believer in Jesus, you get kind of the best of both worlds because you have come to know love, true love, by experiencing the love of Christ. And God tells us what love is in His word. He defines it for us. And that's what we're looking at today. 1 Corinthians 13, we will read it all, but we'll really focus in on verses one through seven. This is what has been come to be known as the love chapter. Anybody ever heard that before? 1 Corinthians 13, the love chapter. I don't really love that phraseology because really all the chapters in the Bible, the Bible as a whole is a love book. It is a book of God's love for His people, those who had sinned against Him, and yet He was on mission to rescue us out of His great love for us. But here in 1 Corinthians 13, we do get a great definition of love and what it looks like in practice when we come together. You've probably heard at least some of these verses before at a wedding or somewhere like that. But today we're gonna look at it and see how we are to understand and apply it as followers of Jesus Christ. So let's go ahead and read 1 Corinthians 13, starting at verse one. "If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it does not easily anger, it keeps no records of wrong. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trust, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when completeness comes, what is in part disappears. When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me. For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; Then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I'm fully known. And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love." Two truths that I want us to learn and apply about love today. The first one is this: Love is fruitful. Love is fruitful. The book of 1 Corinthians is such an interesting book to me. When you open it up and you read the initial greeting and Paul talking about this church in the initial verses, it sounds like things are going so good in the Corinthian church. It sounds like things are really taking off and really going great. Listen to what Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 1:4-7. "I always thank my God for you because of His grace given you in Christ Jesus. For in Him you have been enriched in every way, with all kinds of speech and with all knowledge, God thus confirming our testimony about Christ among you. Therefore, you do not lack any spiritual gift as you eagerly wait for our Lord Jesus Christ to be revealed." They have been enriched in every way by the Lord. They have great speech and knowledge. They do not lack any spiritual gift. They are eagerly waiting for the return of the Lord. That all sounds pretty good, right? That all sounds like a church that you want to be a part of. In fact, it sounds like the kind of church that a lot of people today would be looking for, all sorts of gifted people, pushing things forward, great speaker every week, you can grow in your knowledge of God in spiritual things, a church that seems to have everything. But the rest of the letter after verse seven reveals that everything else is kind of downhill from there in the Corinthian church. And of all the problems that Paul addresses to this really gifted church in Corinth, it all comes down to the problem that they are lacking in one thing. They are lacking in love. They're lacking in love. They're lacking in love for one another. The command to love is the most essential command in the Bible. In fact, when Jesus Himself was asked, what is the greatest command in scripture, what did He answer. Matthew 22, Jesus said, "'Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the law and the prophets hang on these two commands." Love is the greatest commandment. Love is the most essential commandment. Love God. Love your neighbor. And so here in chapter 13, verses one through three, Paul essentially says, "Listen, you may have all the giftedness in the world. You may have all these great things that are happening within the church, but if love is not what's behind it, then it's worthless. It's worthless. It's nothing." You may come together, and some of you may have this seemingly amazing spiritual experience every time you come together with all of these things, but you are lacking the one thing that Jesus said you must do, the one thing He said it all hangs on You're lacking love, He says to them. And so he writes in verse one, "If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal." There's some debate here what Paul is talking about, is he talking about the spiritual gift of speaking in tongues, or is he talking metaphorically about having very beautiful speech and being able to speak well, which the Greeks in Corinth prized those kinds of things. And personally, I think he's talking about both. He's talking about the tongues of men and of angels. In reality, it doesn't matter too much which one he means. Either way, his point is that no matter what is coming out of your mouth, if love is not behind it, no matter how beautiful it may sound, no matter how powerful it may be, if love is not behind it, then he says, "I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal." What is that supposed to mean? What is that supposed to mean? Well, these are important instruments when used at the right time in the right way, right? But when just hit over and over and over and over again with nothing else going on, then they can become quite annoying, right? Like, there's nothing to. It's just noise. Listen, I have kids that play all sorts of instruments. I've been to piano recitals, great. I've been to violin recitals, great. I've been around family when somebody just, you know, brings out a guitar and starts playing, great. I have never been to a cymbal concert. Have you? Anybody been to a cymbal concert, a gong concert? No, why? Because it's not something you want to go to. If my kids came to me and were like, "Hey, Dad, we wanna give up piano. We really want to get into the cymbals. You know, and we want you to come to the concert this Saturday." I'd be like, "Well, the church picnic is this Saturday. I'm sorry, I can't make it to your cymbal concert at this particular time or any other time at that matter as well." You don't go to a cymbal concert because the cymbal is just an annoying noise if it's only by itself, if it's just there by itself and over and over again. But what Paul says is that's what we sound like when we don't have love. We might speak truth, we might speak beauty, we might speak all sorts of things, but we're just a clanging cymbal if we don't speak with love. You see, the problem with the cymbal is that it's an instrument that does not carry its own melody, right? Like, other instruments carry a melody. They can make a song by themselves, but a cymbal cannot do it. A cymbal can bring out the emotions or dynamics of a song. It can greatly enhance song that it's being played to, but it, by itself, cannot make the song. We often think that it's all the other things that are taking place at the church that make the church. We often think it's all the other things that are taking place here that makes us look like Christians. Look at what John, or Jesus said in John 13:35. "By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." If you love one another, that's how they will know that we are His disciples. Now, let me be clear. The words that we say at church are important. We gather around the Word of God. It's what we're doing. I'm preaching the Word of God using my words. We do those things. But if it's done outside of love, if it's done without love, if it's all that's done and there is no love, then we are missing the melody that God built the church around. He built the church around the melody of His love, His love for His people that brought Him to save us, our love in response to His love, and our love for one another that He has given to us when He has put His spirit inside of us. Listen, church, this should be a great warning to us, especially here at this church. We are a blessed church. We have some very gifted people at this church, not just on staff, but you, like, in the church, the church as a whole, we have such gifted people. We have so many resources that we are able to use. But if we are a church that just has all these great gifts and all these great resources, and you can learn a bunch of great stuff here that's true and helpful in your life, in your faith, but we don't have love, then Paul says we are nothing, nothing. It's all for nothing without love. If anything, we're just a droning sound. We're just a gong that never stops, a cymbal without a melody. And there's no fruit that comes from that. There's no fruit that comes without love. And as a church, that means we can't be dependent on mere giftedness. It means we can't be dependent on resources. It means we can't be dependent on all these things in order to show the world who the Lord is. Each and every one of us must live a life of love. And when we gather, we must actively, intentionally love one another, or else we're missing out on everything. We're missing out on everything. Love is where the fruit comes through. Now, in verse two, he gets that much the same thing. Can have prophecy, can fathom all mysteries and knowledge, can have great faith that moves mountains, but without love, it's nothing, it's nothing. And in verse three, he goes beyond just speech and just things of that nature. He goes so far as to say we can do some of the most sacrificial-looking things. We can give our our stuff away to the poor. We can give ourselves up and self-sacrifice in whatever kind of way. We can do all those things, but it's possible to do them without love. And if we do them without love, we gain nothing. We gain nothing in the end. You might say, how can someone give all he possesses to the poor and do that without love? Well, you can do it with selfish motivation to make yourself look super spiritual or to gain good standing among your peers or even to try to earn points with God, maybe. None of those things are out of love. And when you do it from that motivation, you gain nothing. Paul says it's even possible to offer yourself up sacrificially, but do it not out of love. And in doing so, we gain nothing. There are lots of things that we can do that are good things, lots of things that will look really good to an outsider looking in or even looking to, you know, to one another, they might look good. Lots of things we can do to exercise the gifts that God has given us and obey the commands that He's given us. But if we do them from anything but love, Paul says it's fruitless, it's fruitless. And when we come together and we exercise all the gifts and we do all the things that we're expected to do, but we don't show love to one another, it's fruitless. The fruitlessness, or the fruitfulness comes from doing them in love, love for God, love for one another, and love for the world. You see, love is like the kite string on the kite, right? If you pictured the church as a kite, think of a kite and all sorts of designs, all sorts of awesome-looking kites that you can build. And you go out and you're ready to fly the kite. Any child knows that you can't fly a kite unless it is tethered to the string. It is the string that makes the kite fly. Without the string, it just lays on the ground. It might blow around on the ground, but it's not gonna fly in the air like it's supposed to. It has to be tethered to the string. And when we try to untether it from the string, the church is just like a kite blowing around on the ground. But when it is tethered to the string of love, it can fly for the world to see. It can fly, and it can hold on, and it can do all that it is made to do. In the same way, love is what we are made to be built around, the love that the Lord has shown to us, and to turn around and show it to Him and to one another as well. Love is fruitful. It's what makes the church able to fulfill its mission, to ensure that every man, woman, and child has repeated opportunities to hear and see the gospel of Jesus, see it by our love. Love is fruitful. The second truth about love for us to hold onto that I want us to see from this passage is that love is godly, love is godly. In verses four through seven, we find the passage that so many of us are probably familiar with. You've probably heard it at a wedding before, maybe an anniversary party or something like that. And it's a passage that is showing us some of the basic characteristics of true love. That is godly love, love the way that God defines it. And so I want us to take a few minutes and look at some of the specific characteristics of love that God gives us here in this passage. First of all, He says love is patient. Anyone convicted yet? I am. Love is patient, love is kind. Both of these words, we might get them a little mixed up in our our minds as to what exactly Paul is saying here. You think of the word patient, and I think usually people think of someone who doesn't get easily offended or annoyed. They don't get easily offended. They're not easily annoyed. The kids are asking a million questions. The coworkers are leaving them all the work to do, and they just roll with it. Neighbors are making all the noise, and none of it bothers them, right? Well, that's what we think of when we think of being patient sometimes. None of it bothers him. He's just even-keeled. He's cool-headed. He's a really patient guy because nothing seems to bother him. Or with kindness, with kindness, you might think of someone who's just going to give you a smile no matter what. You know they're gonna smile no matter what. They're always in a kind mood no matter what's going on. But this patience and kindness that Paul is talking about is a little bit more than that. This patience in kindness are not passive patience and passive kindness, they're active. Active patience, active kindness. The word for patient here is actually long suffering. Long suffering. That means you do get offended. You do get annoyed. You do have a hard time with people sometimes, but rather than letting those things take you over and rather than letting those things out, you bear with the person in love for their good. You bear with them for their good and for kindness. It's not just that somebody does something to you and you smile back. It's not just taking it on the chin and never reacting. It is an active showing of kindness, that no matter what a person may have done to you, you show kindness in return and that you seek people out to show kindness to no matter who they are. Friends, isn't this the kind of patience and kindness that God has shown to us, His people? Isn't that what He has shown to us? That in our sin against Him, in our rebellion against Him, in spitting in His face, He didn't just not react, but instead He did react. He reacted by being patient with us in our sin. And He reacted by showing us the kindness of sending His own Son in order to suffer and die for our sin so that we may be saved, so that we may know Him, so that we may find life. That is the patience and kindness that God has given to us. And it is the patience and kindness that we have experienced and, therefore, we can show to others as well. He's a good God, isn't He? He's a loving God. He goes on. Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast. It is not proud. In other words, it's not focused on the good for self. It's not always looking at what it doesn't have. And nor is it showing off what it does have to others. Those who love are content with what the Lord has given them and is happy for the good things in another person's life. When we operate out of love, we are content with what we have and glad for what others have as well. Similarly, it does not dishonor others, and it is not self-seeking. Love doesn't push others down in order to get ahead. One commentator said it doesn't cut in line. It lets others go first. We're taught that in order for us to be anything, we gotta push somebody else down in order to raise ourselves up. But that's not what love does. That's not what love does. It does not dishonor others. It is not self-seeking. Further, it is not easily angered. It keeps no records, or no record of wrongs. This is a tough one, if I'm being honest with you. Maybe the toughest one. Not only does it take a while to be offended, but it also doesn't hold onto the offense once you are offended. It doesn't pull out the ledger of every mistake and wrongdoing. When somebody does you wrong, you pull out the ledger and you add it onto the list and you make sure they know all the other things that they have done. But instead it forgives. Now, that doesn't mean that doesn't mean that you never confront someone in wrongdoing. In fact, someone that you love, you will confront them in wrongdoing. In fact, in the very next part, he says, "Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth." It does not delight when someone is doing wrong. It speaks truth, it speaks it in love, but it speaks the truth. So when he says that it does not keep a record of wrongs, he's not saying that we don't confront wrongdoing. We do that. He says it in the very next part, but it does mean that we forgive. He's not saying that we don't confront wrongdoing. We do that. He says it in the very next part, but it does mean that we forgive. Now, I know, I know in a room this size, some of you have have some very hard things. You have some very hard things that somebody has done to you or multiple people have done to you. And I don't know what that is. I don't know everybody's story in here. I do want you to know that as a church, we want to come around you. I do know we wanna love you. I do know that we wanna walk with you and help you to hear the Lord's voice in this. We have an amazing counseling ministry that we would love for you to come and talk with someone or with one of us as the pastors, one of our prayer partners that we always have up here afterwards. We would love to walk with you in some of those things. But what Jesus says is that, as a basic stance and what Paul says as a basic stance, is that we don't keep a record of wrongdoing, we forgive. He goes on, "Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth." It doesn't let someone keep walking in sin or keep walking in lies without confronting them. This goes against everything our culture teaches us nowadays, by the way. It goes against absolutely everything our culture teaches us. Our culture thinks that love is letting people think and do whatever they want, no matter how wrong it may be, no matter what the consequences may be. You just let them think and do whatever they want. And then it's expected that you rejoice in everyone else's choices. And if you don't, then you're a terrible friend, you're a terrible person, and you should just go away. That's what our culture wants to say. But I wanna say to you, that's not what love is. Love is not just saying, "Hey, just do whatever you want, and it's all good." Love is speaking truth. Love is confronting wrongdoing. Love is taking someone aside and saying, "This is not right." We do it in a loving way. We do it in a way that is caring for the person. It's not just so we can say, "Hey, I'm right, and you're wrong." It's because we say, "Hey, I care about you, and I wanna walk with you, and I wanna help you, and I want you to see the goodness of truth." And we walk with them in that. Love tells the truth, and it rejoices in the truth. Last of all, he says it always protects, always trusts, always hopes, and always perseveres. Love doesn't look to give up easy. That's another lie that our culture tells us. "Hey, you know what, if you're not happy with a person anymore, just leave." That's not love. And it never was if that's where you're at. Love looks to persevere. It looks for the best in others. It looks to endure. That is what love is. So what is this love? In general, what is this love that Paul is talking about in this chapter? It's agape love. Agape is the Greek word that Paul is using here for love, as he writes in the original Greek language he was writing in. In Greek, there were a few different words for love. There was philia, which was brotherly love, like Philadelphia, right? The city of brotherly love. It's a brotherly friendship love. There was eros, which was romantic love, which both of these things are important, but what we are talking about is agape love. It's biblical love. It's this biblical love is others-centered concern that cares for the needs and seeks the good of those around us rather than ourselves. I'll say it again. Biblical love is others-centered concern that cares for the needs and seeks the good of those around us rather than ourselves. It is a love that seeks out to give this kind of love, not just waiting for people to come and seek it out for themselves. This kind of love seeks out others to give it to. And so the reason that this great definition of love shows up here in the middle of this book of 1 Corinthians that's talking about all of these problems that they are having in the church, and the reason that it shows up here in the middle of this section of 1 Corinthians, from chapter 11 to chapter 14, which is all about what it should look like when we come together as the church. And the reason it shows up in the middle of a discussion about spiritual gifts is because this very gifted Corinthian church was coming together. They were doing all of these wonderful-looking things. They were having these amazing spiritual experiences on their own, but they were doing it all without love. They were just being a kite fluttering around on the ground, not tethered to the string of love. They were doing it without the melody, just being a clanging cymbal over and over and over again, that maybe each person may have been enjoying themself, but they were not loving one another. It was the place where they failed was with true godly love, and it was the root of all of their troubles, all of their troubles that Paul is addressing. It was what was causing their divisions that Paul speaks to at the beginning of the book. It was at the root of their sexual immorality and their letting it go free and not confronting the people who were living in it. It was why there was chaos when they would come together. It was why some of them were taking communion and not waiting for the others to arrive. They were just doing it for themselves. And it was even why some of them were starting to turn on the Apostle Paul himself. The very one who had brought them the gospel, they were turning against him because they were not living in love. And so church, we have to ask ourselves, at this church, with all sorts of gifted people, with all sorts of resources, with all sorts of wonderful things where you can come every Sunday and have a great spiritual experience in the middle of it all, we have to ask, do we have love? Maybe let me ask it another way. Do we excel at love? Maybe let me ask it a little more pointedly. Do you love? Do you excel at love? Do you seek to excel at love? When you show up on a Sunday morning or at your community group or wherever you might be getting together, do you do it in love for one another, or do you just walk in seeking to be satisfied for yourself? Now, listen, we come here, and our highest priority, just like Jesus said, is the love the Lord our God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our mind, with all our strength. We come here and we put our love on Him. But friend, you cannot love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength without loving His people. It's not possible. That's why when Jesus was asked for one greatest command, He gave two, right? It's because they go together. The greatest is love the Lord your God. The second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. This is the kind of love that God has shown to us, the kind of love that we find in 1 Corinthians 13. It is the kind of love that God has shown to us. It's because it's who He is. We need to remember that love, when we say that God is love or that God is loving, love is not this thing out here on its own, independent, and God measures up to its qualities. That's not what's happening here. God is the definition of love. It's who He is. It does not exist outside of Him. It exists within Him and only within Him. And when we look to Him, we see what love truly is. He is the definition of it. Who God is, that's how we define love. And He always is so. Even in the times in scripture that we see His anger on display, what is it toward? It is toward sin. Because sin destroys that which He loves. It is out of His love that even His anger gets displayed. It never stops. It never ceases. It never goes away. He never ceases to be love. It is who God is. We look to Him to see what love is because He is love. And of course, the ultimate way that we have seen Him put His love on display is in the cross of Jesus Christ. It's a love that showed patient mercy with us sinners and showed the kindness of His grace in salvation toward us. It's a love that was not focused on self, but was self-sacrificial on the cross. It's a love that did not push anyone down to get ahead, but instead pushed us ahead when we were down. It's a love that took the ledger of our wrongdoing and nailed it to the cross of Jesus Christ. It's a love that has defeated evil with truth. And it's a love that never gives up and it never fails, but always looks to persevere. And friends, what we find at the end of this passage, just rather quickly, is that all the other things, all the other things, they go away. Prophecies, they will cease. They won't be needed anymore when we stand face to face with Christ. Tongues, they will be still. They won't be needed anymore when we stand face to face with Christ. Faith, it'll be made sight. Our hope, it will be fulfilled. But love, it will always remain. It will always remain. When Paul says, "Now these three remain: faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love," It's because it's the one that we will carry with us into all of eternity. It will never cease. It will never slow down, but it will only grow as we stand face to face with the God who is love. Friends, you and I have encountered true love on the cross of Jesus Christ. And we continue to experience it day by day because His mercies are new for His people every single morning. And as we live and we live out the work of salvation that Christ has done in us, we put His love on display to one another and to the world. We love Him, and therefore, we love people. It's a love that is not optional. It's a love that you can't possibly experience without being changed by it. And it's a love that you can't possibly experience and not learn from it. So when we come together as a church, are you seeking to love others as yourself? You come seeking to love God, but you can't love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your soul, and with all your strength without loving one another as well. Today at each campus, we are celebrating communion. If you came in this morning and you didn't receive the elements for communion on your way in, you just slip a hand up. Some of our ushers are ready to come and pass that out to you. As we celebrate communion, it is an act of love that we celebrate, and it's an act that we celebrate in love. As we take it together, as the people of God, as we dwell on God's definition of love and is called to His people to love above all else, we remember the great love that Jesus has displayed on the cross for us. And so I'll ask you to go ahead and open the top part. And by the way, I wanna say if you're here this morning and you have never experienced that love of God, you've never come to put your faith in Jesus Christ, I would just ask you, actually, just to refrain from taking communion because it is a proclamation of our faith, but rather to observe it. And afterwards, I would invite you to come up and talk with one of the prayer partners who will be at the front in order to ask them, what does it mean to trust Jesus? What does it mean to follow after Him? But if you are a believer this morning, we want to invite you to participate. And so you can open to the bread. And as we take the bread this morning, we remember Jesus with the night before He was crucified, took this meal with His disciples and He said, "This is my body which is broken for you. Take and eat it." Let's take it this morning. As we take the cup, we remember the blood of Christ that was poured out for us in His love, that we may know Him, that we may be children of God. Let's take and drink this morning. Church, Christ has died, Christ has risen, and Christ is coming again. It's what we celebrate together in communion. And as we go on and we eagerly await His return, let's go out and do it in love, love for God and love for one another. This morning, we're gonna sing one last song as we respond in worship, as we are reminded of the great love that God has given to us, that His mercy is a display of His love and that it is greater than all of the sin that we may have committed. His love endures. His love conquers. And so let's go to the Lord in prayer this morning before we stand and respond. Lord God, we are so thankful that you are a good God, that you are a God who has put your love on display in the cross of Jesus Christ. I pray, Lord, as we respond to that love in worship this morning, that you would send us out, loving both you, first and foremost, but one another as well. Teach us, Lord, to do that. Help us to actively pursue love because of the love that you have shown to us. It's in Jesus' name that I pray, amen.