Learning to Love Like Jesus Part 8 - 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

1:30Immature believers, and perhaps those who thought they were believers but were not. But Paul's message is: this is what love is. You don't love because you're spiritually immature. And if we can, John, and Paul is saying, test yourself, look at these things, understand what love is. Do you really love? And when you put this in conjunction with John's thoughts, in fact, the more I go through John's, the more I go through the New Testament and understand John's theology, I see just how much Paul's theology is so similar. And so test yourself. The very chapter that we are in in 1 John is dealing with testing yourself. Test, see if you are in the faith. What does your confession say? What does your love say? And so very similar in thought. In fact, I did not plan this semester, but we have been in a collision of these exhortations to love one another, haven't we? And I hope as we wrap this section up tonight, that you will be blessed as we reach really a high point in Paul's thought. But I hope that you have been challenged. I think the feedback I get is that this has been a very challenging study.

3:02Not that it's been difficult to understand, but really difficult to play out and practice. And I see that in my own heart as well. Just this command to grow up, to let God be God in your life. And what that means is loving like he loved. Well, as we looked at this morning in 1 John 4, 16, John said, This, we have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. So thought very similar, coming to know, having believed, this is what love is. God in his very essence, in his very essential being, is love.

3:55And John, God is, what is God? God is spirit, right? John makes that statement. God is truth, or God is light, right? In him, there is no darkness at all. And God is love. These are the three God is statements that John makes. And so the exhortation to love like Christ is also an exhortation to know the love Christ has for us. And I hope as you get to the end of this study, this isn't just a study. About going out and being a better person in loving others. But to realize all of this is really an exhortation to know the love that God has for you.

4:49And so, as you can't love like Him unless you know His kind of love, you cannot experientially love others unless you experientially understand you are loved to this degree. So, this study of what love is really comes down to a discovery of how we are loved before God. And I hope it is that to you. I hope it challenges you to love, but I hope it exhorts you to behold your great God. Belief in Christ and love for one another are inspired by the Holy Spirit. There is no other source. And so, what Paul is saying here is gifts that come or that gifts that come without love are from a whole different source. Whatever gifts you have, if you're exercising them without love, guess what? They're not. From the Holy Spirit.

6:03Because gifts without love are from a whole different source. And that's what Paul is saying. I don't care how great the gifts you have, if you do not have love, you are nothing. You are noisy. And we're never going to love like that until we understand how we're loved. So, love is patient. Verse 4: Love is kind, not jealous. Love does not brag. It's not arrogant. Does not act unbecomingly. It does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth, fares all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. We're looking at verse 7 tonight. Real quickly, I'll review where we've been. Love is patient. That is, love is waiting. Waiting. All these are verbs. Remember? All of these are verbs.

7:10Love is doing something. Love is always in action. Love is kind. That is, love is helping. Helping. Think about that. God, let that sink in. God is waiting. God is patient. What a great God to have, right? God is patient. He waits. And let that settle your soul. If you don't get it right right away, guess what? He's patient. Let that settle. And he's kind. He's healthy. Everything he does is in a way of helping you.

7:52I love the way he helps. I love the goodness, the kindness, many kindnesses I've experienced. My kids, I don't know what this has to do with anything, but it just came to mind. My kids often ask me, what is your favorite animal? And they expect me to say something noble, like an eagle, or something scary, like a bear. I always tell them the cow. The cow, hands down, is just the greatest creation. I mean, think about what a cow does. What does it do? It takes grass. We don't do anything with grass, do we?

8:26We just throw it away, right? What do they do? They make milkshakes out of that. They make cheese. They make butter. What? Steak. Oh, yeah. I mean, it just goes on, right? Sour cream. There's no other animal that does it. What does that have to do? Well, that's just God. He is constantly, I don't know. Maybe I just leave that. But I just look around creation. I just see all the many kindnesses that God, just the little details. The things that he gives, and they're good, they're helpful, they're kind, they're generous, and that's what love is. And that's that's God.

9:11Love is not jealous, it's not coveting, he doesn't want to extract anything from us, love doesn't want to extract anything from anybody, love wants to give. Love does not brag, that is, it's not bragging, it's not arrogant, that is, it's not bowing up. Love does not act unbecomingly, it is never degrading of another individual. Love never degrades, never dehumanizes somebody by the way it behaves. Love does not seek its own, it is not seeking some self-benefit, love does not try to extract some benefit for itself, it is seeking to give, to help, to show kindnesses.

9:59Love is not provoked, love is not being easily offended. Love does not take into account a wrong suffered, it doesn't just sit over there keeping record of wrongs. That's not love at all. Love's doing the opposite, sending them away. Love does not rejoice in unrighteousness, that is, it is not rejoicing in things that are not right. Love rejoices with the truth, that it rejoices with the right things. Love bears all things. Get down to verse 11, verse 7. I'm sorry.

10:40Bears all things, right? It hopes, that is, it bears all things. That is, it's covering all offenses. That's what bearing things. It can withstand. It doesn't, it covers, it bears whatever is thrown at it. That's God. God's love for us, covering all offenses. Love believes all things. That is, it's trusting God with all people in all circumstances. As we love, we there's a divine element, an element of faith, trusting God with all people in all circumstances. So now we come to the remaining two. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things. So let's look at hopes all things. And there is a crescendo happening here. There is something that is absolutely wonderful with how Paul ends this list and how he builds up hopes all things. It's a verb.

12:00Present verb, an active verb. It is hoping. The whole idea is love is hoping. It is expecting. It is hoping for the best. It is anticipating the best outcome. That's the idea. It is expecting something good. Expecting the best. That's what love does. Love wants the best. And so it holds out for the best. Remember, 1 Peter 1:13, therefore, Peter says, Prepare your minds for action. Keep sober in spirit. Fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Same word here. The idea of set your hope. Let your expectation for a good outcome for the future be solely based upon the grace that's going to be brought to you. Not how wonderful thou art, but upon the grace to be brought to you. But there, that's that whole idea of hoping, expecting for the best outcome. But there's a noun, love hopes all. That's what it says. All things. It's one word. All. What is he talking about? Well, certainly all things good context. He's not. It's not love hopes for bad things or anything. No, it hopes for all that is good and beneficial. That's what hope does.

13:41It's holding out for the best outcome. And that's how I would state this simply. Love is always holding out for the best outcome. That's what love is doing. It's hoping all things, whether it's a marriage relationship, whether it's a child, whether it's someone's eternal salvation. Love is always holding out for the best outcome. Think about Jesus. Think about Jesus hope? Well, in his humanity, I think he does. But certainly, maybe Jesus is a unique individual in this, but we do see evidences where he longed for the best outcome, right? He wouldn't give up on Peter, would he? Luke 22, 31, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat. But I have prayed for you, that your faith may not fail. And you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers. You see that longing, desiring for the best. Outcome.

15:02Jesus did not give up on Peter. Jesus didn't give up on Jerusalem. You remember in Luke 13, 34, he says, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those sent to her, how often I wanted to gather your children together just as a hen gathers her brood under her wings, and you would not have it. So what does he do? What does Jesus do at that point? Well, forget it, I'm done. No, he says, Behold, your house is left to you desolate. And I say to you, you will not see me again until the time comes when you say, Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. He has not given up on Jerusalem. He has not given up on his ancient people.

15:58So Jesus wouldn't give up on Peter. He wouldn't give up. He hoping for the best outcome, desiring, longing, desiring for the best outcome. Love hopes all things. And if we think about this, love holding out for the best outcome, you can think about hope in this context. Hope is patient. And what that means is hope is waiting for good results. That's what hope waits for good results. That eventually may be realized. It's hoping for those good results to come.

16:37It's the opposite of pessimism, right? Love, which brings about hope, is the very opposite of pessimism. We can go through life pretty pessimistic, right? There's a lot of things going on in our world around us that we could just really get us down, right? Hope does not focus on oneself. Hope doesn't focus on others, really. It has a more substantial foundation, believes all things, has faith. Hope does not focus on itself or others, but always on God in Christ Jesus. That's where that sure hope is set: that God is God, that God is working all things together for his good, for good, and for the good of those people.

17:28There's a real danger in losing hope, isn't there? Misplaced hope leads to despair. When we put our hope in the wrong place, it leads to despair. Do you see a little subliminal? BBS subliminal? Giant despair. Right? But hope, misplaced hope leads to despair. And I mean, that's how. Bunyan personifies this. When you lose hope, it's like being put in a prison, in a dungeon, and the dead are there. And this whole giant despair is his whole duty, his whole goal is to absolutely crush every hope that Christian has.

18:28And how do you get out? You have to come to BBS to find the answer. Do you have any biblical examples? Somebody who completely lost hope? Probably think of several, but Judas certainly comes to mind, doesn't he? After all that with Christ, and I realize he's a complicated figure and there's some layers in there, but fundamentally, somewhere in that mix and at the very foundation of who Judas was, after all that time with Jesus, he had no hope that he could be forgiven. No hope. No hope. It's like, did you get anything out of all those years with Christ? Did you get anything out of all that? Did you not pick up on who he was? Peter denied with curses.

19:30Judas lost hope. There's a real danger in losing hope. We give up on people, right? But when our hope is weak, guess what? It's because our love is weak. We can easily give up on people, can't we? We can even easily give up on this nation, can't we? And the reason we spiral into despair and depression, fundamentally, we don't love. Our love is weak. If you love people, you hope for the best. Not because of them, but because of God. Listen, when people start to stop giving up hope, I mean, it is a dangerous situation, right?

20:26I love the parent who will not give up on his lost child or her lost child. But now, faith, well, I can just recently, I know of a person whose father died, unbeliever all his life, despised the things. Of God, or certainly was not open to hearing the gospel. And by this time, late, he was in critical care. The drugs had pretty much, I mean, pretty much doped up on everything, kind of been hard. And one young zealot with a Bible came into the room, to the critical care unit, and wanted to share the gospel and got very much in his faith. Please say these words. Here's the truth. Please accept this truth. Will you have some? And just really, as if there was no, just reaching out in desperation to bring the truth to this individual who had rejected Christ, the God of the Christ of Scripture for 90 years or so. And yet, here's this individual reaching out, reaching out, and gets a nod, gets a nod.

22:18And the one who loves her father said, you know what? That's enough for me to hope that God, in the end, you see what love does? It hopes for the best outcome. It looks for reasons to hope. Despair looks for reasons to not hope. But love hopes. Look down at verse 13. But now, faith, hope, love abide these threes, but the greatest of these is love. Let's talk about that for a minute. Faith, hope, and love abide. I mean, it gets to the end of this list.

23:04Greatest gifts, faith, hope, and love. Why do you think love is greater than faith and hope? Curious. Very good. Yeah, yeah. What gives rise to faith and hope? Love. Yeah, that's what faith gives rise. I mean, I love the also another angle on this: that love is what's permanent. Faith is going to be done away with. Hope is going to be done away with. Faith, we're going to realize. We're going to be, it'll be replaced with sight. Hope, we don't hope for something we already receive. One day we're going to receive, but love is going to remain. So there's a permanence of love. Love is going to continue. Faith and hope will not. But yes, I agree. The source, what gives rise to faith and hope is love.

24:13And if you have love, you'll believe all things and hope all things. What are some things that we routinely place our hope in only to be disappointed? Hawk me, what are some things that we misplace our hope in? People, people, I'm sorry. Government, government, yes. I mean, we see our we look to our government, and sometimes we put way too much hope for our future in the government's hands, right? And then when we see the government taking a turn that jeopardizes the future we want to have, we can fall into a cycle of despair, right? But yeah, we routinely place our hope in government. Very good. Other things, people, I heard. What else? Money. Yes, money.

25:20Aggie football team. Don't put your hope in the Aggie football team. Thank you. You will. Be disappointed. And I love the Aggies. And I'm hoping for the best. Someday. I don't want to get profane here. But yes, I think you get the idea. What's the solution? What is the solution? Love. Yeah. Love. And how do you get love? You have to quiz you on this morning sermon. How do we get love? We have to have God in our life.

26:05That's right. We have to have God dwelling in us. And how do we have God dwell in us? By abiding in him. How do we abide in him? Obey his commands. Yes. What are some other? I'm trying to, I'm looking for an answer from this morning's sermon. We confess, right, that God has sent his son to be our Savior, right? To be the Savior. It is in that that the whole gospel is encapsulated. The whole mighty truths of heaven itself encapsulated in that one confession. You are loved. Like this.

27:02Therefore, as you accept God's testimony about his Son, you welcome his Son. He abides in you, and you abide in Him. And your love, when you're overwhelmed by God's love, it freely flows out of you. So love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and it endures all things. And this is the ending point of the list. Enduring all things. Love endures. Again, it's a verb. It's an active verb, indicative of a present ongoing action. Love endures all things. The word means to endure, to remain. It's a little different than bears all things. It endures all things.

28:05It remains. Really, the idea is it stands one's ground. That's what love does. Love stands its ground. It's not just a passive, it's not just some passive. It's not just some kind of passive relinquishing. Or it is an active territory taking, standing one's ground. It is a strong front. It endures all things. You remember Mark 13, Jesus says, speaking about the troubled times that are going to be coming upon planet Earth. He says, you are going to be hated by all because of my name, but the one who endures to the end, he will be saved. And this is in the context that the gospel is going to go out to the whole world. God's purpose for tribulation is to see that the gospel goes out, continues to go out. And even in difficult times, the gospel will go out.

29:25And especially in these difficult times. You're going to be hated by all, but the one who endures to the end. What are he talking about there? The one who stands his ground. The one who stands firm in the testimony of Christ. That's the idea. The one who stands his ground. That's the one who endures. So Lab, that's what love does. Love is standing its ground. It endures all things. So looked at the verb, it's enduring all things. Now, what are all things?

30:00All things. Specifically, all difficulties, all perplexities, all threats, all obstacles. It's standing its ground in the face of all of these. All circumstances that would challenge love's ground. Love is standing its ground in the face of all situations, all circumstances, whatever can be mustered. Love stands its ground, faces all things, whether that is a difficulty caused by pain, in the face of great suffering, love stands its ground. In the face of overwhelming loss, love stands its ground.

30:50In the face of even hostility, even the hostility of the one being loved, love stands its ground. Everything, loneliness, any circumstances you can imagine, love stands its ground through all of them, endures all things. So as I boil it down to a simple statement, love is overcoming every challenge not to love. There could be a lot of challenges you face to not love. Grow cold. As Christ said, when he returns, will he find faith on the earth?

31:37And will he find love on the earth? But love is standing its ground. Love is overcoming every challenge not to love. It's easy to grow apart and cold. We have no one better to look at. We could provide examples infinitum, I guess, of the Gospels, but certainly the cross. Hebrews 12:2 speaks about in 12:1, it's talking about the great cloud of witnesses and throwing off every encumbrance. And then in verse 2, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who, for the joy set before him, endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. There is no greater example of one who faced hardship, whose love for humanity endured it all, not just passively, but actively, overcoming, standing its ground.

33:00There's no one. And you think about all the difficulty, all the pain, all the sorrow, all the loss, all the embarrassment, everything, everything that the cross represents and that it involved everything. He endured it. He went right through it, stood his ground to love humanity in the face of it all. That's what love is. Endures all things. Good news. I guess I lost my animation. But what is the good news? Love will never stop loving. That's the gospel.

33:47Love will endure all things. Love will never stop loving. It endures all circumstances, all situations that would challenge it to not love. Right? Why is this good news? Talk to me. I'm not through a few ideas up there, but why is the fact that love will never stop loving the good news? The Spirit of Christ says for eternity. Yes, the Spirit of Christ stays, remains. He's not. I'm not going to. Do something, right? He can endure it. Sometimes I think we have a very shallow view of God. Somehow we think we can offend him and somehow lose, walk away.

34:44What else? Why else is this good news? Why else is this good news? Beautiful are the feet that can each give it. Amen. The good news. Beautiful are the feet that bring good news. That is the gospel. Yes, the good news. Love will never stop loving. Any other thoughts? Well, the nature of love, the fact that it can never stop loving, is why we can be assured of heaven. That's why we can hope for the future is because love is never going to stop loving. There is nothing we can do to keep God from loving us. But that's said it. We are not getting away from the love of God.

35:46We are not getting away. I read it this morning in Romans 8, didn't I? Remember Paul just getting to the end. He says, Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword, but in all things we overwhelmingly conquer. For I am convinced that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor things present nor things to come nor powers nor height nor depth nor any other created thing will be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord there is nothing anyone else can do to keep God from loving us there is nothing we can do to keep God from loving us there is nothing anyone else can do to keep God from loving us we cannot go away from his love that's why the psalmist and this is in conjunction with hope many times why are you in despair O my soul and why have you become disturbed within me hope in God for I shall again praise him verse 11 of Psalm 42 why are you in despair O my soul and why have you become disturbed within me hope in God for I shall yet praise him the help of my countenance my God 43 5 why are you in despair O my soul and why are you disturbed within me hope in God for I shall again praise him get the picture hope in God why How? Because his love endures forever. And that means he will never stop loving.

37:39Put up three statements, and I want you to tell me what the difference is. God loves us. God loves us. God loves us. What's the difference? Is it the same statement? That is, right? One statement. What's the difference? I'm emphasizing, right? But it's all one statement, right? God. Think about that. God. God. Infinite. All-power, omnipotent, powerful, all-wise, all-good. God. That one. Him. I love his creativity. I tell you what my favorite animal is. All that mental capacity of goodness and wisdom, he loves us.

38:45Go to the second one. God loves us. God loves. Loves. Has elevated us to the loving. Us to the same as his own beloved, perfect son who did everything right all the time, loves sacrificially, enduringly, patiently, forever, loves us. God loves us, us, us, us, he loves us, completely undeserving. What a treasure we have, right? How many truths? One truth, right? God loves us. Why should this truth satisfy our souls? Because God loves us. Amen. What else needs to be said? I mean, we run over these words so often and we fail to realize their depth, but this is the gospel, right?

40:09Why can my soul be at peace? Well, because God loves me. Because God loves me. Because God loves me. What do we have in common with each other? God loves us. us. We're the unique ones, right? We have this, right? We have this together. We have this individually. We have this corporately. God loves us. And because of that, we love one another. We have something only we can share together. You see, our faith has put us into a relationship that's tighter than blood relationship. It's an eternal kind.

41:03That's why we're to love one another. Why? That's right. And because God, what? God loves us, right? Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Do you think there's some sort of crescendo happening here? Love is able to bear all things. That is, cover all things, all offenses. It's able to, it's covering all things. It is believing all things. It is hoping in all things, all circumstances, all situations, and it is enduring. I love what John MacArthur said on this statement. Love bears what otherwise is unbearable.

41:57It believes what otherwise is unbelievable. It hopes in what otherwise is hopeless, and it endures when anything less than love would give up. After love bears, it believes. After it believes, it hopes. After it hopes, it endures. There is no after for endurance, for endurance is the unending climax of love. After all that is said about love, the best news, if it can get any better, after all that is said about love, about God's love for you, after all that is said about that, and how we should love others, after all that is said, love never ends.

43:03Finishes it. There's nothing you can add after that. And that's where Paul leaves it, right? He'll go on. But that thought he leaves. Love is patient, love is kind, not jealous, does not brag, is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly, does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth. All things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.

43:37Well, we made it through. We endured joyfully.