Love Does Not Envy Series

Love Does Not Envy

#LoveIs

GOOD MORNING MGCC –

AND - welcome to week 4 in our series ‘Love Is…’

AND LISTEN – if there ever was a series that we need to make every effort to live out when we walk out those doors, it is this one. LIKE – the truths we will discuss have the power to change everything… NOW – you may think that I am exaggerating a bit here… BUT – I think not.

AFTER ALL – consider the following Scriptures…

I give you a new command: Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you must also love one another. By this all people will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another. - John 13:34-35

Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law. – Romans 13:8

The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love. – Galatians 5:6

Most important of all, continue to show deep love for each other, for love covers a multitude of sins. – 1 Peter 4:8

No one has ever seen God. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and his love is brought to full expression in us. – 1 John 4:12

NOW – so far in the series we have talked about…

‘The Unrelenting Love Of God”

AND – about how “Love is patient and love is kind…”

OKAY – let’s do this ‘Love does not envy…’

NOW – I want to ask you a question that I really want you to ponder as we go through our conversation this morning…

“What do you do when life’s not fair?”

“What do you do when life’s not fair?”

QUESTION – have you ever thought in you’re head or said out loud these three word’s? It’s not fair!

YOU KNOW – I pretty sure we all have… in fact those 3 words begin rising up and flowing from out mouths at an early age.

• Tommy’s parents let him stay up until 11 o’clock and I have to go to bed at 9, and he’s younger than me.

It’s not fair!

• All my friends caught brand new bikes for Christmas and still have to ride this old beat up hand me down…

It’s not fair!

• When they turned 16 their parents bought them a brand new car and they are going to pay for their entire college and they don’t even have to have a job.

It’s not fair!

• I am more talented and more deserving than they are, but they always get the lead in the show or the starting spot on the team… It’s not fair!

• I have been with the company much longer, I work harder, I do a much better job, yet they got the promotion I deserved and wanted, it’s not fair!

• All my friends are getting married and starting families and I am still single, it’s not fair!

• Why can’t we afford to take trips like they do, a month traveling through Europe, it’s not fair!

• We serve God and have given up so much more than they have, yet they get all the breaks… It’s not fair.

• Look at this house – why can’t we have a home like this

It’s not fair!

• I can’t believe they can retire at 55 with 2 pensions and here I am at 75 greeting people at WalMart just to make ends meet, it’s not fair!

• Look at how confident they are - everyone always want to be around them, they listen to them, they care about them…why don’t people treat me the same way.

It’s not fair

AGAIN – what do you do, when life is not fair?

UNDERSTAND THESE - are the kinds of thoughts that go through the minds of people, even Christians.

NOW - they may seem harmless.

AND - at times they may even motivate us to try harder, to achieve, to be better people – but the word of God has this to say in Proverbs 14:30;

A heart at peace gives life, but envy rots the bones…”

QUESTION – what is envy?

Basically envy is resenting God’s goodness to others, and ignoring His goodness to you…

John Piper defines it this way…

“Envy is a mingling of a desire for something with the resentment that another is enjoying it and you are not. Things aren’t going so well for you, but things are going well for them; and it just gnaws away at you sometimes.”

AND – here is how I like to define it…

Envy is resenting God’s grace in the lives of other people, while ignoring His grace in our own lives.