Love Is? Part 2

Love is ¡KPart 2

Thesis: Love needs to be defined in light of what the Bible says love is. Love really is only defined in light of the statement ¡§God is Love!¡¨ If you do not start with God then you cannot know or experience love in your life.

Opening Illustration from Step Mom:

Scene were the dad explains to the children what happened to his and their mothers love for one another. He misrepresents what Love really is. But this scene shows that the world does not know what true love is.

Belknap notes: Luke explains to his children why he and their mom got a divorce. He sugarcoats the issue by saying that they still love each other, but it¡¦s a different king of love. Naturally, the children don¡¦t understand and want him to get back together with their mom. He adds Children often hear the lamest excuses and get a warped sense of what love should be. God¡¦s love, however, never wavers and never leaves.¡¨

God¡¦s love for us always remains the same and never changes. We find that the world especially Hollywood desires to re-write the definition of love. Why? Because then they will not feel the conviction of the Holy Spirit for their role-modeling of deceptive meanings of love to the society we live in. Truth is if we define love God¡¦s way and Biblically then we discover that you can not fall out of love. Love is clearly defined in 1 Corinthians as patient, persevering, not self seeking and so on.

Let us re-look at what true Biblical love as defined in our Scripture text.

Scripture Text:

I Cor. 13:1-13 (NIV)

1If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. 2If 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 have not love, I am nothing. 3If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing.

4Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

8Love 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. 9For we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10but when perfection comes, the imperfect disappears. 11When 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 childish ways behind me. 12Now we see but a poor 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 am fully known.

13And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

I Cor. 13 - The Message:

THE WAY OF LOVE

If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don¡¦t love, I¡¦m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.

If I speak God¡¦s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, ¡§Jump,¡¨ and it jumps, but I don¡¦t love, I¡¦m nothing.

If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don¡¦t love, I¡¦ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I¡¦m bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.

Love cares more for others than for self.

Love doesn¡¦t want what it doesn¡¦t have.

Love doesn¡¦t strut,

Doesn¡¦t have a swelled head,

Doesn¡¦t force itself on others,

Isn¡¦t always ¡§me first,¡¨

Doesn¡¦t fly off the handle,

Doesn¡¦t keep score of the sins of others,

Doesn¡¦t revel when others grovel,

Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,

Puts up with anything,

Trusts God always,

Always looks for the best,

Never looks back,

But keeps going to the end.

Love never dies. Inspired speech will be over some day; praying in tongues will end; understanding will reach its limit. We know only a portion of the truth, and what we say about God is always incomplete. But when the Complete arrives, our incompletes will be canceled.

When I was an infant at my mother¡¦s breast, I gurgled and cooed like any infant. When I grew up, I left those infant ways for good.