Love Is Patient: Love Has A Long Fuse Series

INTRODUCTION

SLIDE 1 TITLE SLIDE

- Back in the day Tina Turner put out a song entitled, What’s Love Got to Do with it.

- Love has everything to do with everything.

- Today, we will begin a new series entitled Love Better.

- The thought for this series came from a book by the same title that a friend, Arron Chambers, wrote.

- Our series will center on 1 Corinthians 13, which has come to be known as the love chapter.

- We use the first part of the chapter during wedding ceremonies as we talk about what love is supposed to be like.

- I see way too many marriage relationships, sometimes in my life, along with too many Christians, in which the love chapter has been simply forgotten words on a page.

- In our series, I pray we will tune in and see what God’s Word tells us about how to love better.

- The focus in our journey to better understand love and, in turn, love better begins with the concept of patience.

- Patience is an essential attribute of love, as we explore the practical application through Jesus' interaction with the woman at the well in John 4.

- Application: By understanding how patience plays a critical role in relationships, especially during challenging times, we can learn to exercise love more effectively in our interactions with others.

Big Idea: The big idea communicated is that true love, as defined in Scripture, is patient and transformative, enabling us to connect deeply with others and model Christ's companionship and understanding.

- Let’s turn to our core passage for today.

1 Corinthians 13:1–4 NET 2nd ed.

1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but I do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.

2 And if I have prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.

3 If I give away everything I own, and if I give over my body in order to boast, but do not have love, I receive no benefit.

4 Love is patient, love is kind, it is not envious. Love does not brag, it is not puffed up.

SERMON

SLIDE #2 MAIN POINT #1

I. Patience: The anchor of love.

- Patience is essential for developing stronger relationships with others.

- The first thing Paul mentions to the church at Corinth about love is that “love is patient.”

- When you think of the concept of love, patience is the anchor of love.

- The Greek word we translate patience translates to “long passion.”

- It means doing everything possible to avoid an outburst of passionate anger.

- It also conveys refusing to retaliate with anger, even when suffering.

- To put it more concisely, patience means that love has a long fuse.

- If we want to love better, we must learn the art of patience.

- In the first three verses of the chapter, Paul talks about possessing great gifts and making tremendous sacrifices, but if we do not have love, neither of those things mean much of anything.

- Patience is part of the fruit of the Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23.

- God is patient with us.

- Several verses highlight God’s patience, even in the face of wrongdoing.

- This divine patience is meant to lead people to repentance and salvation.

- When you dig into the other things that love is in 1 Corinthians 13, when you think about it, without patience, being kind, not taking into account a wrong suffered, just to name a few, is all but impossible without patience.

- In our society, and the church seems at times to be no different, we are so easily angered and offended.

- We tend to lack the patience to consider what may be happening in the lives of others that may have led to their poor behavior.

- Folks, CHRISTIAN love has a long fuse.

- The fact is that people around us will hurt us, sometimes on purpose, but most of the time without malice.

- Being patient, especially when suffering for doing good, is pleasing to God.

- Additionally, God’s patience provides people with the time to be saved.

- Satan uses the art of hurry to help trap us into not being patient with others.

- My friend Shan Wood stated this thought concerning busyness.

- “Satan doesn’t show up as a demon with a pitchfork...Today, you’re far more likely to run into the enemy in the form of an alert on your phone while you’re reading your Bible...Both sin and busyness have the exact same effect—they cut off your connection to God, to other people, and even to your own soul.”