"Lessons for Life Pt 1"
Learning to Love
1 Corinthians 13:1-13
1 Corinthians 13:13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love. ESV
Introduction: How hard can it be to love somebody, right? It ought to be easy, right? Everybody loves love, right? Yet, millions find it difficult to love and millions more don't feel loved. And in addition to that in my opinion there are lots of folks to don't have a clue about what real love is.
ILL - Rick Warren in his book The Purpose Driven Life says, "Life is all about love!"
"Because God is love, the most important lesson he wants you to learn on earth is how to love. It is in loving that we are most like him, so love is the foundation of every command he has given us; 'the whole Law can be summed up in this one command; 'Love others as you love yourself" (123).
Why is there so much confusion about what real love is? Some of it has to do with the influences of our culture and some has to do with our experiences as human beings. If I were to ask 100 people to give me a definition of love I would probably get 100 answers. I'm reminded of a scene from the Forest Gump movie where he has asked Jenny to marry him and she refuses. There is a scene as he stands in the hallway and says, "Jenny, I may not be very smart, but I know what love is." The problem for Forrest was that Jenny didn't know what real love was! From what we gather from watching this movie Jenny and so many like her have been sexually abused by a family member while growing up and it twisted and warped her concept of real love. Our culture is very influential in this regard. We are a sexually saturated society where we are exposed to thousands of images that equate sex and love, that shout loud and clear that love and lust are synonymous. The saddest truth of all is that many professing Christians do not know what real love is. You can tell that from the way they behave not only outside the church but even worse, inside the church. Remember, Paul is writing to the church in this letter. The Corinthian church was birthed in a cesspool of a place where immorality, homosexuality, adultery and fornication were rampant. Listen to what says about them:
1 Corinthians 6:9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, 10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. 11 And such were some of you. But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.
ILL - Two taxidermists stopped in front of a window where an owl was on display. They immediately began to criticize the way it was mounted. Its eyes were not natural; its wings were not in proportion with its head; its feathers were not neatly arranged; and its feet could be improved. Just when they had finished with their criticism, the owl turned his head...and blinked. The moral to this story is that many folks wouldn't recognize the real thing even if they saw it! How can we know what love is and experience in our lives and give love to others? No one had more to say about love than the Apostle Paul. Let's look at what he had to say about this subject. First, let's look at:
I. The Argument for Love (Agape)
Let's start with the basics if we can. The key to learning what love means can be found in the following: The majority of the NT was written in the Greek language, actually a form of Greek which was the everyday language of that time. Almost everyone in the world that Paul lived in spoke and wrote this language. It's kind of like English for us here in America. Greek was the common language of that day. There are anywhere from 4-7 Greek words translated "love" in English. The ancients used them in different ways depending on the context of the situation. I'm going to share three with you this morning for our study:
#1 Agápe (ἀγάπη agápē) means "love: esp. brotherly love, charity; the love of God for man and of man for God Agape is used by Christians to express the unconditional love of God for his children as in John 3:16.
#2 Éros (ἔρως érōs) means "love, mostly of the sexual passion."[5] The Modern Greek word "erotas" means "intimate love."
#3 Philia (φιλία philía) means "affectionate regard, friendship,"...philia is expressed variously as loyalty to friends, family, and community. From Wikipedia In our text Paul uses the first word Agape which the KJV translates into the word "charity." To simplify our study I will uses the ESV to read this section of our text:
1 Corinthians 13:1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
What does Paul say about agape in this opening section of 1 Corinthians? Notice Paul does not exempt himself from this truth. He says "Though I..."
a. Ecstatic (tongues) or exalted (angelic) speech
b. Enhanced faith (faith that can move mountains)
c. Elevated self-abandonment (to the point of martyrdom)
Paul states that the results of all this religious exercise without agape is (nothing), which is translated zero! Love is the best gift, the more excellent way mentioned in verse 31 of the previous chapter. Next, Paul moves beyond a statement about the excellence of love to an analysis of the character of agape (love). Again I'm going to refer to the ESV for clarification of the text:
II. The Analysis of Love (agape)
1 Corinthians 13:4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Let me ask you a series of questions.
#1 Does this describe your concept of what love is? When you think of love, is this what you think about?
#2 Is this the kind of love that you have experienced in your life? Has someone given you this kind of love?
#3 Is this how you love others? When you say that you love someone do you love them in the way that Paul describes agape love?
If the answer to any or all of these questions is no then let's take the final few minutes of this message to talk about how you can experience this love personally and how you can extend this love to others.
III. The Application of Love (agape)
a. The source of agape love
WHAT'S GOD GOT TO DO WITH IT?
If you "Google" the word love, and you have to be very careful doing this, you will find all sorts of websites, 120,000,000 to be exact. Here are some examples that you will find:
I love Dogs.com
I love Cats.com (Although this one is a plea to spay or neuter)
I love Cheese. Com
I love Lucy.com
We love the Iraqi Information Minister.com
True Romance Dating Service.com
Love Test.com
Matchmaker.com
The Love Calculator.com On this site you type in your name and your mates name and it gives you the odds of your relationship lasting. The interesting aspect is that on all these sites, love is seen as almost an entirely human endeavor.
There is no question that God Himself is the source of this love so if we want to experience agape love then we must have an experience with God who is the source, the fountainhead, the wellspring of agape love. What does the Bible have to say about how we experience this love?
The Apostle John who knew something about the agape love of God tells us that God in His very essence is this agape love, that "God is love!" At the moment we receive Jesus Christ as our own personal Savior we receive the love of God.
John 1:12 But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:
At that moment when you place your faith in Jesus something wonderful happens that can only be experienced, I can't do it for you, you have to do it for yourself. Paul declares that:
Romans 5:5 ...the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.
When the Holy Spirit comes to dwell within us God "...pours His love into us..." which is how the phrase "shed abroad" is translated. There is no other way for you and I to know this kind of love!
1 John 3:1 "Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God..."
Let me make one last statement concerning this agape love. If you have it you will show it and you will share it.
b. The showing of agape love
1 John 3:18 My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue; but in deed and in truth.
If you have it you will show and others will know it!
By its very nature agape love cannot be concealed. Agape love will show if you have it! It's like the little boy who came home to his mother to tell what the Sunday School teacher had been telling him about Jesus. The little fellow told his mother that the teacher said, "we should as Jesus to come into our hearts." His mother said "Yes son, everyone should." But the little guy asked, "If I do that won't He stick out all over?" If you have the love of God in you it will show!
Finally, if we have we will share it! Not only can we not conceal it, agape love is so wonderful we will want to share it with everyone! How do we share
c. The sharing of agape love
ILL - In the book, "Children's Letters to God: The New Collection", a little girl named, Nan, writes this letter: "Dear God, I bet it is very hard for you to love all of everybody in the whole world. There are only four people in our family and I have trouble loving them!"
We will love God, we will love one another, we will love our spouse, we will love our neighbor and we will love our enemies as well. We will do this in all kinds of tangible and intangible ways. In Matthew 25 Jesus is describing the separation of the sheep from the goats in the judgment and He says:
Matthew 25:34 Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: 35 For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: 36 Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me. 37 Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? 38 When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? 39 Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? 40 And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me
