Chico Alliance Church
Pastor David Welch
“Genuine Love”
Review
I. Receive the gift of righteousness
II. Apply the Gift of Righteousness
III. Place of Israel in the God’s Plan of Salvation
IV. Live the Gift of Righteousness
A. Dedicate fully your body and soul to God’s service
B. Think fittingly and serve faithfully in the body. 12:3-8
Fitting thinking has to do with understanding basic principles
• The principle of Humility
• The Principle of Headship
• The Principle of Complexity
• The Principle of Diversity
• The Principle of Unity
• Principle of Mutuality
Faithful serving has to do with investing our measure of grace in serving the body.
The justified will demonstrate the work of Christ in their life by genuine love for others.
C. Love genuinely
We have heard this word “love” thoroughly tossed around this past week.
It can refer to an action -- “love one another”, “God so loved the world.”
It can be used to describe character -- “God is love.”
It can also be used as an adjective -- “what a loving thing to do”.
The more I think about it, the less I think I really understand what love is all about. It doesn’t help that our English word has such a broad application and usage.
I found at least 17 different variations of meaning in the English dictionary. The Greeks tried to differentiate between some of these applications by using different words. We have looked at them before.
Feeling Love -- Actions stimulated by an attitude based on common pleasure
Family Love -- Actions stimulated by an attitude based on common heritage (blood relationship)
Friendship Love -- Actions stimulated by an attitude based on common interests
Foundational Love -- Actions stimulated by an attitude based on personal strength and commitment
Paul already introduced this divine attribute in his letter concerning God’s love for us.
God demonstrated his love toward us by giving His own Son.
God flooded our hearts with His love by the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
Nothing can separate us from God’s love in Christ.
We find three of these Greek words in our current passage. However, the two of them are based upon a commitment to the foundational love urged at the head of this passage. Having urged us to dedicate their bodies and souls and get their thinking straight regarding their relationship to other members of Christ’s body, Paul then instructed the Romans to show genuine love toward one another. It is interesting to note that the other significant passage calling for genuine love also directly follows another passage concerning spiritual gifting. Without love gifting is meaningless.
“love without hypocrisy”
Or we might say Paul instructs us to love one another genuinely.
The active demonstration of genuine love is the primary evidence of genuine Christianity.
"By this(mutual love) all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another." Jo 13:31-35
The most effective power for evangelism today hasn’t changed since the beginning of the church -- the power of genuine love. This is both the music and message of the Gospel that penetrates the hardened heart. This genuine love is what effectively and eternally impacts a selfish, love-starved culture. Only one definition of love captures its essence – God is love. Wherever you see God manifested, you see love in action. Wherever you see love in action, you see God demonstrated. When those made in God’s image once again reflect the love of the one whose image they represent, the world takes notice. Before the rebellion, man’s natural relational bent was selfless giving and ministry. Since the fall, that selfless giving and ministry to others deteriorated into a life of selfish grabbing and manipulation for self. Only the Lord of Love can restore us to a life that operates according to the royal law of love. Only he can reboot our system to its original settings to once again operate in loving community. This and other passages present a standard, an outline, a template of love by which we may compare and evaluate the level or even the presence of genuine love in our own life.
Paul told the Romans to love without hypocrisy. “Hypocrite” = one who acts on stage, impersonates anyone, plays a part, simulates, feigns or pretends. Paul urges those significantly touched by God to touch others, to continually love with a genuine love.
A hypocritical love would be outward actions devoid of inward reality. They actions do not stem from any desire to meaningfully connect with others. They are actions that hide some other motivation. Most of what passes for love in our culture is actually tolerance. We have no desire to actually make meaningful connection.
Why fake love? Try to convince others we are genuine Christians. Attempt to duplicate supernatural characteristics by natural means. Try to entice others to responds favorably to me. Paul urged the Corinthians to beware of love’s actions without a corresponding attitude.
Paul indicates there that it may be possible to go through the motions without the reality.
It is possible to perform “loving” actions without a “loving” attitude or heart.
If I speak eloquently and even perhaps supernaturally.
If I have prophecy
If I have all knowledge
If I have all faith so as to remove mountains
If I give at a point in my life all my possessions to feed the poor
I give up my body to be burned on behalf of others
“but do not continually demonstrate, have, possess, or desire to truly connect with people”
My actions become only an irritating sound to the people who hear. I become of no eternal significance. (I am nothing) I personally gain nothing in terms of eternal value or reward.
From this passage I discern that love is more than actions. Love describes a passion or desire to meaningfully connect with people. Love has to do with community.
Love has to do with interacting with people. Without meaningful interaction with people, there cannot be genuine love. Some of us might declare, “I could be a loving person if it wasn’t for irritating people.” God’s foundational love finds its energy from inner divinely transformed character and God inspired passion energized by the indwelling Spirit of love. Inability to genuinely love others really says more about me and my character than about the deficiencies or inadequacies of others. If this love is a decision and passion that emanates from our inner core and has nothing to do with the actions or attitudes of others, than failure to love is a melt down within me. It is MY problem.
Foundational love is a divinely motivated decision to persistently pursue meaningful connection with God and others demonstrated by selfless care and sacrificial service that significantly touches or impacts the one being loved.
This love is not based on my feelings but may ignite certain inner feelings. This love is not motivated by external factors but flows from inner character as transformed and ignited by the God of love Himself. Genuine love has at least three aspects.
Love begins with a DESIRE to meaningfully connect with people that stimulates a DECSION to pursue meaningful connection and ends in DEEDS that promote genuine community.
God’s core desire to restore connection with us was so strong that it stimulated a decision to do something about it that ended in the plan of redemption, which included the sacrifice of His own Son and the desire to freely give us all things. Genuine love has to do with the passion for, and the pursuit and practice of meaningful connection with people.
Love has to do with meaningful relationship. The rub is that God instructs us to pursue such meaningful connection even with our enemies and every one else in between.
Love your neighbors. Love your enemies. Love your fellow workers. Therefore most of the portraits and descriptions of love in action that we find, focus on elements related to meaningful relationships and the avoidance of attitudes and actions that block or damage meaningful relationships.
I Corinthians 13 is full of attitudes and actions associated with relational health.
Genuine Love – Spirit driven Hypocritical Love – Flesh driven
Long-tempered NOT Short-tempered
Kind NOT Apathetic or cruel
Supportive of others NOT Jealous of others
Determined to build up others NOT Determined to build up self
Tolerant of the actions of others NOT Provoked by the actions of others
Talks about the qualities of others DOESN’T Talk about their own qualities
Acts thoughtfully DOESN’T Act shamefully
Seeks to satisfy others DOESN’T Seek to satisfy self
Forgives and overlooks other’s offenses DOESN’T Track other’s offenses
Rejoices in truth DOESN’T Rejoice in evil
Protects all DOESN’T Reveal all
Believes all DOESN’T Question all
Hopes for the best DOESN’T Expect the worst
Endures difficulty DOESN’T Evade difficulty
Always lasts and never fails DOESN’T Quit
Such a list causes me to question the genuineness of my love. Am I going through the motions or do I truly desire to meaningfully connect with people? Much of time we go to great length to avoid people we find different from us. God built us for selfless community. (Mutuality) The fallen nature pursues selfish celebrity. Scripture does indicate there are different levels of love. Our desire to connect with others may vary form person to person but the nature of God’s love is to pursue meaningful connection with everyone.
Paul follows his instruction to genuine love with a checklist of attitudes and actions that demonstrate the authenticity of our love. In the Greek he follows the command with twelve “ing” words that we will explore over the next few weeks. If I say I have love for others but fail to demonstrate any of the things listed here I would do well to more closely examine the true nature of my love for others.
What is the source of divine love?
• God is love
The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. 1 John 4:8
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. 1 John 4:16
God always loves.
Everything he does is motivated by love.
Wherever you see love, you see God.
Wherever you see God, you see love.
• Love is from God.
In this is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation (satisfactory payment) for our sins…We love, because He first loved us. 1 John 10,19
Peace be to the brethren, and love with faith, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Ephes. 6:23
God’s love motivates and is the basis of our capacity to love. Because we were created in the image of God who is love, love is at the core of human experience. Even the secular “experts” admit that the core longing of man is to love and be loved. The fall twisted that desire to love and serve others into self-love. Only through a supernatural transformation can that diminished capacity to love God and others be restored to its original capacity.
Love is because of God. Love is from God.
• God floods believer’s hearts with His love by the Holy Spirit Rom 5:1-8
and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out (spilled, gushed out – perfect tense verb indicating a past action with continuing results i.e. poured out and still there!) within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.
At the moment of salvation, God filled our empty relational reservoir with his undiminished love. That includes both the personal realization of it and the practical release of it. God gives us all the resources necessary to personally realize and practically release love. The problem lies in our damaged soul that fails to personally perceive the wonder of His love for us and realize the fulfillment of sharing that love with others. We make the choice to share His love or thwart it.
• Love is the result of surrender to work of the Holy Spirit
“The fruit of the Spirit is love…” Gal 5:22
When we walk by the direction and power of the Spirit, we love. The self-centered lust of the flesh automatically disappears when we walk by the Spirit.
• God grants the believer a spirit (nature) of love
For God has not given us a spirit of timidity, but of power and love and discipline (self-control).
• God causes us to growth in love 1 Thes 3:11-13
Now may our God and Father Himself and Jesus our Lord direct our way to you; and may the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love for one another, and for all men, just as we also do for you; so that He may establish your hearts unblamable in holiness before our God and Father at the coming of our Lord Jesus with all His saints.
Here it is obvious that love is not stagnant. Love grows and develops. God is the cause of growth.
• God teaches us to love 1 Thes 4:9-12
Now as to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another
Just how God teaches us is not specifically taught. He is active in our learning process. He causes growth through teaching. Even though His love indwells us, there is a learning and growing process.
• Love is a protective shield
But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in the love of God, waiting anxiously for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to eternal life. Jude 1:20-21
But since we are of the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and as a helmet, the hope of salvation. 1 Thes. 5:8
God’s love is a shelter in a world that desires to destroy anything that is related to good and God’s kingdom. No matter what rages around us, we are assured that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ.
• Love for God and for others is the central point of the entire Bible.
And He said to him, " 'YOU SHALL LOVE THE LORD YOUR GOD WITH ALL YOUR HEART, AND WITH ALL YOUR SOUL, AND WITH ALL YOUR MIND.' "This is the great and foremost commandment. "The second is like it, 'YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.' "On these two commandments depend the whole Law and the Prophets." Matthew 22:37-40
So do we have any part in this love thing?
• Obedience purifies the heart to initially love sincerely 1 Pet 1:22
Since you have in obedience to the truth purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart, for you have been born again not of seed which is perishable but imperishable, that is, through the living and abiding word of God. 1 Peter 1:22-23
When we respond to the truth of the word of God there is a new birth. The old heart, no longer capable of genuinely loving God or others, is purified and renewed with a new capacity to love. Peter urges us to develop this new capacity to its fullest extent and fervently love one another not from obligation or forced action but from a heart that sincerely desires to meaningfully connect with others.
• Obedience also perfects love in the heart 1 Jn 2:3-6
but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected. By this we know that we are in Him: the one who says he abides in Him ought himself to walk in the same manner as He walked.
John indicates here that obedience to the truth not only restores the capacity to love but develops it as well.
• Love is something we choose to wear or put on
“Put on love which is the perfect bond of unity.” Col 3:14
• Love may be pursued by us
But flee from these things, you man of God; and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, perseverance and gentleness. 1 Tim. 6:11
• Love is to be the guiding factor in everything we do.
Let all that you do be done in love. 1 Cor. 16:14
• Love comes from encouragement by the body
and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more, as you see the day drawing near.
• Love is modeled by others 2 Tim 3:10-11
But you followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love, perseverance, persecutions, and sufferings, such as happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium and at Lystra; what persecutions I endured, and out of them all the Lord delivered me!
• Loves growth depends on intercessory prayer
Paul continually prayed for the development and manifestation of love among believers even among those who were already doing well.
Now as to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another; for indeed you do practice it toward all the brethren who are in all Macedonia. But we urge you, brethren, to excel still more, 1 Thes. 4:9-10
Conclusion
The last days will be filled with those whose love has grown cold. People will be lovers of self even more than God. Parents will be without natural affection.
The consequences of a fleshly walk will be evident by deterioration in relationships. The church will lose its first love for God that will affect their love for each other. Carnality will result in internal fighting and disputes and jealousy. Rather than assemble more which the Bible instructs us to do as the end draws nearer, Christian will isolate from one another. Lack of encouragement by the truth will bring about a hardness of heart. The result will be a failure to reflect a true picture of the God of love to a world that no longer finds love at home or in the church. Much of our interaction is mere tolerance and politeness. We no longer desire meaningful connection with the entire body of Christ.
We pick and choose whom we will significantly relate to based on how comfortable they make ME feel or what they can do for me. This, my friends, is not genuine love. This is hypocritical love and God tells us to love WITHOUT hypocrisy. Let us cry out to God for forgiveness. Let us cry out for a new work in the very core of our souls that we may learn to fervently love one another from the heart. Those who do demonstrate genuine love, I urge you to cry out to God that you may excel even more. For the more we demonstrate genuine love the more the world will realize that God is in our midst.
Study/Application Guide
The following are some suggestions for remembering and applying the truths from this message along with some suggestions for possible further study.
Remembering
The point of this passage is not complicated –“Love without hypocrisy or Genuinely love.”
Until you can do that you must understand what love is all about. Take some time to review the suggested definition for love offered in this message.
Foundational love is a divinely motivated decision to persistently pursue meaningful connection with God and others demonstrated by selfless care and sacrificial service that significantly touches or impacts the one being loved.
Take some time to think about the three elements in genuine love.
Love begins with an inner DESIRE to connect with people
that generates a DECISION to pursue connection
and culminates in DEEDS that demonstrate care and promote community.
Applying
Here are some probing questions.
How many of your contacts with people focus on a desire to meaningfully connect and touch their life in some way? Love is about community. What are you doing to promote community? How is your response to those who do not promise some sort of personal payback now or in the future? Can you invest your time purely for the sake of ministry to someone else? Think about the assertion that since foundational love is character based and divinely inspired rather than motivated by “worthiness in the one being loved, failure to love is my problem not theirs.
Take some time to review the attributes of genuine love from 1 Corinthians 13 as listed in the chart above. Which side of the chart ACTUALLY reflects your relationships with people?
If you find yourself coming up short of the standard, will you first confess you failure to love and then pray each day this week that God would help you realize His love for you and then release that love to others.
What have you allowed in your heart to block the release of God’s love to others? Unforgiveness? Bitterness? Fear of rejection? Pride?
More Study
List out as many demonstrations of genuine love as you can find in the verses after 12:9.
What more about foundational love do you learn from the following verses? Look up these passages and then list any specific attributes or facts about this love you discover there.
1 John 3:21-24; Eph 2:4-7; Rom 13:10; Mark 10:21; Eph 5:1-2; Col 3:14; 1 Tim 1:5; 1 Pet 1:8-9; Heb 12; Philemon 1:4-7; Mark 24:9-14; Eph 6:24; John 5:38-42; 1 John 2:15; 1 Pet 1:22-23; 1 John 3:18
