The Love Of God-3

The LOVE Of GOD-III—1Corinthians 13:1-13

Attention:

Lost in the Translation:

A husband & wife are at a recognized high-brow restaurant celebrating their anniversary. Looking the menu over, they were shocked to see a dish named, “hickory-smoked road-kill possum jowls in pancake syrup.” They summoned their waiter to complain.

Their waiter looks at the menu, & then looks up in shock. He says apologetically, “I am sorry that you had to witness such an outrage. We will take care of this immediately!, & Your meal will be on the house tonight!”

And the entire wait staff is hurriedly gathered together for a brief meeting.

The wife uses the break to go to the bathroom.

But just before she pushes open the bathroom door, the wife overhears the head waiter pointedly directing the wait staff to NOT use the ‘new’ menu, warning them, ““Heads-Up boys & girls! The printers forgot to translate the menu into French again!”

•Just because food has a French name(something most would not understand), doesn’t mean that it tastes good or is even good for you!

•We can be duped into believing that something is of ‘superior’ quality, when it is actually of ‘inferior’ quality & thus quite dangerous to yourself, others, & to the Kingdom of God.

In general people have a similar & genuine confusion about the meaning of love, & what it means to serve a ‘loving’ God. They suppose themselves to be ‘eating from’ the best that ‘love’ has to offer, when in reality they don’t have the first clue as to what they’re delving into.

Need:

To know & apply God’s self-giving love, so as to prevent anything less from taking it’s place in our lives.

•“Self-giving”—Giving of yourself for the sake of another or others, rather than for yourself alone.

Paul highlighted the necessity of self-giving, sacrificial love to the proper outworking of Christian living.

Self-giving, sacrificial love is essential to true Christianity.

How is that kind of love essential to the Christian faith?

*Without Self-giving, sacrificial love, the ‘living out’ of Christian faith becomes mere/empty social reforms of human endeavor....Which the world at large, jealously & ravenously devours, protects, & proffers!

1Pet. 4:8—“And above all things have fervent love for one another, for “love will cover a multitude of sins.”[Prov. 10:12]

1Tim. 1:5—“Now the purpose of the commandment is love from a pure heart, from a good conscience, & from sincere faith,”

*This entire chapter actually describes & defines agaph love with it’s results.

Our best understanding of agaph love & the supreme example of it, is God’s agaph love toward humanity & the world, for the sake of their betterment.

God’s love& it is always a self-giving &/or sacrificial love. God’s Love cannot be accomplished by any of humanity, apart from their approaching it thru God in Christ.

So far we’ve found that:

As A Christian, the Love of God must Humble My...

1. SPEECH(:1)

2. ABILITY(:2)

Today we’ll also find that:

3—As A Christian, the Love of God must Humble My...

SACRIFICE(:3)

Explanation:(:3)

:3—“And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, & though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing.

“And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor,...but have not love, it profits me nothing.”

“Bestow...to feed” or “give to feed” or “give away in food” is a translation of a single word in the Greek—qwmizw. In the Greek sentence, there is no word present to specifically describe “the poor.” However ‘poverty’ is surely implied, as are a host of other related scenarios where the certainty of one’s next meal is threatened or is missing completely.

“Bestow...To feed/Give away in food”—qwmizw—1Aorist Active Indicative 1st Sing.—1) To feed by putting a bit or crumb(of food) into the mouth; 1a) Of infants, young animals etc.; 2) To feed, nourish; 3) To give a thing to feed someone, feed out to. Strong—To supply with bits, i.e. generally--To nourish. Used 2X--Rom. 12:20; 1Cor. 13:3.?From the base of—qwmion—A crumb or morsel(as if rubbed off), i.e. A mouthful; diminutive from a derivative of the base of qwcw—To triturate, i.e. by analogy--To rub out(kernels from husks with the fingers or hand).

Here as before(with speaking(:1), & other abilities such as prophecy, knowledge, & faith(:2)), Paul is taking abilities granted by God’s grace to an extreme, for the sake of argument. His general argument being, that God’s giftedness, spiritual giftedness, is pointless in the absence of ‘agape love.’

•So Christian, if you give of yourself at all, then you must love as God loves.

IF(“though”) I were to “bestow all my goods to feed[others]”, use up every bit of my substance—giving up all my possessions—in order to feed others(implied) of those who are needy & starving, even that action would not be commendable—it would be a useless effort/sacrifice—IF such sacrifice is executed WITHOUT God’s ‘agape love.’