An Observable Example of Love

If you have your Bibles, I would invite you to turn to 1 Cor. 13, and as you are going there consider for a moment a phrase that we are all very familiar with…

We have all heard the saying to put your money where your mouth is…

The concept of course being that when all is said and done, there is often a lot more said than is actually done.

That is antithetical to Christian living. We are called to be doers of the word, and not only hearers. But what if that doing is going to cause a bit of discomfort for you and for me?

The history of the Christian church is full of great and marvelous stories of persons putting their money where their mouth is, but I have always found the account of Cyprian, Bishiop of Carthage, as one of the most moving stories.

Hi his book, “when the church was a family.” Author Josephy Hellerman tells the story of how Christians in Numidian had been taken captive by local raiders for a ransom.

It has caused us the gravest anguish in our hearts, dearly beloved brothers, and indeed it brought tears to our eyes to read your letter which in your love and anxiety you wrote to us about our brothers and sisters who are now held in captive hands... We must now, accordingly, reckon the captivity of our brethren as our captivity also, and we must account the distress of those in peril as our own distress; for, I need hardly remind you, in our union we form but one body and, therefore, not just love but our religion ought to rouse and spur us on to redeem brethren who are our fellow members.

If we can make an observation there first, I’m not sure how often many of us would pen such a letter. I’m not sure how often any of us would dare to claim such care for persons.

Well, eventually the church did raise the money, and notice the letter that is sent back to the church…

[his reply to the church]

Accordingly, we are sending in cash one hundred thousand sesterces which have been collected from the contributions of the clergy and the laity who reside here with us in the church over which, by God’s favor, we have charge...Our fervent wish is indeed that nothing similar should happen in the future and that our brothers, under the protection of the Lord’s majesty, may be kept safe from all such perils. If, however, in order to test and examine the faith and charity in our hearts, anything of the kind should befall you, do not hesitate to write word of it to us; you can be fully confident and assured that whilst our church and all of the brethren here do pray that this should never occur again, yet, if it does, they will willingly provide generous assistance.

Now, I know what some of you are thinking…well how much money is that? Estimates range, but we those numbers tend to run pretty high. That really isn’t the point though, is it?

The point is, that this large congregation in the city, when it heard that its rural brothers and sisters had been taken captive, out of there deep love for that Church, a love whose fount was Christ…sprung into action.

It was not a love that was just talked about, it was Observable Love, and that is what I want to talk to you about this morning

Be the Church

An Observable Love

Introduction

[Read 1 Cor. 12:27-13:13]

I. Love is Absolutely Necessary (1-3)

1 Corinthians 13:1–3 —“If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 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. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.”

Remember the original context of what Paul is writing to the church. There had been some divisions, and the truth is that the church at Corinth could fight about anything…remember when I preached on Candidate Sunday that they were fighting about Being of Paul or Apollos? He also wanted them to be made aware of the gifts of the Spirit…of Spiritual matters too.

The problem back then was that everyone kind of liked the flashy gifts…and that was the gift of tongues…things had gotten so out of hand, that Paul would eventually have to, by Divine inspiration, set down rules governing the use of tongues in Churches.

Now, those rules are no longer in force since those gifts have died out, but they were needed because the congregation was…just a hot mess.

He would even go as far to say…

1 Corinthians 14:20 Brothers, do not be children in your thinking. Be infants in evil, but in your thinking be mature.

They were really interested in all the flashy gifts…but they were not as interested in the one thing that Paul knew that they needed…love.

Gorden Fee helps frame the entire problem of the Church at Corinth this way.

Possessing charismata is not the sign of the Spirit; Christian love is…They speak in tongues, to be sure, which Paul will not question as a legitimate activity of the Spirit. But at the same time they tolerate, or endorse, illicit sexuality, greed, and idolatry (5:9–10; illustrated in 5:1–5; 6:1–11; 6:12–20; 8:1–10:22). They spout “wisdom” and “knowledge”; but in the former they stand boldly against Paul and his gospel of a crucified Messiah, and in the latter they are willing to “build up” a brother by destroying him (8:10–11). In short, they have a spirituality that has religious trappings (asceticism, knowledge, tongues) but has abandoned rather totally genuinely Christian ethics, with its supremacy of love.

Gordon D. Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1987), 627.

Now, today, we would argue that speaking in tongues is not a legitimate activity because that gift has died out. It is not longer needed. But at the writing of this letter, it was still an active part of the church.

The problem was the church at Corinth was all caught up in the wrong things…they had abandoned the central theme of Christian love.

What our text would have us see is that love is absolutely essential to the life of our church family..and it is essential in four ways from our text.

A. For Relationships with Each Other

To “have love,” therefore, means to be toward others the way God in Christ has been toward us.

Gordon D. Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, MI: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1987), 631.

B. For Ministry in the Church

(knowledge + prophetic powers—Balaam as antitype)

It is easier to be orthodox than to be loving, and easier to be active in church work than to be loving. Yet the supreme characteristic that God demands of His people is love…Love is the willing, joyful desire to put the welfare of others above our own

John F. MacArthur Jr., 1 Corinthians, MacArthur New Testament Commentary (Chicago: Moody Press, 1984), 329.

C. For Worship toward God

D. For everything we do

(point being…you might be able to do anything…but without love….you are nothing)

II. The Triumph of Love (4-7)

1 Corinthians 13:4–7 —“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”

Right theology is no substitute for love. Religious works are no substitute for love. Nothing substitutes for love. Christians have no excuse for not loving, “because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us” (Rom. 5:5). We do not have to manufacture love; we only have to share the love we have been given

John F. MacArthur Jr., 1 Corinthians, MacArthur New Testament Commentary (Chicago: Moody Press, 1984), 330.

[the Greek forms of all those properties are verbs. They do not focus on what love is so much as on what love does and does not do]

A. Seven Biblical Examples of What love is

· patient

· kind;

· rejoices with the truth.

· Love bears all things

· believes all things

· hopes all things

· endures all things

B. Eight Biblical Example of What love is not

· envy

· boast;

· arrogant

· rude

· insist on its own way

· not irritable

· resentful;

· rejoice at wrongdoing,

III. Love’s Eternal Endurance (8-13)

1 Corinthians 13:8–13 —“Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known. So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.”

First, love represents “the power of the new age” breaking into the present, “the only vital force which has a future.” Love is that quality which distinctively stamps the life of heaven, where regard and respect for the other dominates the character of life with God as the communion of saints and heavenly hosts

Second, as we have noted, love (ἀγάπη) denotes above all a stance or attitude which shows itself in acts of will as regard, respect, and concern for the welfare of the other. It is therefore profoundly christological, for the cross is the paradigm case of the act of will and stance which places welfare of others above the interests of the self.

Anthony C. Thiselton, The First Epistle to the Corinthians: A Commentary on the Greek Text, New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 2000), 1035.