Sermon Tone Analysis

We come up on the subject of love and specifically loving other people.

the scriptures call it loving your neighbor and that's another way of saying loving the people around you.

It is not reducing it down to just your next door neighbor and that is far as you go.

But the intent behind this is the people that is around you.

Loving other people is an interesting and essential topic of discussion when we consider the current culture.

I do not think that it is unimportant in different cultures but we specifically live in a culture that is redefining love.

Love is such a positive word therefore it cannot have any negative implications.

Therefore anything that is done in negativity cannot be from love.

At least that seems to be the understanding today.

so our stance as a church against sin will contradict much of our culture's actions.

Therefore , the culture will determine that we are being unloving because our stance that restricts their actions is deemed negative.

And if something is negative it cannot be from something positive like love.

But anybody who has been in any relationship knows that protecting a loved one sometimes means you get negative.

You have a spouse that is getting worked up and you tell them to calm down.

Perhaps an elderly parent is being taken advantage of and you tell them do not listen.

Your child is doing an activity that can harm them and you tell them that is not OK.

None of those things come from a place of hatred but they all come from a place of love.

Love protects the ignorant.

love protects those who stumble.

But Unfortunately for us, we have allowed our culture to take the steering wheel when it comes to the topic of love.

But there are bigger issues involved with all of this.

It is quite possible that we are living in the most selfish , self gratifying age that has ever lived.

We live in a time where information comes faster than anytime that has ever existed before.

We live in a time or we can have food the fastest that it's ever been prepared in the history of man before.

It was not that long ago when the women would be in the kitchen all day just to have dinner ready.

You didn't have refrigeration, or microwaves, or grocery stores that packed an unlimited amount of meat.

Nope, the chicken you ate for dinner was plucked that morning.

No, today if we are in the fast food line for more than a minute and a half we sit there and we go this is ridiculous.

If we don't get the information that we're looking for when we want it then we are upset.

It used to be that if you wanted to look something up you had to go down to your local library and get the encyclopedia and look it up yourself.

Before that, you had to pay for higher education and before that you just had to live without the answer.

The point is is that we are in a time where whatever we want we have it and we have it when we want it.

And having that kind of power, is dangerous when it comes to our sinful inclinations.

Many of us recognize it as a great blessing but what we refused to see is how it actually caters to our sinful inclinations.

In our sin we are selfish people.

In our sin people are generally selfish.

So providing a world where everybody can have what they want when they want it the slightest disruption of that sets off the mind.

It is to the point where the slightest inconvenience is looked at as in an infringement on us.

So we say, I want Christianity but I don't want it the way it has been.

I want Christianity but what I don't want is a rigid system that my grandparents used to have.

And because we are a very selfish and self gratifying culture we demand that our churches cater to such attitude.

Not only should a ministry offer XY and Z but the pastor must look a certain way, the pastor must act a certain way, the pastor must speak a certain way, and all of these demands have nothing to do with the call of a pastor laid out in scripture but has everything to do with our selfishness and what we think will cause the proper growth.

If the word of God is not the rule in your life, it will be your sin that will make all your decisions for you.

If the word of God is not the rule of your life then you couldn't possibly give a biblical response in the first place.

Beyond that, the church better never, ever make any demands upon me.

The church better never, ever expect me to go out and do something.

So provide me with free therapy, provide me with great entertainment, provide me childcare when I need childcare, and you better not demand anything of me or expect anything out of me.

This is the common attitude if we are being honest.

We live in the age of consumerism and that consumerism has hardwired our brain to run and think a specific way and we have applied that to worship.

And if this is our attitudes then we can never really be truly loving to anybody.

Selfishness has been alive and well in every single generation since the fall of man.

And This is why we have laws in the word of God instructing us to love others because we Are so prone to only caring about ourselves that we would never stop and think of others.

Even the good deeds that we see taking place now , at least a lot of them, are only done because cameras are watching.

So there are videos of people going Hey I'm going to give $100 to this homeless guy.

Would you still do it if the Camera wasn't rolling and you didn't have the opportunity to post it on YouTube?

That was more for their attention and the hits they get online than it was for the homeless man.

Rich celebrities hire image consultants to tell them what causes they should be giving too so that people will like them.

Some of them give to causes that they truly believe in, but a lot are doing it under the instruction of an image consultant because it helps their career.

they need a good image so the people will like them so they do the things that people like so people will pay to see there form of entertainment.

In the end it's all selfish.

Now if they want to pay millions of dollars to whatever cause, that is their right to.

But let's call a Spade a Spade and start seeing things for what they really are.

This is why we cannot allow ourselves and our culture to define what love is because the way the world is defining love is always motivated by selfishness.

So today's conversation is on biblical love and specifically our love for others so let's look at our text for today.

Now , I didn't see the need to go through these verses that we're covering today one verse at a time because these 3 verses cover a single thought.

And whenever we're doing expository preaching, we are trying to proclaim the intent of the thought behind the word.

So we are looking at a single thought and this single thought is really self explanatory.

But even though it is self explanatory we can unpack it and be edified by it.

And so we begin where we left off last week in verse eight that says Oh nothing to anyone except to love one another for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law.

If you remember last week we ended our discussion on the Christians relationship with the state and we transitioned into our relationship in general to everyone.

Paul gives the instruction for us to owe nobody anything and he is not proclaiming that Christian should never have a loan of any sort because that would contradict other sections of scripture but rather our attitude should be that we only owe our love to others.

Now think about that for a second because I think this is a hard pill for all of us to swallow.

We owe our love to everyone.

Not specific individuals, not the ones who are nice to us, not the ones who can benefit us , but to love everyone as if it is owed to them.

To love them as if we are in debt to people.

Now Paul already made a statement like this in this epistle and it was in the 1st chapter.

It is the same phrase and it is the same concept and it is the same attitude.

It doesn't matter who they are , whether Jew or Gentile, weather Greek or barbarian, it doesn't matter who they are I am in debt to these people and the debt that I owe is the love of the gospel proclamation.

And because I am in debt I am eager to give them what I owe them.

So we are looking at the same language very much an aspect of love.

Now what Paul is saying is said throughout the New Testament and it is emphasized by our Lord and savior Jesus.

James also mentions this and so does Peter.

This is a concept that cannot be ignored.

Loving people is fulfilling the law.

then Paul goes into a paraphrase, he's not quoting in order he is paraphrasing the law.

you shall not commit adultery , you shall not murder, you shall not steal and you shall not covet.

Taken from the 10 commandments given to Israel from God himself through Moses.

And it is this very law that God requires because he has written it on the heart of man but that heart is corrupted by sin.

So when we look at the second half of the 10 commandments we see that it affects other people.

When one commits adultery or murder or they steel or they covet, all of that effects other people and could harm other people.

Then paul doesn't leave it at just these things he says and if there is any other commandment summed up in that saying.

Any other commandment that instructs us to either look after other people, protect other people , or stop ourselves from doing something to other people is summed up in that.

It is not in the 10 commandments specifically that we need to look after orphans but there is a command to look after the orphans and that would be one that is summed up in this law to love our neighbor.

That is what Paul means by any other thing that can be summed up in this law.

Now Paul makes the statement that love does no wrong which is why it is the fulfillment of the law.

True love is not going to wrong anybody which is why true love needs to be practiced bye God's people.

Now there is something to be said about the specific language used here for the word love.

What we have is the word agape and all of its forms.

To help you understand without giving a boring Greek language lesson, agape should be looked at as kind of the root beginning word but it also has different forms which is pronounced differently for example agapeo, agapen.

Each word takes on a different meaning but the route is always the same.