Before we begin the message,
we'll go to God in prayer again. We want to remember those who have
needs. Remember Jean, if you will, in
your prayers. She lost her mother. It was yesterday,
wasn't it, Terrence? Terrence? Yeah, it was yesterday. Ask your prayers for her and
her family as they deal with this loss and grief. Remember Angela in your prayers.
Has anybody heard? I haven't heard from her. Okay. Okay. Good. Good. Okay. Okay. Good. Um, pray for
her. Remember her in your prayers.
Uh, It was in Danville last night.
The Lord, I believe, blessed the message there in Danville.
And just to see Shelby. It's been quite a while since
Dawn passed, but it's sometimes still fresh. And so pray for
her. She continues to struggle with
that. Others who are sick. Rick, had
you heard from him today? Okay, you pray for Rick and,
uh, Jill and others. Uh, pray for Chuck and Patty's. They're gonna be traveling back
soon. I hope, uh, miss them. I look over there and it just
Oh, man. But pray for them and others
who have needs. Ask your prayers for me as I
preach this message to you. I pray to the Lord, give me, give me what I'm gonna preach
to you. I want these things that God has exhorted us to do. I
want to, we're gonna be preaching on love, love, and the importance
of love among the gifts of the saints. the vitalness of it,
probably that God would give us surely more love for Him,
but also more love for one another. I'm sure there is much room for
growth in these exhortations. So ask your prayers for me as
I desire to preach to you. Any other requests need to be
mentioned? Anything else? Joanne, she failed. So she's
doing okay, she's just really sore. So let's remember her in
prayer. Let's go to him in prayer. Gracious Father, again we bow
before you. We lay ourselves before your
throne of grace, because we need help. We've come to worship,
we've come to praise. Father, we find in ourselves
little strength, little ability to do these things, but yet we
know that all strength comes from You. And truly, Father, if You have
commanded us to do these things, You will provide what is necessary
for us to do these things. I pray, Father, that You'd give
me liberty and unction of Your Spirit, that You'd open my mind
and heart to Your Word, And then, Father, pour it out to your people,
refresh them, comfort them, strengthen them, encourage them, I pray,
by the power of your Holy Spirit. And Father, for these that are
sick, these that are sorrowing, these that are grieving, that
we have mentioned, Father, you know well. And we pray, Father,
that you would be gracious in touching their bodies, their
minds, and their hearts. that You would restore those
that are absent from us. We miss them. We long to be near
them, to be encouraged by them. We pray that You would bring
them again to us. I pray, Father, that You would
bless the ministry as it goes out, as Your people are wont
to be fed. I pray, Father, that You would
use this as food for their souls, encouragement for their daily
journey. Pray for strength, that you give
me liberty and strength, body and mind in this time. We all ask that you'd forgive
us our sins, that you would lead us, that you would cleanse us
of our unrighteousness. Help us, Father, instruct us
and give us strength. We pray these things in Jesus'
name. For His sake, amen. Alright, take your Bibles and
turn with me to Romans chapter 12. Romans chapter 12, our text will
be found in verse 9. The apostle writes this, let love
be without dissimulation. of whore, that which is evil,
and cleave to that which is good. We're going to get this in just
a minute. The word dissimulation, don't
let that throw you. It means hypocrisy. In other
words, don't let love be pretend. No pretend love. I've entitled
this message, Love Without Hypocrisy. Love without hypocrisy. in recapping what the Apostle
began here in verses 1 and 2. Remember, this chapter is divided
into three parts. The first part is the exhortation
that encompasses all that he's going to say through this. I
appeal to you, brethren, because of the mercies of God. There's
the reason. because of all that I had said
before, because God chose you, because God loved you, because
Christ died for you, because Christ rose again from the dead,
because the Holy Spirit came to you, because you were quickened
by the Spirit of God in grace, and now you believe, you now
have the righteousness of God imputed and imparted to you in
the new nature. And because of this, what do
we do? present your whole selves as
living sacrifices, daily, consecrating yourselves unto God. Why? It's
reasonable. It's just reasonable. It's your
reasonable service. Don't be conformed to this world.
Isn't that reasonable? Weren't you saved out of this
world? Yes. Don't be conformed to this
world. Be metamorphosized, transformed. Remember, transformation takes
place from the inside out, not the outside in. You don't do
these things to be transformed. You do these things because you
are. And that's the work of the Spirit of God inside of us. And
where does this work, where are we made aware of this work? In
the mind. He said, renewing your mind. that you may prove what is that
good, acceptable, and perfect will of God. Remember, the mind
is the battleground, isn't it? There's a spiritual warfare taking
place inside, but we're made aware of it in the mind, and
what do we have to do? We have constantly to set our
minds right side up. Our minds are always geared to
being upside down, putting ourselves first. serving ourselves and
then serving God. No, renew your mind, switch that. You should humble yourself and
serve God. Now, how do we renew our minds? It's daily, isn't it? I mean,
right now, do you not have to renew your mind? You gotta set
it right. And what does that do? It proves
that God's will is perfect, it's good, it's acceptable. And he says this, we should humble
ourselves, verse three, through the grace given to me, every
man should, among you, not think more highly of himself than he
ought to think, think soberly, according as God has dealt every
man the measure of faith. For as we have many members in
one body, and all members have not the same office, so we, being
many, are one body in Christ, and every one member is one of
another. Don't think of yourself as highly as you ought to. That's
our natural inclination, to think of ourselves. He said, no, no,
you're part of a bigger group. As the body has many members,
so is the church. And then he tells us, in that
body, there are many gifts. When Christ ascended into heaven,
he led captivity captive and gave what? Gifts. And each one of these gifts.
He said, whatever your gift, do that. Perform what God has
given you to do. If it's preaching, preach. If
it's serving, serve. If it's teaching, teach. If you're
given rulership or leadership, then do it with diligence. If
God gives you the gift of giving, do it liberally. Do it abundantly. And so now, he comes to this
matter of in verse 9 through the rest of the chapter. The
second part of that was concerning our gifts. The first two verses
are exhortation, and then verses 3 through 8 have to do with humility
and gifts of the church. But now, he's going to start
talking about, from verse 9 on, our attitude. The attitude in
which we perform this service. And the first attitude is what?
Love. Love. Now, regarding gifts, I do not, I know the apostle
here, when he says, humble yourself, he's not saying that you should
think lowly of your gifts. You should not think lowly of
what God has given you. Why? Because every part in the
church is vital. Every part is necessary. And so don't let us not use our
gift is not important as an excuse not to use it. Sometimes we don't want to use
what we've been given. We may like someone else's gift.
We say, man, that guy's got a good gift. I'd like to have that.
And so what do we do? We put our gift down so that
we don't use it. No, don't do that. Remember the
parable our Lord gave in Matthew 25? He said there was a man going
to a far country, and he gave talents. He gave his money to
these three servants. To one he gave five. The other
he gave two, and the other he gave one. And when he went away,
remember, the scripture says he said to every man according
to his servile ability, and he took his journey. And so we think
of our gifts. God has given us these gifts. And some are greater than others.
I was thinking about that today. You know, I've been given the
gift to preach, but would I say my gift is equal to that of Spurgeon? No, I wouldn't say that I have
that kind of gift. He had only a gift to preach,
but he had a gift to write, and he had a gift to memorize large
portions of Scripture and things. He had many gifts. Now, should I say this? Well,
since I don't have the ability of Spurgeon, then I should just,
you know, not use my gift? No. I don't have that in my mind
at all. I should use what I've been given.
And those servants, those two servants, you remember one that
was given five and one that was given two. They put their money
to usury. They put it out there to be used. That's what God's people do.
When we are given a gift, we put it to usury. And you know
what? It's kind of like taking their
money. They put it in the market. They put it in the stock market.
They put it to usury. You know what? Each one of them
doubled. The man that had five, he got ten. And the man that
had two, he got four. This is encouraging to us, isn't
it? Because when we put our gifts to usury, you know who multiplies
them? God does. You don't multiply
them. God does. That's encouragement,
isn't it? It's encouragement for us to
use our gifts. But there was that one fellow.
He had that one talent. Remember, he didn't He didn't
use it. He didn't put it to usury. And
so when God, when the man came back, he said, why didn't you
just, you know, put it to usury like these other fellows? He
said, well, listen to what the man said. He said, I know you're
a hard master. I know you reap where you don't
sow. In other words, you steal everything
you get. You just take. See, this is a
man that only pretends. There are many who pretend to
believe. They pretend. And one of the
things about pretenders is this. They think hard of God. They
think hard of God. You that believe, do you think
you believe like that about God? I think he's a lot like Adam.
Remember Adam? When God confronted him about
his sin, what did he say? He said, the woman you gave.
And so these people have different things, abilities God give them.
They don't use for the service of God. They use for the service
of their flesh. But we don't think that way of
God. We know this, that any gift that we have is useful. It's
a gift of grace, and it should be used in the manner that God
has given it. And then we trust God to multiply
whatever it is we do. And we have confidence that,
I remember Don saying this, there were three guys in the church,
you know, they each came to him and said, you know what, I can't
preach, but I can mow the grass. I can't preach. The other guy
said, I can't preach, but I can nail a board. I can do other
things. I can't preach, but I can dig
a ditch. And they did. They used all of their abilities,
whatever they had for the service of the church, and the Lord used
it. So the important thing is to
encourage us to be zealous in our use of these gifts. We should be zealous in the service
of God. Isn't that reasonable? Is that
not reasonable? Now, in our text, he's going
to show us something very important. Because if we are to use our
gifts for the service of God, there is a certain attitude that
we are to have in using these things. And it is this word,
love. If we are to use our gifts, they
must be bathed in love. love for God and love for one
another. Now, if we were to perform all
our gifts that we have to the best of our ability, if we were
to be disciplined in our gift, if we were to be zealous in our
gift, But I tell you this, if your
gifts are not performed in love, they're worthless. They're useless. Go to 1 Corinthians 13. Now,
if you want to read chapter 12, chapter 12 is an exhaustive version
of verses 3 through 8 in Romans 12. So 1 Corinthians 12 is an
exhaustive a statement concerning the gifts
of the church. And so in verse 12-1 he said,
Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I would not have you
ignorant. So he's going to talk about spiritual gifts. And he
says the same thing he says in Romans 12 in 1 Corinthians 12.
Now why is he saying this? Because the church of Corinth,
this church was full of people with gifts. Miraculous gifts. There were people who had healings.
They could heal. There were people in that church
that were given the ability to speak in other languages that
they didn't even know. Tia, what if you just came in
and started speaking Spanish? You know, because there was a
Spanish guy here that didn't understand English. And you just
started interpreting what I'm saying to him in Spanish. That's an amazing gift. Wouldn't
that be great? That's what was needed in that church. Because
there were so many people coming that were speaking different
languages. And that was a gift needed at that time. And people
had it. But look at what Paul says in
verse 31 of chapter 12. He says, become as earnestly
the best gifts. That's nothing wrong with that,
isn't it? You desire a gift, ask for it. Use the gift that
you got first. And then if you desire others,
ask for it. It's all right. You can ask God
for it. But he said, I'm going to show
you something more excellent. More excellent. Look at this
in verse 1. He said, though I speak with the tongues of men and of
angels, and have not love. What am I? I have become a sounding brass
and a tinkling cymbal. I consider this in myself because
I preach. He's saying, though I have the
ability to communicate to men in such a way that, I think this
is not literal, tongues of men and angels, But he's talking
about like Apollos. Apollos had a gift to speak. And it sounded like an angel. Stephen, that's what they said
about him. When he spoke, they said, oh, he sounds like an angel. What if I had the gift to communicate
in such a way that it was so pleasing to the ears of everyone
that heard it? That's a good gift, isn't it?
Paul said this, if it's not bathed in love, you're nothing but noise. That's it. Though I have the
gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge,
what a gift that is. Wouldn't that be a wonderful,
isn't this what we do when we study? We want to learn, we want
to know. What if I have God come down
and reveal all mysteries to me? I was speaking with a man just
the other day about how Christ was made sin. He's kind of stuck
on this. And I said, man, you're never
going to figure that out. You're never going to fully understand
it. And then don't look down on somebody that doesn't fully
understand it. Because you don't fully understand
it. What if I could understand it? If I had all knowledge, and then
I'm able to communicate it to you. But I don't have love, though
I have all faith. Oh man, wouldn't that be wonderful
to have all faith, not be afraid of anything? Wouldn't that just
be walking through life with no fear whatsoever, trusting
God with all faith? That'd be a gift, wouldn't it? So that I could remove mountains. But look, if I have love, what
am I? What is all that knowledge without love? It's nothing. He said, I'm nothing. Although
I bestow my gifts to feed the poor and give my body to be burned. Isn't that something? What if
you had such a heart to give your stuff to everybody that
had need? You fed the hungry as much as
you with all your substance. Isn't that commendable? What's the highest The highest
thing a believer could do with his life is what? Be a martyr. Paul said, what if I give my
body to be burned and have not love, what is it profit? What
is it going to do? Nothing. Nothing. Love is the
radical gift of grace to every redeemed sinner. And so no matter
your gift, no matter how high, Your gift is esteemed, or how
low it might appear. If it is not done in love, it
is nothing." You have to recognize that. Without
love, our gifts are of no use. Paul said, then, let love be
without dissimulation. Why? Go back to your text. Let
love be without dissimulation. Why is he saying this? Because
we have a tendency to pretend. Put on a face. Isn't that right? To play act. That's what he's
saying. He said you should love. You
should use your gift in love, but don't use it in hypocrisy. Remember, hypocrisy is a characteristic
of an actor, one who pretends to be something that he's not.
We are never to pretend to love. Never to pretend. This goes against
our fallen ideas of love. The only love we're born with
is self-love. Do you realize that? When you're
born in this world, that's the only person you care about. Ask
a little baby. Look at a little baby and see
who he cares about. Himself. Everything's about himself. Now
we learn to kind of control that as we get older. We kind of learn
to hide that as we get older. But it's still there. And so
if we look at our earthly love, it is usually contingent upon
how it makes us feel. We love because we're loved. And I'll tell you, this is even
true in our spiritual sense, isn't it? We love Him, why? Because
He first loved us. And we could never love Him,
except He first loved us. So we love, but we do love Him. Isn't that so? You that believe,
do you not love Him? You do. You do because of what? He put that love in you. The love we have of Him is not
natural. Not natural. He put that love
wherein we cry unto Him, Abba, Father. So as we are exhorted
to offer ourselves as sacrifices, renew our minds constantly, use
the gifts and services that God has given us, how must we use
them? In love, not pretending. Not pretending. And I want to
look at two aspects of love. First of all, our love to God.
And secondly, our love to one another. Now we are to love God supremely. Is that not right? You that believe,
isn't that true? Is this not your desire to love
Him? I know you love Him. Do you love Him sufficiently? Do you love Him supremely? It is our heart's desire to love
Him with all our hearts, our souls, our minds, our strength,
and our body. But how can we do this? How can
we do this? We know this. That's the first
hinge of the law, isn't it? On these two things, the whole
law depends. Love the Lord your God with all
your heart, soul, strength, and mind, and love your neighbor
as yourself. That's how the law hinges. So in this first part,
how are we to fulfill that? We know that we've not fulfilled
it. But listen, we fulfill this law
the same way we fulfill all the others, by Jesus Christ. That's how it's fulfilled, by
Jesus Christ. By looking to Christ, who is
God's gift of grace and mercy to us, we see His great love
wherewith He loved us. It is by seeing His love that we are able to love Him. He has given us a new heart,
a new mind. Scripture says that that new
nature He's given you is created after God in true holiness. So in the new nature, you love
God supremely. You love God supremely. In the
same way you have fulfilled all of the other law through Jesus
Christ our Lord. Yet we know because of the flesh
that abides. We have not loved Him as we should. And so the encouragement here
is this. Don't be slothful in love. Be fervent in love. Love for your God. Don't be slothful in your service
and exercise of this love. We sing that hymn, I love to
tell the story. It will be my theme and glory
to tell the old, old story of what? Jesus and His love. What excites the believer's love
toward God? If I'm going to exercise these
gifts in love toward God, what's going to do it? The only thing
that's going to motivate my love to God is His love to me. That's
it. I'm going to give you some scriptures
to look at. Look at Deuteronomy 7. This should motivate us to
love by looking at His love. Deuteronomy 7, look at verse 6. Look what God says about
His people. He said, For thou art a holy
people unto the Lord. Isn't that wonderful? This nation
was atypical of it, but spiritually in application, we are a holy
people. Why? The Lord thy God had chosen
thee to be a special people to himself above all people that
are upon the face of the earth. Now why did the Lord do that?
The Lord did not set his love upon you nor choose you because
you were more in number than any people. You were the fewest
of all people. Here's why. Because the Lord
loved you. Are you looking for a reason
as to why God loved you? Are you going to find it by looking
in yourself? Will you find God's reason to
love you based on anything in you? No. God says, I loved you
because I would love you. I loved you because He would
keep His oath that He swore to your fathers. Had the Lord brought
you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you out of the house
of the bondman, out of the house of Pharaoh, king of Egypt. What
a picture of Christ in our salvation. He brought us out, didn't He?
By the Passover lamb, by Jesus Christ. He manifest His love
to us. Know therefore that the Lord
thy God, He is God, the faithful God. which keepeth covenant mercies
unto them that love him, and keep his commandments to a thousand
generations." The Lord loved you because He would. He showed
it by redeeming you, didn't He? Look at Deuteronomy chapter 33.
Deuteronomy chapter 33. Look at verse 3. He loved the people. Yes, He
loved the people. All His saints are in thy hand. They sat down at thy feet. Everyone
shall receive of thy words. One thing about God's people
that He loved, they loved His Word. Do you love His Word? Why? You love His Word because
His Word's Christ, isn't it? It speaks of Christ. Look at
verse 29. He said, Happy art thou, O Israel,
who is likened to thee, O people, saved by the Lord, the shield
of thy help, and who is the sword of thy excellency, and thine
enemies shall be found liars unto thee. Thou shalt tread upon
thy high places. You know, God promises His people
that He loves victory. Victory. Where's the victory?
Where is the victory over our sin, over our enemies? Where
is the victory? It's in Christ. Christ, our Savior. Look at Malachi chapter 1. I
don't know if I can get there. Look at what he says. He says,
the burden of the word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. This is the word of the Lord
to Israel, to you that believe. Look, I have loved you. Is that not sufficient to stir
love? God said that to you. I have loved you, saith the Lord. And this is what you're going
to say, where in have you loved me? Show me. Where's the evidence
you have loved me? Look at this. Was not Esau Jacob's
brother? Sayeth the Lord, yet I loved
Jacob and hated Esau. What's the manifestation that
God loves you? His election, isn't it? You that believe, God loved you. God chose you. God puts you in
Christ. And so it is by looking at His
love that we are able to love. And this love was manifest when
Christ was crucified for our sins. What did our Lord say? Greater love hath no man than
this, than the man laid down his life for his sins. You want
to see how much He loved you. You have to look at the cross.
You won't find it in circumstance. Can you find God's love in your
circumstances? Now, religion tries to find God's
love in circumstances. They say, look, everything's
going well. Well, God must really love me. I'm healthy. God must really love me. Oh,
I'm sick. God must really hate me. I'm
in poverty. God must really despise me. You
can't find the love of God in providence. How do I know that?
Ecclesiastes 9 verse 1 says this, you cannot know the love of God
by what you see. By all that is before you, you
can't determine God's love. You will not take a providence
and trace it back to God in love. You can't do it. You should begin at the love
of God and trace every providence down. And recognize that every
sickness we have, every frailty we have, every affliction we
have, everything we have is a gift of God's love and not of His
displeasure. It's His grace. He may chasten
us, but even in chastisement is it not because He loves us? He said, if you be not chastened,
then are you bastards and not sons. Our Lord Jesus Christ, the manifestation
of God's love is that He bore our sorrows. He bore our sins. We sing that song, How Can It
Be? How can it be that thou, my God, should die for me? You want to love God more, without
hypocrisy, without pretending, and you should look at His love.
Because it is in His love that we are then able to love Him. Don't look to your own strength
to love God, but look to Christ who loved God in your stead. Isn't that something that His
love to God is counted as mine? How much did He love God? Well,
that's how much I love God. How righteous was He? That's
how righteous we are. His love, His righteousness,
His obedience, His blood are all charged to us. Therefore, is there any reason
that we should not render love to Him? Can you find a reason
that we should not render to Him the full love of our hearts? Full love into Him performing
our gifts. If He has given us a gift in
love, should we not use that gift in love to Him? It's not
reasonable. I pray that none of us will be
found slothful servants. but all bathe our service in
the love for God, based on the love of God. Let us love our God, not with
our lips. Isn't that easy? Isn't that easy? Oh Lord, I love You. Oh Lord, You know how much I
love You. But then when He gives us something
to do, Well, I don't have the strength for that. I can't do
that. No, you don't have the strength,
but does he? Then do it in his strength, and
not your own. I think that's hypocrisy, isn't
it? To say you believe him, to say you love him, and when he
gives you a gift, you say, I can't do it. You're saying this. You're hard. You're a hard master. You give me something to do that
I can't do. Really? If God commands us to do something,
will He not give us the power to do it? Of course He will. Let us love without hypocrisy,
without acting. So it's altogether easy to say,
I love God, but it's another thing then to serve and offer
ourselves a living sacrifice. Let us love not in word only,
but in exercise of the gifts that God has given us. Secondly, our love to each other.
Let our love be without hypocrisy toward one another. Why is it that we should love
one another? You that believe, why is it that
we should love one another? Well, we should love one another
because that's what God says. Look at John chapter 13. John
chapter 13. Look at verse 33. Our Lord Jesus Christ said, little
children, yet a little while I am with you. You shall seek
me. And as I said unto the Jews,
whither I go you cannot come. So now I said to you, I'm going
into glory, but you must remain. That's what he's telling them,
that they must remain here. They're going to seek him, but
they're not going to be able to see him just yet. They have work
to do. And he said this, a new commandment
I give unto you. Here it is, that you love one
another. Now this is not a new suggestion,
is it? You that believe on Christ, He
is your King. He is your King. And He said
this to you, I command you, love one another. And He didn't leave
us without how. Look how we are to love one another. As I have loved you. that you also love one another. This is the word given to believers
that we should love one another. Now the word love in our day
is misused, misunderstood. The word love in our day has
much to do with feelings. When a person says, I love you,
they're talking about an emotional thing. Now, love does have emotion. There is no doubt about that.
It does have feelings. But love is not all feeling. And so the world says, I love
that person so long as I have feelings for them. If our love is based on feelings
alone, it won't last very long. When I was dating Cheryl, when
I was dating her at the very beginning, when I first knew
her, boy, I tell you what, I had a lot of feelings. I mean, you could not, wild horses
could not keep me from her. I mean, every thought of every
minute of every day was about her. I mean, every song on the radio,
every time I pass a flower shop, I mean, the emotions were just
pouring out. But you know, as we grew together,
it's not that I didn't love her any less, the feelings subsided,
but yet the love was more stable. It was more real. grew. So yeah, in the beginning
it was based on feelings, but as we grew, I stopped caring
more about my needs and cared more about hers. I remember when Brother Don told
me that at the very beginning before I asked her to marry me. I knew this. He said, Fred, love
is not a feeling. It's a commitment. Because there'll
be times where you're not going to have those feelings. And so
it is true among us. There's times when we don't have
these overwhelming emotions toward one another. But yet there is this command
that we should love one another. Love one another. We are totally
committed to one another. Why? Because we are one body
in Christ. Each one of us have function
in this place. Not to set ourselves above one
another, but rather serve one another in love. And so love
is the cement that holds us together. Our love for Christ unites us
to our head, and our love for one another unites us to the
body. Jesus said, this is how men will
know you're my disciples. Isn't that something? That's
not what religion says, is it? Religion says they're going to
know you're my disciples if you go out and feed the poor. You'll know these guys to be
Christ's disciples if they build homes for the homeless, or they
build hospitals, or they do good. That's not what Jesus said. Jesus
said this. They'll know that you're my disciple
if you have what? Love one for another. That's
the manifestation. Listen. What's the manifestation
of your election? You weren't there when God chose
you. You didn't see it. You weren't
there when Christ died. You didn't see that. How do you
know you were chosen? How do you know you were redeemed?
Here it is, faith. Faith in Christ is the evidence
of my election and redemption. Now what's the evidence of my
faith? The evidence of my faith is love.
Faith and love are together. You can't have one without the
other. You can't. They come together. And Jesus
said, you'll know you're a learner of me. That's what disciple means,
isn't it? Learner. Do you not continually need to
learn to love? Is this not something we continually
learn and grow in? It is. He said in Romans 12,
10, be you kindly affectionate one to another. with brotherly
love in honor of preferring one another. To love one another
is to be committed to one another. It is to be affectionate to one
another. It is to prefer the other person to yourself. That's
what love is. And to love them regardless of
what they do to you. Now this is going to sting. But it's necessary for us to
hear. Our love is never to be contingent upon what others do
for us or to us. Why? Love one another as I have
loved you. Is His love in any way contingent
upon what you've done? Is His forgiveness in any way
contingent upon what you've done? Is His mercy, is His affection,
is His love in any way dependent upon what you do for Him? Even so, love one another the
same way. Brother, you don't know
what this guy did to me. You don't know how he ruined
my name. He called me a heretic. He dragged my name through the
mud. You don't know what he's done
to me. I know a man that says this,
another believer heard him so bad he said, I can't even walk
in the small town I live in without people looking at me. He said
such false things about me. So what? You are to love Him without hypocrisy. You can't pretend. You must love
Him freely. I remember a man whom I loved, a brother in Christ. He had a
disagreement with me over something that wasn't, I didn't see it
as an essential thing. I didn't I don't believe the
way he did. I believe I could prove it out
in scripture, but he didn't see it that way. He came to me, and
he was very angry with me. He came into my house, and he
was very upset, visibly upset. He was angry with me. He said
some choice words to me, and he left. I didn't see him for years. But
you mark this down. The moment he left, he was already
forgiven. I did not need to hold that against
him. I didn't have that in myself.
If it left in myself, I wouldn't have forgave him. But the Lord
gave me peace about it, and I had comfort in it. And you know,
one day he called me out of the blue, years later, and he said,
I am so sorry for what I did. I said, you don't even need to
apologize. He was already forgiven the moment you left. Why? Because that's how Christ
forgives me. How can I hold Him accountable
when Christ doesn't hold me accountable like that? How can I show love
to Him if it's not the same love wherewith I'm loved? How can
I call it love? Love without hypocrisy. Don't
pretend. And the only way you can do that
is if you understand how much you've been forgiven. If you
understand that, how easy is it then to forgive your brother
whatever he did? When you see what your sin did
to Christ on Calvary, how then could you ever hold anything
against anyone? You can't. So when people say this, I can't
love that man. No, that's an excuse. You can. You don't want to. Be honest
now. Stop being hypocritical. If you see what Christ has done
for you, then surely you can forgive that man. If God commands us to do so,
will He not give us power to Is God a hard master sowing where
he did not reap? No, he's not. If you desire to forgive a brother,
then you look at the love of Christ and you'll be able to.
If God will open our eyes to see the love of Christ, then
we would easily be able to forgive and love one another. Why? As he gave us commandment. This
is not a suggestion, is it? Forgive your brother. Is that
a suggestion? Well, I'll forgive him when he
comes back and he does this, this, and this, and he makes
an apology in front of the church, then we'll forgive him. Is that
how you're forgiven? I hope that's not how you're
forgiven. I hope that's not how you're loved. That's not how
Christ loves. If we're His disciples, then
we're to love like Him. Let us be committed to be kindly,
affectionate, and prefer our brethren above ourselves. This
is to value all other persons, preferring and putting them in
front of our own feelings, our own self, our own interests.
If somebody offends you, what's the problem? Well, you're offended. You're putting yourself above
the person that offended you. Now listen, in our own strength,
this is impossible. If left to our own strength to
do this, it is impossible. I acknowledge that freely. But
are you left to your own strength? I'll give you an illustration
of this. I don't have time for the whole thing. But in Joshua
17, you read this later, Manasseh was complaining. Remember, Joshua,
they had already conquered the land, and they had set aside
those lots. They said, OK, Judah, here's
your portion. And Manasseh, here's your portion. And Dan, here's your portion. And Manasseh comes back to Joshua. They said, Joshua, look,
we're a bunch of people. We're bigger than everybody else.
And you gave us too small a land. And he said, wait a second. No,
I didn't. He said, yeah, this part over
here is all forests. And he said, well, go chop it
down and use it. They said, well, either we do
that, that's not enough. You've got these Canaanites over
here, and they've got chariots of iron, and we can't drive them
out. He said, no, you can drive them
out, but you would rather have them pay taxes. They had tribute,
their money coming in. And so when we're commanded to
do things that are hard, most of the time it's because we're
giving tribute to the flesh, right? We're giving to the flesh. We receive tribute from the pleasures
of the flesh so we won't drive these things out. Either that
or we're too lazy and we won't cut down the wood that we're
giving. They had a promise of God that
He would be with them, that He would do, that He would drive
those people out. But because of their unbelief,
they saw that their lot was too narrow. How many times we see
our law too narrow? I don't have enough power. I
don't have enough strength. I don't have enough love. I don't
whine, whine, complain. Instead of recognizing this,
that God who commanded you to do these things will also give
you the power to do them. And so when God says love without
hypocrisy, that seems difficult. Well, it is. In your strength,
it is. But if you look to the love of
God, it's not. If you look to the mercies of
God, not the whole foundation of all this, because of the mercies
of God. What? Love one another without
hypocrisy. Be kindly affectionate one to
another. And he says in verse 11, be not
slothful in business, but fervent in spirit, serving the Lord.
Now he's not talking about your physical business. Tell me the
business of love. This business of loving one without
hypocrisy. This business of kindly being
affectionate one to another. Listen, I would, Paul said, do
this and don't be slothful. Don't be lazy. Be fervent. In what? In love. Be fervent in putting one another,
each other above yourself. Be fervent in this business.
And listen, who does this really? The Spirit. The Spirit of God. So when you are able to love
your brother and forgive your brother, who really is to be
receiving the glory? You? No. When I love you, as I should,
it's really only because you love me. Because he gave me the
love for you. He gave me the ability to forgive
you. So all the glory for this love
belongs to who? The same one who saved me. He
receives all the glory. God help us to love God without
hypocrisy. Without pretending. I like that
about God, I don't have to put on a face. You know that? You
don't have to put on a face with him. I like the way that prayers
in the Old Testament, these guys just blurt it out. You know why? Because they could. Love God without hypocrisy. And
then what? Love one another without hypocrisy.
Don't pretend to love me. Love me as God gave you commandment
to love me. love one another as God gave
you commandment to love one another. How? How are you to love one
another? Even as I have loved you. Same. The same. I can't do that. Not in your
strength, but in his you can. He will give you the strength.
He will give you the power to do it. Why? Because He commanded it. He's
not a hard master. He's not going to command you
to make bricks without straw. That's Pharaoh, isn't it? It's
not God. He's not going to command you
to love without giving you what? Love. Where does that come from? Looking at His love. You look
at His love, you're able to love. You look within, are you able
to love? Look at His love. Then you're
able to. I pray God will help us with
this. Let's stand and be dismissed in prayer. Gracious Father, dismiss us with
your own blessings and mercies. Oh, I plead for grace to love
you and serve you without hypocrisy, without pretending, without the vanity of this flesh. Give us grace as the book of
Christ, seed of great love, wherewith you have loved us. Give us the grace, power, love
to serve one another as our Savior gave us commandment. Forgive us where we fail you,
and fail one another. We pray this in His name.