Welcome to Reign of Grace. This
program is brought to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries,
an outreach ministry of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany,
Georgia. It is our pleasure and privilege
to present to you the gospel message of the sovereign grace
and glory of God in the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. We pray that today's program
will be a blessing to you. Thank you for listening and now
for today's program. Welcome to our program today.
I'm glad you could join us. And if you'd like to follow along
in your Bibles, I'm going to be preaching from the book of
Colossians. This is the Apostle Paul, the
Holy Spirit, inspiring the Apostle Paul to write to a church, a
group, really historically I believe that most historians believe
it was a small group of believers in a city called Colossi. So
this is the Colossian letter. And I'm going to be preaching
from chapter three, beginning at verse 12. Colossians three
and verse 12. And I have two messages that
I want to bring on a particular subject. This is the first one.
This will be part one. And then next week will be part
two. And the title of these messages is Godly Love and Forgiveness. Godly love and forgiveness. And let's begin by just reading
the portion that I'm going to be preaching from in these two
messages, using as a base to talk about these two great and
glorious subjects, love and forgiveness, godly love and forgiveness. And in Colossians chapter three
and verse 12, I'm gonna read these and just make some comments
to open up with. And Paul writes in verse 12,
put on therefore as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bows
of mercy, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, long-suffering. And then in verse 13 he says,
forbearing one another and forgiving one another, if any man have
a quarrel against any, Now here he's talking about brethren in
the church and he says, even as Christ forgave you. Now there's
the standard and basis of forgiveness between brethren, brothers and
sisters in Christ. If any man have a quarrel against
any, if he has a matter, a disagreement, somebody said something wrong
or harmed him, even as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. And then in verse 14, this will
be the last verse for our text, and above all these things put
on charity. The word charity is the same
that's translated the word love. If you think about passages such
as 1 Corinthians 13, which is called the love chapter, he talks
about charity there. And charity is a good translation
of it, but it's the same as the word love. So above all these
things, put on love, put on charity, which is the bond, and that's
something that holds things together, of perfectness, which is completeness. Now, completed, completeness. Perfectness here is not talking
about any kind of perfection of morality or anything. It's not saying that we do anything
perfect. But what it's saying here is
that this bond of love is a bond of completeness. It makes us
complete. It reaches its goal. So that's
my text on godly love and forgiveness. Now let me go back through there
and just give you some thoughts. First of all, in verse 12, he
says, put on therefore. Now what does he mean put on?
When the Bible talks about putting on qualities of character, putting
on gifts of the Spirit, put on love, put on charity, put on
faith. The Bible even speaks of putting
on Christ. Those who have put on Christ.
What is it talking about? Well, it's talking about believing
in these things, actively engaging in these things, embracing these
things. If you put on Christ, you believe
in Him, you rest in Him, and you embrace Him. as your only
way of salvation, your only way of forgiveness, your only way
of righteousness before God. To put on Christ is to believe
in Him. That's God-given faith. That's
not what we do by nature. We don't have faith by nature.
And I'm gonna talk to you in a moment about love. We don't
have love by nature, not this kind of love. but put on therefore,
and how do we do it? He says, as the elect of God.
Now, who are the elect of God? Well, that's God's elect. Those
are the people whom God chose before the foundation of the
world. He chose them, and He chose them each one in His sovereign,
immutable, awesome mind, and He gave them to Christ. for salvation. He chose them to salvation. In
Romans 9, they're called the vessels of mercy. Vessels of
mercy. They're the children of God.
And the elect of God are known by God bringing them to believe
the gospel. The gospel, which is the power
of God and the salvation, to everyone who believeth, to the
Jew first and to the Greek also, or the Gentile also, for therein
is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith, as it is
written, the just, or the justified, shall live by faith. The elect
of God are the justified. What does that mean? That means
they are not charged with their sin. The Bible says in Romans
8.33, Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?
It is God that justifies. They are those who will not be
condemned because they are sinners saved by grace. Romans 8.34 says,
Who can condemn us? It's Christ that died, yea, rather
is risen again and seated at the right hand of the Father,
ever living to make intercession for us. The elect of God, they
are the redeemed of the Lord. They are those for whom Christ
died. They are called His people. He calls them His people. He
calls them His sheep. So put on, therefore, as the
elect of God. How do I know that I'm elect
of God? Because God has brought me to
see and believe and embrace the Lord Jesus Christ as He's identified
and distinguished in the Bible. He says holy and beloved here
in Colossians 3 and verse 12. Put on therefore is the elect
of God, holy and beloved. Holy means separate because God
has separated his people out. When he chose them, he separated
them out. When he justified them, he separated
them out. When he redeemed them, he separated
them out. And he says holy and beloved,
that is beloved of God. Now that's speaking of God's
love towards the elect. That's who God loves. God doesn't
love everybody. The Bible tells us that. God
hated Esau. God hates all workers of iniquity. Who's he talking about there?
He's talking about those to whom God imputes or charges with sin. Remember what I said there as
I quoted Romans 8.33, who shall lay anything to the charge of
God's elect? You see, God will not charge His elect with sin
because He charged their sins to Christ. And Christ took their
sins to the cross and paid the price, paid their debt. And so,
that's the expression of God's love towards them. God's love
equals their salvation. And so he says, you as separated
out and loved of God, put on bowels of mercy. Now that's a
way, the old ancient way of expressing compassion, bowels of mercy,
because it comes from the very inner part of us. Kindness, he
says. Humbleness, and we know what
kindness is. Be kind to people. I mean, that
explains itself. Humbleness of mind. Humble before
God and humble before men. That's what he's talking about.
Meekness. Now, what is meekness? It is
willing submission to God's will, God's way, and God's word. That's
what meekness is. Long-suffering. That means to
suffer long. It means to put up with a lot.
And how do we do that? Well, verse 13 of Colossians
3, forbearing one another. Oh boy, that's tough to do. Put
up with a lot. You say, somebody says, I've
put up with enough. Well, I doubt that. I know I
feel that way sometimes. But forbearing one another and
forgiving one another. Be forgiving. And if any man
have a quarrel against any, even as Christ forgave you. Now how
did Christ forgive his people? And I think the word there that
we need to see is that Christ forgave all of his people. God
forgives all of his people towards them now, as it relates to them
unconditionally. In other words, there was nothing
for them to do in order to gain or earn or deserve his forgiveness. It was all a matter of grace
and mercy. Now, there were conditions for
God to forgive his people, but the conditions were not upon
them. Do you understand that now? Oh,
there are conditions. God cannot just arbitrarily forgive
sinners. When God forgives, the forgiveness
that He applies from Himself to His people must be given on
a just ground. And that ground is what Christ
did on the cross to bring about the forgiveness of sins. And
I'm gonna talk more about that later in these messages. But
understand now, when he says, you forgive one another as Christ
forgave you, that means unconditionally. Somebody hurts me and they intend
to hurt me, I'm to forgive them unconditionally. That's what
Christian forgiveness is. But understand me now. That doesn't
mean that God, when he forgives me unconditionally, that doesn't
mean that there were no conditions to be met in order for God to
forgive me, but the conditions were not on me. You see, I'm
a sinner saved by grace. I'm a sinner upon whom God has
shown mercy. And that includes all the blessings
and all the benefits of salvation, even the forgiveness of sins.
And Christ is the one who fulfilled the conditions so that God could
be a just God and a forgiver of sinners, a just God and a
savior. How can God be both a just God,
a righteous judge, and a loving father. There's only one ground,
that's the blood of Jesus Christ. And later on we'll see in a verse
of scripture where it talks about that God is faithful and just
to forgive us our sins. He's faithful because that means
He promised to do it and He will do it. but he's also just to
forgive our sins. And so he goes on, he says, even
as Christ forgave you, so also do ye. And then verse 14, here's
the love. Above all, and this is a good
umbrella for all that believers do, above all, these things put
on charity. Love, love one another, which
is the bond of perfectness. Now let me talk first of all
about godly love, because that's important. And you know in the
New Testament, if you went back to the original language, you
would find that there are different words for the word love. And the reason is, is because
there are different kinds of love. Now we have the same in
our language today, but we use the same word, L-O-V-E, for all
of them, and the only way we know the difference is by context. For example, if I were to tell
you I love my wife, and I do, and then if I were to tell you
I love my children, my grandchildren, those are two different kinds
of love. The love that I have for my wife is one kind of love. The love that I have for my children
is a different kind of love. And in the Bible, the New Testament,
the original, there'd be different words for those. And I love my
country. That's a different kind of love.
I love my fellow man, humanity. And listen, let me tell you something
now. That doesn't mean I have any
love imperfection. When he says this is the bond
of perfectness, he's not talking about love imperfection. My love
falls way short sometimes than what it ought to be. But there
are different kinds of love. Now the love that he's speaking
of here is not the kind of love that a husband has for his wife
or a wife for her husband. That's romantic love. And it's
not the kind of love that a mother or a father has for the children,
and it's not the kind of love that we have for our country,
or our fellow man, our neighbor, love your neighbor. Now sometimes
that word, same word is used, but it's different context. But
this is godly love. Now you may have heard of the
term agape. And that's what this is, this
is godly love And the first thing I want you to notice about this
love, this godly love, is this. This love has to do with love
of brethren in the faith. Do you understand that? Love
of brethren in the faith, which is a gift from God through Christ
by the Holy Spirit, And nobody, no person born into this world
naturally, born of Adam, ruined by the fall, born dead in trespasses
and sins, nobody has this particular love by nature. You don't have
it by nature. I didn't have it by nature. This
is the love that God sheds abroad within the hearts of His people
when He brings them to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And
before a sinner is born again by the Spirit and brought to
see Christ in His glory, the glory of His person and the power
of His finished work, and how his blood and his righteousness
washes away all my sins and justifies me before God. Before God brings
me to see that, this kind of love that he's talking about
here in Colossians 3 is absent. Now let me show you that. Back
over in the book of John. This is the book of John, chapter
five. And look at verse 39. John 5, 39. He writes here, this is the Lord
speaking to the Pharisees, religious people. He says, search the Scriptures. Now the construction of that
is literally, it would be like I would be looking at you and
you'd have a Bible open in your hands and I'd say, well now you
do search the Scriptures, don't you? And that's what he's saying
here. You do search the Scriptures.
These Pharisees and scribes, were people who read their Bibles,
what they had in the Old Testament at that time. And he says in
John 5, 39, search the scriptures, for in them you think you have
eternal life. And they are they which testify
of me. And you will not, verse 40, you
will not come to me that you might have life. Now see, they
read their Bibles, and they claim to believe in God, they claim
to love God, and they claim to obey God. But he's telling them,
the Lord's telling them, these scriptures that you're reading
and studying and trying to interpret, trying to memorize and trying
to live by, they are they which testify of me. They speak of
Christ. For example, a person who would
study the first five books of the Old Testament called the
law, the Pentateuch, the books of Moses, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus,
Numbers, Deuteronomy, and come out of that thinking that, well,
in order for me to be saved, I've got to work my way by keeping
the law. Well, now that person has missed
the message of even those first five books of the Bible. What
those first five books of the Bible, just like the whole Bible
is about, is about the impossibility of me keeping the law and making
myself righteous in God's sight. I'm a sinner. These men were
sinners. And those books of the Bible,
are meant to drive me to the promise of God to send Christ
into the world to do for me what I cannot do for myself. And that
is keep the law and satisfy justice and bring forth an everlasting
righteousness of infinite value. Well, look back at John 5. He
said in verse 40, you will not come to me that you might have
life. I receive not honor from men, verse 41. Verse 42, but
I know you that you have not the love of God in you. You don't
have the love of God in you. This kind of love that Colossians
3 talks about among believers, the elect of God, they don't
have it. Well, none of us do by nature.
Now how did he expose their lack of love of God? Verse 43, I am
come in my Father's name and you receive me not. If another
shall come in his own name, him you will receive. How can you,
verse 44, how can you believe which receive honor one of another
and seek not the honor that cometh from God only? Now basically
what that says, what that tells us is this. If you don't believe
the true gospel, if God has not given you the gift of faith,
that's a God-given gift, by grace are you saved through faith,
that not of yourself, it's the gift of God. Before you come
to see and believe in and embrace the Lord Jesus Christ, you don't
have this kind of particular love, this divine love. This gift of love. You may love
your wife. You men may love your wives. You women may love your husbands.
I know you love your children. Some of you, most of you, you
ought to. You love your country. Try to be kind and all of that.
But you don't have this love, okay? Because this love only
comes by the work of the Spirit in salvation. Regeneration and
conversion listen to this. This is Romans chapter 5 and
verse 5 and it says hope maketh not ashamed Now what hope is
that? That's the hope of the gospel
and what is the hope of the gospel? It's my it's my expectation my
assurance my believing that I'm saved and right with God and
by His grace based on the righteousness of Christ imputed to me, charged
to me, accounted to me, based upon His blood alone. If I'm
hoping for salvation based upon what I do for God, that's not
this hope. But this hope is the gospel hope.
It's called the hope of God's elect. And it maketh not ashamed,
why? It says, because the love of
God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given
unto us. This love, this godly love, it's
part of the fruit of the Spirit. Galatians 5 and verse 22, but
the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness,
goodness, faith, meekness, temperance, against such there is no law.
So this love is a gift of God. And no man has it by nature. And then another thing about
this love is that nobody has it perfectly. There was a lawyer
who came to the Lord one time. Now a lawyer back then was not
like lawyers today who study and work the law of the land.
A lawyer back then is one who studied the law of God, the first
five books of Moses. And this lawyer came to the Lord
and he said, which is the greatest of all the commandments? And
the Lord said, love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and
strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. He's talking about
perfect love there. And none of us, not even believers
who have been given this kind of love, can say we love God
perfectly yet. We will one day when we go to
be with the Lord, we leave this body of death, the flesh that
hinders us. None of us can say we love our
neighbor as ourself. Perfectly, you see. We can say
we love God and we love our neighbor, but not perfectly. Now what is
it to love God? It's to know him. No one believer
knows the true God. To love God is to love his truth,
the gospel. And to love God is to love his
people, fellow believers. And so this godly love is love
of the truth and love of the brethren. It binds believers
together. In 1 John chapter two, listen
to this, verse nine. 1 John two and verse nine. He
that saith he is in the light, that is in the truth of the gospel
light, and hateth his brother is in darkness even until now. And verse 10 says he that loveth
his brother abideth in the light, the truth, and there's none occasion
of stumbling in him. So understand, this is love of
God that is given to his people by the Holy Spirit and love of
the brethren in the truth, loving Christ. If any man love not the
Lord Jesus Christ, he is none of his. And to love Christ is
to love his truth. When you hear the doctrines of
the Bible preached, do you love those doctrines or do you kick
against them? See, because you can't say, well,
I love God, but not love the things that the Bible reveals
about him. Some people who deny election, you know why they deny
it? Because they don't love the God
of election. The God of all grace, sovereign
grace. Now that brings us down to forgiveness. And remember back in Colossians
chapter three, he says, you forgive one another even as Christ forgave
you. And as I said, the key to that,
and this is where we see the love of God and forgiveness coming
together. How does God love his people? How does God forgive his people?
Well, he does so unconditionally towards them, and that we have
to make that distinction because there are conditions. Listen,
everything that God does in the salvation of a sinner, Every
blessing, every benefit, there are conditions that must be met
in order for God to give those blessings and benefits. But here's
the glory of it, and here's our only hope. None of these conditions
are on the sinner. If they were, they'd all fail. So there are no conditions on
the sinner. The gospel is salvation, not conditioned on sinners and
what they do or even what they choose or decide. The gospel
is salvation conditioned on Christ. And Christ fulfilled those conditions. He met those conditions for his
people. And so God freely forgives His
people. And that's the way we're to forgive
one another. That's the way we're to forgive even our enemies.
That's what Christ said. Love your enemies. Forgive your
enemies unconditionally. But I'm gonna talk about this
forgiveness more in the next message, along with this love.
But we have to understand what he's actually commanding his
people to do. You know, in the church, there's
gonna be problems, even true churches. There're gonna be quarrels,
there're gonna be disagreements, there's gonna be hurt feelings,
all of that. There's going to be some people
who take it too far, but they gotta forgive unconditionally.
I hope you'll join us next week for another message from God's
Word. We are glad you could join us
for another edition of Reign of Grace. This program is brought
to you by Reign of Grace Media Ministries, an outreach ministry
of Eager Avenue Grace Church in Albany, Georgia. To receive
a copy of today's program or to learn more about Reign of
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at 1-1-0-2 Eager Drive, Albany, Georgia 3-1-7-0-7. Contact us
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today and may the Lord be with you.