All right, so we have the reading there from 1 Corinthians 13, which is all about the word charity.
It's a very famous chapter often read during weddings and of that nature. Now, I wanted to preach on this topic of charity
primarily because we've been going through,
you know, chapter by chapter through the book of John and we know that John was a disciple whom, you know,
Jesus Christ loved, you know, and we've gone through 1 and 2 John and John is often talking about love and
you know, we've talked about how important it is to love our God and how important it is to love our brethren, to love his word and to
love fellowship and, you know, all these things come together to love the commandments of God, you know, all these things come together.
But one thing I really wanted to focus on is how do we perfect our love?
You know, yes, it's one thing to say love the brethren,
I know that pastor, but how exactly do I love my brethren?
I know I'm supposed to love my spouse pastor, but how exactly can I show that perfect love to my spouse?
And I know I'm supposed to love my Lord God with all my heart, my soul, my might and my mind.
But how exactly do I show love and of course, this is the chapter of charity and the word charity just means love.
The word charity and love are pretty much identical.
I often think of the word charity though, you know, when we think of the word charity, we think of an organization
that helps the poor, that helps out the poor and needy and of course, that's where charity, that word really comes from is
doing things for those that are, you know, worse off or downtrodden and
you know, that really is what love is at the end of the day. Like love, people often think about as this emotional, this feeling and
you can express love by words and all those things are good, but really what you want love to do is to produce some action.
Right, I mean if I'm beating up my wife, which I don't by the way,
and I say, honey, I love you. I don't really love her.
It's just empty words and so we see here in 1st Corinthians chapter 13. Let's look at verse number 1.
Paul says, though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels.
So Paul says, hey, he was able, he had the gift of tongues.
He was able to, you know, God was able to just use his mouth and speak another language, preach the gospel in another language as
he went out to the Gentiles.
You know, he was able to just speak their language and he had that ability and you go, man,
that'd be so wonderful to be able to just go into,
what's the country,
to go to Sudan and speak Sudanese, you know, just like that without learning the language.
What an amazing gift that would be. But then he says, and have not charity,
I am become as a sounding brass or a
tinkling cymbal. Because look, if I don't have charity, if I don't have love, even though I have this gift of tongues, it's pointless.
It's just noise. It's just bang, bang, bang, bang, brass, sounding cymbal.
I just, you know, playing the drum kit or something with no purpose. There's no melody that it's for.
It's just noise. It doesn't mean anything.
And then it says in verse number 2, and though I have the gift of prophecy.
So, you know, he's got the ability to preach mightily or even foretell future events.
And he goes, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge.
He goes, even if I understood everything there is to understand, and though I have all faith,
like my faith is so great so that I could remove mountains.
He goes, and have not charity, I am nothing. Wow. That's a big statement. And so that's the title for the sermon this morning.
Nothing without charity, you know. Without charity, really, you are nothing, Brethren. Nothing without charity.
So we want to make sure that our love is perfect.
We want to make sure that our love measures up to the love that God expresses here in this chapter.
Now, we obviously know that God is love. Okay? And God is perfect.
You know, and within God, there is no darkness at all, there is no sin, there is no selfishness in God.
He is selfless. He has offered his son to die in our place.
And if we want to understand what charity is, you know, obviously we want to understand what God's charity is.
We want to understand what God's love is. We want to understand his measure of love.
And this chapter does a really great work to express that to us.
Let's drop down to verse number four there. We have a list.
Charity suffereth long and is kind. Charity envyeth not. Charity wanteth not itself is not puffed up.
And so even just there in verse number four, we have one suffereth long,
kind, two envyeth not, three wanteth not itself, four is not puffed up.
We have five qualities in verse number four about charity.
And in total, I believe from what I counted here, we have 15. Is that right? 15? 16.
16 qualities of charity. 16 qualities of what love ought to be like. What God's love is like.
Because God is love. And, you know, as we are commanded to love our brethren and to love our spouse and to love our families and to love our Lord God,
I want you to measure your love with this list that we have here this morning.
You know, how perfect is your love? And I know none of us have perfect love.
You know, we do our best and I'm sure naturally you're more inclined to love certain people over others.
But I want you to think about your love, your charity. How well does that measure up to God's standard here in faith?
1 Corinthians 13. So, like I said, we've got 16 qualities. I'm not going to be able to spend
too much time on each quality, although it's going to be for hours and hours and hours.
But let's just break it down. The first thing we see there is charity suffereth long.
Charity is long suffering. That's why you better marry someone that you love, young people,
because that's a long life. You know, it's death till death do us part. Suffereth long.
You know, charity is something that has longevity. To be long suffering
is to be patient. Because the person you love, they're not perfect.
And they're going to do things that annoy you. They're going to do things that frustrate you.
And guess what? You're going to do things that frustrates them. And guess what?
Brethren in this church are going to do things that frustrate you. And guess what?
You're going to do things in this church that's going to frustrate the brethren.
And if we want to have love, if we want to make sure that our love is patient, it suffers
long, we better make sure it meets up to this quality.
Till death do us part, like I said, you need charity, you need love, you need God's love
in marriage.
You know, 50% of first marriages end in divorce, or 49%, something like that in Australia.
50%.
So that means 50% of marriages, to me, they're entered without love, without the love of
God, without the measure of God's love.
They've got some sort of love, they've got some earthly or selfish, self-centered
love, you know, some feelings and emotions, and they enter into marriage.
But before you enter into marriage, does your love line up with what you see here?
Because you want it to, you don't want it to be the 50% that ends in divorce, you want
it to be the 50% that has, that is long lasting, till death do us part.
And then it's something like, people that enter into the second marriage, I think it's
something like 60% of those marriages end in divorce, and then those that enter into
the third marriage, it's something like 70% of those marriages end in divorce.
But brethren, it's so important that our charity suffers long.
You know, when you hear couples say, well, we've just grown out of love.
No, no, you can't, if it's real love, you can't grow out of love, because it's
suffered long, it's patience, it's going to last the distance.
If you say to me, pastor, you know, I did love my spouse when we got married, but it's
just, the love's gone cold, we just don't love each other anymore, it wasn't love
in the first place.
Or you've just forgotten.
And more likely, you've forgotten.
You know, because many times marriages will take you into the decades, right?
They'll take you into the first 10 years, the next 20 years, and then your kids all
grow up, and many times marriages end when the kids leave the home.
But then why did it last that long?
You know, why did your marriage last those 10 years, 15 years, those 20 years?
You know, it was long lasting to an extent, and you say, well, it's gotten cold.
No, it's just, you're no longer measuring your love with God's standard.
You've accepted the world standard, you've accepted your selfish standard, but you need
to go to God's word and say, hold on, you know, if I've been married, then I know,
if this is charity, then I know it needs to suffer long.
It's going to last a distance, and it's going to require, guess what, work.
I mean, why do you think the Bible is constantly telling us to love one another?
Why do you think the Bible is always constantly telling us to love our God?
Why is the Bible constantly telling husbands, love your wives?
Because it requires effort.
It requires work.
If it came naturally, you wouldn't need the instruction to do it.
You would just do it if it just comes naturally, or automatically.
You need to put the effort in, and that's really where love is, right, it's the effort.
It's the work that goes into the marriage that matters.
It goes, you know, into maintaining that relationship, to deepening whatever relationship it is,
whether it's brothers and sisters in the Lord, you need to work at it, and my whole
point of this, the 16 points that we see of charity here, is if you say pastor, there
is an area here that my love does not measure up, whether to my spouse, to my children,
to my church members, or to my God, then you need to say, well I need to work at this then.
And we know God is love, so God, I need your love.
I need more of your love.
You know, this love that I think I have just doesn't line up with your word.
So I need your love to be able to express love to others.
The next thing that we see, Safra Flong and his kind.
And his kind.
You know, the word kind means to be soft and gentle.
And you know, for those that are married, when you speak to your spouse, are you soft
and gentle to your spouse?
You probably were when you started dating, right?
When a guy takes out a girl when he's on a first date, you know, that's all very
showy and nice.
You know, you open the car door, you pay for the meal.
You've been very gentle, you've been very kind.
Are you still that way after 20 years of marriage?
Are you still that way after 40 years of marriage?
Well, if you got the right charity, you will be that way.
You will continue in kindness.
Keep your finger there.
I want to show you a proverb, which is interesting to me.
Come with me to Proverbs 19, Proverbs 19 verse number 22, Proverbs 19, 22.
We're just going to see the first half of this verse here.
I've often read this, there's a lot of problems, I just can't wrap my head around.
And this was a problem that I couldn't wrap my head around until I really got preparing
for the sermon.
But Proverbs 19 verse number 22, it says, the desire of a man is his kindness.
Think about that, the desire of a man is his kindness.
So there was a correlation between desire and kindness.
You know, again, kindness is being soft or gentle, desire.
Think about it this way.
I think of a man that, I'm not really into cars, but a lot of guys are into cars.
And they might have their dream car, the right year that they want, that brings back certain
memories or it just looks flashy and they just love that car.
They're going to have a stronger desire for that car than just a beat up old Camry,
sorry brother.
Or a Corolla like mine, okay?
Your desire is going to be to that dream car, right?
And it says the desire of a man is his kindness.
So which of those cars are you going to be more careful around?
Which of those cars are you going to maintain, look after, and not allow a single scratch?
You know, when you go to the shops, you're going to park far away from the entrance all
by yourself so nobody accidentally hits your car or something.
It's going to be the one that you desire.
There was a strong correlation between kindness and desire.
And you know, like I said, if a young man takes a lady out for a date, he desires her
company and he's going to show kindness.
Sometimes then you've locked that in, she's my girlfriend, she's my fiance, she's
my wife, nothing's going to change that anymore and the kindness starts to drop away.
But brethren, you need to remind yourself, you know what, I have a desire, you know,
you have a desire for young children.
You know, when you see a little baby born, you show kindness, you're gentle toward
that little child, okay, because there's that desire, you know, there's a great love
and in order for you to develop a greater love, you need to show kindness one to another.
Show gentleness one to another.
You know, when a brother messes up, don't just tear him down, you know, show kindness.
Say, brother, I'll be praying for you, you know, I'm there for you, you know, if you
need anything, let me know how I can be of any help.
So I just, I like that correlation, that probably makes a lot more sense to me now.
You know, the kinder you are to something shows the desire that you have toward it.
We're looking at charity, we're talking about love, you know, the more kind you are
to certain individuals shows you how much you love that individual.
If you're impatient with that person, you know, you're very abrupt with that person,
it just shows that you don't have the charity toward that person that you ought to.
Back to 1 Corinthians 13 verse number 4.
It says charity, the next one is charity, envyeth not.
I should have told you to stay, I keep a finger in, actually don't worry about problems right
now.
But charity, envyeth not.
Again, what is envy?
Envy is similar to jealousy, our world hasn't mixed up, okay.
What the world thinks of jealousy today is actually biblical envy, okay, and jealousy
in the Bible is a positive attribute to have.
They are kind of similar, okay, in the sense that, you know, there are things that you
want, there are things that you desire, there are things that you are protective over or,
and when it comes to jealousy, basically, it's just this, you're protective over
things that belong to you, that rightfully belong to you.
So it's right for me to be jealous over my wife, because she rightly belongs to me.
And it's right for my wife to be jealous over me, because I rightfully belong to her.
Like if I'm hanging out with a whole bunch of ladies or something, like it's proper
for my wife to go, that's inappropriate, they shouldn't be doing that, you know,
and it shouldn't bother her.
And it's the same as me, if I say you're hanging out with a bunch of dudes, that shouldn't
bother me, right.
I should become jealous over that, because we belong one to another, we know that God
is jealous.
Because as his people, our worship and our love belongs to him, and many times the Israelites
of old will turn and worship some false god, and God is jealous.
That worship belongs to me.
You are my people, I am your God.
That is jealousy, but envy is different.
Envy is when something does not belong to you, and you desire that, okay.
So brother so-and-so's house, you know, sister so-and-so's car, you know, brother
so-and-so's wife, or whatever it is, you know, it belongs to another, but I desire
what they have, that is envy.
And Proverbs 27 verse 4, I'll just read this to you, just listen to this, Proverbs
27 verse 4, it says, wrath is cruel.
We know what wrath is, right?
It's like excessive anger.
Wrath is cruel, and anger is outrageous.
But who is able to stand before envy?
So like, we want to get the wrath and the anger out of our lives, and like, you know,
when you're dealing with this situation, it's difficult, like, it's uncomfortable
if you're hanging around an angry person, or if you're, you know, you're excessively
rattled for the wrong things potentially, but even more damaging than all of that is
envy.
Who is able to stand before envy?
See, envy then creates bitterness, and it's like, why does that person have what they
have?
Why can't I have that?
You need to get the envy out, and look, if there's envy in this church, it's not
charity, it's not love.
You say, I love you brother so-and-so, sister so-and-so, but do you envy something about
their life?
It's not, it's not right, because charity does not envy.
Envy if not.
Come with me to John chapter 3 please, John chapter 3 verse number 26.
John chapter 3 verse 26.
Now the right approach is if family so-and-so are blessed with something amazing, whatever
it is, and you'd be like, oh, that's kind of nice, you know, what would be the right
approach?
The right approach is praise God for family so-and-so, you know, thank, thank the Lord
for looking down upon them, blessing them, and giving them something wonderful, whatever
that is, instead of going, that should be me, it's wrong.
And when you look at John chapter 3 verse number 26, John chapter 3 verse number 26,
I like this, you know, John the Baptist had a great ministry, a great ministry, you know,
and he pointed people to Christ, you know, he's like, you know, of the New Testament,
he's like the first soul winner on the scene.
And John chapter 3 verse number 26, it says, and they came unto John and said unto him
Rabbi, he that was with thee beyond Jordan, to whom thou bearest witness, behold, the
same baptizer, look at this, and all men come to him, John, you used to have a great ministry,
but now everyone goes to that Jesus over there, you baptized, what are they trying to do?
They're trying to provoke John the Baptist to envy, I had a great ministry, now someone
else has a great ministry, you know, or for me to look at another pastor of another church
and go man, that'd be nice, it'd be nice to have their building, it'd be nice to
have their members, it'd be nice to have those numbers, the devil comes along and wants
to put envy in your heart, toward your brethren, in this case it's Jesus, it's God, you
know, and how does John respond, I love it, verse number 27, John answered and said, a
man can receive nothing except that be given him from heaven, brethren if someone here
has something, your friend has something nice, they have it because it's been given to
them from God in heaven, and again thank you Lord for looking down on the person that I
love and giving them something nice, you know, and then verse number 28, ye yourselves bear
me witness that I said I am not the Christ and that I am sent before him, but that I
am sent before him, he that hath the bride is the bridegroom, but the friend of the bridegroom
which standeth in here of him rejoiceth greatly because of the bridegroom's voice, this
my joy therefore is fulfilled, he goes I'm not envious that Jesus Christ has a better
ministry than me, I'm not envious that my disciples are now following him, I'm not
envious that everybody is seeking his ministry and not mine, he says I'm rejoicing, I'm
over the moon, I'm the friend of the bridegroom, you know, like your friend's getting married,
you're going to rejoice about your friend finding that lady, that should be me, no charity
will rejoice, I love John the Baptist, man he had a great mystery, he could have let
it go to his head, to his flesh, he goes no, no, you know what, I'm rejoicing because
anything good comes from the Father above and I'm going to rejoice over that and Brevin
that's why if you have the right love, you're not going to envy your brother or sister,
you're going to be thankful that God has blessed them in such a great way.
Next thing that we see in 1 Corinthians 13, charity vonteth not itself, vonteth means
basically to be boast, to lift yourself up, to be boastful, okay, I don't know why,
I don't, look I'm going to be careful because I have the flesh, I have the flesh, I honestly
I don't like to boast of myself, I don't like it, I've told you before even when
I tell stories about my life, I don't want it to come across like oh man our past is
such a wonderful God, I don't like boasting of myself but I don't like it and part of
the reason is I just can't do it with a clear conscience because even when nice things
happen to me, even when good things happen to me, I know my sinful condition, I know
I'm a weak man, I know I have struggles, I know I have problems, the last thing I want
to do especially behind the pulpit is to boast of myself or another man or boast of God who
is perfect but charity does not boast of itself, you know, the Bible says in Proverbs
27 2, let another man praise thee and not thine own mouth, a stranger and not thine
own lips, it's fine if someone else praises you, even that makes me feel uncomfortable
when someone praises me, right but that's what God, look don't praise yourself, you
don't need to praise yourself, you don't need to boast of yourself, the reason people
do this is because they feel like they lack recognition, I need to be recognised for what
I, look when you have the right love, you know that God sees all things and God recognises
what you have done, be satisfied in God, even if no one else sees it, in fact that's when
your reward is going to be great, it's when nobody else sees it but the Lord God sees
it and then you don't need to boast of yourself, Jesus Christ when he comes back, he'll boast
of your works and he'll reward you for what you've done and brethren look, I've only got
two eyes as a pastor and I know a lot of you guys do wonderful things around the church
and I'm going to sometimes not see it and I'm going to forget and I'm not going to thank
you, okay, not because I don't want to, it's just I've only got two eyes, right and actually
one's a little, one eye is not that perfect to be honest, it's a little blurry but always
remind yourself when you serve and when you serve the brethren, do it out of love, do
it out of a love for Christ, even if nobody else sees it, you know preachers when you
get up behind this pulpit and you spend a good 10 hours putting your sermon together
and you're like man this is going to be awesome and you preach it and nobody says that was
a great sermon, don't worry, you're serving Christ, okay, serving him, just do it for
Jesus and nothing else will matter but charity is not boastful, it does not speak of self,
you know and the next one is very similar, charity is not puffed up, now the difference
between this, you know, when you boast, you're just speaking highly of yourself but someone
that is puffed up, what this is, is similar but they, it's how they view themselves next
to the average person, to anybody else, you know, they think they're higher than others,
they think they're better than others and you guys know the term holier than thou, you
know, I'm holier, I'm more righteous, you know, this church is just made up of people
that aren't serving the Lord to my standard and I, because I'm holier, look at my life.
So it is similar to boasting but it can be more of an internal thing but it's how you
view other people and that holier than thou, I just want to read it to you where it comes
from, Isaiah 65 verse 5, it says we say stand by thyself, there are people that will stand,
I knew I felt this church, those people, I'm of a better standard, I'll stand over here,
you guys stand over there, you know, I'm on the podium guys by the way, I'll stand over
here, you guys are over there and then for I'm holier than thou and then God says these
are a smoke in my nose, a fire that burneth all the day, these are a smoke to my nose,
you know what this reminds me of, my dad does a lot of barbecues and he does the whole,
you know, the charcoal, basic charcoal barbeque and I stand around the barbeque sometimes,
sometimes the, you know, the smoke just gets, you know, the wind blows in the right way
and just it comes into your face and then it irritates your eyes and it's, you know,
it goes up your nose, that's what God thinks of your holier than thou attitude, if you
have the right love you will not boast, you will not want, you will not, actually sorry,
you will not be puffed up, you will not look others as lower, you know and when I think
of these two things boasting and comparing yourself to others, something else you want
to be careful of with your love is not to be passive aggressive and I hate passive aggressiveness,
I hate it because I see it in myself actually, I hate it in myself, you know and I see it
and I say things and I go why did I say that, you know and sometimes my sarcasm can be passive
aggressive, like I actually mean it for a joke but then someone can mean it, like take
it personally and I can see why they take that personally, you know, passive, you know
and it's basically a combination of these two things, let me give you an idea of what
passive aggressiveness is, it's essentially like this, you know one parent might go to
another parent and say oh you allow your children to eat that, I would never allow
my children to eat that, they're not saying anything bad about the kids or anything like
that, they say but I'll never do that for my, toward my kids, well then what are you
saying about me, like you haven't really gone out there and attacked me but by your
words you are attacking me, you're being passive aggressive toward me because you see
yourself better than the others, you see yourself as a better parent than others, you see your
children as better than the other kids.
Another way that people might use passive aggressiveness is kind of again a combination
of the two things but instead of referring to themselves because they know actually they're
going to take that to mean that I, you know, they're going to take that to mean that
I'm better than them so I'll use a third party in this passive aggressive style, you
know.
For example, I'll just use someone because there's no Duggs here, there's no Duggs,
you'll be like man I love how brother Dugg attends every church service, brother Dugg
is there three times a week, I wish we had more church members like that, you say to
a church member that attends like once a week, you say to a church member that attends like
twice a week, you know a church member that attends lives too far and you know they're
not going to make it but you say well just brother Dugg, what a blessing he is, I wish
everyone was like that, that's passive aggressive, I'm not boasting of myself, yeah but you
know you're tearing down that brother or sister, you know that's your intention,
so brethren be careful that's not love, that's not charity, okay now am I saying
that if you have these bad qualities that it's not real love, I'm not saying that,
okay there is love, you know the new man, we know the new man loves the brethren, we
know that, we know the new man loves the Lord but our flesh gets in the way and so when
we see these inconsistencies and these problems in our love then that's why you need to
go, I need to fix this pastor, as I go through this list, man I do recognise these things,
I am passive aggressive toward my wife or whatever or to my to my brethren, I can see
these qualities, man I need to change this, Lord God I need your perfect love, you know
please clean up, you know these expressions of love that I have, I realise Lord it does
not line up with your standard, just like anything in the Bible right, when you see
something that's not lined up with God's standard, you need to make a conscious decision
that I need to change this and God I can't change it on my own, I need your help to make
this change in my life, 1 Corinthians 13 verse number 5, we'll go to the next verse, now
we have doth not behave itself unseemly, that's another one, seeketh not our own,
there's another one, not easily provoked, another one, thinketh no evil, so we've
got four things here in verse number 5, what else do we learn about charity, the next thing
you see in verse number 5, charity does not, doth not behave itself unseemly, now something
that is unseemly, we would use the word inappropriate, you know, charity is not going to be inappropriate
and if you have true love, you're not going to say inappropriate things to people, you're
not going to ask inappropriate questions, you know, you're being mindful of that person's
feelings, you're being mindful of that person's situation and so you want to make sure you
say things that are not going to, you know, hurt them or destroy them or offend them,
you're going to make sure what you say is appropriate to the situation, another way
to look at this is being respectful of boundaries, you know, every family ought to have boundaries
but let me encourage you brethren, please have boundaries in your families, please
don't let anybody just interrupt your family life and ask the most personal and private
questions about your life, listen, you need boundaries, okay, to protect yourself and
to protect other people, there are certain people that just love to interfere in other
people's lives and you might like it because you might come across, man, they love me so
much that if they care so much about me, you know, they want to know so much about
us, you know, so I can be praying for you brother but they're gathering information
to use against you at some point, you've got to be careful, you know, I believe this
is true, what I'm about to say to you, I believe is true, again and this is based on
my experience, okay, I'm not just saying my experience as a pastor of New Life Baptist
Church, I'm saying my experience in church my whole life, every conflict, every conflict
that I've seen is because someone's been inappropriate or unseemly or crossed boundaries
that did not belong to them, every single time, like every conflict that can have various
issues and various things that were said about different issues, when you boil it down to
it, someone infringed on someone's personal life, they crossed someone's boundaries
and they just don't know how to stop, you know, and again having boundaries, having
these protected things is good for your family but it's also good for them so you can help
that brother or that sister who struggles in this area to go, oh wow, they're saying
no to me, you know, and if several families go, no, no, look, you've gone too far there,
you know, those questions are not appropriate, you know, your interference into my family
life is inappropriate, when they start hearing that multiple times, then oh man, my charity
is not perfect, I need to change this about my love, you know, you're being too loving
which is no such thing because being inappropriate is not true love, being unseemly is not true
love so, you know, be careful, you know, give people personal space, you know, you don't
need to know about everyone's private matters, you don't need to know about everyone's
little detail of, you know, their life, people will share with you things that they're
not wrong with, you know, sometimes, you know, as a pastor, I know I'm going to get
more of that, pastor, I'm struggling with this or that, you know that I'm not going
to just start questioning, like if you've spoken to me, you know, I don't need every
single piece of detail, I don't want to know, I don't want to know because I don't
want to be unseemly towards you, feel like, well brother, sister, you know, we'll pray
for this, we'll take it to the Lord, I'll take it to the Lord and we'll leave it with
him because he knows all things, like God knows how to be appropriate in his love.
The next one that we see is charity seeketh not her own, okay, not her own.
So charity, real love is not selfish, it's selfless, you're looking out for the needs
of others, okay, so when you get married, for example, you know, I mean, it's one
thing to say yes, it'd be nice to have someone, a partner in life, it's nice to have someone
that I can love and I can have company with and not be lonely, I understand all of that
but really when it comes down to marriage, it's not about what you can get out of it,
it's what you can give, that's real love.
I mean, when you think about God and his sacrifice to us, Jesus Christ, did God really think
about what he gets out of it, I mean, he dies, what did God get out of it, he took the sins
of the whole world upon him, what did he get out of it, the son took the wrath of the father,
alright, the father forsook the son, I mean, what does God really get out of it, no, it
was selfless, God said I'm looking down at a sinful creation, sinful people, human
beings on their way to hell and you know what, I'm going to be selfless and offer my son
to die in their place, that's what God's love is like and brethren, that's what our
love ought to be like as well, if you want to turn, actually no, I'll just read it
to you, Philippians 2.4, look not every man on his own things but every man also on the
things of others, so charity seeker if not our own and again you want to be able to understand
this in light of what we saw earlier that charity does not behave itself unseemly, okay,
we want to make sure it's appropriate but at the same time, yes, we are looking out
for the needs of others but you don't want to break those boundaries, okay, you can,
you can learn a lot about certain people without being inappropriate.
You can know enough, you know, to help them in life, to be a blessing to them but that's
what, by the way, and really that's what marriage is, okay, young people, especially
young people, I want you to know, it's what can I do for my spouse, you know, husbands,
how can I love my wife even more so and wives, how can I be more submissive to my husband,
you know, honour him and respect him the way that he deserves as the leader of the house.
And then verse number five continues, is not easily provoked, okay, it's not easily offended,
you know, love or charity is not a short temper, right, I mean, if my wife does something to
annoy me and I just blow up about it, it's not real charity, let's be slow to anger,
okay, not easily provoked every time something is said and get frustrated, as soon as a brother
or sister in the Lord does something, look, do you think in my life there's been times
when brothers and sisters have done things that I don't like, of course, think of your
own life, of course there's been things that people have, but you know, were you easily
provoked or were you patient like we saw, you know, long suffering with them, if you're
easily provoked, if you're easily offended, easily eaten up, you know, when someone does
something, it's not real love, you need to work on it, again, it's just back to
the long suffering, patience, it's not easily provoked, you know, Proverbs, I'll get to
turn to Proverbs, Proverbs 15 please, Proverbs 15, Proverbs 15 verse number 18, I want you
to see this one, Proverbs 15 verse 18, husbands and wives, how often do you guys have arguments,
how often do you have fights in your marriage, look, of course, you're going to have fights
because we're human beings and we're sinners and all of that, okay, but it should be rare
if you love your spouse the way God wants you to, you know, it can't be every time they
leave the toilet seat up or down or forget to replace the toilet paper or forget to put
the shoes away or whatever, these tiny, tiny, tiny things and you fight about it, it's because
your charity is easily provoked and according to God, charity is not easily provoked.
But Proverbs 15, 18, Proverbs 15, 18, a wrathful man stirreth up strife, but he that is slow
to anger appeaseth strife, are you someone that is in constant strife, it's just like
strife follows you everywhere you go, every relationship you have, family, friends, work,
church, you know, are you just constantly, you know, in the mix of conflict, it's persecution,
no, it's you, it's your lack of charity is what it is, you know, when someone says the
whole world is against me, every single person, you know, my family sucks and my church sucks
and my work sucks and everyone, you're the one that sucks, you're the problem, you stir
up strife, you're easily provoked because you haven't got God's perfect love.
Look, he that is slow to anger, it's not that anger is a sin, it's just we're too slow to
anger, alright, appease of strife. If you take the time, alright, cool heads prevail, you know,
you try to sort things out slowly and carefully, look, you stop the strife from even coming in
your life. So how much strife is in your marriage, how much strife is in your relationships at church,
say I got a lot of strife, then change it, ask God for his perfect charity in your life.
The next thing that was said was think of no evil, charity think of no evil, that is to think the
best of people, alright, you view others as innocent until proven guilty, I think many times
think of people guilty until they prove themselves innocent. I strive, that's what I want in my life,
I want to think the best of people, I want to think the best of my church members and you know,
when it says think of no evil, also I don't want to harm you as my church members, you know, evil
is, you know, the word harm is, you know, Bob many times uses the word evil in reference to
being harmful, you know, is your actions harmful to other people, you know, when I get behind the
pulpit to preach, I don't want to harm you, I just want to preach the truth of God's word and I know
if it's God's word, it's not going to harm you because God's word and God's charity is perfect,
you know, I don't think evil toward, like we ought not to think evil toward one another,
not to think about how we can harm other people, you know, 1 Peter chapter 3 verse 8,
finally be all of one mind, having compassion one of another, love as brethren, be pitiful,
be courteous, not rendering evil for evil or railing for railing, but contrariwise blessing,
knowing that ye are therefore called, that ye should inherit a blessing,
for when someone does evil to you, how do you respond with evil, God says no, no bless him,
bless them instead, when someone rails against you, do you rail back, no bless them, okay,
bless them in return, do good to your enemies, brethren this is what charity is, you don't want
to harm others, even when they're harming you, even when your brethren at church are harming you,
even when your family is harming you, even when your friends are harming you, you know what,
you bless them in return, show them the love of God, again we're comparing ourselves to God's
standard and we were harming God were we not, every time we sin we offend our Lord God,
every time we sin we trespass against his commandments, every time we sin we go against
his will and even then he sent Christ to die for you and even after you're saved he's willing to
forgive you in your daily walk of Christian living, that's God's standard of love,
how well is your standard of love, it's not perfect is it, mine's not perfect
and as I'm putting this sermon together I was being challenged, I go man I can be a better
husband, I can be a better dad, I can be a better pastor, I can be a better friend, I can love
better but I can't do it on my own, it's not there in my flesh, it must be from God, it must
be from above because again God is love, I can only love if I am close with my Lord, I can only
love properly if I know God's standard of love and you have to be willing to go Lord I fail,
Lord we're going for these points man, I failed point number three, point number five,
point number eight there, man I'm struggling Lord, all these areas, you know the only way
to change is to first recognize you need to change it and I messed up and Lord please forgive me
and Lord help me do better moving forward, help me to love better moving forward.
Verse number six, first Corinthians chapter 13 verse number six,
first Corinthians 13 verse number six, it says rejoice of not in iniquity but rejoice of in the
truth and I separated these two things you know point number 10 and 11 here, I mean they kind of
they do go hand to hand of course but charity does not rejoice in iniquity, charity does not
rejoice in sin, when someone fails in life, when someone commits sin, when someone's weak and they
give in to their sinful whatever lusts, are you like woohoo, I knew it, I couldn't wait for
brother so and so to fail and because he's been up himself, he's been boastful, now he's been taken
down, woohoo, that's not love, come on, you know it's not, does that sometimes happen in the heart
though, I bet it does, even a little bit, that satisfies me, they've messed up, it's so bad,
it's so bad to think like that but we do sometimes, I do sometimes,
I shouldn't say that pastor, it's what I am, I'm a human being, I'm a sinner is what I am,
I'm not perfect, I mean charity rejoices no iniquity, all right, rather you're saddened,
you're not going to rejoice, you're saddened when a brother or sister fails,
you're saddened when a brother or sister destroys themselves and commits sin and you know gets
themselves away from God, is backsliding, whatever it is, it should sadden you, saying Lord please
restore them, Lord can you use me to restore them to you, that's love, that's charity,
charity says rejoice of in the truth, charity rejoice of in the truth,
I hope this truth this morning is challenging you
and instead of going oh, pastor's pointing out my sins again, how about you rejoice in the truth,
is it true, is it God's word or is it not God's word, doesn't matter if it makes you feel
uncomfortable, it offends you a little bit, that's not charity, if it offends you,
if it's easily provoked, you say you know what, if what I'm hearing is the truth,
you know what, I'm going to rejoice in the truth,
you know there are times I have to get up behind the pulpit and teach something,
I know it's going to offend this brother or sister, I know it's going to offend this family,
but if I have real charity, if I really love you, I'm not going to hold back the truth,
I will tell you the truth and if you truly love the truth, that's what church is, the pillar and
the ground of truth, then when you get offended, you'll be like man, my preacher, whether it's my
pastor or some other man up behind this pulpit, my preacher must love me because he was willing
to offend me but I can see that it's coming from God's word, it's coming from the truth of God's
word, that's love and of course if we can accept the truth more readily, we'll be more able to
make changes in our life, we'll be able to improve our love. Verse number seven,
next thing that we see here is charity, bear of all things, that's another one,
believe of all things, hope of all things, endure of all things, so we've got four points here,
bear of all things, believe of all things, hope of all things, endure of all things,
so the next first one is charity, bear of all things, you bear, I think of carrying burdens,
you bear all things, again it just has to do with understanding that the person you are called to
love, except God, but everyone else, have problems, have weaknesses, have bad habits,
have failings, so I'm just going to give up on that person and we're going to bear it and we're
going to just try to put up with it and we're going to try to be a supportive person. Galatians
6 says, bear ye one another's burdens and so fulfil the law of Christ,
bear ye one another's burdens, that means everyone's got burdens,
everyone's got burdens, are you willing to say pastor, I've got no issues in life at all,
man, maybe some of the little kids, you know, maybe Samuel right, I've got no burdens,
I've got no issues in life, even the little babies have issues right,
they get hungry, they need a change of nappy, that's their burden, they got whinged,
those are their burdens, we all got burdens and the Bible says to bear one another's burdens,
it beareth, you know, you're not just, oh man, sister so and so and her problems again,
how about sister so and so and her problems, I'm going to pray for her, how about that,
she can't carry them and I can't help her really, I'm limited here but I can carry them to God for
her, I can bear them to God for her, how about that instead, carry burdens and the next one
says charity believeth all things and we know that not everyone tells the truth but you know what
what this means is when someone says something to me,
I'm not going to try to catch them out in lies, I'm going to view what they're saying to be true,
and as a pastor sometimes there are conflicts and I hear one side and I hear another side
and I know that they can't both be true
but I'm going to believe both, I'm going to say you know what, I think
that obviously they're not both true, maybe they're neither true, okay but I'm going to
believe what brother so and so said or sister so and so said to me is true to the two of them,
that's how they see that situation, they might be incorrect, you know, they might be missing
information, they may have be exaggerating or they may be allowing their emotions to get the better
of them when they express those words but I'm going to assume what they're saying, believe to
be true, I'm not going to believe at this time that they're trying to deceive me, I'm not going
to believe at this time they're just trying to cause problems, I'm going to believe this person
actually wants to sort out the issue, so I'm just going to believe them until I have evidence
obviously, okay and it's a believer for all things and again willing to accept what others have to
say is true to them at that time, at that time anyway, right like I'm not just going to start
knocking down you know your thoughts or your feelings, I mean because I don't know just yet,
it all might be true but so I'm just going to believe it because I love you, I'm not just going
to all right where can I find the inconsistencies here and you know I think this is a lie here,
you know I want you I want people to talk to me and express what they're what they have to say,
well that's how we ought to be, you know even when someone says something in that is inaccurate and
I know it's inaccurate, I'm going to believe that their intentions are true, their intentions are
pure, other times when the preacher is going to say something inaccurate, sometimes but you know
the preacher's intentions by now you should know whether it's me or someone else that their
intention is pure, they just said something you know incorrectly by you know a little brain snap
in their head, something did not line up properly you know between their mouth and their brain and
you know you're just going to say well I'm not going to say I'm not going to, oh man he must
definitely be a false prophet because he said something a bit weird you know or just you know
a preacher quotes a Bible verse and they preach and it's like out of context, I mean what they're
preaching is true but you know it's inaccurate, it's out of context, you're not going this guy
doesn't know the Bible, maybe he's not even saved because you know you wouldn't know this if the
Holy Spirit was living within him, again you know charity believeth all things, next one's kind of
similar verse number four point number 14 charity hopeeth all things, hopeeth all things, charity
charity is hopeful for the future okay, it's positive, it's been positive minded, it's not been
negative, when problems come you have to be positive minded you know you look if you're just
negative it's going to tear you down, you're not going to be able to work through your problems
and your struggles, the first thing you do when your problem comes it goes you say God you must
have given me this problem for a reason, you must have allowed this problem for a reason,
there's something you're trying to show me, what is it Lord,
there's something you want me to change maybe Lord, what is it that you want me to change,
I want to be positive about this, you're doing this for me, for my prophet
instead of being oh God again why, can't you pick on someone else, it's not going to help you,
love is hopeful for the future, I think we have our better years ahead of us at New Life Baptist
Church, our best years ahead of us, I think my next, I think it's 20 years come January my
marriage, I've enjoyed the first 20 years but I reckon the next 20 years is going to be even better
but what if I say it's not going to be better, I'm not going to work on my marriage,
we're not going to maintain love and could end in divorce or what have you, what kind of problems,
separation, being hopeful, being positive, no one likes being around negative people,
have you ever been around negative people, just always negative, everything's negative,
everything's bad, everything's falling apart, it's all about to fall apart, oh come on,
you know the sun came up, let's look at the sunset together, that's something nice,
we woke up and we could breathe, I'm actually alive this morning, praise God for that,
I'm going to rejoice in those things, I'm going to look at things from a positive perspective.
The reason why charity hopeful things is if you don't hope, if you're not hopeful,
if you're not positive, you know your negative words, your negative reaction
are going to bring your loved ones down with you, right, when you're constantly around someone
that's negative, what's going to happen, you're going to start getting negative,
you're going to start, it's going to hurt your life, you know when you have perfect love,
when you've got the perfect charity, your hopeful disposition, your positive mindedness
is going to affect those other people around you to be positive and lifted up as well,
that's how you can show love one toward another, hope of hopeful things
and then it says charity endureth all things, charity endureth
all things, very similar to being long suffering but you know it lasts a distance,
it accepts that people will fail but you know what, you still love them even when they fail.
Can you come with me to 1 Peter chapter 4, come with me to 1 Peter chapter 4,
charity endureth all things, 1 Peter chapter 4, you know when someone does you wrong,
look if you're going to spend time with anybody, they're going to do you wrong,
if you're going to spend a long time with anybody,
that's why some people just come to church, hear the sermon, run away before anyone does them
wrong and before they do anyone anything wrong, if you're going to be around people, people are
going to do you wrong, okay, it's just how it is but is your love going to endure that,
you're going to be able to say you know what, yeah, you know they did me wrong but you know
what, we've been friends for the past five years and you know they're probably just having a bad
day, they're probably having a bad time at the moment, I'm just going to endure that
and I'm going to stay a good friend, I'm going to continue to love them
because the track record speaks of itself, always just that again that one little issue,
I don't want anything to do with them, it endures, 1 Peter chapter 4 verse 8,
what a powerful verse this is, and above all things have fervent charity among yourselves,
say why, for charity shall cover the multitude of sins, charity covers the multitude of sins,
so have fervent charity one toward another, again why is this taught out throughout the Bible
because we don't have perfect charity, we don't always have fervent charity, can someone commit
to sin, I'm done with them, someone does you wrong, I'm done with them, wrong, if you truly
love them, it would endure, if you have fervent charity for them, it's going to cover the multitude
of sins, you're going to go you know what I can put that aside, I can forgive them,
you know what I can overlook that passive aggressiveness, I can overlook the wrong
they've done, I'm just going to get on with it, maybe they did not intend it,
maybe they had a bad day, they're having a bad moment, you know what I know what they're strung
with and probably what the strung with just came out in my conversation with them and they just
vented toward me and they don't mean it, you know I mean they shouldn't have said those things but
I think they've got bigger issues behind the scenes so I'm just going to,
I'm going to have fervent charity and that's going to cover their sins,
okay that's what love is brethren, it endures with all things and then first Corinthians 13 verse
number 16 the last one, point number 16 charity never faileth, never, that's why how can a married
couple say we've grown out of love, it doesn't fail, real love does not stop,
it doesn't give up, you know it doesn't die, our love died, no it doesn't die,
it's just that you no longer are measuring yourself up, you're no longer working toward
the charity that you see in the bible, you're no longer putting the effort in,
you've gone back to a very carnal love, you need to go back to God's love, you need to work
on your relationship, you need to work in your marriage, you need to work in your relationships
with people at church, it doesn't give up, it never fails, the other way that I look at this
is charity never fails meaning that if you have love, if you pursue love it will always succeed,
it will always be profitable, like you're never going to get to the point where man I showed so
much love and that was all for nothing, no no it succeeded, it's profitable okay, you'll always
be better off having charity than no charity because without charity you're nothing,
I know all the doctrines pastor, I know it all down perfectly,
man I can speak in tongues, I can get out there and preach the gospel to every language,
you don't have charity you're nothing, Paul says that about himself,
that's the main thing, that's the main thing, charity, love
and so brethren there's many things here right, many things in this list, charity suffer long,
charity is kind, charity envyeth not, charity wanteth not, charity is not puffed up, charity
does not behave itself unseemly, charity seeketh not her own, charity is not easily provoked,
charity thinketh no evil, charity rejoiceth not in iniquity, charity rejoiceth in the truth,
charity beareth all things, charity believeth all things, charity hopeeth all things,
charity endureth all things and charity never fails, so what is your love like,
what is your love like, again we go through the bible, John, 1st John, 2nd John, love, love,
love, yes good, fantastic but now a little bit deeper, how does your love measure up
with God's standard because I told you brethren, I'm putting this list together and I'm like man,
I failed big time, yeah like ah man, I need to work on this, man I really, I'm not doing well,
oh look, am I going to say there's nothing on that list, of course
you know and there are days that I'm doing better than others because the flesh gets in the way,
problems get in the way, right but how well do you measure up, look I don't want you to be
nothing, I don't want our church to be a nothing church in the eyes of God,
look doctrine is important, everything that we do is important, serving the Lord is important,
praising the Lord is important, going soul winning is important but brethren if we have
not charity then we are nothing, I don't want that about my life, I don't want that about my
marriage, I don't want that about my family, I don't want that about our church, I don't want
that in life, I don't want God to say man that was all for nothing because he didn't have the
charity that I have, he didn't have the love that I have toward others, alright brethren, anyway
please take this to heart, please think strongly about it, there's a lot of areas that you know
you need to change okay and when you recognise those things say yes Lord I messed up, God help
me, give me your love, give me your love Lord so I can express that love to others, okay let's pray.