When you go to college and move to a new city, we need a church to go. Now, how to find a good church? What is a good church?
Pastor Chuck Swindoll says, “there are many churches, Korean churches, American churches, white churches, or African American churches. But there are only two kinds of churches. They are churches with love and churches without love.”
If there is no love in a church, no matter how big the church is or how powerful the sermon is, it is not a biblical church. What about our church? What about your youth group? Do we have love among us?
Love is essential as a Christian character (v1-3)
1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but I do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.
2 And if I have prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.
3 If I give away everything I own, and if I give over my body in order to boast, but do not have love, I receive no benefit.Verse 3 is a striking statement. If you give away my own possession and life, it will be a great sacrifice and commendable. Even so, such a sacrifice might not be from love. If a sacrifice for others might not be identified as love, what is love?
Love is a God’s character (v4-7)
4 Love is patient, love is kind, it is not envious. Love does not brag, it is not puffed up.
5 It is not rude, it is not self-serving, it is not easily angered or resentful.
6 It is not glad about injustice but rejoices in the truth.
7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.· Patience (passive) and kindness (active) characterize God, and truly Christian behavior. (v4a)
· Love properly manages hurts and offences that others cause against you. (v4b-5)
Love does not deal with other people in a way that injures their dignity. It does not insist on having its own way (“not seek its own”). It is not irritable or touchy (“not provoked”), but it absorbs offenses, insults, and inconveniences for the sake of others’ welfare. It does not keep a record of offenses received (“not take into account a wrong”) to pay them back. This is what Jesus did to us. He didn’t condemn the adulterous woman. He didn’t accuse Peter’s denial. Rather, He bore the penalty of their sins.
How to absorb offenses or insults? The Bible doesn’t tell how to be like that? But Gal 5:22-23 says, it is the fruit of the Holy Spirit. Without the Holy Spirit, you cannot. “one of the great arts in life is to learn what to forget”
· Love wants others to live. The life comes from righteousness (v6)
Love does not delight on other’s failure or sins. Love cannot share the glee of the successful sinner. No gossiping about the misdeeds of others. It rejoices spiritual growth of others.
LOVE is not just a virtue we need to have. It is a character of God. Unless we are connected to Jesus, we cannot love. Love is a stream of water that flows from Jesus to us. Wherever it flows, all people can experience God’s characters: love, righteousness, mercy, and light. Love without righteousness is not true love because it does not make us live.
· Love is ready to sacrifice all he has for others to grow in faith (v7)
This doesn’t mean that a Christian is to allow himself to be fooled by every rogue, or to pretend that he believes what white is black. But in doubtful cases he will prefer being too generous in his conclusions to suspecting another unjustly. Even though it might cost him a sacrifice of money, health, or life. For the sake of others.
Love covers unworthy things, rather than bringing them to the light and magnifying them.
Love is hopeful that those who have failed will not fail again (like our moms), rather than concluding that failure is inevitable. It does not allow itself to become overwhelmed but perseveres steadfastly through difficult trials. And love is ready for the sacrifice that is required for others to grow.
The Permanence of love (v8-13)
8 Love never ends. But if there are prophecies, they will be set aside; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be set aside.
9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part,
10 but when what is perfect comes, the partial will be set aside
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13 And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.Love made Jesus to die on the cross…In heaven we will praise Jesus’ loving sacrifice more than anything else like His power or miracles.
What is your reward in heaven? Jesus would not ask you how much you read Bible, pray, or evangelized. He would ask you how much you have loved God and how much you loved others.