Love’s Mandates

Introduction

I am extremely privileged to be able to talk about this great word in the Bible. And may what I have to say about it for just a few minutes tonight be helpful to us all to appreciate it, understand it, and to pursue it in our lives. And that’s exactly what Paul told us to do about this in 1 Corinthians 14 and verse 1. He said, pursue love. Like all the great words of the New Testament, the word love has suffered from abuse and people’s false notions about what it means. Just like the word grace has been abused, the words faith, spirit, a little less spirit too. Baptism, as we talked about the importance of that, of coming into Him. Every great word of the New Testament, we might throw in the word works.

And Jared and I were talking about that after services this morning and some discussions that he’s had in regard to that word and how it’s used in the New Testament. The word church could be added in this list as well. And so I want to talk to you for a few minutes about a word that, again, we talk so much about that we may think we understand it completely. And I’m here to tell you, I don’t know that I’ll ever get to the depths of what it really means. And so, this is a word that is often misunderstood, particularly in the religious world today that talks so much about love. It is abused. And so often individuals want to insert their own definition for it. And I want to tell you, I think it’s very difficult for us to remove the connotations of the word love and the way it’s used in our language.

I think it’s very difficult for that not to influence the way we look, even at biblical love. And even though we’ll say in our minds, I know it’s something deeper and richer than it’s often called. I still think we struggle to impose what we think about love and the way we use that term on the biblical word. And I know we know it’s the Greek word agape. In many instances, that’s the deepest and highest kind of love that we read about in 1 Corinthians 13. There’s the Philaleo, the brotherly kind of love that we read about in a number of passages. And sometimes those terms, even in the Greek, somewhat overlap in meaning. And so they had all these different words for a love. They had another word for erotic love.

They had a word for family love. And I like to talk about that. It’s the Greek word storgay that has to do with natural affection and one of the sins of the Gentiles in Romans chapter 1. They were without storge, ostorgo. They were without natural affection. And so that’s an important thing in relation to what the Bible has to say about love as well. But how are we going to define this term? When we say we love something, and I know we use this illustration all the time, we’ll say, I love my wife, or I love my husband, or I love my kids, and we’ll also say, I love my car. You know, a car doesn’t get in bed with you at night and keep you warm.

Now, it might keep you warm in the winter when you’re out somewhere, but it’s it’s not going to hug you back. And yet, some people, boy, that’s their total world is their car. And it doesn’t hug. It doesn’t even say I love you. It’s just a machine. Pretty, sometimes. Sometimes ugly. But pretty, but it doesn’t hug you and tell you it loves you. Even pizza, as good as it is sometimes, unless you get too much of it in our culture. And hamburgers and watermelon or whatever it is that you really like. And we’ll say, I love that. And we all know, well, yeah, or I love my pet. My dog. My gerbil. Does anybody have those anymore? Hamsters, whatever. I mean, we’ll say, I love, I don’t know why you’d love one of those things, but or I love my pet.

And we all think, I know, I know, I know. Loving my pet is not like loving my spouse. Really? Well, it shouldn’t be, but you know, sometimes it is. Because I’ll tell you what we often mean when we say, I love you. What we’re just saying is we have a special affinity for this thing. You know, it’s not like somebody else. It’s better than that. Or it’s special to me in some way, some unique way. It’s more special to me than anything else. Or we’ll talk about our sports teams. I love, and we’ll put our sports team at the end of that. And we have a special affinity for them, and we’ll spend some time watching and serving our team. Unless you’re like Steve and Terry and you can’t bear to even watch your own team.

The oddest thing I’ve ever seen. But I wonder if that’s sort of the way when we say, you know, I love, and it’s a person, I wonder if it’s not any more than just this special affinity. Yeah, it holds a special place in my life. But is it the biblical love that we see described? And so what I’m most concerned about tonight as we look at a few things from the scriptures is that we get God’s definition and we pursue that kind of love in all of our relationships. And let me give you some biblical insight into this word. We have to start in Romans chapter 5. Romans chapter 5 and verse 8. And we’re going to look at the context here. So if you have a string, I want you to mark this passage because we’re going to come back to it.

You’ve heard this before, most likely. Okay, you want to know what agape is. This is its description for us right here. But God demonstrates his own love toward us. In that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. I want to tell you, this is so insightful to the true nature of God’s love. When it says in 1 John chapter 4, God is love. It is essential to his nature. It’s what he’s all about. It is best described for us right here in Romans chapter 5 and verse 8. What does it mean God is love? It means that he saw something in humanity, all of humanity, that was worth he himself coming, suffering rejection, though undeserved, by the object of his love, even to the extent as we’ll see in Philippians 2, in that context, Philippians 2, even dying on the death, the death on the cross, because he saw something in the object that was worth that kind of a sacrifice.

And we know what all of that was for. It was for you. It’s for every person that has ever lived in this world, every creature of God, every man, every woman. God did that so that he might save some of us. And that we might be in his presence. And to bask in all the glory and joy of that forever. Now, can we imitate that kind of love? That’s what we’re asked to do. In Ephesians chapter 5, when we’re told to be imitators of God and walk in love just as Christ did, I mean, that’s what we’re being asked to do to show that kind of love. I want to hopefully give you some thoughts about how you can do that tonight as I talk to you about love’s mandates.

1. Love One Another As I Have Loved You

And I like this word. Maybe because you’d remember it better than if I just said love’s commands or directives. So this is love’s mandates, not to be confused with Reuben’s mandrakes. That’s something else in the Bible. Okay. This is love’s mandate. That’s bad preacher joke, is what that is. Alright, love’s mandates, and we’re going to look at four characteristics of true agape biblical love, two of which issue from Jesus Himself. And again, this will be no surprise to you. What did he tell his disciples in John 13? Remember I said, hold your finger there in Romans 5, John 13. A new commandment. Well, the greatest commandment in the law was love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind. The second is likened to it, love your neighbor as yourself.

And so now Jesus is saying love, and it’s a new commandment. How can that be? I mean, if you love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, what else is there? I mean, is there another level after that? What’s different about this? Well, it’s love one another as I have loved you. And this is the important thing. He says, by this all men will know that you are my disciples, that you that you have signed on to serve me, and you’re one of mine, he says, if you have love for one another. The new quality to this is the example that Jesus set the human display. God has displayed love from heaven over and over again throughout time and throughout history in his redeeming work.

But in Jesus Christ, it came in human flesh, and he demonstrated that love. So now what was that about? What’s the portrait of it? Well, he taught people. Because that was in the best interest of them knowing truth and being saved. He was patient with people and their failures. And we’re going to talk about Paul in a minute. And in our study of 2 Corinthians, considering the way they were rejecting him, did he display a little bit of patience with those brethren? What about the passages we read at the end of 2 Corinthians? When you consider everything that precedes those verses in 2 Corinthians, you go, that’s a pretty surprising ending. That he wants all of this good stuff and says all of these positive things about these brethren.

I mean, he was patient with people who failed. He reproved people, to be sure. And we talked before about his denunciation of the Pharisees. Is that because he just wanted to grind them to powder? I want to show them who’s boss. I’m going to push, I’m going to show them real authority. And he had it all authority in heaven and earth. And I’m going to grind those scoundrels to pieces. It was in his ultimate wisdom. He knew that was the only way he could reach them, potentially. The only way he could get through there, as we would say, their thick skulls. To somehow wake them up to their need for him. And so sometimes rebuke is involved, and we know that in regard to the preaching that Timothy was told to do preach the word, reprove, rebuke, exhort with all long suffering.

I mean, he prayed for people. He prayed. He prayed for his disciples the night of his betrayal in John 17. He served them. He went around the room with the towel and washed their feet. And he gave them an example to follow. Okay, our love in every relationship should be no less. Sometimes misdeeds have to be reproved. That’s a part of this love because as long as one continues in this pattern of misdeeds, the soul is in jeopardy, and that’s what we’re concerned about. And we need to be praying for others. We talked about intercession this morning and serving others and patient with failures because we want people surely to be patient with us. And so we’ve got to demonstrate this love. Now, let me suggest to you in Ephesians 3, in Ephesians 3, this is an unending quest.

An unending quest for us. One of the prayers. Paul, of course, imitated Jesus. He was praying for brethren all over the place all the time. And he and he prays in Ephesians 3 and verse 17 about the Ephesians, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith. That is, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God. We know that passage. And so as we learn about the love of Christ, then Paul is praying that love be demonstrated in our hearts, and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints. And this is so this is our joint project that we may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and the length and the height and the depth.

That’s about every direction that there is. And to know the love of Christ, which surpasses knowledge. That you may be filled up to all the fullness of God. So in our pursuit of this quality, we become filled up to the fullness of God. And we’re trying to help each other understand this quality. This is with all the saints. We’re delving into. Let’s examine the love of Christ, its height, its depth, its breadth, it’s everything about it. Let’s learn it. It’s a never ending quest because as you strive to know this, he says, it surpasses knowledge. And no wonder to him be the glory in the church. Ephesians 3 and verse 21, one who can love like this. God can help us to love like this. And I want you to go back now to Romans chapter 5.

Romans chapter 5, when it talks about our justification by faith and the peace with God that results in verse 1. He talks about exalting in hope and in tribulations, and that these tribulations know that they bring about perseverance, and that’s what we’ve got to have. Perseverance and proven character. Christianity, you want to summarize what it’s all about? It’s the development of character. The fruit of the Spirit that we talk about.

It’s about developing proven character and hope, and hope that does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out. See this earlier in the context. The love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us. And so as we read this product that comes to us from the Holy Spirit, we can know the love of God to some degree, because it really surpasses knowledge. And we can imitate the love that Jesus displayed. God help us to love like this. How many times have you heard the verse? Husbands love your wives. Even as Christ loved the church and gave himself. Do you ever feel, guys, that we struggle to measure up there? I do that perfectly all the time.

Husbands love your wives even as Christ loved the church. I mean, it was a perfect display of love. He never faltered in it ever. I can’t say that. But that’s the model that’s been given to me to pursue and to imitate. So the better I understand this term, then the more I can glorify God. Simon Kistemaker, in his commentary on James and 1st through 3rd John said about love. In many families today, divorce, desertion, and separation create untold grief and bitterness. Couples who at the time of the wedding declared that they would love each other until death do us part exhibit callous indifference when they contemplate divorce. Their wedding vows lie broken like pieces of porcelain on a stone floor. What went wrong? Love has vanished.

2. Do You Love Me? Tend My Sheep

Because it could not flourish in an atmosphere of ever taking but never giving. Love can succeed only in an environment where it is allowed to give. For genuine love is sacrificial giving. What does the Lord expect in marriage? Husband and wife should honor and love one another, even to the point of being willing to lay down their life for one another. When husband and wife tenderly care for each other. By imitating Christ’s example of sacrificial love, they will experience that God keeps them together in marital love and blesses their home and family with years of wedded bliss. Certainly some thoughts to consider. As we pursue the model of Jesus’ love. But there’s a second aspect of this. And it’s demonstrated in John 21, where Peter faltered and denied the Lord three times, and then after his resurrection, he challenges Peter by saying, Do you love me, Peter?

So if he’s asking that question, then by listening to these responses in this interchange that takes place, then maybe we can learn some things about love. And he says, You know that I love you. And a big play is made about Peter doesn’t use the word agape in response. He uses the Philo term. Later argument about that text by a lot of Greek scholars today is that there wasn’t that great of a shade of difference between the two terms, and that the answer was considered sufficient. If that’s not the case, perhaps the other argument is true that Peter, because of his failure, was unwilling to use the word for the highest form of love, agape, in response. But regardless, Jesus doesn’t upbraid him or rebuke him for the answer that he gives.

He simply says, What? Every single time. If you say that you love me, Peter, do what? Tend my sheep. Tend my lambs. What follows that discussion in John 21 is the indication of the death Peter would die. And Peter turning to the disciple whom Jesus loved and says, What about this man?

And Jesus responded, What? What is that to you? You follow me. Sometimes in our approach to Scripture, it is so easy to see how something might apply to someone else, to look in another direction. Tony’s preaching about love. Well, there’s people here that use that tonight. You know, but really, how about me? Really, someone else’s response. What is that to you? What about you? You follow me. And I’ll tell you what love’s mandate is for you and me, and that is that we tend to sheep. This isn’t just an elder responsibility. This is a responsibility of one who wants to love like Jesus loved. You’ve got to tend to other people, to their well-being. Sometimes I think we get sidetracked from our real mission by asking a lot of questions that don’t amount to much of anything.

I mean, we can we can sometimes, we can in a Bible class, we can dissect a verse down to its phrase and that phrase and that word. And yet at the end of the day, we need to be asking about those kinds of classes. What did we take practically from what we studied? What did we learn about a right response to God? And that failure sometimes that we get distracted. Hendrickson gives the illustration of a man who was wounded by a feathered poison arrow. That’s probably never happened to you. But you’ve been wounded by a feathered poison arrow. And so you say, I wonder what kind of bird was used to make those feathers. Or what kind of wood was used in the construction of that arrow.

3. Regard One Another As More Important Than Yourself

Or I wonder about the person who shot it, whether he was tall or short or skinny or fat. Those aren’t your considerations. He says, you do something, first of all. You’ve been shot by an arrow. And I think sometimes in our discussions about the Bible, we can go here and there and yawn. And I’ll tell you, this subject gets right to the heart of my response to God. And we need to stay focused on this work that we’re called to pursue. What about the apostle Paul? What mandate did he give in regard to love? If I could summarize the preaching of Paul, we could look at Ephesians 3 when he talked about the love of Christ. But I think this summarizes and fits in line with what Jesus has said about love.

Have you heard this quote? Have you heard me quote this verse before? If you can’t tell me by now that Tony is quoting this verse, and it’s found in Philippi 2 verse 3. When are we going to get there?

Philippians 2, verse 3. And well, he talks about this verse a lot. I mean, it’s it’s it’s getting old, Tony. You keep talking about esteem. Well, I want to tell you, I’m going to wear it out, and I’m going to wear this out like I wear out the first Beatitude. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. I’ll tell you the two have a connection. Only the person who is poor in spirit will do what Philippians 2 and verse 3 says. Do nothing from selfishness and empty conceit. But what? Philippians chapter 2 and verse 3, are you over there? Look at what it says. But with humility of mind, let each of you regard one another as more important than himself.

That’s a New American Standard rendering of that. Do not merely look out for your own personal interest, but also for the interest of others. And that takes us back to feeding the sheep. And what follows this is the example of Christ, having the mind of Christ that he humbled himself by becoming obedient unto death, even death on the cross. And the reason why I wear this out is simply this.

This is not something that you just naturally do. You’ve got to determine to do this. And I like to use the illustration. Who does this leave out? Esteem others better than yourself, but regard one another as more important than yourself. This is not just talking about those who are in Christ with us. This is talking about the way, and we said this morning, remember, this new creature in him changes the way we look at ourselves, changes the way we look at others. But particularly is it true of this brother relationship in Christ. Love meets the needs of others before it meets the wants of self. How are we doing in the display of this attribute, which is what love is? This quote is attributed to Francis of Assisi.

I don’t know if I said that right.

It’s a funny name. But you’ve heard of him before, probably. He said, preach the gospel at all times. And if necessary, use words. Oh, I like that thought. Christians are about the business of preaching the gospel at all times. Do we see that as our mission? I mean, it’s not about, you know, standing in pulpits and speaking for 30 minutes, hopefully only 30. It’s not about that. It’s about me going out there and preaching it by my behavior. And if we want to preach it, this is where it’s preached. You know, we can say, I’m a servant of others. I am a servant of others. That’s easy to say. But is it demonstrated? How are we demonstrating that in our homes? To, you know, would your mate, oh my, I better not ask them.

But would your mate say, my husband or my wife serves me? Preach the gospel at all times. And if necessary, use words. You know, there is no better proving ground for this kind of love in our homes. I would love to have seen Jesus in Nazareth growing up there with his family and how that worked for 30 years. You know how hard it is to have an older brother who. Now, I don’t know personally, I don’t have an older brother. But, okay, at least it’s going like this. So, Dave, you’re on talking about you here. You know how hard it would be to have an older brother who never made a mistake? I mean, Jesus did no sin. And he demonstrated this service kind of love, not just during his ministry, but first when he was living in Nazareth in his home.

And so is that demonstrated in ours? Again, this you don’t just say, you know, I’m gonna do that. You gotta work at this. You have to develop this quality. And you know, it’s easy to do for a day, or maybe an hour. It’s easy to do for an hour or a day, but how do we do consistently day after day after day? What does this mean as we eat at a restaurant and somebody is our waiter or waitress? And what does this mean as we are dealing with life’s hassles and you stand in line for an hour? You ever done I’ve done that here in COMBOL at the vehicle place, license plate, and learn license plates down here. It’s like, really? There’s two people working here, really?

You know, and you get disgusted because there’s no more respect for your time than that. And so you get to the window and you.

4. Lay Down Our Lives for the Brethren

I mean, that person didn’t do it. They’re just doing their job. I keep telling myself, they’re just doing their job. They’re just trying to do their job. It’s not their fault. It involves all this red tape and it’s taking forever. And so we need to think about how we are relating to others. One more thing. John. In 1 John chapter 3, what did John say? He laid down his life for us. Getting back to the model of love, Jesus himself in 1 John 3. How do we know that we have found life in Christ? We have passed out of death into life because we love the brethren. That could be tied to 1 Peter chapter 1, where it says, in obedience to the truth, our souls have been purified unto a love of the brethren.

One of the great characteristics of the new life in Christ is this brother to brother relationship. We are born into him to love our brethren. And so we will know that we have passed out of death into life because we love the brethren. But you know what? If you hate your brother, everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. People don’t see themselves as murderers. That’s awful. A murderer. Put them away. Put them to death in Texas. But if we hate our brother, he says, it is tantamount to murder. He’s not saying if you hate your brother, you ought to go ahead and kill him. That’s not what he’s saying. Like he’s talking about lust in Ephesians and in Matthew chapter 5 in the Sermon on the Mount to commit lust in your heart is tantamount.

It’s the same as committing adultery in terms of sin. But he’s not saying if you have committed lust, go ahead and commit adultery. Well, there’s some consequences to that. And he’s not saying that here. You know, if you discover that you hate your brother, you ought to go ahead and shoot him. That’s not what he’s saying. What he’s saying is the sin is the same. It can keep you out of heaven, just like murder. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer. And you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him. So what is he saying there? No hater of his brother has eternal life abiding in him. And we know love by this. This is what we know about love. That Jesus laid down his life for us.

Conclusion

It says he, but my he is capitalized. This is obviously Jesus. He laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. This is love. And so if we’re monitoring how we’re doing, the question is, how far would I go? What would I sacrifice? What could I give up for the object of my love? Because that’s the model Jesus gave for us. So what have we learned? What are we learning tonight about this term, agape, as we read about it? It’s usually a lot more than what we say when we use the word love in almost any sentence where we use it. This is a love of choice. This is a love that has a zeal for what is right and best.

It is a love that works. It’s diligent. It is a love that completely disregards self. And aren’t you glad Jesus displayed that kind of love? He wasn’t thinking at the cross, this feels really good. I would choose this as a way to live a day. It was completely selfless. It was a choice. He laid down his life for us. And look at all of the work that he did to help people understand what God wants for us. And so you can apply this in every relationship that is. Love God. I love God. Well, then what are you going to choose to do for him? See, again, people, I love God. People say, I love God. But what are you going to choose to do? Are you going to love him enough to investigate his word?

You can’t say, I love God and be ignorant of the New Testament. You can’t do that. I love God, but I’m going to be as lukewarm as the day is long. I’m going to attend very infrequently. If I just don’t feel 100%, I’m going to stay at home. Where’s the zeal? What if the Lord had decided to stay at home? We’d all been in bad shape. And he stayed away from home for quite a while doing his work and showing his diligence and demonstrating his selflessness. Now, I don’t know what kind of picture. I’ve tried to paint you tonight a picture of what it really means to love God. And I think all of us would raise our hands. I’m inadequate, me. I have not done this perfectly.

I may not have even done it well. But this is love’s walking papers. And you need to work on it this week. And so do I. I can’t preach about this every week. There are a lot of other things to talk about in the New Testament. But this is what it means to be a Christian. And I know there’s somebody that you can apply this toward because you’re going to come in contact with people tonight and tomorrow. And these qualities need to be governing all of those relationships, however, surface they might be. Or however intimate they might be. And I tell you, we can talk to our elders. We could go around the room and they’d tell you, sometimes I struggle with that. Some days I do better than others.

And that’s why to know this surpasses knowledge at the height and the breadth and the width and the depth. It surpasses knowledge. We struggle because we have this problem of selfishness that we have been fighting from our very first sin. And we will continue to fight that nasty beast. And the devil all the way along is going to be let selfishness back in the door. Let it back in. Come on. Put self on the throne. Elevate you to your rightful place. That’s what he does to us. And when we say, I’m going to say no to myself, and I am going to put someone else ahead of me, we become more like Christ every time we do that. Oh, that could hurt. Christ’s love caused him some pain.

And if it never causes us any pain, then do we really know the love of Christ? Mike, this might be a good thing to remind on Wednesday night about this lesson. And so, as you think about your response to God, this is where it all begins. Somebody needs, it’s not just about, again, the X’s and O’s of forgiveness and cleansing. And sometimes I think we sometimes present it that way. You’ve got to do this, and this, and then your sins are washed away. All of that is really, if you want to strip all of that away and go to the real basis of everything is, are you going to love God because he loved you? Are you going to reciprocate the love that he had?

That’s really what obedience to the gospel is all about. And if there’s someone in this audience who needs to respond in love for God and then to pursue love for him and love for others, then we bid you come while we stand and sing.