Love

Tom Shrader teaches that genuine Christianity is fundamentally about doctrine rather than behavior, though right doctrine leads to transformed living. He explores what it means to be a real man according to Scripture, emphasizing that God defines masculinity as spiritual strength demonstrated through obedience to His Word rather than worldly measures of toughness or emotional stoicism. Using 1 Corinthians 13, he examines the fifteen characteristics of biblical love, challenging men to evaluate whether they are truly lovers in God's terms.

“Christianity is essentially what we believe, not how we behave.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: September 2007

Recorded: 2007 at Cannon Beach Conference Center

Duration: 1 hr 12 min

Themes: love, masculinity, doctrine, obedience, grace, identity, salvation, transformation, questioning faith, new believer, husband, father, struggling with identity, men's ministry, young adult, christian man

Scripture: 1 Kings 2:1-3, Romans 1:18-22, Romans 12:1-2, 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, Ecclesiastes 12:13, John 13, Psalm 119

Theological Themes: soteriology, salvation, biblical manhood, sanctification, grace doctrine, spiritual maturity, christian living, doctrinal foundation

Full Transcript

Last night we talked about God, who He is. We talked about Jesus and grace that we find in Him and Him alone. I have learned in my life that the whole key to this life is understanding God and who He is.

There was a time in Moses' life where God appeared to him. And after some level of dialogue, God is communicating to Moses who He, God, is. And He says, I am. Louis Giglio has a wonderful little book called I Am Not, But I Know I Am, and you'll understand it as we read this.

God's Name: I Am

Giglio's talking about God speaking to Moses. Giglio writes this: "God was telling Moses, I am the center of everything. I am running the show, I am the same every day forever, I am the owner of everything, I am the Lord, I am the creator and sustainer of life, I am the Savior, I am more than enough, I am inexhaustible, immeasurable, I am God."

Giglio writes, "In a heartbeat, Moses knew God's name and something more. He finally knew who He was. If God's name is I Am, Moses' name is I Am Not. I am not the creator of everything, I am not in control, I am not the solution, I am not all powerful, I am not calling the shots, I am not the owner of anything, I am not the Lord."

That's my name too and yours: I Am Not. Just try under your breath to say it. My name is I Am Not. I am not running anything, I am not the head of anything, I am not in charge of anything, I am not the maker, I am not the Savior, I am not holding it all together, I am not all-knowing, I am not God, and that is a key thing for you and me to understand.

Our Problem and God's Solution

That's what we tried to establish last night, that our problem is us, or your problem is you, or my problem is me, our problem is our sin, and the solution is God. Acts of Cato writes this: please note, salvation—we talked about salvation last night, deliverance from the consequence of our sin—salvation is God-given, God-driven, God-empowered, and God-originated. It's a gift not from man to God, but from God to man.

Grace is created by God and given to man, and on that basis alone, Christianity is set apart from any other religion in the world. Every other approach to God is a bartering system: if I do this, God will do that. I am either saved by works that I do, or emotion, what I experience, or knowledge, what I know. By contrast, Christianity has no whiff of negotiation at all. Man is not the negotiator, indeed, man has no grounds from which to negotiate, and that's what I tried to establish last night.

Christianity: Doctrine Before Ethics

Everywhere I go, when I am given an opportunity to speak, even if it's a Christian camp with a bunch of little Christian boys, I try to come back and make sure that we understand what it means to be a Christian, because you and I live in a world that's lost, for the most part, a sense of what that means. It is at its core a group of doctrines, not an ethic. Did you get that? Christianity is essentially what we believe, not how we behave.

Essentially the way that we would say we as Christians should behave is the same way that a Buddhist would say that those who follow Buddha should behave, or anything else, really, when you get down to it. Kind of at its core: love, do good, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, don't go out on your wife, don't steal, don't lie, don't cheat, don't get caught, that kind of a thing. It is different in that we start with a doctrinal proposition and from that flows behavior.

I'm not saying that it doesn't matter how we behave, but I'm saying that we acknowledge, and this is how our whole relationship with God starts, we acknowledge by saying we'll never be good enough, we can never be good enough, we can't do enough, everything we do is flawed, I'm never pure enough, I'm never humble enough, never righteous enough, I'm never holy enough, I'm never good enough.

The Reality of Grace

And God begins by saying, I understand that, and here's the deal, you aren't going to get a whole lot better. It may be that here's perfection and you're here, you may move the ball to there, but you still got it, it's still fourth and thirty, you aren't going to get there, man. But you go, guy, that's what He's saying. So you got to get that, that's what I'm all about, because God's all about, and I think the apostle's all about, and I think this book is all about grace.

Unmerited favor, which by very definition, you all got it, right? By very definition, unmerited favor can never be what? Merited. I can never earn it. So for some of you, you need to hear that.

When Dave sang that song, that very first song about freedom, it's not just the freedom from all our sins and all, it's the freedom—this will get me run out of a lot of places—it's the freedom to even quit trying, because you aren't going to get there. It's the freedom to just be who God made you to be. And then let Him begin to work through you, and that sounds to me like a fortune cookie, but that's kind of what He says.

Opening Our Bibles

Now some of you all, and I know how you are, because I'm this way too, you're Bible guys, because you brought your Bibles last night, and you're Bible guys, and I'm sure when you got back to bed, you thought, you know what, I don't know we ever opened our Bibles last night. We looked at one little passage, but he just jumped off from that. I don't put much faith in this man as a Bible teacher.

So for those of you who are in withdrawal, why don't you go ahead and open your Bibles? Go ahead and open those Bibles to Romans chapter 12, and now we're going to get the basis for where we're going.

As I said last night, and I know I had a couple guys who were here with either their children, their sons, or younger guys, and they were thrilled, and not everyone is, and I understand that. They were thrilled, and I said, we're not going to do a bunch on marriage and a bunch on kids. It didn't apply. And again, I want you to know, if you need help, and you're in that, there's books and all that, go get it. But I know in my life, I don't need another book on marriage and family. What I need is to do what I know God wants me to

Now having said that this Christian faith is all about doctrine, I'm not saying it doesn't matter how we live. In Romans chapter 12, verse 1, Paul writes this: "I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is good and acceptable and perfect will of God."

Let me read you two paraphrases, so we just kind of wrap our arms around this. J.B. Phillips paraphrases the two verses this way: "With eyes wide open to the mercies of God, I beg you, my brothers, as an act of intelligent worship, to give your bodies as a living sacrifice consecrated to Him, acceptable by Him. Do not let the world squeeze you into its mold, but let God remold your mind from within, so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all His demands and moves toward the goal of maturity."

In his paraphrase, The Message, Eugene Peterson writes this: "So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: take your everyday ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going to work, walking around—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for Him. Verse 2: Don't become so well adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God and you'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what He wants from you and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you."

True Worship Is Your Entire Life

Here's what the Bible says: as followers of Christ, we are to present our body, which is a picture of everything that we have and everything that we own and who we are, to present our body to Him and that is our act of worship. Again, from the New King James: present our bodies, a living sacrifice. From Phillips: present our bodies, an intelligent act of worship. From Eugene Peterson: take your everyday ordinary life, everything there is—and I love the way he puts it—sleeping, eating, going to work, walking around, and place it before God as an offering.

We have done some things, and I understand why, and I don't get bent out of shape on this stuff. I just don't argue much anymore. I don't debate, I don't get into this stuff. It's like Brayden: all done. I just don't want to argue with it. I've never won any of these to the point that anybody's ever changed their mind. It's never been beneficial and I frankly have ticked off some very good golfing partners. So why go through this aggravation?

Well, I do want to take a stand on a couple of things we've done. For example, we build a new building where we hold our Sunday services and we oftentimes call it the worship center. We do what we did here this morning and here's how we typically talk about it, at least internally. We'll say, "Well, we're going to come together, we're going to sing some songs, we're going to have a time of worship, and then you're going to teach." And we make this distinction so that, rightly so, you begin to think that somehow worship has associated with it music, that worship is something you do in that worship center over there.

In fact, you come to our worship hour and I think, and I don't think it's intentional, we almost communicate that worship is that thing you do here for a specific period of time, oftentimes, almost always, including music and teaching. And God's Word says, "No, worship is your life." It's everything you do. It's getting up, it's going to bed, it's brushing your teeth, it's combing your hair. It's all that you do. It's the way that you live.

Living in Tension Between Two Worldviews

Now we begin to understand a little bit of conflict in our life. Our lives as followers of Christ, genuine followers of Christ, just hang in these extraordinary tensions. And one of them is this: God saved you, and you say, by God, from God, right? By God, from God, for what? For God. And here's what He says: Watch out because there's the world. Don't be conformed to the world. Don't let the world squeeze you into its mold. Don't become so well-adjusted to the culture that you fit into it without even thinking. There are two clashing worldviews.

And all of a sudden, we begin to see things a little bit differently.

A Biblical Model of Manhood

I want to talk about being a man. I said to you last night, there's a passage of Scripture that I'm sure has been in here a long time, and I'm sure I've read it many times, but for whatever reason, it wasn't until a few months ago, maybe within the back of my mind, knowing that there was a men's conference lurking out there in the future, that I came across a passage. And I'll invite you to turn there, Old Testament to the book of 1 Kings, give you all an extra second to go to the table of contents to discover what page you might find that on. I have tabs, which makes it way easier. 1 Kings.

So you go Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges. Don't be impressed that I memorized these. I got my tabs. I'm just reading you my tabs. Ruth, 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel, ah, 1 Kings. 1 Kings chapter 2.

There is, and I am not—I rarely come to something where people don't say to me, "Do you have books to sell or tapes to sell?" No. "You should write a book." You should mind your own business. I don't write. My mother asks, "Why would I write a book?" Yeah, there's sleep to engage in and TV to watch.

Now, those of you who are much more entrepreneurial than I am, I am about to give you a wonderful book idea, and it's right here in these three or four verses. You'll have to pick where you want to stop, but this is a man's book. This is something you could sell, and then what's the groups in this, Promise Keepers and all of these. You could sell, and then Dobson, you go on Dobson, you—

The Context: A Dying Father's Final Words

Now the days of David drew near that he should die, and he charged Solomon his son saying. So you get the backdrop now. What's happening? David is dying.

I love these things. I love the dying stuff. I love those ends of life. I love to read books about the last days. I read a wonderful book on the last years of Robert E. Lee. I love Robert E. Lee. It was the last years of Robert E. Lee. A fascinating book on the last years of Napoleon. I love the last years.

If somebody's got like a biography—there's one I read on Martin Lloyd-Jones, which is two really big books. I don't—it's just too heavy and everything, a whole—but two big books. Well you got the early one, and I always start with the second one. I don't care about the early stuff very often. But I love the end of it.

I like 2 Timothy. That's one of my favorite books. I like 2 Timothy because Paul says in 2 Timothy, "I'm about to what? I'm dying. I'm about to be poured out as a drink offering." So now there's an intensity there. Here's this guy that I think you could argue from scripture that Paul loved more than anybody on earth, Timothy. And here's that moment, that wonderful moment, very similar to this, that wonderful moment where Paul sits down, in this case writes, writes to Timothy, and he pours his heart out to him.

So that's the backdrop. David's dying. He's got Solomon there, he's going to give him his charge.

The Universality of Death

Verse 2: "I go the way of all the earth." Now I think that's important. First to understand, this whole idea of death is universal. George Bernard Shaw said it this way: "The statistics on death are impressive—one out of one people die." So it just is. It is what it is.

There was an incident that happened here at Cannon Beach just over three years ago that has become a really significant part of my life with Susan. And I'm going to talk about that somewhere, I don't know where, tonight or tomorrow, somewhere. But I have a phrase that I'll use with her: "It is what it is." She hates it. She hates it when you say "it is what it is." And I'll say, "Okay, I don't know how else to say it. It is what it is."

You're going to die. You ought to be prepared for it, should think about it. I think it needs to be a constant part of your thought process, and I'll talk again more about it. "I go the way of all the earth."

What It Means to Be a Real Man

Now here he is to his son: "Be strong therefore and prove yourself a man." That's pretty good. Here's what he's saying: Be a man. I'm dying, this is the last thing I'm going to say to you, be a man, be a real guy.

Well here's where this gets to be a bit problematic. What does it mean to be a man, a real man? Again, the clash with the culture. The culture might talk about a real man—real men are tough, a real man, physically strong. Real men don't cry.

I deliberately wore pink today. I presume that some of you looked and said, "My Lord, what is he wearing today? What is he doing? He has on shorts. Does he not know what his legs look like?" I do. I have been through all the embarrassment of—I've been where I'm walking down the street and the kid says to his mom, "Look at mom, a man riding a chicken." I've done it all. I've heard it all. There's nothing you're going to say that I haven't heard.

Here's the overriding principle in my life: I don't care. And I am too old to worry about anything but comfort. I deliberately chose this—some of you less informed would say pink, in actuality salmon colored shirt—to prove to you that I am a real man. I don't know that I've been successful in proving that, but to prove to you that I'm a real man.

When God talks about being a real man, His emphasis is not necessarily at all on physical strength or emotional strength, it's on spiritual strength. "Be strong therefore and prove yourself a man." What does that mean? What does it mean to be a man?

God's Definition of True Manhood

Verse 3: "You keep the charge of the Lord your God to walk in His ways, to keep His statutes, His commands, His judgments, His testimonies, that it is written in the law of Moses that you may prosper in all that you do. And wherever you turn, the Lord may fulfill His word, which He has spoken concerning me, saying, if your son takes heed to their way, to walk before me in truth with all their heart, with all their soul, He said, you shall not lack a man on the throne of Israel."

God says to you and me, and it is different, and I got it, it's different than what the world says. God says to you and me, "Be a man." Here's how we discover what a man really is: We go to His word. I'm a big Bible guy.

The First Missionary: Creation

I said to you last night that the first missionary that God gave us is creation. That's Romans chapter 1. And again, you know, if you want to, you can mark—I'm semi-done here with 1 Kings. If you want to mark it, we'll come back.

But in Romans chapter 1, God writes this in His word. In verse 18: "The wrath of God is revealed against heaven and against all ungodliness and righteousness of man who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, because what has been made known of God is manifest to them, for God has shown it to them. For since the creation of the world, His invisible attributes are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and His Godhead, so that they are without excuse."

And then He goes on to just unpack that. "Because although they knew God, they did not glorify Him as God, nor were they thankful, but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. To professing to be wise, they became fools." And then the rest of Romans chapter 1 just unravels around them.

If you want to know what it means to be ungodly, here's what you have to do to be ungodly. That's what that verse tells you. You don't have to do anything. Don't give Him thanks. Don't give Him praise. That's what's ungodly.

Now God did not leave us out here just kind of...

wandering around, trying to figure this out on our own. We can come back to this. We can almost take any topic, but certainly let's just take God Himself.

How do I understand who God is? Not by going to the beach and looking at haystack rock and beginning to just contemplate. Now I can figure out some things from creation. I can figure out from creation that He's all-powerful. I can get that He's a big guy with a lot of power. I get all that from creation.

But how do I get to know how He really is? Well He communicated that to us in two ways: in this word and through Christ. If I want to know how God would respond, I look at Christ. Christ is God, and I understand that. God's Word is really important.

The Authority and Reliability of Scripture

Now the reason I spent time on this is that for most of us in the world we live in, the Bible is not thought of as a book written by God to us, but a book that is written that gives us some great instruction, but is not truth. There is, in fact, no error in this book. It is without error. It is infallible, meaning not only does it not have error, it can't error.

I'm sure that there are things that we read in there, and the error comes in our interpretation or understanding of them, but there is no error or mistake there. God communicated to us through that Word, and we need to understand that. We begin to understand God and who He is. We learn about those things, His wrath and His judgment, but we learn about His grace and His love.

We learn about biblical Christianity. No man in his right mind would have ever, I don't think, contrived something like Christianity, conceived of a God becoming man dwelling among us and dying in our place. But beyond all of that, the Bible gives us great instruction on how we're to live.

George Washington Carver's Faith

There's a man by the name of George Washington Carver. He was born on a Missouri farm. Parents were slaves. He actually received a B.S. degree from Iowa Agricultural College, ultimately Iowa State. He researched and developed over 325 products from peanuts, 308 products from sweet potatoes, 75 from pecans, later moved to Tuskegee, Alabama.

Wonderful man. He died in 1943. He was offered all sorts of job opportunities. Thomas Edison tried to hire him. Just a wonderful, wonderful, wonderful man.

He was called in 1921 before a Senate subcommittee. Let me give you the dialogue. This is a wonderful dialogue. His fame is renowned. All these applications of these products, they're all over.

A senator asked him, "How did you learn all these things?"

Carver: "From an old book."

A senator: "What book?"

Carver: "The Bible."

Senator: "Does the Bible tell us about peanuts?"

George Washington Carver: "No sir, but it tells me about the God who made the peanut, and I asked Him to show me what to do with it, and He did."

That's just a wonderful moment. Trust the Lord with all your heart. Don't lean on your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge Him, and He will direct your path.

The Psalmist's Love for God's Word

Psalm 119, it's the longest of any chapter that we have in the Bible. And the recurring theme, and I'm just going to read to you, just listen, just let this wash over you to the point where maybe you even go, and it's too much. So I'm just going to roll through this psalm, and what the psalmist is talking about is the law of the Lord, or the word of the Lord, testimony of the Lord, back in that passage in 1 Kings, the statutes, the commands. Here's what he's talking about: he's talking about God's word.

Happy, reading from Psalm 119, happy are people of integrity who follow the law of the Lord. Happy are those who obey His decrees and search for Him with all their hearts. They don't compromise with evil. They walk only in His paths. You have charged us to keep your commands carefully, all that my actions would consistently reflect your principles.

The psalmist goes on and on and on. I've hidden your word in my heart that I may not sin against you. Blessed are you, O Lord. Teach me your principles. Verse 19, I am but a foreigner here on earth. I need the guidance of your commands. Don't hide them from me.

I'm overwhelmed continually by the desire for your law. Teach me, O Lord, to follow every one of your principles. Give me understanding. I'll obey your law. I'll put it into practice with all my heart. How I delight in your commands. How I love you. I honor and love your commands. I meditate on your principles.

I meditate on your age-old laws, O Lord. They comfort me. Verse 65, you have done many good things, Lord, just as you have promised. Forever, Lord, your word stands firm in heaven. Your faithfulness extends to every generation.

Verse 97, oh, how I love your law. I think about it all day long. Your commands make me wiser than my enemies, for your commands are my constant guide. Yes, I have more insight than my teachers, for I always am thinking of your decrees.

Verse 105, your word is a lamp to my feet, a light to my path. Give me discernment, your servant, then I will understand your decrees. Your decrees are wonderful. No wonder I obey them, and on and on and on and on and on this psalm goes.

The Singular Source of Truth

If we want to understand God, and then we want to understand the world we live in, and then we want to understand all of these things about this, then we have to go, and I have no problem. I read a lot of books. And I just got an email from a guy that is just a wonderful guy. And he's a baseball coach, so he's pretty busy, and getting to a lot of studies and stuff is difficult.

And he said, "I know you read a lot. Give me five biographies to read." And I think he was stunned when all five of them had nothing to do with Bible or church or anything. I read a lot of stuff. And so I will read about guys, and I enjoy reading about people, and I think I can learn a lot from them, but if I really want to understand mankind, I need to go to this singular source, the scripture.

They always say that when you speak to a group, that something like six to seven out of every ten people there are hurting.

So maybe that's where you are now. Maybe you're in the midst of real hurt or pain. Maybe it's a career pain. It's a relational pain. Maybe it's dealing with a kid. How do you sort out the confusing things of life?

I was at Knott's Berry Farm with the girls, and they had something I hadn't seen before. I went there one time and hadn't been there since. I didn't know that it exists anymore, but it was incredible. It was a human maze. You ever seen it? You walk in there and try to get your way out of there, and it's almost impossible to do.

Up on top of this was a place where you could watch the people in there. It's wonderful. They're lost. They're in there for hours. It's a great place to put your kids. Let's go eat. We'll put them in a maze and come back in an hour, and they'll still be there.

There is a lady standing next to me, and there's a kid in there who's beginning to panic. The mother goes, "Okay, Biff, Biff, Biff. Look up here now. Make a left. Make a left. Make a left. Make a right. Right, right, right. Make another right real fast. Make a left. Make a right." And he's out. Incredible.

God's Higher Perspective

God said, "My ways aren't your ways. My thoughts are not your thoughts. My thoughts are higher than your thoughts. My ways are higher than your ways." In a sense, God comes along and says, "Here you go, Tom. Make a left. Make a right. Oh, no, no, no, no, no, go down there." That's what David says to Solomon. That's what David says to us. That's what the Word of God says to us.

For us to begin to sort out the things of life and understand life and values and all that goes with it, we need His words. Now, I think it's interesting, and though I would not normally do this, this would normally be the close, but I want to get it out of the way so we can have some real stuff here. I think it's really important to say, did Solomon ever get this?

Solomon's Ultimate Conclusion

If you turn to the right and work through 2 Kings and Chronicles, Psalms, Proverbs, and then the book of Ecclesiastes. In the book of Ecclesiastes, Solomon sits down at the end of his life and in essence writes his memoirs and says, "Listen, here's what I've learned." He begins, here's a great way to capture a crowd, "Vanity, vanities, all is vanity. Useless, useless, everything is useless." And then he goes on and outlines it.

Now that's one thing if you're listening to a bitter old man who's never had any success, but Solomon is that guy that God allowed to have everything you think would make you happy. So when you talk about money, arguably in the history of man, even to this day, there's been no one who's amassed a fortune like Solomon. Building elaborate homes, public works. He says he denied himself no pleasure, booze, women, 700 wives, 300 concubines—the original 700 club by the way. He's got it all.

I think about that because guys, not all guys, I know there's exceptions, you all probably are. But generally guys tend to think about sex. Here's what Solomon, get this now, Solomon could be with three different women every day for a year, never running the same one again. And this is pretty important. I dwell on this. I wouldn't do it if the ladies were here, but it's us guys. These women were committed not to go, "Well, I don't think I'll do that. I don't think so." These gals existed to satisfy him. That was the whole thing. "How's that feel, Solomon?" "Oh, good. Oh, good. Okay." That was the whole dialogue. That's what's going on. Three a day. That's why they're there.

Now, here's what I want you to get. We get through all of that. At the end of his life, he sits down. Here's the conclusion, chapter 12, verse 13. So we got what David said. Here's what Solomon says: "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter. When everything else has been said and done and I got all that stuff, here's the whole thing that matters. Fear God and keep His commandments, for this is a man's all, for God will bring everything into judgment, including every secret, whether good or evil."

Solomon heard it. He seemed to struggle his way through life, walk around a little bit, like you, like me, and ultimately he got this. Long introduction. That's all introduction. We aren't even to the meat yet. That's all introduction to say this. God's way of communicating and values are often different than the world. And there is no clearer example than that than when we talk about love.

The Importance of Love for Men

So I'm going to invite you to turn to 1 Corinthians chapter 13. You almost think this would be something we would talk about at a women's conference, not at a men's conference. But this idea of love is absolutely crucial to the Christian life.

Now, I want to be clear here. I talked last night about grace, today about love, and I'm wearing pink. It could easily be assumed on your part that I'm some sort of a soft, sensitive, little weenie. That is not true. I am a very conservative fellow.

A Personal Aside

I love coming to Cannon Beach. One of the things that bothers me is that the people in Oregon tend to, and maybe there's only a few of them, but I'm always behind them. They have Subaru wagons with Birkenstocks and a Dennis Kucinich bumper sticker. He's driving 55 miles an hour. I don't understand. That's just a recommendation, boys. Go. Go. You know? Tell him if he stops you, just tell him it's on me and hit him. Send me the tab. I've never been to a place where they drive slower. As Susan said, it's a speed limit, and I'm saying, go back to sleep. But they just go slow here.

The radio is filled with, and I don't mean this just to be offensive, but just stupid. I've never heard, collectively, so many stupid people have radio shows as up here. This is not my kind. Politically, theologically, I'm very conservative.

Let me use a word. I know it's divisive for some of you. Some of you won't know what it means. You're the lucky ones. Some of you will. I am a Calvinist. I'm hardcore. When I taught the

When we went through the Gospel of John, we blew through it, and it took us five years. I mean, that's me. But when Jesus is sitting down with His boys in John chapter 13, He's getting ready to say goodbye to them. He's about to go to the cross.

Here's what He says. The world will know that you are mine, not by your orthodoxy. Now, I'm a doctrine guy. See the tension there? Some of you are already trying to figure out how you can line up afterwards and challenge me on this. Don't. I don't have time for that. There's ball games to watch. I'm teasing. But you're already going to go, oh, well, what about this? I got the tension here.

Doctrine's important. Didn't I start by saying that? Did you hear that? I started with that. Doctrine's really important. That's what we're all about. But Jesus didn't say the whole world's going to know you're my boys because you're theologically sound. He didn't say that. He said the world will know that you are my disciples when you love one another.

What Is Love?

Well, now I'm going, if love is that big a deal, then what is love? Because the world has its whole view of it. But again, I need to know what God says. There it is. You got it?

Verse 13, verse 4: love is patient. Love is kind. Love is not jealous. Love does not brag and it is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly, does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Now, are you a lover? Pretty important. And He defines it. He lists 15 characteristics. Seven of them are stated positively. Eight are stated negatively. Seven of them say love is. Eight of them say love is not.

Examining Yourself

We're going to spend the rest of our time - what time do we stop? Do you know, Eric? What time? No, no, that's not true. There's a schedule. 11:30. So about 12:40. No, about 11:30. Just teasing. Yeah, it's a recommendation. But I want to get through this.

The whole point here is for you to examine yourself. I'm into exams. I digress. I'm into exams. This is all guys, so I'll go ahead and tell you about this. I am 58. I'll be 58 in November. One of the things about being older is stuff just stops working. Stuff just stops working like it used to.

So I go to - I have a guy in our church who is a cardiologist. He said, have you been to a heart doctor or cardiologist? I said no. He said, we ought to come in and get that checked. So I go in and we go through all this checking. He comes back and he says, cholesterol's a little high. We can work on that. No big deal. Exercise a little. I said, you must have a pill for this. Give me a pill. So we could work with you.

He said, but there's another problem here. Your PSA's a little high. Boys know what that means? The older ones do. The younger ones are going, PSA, that's an old airline they used to have somewhere around here. You younger boys are about to get a lesson in what it's like to grow old.

The Doctor Visit

So he said, you need to go to a urologist. I said, okay. I'll do that. Remember, the context here is examining yourself. So I go and he says, we got a bit of a problem. Your PSA's high. And there is microscopic blood in your urine. I said, what is that? He says, it's blood you can't see. I said, I know that. What does it mean? What do we do?

He's a fellow from India and he said, well we need to do this test. I said, well who does it? Well, I do. He said, you need this. I said, well, who does it? He said, well I do. I said, okay. He said, you need this. I said, who does it? He said, well I do. I said, it's like you came in to rotate your tires and you buy a whole new transmission.

He and I and one of his nurses have grown very close over the last three or four weeks. We did one test that you can imagine. Here's the word he used, invasive. But you know what? I was able to manage that. He said, now we've got to do another test. We've got to go check your bladder. I said, well how do you get there? Because that's a long way down that way. He said, well, we're going the other way. I said, okay.

I'm preparing myself for this. You all right boys? Hanging in there? Here's what he didn't tell me. That we were going to have a young assistant in the room with us. So she told me to just robe and prepare and she left, said the doctor will be in. But she reappeared and strapped on a pair of gloves.

She then used - prepositions are important, language matters. She then said, we're going to put this on. But what she meant was, we're going to put this in. And there's a big difference. There's a big difference. Then, amidst her own laughter - which is a whole other issue I had to deal with - amidst her own laughter, she's done and says, that's the worst part. So she has an integrity problem I'm about to discover as well.

He now comes in. You all been through this? How many of you guys been through this? Not many. The rest of you, let me just tell you, run while you can. He then comes in with something that looked about like this. He says, we're going to go looking for some stuff, like a scavenger hunt. And he went in. He said, do you want to watch this? I said, I have the Discovery Channel. I'm going to get over with it.

So we're all done. He said, there's no problem in there. Here's the problem. I am a big fan of medicine, by the way. He said, we have to really take radical - we have to do radical stuff to eliminate things. Here's the problem. You got kidney stones, my friend, present tense. On both sides, they're big, and we got to get them out. We're going to go in there. Here's his exact words -

going to go in there and get them. I said, you know, that's what they said about bin Laden. And I said, I fear I know the answer to this question, but how do you get in there? He said, well, we've already laid the groundwork for this process. So that, as you are thinking about me in a couple of weeks, that's our next process.

My point is, by the way, I said to him, we're done, I said, how did you decide to do this as a profession? He said, I was drunk in medical school, and this was my choice. I said, oh, I was hoping there was an inspiration here, but never, ever. My point is, I want you to do that kind of an exam on yourself right now about whether you're a lover, but not quite hurt yourself in the process.

Examining Ourselves as Lovers

Are you a lover? That's what the world says, because the world's got its own view of a lover. Are you a lover like God says? So if you want to talk about marriage, here's what God says, husbands, love your wives. What does that mean? Well, as Christ loved the church, what does that love look like? Here it is. And we're going to go through these very quickly. We've got about 20 minutes here.

Love is Patient

Love is patient. I want to define these words. Love is patient. The word that's chosen there is a word that speaks not of circumstances, but with people. So do you love your neighbor? Do you love your coworker? Do you love your wife? Do you love the people at the mall? Do you love the people here? Love has to deal patient with people, not with circumstances. I got problems with circumstances. I've got real problems with people.

It's used of a person who's been wronged and typically has the power to avenge that wrong. So I think immediately, and every one of these, by the way, could point you to Christ. Love is patient, or some of your translations will say love is long-suffering. It's active. It's not passive. It's not abstract. It's not a feeling. It's alive, though there's feelings attached to it.

Love is patient. Here you go. If you've got to write this down, you've got issues. In life, you're going to get screwed. I don't have a verse for it, but it's in there. You just die, right? How many of you have been in life? I mean, I would assume this goes up. You just have been. I have. And I've screwed people, too, I'll bet. Here's what He's saying. Love doesn't try to go out and see how it can even the score. Love is patient and understands that people often do stupid things.

Love is Kind

And love is kind, to be useful, serving, gracious. It's the idea of patience in action. I will tell you, the first test of this, in all likelihood, is at home. Amazing how patient we are with our buddies and our friends. Most guys I know are more patient and kind and understanding with a waitress in a restaurant than they are with their own wife and family and kids.

The way that you talk, oftentimes to your families, are embarrassing. When I hear around church or in stores, wherever I am, I hear husbands talk to wives. Wives talk to husbands, but we're not talking about gals here. Husbands talk to their wives in ways that is absolutely so degrading. It just lacks common courtesy, guys. Love is patient. Love is kind.

I'm walking into an office building the other day, and I'm carrying all this junk, and there's a guy there. He goes in, he looks right at me and doesn't hold the door. And I wanted to say, you jerk. Am I blind? Am I invisible? I go to the bookstore. I spend a couple hours a week in a bookstore, easy. And I will be standing there looking at books, and people, oftentimes staff, that really drives me nuts, will walk right between me and not have the common courtesy to say, excuse me.

I'm in a bookstore last year, and this guy walks through, he's kind of a big guy, and I've just had it. And he walks through and he gets through, and I'm doing my little soul burn, but apparently I said in a voice that was audible, not my intention, in a voice that was audible, what am I, invisible? And he said, pardon me? I said, nothing. He said, no, no, no, you said something. And I'd had it. And I'm small, but I'm scrappy. And more importantly than anything, I'm very fast. And I said to him, you walked right in front of me here. I'm reading these, I'm looking at these books, you walked right in front of me. Could you at least say, excuse me? You know what he said? I'm sorry, I didn't realize it, excuse me. Well, don't let it happen again. No, I didn't say that. Don't let it happen again. Love is patient, love is kind.

Love is Not Jealous

Here you go. Love is not jealous. That means to have a strong desire. It has two sides to this. I want what you have, which is dark in and of itself. I want you to have, here's something even darker, or I don't want you to have it even though I don't even want it.

I'll give you two examples. I mentioned last night I have two girls, Sarah and Haley. They're very different girls. Sarah, a lot of her life, imagine herself getting married, imagine herself having kids. Haley never dated. Never dated her whole life, never dated. And Haley, and both of my girls are very, very, very, they're pretty. They're athletic, cheerleader type girls, they're wonderful. Haley just never dated. She's very picky. Literally, I said, you know, Haley, you're going to go out. I said, look at, and I, worse, one day I said, look at that guy. And she went, look at his socks, he's a geek. I said, okay, Haley. It could be a lonely life that you're going to have.

God brings a guy into Haley's life, she gets married. She didn't really care about getting married. Sarah really did. And I thought, I wonder how Sarah's going to handle this. And I saw her in a moment of real jealousy, could have been, I saw her love her sister and plan the wedding. Haley was kind of neutral, and kids, Sarah really wanted kids. Haley got pregnant. I thought, what's it going to be? One of Sarah's favorite people in the world is Haley's son, Brayden. It's not jealous.

In my life, there are four things that I've seen that I'll never see anything like them again. Number one, the

Beatles. There'll never be another band like the Beatles. They're the best. Number two, Secretariat. There'll never be another horse like Secretariat. Everybody talks about it. Every year, I've got to listen to that same dribble about all these horses. It isn't going to happen. Number three is a UCLA basketball team like John Wooden's team. It's never going to happen again. It can't happen. Number four is a sports personality fighter like Muhammad Ali. It isn't going to happen.

So one day, I'm explaining this to a group of people. I'm done, and this is a long set of circumstances, but anyway, I'm done, and the guy said, you want to meet Ali? And I said, I'd love to. He said, he's going to be in my office today at three. Why don't you come over? I said, okay.

So I'm like a little girl going to Britney Spears' concert. I'm over to Walgreens to get a picture because I'm going to run in. This is last March, so I'm going to run in. And I'm all ready, and he said, listen, you know, he's coming in, and he's doing some stuff, and he's got issues.

So I'm in there, and I'm, you know, a little doofus, and he comes in, and the guy said, hey, champ, this is Tommy. He's a big fan of yours. And Ali goes, I've never heard that. No, he just looked over, and so there was some work to do, but over in a corner was a big book. When I say a big book, it's a 50-pound book, limited edition that this guy had in his office of Ali. It starts from just when he was a little boy all the way through.

So he said, hey, champ, why don't you and Tom look at those pictures, and we'll do our work. So I'm sitting there, and Muhammad's got physical challenges at this point. And he sits down, and the guy said, hey, they're big pages, so why don't you turn the pages? So I would turn the pages, and when Muhammad wanted the picture turned, he'd go like that, or he'd point things to me, like just a picture of him and Sam Cooke, just different things.

So we're going through, and we get to where he's fighting Archie Moore. And some of you are old enough to remember he always had a poem. Well, I cannot remember a Bible verse, can't. I get to the Archie Moore fight. He taps it, and I said, I'm not going to turn it yet. Get a seat by the door, because Archie Moore will fall in four. He looks up. He can't control face muscles, so he can't smile. His eyes danced. I had a new friend.

And we went through this, and they said, hey, he'll sit and look all day at these pictures if you'll turn them. And I said, I'm here the rest of the day if that's what you want to do. And they said, no, it's time to go. We got to go. And I said, let me just, I said, I want to, I know it'll be in here, I want to show you my favorite picture of you. And I flip it to the Frasier fight, and he's coming into the ring, he's got on that red robe, and he's dancing around. I said, I love this picture. You could see the response. I said, no, let's just, let's give me five more minutes. Let's do the foreman fight. And so I flip to the foreman fight, and he gets excited. We go, a wonderful, wonderful moment in my life. Just a great moment in my life.

Not making any statements here. Don't talk to me about all this. I'm just, just a wonderful moment. I call my brother, who is a gigantic Muhammad Ali fan, and I tell him the story. He calls the next day. And when I hung up, I thought, I don't know if I should, you know. He calls the next day, and he said, I was awake all night thinking about that. I am so happy for you.

And I thought, I don't know if I would have said that if he'd have called me. You see that? That jealousy.

Love Is Not Jealous

Love isn't jealous. Love is genuinely happy when you get bumped, the other guy, get bumped to first class. Genuinely happy as life begins to unfold. Love is not jealous. You see it there?

Here you go. Love does not brag. It's the only time the word is used in the New Testament. It's the idea of enticing you to jealousy. Let me tell you about you and me. Let me tell you what I'm doing. I'm inflating my resume, trying to make you envious, trying to inflate who I am.

The Humility of True Love

William Carey, I don't know if you know that name, he's the father of modern missions. He was a brilliant linguist, translated parts of the Bible into as many as 34 different languages and dialects. He was raised in a simple home in England, and early in his life, he worked as a cobbler. He was ridiculed for that, for that ancestry. At a dinner party one evening, a man said to him, I understand, Mr. Carey, that you were once a shoemaker. And Carey reportedly said, oh no, your lordship, not a shoemaker, only a shoe repairman. Love does not brag.

It goes right with it. Love is not arrogant. Jesus delivers this assessment in the Gospel of John, that there has been no one who has lived to this point who is greater than John the Baptist. Now think with me. We're talking about some big guys here. Abraham, David, Solomon, Joseph, Isaac, Jacob. Nobody bigger than him. And yet, as John the Baptist assessed his own life, he said this, I'm not even worthy to untie His sandal. He must get bigger, Jesus. He must increase. I must decrease. Love does not brag. Love is not arrogant. It means proud.

The Key to Love

Here's the key, and if you've got Bibles and you're marking them and all this stuff, here's the key to this whole thing. Love does not seek its own.

My mentor is a guy by the name of Larry Wright. That's interesting. Larry was the instrument. I told last night about going to Bible study, Larry was the teacher of that Bible study. And I got to know him, and he got to know me, and there was an instant click. In my life, no one outside of my immediate family, no one's had more influence on me than Larry Wright. An amazing man. Larry died six years ago. There's a hole in my heart. No one ever will ever take that place. They couldn't possibly take that place.

Larry wrote poems. Now, let

Let me tell you about poems. I never get them. I don't understand poems. And I try. Almost every summer, I feel inadequate because really bright people seem to like poems. So I'll pick up some poetry and start to read it and go, I don't get it. I don't understand it.

It's like the Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe thing. I don't get it. My girls will go, "Well, the lion's Jesus," and I'm saying, "Okay, why didn't he say Jesus?" I don't get it. I never get this.

Here's what I love about Larry's poems—I get them. Let me read you one: "How easy it is to be loving, to be kind, tenderhearted each day. I'm so wonderfully easy to live with when things are going my way. When things are going my way, I'm as sweet as sweetness can be. I can't understand as hard as I try why others aren't caring like me. Be careful that you don't upset me, don't cross me, or cause me dismay, or I won't love you the way that I do when things are going my way."

Now I get that. That's what he's saying.

Love Doesn't Seek Its Own

Love doesn't seek its own. Love is not obsessed. By the way, you live at a time and in a country that is obsessed with rights. Love is not obsessed with rights. It's obsessed with responsibilities. And that's the key.

I used to go—our girls got this. They just picked it up from a young age. I would come home from a trip, and I would have a gift, and I'd always obviously have two. I would give a gift to one, and immediately the other one would say, "What? What about me? What about me? What about me?"

We come out of the womb screaming, "What about me? What about me? What about me?" And most of our offense and most of our anger and most of our problems is that we're bothered by somebody who's cut us off in traffic or whatever the equivalent is in our life, and we're saying, "What about me? What about me? What about me?" And Jesus is saying, love says, "What about you? What can I do for you? It's about you. It's not about me."

It's pretty difficult to have a marriage that's in trouble when both parties are saying, "I'm only concerned about you," and "I'm only concerned about you."

The Challenge of Loving Unconditionally

Now here's where the tension lies, and I will get this all the time. I had a guy in my office, and he said, "My wife is a witch. She's awful. Anybody that knows this will tell you she is bad. Do you know her, seen her, been around her? Would you agree she's a witch?"

I said, "I can't make that kind of assessment. I can say this: I wouldn't have married her." But I wouldn't have married her, but what's the deal now? You did, and when you said, "Better, worse, richer, poorer, sickness and health, till death do us part," okay, we're in some of that sickness, poor stuff.

So here's what he said. He said, "What do I do?" And I told him, I said, "You've got to love her like Christ loved the church. You've got to seek not your own. You've got to serve her." You know what he said to me? "How long do I have to do this?"

And what he was going for was this: "Okay, I'm going to do this for a week. How long do I do this? What if she doesn't respond in a week, or a month, or a year, or two years? How long do I have to do this?" And I told him, "God says that you're to do it forever, until you die, okay?" He says, "Here's what you're supposed to do. You're supposed to seek not your own, but serve other people." And the whole implication of all this is whether they deserve it or not.

Love Is Not Provoked

Let me get through this really quick, and this is important. Love is not provoked. That means to arouse to anger. And this is supernatural.

There's a wonderful story. You know the name Jonathan Edwards? You all know Jonathan Edwards, greatest mind that America ever produced, according to Encyclopedia Britannica. There was a man who fell in love with one of his daughters, and came and asked Edwards, "Can I have your daughter in marriage?" And he said, "No, you cannot."

The man said, "But I love her, and she loves me." "It doesn't matter," Edwards said. The man asked him, "Why?" And he said, "Because she's not worthy of you." "But she's a Christian, isn't she?" Here's Edwards' answer: "Yes, but the grace of God can live with some people with whom no one else could ever live." And he's saying, "If you're going to marry this woman, it's going to take you places you don't want to go."

Love Doesn't Keep Score

Here you go. Stay with the definition. Love does not take into account a wrong suffered. It's a bookkeeping term. It means to enter into a ledger with the idea of keeping a permanent record. Let me say it another way: Love doesn't keep score.

There's the old story about the man who says, "Whenever my wife and I fight, she doesn't get hysterical, she gets historical. Do you remember when, in 1975?" That kind of thing. Love doesn't keep score. Love doesn't just forgive and forget. Love remembers and still forgives. Love doesn't have any sense of bitterness or rage.

Love Doesn't Rejoice in Unrighteousness

Love doesn't rejoice in unrighteousness. In other words, love doesn't take satisfaction in sin. Love doesn't laugh at what God calls evil. Or delight in others' troubles.

There is something that drives me nuts about people in general, Christians in particular. They can't shut up. They just keep talking. They just keep talking. And big minds talk about ideas. Small minds talk about people. And there's a lot of small-minded Christians talking about people. It's gossip. I hate it. It drives me crazy.

It's funny because a lot of times, I'm like the last one to hear, and they say, "Well, I'm sure you've heard." And I'm going, "I don't hear." You know why? Because nobody tells me. You know why? Because they know I don't want to hear this garbage. Love doesn't rejoice in unrighteousness. Love doesn't just keep talking and yapping.

Love Rejoices in Truth

Love rejoices. Here's the positive now. Love rejoices in truth, God's truth, biblical truth. Love loves truth. Here you go. And then He closes. You see it? He closes with four strong positives. Love...

The Final Four Characteristics of Love

Love bears all things. Love believes all things. Love hopes all things. Love endures all things. Let me try to tie them together. They're really very similar. Love bears all things. It means to cover up. Literally, it means love covers a multitude of sins.

As a result of the fact that I'm not seeking my own and I care more about you and I'm not rejoicing in sin, let me ask you some questions because I think they're really important. I have discovered that most people are lonely. Most people are lonely because they don't have friends. Most people don't have friends because you are not somebody somebody wants to spend some time with.

The Challenge of True Friendship

I had a guy come to me one time. He said, "Well, you've been my friend." I said, "I don't have time to be your friend." That may sound harsh to you, but I don't know what else to say to him. My friend dance card's all full. I don't need a friend. He said, "Well, I need a friend."

I said, "All right, here's what I want you to do. I want you to go away and we'll meet next week. I'm going to give you one more meeting because that's all I got. One more meeting. When you come in next week, I want you to make a list of the things you're looking for in a friend."

So he came in and he listed them. Now if you were going to list them, it'd be the same thing. Social compatibility, somebody you can trust. So he gets through the whole thing. And I said, "Now, are you that kind of person?" He said, "No, you don't understand. I'm looking for a friend." And I'm saying, "If you're this kind of person you just described, you're not going to have any problem finding a friend because the whole world's looking for people like that. I can't find many of them."

Love Bears All Things

One of the ways that I know if you're going to be a friend is if you're trustworthy with information. Can I tell you something and not hear it back the next day? And am I going to have to talk to you in the midst of talking to you and begin to unpack it because friendship's kind of hard and ugly and difficult, isn't it?

My best friend is also chairman of our elder board. That's a problem. Can be. So we go at it pretty good sometimes. And I do stupid things and say stupid things. But you know what? Love bears all things. It means to protect. Love covers.

Love Believes All Things

Love believes all things. It's not cynical or suspicious. It's hard for me because I am by nature pretty cynical. Love is ready to believe anything that's grounded in reality and it's ready to start over. God's grace is powerful enough to change anybody, anytime, anywhere.

I told you last night the story of how God saved me and I told you that I went to this Bible study. When I was done, I went back to the guys who went to the Bible study and I said to them, "Why did you never invite me to that thing?" You know what they said? "It never occurred to us that God could save a guy or would save a guy like you." That's how lost and helpless and hopeless it was. You know what I discovered? Those are oftentimes exactly the guys that God's in the process of saving.

You are a very, very bad judge of where God's going to move in people's lives. You'd never pick somebody like a John Newton or a Chuck Colson or an Apostle Paul. Here's Paul. Paul's on the way to wipe out the church and God says, "You know what? I like your zeal. I like your enthusiasm. We need to change jerseys here and get you on this ball club. We're going to move you over here and now you're my kind of boy."

Love Hopes and Endures All Things

Love believes all things. Love bears all things, believes all things, and hopes all things. Here you go. Love is persistently optimistic. I'm going to talk tonight or tomorrow, somewhere in there, about failure. Love endures all things. It holds fast.

Here's the question we started with. Men, real men now, know you're a lover. Not in the world's terms, but are you patient and kind and not jealous and not bragging? Do you seek your own?

I will tell you this, men, and I mean it. This is the greatest advice I can give you. You will never find real relationship, either with your wife or with a woman or with a guy. You'll never find real relationship if you're about seeking your own. It's never going to happen. You will be a miserable man all your life. Nobody wants to be around somebody who's obsessed with themselves and their rights and all that goes with it.

Jesus: The Perfect Example of Love

Now, here's the deal and we got to go. Every one of these 15 characteristics describe Jesus. If you're wondering what that looks like, it looks like Him. Jesus didn't come to this earth because He needed to bolster His resume. Jesus came here to seek and save the lost, right?

Jesus was all about not Himself, but about His Father and about emptying Himself so that He could do for you and me what we couldn't do for ourselves, which is save us. Grace, unmerited favor. Love. Are you a lover? That's how the world's going to know.

The World's Assessment of the Church

I just started a book this morning, and a friend of my son has written it. And this guy is clearly a bright kid. And his whole thing is about the world's assessment of the church. And the general assessment is this, that it just doesn't look like a place where it would be fun to go. And the people in it just don't look like they're having much fun.

And that, frankly, was always my assessment of church. Don't do this. Don't do this. Don't do this. Don't wear this. Don't wear this. Women didn't wear makeup, and God knows they needed it. And it was all about food, and it was all about eating. It was a bunch of don'ts, don'ts, don'ts, don'ts, don'ts. And there are some of those don'ts.

But you know what it says? There's something, and I said it last night. And maybe I'm growing old. Maybe I'm mellowing. I don't know. But there is something so compelling about love. When the world looks at you, do they see a genuine lover?

Now, here's the deal. You've got to go. Here's the deal. There's no way you can do this. You

You can't do it. There's no way that you're going to be these things naturally. It's all supernatural.

What does that mean? That means that I'm constantly, here's a great phrase, every day I have to preach to myself, "Tom, God loves you. And now God says, you go and you love others. And you let Him love them through you." Isn't that something?

And in there is freedom. In bondage to sin, you are bought at a price. Don't entice yourself all over again to a church or to a denomination. You're free. You are free to love. You're free to care. You are free to be the person God created you to be. Every one of you different and unique. You don't have to go and be just like your pastor, just like a leader, just like Jeff or just like the band. Free to be the people God called you to be.

What I want to do tonight and tomorrow is just, we're going to have like two fireside chats. And I'm going to talk about things that are really important and things that are going to get in the way of this. Things that are going to get in the way of you being the man that God called you to be.

Sounds like a good start. Have a great afternoon. Find lunch somewhere. Get a nap. Walk on the beach, but what's the point? You can get a nap. Have fun.

When we come back together, dinner's at 5:30. So get in there, fill your bellies. But come in here at 7 o'clock and we want to be, we're going to work. We're going to work real hard, get through our stuff, and make this a time that counts.

Let me pray for you as we go. Father, thank you for these men. I pray that they would begin to love You with the love that You have for them. And God, let us begin to love this world. It starts at home. It starts with the people in our lives. Let us be men who don't seek our own. We're patient and kind and ultimately bear all things and believe all things and hope all things and endure all things. God, we love You and only because You first loved us. Father, thank You. We pray to You in Jesus' name. Amen.

I'll see you tonight.