God's Definition of Love, Part 1

Tom Shrader opens a series on love by placing 1 Corinthians 13 in its context between chapters 12 and 14, where Paul corrects a church that had elevated spiritual gifts above love. Shrader walks through the first five attributes of love — patience, kindness, freedom from jealousy, freedom from boasting, and freedom from arrogance — arguing that none of these can be genuinely produced apart from the work of the Holy Spirit. He challenges listeners to replace the word 'love' with 'Jesus' throughout the passage, making clear that authentic love is not a human achievement but the visible fruit of a life surrendered to Christ.

“Love is not a sign of weakness. It is a sign of strength under control — something bigger than me, a greater good.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: God's Definition of Love

Recorded: 2007 at East Valley Bible Church

Duration: 53 min

Themes: love, patience, kindness, humility, jealousy, spiritual gifts, holy spirit, fruit of the spirit, struggling with jealousy, dealing with pride, new believer, young adult, marriage, navigating conflict, feeling unloving, small group leader

Scripture: 1 Corinthians 13:1-7, 1 Corinthians 12:1-7, Matthew 5:13-16, Galatians 5:17-23, 1 John 3:18, Titus 3:4, Acts 7:54-60, John 3:30, Romans 1:16

Theological Themes: pneumatology, sanctification, fruit of the spirit, holy spirit's work, agape love, 1 corinthians 13, spiritual gifts, christlikeness

Full Transcript

God's Definition of Love, Part 1

Maggie has been at this church for a long time. She left a few years ago to go and serve in Africa for a year, came back, and she leaves in a week for Uganda. We would love for you to hear from Maggie, but having her here four times on a Sunday is impractical and difficult to do. So what we did was have Mike Posh, who is the head of World Ministries, sit down with Maggie for an interview. We thought we'd play that for you this morning and remind you of what God is doing in East Valley Bible Church and around the world.

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*The following is an interview conducted by Pastor Mike Posh, Pastor of World Ministries, with Maggie Dahlman.*

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**Mike Posh:** Maggie, you've spent a year in Sierra Leone, Africa. You've seen something of the plagues and the difficulties and the war and what that's all about. Why would you want to go back?

**Maggie Dahlman:** When I was in Sierra Leone, God really opened my eyes and my heart to see what was happening in this world. In the midst of that, He not only opened my heart, but He showed me a mirror to what the real need in Africa is, and that is a changed heart. They need the gospel. They need Jesus Christ. We can send all sorts of relief and all sorts of educational opportunities, but it's only a Band-Aid without Jesus Christ. We have the gospel, and we have the gospel to bring. I just feel privileged to be a part of bringing that.

**Mike Posh:** So you think it still makes sense to go out to difficult places with the gospel?

**Maggie Dahlman:** Absolutely. Romans tells us the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. There are unsaved people, children — 45 million orphans — living without hope. I have the gospel, and God uses the gospel to bring them hope.

**Mike Posh:** Tell us what you're going to be doing at Rafiki Village.

**Maggie Dahlman:** Rafiki has villages in ten of the poorest and neediest countries in Africa. They consider themselves a rescue mission. Their ministry is to orphans and vulnerable children. They set them up in a village, give them a home, and meet their physical, social, emotional, and spiritual needs. So these children get food every day instead of walking through garbage dumps, and they get the Word of God every day — a full reformed Christian education. I will get to teach the older girls, ages thirteen to eighteen, and I will also do finance for the village.

**Mike Posh:** I know it's important to be supported on the mission field. How will our church be able to support you? Maybe tell us a little about your missionary sending team.

**Maggie Dahlman:** East Valley has been so gracious in helping me find an agency and get connected again over there. So many people have listened to what's happening in Africa and have responded with financial and prayerful support and have just shown their love. Right now there is a missionary sending team here at East Valley of about twenty people who will be a core group and advocates for Africa, for Rafiki, and for me. So that if I have a need, they're there. They will constantly keep me before the congregation so the congregation realizes they are in partnership with me — that I am a part of this body — and so that I will remain visible through this missionary sending team.

**Mike Posh:** And if someone is not part of that team, how might they be supportive?

**Maggie Dahlman:** If they wanted to be in prayer and receive quarterly newsletters, they could sign up with the MST — the Missionary Sending Team Coordinator. Steve Burrell is here. They would receive prayer requests and praise requests, get to know what's happening in Uganda, and be a part of that.

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A Call to Partnership and Prayer

It is exciting to know that God has called us all to be missionaries — all to proclaim the gospel in our world and around the world. Maggie leaves, as we said, in a week. Some of you are already part of that sending team. Maybe you would like to join. Let us know here, and somebody from World Ministries will contact you and give you information on how you can be part of that. You can receive her newsletters, and she is a wonderful writer — these emails will have a great impact on your life.

Because it wasn't practical to have Maggie in every service, we've done two things. First, after each service, you can go up to room 200 — if you don't know where that is, there are people standing outside who would love to help you find it. Maggie will be up there. If you know her, you'll want to go up and say hello and goodbye. And if you just saw Maggie for the first time this morning, it would be a great source of encouragement — for you and for her — to go and introduce yourself.

We will take this moment, as we will in each service, to pray for Maggie before we get into today's lesson.

*Father, thank You for Maggie Dahlman. Thank You that You have taken her gifts and talents and all that You have done in her life, and You have changed her heart. You have given her a desire to go to a difficult and needy part of the world, and also the resources and the ability to go. We pray that as she arrives, she would be a wonderful friend to those older girls, a wonderful teacher, that she would help meet physical and emotional needs — but more than anything, that You would allow her to meet the spiritual needs that are present in that village. God, we thank You for her. We thank You for the sending team, people who are coming around her and supporting Maggie and others around this world. God, thank You for that privilege. We pray to You in Jesus' name.*

Introduction and Series Overview

Open your Bibles to 1 Corinthians chapter 13. We are doing a series titled "God's Plan for Growing in Grace." It follows the series "God's Plan for Salvation." We have said that we are saved by God, from God, for God, and this series really focuses on the part of being saved for God.

We landed in Matthew chapter 5, verses 13 through 16. That was the genesis of this for me. I spent some time last summer in Matthew 5, and I was captured especially by verse 16, which says this — Jesus speaking to His disciples, to us: "Let your light shine in such a way that men see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven."

Two Sections of Matthew 5:16

What we tried to do over the last couple of weeks is unpack that verse. When we look at chapter 5, verse 16, we noticed that it easily divides into two sections. One is a call to action, something that is visible. The other is a reaction.

The call to action is this: I am to let my light shine in such a way that people see my good works. Apparently what Jesus is saying is that if you are a Christian, people should see it. If you were to walk into the office tomorrow and somebody said, "What did you do this weekend?" and you said, "I went to church," and these people passed out, there would be an indication that perhaps you have not lived up to that admonition.

People should see something different about you. If you are married, your marriage is different. If you are dating, your dating is different. You are a different employee, you are a different employer. There should be a visible joy in your life, something attractive to the people around you. It was always fascinating to me that little children were comfortable with Jesus. Think about who kids are comfortable with — not stern, harsh people. There is something about children where they instinctively know it; they instinctively stay away from certain people and instinctively run up to others. Something about Jesus visibly communicated who He was, and that should be evident in our lives as well.

The second part of Matthew 5:16 is the reaction: as a result of that visible difference, people will glorify your Father in heaven. What we have said is that will not happen naturally. If people see your good works, they will naturally praise you. The only way they will glorify Him is if you tell them to. So Matthew 5:16 gives us two charges: to make the invisible God visible, and then to speak the truth boldly. If I make the invisible God visible but do not speak the truth boldly, I am a coward. If I speak the truth boldly but have not made the invisible God visible, I am a hypocrite. Neither of those is desirable.

Being Before Doing

The first part of Matthew 5:16 deals with good works. Jesus says in Matthew 5:13, "You are the salt of the earth," and in 5:14, "You are the light of the world." The words "you are" signify not doing, but being. At the risk of being a little philosophical here, He is not saying run out and do these things — though those things will inevitably take place — but rather that there is something in you that begins to motivate them.

God begins to work in your life. If you are singing songs of surrender — "You are all, You are everything," "How great is our God," "You are our King," "Jesus, lover of my soul" — and you really mean them, then it begins to radically change the way you think. "Have the mind in you that was in Christ Jesus." "Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind." There ought to be something different about the way you look at the world around you.

So before we get to doing — the things we are supposed to do — we want to talk about why we do them.

The Fruit of the Spirit

Last week we landed briefly in Galatians 5, where Paul says to be led by the Spirit. In other words, if you say you are a Christian, act like it — the Spirit will produce these things in your life. First, beginning in verses 17 and 18, Paul describes what is evident when someone is not a Christian. We call those the fruit of the flesh. But in Galatians chapter 5, verse 22, Paul says this: "The fruit of the Spirit" — the byproduct of a right relationship with God through Jesus Christ — "the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control."

When we looked at that, we noticed that Paul is grammatically irregular. If we were to write that sentence ourselves, it would read: the fruits, plural, of the Spirit are, plural, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control — because he lists nine things. But God does not make an error in His words, so God says through Paul exactly what He wants to say.

Here is what He is saying. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, and self-control. He is saying one of two things, and they are almost identical. He is either saying the fruit of the Spirit is love, and then all these other things are part of love — they define it — or he is saying the fruit of the Spirit is these nine things, and they come as a bunch, and you cannot have one without the others.

The Context of 1 Corinthians 13

The fruit of the Spirit is love, along with all the other qualities listed. You cannot say, "I have the fruit of the Spirit — I have patience, kindness, and self-control." Paul says you have all nine of them. Where love is present in your life, all the fruit is present. Either way we look at it, it all starts with love.

Last week, the question was raised: if we want to teach about love, where should we turn? The answer was 1 Corinthians 13. Because we jumped into the passage last week, it is worth stepping back and providing a little background we did not cover then.

1 Corinthians 13 is strategically placed between chapter 12 and chapter 14. Those two chapters talk about essentially the same idea — the gifts of the Holy Spirit. Look at chapter 12, verse 7: "To each one is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good." Paul is talking about something each believer receives at conversion — a special gift, an enablement to perform a function in the body of Christ with effectiveness and efficiency.

Look also at verses 4, 5, and 6. There is a variety of gifts, all coming from the same Spirit. There are a variety of ministries, all from the same Lord. There are a variety of effects, but the same God who works all things in all persons. Paul goes on to use the illustration of a body — an arm, a knee, a hip, an ear, an eye, a nose, a brain, a heart, kidneys, a liver. The body has many parts, but it is still one body. That, he says, is the way it is in the body of Christ.

Gifts, the Body, and the Common Good

We might be tempted to argue that a brain is more important than a little finger, or that one part matters more than another. Paul's point, however, is that all these parts are important. Whether He has made you a little finger or a nose or a knee or a heart or a brain is not the issue. The issue is whether you are using what you have been given for what he describes in verse 7 as the common good — the body.

One of the most important things you can do as a Christian is be involved in the body of Christ, and the most common, logical place for that is in the church. If you say you are a Christian, you should have a relationship with the church. There are at least two reasons for this within the area of giftedness alone: you need a place to exercise your gift, and others need to receive that gift from you — just as you need to receive the gifts others bring. We need each other. That is Paul's whole point.

Now look at chapter 12, verse 1: "Now concerning spiritual gifts, brethren, I do not want you to be unaware. You know that when you were pagans, you were led astray to the mute idols, however you were led. Therefore I make known to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God says, 'Jesus is accursed,' and no one can say, 'Jesus is Lord,' except by the Holy Spirit."

Paul is describing a situation the Corinthians knew well. Before their conversion, they came from environments where the demonstration of gifts was the central thing — where show was the thing. They were in pagan settings, and they brought that same mentality into the church. In 1 Corinthians 12, 13, and 14, Paul is addressing a real problem: the gifts were being taken out of context, gift envy had become the issue, and the gifts themselves had become objects of worship. That is precisely what Paul is warning them against.

The Supremacy of Love

That context sets up 1 Corinthians 13, where Paul speaks of the supremacy of love over all these gifts. He begins in verse 1: "If I speak with the tongues of men and angels, and I do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal." He is speaking in extraordinary hyperbole. If I speak with the greatest of all languages — if I speak as though from an angel itself, with magnificence — and yet I do not have love, I am making nothing more than noise and racket.

He continues: "And if I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing." At the close of chapter 12, Paul says, "I want to show you a still more excellent way." This is that way — the way of love.

His argument is clear: it is absolutely important to have a gift and to use it. But if someone is speaking in some extraordinary way and the core motive is not love, then it is an absolute waste of time — nothing but the clang of a gong. If someone has the gift of prophecy, the ability to proclaim truth, or knows divine mysteries, or possesses all knowledge, or has faith strong enough to say to a mountain "move" and it moves — and yet does not have love — Paul says that person is nothing.

Ray Steadman writes that Paul is thinking of theologians particularly — men and women with great ability to detect and understand the mysteries of Scripture.

The Supremacy of Love Over Every Gift

Paul says if he could answer all those questions, if he could explain all those mysteries and movements of God, and still he is not a loving person — if he is difficult, cantankerous, hard to get along with, even though he could move mountains by faith — he lacks the loving spirit, and it is all nothing. Paul is saying there is a supremacy here to love. He goes on to describe about as loving an act as one can imagine: giving it all away. Verse 3 speaks of giving away all possessions, feeding the hungry, helping the poor, even sacrificing one's life — perhaps with persecution in mind. But if it does not have love at its core, it is a waste of time.

We will come back and talk about these actions, but the motive behind the action becomes the issue. Charles Spurgeon writes this: "If you make doctrine the main thing, you are very likely to grow narrow-minded. If you make your own experience the main thing, you will become gloomy and critical of others. If you make ordinances, communion, baptism, etc., the main thing, you will be apt to grow merely formal. But you can never make too much of the living Christ Jesus. Remember that all things else are for His sake." This is all about Jesus.

Those of you who worship in this room sang those words today. The Holy Spirit knew what He was doing when He put those songs of worship together with this message. It is all about Christ. God is love.

Replacing "Love" with "Jesus"

So that we never play with Scripture or start messing around with it, but simply for the sake of illustration and to get our minds focused rightly, we could actually take the word *love* and replace it with the word *Jesus* — the person Jesus. If I speak with the tongue of men and angels, but I do not have Jesus, I become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and know all the mysteries and all the knowledge, if I have all the faith so as to remove mountains, but I do not have Jesus, I am nothing. If I give all my possessions to feed the poor, if I deliver my body to be burned, but I do not have Jesus, it profits me nothing.

Now He defines love. Let's read it again and break it apart. We reached the end of verse 4 this morning. "Love is patient. Love is kind. Love is not jealous. Love does not brag and is not arrogant. It does not act unbecomingly. It does not seek its own. It is not provoked. It does not take into account a wrong suffered. It does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things."

Again, we could replace the word *love* with the person of Christ. We have said God is love, and Jesus becomes the physical manifestation of that for us. So for each one of these fifteen attributes or character traits, we could look to Jesus' life and find them there. Jesus is patient and kind and not jealous. Jesus does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly, does not seek after His own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth. And we see in His life, in verse 7, that Jesus bears all things and believes all things and hopes all things and endures all things.

Are You a Lover by God's Standards?

Here is the question before us today. Some of you might laugh. Are you a lover? Let us add: in the biblical sense. Are you a lover by God's standards? For Christians, it is absolutely impossible to say yes to that question if you are not a Christian. If you are not a Christian, you cannot possibly be a lover in this sense — it is impossible. The Bible says love is the result of a right relationship with Christ. Love is a fruit of the Spirit, and the Spirit only indwells those who know Christ in a personal way.

When I read through this list — love is patient and kind and not jealous, does not brag, is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly, does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not keep score or keep account, rejoices in truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things — I look at that and say it is a very intimidating list. I look at it and say I do not know if I can do that. And the answer, of course, is you cannot do that. That is the whole point. This is the evidence of God working in your life. If you are to let your good works shine before men so that they see these things, those good works must have behind them the right motive.

One Trait That Captures Them All

Now I want you to help me see how I look at this list. Among these fifteen character traits, seven of them are stated positively — "love is" — and eight of them are stated negatively — "love does not brag." But there is one that seems to capture all of them. There is one that, if I were to take just one, says this is the key.

Look at that list and see if one thing jumps out at you. If you could only pick one of these fifteen traits, which would it be? Here is the one I landed on: *it does not seek its own.* That seems to be the key. All the others flow from that. When we get to that one, we will hang on it for a while — and we will get there next week.

Love Is Supernatural

In its essence, if I were to bring this all down to one thing, it would be this: love is supernatural. Love doesn't seek its own. That is the heart of it.

Love Is Patient

First of all, love is patient, or long-suffering. In First John chapter 3, verse 18, John tells us, "Little children, let us not love with word or with tongue, but indeed in action." In other words, this love is active. There is evidence of it. It is not abstract, and it is not passive.

Is love a feeling? Certainly there are feelings attached to love, but there is more than that. Love is alive. When Paul wrote about patience in the Greek, the word he chose limits the test of patience exclusively to people. He is not talking about circumstances here. There are other words that would encompass that. What he speaks about is patience with people specifically.

God is patient with people. God is long-suffering, and He calls us to be the same way. When I think of God's long-suffering, the most pronounced illustration that comes to mind is Jesus on the cross. They were mocking Him, saying, "He saved others, but He can't save Himself," while He had total power — absolute power — to save Himself at that moment. He didn't. Ultimately, He cried out wanting the people around Him to be forgiven, acknowledging they did not understand what they were doing.

That is Jesus. But in Acts chapter 7, Stephen has almost the identical response. Stephen, the first martyr of the church, came under real assault from the Jewish leaders of his time. He delivered an incredible message, and Acts chapter 7, verse 54 tells us that when they heard it, they were cut to the quick and began gnashing their teeth.

Then comes the operative phrase: "Being full of the Holy Spirit." He was not acting of his own accord. This was not his own personality at work. Being filled with the Spirit, he gazed intently into heaven and saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at the right hand of God. He said, "Behold, I see the heavens open and the Son of Man is standing at the right hand." They cried out with a loud voice, covered their ears, and rushed at him with one impulse. Verse 58 says they drove him out of town and began to stone him. A young man named Saul — who would become Paul the Apostle — stood holding their coats.

As they went on stoning Stephen, he called out, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." Then, falling on his knees, he cried out with a loud voice, "Lord, do not hold their sin against them." And having said this, he died. That is love. That is patience. That is long-suffering.

Strength, Not Weakness

This kind of patience is not a sign of weakness. It is a sign of strength under control. It is a sign of something bigger than oneself, a greater good at work. I cannot do that naturally, but when I am filled with the Spirit of God, there is a patience with people that enters my life.

God's Patience Toward the Unrepentant

God is patient. There are some in this room who did not take communion — and I say this not to alienate anyone, but simply so you understand — who, in a strict sense, deserve judgment at this very moment. The Bible says the wage of sin is death. You have sinned. You are unrepentant. There is no turning to God, and yet He waits. Yet He is patient. That is why we plead with you.

Perhaps someone invited you here today, and you are wondering why. Let me tell you why. They may not even say it in these words, but the reason they invited you is not to earn a reward or a gold star. The reason they invited you is because they love you. They love you, and they know that if you die in your current condition, you will spend eternity separated from God forever in a place called hell — and your life here will be hell as well.

God would be perfectly just in bringing judgment right now. And clearly, for those not following Him, that destruction is already at work in their lives. But He holds back. However, be careful.

A Warning About Presuming on God's Patience

I was once in a small group, and when it came time to pray, the man to my left said, "I'll start. We'll go around the room, and Tom will close." Those are the words no one wants to hear. You do not want to go last, because by the time it gets to you, all the good prayers are taken. That last prayer always ends up being something like, "Father, I can only echo the thoughts of the people here today."

That first man prayed, "Father, I thank You that You are patient." I thought, that is a good thing for me to hear. I need to receive that into my spirit. Then he said, "Father, I am thankful that You are infinitely patient." And I thought — no. He is not infinitely patient. He may have brought you to this point. He may give you another day, or a week, or a year. But He is not

Love Is Kind

Love is patient. Here is the second thing — love is kind. It means to be useful, serving, gracious. It is the counterpart of patience. Titus chapter 3, verse 4 says, "But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared." We are talking about Christ — God so loved the world, God so cared for the world. He expresses this love, and here is what that love looks like. It is love in action. It is kindness. He saved us.

Love is kind, courteous, gracious, and pleasant to people. The perfect test of this is how you are doing with those closest to you. I was with a man one day and he said, "I have to confess to you that I have just been nicer to the waitress at this restaurant than I am to my own wife." There is the test.

It seems easy to be polite to a waitress or a server, to someone there to help you, but that courtesy does not always carry over at home. We seem to have a whole different set of etiquette at the table depending on where we are. If we are out for dinner, we say, "Will you please pass the pepper?" — and by the way, 73% of people who are asked to pass either salt or pepper will pass both. I cannot remember a Bible verse, but I can remember all this stuff that does not matter.

At home, though, you just reach across, knock things out of the way, and grab. Here is a person who brings you food that was prepared by another, who is waiting for you to pay them, and you say, "Thank you so much." But a wife or husband who prepares a dinner, brings it in, and sets it in front of you gets, "Where is the knife and fork?" It is common courtesy, and love requires it.

Love Is Not Jealous

Love is patient. Love is kind. Now Paul states the negative: love is not jealous. To have a strong desire is what that word means, and it can be either positive or negative. We can stumble on this word because the Bible tells us that God is jealous, and we think, "God is jealous? That doesn't seem right." The reason it seems wrong is that we read into it our own emotion of jealousy.

It was 30 years ago that Susan and I began to date. After we had been dating for a while, I felt the relationship needed to be ratcheted up a notch — two or three, actually — and that it should have a sense of exclusivity. In other words, we did not need to be dating other people. She said no; she wanted to continue dating, and she was seeing another guy whose undergraduate work was at Notre Dame and his graduate work at Southern Cal. The guy was a loser.

So I tried to win her over and figured I would fill her calendar so she would have to be with me. But she spent a lot of time with this other guy. Finally — and guys, you do not want to say this to your date — out of insecurity I said, "You have got to pick between the two of us. This is killing me." I was in apartment 202 and she was in 201, so I would see his car, and it drove me crazy.

She came over one day and said, "I am sick of you bothering me about this. I am going to make a decision tomorrow." So I got home and his car was there at 5 o'clock — the engine was cold, so he had been there a while. He was still there at 5:15, 5:30, 5:45, 6:00, 6:15. I was thinking, how long can it take to say goodbye to this guy?

Finally, at 7 o'clock, the doorbell rang. By that point I was convinced I was in trouble. She said, "Well, I was telling him and explaining to him that I don't want to see him anymore, and I'm just going to date you." And I said, "Well, obviously, that's the case." Those two hours — whatever jealousy looks like on the negative side — were filled with it.

Now, when we hear that God is a jealous God, we do not mean anything like that. When He says, "I want you to have Me as your God and no other gods before Me," what He is saying is, "I want what is best for you." All I wanted in that situation was what I thought was best for me.

Two Sides of Jealousy

There are two aspects to this idea of jealousy. The first is, "I want what you have." When we hear the word jealousy, we typically think of that. The other side is, "I wish you didn't have what you have." I may not even want what you have — I just do not want you to have it. That is an even darker side.

Does this describe you a little bit? It seems like human nature. On one side, I want what you have. On the flip side, I do not want you to have it, even though I do not want it myself. The opposite of jealousy is the ability to rejoice with others.

I will give two illustrations from my own life — and I only use myself in these as a negative example. Both happened to me in the last year. I have two daughters, Sarah and Haley, about 20 months apart. Haley is the younger and Sarah the older. Haley never dated in her whole life and was not really interested in boys. I would be at the mall and say, "Haley, there's a boy," and she would say, "Look at his socks."

Love Is Not Jealous

Love is not jealous. I watched this play out in my own family in a way that still amazes me. My daughter Haley used to say to me, "Dad, I'm going to find a guy just like you." And I said, "Yeah, but your mother said they broke the mold." Sarah, on the other hand, dated and was older, but the way God orchestrated things, Haley got married first and Haley had a baby first. I watched Sarah like a hawk to see if there would be any jealousy in that, because those two girls really loved one another.

I don't remember — and some of you have raised girls — I don't remember ever a time in their life where they had a disagreement or a harsh word with each other. Ever. I came home one day and they were on the couch, young — oh my gosh, three and four years old. I walked in with my usual jovial self and said, "Hey, how's everybody doing?" Susan said, "Leave them alone, get away from them." I sensed Mrs. Schrader was having a tough day.

So I stayed nearby, because you can't have that much pressure without it eventually releasing. I heard her call to the girls: "Look up here. Now look at each other. That person you're looking at is your best friend. And I don't ever want to hear one harsh word from your mouth about that person. Ever. Now get out of here." And for twenty-five years, I never have heard one.

I waited to see how Sarah would handle Haley getting married first, because I thought if there was a chink in that armor, that's where it would show. She was so happy for Haley when she was married. When Brayden was born, Sarah was the one right there. That is love that is not jealous — and that is unbelievable.

Love Does Not Brag

Love does not brag. It is the only time that word is used in the entire New Testament. It is, in a way, the other side of jealousy — jealousy wants what you have, while bragging attempts to make you want what I have. It is about being braggadocious, inflating your view of who you are, flaunting it in front of others. Have you heard about my new fill-in-the-blank?

William Carey, the father of modern missions, was one night at dinner in London when a man set out to humiliate him. In a very loud voice the man said, "I suppose, Mr. Carey, you once worked as a shoemaker." Carey replied, "No, your lordship — not a shoemaker, just a cobbler." He didn't even claim to make the shoes, only to mend them.

Let me help you out here: some of you are extraordinarily talented and successful. Nobody likes an important person.

Love Is Not Arrogant

Love is not arrogant. So love is patient, love is kind, it is not jealous, it does not brag, and it is not arrogant. The word means overbearing and haughty — a synonym would be proud. Napoleon said, "I am not a man like any other." That is a fitting illustration of arrogance — looking down on others.

When I think of examples of the opposite, other than Christ Himself, I think of John the Baptist, whom Jesus called the greatest man who had ever lived. That is extraordinary company — Abraham, the whole sweep of the Old Testament. Greater than any of them. And yet John, who was the hot thing at the time — everyone in town was coming out to hear him, Jesus had not yet arrived on the scene — had his disciples asking him, "Are you the one? Are you the one?" He said, "The One who is coming — I am not even worthy to untie His sandal."

Then when Jesus did arrive, not only did John's star begin to diminish, but John began sending his own followers to follow Christ. That would be a difficult thing to do, humanly speaking. And then John says, in John chapter 3, verse 30, the words that should be our mantra: "He must increase and I must decrease."

Taking the Inventory

We have now covered five attributes. That means we are about a third of the way through this description of love. How are you doing so far? Does that sound like you? Can you put your own name in there? Can you even read it without laughing? "I am patient. I am kind. I am not jealous. I do not brag. I am not arrogant." That is the call — to be a real lover. That is what it means to be a lover in God's economy.

We will pick that list up next week. Go ahead and read through it and take the inventory. It is a fair question to ask: how am I doing?

Closing Prayer

Father, make us men and women and students who really are lovers, whose lives are filled with good works that flow from a right heart and a right relationship with You. Instinctively, I am not patient, and I am not kind, and I am jealous, and I do brag, and I am arrogant. There is no hope for me to change that on my own. I can try and try and try — it is not going to happen. But with You in my heart, with You in my life, with my soul committed to You, I can be patient and kind and not jealous and not brag and not arrogant. God, will You do that work in our lives individually and in our life collectively as East Valley Bible Church? Transform the way we think, and therefore the way we live. We pray that to You in Jesus' name. Amen.