Scott Brown's sermon "What Love Looks Like, Part 1" explores 1 Corinthians 13, focusing on the importance of love in Christian life and its foundation in three key doctrines: regeneration, sanctification, and the gospel. Brown emphasizes that true Christianity involves a transformation characterized by love, contrasting it with superficial acts of faith. The sermon defines love through the traits listed in 1 Corinthians 13, such as patience, kindness, and humility, urging believers to reflect on God's love demonstrated through Christ. Patience is described as 'long-suffering,' a crucial aspect of love that allows believers to endure wrongs, reflecting God's patience with humanity. The sermon also warns against envy, describing it as destructive and demonic, while encouraging believers to overcome it through the fear of God. Brown calls for introspection and repentance, highlighting the need for believers to embody love's attributes and to rely on God's grace for transformation.

1 Corinthians 13 verse 1, though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging symbol. And though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge. And though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor and though I give my body to be burned But have not loved it profits me nothing Love suffers long and is kind love does not envy love does not parade itself is not puffed up Does not behave rudely does not seek its own is not provoked Thanks, no evil does not rejoice in equity but rejoices in the truth. Let's pray.

Thank you for today Heavenly Father, thank you that we have the liberty to be assembled here together. Thank you for another week. Pray we be diligent as we look forward to this week to remind that we would be reminded what we hear today. I pray it would change us to make us more like Christ. I pray you bless the preaching and our response to that preaching in Jesus' name, amen.

Oh, thank you very much. Those of you who have been with us know that we're taking an excursion into 1 Corinthians as an illustration of the doctrine that John is teaching in his letter, 1 John, and because he speaks much of love in 1 John, and so we're going to be defining it, and we're here in 1 Corinthians 13 in order to do so. And John has raised the question, what does a Christian look like? What is a Christian? And he says very clearly that he who says he loves God and hates his brother is in darkness.

He does not know God. So John brings up this whole matter of love and in 1st Corinthians 13 there are 15 marks of love that we're beginning to walk through here. Now, as we're here in 1 John and now in 1 Corinthians 13, it's important that we understand that there are, before us, there are three great doctrines. And the first is the doctrine of regeneration, the second is the doctrine of sanctification, and the third is the whole doctrine of the gospel. And John has brought up the matter of regeneration, that if you say you love God and hate your brother you're a liar and the truth is not in you.

And the whole idea that John is communicating is that regenerate people are a changed people and the power of hatred has been broken in their heart. And it's so critical that today we understand what regeneration is. What does it mean to be born again? What does it really mean to be a Christian? Because we have so many millions of people in our country today who think that what it means to be a Christian is that you sincerely at some point in your life said yes to God or raised your hand or walked an aisle or you cried or you asked God for forgiveness this one time.

But that's actually not what the Bible says constitutes a Christian. And so John is explaining this and it's critical that we understand what regeneration is. The church at various times has begun very confused about regeneration. This is why every great revival in history has had its focus on the preaching of regeneration. What does it mean to be saved?

So that people examine themselves and compare themselves to what the scriptures have to say. And so John makes this very clear in his letter and he says, beloved let us love one another for love is of God And everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God. He couldn't say it any more plainly. And so we're here in this to really bring forth the whole doctrine of regeneration and Every person here today or hearing this message should ask themselves.

Am I regenerate? Have I been born again? Have I just said I was born again and yet have no inward manifestations? In other words, has the power of hatred been broken in my life by Jesus Christ? And then also there's the doctrine of sanctification that's here because there's a process of growth that John speaks of in his letter and it exists in Christians.

God is not finished with us yet and the love of God as John says is being perfected in a Christian and in any true church. And so you would always expect that in a Christian, love is being perfected sequentially and progressively in his life. He's not perfect. God is not finished with him yet. The same thing with the church.

You should always see a church that's growing in love. When a church is declining in love, something is wrong. Now, a church should always define love by what the Bible says love is, because we're also very confused about what love is, and that's why places like 1 Corinthians 13 are so incredibly important, because you might say that you feel love, but yet at the same time, you're not patient, and you're not kind, and you envy. So you should always compare what you're feeling with actually what love is. And so 1 Corinthians helps us to understand this for the purpose of our sanctification that we would grow in love.

A church that's growing in love and an individual that's growing in love. So it's the whole doctrine of sanctification. And this is why John says, if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. John is assuming that you might have loveless moments. And when you sin, you have an advocate with the Father.

And then there's the whole doctrine of the gospel that is implied here. And This list of the marks of love are all elements of the gospel The good news is that God so loved the world that he gave his only son We just sang this song the love of God is rich and pure measureless and strong It shall forever more endure the saints and angels' song." And so the power of the gospel is the power of the love of God reaching out to sinners. And what we find here in 1 Corinthians 13 is all of these elements of love are elements that God has loved his people with. And so when we read 1 Corinthians 13, we're not just being challenged to moralism. We're really being challenged to lift our heads up to heaven and to look at the love of God and see how God has loved you because he's loved you in every single way that he describes here.

So these three doctrines of regeneration and of sanctification and of the gospel are here. Now, this is why John says in 1 John 4, 9, in this is love, in this the love of God was manifested toward us, that God sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him in this is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins. And then he says, Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. So as we're thinking about this passage, we should think theologically about it, we should consider what is actually being communicated so that we would think rightly about these various things. And what we find with the love of God is that he did suffer long.

He was kind. His kindness led us to repentance. He was gentle and humble and heart. He did not behave rudely to us. He spoke to us with words of love.

He did not seek his own. He sent his son who would lay down his heavenly glory in order to save sinners. So every element of 1st Corinthians 13 is also tied to the love of God. So when you read 1st Corinthians 13, don't just think about yourself. Think about God.

Because God is love. And I pray that our time in 1 Corinthians 13 would perform a number of functions. Not only would it break our hearts for our lovelessness, but that it would also give us an opportunity to soak ourselves in the love of God. Every attribute that we read about here that you fall so short in that I fall so short in Let it remind us of this one great thing the love of God Soak in the love of God Remember how much God has loved you. I don't know if we'll ever be able to really properly apply this unless we see it that way.

Because when it comes down to the nubbies of it, we love one another because God loved us. We forgive one another because God forgave us. And we wouldn't want to treat our brother differently than we've been treated. This is the love of God. So I pray that it's a time of real saturation in the love of God.

You know, It's so easy to be filled up with remorse and guilt for all the loveless things we are and do. Yet, God is rescuing us from that through his Son Jesus Christ. So don't forget to revel and soak in and be saturated in the love of God. And think of how he has manifested his love. So there it is.

Also you can see this, the outline that I've placed before us. I want us to understand where we are. The first three verses speak of the true value of love. And the truth in the first three verses is, without love, you ain't nothing, and whatever you do doesn't profit you nothing. That's basically the summary of the first three verses.

And then you see the signs of love that are mentioned here in verses 4 through 7. The first two are what love is and then the next several are what love isn't and then in verse 7 Paul goes back to what love is. Now this morning I'm going to spend more time on the first two, what love is, because it seems that these are summary statements for which there's a setup for what love isn't. So they're all very connected And then the next section in verses 8 through 12, you see the permanence of love. Love never fails.

And then finally you see the supremacy of love in verse 13. Now abide faith, hope, love, these three, but the greatest of these is love. So all of these things as you can see are very simple. This is an incredibly simple passage of Scripture. For a person preaching it it's very easily outlined.

It's very simple to order in logical form. Here's the problem. It's easy to read, easy to understand, hard to do. Right? That's the problem.

And so God here is giving us his superior ways. He's delivering us from ourselves so that we would enter into his world of love. This is what heaven is. It's a world of love. God gives us a foretaste of his love in his church.

First by causing us to be born again and bringing us into his tabernacle, into his house where he teaches us how to love. And then finally as we see how we fall so short of love he brings us into his heavenly home where everything is perfected. And all of the tears from the lovelessness of your life and my life and everybody else's life will be wiped away. And you'll enter that world of love. So there's hope.

These things should give us hope. Every hopeless thought about yourself should give you a hopeful thought about God and about his heaven that he has prepared for you because he has prepared a world of love for his children and I pray that we really understand that. Now one final thing in this long introduction here It really speaks of how to preserve love in your family and in your church and in your workplace and these are the necessary things that we have given to us. Okay now let's look at these statements about love. The first is, love suffers long.

It's translated in other places, love is patient. You know, what is long suffering? Well, it's patience that's long, and it stretches out by the length of the difficulty. This element of love is the act of waiting, not acting, it's waiting. The word actually implies a long fuse.

There are two words, macrothumia, macro, large, big, thumia, A long fuse. Love gives you a long fuse with others. I love the way that Jonathan Edwards speaks of it in his book, Charity and Its Fruits. He says, love disposes us to meekly bear the injuries received from others. I'll read that again.

Love disposes us to meekly bear the injuries received from others." I'll read that again. Love disposes us to meekly bear the injuries received from others. And what kind of injuries can you receive in this life? Well, let us count them. Name them one by one.

There are so many ways that you can and you have and I have been injured in this world. Anybody here not been injured by others in this world? Let me see a raise of hands. Well, it just shows that you live in this world and because everyone has been injured in some way. There's unfair treatment that you receive in this world.

Count on it. There will be hurtful words spoken to you by friends, neighbors, loved ones, brothers, sisters. It is rare never to hear a kind word from someone, but every once in a while you'll run across someone who has never uttered an unkind word to you. I can name some people who've never, at least to my face, said anything unkind to me. It's a blessing.

Maybe that's one blessing of being part of a Christian community. Because you actually can run into people who haven't spoken an unkind word to you. Now, they've probably spoken it to somebody else, because somehow you're just so easy to love. Because that's the way it works, isn't it? There are some people that can do no wrong, and there are some people that can do no right in your life.

But there's dishonesty that you will experience. There is oppression that you will experience. There's unfaithfulness. There's broken promises. Edward says you often have to suffer long because people are asking unreasonable prices for what they do or by withholding what is due from their neighbors unjustly, neglecting to pay their debts or unnecessarily putting their neighbors to trouble and difficulty to get what is due from them.

Do you have a neighbor? Have you ever heard of a property line dispute? I mean there are real problems in this world and sometimes people do wrong to you and that's what love is designed to address. It's designed to address the real world that you live in And so he calls us to have a long fuse in the midst of this kind of treatment. In this world, people will speak evil of you.

They will backbite. They will spread false reports. They will misrepresent you. They will exaggerate your weaknesses and your faults. They'll twist your words.

They will take their own revenge. And in all of these things that God has placed in the world in order to glorify His love through you and I, He gives us this command to suffer long because love suffers long. Are someone resisting you? Is someone attacking you? Are you experiencing opposition to your plans?

Well, all of these kinds of things are designed to be taken care of through this word, patience. And your response reveals your heart. And are you impatiently agitated by these wrongs? Are you flabbergasted by these wrongs? Have you ever been flabbergasted?

You're just stunned that someone would do such a thing to someone so nice as you. It's amazing. And the flabbergastration can just roll on and on and on. And the frustration and all the gastrations that take place in your in your flab or gastration just continues to keep on ruling your soul. Well this is the problem with living you know in this world.

Now He's speaking of patience, long suffering. Many translations translate it as patience. I have a really hard time saying long suffering when I try to repeat it because I memorized it in the New American Standard a long, long, long, long time ago. So love is patient to me. But long suffering is actually the word.

What is it? Well, patience is not the same as just grinning and bearing it. You just grit your teeth through it where it's not the same as sucking it up. Patience is not the same as putting on your game face. Patience is not stoicism.

Some people just have the ability not to respond. They just do. But it doesn't mean they're being patient. It might mean they're being patient, but you just never know because patience is something that's in the heart It's that gastration or that lack of that you experience Patience Doesn't respond in kind it rests Patience does not always hold people accountable. Let me just say that again.

Patience does not always hold everybody accountable. I've encountered this idea that whenever somebody sins, you've got to hold them accountable. Well this whole chapter really argues against that. There are times when you must rebuke your brother, but There are also times when you do not, it's not right to hold that person accountable, but to let them go. Patience is often expressed in the fruit of the spirit of self-control that does not rebuke his brother.

It's a fruit of the spirit. And it constrains confrontation. And in the constraint of the confrontation is its fruit and that is harmony. And it allows imperfect people to live together and not kill each other, and not always be nailing each other to the wall. It gives proper time for sanctification.

You know, when you're married, when you're married a long time, you look back over the years. You know, it's my wife's birthday today. She's 55. I married her when she was 20. And you know what?

It's been a long time. It's been a lovely time. But I look back and I realize, you know, my wife has given me time. And I've given her time too. And It's because we believe in God, because we believe that God's spirit is the ruling factor.

That sanctification takes time. This word that's communicated in the English word long-suffering has to do with time. But we think of time often wrongly. We say, I can't take it anymore. I'm done with this.

Have you ever said that? Well, if you haven't said it, you probably thought it. You know, I don't need this anymore. Have you ever said that? I don't need this.

But then God seems to come around if you're really listening. He says, oh yes you do. You do need it because I'm glorifying myself through you in love. Someone has offended you, attacked you, spoke harshly to you, and I have now set the stage for the demonstration of my patience. Haven't I been patient with you?

And now you have the opportunity to be patient with somebody else. This is a word that implies time and progress and latitude that we give. Now, worldly wisdom strikes back. It retaliates, it responds. It's micro-thumia, not macro-thumia.

And the world does not value this quality at all. The world says the strong strike back. If you're weak you tolerate. That patience is weakness. And it's not a virtue to tolerate a wrong done But the Bible actually says that God glorifies himself when you tolerate a wrong done.

I Don't want to qualify this with 15 qualifications But there are certainly times that wrongs must be made right and confronted. I don't want to be misunderstood here. But it's very clear what this is. This is a long fuse that recognizes self-righteousness, that might recognize a wrong view of accountability, that might recognize a sense of entitlement like you deserve something, that you have your rights and if anybody puts their toe over the line of your rights, you're going to say something about it. It starts when you're really little.

You remember when you were riding down in the car and your kids were little? You know, you're riding down in the car and particularly in those days before baby car seats. Now, baby car seats have constrained this. But in the days before baby car streets, which my kids largely grew up, you would often hear in the back of the car, he touched me. He touched me.

He put his toe over the line. He got into my space. So then you have to deal with long suffering, sometimes with a long instrument in a car. But long suffering is tested from the very beginning in a child. Every parent here is dealing with that problem.

Every single parent here is. How do you deal? How do you teach your children to be long-suffering? Well, it starts when they say, he touched me. You know, my sister used to say, he hit me on my shot.

You know, she just got a shot. So, teaching a people how to be long-suffering is so critical. Edwards says, there's a way that we respond. He says, When the injuries we suffered are allowed to disturb our calmness of mind and to put us into an excitement and tumult, then we cease to bear them in the true spirit of long suffering. If the injury is permitted to discompose and disquiet us and to break up our inward rest, we cannot enjoy ourselves and are not in a state to engage properly our various duties, especially if we are not in a state of religious duties as in prayer and meditation.

And so Edwards makes it very clear that You can know whether you're long-suffering. Are you upset? That'll help you if you know have you been Discomposed in the calmness of your mind Well, then you may be sinning In that area, You know Paul said also to the Corinthians in 1st Corinthians 6, why not rather suffer yourselves and be defrauded? Christians have a whole different view of being pressed upon and being defrauded. Now one of the things that I think is very important is that this is not just an urging to have some kind of outward behavior.

A person can be very smooth externally and calm and collected on the outside but not extending grace from the inside by the power of the Holy Spirit and that is critical. Now there are many examples of this in Scripture. Stephen who's being stoned, He says, lay not this charge against them while rocks are being thrown at him until he's dead. The Lord Jesus Christ himself on the cross, Father forgive them for they know not what they do. This is an attribute of God in Exodus chapter 34 verse 6.

We read, the Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abounding in goodness and in truth. In Romans chapter 2 verse 4, Paul says, or do you despise the riches of his goodness, forbearance and long-suffering, not knowing that the goodness of God leads you to repentance. It was his long-suffering goodness that brought us to the place where we could even repent. So long-suffering is a gateway to repentance. God demonstrates His patience to His elect in Luke chapter 8 verse 7, where we read that God will avenge his own elect who cry out day and night to him, though he bears long with them." He bears long with his elect.

This has been commanded to the churches, like for example the Ephesian church in Ephesians chapter 4 verse 2. He says, I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you to walk worthy of the calling which you were called with all lowliness and gentleness, with long suffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. But it wasn't just Ephesus. The Thessalonian church also needed to hear this because he says in 1 Thessalonians 5 14, he says, uphold the weak, be patient with all. Yeah, all, be patient with all after having listed various kinds of problems that people have, the faint-hearted, the weak, and the unruly.

And then the Colossian Church also had this problem. Churches have this problem. People often, you know, their fuse goes out and they need to go back and get a long fuse again. Therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, put on tender mercies, kindness, humility, meekness, long-suffering, bearing with one another, forgiving one another, if anyone has a complaint against another even as Christ forgave you so you also must do but above all these put on love which is the bond of perfection the Colossian Church the Thessalonian Church the Ephesian church and obviously the Corinthian church had a problem with long suffering. So here's the question, how's it going?

And you know, ask the Lord to convict you if you've lost long suffering for any of your brothers and sisters here in this church. It's easy to lose. It was easy to lose in the big churches in the New Testament. So don't think that it might not be easy to lose here. And so in this we have to just always remember God's long suffering with us.

And we should not forget how quickly we are long suffering and patient with ourselves. Are you long suffering with yourself? We should not forget how patient we are with ourselves and Not forget how we can lose our patience with others But you remember the patience and the long-suffering of God How patient has God been? Over the last 20 years 30 years Or how about this? How patient has God been with you today since the first moment that you woke up.

How patient has he been? How many times have you forgotten him just today? How many times have worldly thoughts start swimming in your brain just today? And yet God is patient. So it's such a wonderful opportunity to soak in it, to really see the love of God in Jesus Christ and see what long-suffering he's extended to us and what a blessing it is to be a church like that.

What a neat church to have a bunch of people who are long suffering. What a neat marriage. What a neat workplace where people are long suffering. Okay, the next, love is kind. This is the next mark of love.

Now, kindness is the flip side of patience. Patience waits and doesn't act against someone. Kindness rises up and takes action. Do you see the difference? Kindness jumps forward, patience waits.

And so it's the flip side. Kindness is something that you do. Kindness repays injuries with good. Kindness is a response that is outward and when you're wronged you do what is good. You seek their good.

Now the word that he uses here for kindness is a word that means useful. Kindness is a useful quality, and because it does things that are useful to the other person. You know, everybody wants to be known for something. We should ask ourselves, do we want to be known as being kind? You know, when you're getting laid in the grave, and everybody's gathered around, and your dead body is being lowered into the ground.

Do you want them to think he was a kind man? She was such a kind mother. Well, everyone would want that, but often we forget that in the flash of the moment. And, you know, even in the eyes of sinful men, kindness is recognized as a great value. In Proverbs 19 22, what is desired in a man is kindness.

What is desired in a man is kindness. Everybody appreciates kindness in a person. There's so many examples of this in the Bible. How is God kind? One of the most remarkable examples is in Matthew 11 where Jesus utters these really familiar words.

He says, come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. He says, take my yoke upon you and learn from me for I am gentle and lowly at heart and you will find rest for your souls. And then he says in verse 30 in Matthew 11, for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. He used the word easy. And he uses this exact same word for kindness.

For my yoke is kindness. It's easy. You know, kindness is an easy virtue, isn't it? But the Lord in Matthew wants to Make us understand that in many ways his relationship is easy. He's kind with us.

I think we can all testify at how easy and kind God has been to us. He's not punished us according to our sins. He's actually taken our sins and put them as far as the east is from the west. I don't know how you get easier than that. Now, God also does chastise and he does things to get us to come to our senses.

But here you have this testimony that when you enter the kingdom of God, you come to Jesus Christ and he's easy, he's kind, He's the kindest of all. You will never have a better shepherd than Jesus Christ, never a kinder shepherd that existed than Jesus Christ. His yoke is kind and his burden is light. The Bible says that a virtuous woman is one who speaks out of the overflow of kindness in Proverbs 31 verse 26. She opens her mouth with wisdom and on her tongue is the law of kindness.

God shows mercy by being kind to us. Psalm 117 says, for his merciful kindness is great toward us and the truth of the Lord endures forever. Praise the Lord. In Psalm 141 verse 5 and in Hebrews 12 we know that rebuke and discipline are often the marks of kindness from God toward us. David says, let the righteous strike me, it shall be a kindness.

Let him rebuke me, it shall be as excellent oil. Let my head not refuse it, for still my prayer is against the deeds of the wicked." So even rebuke ought to be viewed as an act of the kindness of God somehow. God is using that difficulty in order for you to see the kindness of God and to repay with kindness. And one of the ways that kindness is seen is through forgiveness. That's why Paul says to the Ephesian Church in Ephesians 4, 32, and be kind to one another.

Tender-hearted, forgiving one another even as God and Christ forgave you. You know, every opportunity that you have to be kind or tender-hearted or forgiving because it's being challenged is an opportunity to remember that God in Jesus Christ has also been tender-hearted toward you. He's also been forgiving toward you and he's been kind to you. But the unregenerate can fake this. They can put on a show of kindness.

Proverbs 26, 24, and 25 says this, He who hates disguises it with his lips and lays up deceit within himself. When he speaks kindly, do not believe him. How about that? Sometimes people are going to speak kindly and you shouldn't believe them. Again, this is the real world that God is describing for there are seven abominations in his heart sometimes the sweetest speakers Have the poison of asps on their tongues and He says they have they have seven abominations in their heart, even though they speak kindly, do not believe them.

This should help us with our naivete living in this world. So these things are really about responses. How do you respond? What comes out of you? You know, you've heard that old illustration.

When you knock over the vase, the only thing that comes out is what's in the vase. Somebody squeezes you. Who you really are is what comes out. It just reveals who you are. And this appeal to kindness and saying that love is kind reveals this matter of who we really are.

And it reveals a matter of either that you're in an unregenerate state or you're being sanctified and God gave you a trial, he gave you a slander, he gave you a wrong in order to reveal his glory so that his kindness would be demonstrated to those who don't deserve it just like you. And then the third is envy. Do not envy. Love does not envy. This is a this envy is the feeling of disappointment when someone else prospers because you want what they have.

Oh the disappointments of life that The Greek word here literally means to boil, to steam, and you began to steam because of someone else's success, because you want it. And you know Calvin said that envy is the seed of all contentions. Now, there are two forms of envy. First, there's kind of a shallow, superficial envy, and it goes like this. I want that.

I want his car. We just want what they have. It's just very superficial. But there's a more diabolical one. Now the superficial one can grow into the diabolical, dangerous one.

But the second is dark and it's perverse. And it ends up here, I hate you because of what you have. I don't want you to have it. I hope you lose it. And I'll say things and do things to try to get you to lose it.

I'll slander you, I'll destroy you, I'll gossip, I'll do anything I can so that you don't have it. Now, it's not only money and wealth that is the stimulus for envy. Human beings aren't very discriminatory because you can envy for a hundred different reasons. Now, in the English language, envy and covetousness are very similar and I think that you can take envy, covetousness, jealousy and put them all together. It's the same world, the same cauldron.

Now, we typically envy a person and we covet a thing that they might have. Cain killed Abel out of covetousness and jealousy and envy, but someone is gaining someone that you want. Now when you envy, you might envy a quality that someone else has. You might envy a relationship that someone else has. Like for example, you might have envy because your friend is closer to someone else than they are to you and because of that you envy them.

You wish you had that same relationship with them And so you're steaming inside and you would even say and do things to try to destroy that relationship so that you could get in this. This happens more often with women than it does with men. Probably because men are less discerning and they don't really know what's going on anyway. But women feel it bigger and they see it clearer. It might envy a power that someone else has or a privilege that someone else has or some skill or it might be a thing.

You can envy a husband or a wife or a car or a house. These are the obvious things. Often you'll find men who work very, very hard and really they're driven by the bread of sorrows that the psalm speaks about and they're jealous and they're worried about looking better than their peers and so they'll spare no no time expense in order to get up because they envy someone else and they're just trying to prove themselves to be bigger and better than that other person. Parents sometimes mistreat their children because of envy. They want their children to be like other children so they're harsh with them and relentless with them and they don't shepherd them according to their own situation.

You know I've said before here that lust is like a dragon and if you feed him he only grows. You feed that dragon of lust he grows and you grow him by feeding him impurity. He loves garbage. The dragon of lust just loves filthy things. He eats them and then he eats you because you're filthy.

That's what he does. In the same way envy is like that. Envy is a monster in a very same way. And when you feed that monster of envy, He grows and he can get really, really big and he can overcome you and the more you feed him, the more he fills your soul. But what do you, you know, if you feed the dragon of lust and purity, what do you feed the dragon of envy?

You feed him disappointment. That's what he lives on. He grows by disappointment. You just feed him your disappointments. You think about all the things that haven't gone right all the people that have done you wrong All the things that you don't have, just feed him disappointment.

He will get so big, he will devour you and everybody else around you. He lives on disappointment. The disappointments of what has been withheld from you. The disappointments of what you've lost. The disappointments from what has been deprived of you.

Or how someone else has prospered more than you and has gotten in better than you and how you are more deserving of that relationship, of that husband, of that skill, of that resource or whatever it might be. The monster of envy is nourished on your disappointments. Now it's a very dangerous thing to feed envy. In Romans chapter 1, verses 28 and 29, we learn that envy is a mark of the unregenerate. Paul is speaking of those who did not retain God in their knowledge, and he gave them over to a debased mind and they were filled with unrighteousness and immorality and wickedness and maliciousness and then he says full of envy.

So envy is a mark of the unregenerate And then he goes on and just explains even more deeply how this works. And there's so many examples of it. Adam and Eve wanted the knowledge of good and evil and it was deprived of them. Cain killed Abel because God accepted Abel's sacrifice and he was jealous. Now I want to give you four things about envy.

We're gonna sort of unmask envy for a moment here. The first is found in James 3 for 14. And this is that envy is a demonic power. Envy is a demonic power. James says, but if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast or lie against the truth.

In other words, don't ignore it. Don't act like it's not there. This wisdom does not descend from above but is earthly, sensual, and demonic. For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. But then he says, but the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits without partiality and without hypocrisy.

Now the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. So the first unmasking of envy is that it's demonic. You have to know where it comes from. The second is this. It's the beginning of a slide.

Envy is the beginning of a slide. Psalm 73 verse 2 says, but as for me, my feet had almost stumbled, my steps had nearly slipped, for I was envious of the boastful when I saw the prosperity of the wicked. And here in this, in Psalm 73, you find this case study of how a man started slipping into envy, and God rescued him through worship. Through the worship of God, he was rescued. And you know, why has God brought us together?

Perhaps, you know, there's someone here that's just beginning to slip in envy, and now you're being rescued by the Word of God. The worship of God and the truth that's in the pages of Scripture is coming to your aid to rescue you. It's the beginning of a slide. Proverbs 27 says that it's powerful. It is so powerful.

He says, "...wrath is cruel and anger a torrent. Who is able to stand before envy or jealousy? It's like a tidal wave. Who can stand before it? It is powerful.

And then it's destructive. Destructive. Number four, Job 5.2 says, for wrath kills a foolish man and envy slays a simple one. Envy slays. It will slay you.

Solomon said in Proverbs 14 verse 30 that envy is rottenness to the bones. So that's the reality about envy. It'll tear you apart and everybody else around you and it's demonic. And there are so many examples in Scripture, Saul and David, Haman's pride in his parade, Joseph's brothers, in the Song of Solomon, that song of love, In chapter 8 verse 6, he says that envy and jealousy is as cruel as the grave. And it's one of the sins of women.

They wish they had someone else's looks or hair or taste or house or husband or children. They wish they had opportunities that other women have that they don't have because of whatever. But there's hope in it. There's repentance. But Proverbs 23 verse 17 says that envy can be overcome.

He says, do not let your heart envy sinners, but be zealous for the fear of the Lord all day. You want to be rescued from envy? It's the fear of God, the fear of God. Maybe you're struggling with envy. You know, the NCFIC just launched the beginning of what's going to be 90 little short videos on the fear of God.

They'd be there for you. The fear of God rescues you from envy. What a blessing that is. You know, we often forget how quickly, we forget that God is good to us and that he does all things well. And whatever we don't have is designed so that we would glorify him even though we do not have it.

This is an excursion in the love of God. And then The next three of these qualities are really descriptions of pride. Love does not parade itself. Number four, number five is not puffed up, and number six does not behave rudely. These are manifestations of pride.

And he gives these various words to help us to understand that. And so love does not parade itself. Now, this has to do with showing off in order to make people think well of you. Wanting to make sure that everybody knows that you're better and cooler and maybe better looking, better dressed, better taste, richer, whatever. This is parading yourself.

You know, young people particularly struggle with this. It takes on different manifestations the older you get, but young people are just so terrified of being uncool you know everybody understands that and they often they'll go to church and I'll say look at look at all those uncool people and the truth is they are parading themselves they want to parade themselves that's the root of it Because they don't have God in this world, they want to get some adulation from somebody and they so fear not getting it that they'll do anything, say anything, dress any way to try to act cool. And then they'll look down on everybody else who isn't according to their style. I'm going to talk about three parades here. First of all, there's the social media parade, where you try to make everybody think just how marvelous your life is, and it's in pictures.

Then there's the fashion parade. The fashion industry feeds this. New styles are created for the next parade and you create your look, you know, according to your clothing and your hair or your car. Anything that will make you feel a little bit more up than the other person. It's boasting, it's parading yourself.

And then there's not only the social media and the fashion parade, but then there is the one that Jesus talked about. It's the religious hyper spiritual parade. He talked about this in Matthew chapter 6. We're tempted to use more socially acceptable ways in the parade to blow our horns. And Jesus in Matthew 6 talked about prayer and charitable giving and fasting.

And so we toot our horns. And so Jesus says, he says, when you do a charitable deed, do not sound a trumpet before you as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory for men. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward." So there's the religious parade as well. There are innumerable parades that you can get yourself into in this world, but It has to do with this very same thing of parading yourself. And then the next manifestation is not being puffed up.

Love is not puffed up. There are different ways to be puffed up. Paul said that knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. And he said if anybody thinks he knows anything, he knows nothing that he ought to know. Inflated about your knowledge, theologically, whatever, any kind of knowledge.

You know more than the other person. That's the essence of being puffed up. Solomon said that pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fault. Better to be of a humble spirit with the lowly than to divide the spoil with the proud and the puffed up. That's what he's speaking about.

Now the Apostle Paul said that it's very dangerous. It's even dangerous for people who want to be in the ministry. In 1 Timothy chapter 3 verse 6, he says that elders are in danger of getting puffed up and the consequences are devastating. I mean they are so devastating and elder getting puffed up leads to the damnation of the devil and elders can get puffed up and so the Apostle gives these various qualifications for elders that they're blameless that they're the husband of one wife, temperate, sober, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach, not violent, not greedy, but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetousness. And Then he says, not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride, he fall into the same condemnation of the devil.

Being a novice as an elder exposes you and a whole congregation to trouble and really the condemnation of the devil. So being puffed up is very dangerous. You know Often discouragements and different emotional problems are tied to this kind of thing. We lose something and our pride is so dear to us because we are so puffed up. We think so highly of ourselves.

In 1 Corinthians 4 verse 6, Paul says that there's a way that you're puffed up in the church where you think your ideas are superior to God's. It's being puffed up. In other words, setting aside what God has established for the church to do something better than God, something cooler than God. And so He says this, he writes that you may learn not to think beyond what is written. In other words, don't do in the church beyond what's written.

Do what's written. Why? That none of you be puffed up on behalf of one against another. In other words, that your own ideas don't puff you up. Just do the things that God has told you to do so that you're not puffed up by one person getting their ideas having greater ascendancy than another.

We're puffed up when we follow this world. He speaks of this in Colossians chapter 2 verse 18. He talks about being vainly puffed up by a fleshly mind and he's talking about embracing the ways of the world and doing the ways of the world in any part of your life, in your work or your family or anything in your life, you follow the pattern of the world, you're just puffed up with yourself. We follow the patterns of the world in so many ways. In all the areas of our lives, there are ways that we can either follow the pattern of the world or follow the pattern of God.

And he says, when you do that, you're puffed up. And then he says, love does not behave rudely, number six. Love does not behave rudely. Now, he's speaking of a rough or coarse or offensive or uncivil kind of behavior. Not considering the value of other people and as a result you treat them poorly and you're not considering the feelings of others.

So in your manner of speech, you just say what you want. And this word, rude, means poor manners. You could care less what people think. You just want to be you. You just want to say what you want to say.

You want to act like you want to act, you want to talk how you want to talk, you want to dress the way you want to dress, you are going to do what you want to do. That's rudeness. You dress yourself a certain way and you say, I don't really care what anybody thinks. That's rudeness. There are ways in our society, there are certain dress that's appropriate for certain things.

You just don't go to a wedding in flip-flops and shorts and a t-shirt. It's rude to do such a thing. Unless you live in Southern California or Hawaii, it might not be that rude. But around here it would be very rude. But it's undisciplined behavior that disregards the feelings of others.

This was a real issue in Corinth. You had rudeness in the Lord's Supper, the well-to-do people were gorging themselves and the poor were being ignored. You had lawsuits, you had women usurping the role of men, you had people just babbling on trying to express themselves in the church. There was a lot of rude behavior going on in the church in Corinth. It's just lack of consideration for other people and a failure to recognize that you're there to be a blessing to other people, not be yourself.

You know, in this world, everybody wants you to just be yourself. God says, don't be yourself. Be a reflection of Jesus Christ and his love. So there you have it. There are six marks of love here.

Love suffers long, is kind, love does not envy, love does not parade itself, love is not puffed up, love does not behave rudely. Now the truth is that every person here deserves the wrath of God for their impatience, for their lack of kindness, for their envy, for their parading themselves, for their being puffed up, for their rudeness. We've done all of these things. James says if you've broken one law, you've broken them all. What should we do?

We should search our hearts and we should repent of particular sins particularly, to see if any of these things have taken a foothold. In the process of our sanctification, perhaps God has met us with these words to stop. He's stopping us in our tracks, stopping envy in its tracks, stopping a short fuse in its tracks. And to recognize that if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous, you can be relieved of the sin that has so gripped you. But then there's also that person who knows that they have no power to love and they really do, they don't mind that short fuse, they don't mind the parading themselves, They don't mind the impatience that much.

And with that kind of person, that person should realize who they are, that they're unregenerate, that they have no care for holy things and God will deal with them according to their own rudeness, their own lack of kindness. He will deal with them with a short fuse for all eternity if they don't repent, if they don't turn to Him and trust Him. And so the message here is, look at the kindness of God that exists in Jesus Christ. Look at His righteousness. Receive him.

Receive his righteousness. Repent of your sins. Believe in the gospel and trust in Jesus Christ who loved his own to the end. And to recognize that God will save you from this loveless path that you're on, and He'll bring you into His world of love. So here we have it in 1 Corinthians 13, various declarations of the love of God.

Let's soak in it. Let's really somehow get in touch with his love in our church that we would find ourselves growing in love in all of these ways. Would you pray with me? Oh Lord, We do need to grow in love. We see various manifestations of lovelessness in our lives.

Oh Lord, make us a repentant people. I pray that you would take all the things that have happened to us, even recently, to cause us to humble ourselves before you, to confess our sins and turn to you and recognize the world of love that is so good. Lord, we thank you for being patient and kind with us. And how your kindness has led us, maybe even today, to repentance. Amen.