In the sermon 'Above All Things Have Fervent Love' by Jason Dohm, the primary focus is on the biblical call to fervent love, drawn from 1 Peter 4:8. Dohm emphasizes that believers are called to love God and one another earnestly, as this love is the pinnacle of Christian virtues. He contrasts the old life of sin with the new life in Christ, which is characterized not only by ceasing from sin but by actively loving. Dohm highlights the importance of living with a 'pilgrim mentality,' recognizing the temporary nature of earthly life and the significance of heavenly citizenship. The sermon stresses the urgency and seriousness of life in light of the imminent return of Jesus, urging believers to be watchful in prayer. Practical expressions of love, such as hospitality and using one's gifts for the benefit of others, are discussed as ways to fulfill this calling. Dohm also explores how love covers a multitude of sins, citing biblical references like Proverbs 10:12 and emphasizing the transformative power of Christ's love. Ultimately, the sermon calls for a life dedicated to God's glory, marked by fervent love and readiness for Christ's return.

The title of the sermon this morning is Above All Things Have Fervent Love. I've just lifted the title right out of verse 8. There was really no way to improve on what was already in the text. That is what the text is about. It is about our calling as brothers and sisters in Christ to have fervent love for one another.

And Peter sets that above all things. In chapter 3, the last chapter, 3 verse 18, Peter starts talking about the sufferings of Christ. And He says it's a substitutionary suffering. He says that the sufferings of Christ is the just for the unjust that He might bring us to God. That Jesus Christ might bring us to His Holy and just Father.

We could never come on our own before His Holy and just Father. But because He's righteous, because the just stands on behalf of the unjust, He can bring us to His Holy and righteous Father. So Peter starts talking about the sufferings of Christ there. And then in the first verse of this chapter, chapter 4 verse 1, he says, Therefore, since Christ has suffered for us in the flesh, walk in newness of life. Now that's my paraphrase.

That's not exactly what the text says, but that is what the text says more or less. It talks about walking in newness of life because of what Christ has done for us in dying for us, in purchasing a new life for us. The flow of thought goes like this, if Christ has purchased a new life for you, then you should live a new life. If Christ has purchased a new life for you by dying for you, you shouldn't live like the old man. You should walk in newness of life.

So the thrust of the text, having said that, the thrust of the text last week was focused on ceasing from sin. It was focused on not doing the old things, Not walking according to the way of the old man, but because you're a new man, walking according to a new way. Peter was saying, If you've been redeemed by Jesus, you don't have another moment to waste. You spent enough of your life rushing after the things that those pagan Gentiles rush after. You don't have any more time to spend on those old things anymore.

Too much time has already been wasted in those old things. So we should walk in newness. So that was the thrust of last week. Ceasing from sin. Not having any more time to spend that way like the Gentiles spend their lives.

But the Gospel does not just save us from things. The Gospel saves us to things. The Gospel saves us to love. To loving God. To loving our neighbors.

And so Peter, having talked about the old man and how inappropriate it is for Christians to stay in that state and walk in those ways that were consistent with the old man. The redeemed man ought to walk in newness of life, which means more than just ceasing from sin. The Gospel hasn't just saved you from that, it has saved you to something else. Something that fills the vacuum, that fills up all the old things that the Gospel is meant to sweep away. It's filled up with something very beautiful.

It's filled up with love. Loving God and loving our neighbor. So our text today is fundamentally about what the Gospel has saved us to. If you've been redeemed, you've been redeemed to love. To love God and to love your neighbor.

That's what our text is about. So before we get to the verse by verse explanation of the text, I want to say if you are primarily concerned with what the Gospel keeps you from, you've missed it. This is very common for new Christians. To be totally wrapped up in the things that the Gospel has saved us from, and to try so hard through our own efforts to get away from those old things. And that's appropriate.

We need to get away from those old things as fast as we can. But, If we stop there, we have missed the joy of the Christian life. God hasn't just saved us from walking like we used to walk. He has saved us to joy. The joy of loving God and the joy of loving one another.

Let's go to the text with prayer. Father, I pray that you would fill us to the full with what you have saved us to in Christ. I pray that you would fill us to the fullest measure with love for you. You would turn every affection of our heart towards you. And that you would give us fervent love for one another, earnest love for one another.

God I thank you for your words that corrects so many of the errors that we're prone to. Help us oh Father in Jesus name, Amen. Alright let's begin by looking at verse 7. First Peter chapter 4 verse 7. Peter says, but the end of all things is at hand.

Therefore, be serious and watchful in your prayers. Peter is giving us the pilgrim mentality by taking us to the end of all things. Peter said it's right here at hand. It's right next to you. The end of all things is right next to you and he's forcing us to think like pilgrims, to impart to us a pilgrim mentality.

In chapter 2 verse 11 Peter says, beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims that you abstain from fleshly lusts. He's begging us, his readers, as pilgrims and sojourners. What Peter is doing is to call his readers to understand the transfer of citizenship that happens when you've been redeemed. You go from American to something else entirely. You go from earthly citizenship, caring so much about earthly things, to a transferred citizenship to a better country.

And so that you're always looking forward to it. And your king isn't the president of the United States anymore. You have another king who you'll follow anywhere. And who you love. And who loves you.

It's a very different kind of kingdom. And thank God he has transferred our citizenship from being a citizen of this earth to being a citizen of this king who loves us. And so Peter is forcing us there by telling us that the end of all things is at hand. In light of this, in light of the end of all things being at hand, how foolhardy is it to be preoccupied with earthly things? If the end of All things is really right next to you.

What kind of fool do you have to be to spend the remaining moments, however many or few they are, to spend those loving things associated with the earth? You have to be some kind of a fool. And Peter is telling us this. Peter is urging us to think like pilgrims who have a citizenship somewhere else, who have only a few moments left to spend so that we ought to spend them well. This is about the spending of your life.

And Peter is urging us to know that we only have a few moments left to spend this life. How will you spend them? Will you spend them loving the things around you? What kind of a fool are you? That you would spend these last few moments clutching the things of earth.

Therefore, Peter exhorts us to two things. Because the end of all things is right next to you, Peter exhorts us to two things. First, to be serious. Be serious with your life. Secondly, to be watchful in your prayers.

Some translations render it sober-minded for the purpose of prayer. I think that's the ESV, sober-minded for the purpose of prayer. It might be the NASB, but they're very similar. To be watchful in your prayers. So Peter wants us to be two things.

Be serious and be watchful in your prayers. A person who understands that the end could be anytime is serious about the moments of their day. They live a serious life. And they have an eye towards the return of Jesus. They always have an eye upward.

Because they know that Jesus could come back at any time. You know with the resurrection and ascension and exaltation of Jesus Christ, the work of redemption is finished. There's nothing else that God needs to do to redeem a people. All that work is done. Jesus says it is finished and so it is.

And Jesus could come back at any time. And Jesus himself has said, no man knows the day or the hour. So a redeemed person who is thinking rightly has one eye up. Has an eye towards the return of Jesus Christ to bring an end to earth history. And it could happen at any time.

This is just how Jesus taught Peter to think. We keep seeing this, don't we? All throughout the letter is that Peter's been taking his cues from Jesus. You can see all these things that Jesus is saying and just track them right back and plant them, root them in our study of the book of Matthew and the things that Jesus personally, directly taught to Peter. Now Peter is teaching those who are looking to him for teaching.

Turn in your Bibles to Matthew 24. In Matthew 24 we get a heaping helping of what Jesus directly told Peter on this same subject. On this same subject. Matthew 24 verse 36, Jesus says to Peter and to the other disciples, but of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but my Father only." So the end of all things is at hand, but the day or the hour, nobody knows. We are in the end times.

We are at the end of the ages. But of the actual day and hour that Jesus will return, nobody knows. The angels of heaven don't even know. Only the Father knows. Now, skip to verse 42.

Matthew 24 beginning in 42 and we'll read through the end of the chapter. Jesus says, watch therefore, for you do not know what hour your Lord is coming. But know this, that if the master of the house had known what hour the thief would come, he would have watched and not allowed his house to be broken into. Therefore you also be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an hour you do not expect. Who then is a faithful and wise servant whom his master made ruler over his household to give them food in due season.

Blessed is that servant whom his master, when he comes, will find so doing. Assuredly I say to you that he will make him ruler over all his goods. But if that evil servant says in his heart, my master is delaying his coming, and begins to beat his fellow servants, and to eat and drink with the drunkards, The master of that servant will come on a day when he is not looking for him, and in an hour when he is not aware of, and will cut him in two and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." Jesus had taught Peter to live with an expectation of the return. And it gives you a sober-minded, Serious life.

That's what this does. And this is what Peter is exhorting us to in this text. When you don't know exactly when the Master is coming, but you know that the end of all things is at hand, And you have confidence that no one knows the day or the hour and that there will be a reckoning when he does come. You live sober-mindedly. You live seriously.

You Make an account for your minutes. If you think he's coming back 100 years from now, a thousand years from now, 10, 000 years from now, you're not worried that you're not living a serious life. But if you can be confident that no one knows the day or the hour, it changes how you look at the spending of the minutes of your day. In verse 25, I won't read it, but in verse 25 here, 1-13, it's the parable of the 10 virgins. Their job is to be ready for the coming of the bridegroom.

But there's a delay and they don't know how long the delay is going to last and so some of them are found not ready. This is the warning of Jesus to Peter and now he passes it along. It's our job to be ready. You don't know the day or the hour, it could be in our lifetime. Some who have been tasked with being ready will be found not ready.

Because they weren't serious minded and they weren't watchful in your prayers. Think about your prayer life. Does your prayer life say that you believe he could come back any day or hour? If you thought he was coming tomorrow, how earnest would your prayers be? How fervent would your prayers be?

How passionately would you be calling upon God for help if you thought he was coming back next week? We should pray like that. Jesus, in Matthew 6, after talking about the prayers of the hypocrites, He says, but you when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in the secret place. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. People with an eye towards the return of Jesus are going into their rooms and they're closing the door and they're praying to their father in the secret place.

Earnestly, not these superficial prayers where we just touch on the heads of a few things and we go on like we've got a hundred years until he comes back or a thousand years or ten thousand years. They are praying earnestly. They are watchful in their prayers. What is your prayer life saying about what you really think about the return of your king? In my own life, I don't like the answer to that question.

When I ask myself that question, what does my prayer life say about what I really believe about the return of my king? The answer to that question makes me really nervous. Does the answer to the question make you nervous? Make you feeling like you might not have spent your time well, invested your time well? These are sobering questions that are designed to help us.

This is why Peter raises it in his letter. So we'll think. So we will ask ourselves that question. How serious are you? I'm not advocating squeezing out all humor out of life.

That has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. Are you living a serious life? That's what I'm asking. Or does the spending of your time on the most trivial things, on the silliest things, Does the spending of your time make you think that you're not living wisely now that you think about it? The answering of that question in my own life makes me very nervous.

I'm glad Peter has brought us here So we'll ask and answer that question. Are you living a serious life? Or is your time invested on trivialities, on the silliest things? That's a foolish way to live, Peter is saying. Jesus has already said.

Would you be embarrassed if your king came back today at how you've invested the minutes and hours and weeks that you've been given? Brothers and sisters, we do well to arm ourselves with a pilgrim mentality who knows that our citizenship has been transferred to a foreign land, and the king is coming back. Beloved, I beg you as sojourners and pilgrims. Now the skeptics might object. It's been 2, 000 years.

Peter was writing to these people in modern day Turkey saying the end of all things is at hand and now we're studying this letter 2, 000 years later. He still hasn't come back. This couldn't be true. Peter has anticipated this and inspired Peter has anticipated this already. We'll get there in a couple of months.

I'll give you a preview. Second Peter, same author, different letter. Second Peter 3 verses 3 and 4 and then 8 and 9. Listen, 2 Peter 3 verses 3 and 4. Peter writes, knowing this first, that scoffers will come in the last days, walking according to their own lusts and saying, Where is the promise of his coming?

Where is he? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning." Skipping to verse 8. But beloved, do not forget this one thing, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some count slackness. But is long-suffering toward us, Not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance So that question has popped into my mind is probably popped into your mind, too The end of all things is at hand now we're reading this letter 2, 000 years after the original readers read it.

Where is he? Peter comes back in his next letter and he says, God's looking at things differently than you. A day is as a thousand years with God and a thousand years as a day. And He's not slack, He's not slow concerning His promise. As some count slackness or slowness.

So if you're counting God to be slow or slack concerning His promise, you're just counting it different than God Himself counts it. But Peter says it's his mercy. Every day is a kindness. The redemptive work is done. Every day, Today is a kindness.

Today is another opportunity to repent. Today is another reflection of the long suffering of God towards sinners. And it's kindness to afford one more opportunity to repent. Don't presume upon God. Don't assume that there will be another day.

Peter is arming us with this mindset. I'm not making this up. This is where Peter is taking us. Don't assume that there will be another week, another month, another year. I'll repent later.

No, today is the day of salvation. And every single day that you wake up is a kindness, because God has extended another opportunity for sinners to repent. If we aren't here when Jesus returns, even so, our life is a breath. And the older I get, the more I see that that is true. My life is just a vapor.

When I was young, it just seemed like I had forever. Now I'm 43 years old, and it's been like a day. And you only have one life to spend, and that life is a vapor. And you're spending it every day. Do not let your days slip away by wasting minutes thinking that you have so many more minutes left.

It's just a breath. And you've only one to spend. And You don't have one more minute to waste like the Gentiles waste their lives. You have one life to live for the glory of God. Live every second for His glory.

He has redeemed you if you are His. He's bought your life. You are bought at a price. You are not your own. Live to His glory.

Back to 1 Peter. Although I love sneaking back into Matthew. Wasn't Matthew fantastic? Isn't it good to sneak back into Matthew? Alright, 1 Peter 4, verse 8.

And above all things have fervent love for one another, For love will cover a multitude of sins. Fervent love is to be set above all things, all other things at the top of the list. Fervent love. Peter has covered what we are saved from and he turns what we are saved to. We are saved to love.

Love is at the top of every list when Jesus gets asked which is the great commandment. He says the greatest is to love God, The second is like it to love your neighbors yourself. Paul says, love is the fulfillment of the law. Paul says, love from a pure heart is the goal of our instruction. You look at the list that prioritize, and what floats to the top of every list?

Love. So here's another list with love at the top. Above all things, have fervent love for one another. We are saved to love so we ought to be fervent about it. We ought to give ourselves to it.

Are you giving yourself to love? Are you giving yourself over to the pursuit of loving God and loving your brothers and sisters and the lost. Peter puts it in the pecking order, above all things, have fervent love for one another. Now having made it the priority, Peter teaches us about love's vital function. It covers a multitude of sins.

This is a vital function of love. To cover a multitude of sins. Peter here is quoting a portion of Proverbs 10 Verse 12. He quotes half the verse. Let me give you the whole verse.

Proverbs 10, verse 12. Hatred stirs up strife, but love covers all sins. There's something that stirs the pot, brothers and sisters. There's something that stirs up trouble, that inflames strife, it's hatred. So if you've got strife, you can look upstream somewhere and know you've got hatred.

But there's something that's the opposite. That throws a wet blanket on strife puts out that fire. And it's love. There are opposites. Hatred and love are opposites.

You knew that. But the effects are the opposite as well. Hatred, you look downstream from hatred you find strife. When you look downstream from love, you find the covering over of a multitude of sins. Look at how much strife is in the body of Christ.

We're in trouble. It does not speak well of the visible church. It does not speak well of people who profess to be Christ, that there's so much strife. Now I'm not talking about fighting fair and contending for truth. You can have that all day long without strife if there's love.

We can contend for truth and not have strife as the Bible defines it. How does love cover a multitude of sins? I'd like to propose three ways that love covers a multitude of sins. Number one, Christ is the foundation of all of it. Christ is the foundation of all of it.

If you don't have the way that Christ's love covers over a multitude of sins, there's no point in talking about anything else. All of it is rooted and grounded in what Jesus has done. Romans 5 verse 8, But God demonstrates His own love toward us. In that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. This is the demonstration of God's love.

It's covering over the multitude of our sins in Christ. It has to start here. There's no hope for you demonstrating this in a different way. You can never demonstrate it in an atoning way. Because Jesus was sinless, he could demonstrate this principle in an atoning way, in a way that brings us to God, the just for the unjust.

You can't do that. But you can demonstrate it in a different way. When God demonstrated His love, He sent the Son who he loved to die for sinners, to cover over a multitude of sins and separate those sinful people forever from their sins. As far as the east is from the West. How great is that?

So here is the dynamic in play for those who have been redeemed. They've received mercy, that kind of mercy, not when they were cleaned up, but while they were sinners, while they were wallowing in their sin, they received this. And now they have it to give. So All of it is founded in what Christ has done. You receive this great reservoir of mercy and now you can draw from it and give from it and you're required to.

Number two, love sets us free from score keeping. Hallelujah. Hallelujah. There is no greater misery in this world than score keeping. Not for you, not for the one you're keeping score with.

Everyone ends up miserable with score keeping. And the blood of Jesus Christ has made us free from that. You don't have to do that anymore if you're redeemed. If you're not redeemed, there's an internal compulsion that you'll never get away from it. And you might hate it, you'll still do it, because you've not been redeemed.

But if you have been redeemed, there is hope for you. That you won't have to always be a scorekeeper. Listen to a companion proverb. So Peter has quoted Proverbs 10-12. Love covers a multitude of sin.

Here's what I believe is a companion proverb to that. Proverbs 19, verse 11. Listen to this. The discretion of a man makes him slow to anger, And his glory is to overlook a transgression. I believe this describes a redeemed person.

Slow to anger, slow to anger. And it's his glory to overlook a transgression. Not to put a tick on the scorecard. Another one, another one, another one, another one. That's seven for you, and four for you.

And Your brothers and sisters are in the never ending dog house. There's no end to it. You have a bunch of dog houses and all your brothers and sisters to a greater or lesser extent are in it. Because you know the score. But a person who's been redeemed, it's his glory to overlook a transgression.

This is what it means when we make progress in the faith. When God produces the fruits of the Spirit in our life, we begin to become mature, you stop keeping score like that. Turn to 1 Corinthians 13. So nowhere is better than 1 Corinthians 13, the great love chapter. But 1 Corinthians 13 paints such a beautiful picture about being set free from a score keeping system.

This is what love is about. Part of what love is about. 1 Corinthians 13, I'll begin in 1 and read through 7. Now remember, Peter has said, above all things, now look at what Paul says, 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 cymbal. 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 love, 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. Love is not provoked. Thinks no evil. Does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth. Bears all things.

Believes all things. Hopes all things. Endures all things. If we are going to give ourselves to fervently loving one another, we're giving ourselves to this. And keeping scores so out of step with all these things.

Real love, the kind of love that we receive from God our Father through Christ, is such a patient love. Such a forbearing love. Such a forbearing love. Such a suffering love. Think of what a cheat sentimental love is compared to that.

What a cheat. What a paper thin substitute. What a horrific thought that anyone would ever trade sentimental cotton candy love for that. Think of what more of that will do for all of your relationships. What if you had 25 percent more of that?

What would it do to your marriage? Dads and moms, what would it do in the relationship with your children? Boys and girls, what would more of that do in your relationship with your parents? Brothers and sisters, in our church, what would more of this do? If we could have a 25% increase, like all the candy bars promise you, 25% more, I don't know why it's always 25%, but That seems to be the number.

If we could have 25% more of this kind of love, agape love, sacrificial love, non-score keeping love, patient love, fervent love, what would it mean for our church? Your marriage, your parenting, your work life, your relationship with your neighbors. That's rhetorical. It would mean a lot. It would mean the world.

So what keeps us from it? Pursue it. Peter is calling us to pursue fervent love. This is why he's attaching adjectives to it, to describe it, to stir us up to fervent love so that we wouldn't be satisfied with something less than an earnest love that demonstrates itself. Through patience and kindness and all the things that we've been reading about in 1 Corinthians 13.

Whose glory it is to pass over a transgression. Number three, Love helps deal with sin. Because Peter has said, quoting Proverbs, that love covers a multitude of sin, it does not mean that love is blind to sin or love doesn't care about sin. That's not what that's teaching. Love actually helps to deal with sin.

Listen to Galatians 6 verse 1. If Galatians 6 verse 1 isn't on your to memorize list or already memorize list, it really ought to be. Listen to it. Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual, restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself, lest you also be tempted. In Galatians 6.1, Paul is addressing the spiritual.

Who is that? The ones who are good at love? That's what it means to be spiritual, to be good at love by the Bible's definition. So maturity isn't just maturity in doctrine. It's maturity in applying doctrine and that means love.

You got it? So our mature brothers and sisters aren't the ones who know the most doctrine. It's the ones that apply the most doctrine and how can you tell? They're the best at loving God and neighbor. Most of us, probably all of us, have attained to more knowledge than we've attained to experience.

In other words, we know more than we do. So we're better at parsing theological nuances than we are at actually applying it in love. Well, that's probably going to continue to be true forever. But as God gives us light, May we walk by the light and learn to be good at loving, to be spiritual, to be mature. So Paul addresses the ones who are good at loving.

And he says, you spiritual ones, you mature ones, you ones who are good at loving, when you see your brother or sister caught in a sin, you go to them and restore them. So love is not just turning a blind eye towards sin. When Peter quotes the Proverbs saying it covers a multitude of sin, it doesn't mean that it doesn't care about sin. It cares about sin, but in a loving way. It addresses sin.

This is an important expression of love. Helping your brothers and sisters with their sin, is an important expression of love. Everybody knows the great commandment, love God with all the heart, all the soul, all the strength. The Second commandment is like it. You know it.

Love your neighbor as yourself. Do you know what the rest of that passage says? The second commandment is Leviticus 19 verse 18. Love your neighbor as yourself. Listen to it in context.

This is Leviticus 19 starting in 17. You shall not hate your brother in your heart. That's a good start for loving, not hating. You shall not hate your brother in your heart. You shall surely rebuke your neighbor and not bear sin because of him.

You shall not take vengeance nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself." Right in the context of loving your neighbor as yourself is talk about rebuking your neighbor. And it's saying in Leviticus what Paul is picking up on in Galatians 6.1, I guess it's the other way. Leviticus comes first. Paul is drawing on Leviticus where it's clear that an expression of loving your neighbors to rebuke him over his sin. Not as a know it all idiot.

Okay. Not as a know it all idiot, but as one who is spiritual, who can come and gently restore, who comes to his brother or sister in Christ, who has been caught in a sin in a spirit of gentleness to restore. This is one way in which love covers a multitude of sins. It helps with sin. It helps us get free of it.

When God sends a spiritual brother or sister in a spirit of gentleness to help us get unentangled from that sin. Brothers and sisters, how are we doing? We're a church. Our survival depends on this. Our survival depends on us continuing to grow in love so that the multitude of our sins against one another will be covered and not inflamed.

We're going to be sinning against one another because we live in pretty tight quarters in the local church. And that's a sad fact but a true fact. We are going to be sinning against one another. Will hatred stir up strife as we sin against one another? Or will love cover a multitude of sins?

Will we be slow to anger? Will it be our glory to overlook a transgression? Peter is calling us to this. Verses 9-11. Back to Peter.

Back to our text. Verses 9-11. Be hospitable to one another without grumbling, as each one has received a gift, minister it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God. If anyone speaks, let him speak as the oracles of God. If anyone ministers, let him do it as with the ability which God supplies.

That in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ to whom belong the glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. In verses 9 through 11, Paul gives us some outlets for love. He's still talking about love, so don't dare separate verse 8 from verses 9, 10, and 11. Because Paul is just continuing to put meat on the bones to add explanation for what he said when he says we ought to love one another fervently and he's giving us practical expressions of love what does this look like?

Peter answers the question. Did I ever say Paul? It's Peter. Peter wrote this book. The whole thing.

So whenever I say Paul, substitute in, replace all. Peter. Sorry about that. Peter gives us practical expressions for love. He gives us two.

Hospitality is a practical expression of love and using the gifts that we have received to bless is a practical expression of love. Let's look at both of these. Number one, hospitality. Hospitality is a practical expression of love. Let's look at both of these.

Number one, hospitality. Hospitality is a practical expression of love. Now you see it's coupled here with without grumbling. You might say why without grumbling? I many times have read this and thought, that's a strange pairing to me because we think of a dinner party.

What's to grumble about with Dinner party. Unless the food is bad or... Peter is talking about something that is going to cost you a lot more than a dinner party. Peter is talking about something that is going to cost you a lot more than a dinner party. It literally means, this Greek word literally means, generous to strangers or generous to guests.

When Peter wrote this, inns weren't always a good or safe place to be when you're traveling. Not a good place to be and or not a safe place to be. So when you're traveling you find another brother and sister in Christ and You might hunker down there for one day, two days, three days. There's no expectation that any money is going to change hands. You do it just because you're brethren.

That might lead to more grumbling in spirit than a dinner party. Early Americans probably had a much greater sense than we do. If you've been to Mount Vernon and they talk about the schedule that the home kept, A big part of the schedule of the home was entertaining travelers. Go to Mount Vernon, it's fascinating. They lived the way that Peter is describing.

People that George Washington had never met would come and stay with him a week on their travels. There's something behind hospitality that we can't miss. It's not just about hospitality. Hospitality is the manifestation. Hospitality is the demonstration.

And so it's more than just a willingness to have guests in your home. Fervent love for one another frees us from fervent love for our stuff. Did you get that? Real, true, live, fervent love for one another sets us free from a fervent love for our stuff. This is what Peter is getting at.

This is what we see in the life of the early church. In Acts 2, 3, 000 people get saved. They get baptized. They're living together. And it says when somebody had a need, somebody else would sell their stuff.

This is what happens when people get redeemed. They stop having a fervent love for their stuff. They start having a fervent love for their brothers and sisters in Christ because they're close, closer than blood now. So if you've got a need, I'll sell my stuff to supply your need. This is what's behind the hospitality that Peter is speaking of here.

Let me read this great quote from Robert Layton. Robert Layton, mid-1600s, pastor in London, and then Bishop of the Church of England in Scotland in the mid-1600s. And he's written a fantastic commentary on 1st Peter that I would not come up here without without reading just because I found it be so helpful so there's a number of things I'm reading every week and this is one of them. Robert Layton says this, a large heart with a small amount of money will do a great deal with cheerfulness. While hearts glued to the poor riches they possess, or rather are possessed by, can scarcely part with anything until it is pulled from them.

Robert Layton gets right to the heart of the matter here. Some people are possessed by their things, and some people possess their goods, which isn't. Some people are owned by their things, not the other way around. So Robert Layton looks around the landscape and he sees some people with not very much money doing an awful lot with it cheerfully. And then he sees others that are drowning in possessions that you have to pry anything out of their hands because their possessions own them.

Peter is calling us to a willingness to put everything in play for the kingdom of God. In your life is everything in play for the kingdom of God. Your stuff and everything else, Is it all in play? Can God get at it? Can God call it into action?

Can God mobilize it for His kingdom? Can your king mobilize everything about you, everything that you have for his kingdom? Are there certain things that he can't touch? Wow! When there are certain things your king can't touch, there's a big problem.

I'm So thankful to be co-laboring with two men who are an A plus in this category. If you want to know people, men, who hold their things so loosely, who put everything, their money and everything else into play for the kingdom. Go spend time with Scott Brown and Dan Horn. There's somebody always in their house and it's usually long term. We're not talking about dinner guests here.

We're not talking about a dinner party. We're talking about hospitality that costs. And they never grumble. Praise God that He has raised up men who can be an example for us in this area. That's why elders have to be hospitable.

Two lists, qualifications for elders. 1st Timothy 3, Titus 1. Hospitality is on both lists. Elders must be hospitable. And man, you've got a couple of them that are just outstanding A+.

Do you see how this fits with the Great Commission? Do you see that how a people who have a mission to send the Gospel to the furthest reaches of the earth need this? Need to have 10, 000 staging points for resources along the way that the Great Commission can draw on, that those who are advancing the Great Commission can draw on. They can go, they can be places. This happens all the time in churches that have any level of activity, Great Commission activity.

Think of the opportunities that we have here. Think of the Malawi guys who came two years ago and there were four homes that had a house guest for a month. That was hospitality that cost something. And those four families would tell you that they got more than they gave. That the payback was more than the investment.

Think about every Father-Son Retreat or conference that we've ever had in town. There's a flood of people coming from out of town and we place, we place those people, sometimes family, in your houses all the time. You guys have been very open-handed with your houses. Think about the Wintons who came here to do evangelism in the middle, open air in Youngsville. That was a blessing.

Well, part of that picture was hospitality being offered. Who in the room hasn't lived with the Lundquist? Most of us at one point or another have lived, Laura raises her hand, the domes have not lived with the Lundquist. I would just like to report, I think we're in the minority. But our things have to be in play for the kingdom.

Our king has to be able to mobilize our stuff and everything else about us for his kingdom because there is a great commission, a hard commission, a big commission. Number two, number one was hospitality. Number two is using the gifts that we have received to bless Using the gifts we have received to bless Everything in your life worth sharing You've received as a gift Do you believe that's true? I believe that's true. The older I get, the more I believe it's true.

Everything in my life worth sharing is a gift. I got some things in my life that aren't worth sharing. I did not receive those from heaven. Those are my fault. Everything worth sharing I have received from heaven.

Both the stuff and the intangibles. Turn your Bibles to Ephesians chapter 4. Ephesians chapter 4. This is our last stop. I knew I wasn't going to have much time, and I have actually less time than I thought.

If I had had more time, we'd go to 1 Corinthians 12. So put that down, just to work through 1 Corinthians 12 later. It's so much more beautiful and comprehensive, but we just don't have time. So I'm skipping over 1 Corinthians 12, I'm landing us in Ephesians 4. Ephesians 4 verse 7.

But to each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ's gift. Everything that you have worth sharing was given to you according to the measure of Christ's gift. Everything that you have worth sharing was given to you according to the measure of Christ's gift. It was grace. Now skip down to 11.

And He Himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints, for the work of ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ, till we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. But speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things into him who is the head, Christ, from whom the whole body joins together, joined and knit together by what every joint supplies according to the effective working by which every part does its share, causes growth to the body for the edifying of itself in love." Peter has sort of touched on this in that we're holy stones being built up into a holy temple. And Paul speaks of it in Ephesians 4 in a little different way. He's talking about a body. Different parts of the body.

Different gifts. Everyone. Just grace. All grace, all the gifts are grace. All working together for growth of the whole.

So if you've been given a gift and you have been given a gift, it wasn't that you could be a repository for that gift. It was so that you could be a conduit for it. You could be a channel of it. God is sending grace through you to your brothers and sisters in Christ. That's why you have the gift.

That's why Peter says it's stewardship. That's why you have it. To give it. That's why I have all my gifts. That's why you have all yours.

Stuff and non-stuff. Gifts. To put into play for the Kingdom of God to be a blessing. So if you've been given the gift to speak, you be God's man or woman on the ground. This is where Peter goes with it next.

If you've been given the gift to speak. Now that's more than just me standing up in the pulpit, isn't it? Don't we have an obligation? Isn't the Great Commission more than just pulpit preaching? Of course it is!

You've been given the gift to speak. You are God's man or woman on the ground to speak the words of God. Peter calls it the oracles of God. That literally just means the utterances of God, the very words of God. That's what we've been given and we're a conduit of it.

We've been given the words of God and we're a channel for the words of God to other people. That's why if you have any gift to speak at all, that was what it is intended for. 2 Corinthians 5 verse 20. Now then we are ambassadors for Christ. As though God were pleading through us.

As though God were pleading through us. As though God were pleading through us. We implore you on Christ's behalf be reconciled to God. That is the fundamental of all the speaking gifts, to stand on behalf of God to speak what He has spoken. And to say we implore you on Christ's behalf to be reconciled to God.

This is why in Matthew 7 At the very end of the Sermon on the Mount, it says that the people were astonished because here Jesus was teaching like He had authority, not as the scribes. Now we can't teach like Christ on our own authority, but when we have His words, when we're filled up with His words, when those are the words that are on our lips, we can teach with complete confidence and authority. Standing on Christ's behalf to say to others what He has said. And if you've been given the gift of serving, the gift of ministering, do it with the strength, with the ability that God supplies. In our rendering in the New King James, it says the ability that God supplies in many of the other good translations it's the strength that God supplies.

Both are perfectly good translations. Both words are fitting. With the ability that God supplies, with the strength that God supplies. Serve. With all the strength that God supplies.

Serve. Minister. 2 Corinthians 12 verse 9. God tells Paul, My strength is made perfect in weakness." So then Paul starts bragging about his weakness. Reveling in his weakness because that's when God is strong.

Brothers and sisters, here's the point of this section. Endeavor to be more fruitful with every gift that God has given you. No matter your level of fruitfulness, there is always room to be pruned and to grow and to excel more in the gifts that God has given you. Endeavor. Promise yourself today that you're going to be more fruitful with every good gift that God has sent into your life.

Everything that's worth sharing in your life, that you'll be more fruitful with those things. That you'll consecrate yourself to Him. That you'll consecrate every single thing He's given you, every penny that He's given you, every vehicle He's given you, every laptop He's given you, everything will be put to use to bring Him glory. This is the purpose that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belong the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.

Two quick applications. Just two. I can see the clock. I only had two anyway. I can stretch those two out if I have time, believe me.

Alright, number one. Keep a watchful eye out for Jesus' return. If you've stopped thinking that way, restart. Keep a watchful eye out for Jesus' return. It will make you serious.

It will make you live a serious life. Not a frivolous, silly life. It will make you watchful in your prayers. You'll start to pray like you might come back next week and you'll be the better for it. Number two.

Fan fervent love in three practical ways. Fan it into flame. Fervent love in three practical ways. Covering sins. Be slow to anger.

Let it be your glory to overlook a transgression against you. Covering sins. Number two, hospitality. Hospitality, that costs you dearly. Do it without grumbling.

God loves a cheerful giver. The things that He's given you, just give it. Give it cheerfully. Three, in using your gifts. Put your gifts to work for the glory of God more than you ever have.

That includes your stuff and then everything else. God will be glorified. Let your light so shine before men that they see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven. Let's pray. Father make us a faithful people.

Every week we come. The standard is set before us in Your Word. We see how far short we are of the standard. This is good for us, Lord. This just lays us low.

We're better off to be laid low before You than to think we're something. God, help us to make progress. Give us progress, Lord. Give us fervent love. I pray, O God, you would pour out through your Son Jesus Christ in His Spirit, you would pour out fervent love into our hearts for one another.

Give us an overabundance, God. May it manifest itself. May it display itself through hospitality, through the covering of a multitude of sins as we live together in these close quarters, through the employing of every gift that you ever gave us for the building up of the whole. I thank you for the beauty of the picture that you give us in your Word. Oh God, may we live together in this way.

To your glory. Be exalted, oh God, in Jesus' name, Amen.