Christian Fellowship (7) What is Love? (4)

Introduction: The Importance of Christian Living and Fellowship

0:02 The following message was delivered on Sunday morning, November 28th, 1993, at the Trinity Baptist Church in Montville, New Jersey.

0:14 I would invite you to turn with me in your own Bibles to 1 Corinthians chapter 13, and follow as I read in your hearing these verses that have been read in your hearing on several occasions already, and, God willing, will be read at least on several more occasions in the present course of our study. 1 Corinthians 13, verses 4 through 7. Love suffers long and is kind. Love does not envy.

0:59 Love does not vaunt itself, is not puffed up. Love does not envy. Does not vaunt itself. Love does not behave itself unseemly.

1:10 Does not seek its own. Is not provoked. Takes not account of evil. Rejoices not in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth.

1:26 Bears all things. Believes all things. Hopes all things. Endures all things.

1:39 Now, let us again ask God's help that in the ministry of the Word we shall know the presence of Christ himself as the prophet of his church standing in our midst, ministering to us by his own person through the ministry of the Spirit who takes the written Word and makes it his own Word to our hearts. Let us pray. Our Father, we thank you. We thank you for the fresh reminders that were brought to us in the Sunday school hour that we do live in the age of fulfillment, the age of the Holy Spirit. And we thank you that in the mystery of your triune being where the Spirit is, you and the Lord Jesus are. And we therefore continue in the posture of wonder and worship. And pray that now we will know something of the ministry of the Spirit whose great delight is to take the things of Christ and reveal them to us with power.

2:55 Who takes the Word and makes it the very voice of Christ as his own prophetic ministry is exercised in his church. Lord Jesus, stand in our midst and speak with clarity. And with power, we cry to you for your aid. Hear us and help us for your name's sake.

3:22 Amen. I have had occasion at least a half a dozen times over the course of the years of ministry among you to say that the most important question that anyone can ever ask is a question that was asked by a, a Roman jailer in the city of Philippi almost 2,000 years ago, who in great distress of soul and trembling for fear cried out, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? And if a man who has asked that question as the jailer did is given the right answer and embraces that answer from the heart, then there is a second question, second only in order of importance to that first question, what must I do to be saved? And that question is, how shall I live now that I am saved? As the first question brings us directly into the teaching of the Bible concerning the way into life, the second question,

4:48 brings us just as directly into the teaching of the Bible concerning the way of life, or in more familiar terms the doctrine of the Christian life. Now in addressing those foundational issues which have formed the very nerve centers of our life as a church over a quarter of a millennium, I mean a decade, a quarter of a century, I'm sorry, I'll get the right word, we have been considering our determination to maintain a balanced biblical doctrine of conversion, the Christian life, and the mission of the church. And for many months now our attention has been focused on what constitutes a balanced doctrine of the Christian life. And our study presently is focusing upon this vital, fundamental principle of the Christian life, namely that there are no effective substitutes for the God-appointed means of grace. And as we are considering the public or corporate means of grace, using Acts 2 and verse 42 as a text to identify those major public means of grace, and as an outline in addressing,

6:17 those issues, we have already considered what it means for us in our present constitution as a church, as that church in Jerusalem did to continue steadfastly in the apostles' teaching. For us that means that there will be a central place given to the reading, teaching, and preaching of the word of God in our corporate life. But it is said of that early church that they not only continued steadfastly in the apostles' teaching, but also in the fellowship. And therefore we are addressing this whole question of the fellowship of the church as a means of grace. We address the concept of fellowship which essentially is that of shared life. We consider the context of distinctive Christian fellowship, and it involves our embracing the one Lord and Savior, being incorporated into the one body by the Spirit, and being placed into one family. And then we began to consider the content of distinctive Christian fellowship.

7:43 What is this thing called fellowship? When it is said, they continued steadfastly in the fellowship. What is it in which they were continuing steadfast? And we saw from the scriptures, particularly Romans 15 and verse 7, that true church fellowship begins with an unfeigned and unreserved acceptance of one another for that which God has made us in Christ.

8:17 It does not rest upon economic, racial, ethnic, sociological factors. It rests upon the realities of that which God has made us in Christ as part of the new humanity. Then I proceeded to demonstrate from the scriptures that this fellowship that begins with unfeigned and unreserved acceptance of one another, must, grow and develop in a climate where the graces essential to its life and growth are flourishing through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. And at the head of those graces is the grace of mutual love and brotherly affection. I established from the scriptures the supremacy of this grace of mutual love and brotherly affection, as the bond of true Christian fellowship. Then we began to address several weeks ago the question, by what objective standard can we assess the presence and direct the expressions of this grace of love? And the answer I've sought to demonstrate from the word of God is this.

Review of Love's Characteristics and Standards

9:43 We can evaluate, assess the presence and direct the expressions of this grace of love by the precepts of the law of Romans 13, 8 to 10, the pattern of Christ, John 15, 12 and 13, and then the principles of 1 Corinthians 13, verses 4 through 7. And two Lord's days ago in our ministry from this passage, six Lord's days ago, in the reckoning of time, we had occasion to note as we looked for the first time at 1 Corinthians 13, 4 to 7, three very vital, overarching observations. And I trust you do not regard it tedious for me to repeat them, that the grace of love is set before us in this passage in an exclusively practical way. When Paul begins to address the grace of love, When Paul begins to address the grace of love, When Paul begins to address the grace of love, When Paul begins to address the grace of love, When Paul begins to address the grace of love, When Paul begins to address the subject of what love is and does, he gives us a string of 15 present tense verbs. He tells us what love does and does not do.

11:01 He is not concerned to give us philosophical perspectives on love. He is not concerned to give a formal definition of love. He describes love in action. What she does, and what she does not do, so that we, bringing our lives to the standard of action, may determine whether or not we are truly loving one another, whether we are biblically expressing brotherly affection.

11:35 Secondly, in that overarching view, we noted that the grace of love is set before us in an intensely realistic way. In other words, love is described as love will act in the world that now is. This description of love will not be valid in heaven. Certain aspects of it will, but for the most part, love is described in the realistic context of this present world where even the new humanity in Christ has the plague of remaining sin.

12:16 Where there will be words spoken and deeds done that can hurt and wound and grieve, and therefore love suffers long and is kind. It's a world where there is unrighteousness, where there is provocation, where there is a temptation to self-seeking and unseemly behavior, where there are pressures that would bring us to the end of love's acting, and love's reactings. I say the entire section is intensely realistic. It is love at work in Trinity Baptist Church as Trinity Church is presently constituted. And thirdly, the grace of love is set before us in a wonderfully balanced way. We have eight negatives and seven positives. Eight things love will not do.

13:17 Eight things love will do. Then in our two previous expositions, we concentrated on the opening words, love suffers long and is kind. Love envies not. Here love is acting in the context of provocation and ill-treatment.

13:39 And what does it do? It suffers long. That's the passive action. That's the action of love.

13:47 But it is not only that grace that enables us to suffer long and to take it, as it were, without reacting in a carnal way, but that very love enables us to be kind and beneficent, to show kindness even to our enemies, even as our Heavenly Father sends His rain upon the just and the unjust. So love not only acting in the context of provocation and ill-treatment, but love acting in the presence of God's good gifts to others. Love does not envy. Love refuses to allow that horrible green-eyed monster to be let loose in our hearts when God confers good things upon others. Love will never move us to envy, but to rejoice, in the good gifts that God confers upon our brethren. Now, this morning, I want to attempt with you to focus our attention together upon this couplet of things that love does not do in the 1901 edition rendered as follows, Love vaunteth not itself is not puffed up.

Defining 'Love Does Not Vaunt Itself' and 'Is Not Puffed Up'

15:11 Now, Jonathan Edwards has beautifully demonstrated the progression of thought in the Apostle's mind when he wrote as follows, As, on the one hand, love prevents us from envying others for that which they possess, so, on the other, it helps us from glorying in what we possess ourselves. See the progression of thought? Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, Love does not envy what God confers upon us, to that which God has conferred upon me. Love will never move me to envy. Love will never move me to want myself to indulge in proud, boastful speech, nor to have an inward puffing up of my spirit in carnal, devilish pride. Now as we attempt to understand and apply these two aspects of love's actings, consider with me first of all the meaning of the two

16:35 key words. When the apostle under the guidance of the spirit wrote, love vaunts not itself, is not puffed up. Precisely what was he saying? Well, to give you some idea of how difficult it is to be precise, listen to some of the various translations in the different versions of the scriptures that we have accessible to us. The New King James Version renders it, love does not parade itself, is not puffed up, and in the margin puts the word arrogant. Love does not parade itself. Love does not parade itself. Love does not parade itself, is not puffed up or arrogant. The NIV, love does not boast,

17:27 it is not proud. The New English Bible, love is never boastful nor conceited. Phillips paraphrase of the New Testament, love is neither anxious to impress, nor does it cherish inflated ideas. There are times when Phillips paraphrase, and it is that, is nothing short of brilliant.

18:00 This love, without which there can be no true, dynamic, ongoing experience of biblical koinonia or fellowship, is described as that which is neither anxious to impress, nor does it cherish inflated ideas. The New English Bible, love does not parade itself, is not positive rather, is not proud. That does come out simply by the presentian concept of love. In the modern world, we can say that, go to the scriptures and later on in the zamanical Boolean period, these books are described as rememberable, and this the ποστε not as st altitude but PRIDE are not path as we have in the modern world.

18:41 And these were not story of the word love, ph쉬, meaning to promote forgetfulness and protesthood. those words a little more precisely and in a little greater detail. And I'm going to render the first verb, love does not indulge in boastful bragging. Now one of the difficulties the expositor faces when he comes to a passage like this is that when he confronts this word that Paul used saying love faunce not itself, love does not parade itself, does not boast, is never boastful, love is not anxious to impress, is that this word is found only once in the New Testament and that's here. Now the other word that one finds translated many times in the New Testament as boasting or glorying, there's a standstill. It's a standard verb used over 30 times in the New Testament and it's rendered usually boasting or glorying. In its noun form there are two different nouns and they are used

20:00 more than 20 times. So we have 50 plus usages of a standard word for boasting or glorying and the Holy Spirit gave the apostle no liberty to use that word, though it was one of his favorite words. Most of its usages are found in the Pauline corpus of the New Testament. But the Spirit of God directed Paul to use a word which, with the best available resources at our disposal at this point in human history, as best we can discern, is rooted in a noun which would be used to describe a braggart, a windbag. And this is the word that Paul used to describe a braggart, a windbag. And this is the word that he used. And he said this.

20:48 It means the word, when you use a word that is written out of a verbal form and therefore it points to an activity primarily of the tongue in which a person speaks of his own gifts, his own possessions or his own accomplishments in any area so as to draw attention to himself or to promote himself. When a man, a woman, a boy or girl uses his tongue, it means that he speaks with his tongue. The차 . his or her tongue to speak of his own gifts, his own possessions or accomplishments in any area, so as to draw attention to himself or to promote himself, he is indulging in the thing which Paul says love will not indulge. Love does not indulge in boastful bragging. Now it is right and proper, and the great apostle is an example of this, at times to speak of one's gifts, one's possessions, one's accomplishments. When Paul was defending the validity of his apostleship, he spoke of his accomplishments as an apostle.

22:11 He said, I did not. I did not come behind any of the apostles in that which Christ was pleased to do through me. And he says the signs of an apostle were wrought in me, or the marks of a true apostle by signs and wonders. So not all speaking about one's gifts, possessions or accomplishments is boastful bragging.

22:37 But listen carefully to what I've said, as I've labored for hours, and tried to bring my thinking under the discipline of the best tools at my disposal, I'm convinced this comes closest to the mind of the spirit in identifying what love will not do.

22:58 Love will never move a man or woman to speak of his own gifts, possessions or accomplishments in any area, so as to draw attention to himself or, or to promote himself.

23:17 And the second word, love, is not puffed up. I'm going to render love does not indulge in the inflating influence of pride.

23:32 Love does not indulge in the inflating influence of pride. Now, thankfully, Paul had already used this verb several times in this letter to the Corinthians, and the significance of it is quite clear in each of the previous contexts. Will you turn to chapter 4 and verse 6? Now these things, brethren, I have in a figure transferred myself and Apollos for your sakes, that in us you might learn not to go beyond the things which are written, that no one of you, here's our word, be puffed up for the one, against the other. Now in that setting, Paul is dealing with this problem of divisions in the church of Corinth, divisions occasioned by people claiming certain ministers as their favorites, and claiming them as their own, lining up behind them, and pitting themselves against their brethren. And so Paul says you are puffed up in this activity, the one against the other. You see how being puffed up inflates a man in such a way that he begins to dislodge his brother.

24:57 Puffed up brings us into a context, not of koinonia, of shared life, but of fractured life. One against the other. Again, he used it in verses 18 and 19 of this same chapter.

25:17 Now, some are puffed up, as though I were not. Some are coming to you. Some are rowing about with an inflated view of their own security in their carnal position, and in what they are promoting that is contrary to apostolic directives, and what they know to be Paul's mind as an apostle. So they are puffed up.

25:41 They are inflated with a sense of their own importance and influence upon the church. But I will come to you shortly, if the Lord will, and I will know not the word of them that are puffed up, but the power. For the kingdom of God is not in word, but in power. You see, these puffed up, inflated, ecclesiastical blowfish is what I call them.

26:07 As I pleaded with God for an imagery that would touch most of you, most of us have seen a blowfish. And when he's all blown up, you look at the blowfish and say, man, if I could land that on my plate and cook it properly, I'd really have some delicacies. No, just mush him, and you find he was all three-quarters, seven-eighths of him, nothing but air.

26:32 Well, these ecclesiastical blowfish were floating around the church carnal. And Paul says, if I come, I will know not the mere words of these puffed up, ecclesiastical blowfish, but I will come in the power of the Spirit of God. I will come with God. I will come with God attesting to the validity of my identity as an apostle of Jesus Christ.

27:00 So here again were people who were indulging in this inflating influence of pride. They were puffed up. Chapter 5 and verse 2, where Paul is rebuking them for not disciplining this man who had indulged in a very gross form of sexual immorality. He says, and you are puffed.

27:22 You are puffed up and did not rather mourn. Here puffed up is contrasted with mourning. Now what's the spirit of a man who is mourning and grieved over his sin? He is a humbled man.

27:39 The opposite of a humbled man is a puffed up man, swelling with a sense of his own importance. In this case, apparently they were puffed up with pride that they had reached the act, the ultimate of unconditional love, that they could tolerate this scoundrel in the church without shame. Then in chapter 8 and verse 1, he uses it again. Now concerning things sacrificed to idols, we know that we all have knowledge.

28:11 With respect to the matter of things sacrificed to idols, we know that we all have an understanding of the realities that an idol is nothing, and the meat of the meat is nothing. Is what is offered to the idol still a hunk of meat? However, other factors enter in that should determine whether or not I will eat the meat that is offered to idols. And knowledge alone, knowledge without the pressure and the consideration of love, knowledge puffs up.

28:41 Merely knowing these realities, detached from the spirit of love that will implement them in the best interest of others, knowledge puffs up. And it's a play on words, but love builds up. Knowledge merely inflates a man, love will make me do what will substantially build up another man. Mere knowledge may inflate me with a sense of my own importance, but love will make me deny myself in order that I might substantially and truly build up my brother.

29:21 So then in summary, what is Paul saying about love? He says love does not indulge in boastful bragging. That's the external. That's what goes on with the mouth.

29:37 Then he goes from the external to the internal and says love does not indulge in the inflating influence of pride. You see, taking the clue from the Lord Jesus that out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaketh, Paul moves from the mouth to the heart and says where love is being shed abroad in the hearts of the people of God who are full of the spirit of God, there that love will promote a climate for genuine koinonia, genuine fellowship, where love will not indulge in boastful bragging because love will not indulge in the inflating influence of the pride of the heart that gives birth to the bragging of the tongue. Well, according to my present life, that's the meaning of the two words. Now then we ask secondly the question, what is the manner in which love prevents boastful bragging and the inflating influence of pride? For remember, we're not dealing with bragging in abstraction or pride in abstraction and this has been the great difficulty in preparation

Love to God Prevents Boasting and Pride

31:01 because so many of those who have commented upon this verse and those who've even put together collections of sermons launch off into topical sermons on both of these sins and there's so much in the Bible about them, the discipline of sticking to this verse and to the apostles' train of thought. It has been most difficult. But I've sought to do that and have asked and asked and asked and asked and cried and pleaded with God for light. Lord, what is the connection?

31:33 It just doesn't say that good Christians don't boast and good Christians are not puffed up with pride. It says love, love. It is the peculiar power of love. Shut the mouth of boastful bragging.

31:52 And the peculiar power of love to shrivel, to wither and to put the dagger into the very heart of the swelling of internal pride. And what is the manner then in which love shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit? Love which is the fruit of the Spirit. What is the manner in which love prevents boastful bragging and the inflating influence of pride?

32:27 Well, let me attempt to answer it under three headings. First, because love to God gladly acknowledges Him to be exactly what He claims to be with respect to what I am and what I possess. How does love prevent boastful bragging? How does love keep from this internal indulgence of the swelling and the inflating of pride?

33:05 Because love to God gladly acknowledges Him to be exactly what He claims to be in reference to what I am and what I possess. Now, what does He claim to be with respect to what I am and what I possess? Well, He claims to be my Creator. And according to Psalm 139, anything that I am that is part of my fundamental constitution as a human being, God made it so in my mother's womb.

33:45 David celebrates the reality that he was knit together on the loom of God's own creative power. Wisdom and power in his mother's womb. According to Acts 17, in Him we live and move and have our very being. He gives to all life and breath and all things.

34:08 He claims to be my sovereign Creator who made me what I am, my present sustainer, and listen carefully, the sovereign dispenser of all that I possess, whether of gifts, of station, of influence, of possessions. He claims to be the sovereign dispenser of all that I possess. Now then, if that's what God claims to be, and I love Him for who He is and what He's revealed Himself to be, then how in the world can I ever indulge in boastful bragging? If I glory in anything, I will glory as the Scripture says, in the Lord. The Apostle understood this and when he sought to go after that blowfish mentality at Corinth, remember how he attacked it with what did he lance the blowfish at Corinth? In 1 Corinthians 4, 7 we see the lance.

35:23 After telling them that he's writing as he writes, in order to counteract this spirit of being puffed up for the one against the other, notice how he goes after the blowfish. Verse 7, For who makes you to differ? And what have you that you did not receive? But if you did receive it, why do you glory as though you had not received it?

36:03 You see what his questions are doing? His questions are taking them precisely to this issue. You claim to be the children of a God who is the sovereign dispenser of all that you possess. Have you that you did not receive?

36:26 If you differ, who makes you to differ? And though there is some difference among the commentators, with regard to the precise intention of that first question, we can take it in the sense that many do, who makes you to differ? Is there an area in which you have, by objective criteria, superior intellectual endowments, superior physical endowments, superior spiritual endowments? Is there an area in which you are placed above any one of your brethren?

37:01 If so, who made you to differ? Why are you not a drooling idiot with an IQ of a chimpanzee? Who made you to differ? Is God the sovereign creator who gives to one the capacity for an IQ of 80 and another an IQ of 150?

37:31 Is he the one who knits together in the mother's womb the diversity of mental capacity? Who made you to differ? Is that God? For who is?

37:47 Then that love will never allow me to indulge in boastful bragging, for I know he has made me to differ. Look at the second question. What have you that you did not receive? Is the area of your boastful bragging that you've made it in business, hard work, diligence, risk, good management?

38:11 I made it! No, is that so? Is that so? Who that you are?

38:20 What have you that you did not receive? Who gave you the strength to get up and go to that work that you might work hard? Who sustained your life that you might be industrious? While others lie on beds of pain day and night, month in, out, year in, year out, it would yearn for the privilege of one day of productive labor.

38:47 Who makes you to differ? Who kept you from being in that car crash that broke your neck and left you a quadriplegic? How stupid! Pride!

39:00 Never could Nazarite to stand and look over your own little kingdom and say, this is what I have wrought. Moral back. Who makes you to differ? What have you that you did not receive?

39:20 But if you did receive it, and here's his standard, and here's his standard word for glory or boasting, and here it's used in the negative sense, why do you glory? Why do you boast as if you had not received it? A man that knows that all that he has is given, he can say thank you a million times, but he never boasts or brags. He gives thanks and glory to God.

39:56 But with respect to personal endowments, has God given you an attractive face? If he has, he doesn't want you to go around saying, oh, I'm ugly. Is there anything wrong with someone saying God has given me a more than ordinarily attractive face? That's reality.

40:15 You'll know it soon enough. What do you boast? Who made you to differ? God could have made you so ugly that it would take an iron will not to stare at you every time you went into public.

40:35 Who made you to differ? Now, if you've seen the film The Elephant Man, you could have been made such a creature. Who made you to differ? Personal endowments of face, of form, of intellect, conferred possession, and even spiritual gifts, according to 1 Corinthians 12.

41:01 And this no doubt was one of the issues Paul was addressing. They were allowing the diversity of endowment of spiritual gifts to puff them up one against the other. But he says, look, look, look, the gifts have been given to each according as God will. To one is given by the Spirit this, and according to a given by the Spirit another, but according to the will of God.

41:28 That's why love prevents boastful bragging and the inflating influence of pride. Because first of all, it is love to God that gladly acknowledges Him to be exactly what He claims to be with respect to what I am and what I possess. The sovereign dispenser of the whole shebang. Therefore there's no room for bragging and there's no room for the Spirit that gives birth to the bragging, the swelling blowfish pride of the heart.

Love to Neighbor Negates Desire for Superiority

42:05 But then secondly, as we address the manner in which love prevents boastful bragging and the inflating influence of pride, it works because love to one's neighbor negates any desire to prove my superiority to him. Love to one's neighbor negates any desire to prove my superiority to him. Why does a man indulge in boastful bragging and the inflating influence of pride? Is it not to make himself to appear superior to others?

42:48 If in no one's eyes but his own he wants to feel he's above his brethren. Listen to a Welsh preacher of another generation commenting on this very passage. He wrote, Humility tends in the first place to prevent an aspiring and ambitious behavior amongst men. That man that is under the influence of a humble spirit is content with such a situation among men as God is pleased to allot to him and is not greedy of honor and does not affect to appear uppermost and exalted above his neighbors. You see, that was the problem with that character described in Luke 18, the Pharisee. He's the perfect quintessential picture of the things love does not do. He stands in the presence of a fellow man and in the presence of God and has the gall to say, I thank you God, I'm not like others.

44:00 But why was he doing this? The opening verses tell us, Jesus addressed this parable to certain who were confident that they were righteous and set all others at naught. They exalted themselves above others. And the parable was spoken to identify that wretched sin.

44:27 A boastful bragging that this Pharisee indulged in the very presence of God. I thank you, I'm not like the rest of men. That was not the thankfulness of one who sees a man in a wheelchair and says, but for the grace of God I'd be there. Or sees a wreck of humanity lying in the gutter.

44:56 The wreckage of years of abandonment to drugs and to illicit sex and to alcohol and says, oh God, thank you for sparing me. Left to myself, that could be me. That spirit is a Christian spirit. But the spirit of the Pharisee, you see, was one of climbing over others in order to parade himself even in the presence of God.

45:25 And you see, true love to one's neighbor will negate any desire to prove my superiority to him. A way of application, let me say, with reference, for example, to our jobs, our income, our home, our clothing. Why is there no boastful bragging that highlights what my brother may not have? Because love works no ill to his neighbor.

46:00 And I know that it would bring pain to my neighbor to highlight what God may not have given to him and might leave him vulnerable to the sin of envy. For nothing provokes envy quicker than a boastful braggart. It's amazing how, in the heart of a true Christian, envy remains relatively subdued in the presence of humble believers who may have been given much more by God than God has given me. But when we sense that someone is indulging in boastful bragging and is indulging a spirit of unmortified, swelling, puffed-up, blowfish pride, it can very quickly provoke the spirit of envy in the heart of the one who beholds it. I want to touch on an area where I think some of you need particular application here. Love does not indulge in boastful bragging not only with respect to one's personal income, home, clothing, station in life, but with respect to the accomplishments and abilities of our children. Some of the most naughty tensions that have existed in Trinity Church

47:27 over the years have existed right here. Parents who were forever indulging in boastful bragging about their children's accomplishments and in reality what they were doing was using their children as a balloon on which to float themselves. Love will not do that! God may have given that brother or sister a child who, working three times as hard as yours, can barely pass every single class and get a seat.

48:02 And when you go bragging about your child's straight A's, you grieve your brother, your sister. Don't do it. Love will be sensitive to that and will not indulge in boastful bragging. And love will not allow you to indulge in the spirit of puffed up, inflated pride.

48:24 That's my child. I can remember well my godly and wise parents if I came home with a report card with straight A's and that was not an exception. They'd sit me down and say, Son, if you had any ability to do that, God gave it to you. Now look at the little numbers next to the grades.

48:50 This tells what you are. The other tells us what God gave you. This tells what you are. Character, effort, evaluation of those things that come through the discipline of one's self and one's time.

49:10 And if I got an A3, I was in big, bad trouble. If I got a C1, no problem. The one meant honest, diligent, consistent effort. Application to the task.

49:29 A two-man team. Relatively diligent effort. A three meant only average effort. I'd get my behind tanned for threes even if they were joint A's.

49:42 Thank God for parents who have that respect. Do you have it? Are you imparting it to your kids? Or are you teaching them to be boastful braggarts?

49:59 To swell with pride. It's one thing to come home from the basketball game and say, Dad, Mom, I scored 14 points today! Another thing to come home really feeling you're Mr. Hotshot because you scored in double figures today in such a way that you put yourself above others and you make the poor guy that couldn't find a hole that day for love nor money.

50:26 You make him feel like dirt. But why does love not indulge in boastful bragging and in the inflating influence of pride? Because love to one's self because love to one's neighbor negates any desire to prove my superiority to him. Love has no desire to prove I'm better than my neighbor.

Love's Nature is Self-Giving, Not Self-Promoting

50:55 Therefore love does not indulge in boastful bragging or in inflated pride. And then thirdly, because it is in the very nature of love to give itself rather than to promote and assert itself. You got that? It's in the very nature of love to give itself rather than promote and assert itself.

51:24 Paul could write, Love faunts not itself. Love does not indulge in boastful bragging. Love is not puffed up. It is not inflated with a false sense of self-importance.

51:40 Why? Because the very nature of love is to give itself to others rather than to promote and assert itself. John 3.16 God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son.

52:02 The text you heard preached in the wedding yesterday, those who were here, Christ loved the church and gave Himself up for it. Love sees itself as people, not as objects, who can be a sounding board to echo my greatness. But love sees them as objects on which to spend itself, never as pedestals on which to stand and promote myself. See the difference?

52:42 Love looks out at its brethren and says, Where can I take the role of my Lord who girded Himself with a towel and washed the feet of His disciples? Where do your feet need washing? I am prepared to serve you for Christ's sake and for your good. Not to use you to be a sounding board for my importance, to stroke me and affirm me.

53:17 This is one of the deepest elements of the curse of this wicked, pervasive, ubiquitous, self-esteem garbage. It looks out on everyone in the world as a big set of hands to stroke me and affirm me and assure me I am okay, so I can feel good about myself. If I hear that term one more time, I think I am going to go into the loony bin. Well, I feel good about myself.

53:47 So who cares whether you feel good about yourself? The issue is, are you good? Are you right with God? Is there moral goodness?

53:57 And if there is, one of the aspects of your moral goodness will be a spirit of continuous repentance, shame over your sin, and brokenness before God, qualities that the self-esteem movement abhors. No love in its very nature gives rather than asserts itself. Listen to the insights of old Matthew Henry. Listen to the insights of old Matthew Henry.

54:25 True love will give us an esteem of our brethren and raise our value for them, and this will limit our esteem of ourselves and prevent the tumors of self-conceit and arrogance. He says what we need is not more self-esteem, but more other esteem, esteem of our brethren that will raise our value for them, and this will limit our esteem of ourselves and prevent the tumors of self-conceit and arrogance. These ill qualities can never grow out of tender affection for the brethren or for what he called a diffusive benevolence. We would say a widespread spirit of goodwill to one another. Koinonia. We're going to have fellowship.

55:20 We must be continually filled with the spirit whose fruit is love, love that what? Not only is prepared to suffer long with indignities and to be kind to the one who perpetrates the indignities, but love that will not envy what God sovereignly bestows upon my brethren that can rejoice in every good gift that God gives them, though he is pleased to withhold a similar gift from me than that love that will not indulge in boastful and in prideful speech, that will not allow the heart to swell and be puffed up with inflated notions of my own importance. A contemporary commentator has written, Love knows that the greatest among men is not he who can command the greatest measure of the strength of others to serve him, but he who can take upon his own shoulders the largest measure of other men's weakness. That's true greatness.

56:45 Several of the authors, and I don't know which one was quoting from the other, but as I was doing my reading and scratching and praying and searching for light on this matter, several made the observation that it's only little things that need to attract attention to themselves. Did you ever see the sun making any effort to attract attention to itself? Did you ever hear of the Rocky Mountains going into a furor because someone drove by and didn't notice them? Did you ever see the sea write a formal complaint to the star ledger that it was ignored for a week?

57:15 And these authors said, Great things like the sun and the mountains and the mighty oceans and the great things like the sun and the mountains and the mighty oceans and the great things like the sun and the mountains and the mighty oceans are only solutions that they don't need to indulge in boastful bragging. Great things are just there and they're recognized for what they are. It's little things that clamour for action. It's little narrow hearts that don't see a great magnificent glorious sovereign God upon the throne who's made me just what He knows.

57:59 I should be that I might bring that dimension to Him that no other creature can give to Him. There's the dignity of my individuality. There is a measure and a kind of glory that I can give to God by being me that I could not give by being someone else. Therefore, I'm content to be me. Bring glory to God.

The Necessity of the Spirit for True Love

58:23 I embrace the fact that He's the sovereign dispenser of all that I have and am. And in loving that God, that love will not indulge in arrogant boasting. It will not allow the heart to indulge in inflated pride. Now, in my final word of application, dear people of God, do you see why, if we are to continue steadfastly in true biblical koinonia, shared life that is meaningful, shared life that is accomplished, conduit of the Spirit of God to minister one to another, do you see why being filled with the Spirit is not a luxury or an option? For it's only as we are filled with the Spirit that the Spirit will produce in copious measures in us the fruit of His own indwelling presence, which is what? The fruit of the Spirit is love. Paul says, I beseech you by the love of the Spirit.

59:33 There is in the person and indwelling of the Holy Spirit that divinely imparted capacity to so love that I will not indulge in boastful bragging or in swelling pride, but rather in that love that finds its delight in self-abandonment and self-giving. It will make me say as daily to the man who worships and even though ever doing wrong, God will not beters my faith that ever I will be in this from no frailty. Now the 9th time I say the things that I do. The 1st time, or rather the 5th time, when I pray for, now you're thinking about it, when I pray for a couple of reasons, a couple things that are relevant to Acts—as I said earlier, and only made my認為 to God it does notổ they revealed to me. How? The first is prayer. who he is, the sovereign disposer and dispenser and director of all human history, including redemptive history. And he chose David's line to be the line through which Messiah would

60:48 come. And though he had so exalted a position, he was greatly humbled. For the great apostle, he speaks of the mighty works that were accomplished in him, and yet he says in 1 Corinthians 15, I am what I am by the grace of God. Then after mentioning his unique place in the purpose of God in Ephesians 3, that through him an aspect of truth would be revealed more clearly than through any other New Testament writer, the great truth that in Christ and in the church, Jew and Gentile are now standing on equal footing. He said this is the mystery hidden for ages and generations. But now, wonderfully revealed, it's in that very setting where he speaks of his unique endowment and calling that he says, unto me, who am less than the least of all the saints, was this grace given. It is not wrong for a man objectively to assess what God has given him. It is wicked to indulge in boastful begging as though it were not given. That's the issue.

Application to Unconverted Youth and Adults: The Pride of Unbelief

62:02 My unconverted friend. Young people. I see some of you young ladies and I tell you, my heart grieves because it's obvious. It's obvious to anyone who's got eyes that you are really enamored with your face and your form. And I'm going to look at the beads so no parent thinks I'm picking on his or her daughter. I see some of you young men and you've begun to get a little bump and lump here or there on a phony arm or back. And you strut around like you were Arnold. And some of you, God's given you good news. And some of you, God's given you good news. And some of you, God's given you good news. And some of you, God's given you good news. And some of you, God's given you good news. So there are times when you're proud of your intellect. And there are times when it becomes evident that you're proud of your intellect. Oh, listen to me young people, and adults as well. Jonathan Edwards speaks to those who are strangers to the grace of God and therefore strangers to this spirit of love that does not indulge in boastful bragging, is not inflated. He says, your spirit

63:06 is a proud spirit, though you may not seem to carry yourself very proudly amongst men, you're lifting up yourself against God in refusing to submit your heart and life to Him. In doing this, you're disregarding or defying God's sovereignty and daring to contend with your Maker, though He dreadfully threatens those who do this. You see, you don't need to go around bragging all the time and making it appear to everyone that you're proud, but the very fact that you will not bow to the God who made you and the God who commands you to believe on His Son and turn from your sin and give up running your own life and being your own little god or goddess, that's the essence of horrible pride. You are proudly casting contempt on God's authority, refusing to obey it, and continuing to live in disobedience and refusing to be conformed to His will and to comply with the humbling conditions in the way of salvation by Christ. They are humbling conditions. You've got to come to God and stand on the same ground as if we could get that man I described earlier, 30, 40 years of a life of a paralect, and if we could get him sober and preach the gospel and the Holy Ghost, we're to bless it, and he says through his drawn, lying, sin-scarred face,

64:35 but preacher, is there hope for me? And we tell him of a crucified, immolated, incarnate God upon a place, called Calvary, who died for sinners and who sincerely offers His grace to all who will come. It's a humbling thing for you, as a fresh-faced, unscarred youth, to say I've got to stand on the same ground with that old paralect and say nothing in my hands I bring, simply to thy cross I cling. Foul!

65:14 Oh yeah, he's foul, but not, oh yes, you're foul too. Foul with your priesthood. Pretty, unlined face. Pretty in your form.

65:25 You too are foul, and you must be prepared to lock arms with the old paralect and say, whatever your name is, old paralect, I need the same Savior in you. I need the same blood. I need the same virtue of the same Son of God.

65:45 That'll take the strut out of you. That won't make you have an ugly face, but you'll never go around proud of your pretty face or your pretty face. You'll never be in the same form. In fact, you'll walk so carefully before God because you'll know it's a liability to your sanctification.

66:02 Before any of my children were ever conceived, my wife and I prayed, Oh God, if it please you, don't give us unusually attracted children. Make them reasonably attracted so they'll not have deep emotional problems with what they look like, but oh God, spare them the curse of excessive beauty or handsomeness. We prayed that. Before they were conceived.

66:31 Your parents may have prayed that, but in spite of it, God gave you an unusually pretty face and fair form. My friend, rather than be proud, it ought to humble you. But that's a horrible thing.

66:49 God resists the proud. He gives grace.

66:55 And in the day of judgment, whatever else is going to happen, God will fulfill the promise of Isaiah that the Lord will bring down the proud and stain the pride of all glory.

Self-Examination: Do People Feel Comfortable in Your Presence?

67:10 Well, there's our text. Where does it find us this morning? We have a heart, by the grace of God, full of the love that will allow no room for boastful bragging. Do people feel comfortable in your presence?

67:26 Or once conversations pass through, they say, oh no, here we go again. A litany of his virtues. A litany of his accomplishments. A litany of his this, her that, her the other thing.

67:38 But do people love to be in your company? Because, because your attention is not focused on you, but on them. You say, I didn't even realize it, but, you know, I told him things. I told her things that I wouldn't have...

67:54 You say, why did I do that? Because you sensed they were there for your benefit. Not you there to promote them. To be another set of ears to listen to all their virtues and all their accomplishments.

68:09 Which one are you? Say, I don't know. Well, go around and ask a few people.

68:15 Go around and ask some people. Say, be honest. Be honest with judgment day honesty. Do you see in me the love that does not indulge in boastful bragging?

68:25 Do you see anything about me that is indicative of a proud, inflated, blowfish spirit? Be honest, my brother, my sister, my husband, my wife, my children. Help me! Because God knows I want to be a man filled with the spirit of love that wants not itself and is not puffed up.

Prayer for Humility and Love

68:45 May God grant that His Word will find its place in our hearts and the Holy Ghost will give us that love. Let us pray.

69:03 Our Father, we thank You for Your Word. We thank You for answering our prayers that we would be given help in seeking to understand it and apply it and feel its pressure upon our consciences. And oh, how we plead with You that where Your Word has discovered boastful bragging, the swelling and puffing up influence of pride and arrogance. Oh, may the Spirit now come as the Spirit of judgment and of burning.

69:37 And may He point every convicted mind and heart to the fountain open for sin and uncleanness. And for those who in their pride and arrogance have never bowed before You, have never taken their place with the derelict, and said, I am unclean, undone. Lord Jesus, have mercy. Will You not bring them to that place?

70:01 Oh, God, crush the pride that would keep them in the delusive notion that they can make it on their own. Oh, that they may come in the flesh-withering, humbling posture of penitent, believing sinners claiming only the blood and righteousness of Christ as their resting place. Seal Your Word to our hearts, we beg of You, for the honor of Your name, for Your dear Son, and for the good of our souls. Amen.