Love in the Exercise of Spiritual Gifts

Transcript

GR 1350
04-22-07
Love in the Exercise of Spiritual Gifts
I Corinthians 13:1-3
Gil Rugh

If you are here regularly at Indian Hills, you'll know we are studying the book of I Corinthians. And we come to one of the more familiar chapters in our Bible, I Corinthians 13. It has the unique distinction of being known as the love chapter in the Bible and if you're going to go to one chapter that unfolds something of the details of the love that God has produced in the hearts of His children, we'd go to I Corinthians 13.

I want to talk a little bit about love generally as it's unfolded in the scripture and it may seem a little bit of an extensive background or introduction to our study, but once we have these facts firmly fixed in our minds and we are reminded again that some of these details in the opening verses that we are going to look at fit into place rather clearly and naturally. The Bible sets forth the fact in a rather open and clear way, that the defining characteristic of God and His dealing with mankind is His love. We want to talk about the characteristic of God you think of when you think of His dealing with mankind, we'd say it's His love. And the defining aspect of this love is the sacrifice of His Son to pay the penalty for our sin. Think of John 3:16, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son in order that whosoever believes in Him might not perish, but have everlasting life". God's love, God gave. And that love is always in the context in the giving of His Son to deal with our sin. You cannot comprehend the love of God apart from understanding something of our sin as human beings, our sin which makes us guilty, personally and individually, before a living God.

Turn over to Romans 5, a passage that Vince read in connection with the song we were singing. Romans 5:6, "For while we were still helpless, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly". Now note that connection. Christ died for the ungodly. For one will hardly die for a righteous man, though perhaps for a good man someone would dare even to die. We're going to talk about that concept of giving your body, sacrificing your life when we move into I Corinthians in a few moments. But look at verse 8, "But God demonstrates His own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us". Down in verse 10, "For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son". You see that repeated stress, and you may have it marked in your Bible. Verse 6, we were helpless, Christ died for the ungodly; verse 8, we were yet sinners; verse 10, we were enemies, helpless, ungodly, sinners, enemies, and Christ died for us. Verse 8 says "God demonstrates His own love toward us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us". You know it's rather popular to talk about the love of God and people talk about God is love. We have all kinds of sentimental and unfounded ideas about this. You know if you do not grasp something of the concept of your sin, your hopeless, helpless condition, the fact that you were the enemy of God and that God had His Son come to earth to suffer and die to pay the penalty for your sin, you have no real concept of love.

There was a commercial probably a number of years ago that appeared on television where a man would walk down the street and a beautiful girl would walk by and he would say, I love you. Well, it was humorous because it was meaningless. Right? He didn't know this person, she meant nothing to him, he had never seen her before. It's like if you leave here today and you go to the restaurant and everybody you walk by you say, I love you, I love you. That doesn't mean anything. And then you go home and say to your wife, I love you. Well, do you love me any differently than the 42 people you've already told that to today? I mean, it just doesn't mean anything.

And people talk about the love of God and they hand it out here in the air and by that they mean God does everything I think He should do, and it's some kind of sentimental, meaningless statement about God. The demonstration of God's love according to God Himself is that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. The same concept as John 3:16, "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son so that those who believe in Him would not perish". You see the concept? We were enemies, we were perishing, we were sinners condemned. But God had His Son, His only begotten Son, His unique Son die for us.

Come over to Ephesians 2. Look how we begin in verse 1, and you were dead in your trespasses and sins. You were dead, you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air. In other words, you walked under the authority and control of the devil. Verse 3, we all lived in the lust of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and the mind. We were by nature children of wrath. Just like the rest of the world. But God being rich in mercy because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ. You see we talk about the love of God, verse 4, and His mercy flows out of His love. God being rich in mercy because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our sins, even when we were children of the devil, by nature as sinners under the wrath of God. He had His Son die for us that we might be identified with Him in His death and in His resurrection. Even when we were dead in our transgressions, He made us alive together in Christ, because Christ died and was buried and was raised. And we are identified with Him.

As you note in Ephesians 2, the end of verse 3, "We were by nature children of wrath". We were born sinners. David said, in sin did my mother conceive me. Now in II Peter 1:4 Peter tells us that because of God's sacrificing His Son on the cross and our faith in His Son which causes us to be born again, we have become partakers of the divine nature. We are now God's children, we partake of His character and His character is love. We've talked in I Corinthians about the fact the Holy Spirit comes to indwell those who are born into God's family. Our bodies become the temple of the Holy Spirit. And what does the Holy Spirit produce in our lives? Galatians 5:22, the fruit of the Holy Spirit is love. And you see the very character and nature of God is now produced in us as His children.

Turn to Ephesians 5:1, "Therefore be imitators of God as beloved children, and walk in love, just as Christ also loved you and gave Himself up for us". You see God is love. We're going to go to that passage in a moment. God demonstrated His love in the sacrifice of His Son. Now we are to become imitators of God as His well-loved children and walk in love. What kind of love? The same kind of love that Christ had for you when He gave Himself up for us, that sacrificing love. This is what we call, the Greek word, agape love. Different words for love in Greek. And this word is the most popular, this family of words related to the noun agape, love. It is used in its various forms some 320 times in the Bible. The next closest word is the word we are familiar with in Philadelphia, philanthropy, phileo love. It's used 50 times, that's the next closest Greek word. So this agape used some 320 times in the Bible. The key element in this word is sacrifice, the willingness to give yourself for someone else. Nothing wrong with phileo love, it is a family love, it is a reciprocal love. But in agape love it is a sacrificing love, it is not related to you receiving something. It's your giving something, giving yourself, sacrificing yourself. So we are to imitate God in His love and following the pattern of Christ who gave Himself up for us.

Back up to John 13, and we are in the last night of Jesus' life. He had dinner with His disciples and so chapters 13-17 of John talk about events of that last evening and the instruction He gave His disciples in anticipation of His betrayal and crucifixion. In John 13:34, "A new commandment I give you that you love one another". You say, I thought there are commandments to love in the Old Testament and we love God and love our neighbors, but here He says I give you a new commandment that you love one another even as I have loved you, that you would also love one another. This is given on the brink of the sacrifice of Himself for them. Now this self-sacrificing love is to become the characteristic of your life. We need to understand, this is not something God does, an act of love, but love is what He is. It's not all that He is, but it is what He is in His being. And His actions flow out of His character. Now as those who are partakers of the divine nature we have the love of God produced in us and now it flows out in our actions. By this all men will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. So it becomes a defining characteristic of believers in their relationship with one another.

Look down in chapter 14 verse 15, "If you love me you will keep my commandments". Now you'll note here, obedience flows out of love and those who love Him obey Him. Jump down to verse 21, "He who has my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me". Verse 23, "If anyone loves me he will keep my word. My Father will love him, we will come to him and make our abode with him. He who does not love me does not keep my words". A person says, I love Christ, I love God, but is not obedient to His Word is a liar. He doesn't love God. Well that's a terrible thing to say, you can't judge him. No, I can't, but God can, He is the judge of all of us and Jesus says that He who has my commandments and keeps them is the one who loves me. Verse 23, "If anyone loves me he will keep my word". Verse 24, "He who does not love me does not keep my words".

Look over in chapter 15 verse 12, "This is my commandment that you love one another, just as I have loved you". I want you to note now, we're talking about God's love produced in and through us. You love one another just as I have loved you, and this is in the context of His impending sacrifice. Greater love has no one than this that one lay down his life for his friends. We're talking about that self-sacrificing love that knows no limits, that gives itself even to the point of death for the good of another. A person says, I don't love them anymore, I'm not in love with them anymore. In other words you're saying that you have not had the love of Christ in your life, it has been some artificial worldly counterfeit. How can you say that? Well you're sitting there breathing, living and you say you don't love them anymore. But the love we're talking about that God produces in a life is a love that sacrifices itself even to the point of death. And as we'll see before we're done in our study of chapter 13, this kind of love has no end.

Turn over to I John 4. I realize this introduction is its own sermon, but you get both sermons for the same price. I John 4:7, and obviously it's the word love and its various forms are used, agape love, some 320 times in our Bibles, we could spend a lot of time and a lot of sermons just studying this one concept, this one word. Look at verse 7, "Beloved", there's our word right there, loved ones. "Let us love one another. Why? For love is from God and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love". There's that statement, God is love. He'll repeat it in a little bit in the same section. Now that doesn't turn around, love is God, so anybody demonstrating love is demonstrating God. We're talking about love in the context of scripture. God is other things than love, God is holy, God is righteous. Sometimes other characteristics, we go through the characteristics or attributes of God. But here, God is love and so love is from God. We're talking about love as it is presented biblically, not man's ideas of love, the world's idea of love where you can watch famous people declare their love for one another. Six months later they are attacking one another and they divorce or whatever. That's not what the Bible is talking about love, we're talking about that self-sacrificing love that knows no limit and knows no end. That's the love that is from God.

Everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love. By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God sent His only begotten Son into the world that we might live through Him. It's similar to Romans 5, God manifested His love to us in this way, He sent His only begotten Son, His unique Son, the one most precious to Him as a sacrifice for sins that we might live. Now that's love, what we're talking about. So we talk about the love of God in us, we're talking about that kind of sacrificial love that will give itself totally. How sad it is and among believers who fall in and out of love, profess to know the love of God and be in love with God, have His character produced in us, and we walk away and say, I don't love them anymore. It raises the serious question, did they ever know the love of God? Because verse 8 says, "The one who does not love does not know God". He's not talking about what the world calls love, he's talking about the love that is produced by the loving God in the heart of those who come to know Him.

Verse 10, "In this is love, not that we loved God but that He loved us". Remember, He loved us. We were helpless, we were enemies, we were sinners. He loved us, He sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. You know what the word propitiation means? It means to appease wrath, to satisfy the demands of justice. The only begotten Son of God had to come down and take our place and bear the wrath of God because He is not only love, He is holy and He is just, to pay the penalty for our sin. So that the demands of justice could be satisfied and God could give us forgiveness through faith in Christ. Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.

Verse 13, "By this we know that we abide in Him because He has given us of His Spirit". And what is the fruit of the Spirit? Galatians 5:22, "The fruit of the Spirit is love". Verse 16, "We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, the one who abides in love abides in God and God abides in Him". This is the realm in which you live, this is not just something we do. This is where we live, this is who we are. God is love and as His child, a partaker of the divine nature, I am to be love, you are to be love. That permeates all that we are and thus all that we do. That's where we live, abide, to dwell, to live there. The one who abides in love abides in God and God abides in Him. By this love is perfected with us that we may have confidence in the Day of Judgment because as He is, so also are we in the world. We are here in the world exercising the love of God, willing to sacrifice ourselves that the lost might hear the glorious gospel, willing to sacrifice ourselves for the spiritual maturing and welfare of other believers.

Verse 19, "We love because He first loved us. If someone says I love God and hates his brethren, he is a liar. For the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen". And this commandment we have from Him, that the one who loves God should love his brother also. How many times does God have to say it? Do we get the point that this is absolutely essential in the eyes of the sovereign God? There is no going around it. Don't say you don't love your brother anymore and claim to love God. What does this say about what goes on in many of our churches? Dealing with believers or not, what does it say about many so-called Christian marriages? Are we dealing with believers or not? I mean, how are we different from the world? Now we're told that the divorce rate among professing Christians, evangelical Christians, is the same as the world. But we supposedly know the God who is love and that limitless love is produced in us so that we are in the world as God is with a sacrificing love that knows no end, no limit, no stop. And we're falling in love and out of love. I'm reminded of Matthew 7, "Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, we did many mighty things in your name and He'll say, depart from me, cursed ones. I never knew you". What makes us think we can parade around without the character of Christ, manifest the nature of the lost, and yet say we have become partakers of the divine nature? God says it is not so. Serious matters.

Come back to I Corinthians. You say, wow, it doesn't sound like a sermon on love to me. But it is. This is a serious matter. If we understand who we are, now we come to I Corinthians, what is said should flow rather simply and clearly. Go to chapter 8 first. Chapter 13 is not the first time Paul talks about this. In fact, he's already rebuked the Corinthians. Verse 1, "Now concerning things sacrificed to idols we know that we all have knowledge. Knowledge makes arrogant, but love edifies". So here the Corinthians were proud of the knowledge they have. But you know knowledge, even of the scripture, divorced from love becomes a destructive thing. Verse 3 says "If anyone loves God he is known by Him". Note that. He can talk about love in the context of loving other believers in the same context of talking about loving God and being known by God, because they are inseparable. We love because He first loved us. So God the initiator bestowed His love upon us, now we are the children of God. And now we are to love one another. And all you have is knowledge, even the correct knowledge, things sacrificed to idols, they are nothing. But knowledge apart from love is destructive.

Look down in verse 11, "For through your knowledge he who is weak is ruined, the brother for whose sake Christ died". I mean, you're using your knowledge in a destructive way because it is not motivated by love. So be sinning against the brethren and wounding their conscience when it is weak, you sin against Christ. So you have this knowledge of truth but you don't have love and it turns out to bring about sin against Christ and the destruction of a weaker Christian. So here's what we are, this circle, love. Now out of this all kinds of things are done, but anything that doesn't flow out of love which is at the heart of our being, is destructive and ruinous and contrary to God's purposes.

Come over to I Corinthians 13. Paul is going to place now the whole discussion of spiritual gifts in the context of love. Remember chapters 12-14 are about love. We ought to keep this in perspective. Gifts that the Spirit has given to enable a believer to function as part of the body of Christ, if used without love, will be destructive to the body of Christ. Just like the knowledge used without love became destructive in the body of Christ. So in I Corinthians 13, our spiritual service with our gifts must be motivated by love. Now think about it. Here is a special spiritual enablement God gives to bring glory to Himself and build up His people and it can be used in such a way that it is destructive and ruinous. We're not going to take the time, but if you look at each of the other passages in Romans 12, Ephesians 4 and I Peter 4, you will find that in the context of talking about spiritual gifts, he also talks about love. This permeates the New Testament so we would expect it to be so.

Look at how chapter 12 ended. Verse 31,"But earnestly desire the greater gifts". And we made a comment about that and we will pick it up again, because look at chapter 14 verse 1, "Pursue love, yet earnestly desire spiritual gifts". We have basically the same statement, earnestly desire spiritual gifts, at the end of chapter 12 and the beginning of chapter 14. Before pursuing anymore instruction about gifts, I want to put them in the context of love, then you'll understand how they are to operate. So he says at the end of verse 31, "I show you a still more excellent way", a way that is more excellent than the pursuit of spiritual gifts, because the pursuit of spiritual gifts must flow out of this or the gifts and you are worthless, of no value. You have to walk in love. Remember we read Ephesians 5, imitate God and His love, walk in love as Christ did in giving Himself. So out of the love we have will come the exercising of our gifts. So our concern is first and foremost, not what is my gift and I'm going to use my gift. And as the Corinthians were taken up with the importance of some of the gifts and the more spectacular gifts, and they ought to have honor for that. Wait a minute, my first concern is how can I serve and help others in the body. What can I do for the benefit of others? In what way could I use my life and give myself to enable you to grow more, to help you be stronger as a believer, to help another person hear the truth. Not, this is my gift, how can I do it. No, first, how can I demonstrate love. Now in this desire to manifest love I will find that my spiritual gift comes to the fore. But my first desire is how can I give myself for your benefit, for the benefit of others. That's love. And out of that comes the exercising of my gift. You get this turned around and pretty soon you find yourself upset, even in the exercising of your gift, because I'm not focused on love. I'm focused on the gift if things don't come together as they should.

You'll note here several things that are going to take place. We're just going to look at the first three verses, in case you wonder where we're going, we'll have to hurry for that. And note, each verse begins with a condition—if this happens. Verse 1, "if I speak"; verse 2, "If I have"; verse 3, "If I give". And that condition is qualified, same statement three times. Verse 1, "But do not have love"; verse 2, the end of the verse, "But do not have love"; the last part of verse 3, "But do not have love". If this is true but I do not have love this is the result. In each of these sections Paul is going to use hyperbole. He is going to go to the extreme in using gifts as an example that no one is being gifted to that extent. He's going to use himself. Look at verse 2, "If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries, all knowledge, have all things". If that were true of me, but that's obviously an extent that no one has. No one has all knowledge because at the end of chapter 13 he'll say, we all know in part at this point. But the point is, if you have a gift greater than anyone else has, to an extent that no one else has ever had this gift, if I have that but don't have love, then it is worthless. So put it in perspective. The first issue is not, what is your gift and how great is it. The issue is your love and how great is it.

So let's pick up with verse 1, "If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels". You'll note here, if I have the gift of tongues to a degree that no one else did. Paul again using himself. If I, if this is true of me as an apostle, if I would have the gift of tongues. I have the gift of tongues so that I could speak all the earthly languages and all the heavenly languages. In other words any language on earth, any language in heaven. The point is not to say that there is a certain language of heaven that angels are speaking, we don't know. The point is wherever you could go with whatever language, the height or the depth, anything on heaven, anything on earth, if I could speak it. We don't know if angels have a different language because every time angels speak in the Bible they speak in the language of the people listening. So no one has to say, they're speaking angelic, I can't understand them. So any time angels are speaking they are speaking in languages........ But the point is there, clearly. If I have the tongues of men, all the languages that we speak on earth and all the languages that angels could speak, that would be tongues to the extreme. But do not have love. Now note, I have the gift of tongues to a degree that no one else ever had it, but I don't have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. I'm just noise. And he doesn't say my gift is noise, but I am noise. I'm just making noise. You know, Paul doesn't separate the person from the gift going on here. So here is a person with a gift of tongues to a degree and extent that no one else has ever had it, but doesn't have love, just empty noise, meaningless noise. There is no spiritual significance, there is no spiritual benefit coming from it. I mean, that's remarkable.

Look at verse 2. "If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries and knowledge". And this goes together. A prophet was someone who received revelation from God, mysteries are things that cannot be known unless God reveals them. Knowledge would have to do with the understanding of what has been revealed. For example, remember Daniel, the prophet. God revealed many wonderful things to him, some of which he didn't understand, and when he asked for explanation, knowledge, the angel told him, it's sealed up, it's not for you to know, it's for a later date. Old Testament prophets, Peter said, wrote about the suffering of Christ and the glory of Christ. They couldn't understand, they didn't have knowledge about it. But here is a person with the gift of prophecy and they know all mysteries, all there is to be revealed. Obviously no one would, but to give you the fullest possibility, Paul says, if I have this and I had all knowledge. So I not only had the revelation of the mysteries, I had the understanding of them all. So I have the gift of prophecy to an extent no one else had ever had it, there is nothing I didn't know about and understand. And add to that, if I have all faith so that I can remove mountains. I take it this gift of faith from chapter 12 verse 9 probably here talking about in the context of wonder working faith, miracle faith, mountain-moving faith. Jesus used that example in Matthew 17 and Matthew 21, faith to move mountains. And it was proverbial as well, besides scripture, and we use it today—faith to move mountains. In other words, there is nothing that I couldn't trust God to get done. Not that anybody ever did literally move the mountain in that sense, there's not any indication that it ever did. In Jesus' travels He never said, I don't feel like walking up that mountain, I'm just going to move it over into the Mediterranean and it will be flat ground and I'll keep on going. But the point is there. So what Paul is saying, if I had this kind of miracle producing faith to move mountains. So here, I have the gift of prophecy, there is nothing that has escaped my knowledge and understanding, I have faith to do the most powerful miracles, nothing is outside that bounds.

But I don't have love. So you'll note here, he doesn't say, those gifts are worthless. He says I am worthless, I am nothing, I am zero. It's not even, well I don't amount to much. Think about it, a person could have the gift of prophecy to a greater degree than anyone ever had, the gift of faith to a greater degree than anyone ever had and be a total zero in God's sight, absolutely worthless, nothing. We say, well I don't think anyone is ever nothing. Then you ought to read the Bible because God says you are nothing. Paul said, I am nothing because my gifts are not what make me what I am. It's the love that Christ has produced in my life. I am nothing, I have no value, I am worthless, I contribute nothing to the body of Christ, I contribute nothing to bringing glory to the living God. I am worthless, without value, without love.

Look at verse 3, "If I give all my possessions to feed the poor, I surrender my body to be burned." We move into philanthropy here, might have to do more with the gift of helps, serving. Here is a person who would give all their possessions to feed the poor. I'm going to sell my house, sell everything I own, liquidate all my stocks, I'm going to take it all and give it to take care of the poor. That would really be popular today. Philanthropy. But if you don't have the love of God, doesn't amount to anything. Not only if you give all your possessions, if you give yourself, your body to be burned. I mean, here is the ultimate sacrifice in that sense. I'm going to give my body to be burned, I'll be a martyr. But if you do it without love, it's of no benefit. Do not have love, it profits me nothing. You see great philanthropic acts, it's something now for the very well-to-do to give their money and it's going to be used to help the poor or find solutions to disease. And that's all fine, but you understand, before God, that benefits nothing. We ought not to be confused on this. You don't buy God, you don't even impress God with your philanthropy. It profits me nothing. It doesn't say it's not all that profitable. No, it profits me zero, nothing. The giving of everything you have for the poor and the giving of your body to be burned, if it is not driven by love, the love that God produces in the heart. That's why God is not pleased with the religious acts of men, the gifts of men. They are not ultimately done in the context of recognizing His love demonstrated in His Son and in humility bowing before Him and placing our faith in His Son that we might enter into His love, and now have that produced in our hearts, a love for Him and thus a love for others. Everything else is nothing to Him and is an act of rebellion. It's offensive to Him. That's why you can read the Old Testament prophets and He can be saying, don't come to worship me anymore, I can't take it, it's repulsive, it only angers me. That's why the Old Testament says the prayers of those who disobey God's Word are an offense to Him. We need to understand the scripture here. We sometimes slide over into a sentimental puddle and we think, at least they pray. How would you like it if we said, at least they offend God. God says if you don't obey my Word, your prayers are an offense. Who are you to think you can storm the gates of heaven, who are you to think you can barge into my presence when I in love gave my Son and you think you can go around Him and come before me. There is only one throne of grace, and that comes through Jesus Christ. I am the way, the truth and the life, no man comes to the Father but by me.

So we understand, now, Paul is writing to the church and here we are as believers and what has happened at Corinth, they are taking even the blessings of God in gifts and failing to function in love, so that they're destroying weak Christians. They are characterized by division and conflict, they are trying to get one up with the exercise of their gift. Where is love in this? Self-sacrificing love that it doesn't matter what I get back, doesn't matter what benefit there is or isn't to me, doesn't matter what it costs me. That doesn't enter my mind. That's the love he is talking about. You know that's remarkable. I think I can preach a sermon, teach the Word of God and it be of no value. It profits me nothing. Doesn't mean that God might not use it in a life, but I am nothing in the doing of it, and it profits me nothing because I didn't do it out of love. So we don't want to get deluded here and tripped up thinking, well, I think God blessed. If I didn't do it out of love, it is nothing to me, I am nothing, God views me as worthless. He may have used His Word. He used Balaam's ass to speak His Word. The donkey was still a donkey, you know, but God used the word. But the donkey was nothing. Ought to tell us something, what God is saying here. We ought to be careful I don't delude myself into thinking, well............. Am I doing it out of love? Part of it comes to, we'll get to the description of love to evaluate myself and see if it really is being done out of love or being done for any number of others. There is only one way to do it right and a multitude of ways to do it wrong. The only right way is to do it out of love, but that's the way I have to do everything in my life. That's why we come to this passage not just about spiritual gifts, but in other contexts. We want to put it in its proper context. Even a spiritual gift can be worthless and I can be worthless in the using of it if it's not done for the glory and honor of God.

I want you to note just what he emphasized in these three verses and then we'll have prayer. In verse 1, "The exercising of the gifts but don't have love, I produce nothing of value, just noise". Nothing of value. Verse 2, "If I have the greatest gift to the greatest degree and don't have love, I am of no value". So verse 1 I produce nothing of value, verse 2 I am of no value. The end of verse 3, "If I go to the ultimate in giving but don't do it out of love I profit nothing, I gain nothing of value". So I can stand before the throne and say, Lord, look at the sermons I've preached. Those are of no value, you didn't do that out of love, desire for their good, sacrifice yourself for their benefit. So I gained nothing of value. I produce nothing of value, I am of no value, I gain nothing of value.

Could God make it any clearer? Without love it is empty, it is worthless. And it's the love that Christ produces in the life. This is God's love, it will be without end. Praise Him for that. Where would we be if there could be an end to His love for us? But it is eternal, just like the one who produces it in us.

Let's pray together. Thank you, Lord, for the greatness of your love. Some of these things stretch us in our understanding. We easily slide into complacency, into sloppiness, into carelessness, even in our service for you, thinking as long as we are doing the right things, that's good enough. Lord, you are the one who judges the motives of the heart, your concern is with why we are doing what we're doing. Lord, how sad that we who have been the recipients of an infinite love think we can measure out our love, that we are justified at times in ending our love. Lord, I pray that your character might be genuine in our lives first of all, and then that we would be concerned to do all that we do to demonstrate that marvelous, sacrificial love that you have for us in the giving of your Son. We give you thanks in Christ's name, amen.