JOY
The Holy Spirit brings joy to every Christian. He fills our hearts with praise and thankfulness to God. Yet as you look back over the past few weeks, how joyful have you been? How can you experience this refreshing fruit of the Spirit more fully?
What do you think of when you hear the word “Joy?”
Charles Spurgeon had a lot to say about joy:
As for joy, if it be not the first product of the Spirit of God, it is next to the first, and we may be sure that the order in which it is placed by the inspired apostle is meant to be instructive. The fruit of the Spirit is love first, as comprehensive of the rest, then joy arising out of it. It is remarkable that joy should take so eminent a place; it attainted unto the first three, and is but one place lower than the first. Look at in its high position, and if you missed it, or if you have depreciated it, revise your judgment, and endeavor with all your heart to attain it, for depend upon it this fruit of the Spirit is of the utmost value, and it is brought forth in believers not alike in all, but to all believers there is a measure of joy.
The word “joyful” is a very sweet and clear one. “Happiness is very dainty word, but yet it is somewhat insecure because if begins with a “hap” and seems to depend on a chance which may happen to the soul. We say “happy-go-luck,” and that is very much the world’s happiness; it is a kind of thing that may hap and may not
hap; but here is no hap in the fruit of the Spirit, which is joy. When we are joyful or full of joy, and that of the best kind, we have favored indeed. No man taketh this joy from us, and a stranger intermeddleth not with it; it is a celestial fruit, and earth cannot produce its like.
There is room in Rome that is filled with the busts of the emperors. I have looked at their heads; they look like a collection of prizefighters and murderers. Brutal passions and cruel thoughts deprive the lords of Rome of all chance of joy. Turn now to the poor hunted Christians, and read the inscriptions left by them in the catacombs; they are so calm and peaceful that they say instinctively, “A joyous people were went to gather here.”
Why should Christians be such a happy people? Why, it is good in all ways. It is good for our God; it gives Him honor among the sons of men when we are glad. It is good for us; it makes us strong. “The joy of the Lord is your strength.” It is good for the ungodly, for when they see Christians glad; they long to be believers themselves. It is good for our fellow Christians; it comforts them and tends to cheer them. Whereas, if we look gloomy we shall spread the disease, and others will be wretched and gloomy too. For all these reasons, and for many more that can be given, it is a good and pleasant thing that a believer should delight himself in God.
Gloomy Christians, who do not resist despondency and strive against it, but who go about as if midnight had taken up its abode in their eyes, and an everlasting frost had settled on their souls are not obeying the commands of God. The command to rejoice is as undoubted a precept of God as to love the lord with all your heart. The vows of God are upon you. O believer, and they bind you to be joyful.
Spurgeon addresses the reason you as a believer may not be experiencing the joy of the Lord by saying that I must notice, in the fourth place, that This Fruit Of The Spirit May be Choked In Its Growth. Some of you may have muttered while I have been speaking of this joy, “I do not know much about it.” Perhaps not , friend, shall I tell you why?
J VERNON MCGEE observes that the world has what they call the “happy hour” in cocktail parlors all across our land. People don’t’ look too happy when they go in, and they sure don’t look happy when they come out! They are a bunch of sots, if you please. That is not joy.
C. S. LEWIS got a bit close to the biblical meaning when he called joy an “unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction.” That statement is a bit obtuse but Lewis then goes on to add that joy “must be sharply distinguished from happiness and from pleasure.” Ultimately Lewis experienced joy when he discovered that Jesus was the wellspring of joy.
C. NORMAN BARTLETT rightly says that joy is more intense than happiness and is not like it, dependent upon outward circumstances or happenings. The difference may be illustrated by a river that flows steadily and continuously onward as compared with the transient hillside torrents produced by cloudbursts. There is no joy to compare with that which flows from a deep, rich and sweet communion with Jesus Christ.
MARTIN LUTHER comments that joy is the voice of the bridegroom and of the bride, that is to say, sweet cogitations of Christ, wholesome exhortations, pleasant songs or psalms, praises and thanksgiving, whereby the godly to instruct, stir up, and refresh one another. Therefore, God loves not heaviness of spirit; He hates comfortless doctrine, heavy and sorrowful cogitations, and loves cheerful hearts. For therefore has He sent His Son, not to oppress us with heaviness and sorrow, but to cheer up our souls in Him. For this cause the prophets, the Apostles, and Christ Himself exhort us, yes they command us to rejoice and be glad; “Rejoice greatly O daughter of Zion; shout, O daughter of Jerusalem; behold thy King cometh unto thee.” (Zechariah 9:9)
And in the Psalms it is often said” “Be joyful in the Lord,” Paul says “”Rejoice in the Lord always.” And Christ says: “Rejoice because your names are written in heaven.” Where this joy of the Spirit is, there the heart inwardly rejoices through faith in Christ, with full assurance that He is our Savior and our Bishop, and outwardly it expresses this joy with words and gestures.
Also, the faithful rejoice when they see that the gospel spreads abroad, that many are won to the faith, and that the kingdom of Christ is enlarged.
JOHN EARDIE writes that joy is based on the possession of present good, here means that spiritual gladness which acceptance with God and change of heart produce. For it is conscious elevation of character, the cessation of the conflict in its early stage, the opening up of a new world, and the hope of final perfection and victory. It is opposed to dullness, despondency, indifference, and all the distractions and remorses which are wrought by the works of the flesh.
This joy is the spring of energy, and praise wells out of the joyful heart. Where the heart is gladness, the instinctive dialect is song. May not the joy of restoration at least equal the joy of continuous innocence? It is therefore here not merely nor prominently Mitfreude, joy in the happiness of other, nor joy as opposed to moroseness, though these aspects or manifestations are not exclude.
MATTHEW HENRY defines joy as cheerfulness in conversations with our friends, or rather a constant delight in God.
DONALD CAMPBELL, former President of Dallas Theological Seminary, says joy, “chara,” is a deep and abiding inner rejoicing which was promised to those who abide in Christ. (John 15:11) It does not depend on circumstances because it rests in God’s sovereign control of all things.
WILLIAM MACDONALD says joy is contentment and satisfaction with God and with His dealings. Christ displayed it in John 4:34.
ADAM CLARK defines joy as “the exultation that arises from a sense of God’s mercy communicated to the soul in the pardon of its iniquities, and the prospect of that eternal glory of which it has the foretaste in the pardon of sin.
WILLIAM BARCLAY adds that it is not the joy that comes from earthy things, still less from triumphing over someone else in competition. It is a joy whose foundation is God.
HAYDN, the great musician, was once asked why his church music was so cheerful, and he replied: “When I think upon God, my heart is so full of joy that the notes dance and leap as it were from my pen, and since God has given me a cheerful heart it will be pardoned me that I serve Him with a cheerful heart.
Biblical joy has a spiritual basis for as Scripture explains this joy:
Is joy in the Holy Spirit: “for the kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.” (Romans 14:17)
Is the joy of faith: “And convinced of this, I know that I shall remain and continue with you all for your progress and joy in the faith.” (Philippians 1:25)
Is the joy of the Holy Spirit: “become initiators of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much tribulation with the joy of the Holy Spirit.” (1 Thessalonians 1:6)
Is joy in the Lord: “Finally, my brethren, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things again is no trouble to me, and it is a safeguard for you.” Philippians 3:1)
Is the welcome which will be addressed to faithful servants: “His master said to him, ‘Well done, good and faithful slave; you were faithful with a few things, I will put you in charge of many things, enter into the joy of your master. (Matthew 25:21,23)
The Christian life is to be a life of joy. It is founded on faith in Jesus, whose life on earth began as “good news of great joy for all people.” Luke 2:10. The theme of joy is underscored by the 59 uses of joy and the 74 uses of rejoice in the New Testament always to signify a feeling of happiness that is based on spiritual realities.
Joy is God’s gift to believers. Paul speaks of more that just a mood. This is a deep confidence that was rooted in God’s sovereign control of the universe, His unchanging promises and eternal spiritual realities including the assurance of ultimate victory for those in Christ.
Joy is a part of God’s own nature and Spirit that He manifests in His children.
Joy is the inevitable overflow of receiving Jesus Christ as Savior and of the believer’s knowing His continuing presence and having a sense of well being experienced by one who knows all is well between himself and the Lord.
Joy not only does not come from favorable human characteristics but is sometimes greatest when those circumstances are the most painful and severe.
God’s joy is full, complete in every way. Nothing human or circumstantial can add to or detract from it. But it is not fulfilled in a believer’s life except through reliance on and obedience to the Lord.
Although joy is a gift of God through His Spirit to those who belong to Christ, it is also commanded of them “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I say, rejoice!” Paul commands it in Philippians 4:4 and 3:1. Because joy comes as a fruit of the Spirit, the command is not the blessed seed of joy they already possess. The command is to gratefully accept and revel in this great blessing they already possess.
Certainly there is joy in human life, such as joy when one experiences a victory, “We will sing for joy over your victory, and in the name of our God we will set up our banners. May the Lord fulfill all your petitions” (Psalm 20:5), or reaps a bountiful harvest. (Isaiah 9:3).
But more often the Bible speaks joy in a spiritual sense. For example, Nehemiah declared to the down in the mouth, not very filled with joy, Jews that “The joy of the lord is your strength.” (Nehemiah 8:10). Similarly, David pleaded with God to “restore to me the joy of Thy salvation” (Psalm 51:12). It is not surprising that joy and rejoicing are found most frequently in the Psalms, about 80 references and the Gospels, about 40 references.
We could go on and on talking about joy. We can discuss the definition of joy, do a word study on it, and I could fill this posting with lots of pages about joy.
What does joy mean to you?
How have you experienced joy?
How does the joy of the Lord strengthen you?
Is it easy to experience joy in the good times?
Do you find it difficult to experience joy in the hard times?
At the beginning of the year when the financial meltdown was the topic of the day on the news channels, at first I was apprehensive about what was going on, mainly because nobody knew exactly was what going to happen next.
There was talk of a depression. I have noticed that everything that was happening, the stock market falling rapidly. I saw it close at –800 points one day. There was the housing market meltdown. People losing their homes. People getting laid off from work by the thousands. All of this was being perpetuated by fear.
I made a decision not to get caught up in the fear. I remembered the Exodus from Egypt. I have a copy of the logistics of the Exodus. It is mind boggling to see what was required to take care of approximately 3 million people. If God could take care of 3 million people for 40 years, feed them, provide water, shelter from the heat, and their clothes and shoes didn’t wear out, then He certainly would not have a problem taking care of me.
I have not worked since December 19th, 2008, except for a couple of weeks with a temp agency. Yet God has met my every need. It has been a joyous occasion to watch Jehovah Jireh do His thing.
I could have focused on my circumstances, which would have depressed me. I chose to focus on my heavenly Father and have enjoyed every moment watching Him provide for me. What joy! The joy of seeing Him provide for my every need strengthened my faith in Him.
He is truly the God who is more than enough! Here is my joy. Enjoying a Father who cares for me take care of me. Joy in the midst of adversity will carry you through. Choose to be joyful and rejoice. No matter what.
Jesus fulfills His words in John 16:24:
"Until now you have asked for nothing in My name; ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be made full.”
I am going to challenge you to spend some time reading the gospels and seeing the joy of Jesus. Pay attention to the passages of Scripture about joy, especially in the gospel of John.
Make a decision to be full of the joy of the Lord, no matter what your circumstances are.
Tuesday, August 18, 2009
FIRST CORINTHIANS 13 PART TWO
LOVE DOES NOT REJOICE IN UNRIGHTEOUSNESS
To rejoice in unrighteousness is to justify it and make wrong appear to be right as Israel turned God’s righteousness upside down in Isaiah’s day.
“Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! (Isaiah 5:20)
The Pulpit Commentary notes that the rejoicing at sin, the taking pleasure in them that commit sin, the exultation over the fall of others into sin, are among the worst forms of malignity. (Romans 1:32)(2 Thessalonians 2:12). The Greeks had a word “epichairo,” to rejoice over, exult over, mostly of malignant joy; “kakia,” evil, to describe “rejoicing at the evil, whether sin or misfortune, of others. (Proverbs 24:17). It is the detestable feeling indicated “that there is something not altogether disagreeable to us in the misfortunes of our best friends.
Ray Pritchard writes that love does not delight in evil. It takes no pleasure in wrongdoing, is not glad about injustice, and is not happy when evil triumphs. And it takes not joy in hearing evil openly discussed.
Love is never glad to hear bad news about another person. Love never says, “Well, they finally got what they deserved.” Love is never happy to hear that a brother or sister fill into sin. Loves does not enjoy passing along bad news. This certainly goes against the grain of modern life. We all know that “bad news sells,” and that good news goes on page 75. That’s why they put those supermarket tabloids right by the checkout counter. We all want to heart the latest juicy gossip about our favorite celebrities. True love isn’t like that. It turns away from cheap gossip and unsubstantiated rumors. And even when the rumor turns out to be true, love takes no pleasure in the misfortunes of others.
Albert Barnes has a thoughtful comment writing that love does not rejoice over the vices of other me; does not take delight when they are guilty of crime, or when, in any manner, they fall into sin. It does not find pleasure in hearing others accused of sin and in having it proved that they have committed it. It does not find a malicious pleasure in the report that they have done wrong; or in following up that report, and finding it established. Wicked men often find pleasure in this, and rejoice when others have fallen into sin, and have disgraced and ruined themselves. Men of the world often find a malignant pleasure in the report and in the evidence that a member of the church had brought dishonor on his profession. A man often rejoices when an enemy, a persecutor, or an alandeter, has committed some crime, and when he has shown an improper spirit, uttered a rash expression, or taken some step which shall involve him in ignominy. But love does none of these things. It does not desire that an enemy, a persecutor, or a slandered should do evil, or should disgrace himself. It does not rejoice, but grieves, when a professor of religion, or an enemy, when a personal friend or foe, has done anything wrong. It neither loves the wrong, nor the fact that it has been done. And perhaps there is no greater triumph of the gospel that in its enabling a man to rejoice that even his enemy and persecutor in any respect does well; or to rejoice that he is in any way honored and respected among men. Human nature, without the gospel, manifests a different feeling; and it is only as the heart is subdued by the gospel, and filled with universal benevolence, that it is brought to rejoice when all men do well.
LOVE REJOICES WITH THE TRUTH
To rejoice with the truth means to be glad about behavior in agreement with the truth of God’s Word. So if someone falls into sin, don’t gloat, grieve, because that is God’s attitude toward over sin. And if they repent, love rejoices.
William Barclay writes that Christian love has no wish to veil the truth; it is brave enough to face the truth; it has nothing to conceal and so is glad when the truth prevails.
Ray Pritchard writes that loves takes joy in what is true and good and right and holy and pure. Love cheers whenever the truth wins out. It is glad to know that suspicions were unfounded. Love believes the best and is glad when the verdict is “not guilty.”
Albert Barnes has a lengthy comment in that the word of truth here stands opposed to iniquity, and means virtue, piety, goodness. It does not rejoice in the vices, but in the virtues of others. It is pleased, it rejoices when they do well. It is pleased when those who differ from us conduct themselves in any manner in such a way as to please God, and to advance their own reputation and happiness. They who are under the influence of that love rejoice that good is done, and the truth defended and advanced, whoever may be the instrument; rejoice that others are successful in their plans of doing good, though they do not act with us; rejoice that other men have a reputation well earned for virtue and purity of life, though they may differ from us in opinion, and may be connected with a different denomination. They do not rejoice when other denominations of Christians fall into error; or when their plans are blasted; or when they are calumniated, and oppressed, and reviled. By whomsoever good is done, or wheresoever, it is to them a matter of rejoicing; and by whomsoever evil is done, or wheresoever, it is to them a matter of grief.
The reason of this is, that all sin, error, and vice, will ultimately ruin the happiness of anyone; and as love desires their happiness, it desires that they should walk in the ways of virtue, and is grieved when they do not. What a change would the prevalence of this feeling produce in the conduct and happiness of mankind! How much ill natured joy would it repress at the faults of others! How much would it do to repress the pains which man often take to circulate reports disadvantageous to his adversary; to find out and establish some flaw in his character; to prove that he has said or done something disgraceful and evil! And how much would it do even among Christians, in restraining them from rejoicing at the errors, mistakes, and improprieties of the friends of revivals of religion, and in leading them mourn over their errors in secret, instead of taking a malicious pleasure in promulgating them to the world! This would be a very different world if there were none to rejoice in iniquity; and the church would be a different church if there were none in its bosom but those who rejoiced in the truth, and in the efforts of humble and self-denying piety.
S. J. Kistemaker comments that love takes notice of the evil in this world but never gloats over it. Instead it grieves over the sins that human beings commit against one another. These wrongdoings may appear in numerous forms: intentional and unintentional evils, sins of commission and omission, harsh persecutions and mild neglect, and last, national conflicts and personal controversies. On the other hand, one of the characteristics of love is the constant attempt to discover good and praiseworthy words, thoughts, and deeds in a person. Love searches out the truth and rejoices when that truth is triumphing over wrong. Love and truth are inseparable partners residing in God Himself. God shares these characteristics with His people. He endowed them with love and truth, which though tainted by sin, are renewed in Christ Jesus through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.
LOVE BEARS ALL THINGS
The word “bears” comes from the Greek word “stego” from “stege,” a thatch or roof or covering of a building. It derives its first meaning from “stege” and thus means to cover closely, to protect by covering and them, to conceal and then, by covering, to bear up under.
The core meaning of “stego” denotes an activity or state which blocks entry from without or exit from within.
Love is that beautiful virtue that throws a cloak of silence over what is displeasing in another person. From this meaning one derives the picture of covering things with the cloak of love and protects.
Spirit controlled and empowered believers love as a lifestyle by choosing as an act of their will to cover over in silence, to “hide” the faults of others, to bear with or endure. Love doesn’t broadcast another’s problems to everyone. Love doesn’t run down others with jokes, sarcasms or put-downs. Love defends the character of the other person as much as possible within the limits of truth. Love won’t lie about weaknesses, but neither will it deliberately expose and emphasize them. Love protects.
Authentic agape love continually seeks to cover and protect the object that is love and for husbands this applies especially to our wives! Love protects other people. It doesn’t broadcast bad news. It goes the second mile to protect another person’s reputation. Love doesn’t point out every flaw of the ones you love. Love doesn’t criticize in public.
F. F. Bruce comments that love covers unworthy things rather than bringing them to the light and magnifying them. It puts up with everything. It is always eager to believe the best and to “put the most favorable construction on ambiguous actions.
John Wesley writes that whatever evil the lover of mankind sees, hears, or knows of anyone, he mentions it to none; it never goes out of his lips, unless where absolute duty constrains to speak.
W. MacDonald adds that love does not needlessly publicize the failures of others, though it must be firm in giving godly discipline when necessary.
John MacArthur adds that the verb “stego” basically means to cover or to support and therefore to protect. Genuine love does not gossip or listen to gossip. Even when a sin is certain, love tries to correct it with the least possible hurt and harm to the guilty person. Love never protects sin but is anxious to protect the sinner. Fallen human nature has the opposite inclination. There is a perverse pleasure in exposing someone’s faults and failures. As already mentioned, that is what makes gossip appealing. The Corinthians cared little for the feelings or welfare of fellow believers. It was every person for himself. Like the Pharisees, they paid little attention to others, except when those others were failing or sinning. Man’s depravity causes him to rejoice in the depravity of others. It is that depraved pleasure that sells magazines and newspapers that cater to exposes, “true confessions,” and the like. It is the same sort of pleasure that makes children tattle on brothers and sisters. Whether to feel self-righteous by exposing another’s sin or to enjoy that sin vicariously, we all are tempted to take a certain kind of pleasure in the sins of others. Love has no part in that. It does not expose or exploit or condemn. It bears; it does not bare.
Matthew Henry writes that love will cover a multitude of sins (I Peter 4:8). It will draw a veil over them, as far as it can consistently with duty. It is not for blazing nor publishing the faults of a brother till duty manifestly demands it. Necessity only can extort this from the charitable mind. Though such a man be free to tell his brother his faults in private, he is very unwilling to expose them by making them public. Thus we do by our own faults, and thus love would teach us to do by the faults of others; not publish them to their shame and reproach, but cover them from public notice as long as we can, and be faithful to God and to others.
It will pass by and put up with injuries, without indulging in anger or cherishing revenge, will be patient upon provocation, and long patient, holds firm, though it be much shocked, and borne hard upon, sustains all manner of injury and ill usage, and bears up under it, such as curses, slanders, prison, exile, bonds, torments, and death itself, for the sake of the injurious, and of others, and perseveres in this firmness. What a fortitude and firmness fervent love will give the mind! What cannot a lover endure for the beloved and for his sake! How many slights and injuries will he put up with! How many hazards will he run and how many difficulties encounter!
LOVE BELIEVES ALL THINGS
Paul is not saying that love is gullible and believes everything and does not exercise qualities such as wisdom and discernment. What he is saying is that love will believe well of others unless convinced otherwise. It seeks to put the best possible construction on another’s words and actions.
In this context, “believes all things” implies that love sees the best in others or gives the other person the benefit of the doubt.
The love that believes has faith in God, who will work out His divine plans even when all the indicators seem to point in different directions. To “believe all things” means that love believes the best that is possible as long as that can be done. Love gives the benefit of the doubt. It takes people at their highest and best, not at their lowest and worst.
Augustine interprets this as “believing the best” about all people.
John Calvin writes that Paul is not saying that a Christian, strips himself of wisdom and discernment, not that he has forgotten how to distinguish black from white!
C. F. Pfeiffer writes that this aspect of love does not include gullibility. It means, rather, that the believer is not to be suspicious. If, however, sin is evident, the believer must judge it and support its discipline.
Albert Barnes writes that “believes all things” cannot mean that the man who is under the influence of love is a man of universal credulity; that he makes no discrimination in regard to things to be believed; and is as prone to believe a falsehood as the truth; or that he is at no pains to inquire what is true and what is false, what is right and what is wrong. But is must mean, that in regard to the conduct of others, there is a disposition to put the best construction on it; to believe that they may be actuated by good motives, and that intend no injury; and that there is a willingness to suppose, as far as can be, that what is done is done consistently with friendship, good feeling, and virtue. Love produces this, because it rejoices in the happiness and virtue of others, and will not believe the contrary except on irrefragable evidence.
William Barclay writes that this characteristic has a twofold aspect: (1) In relation to God it means that love take God at His Word, and can take every promise which begins “Whosoever” and say, “That means me.” (2) In relation to our fellow men it means that love always believes the best about other people.
Matthew Henry writes that love believes and hopes well of others. Indeed love does not by no means destroy prudence, and out mere simplicity and silliness, believe every word. It is apt to believe well of all, to entertain a good opinion of them when there is no appearance to the contrary, nay, to believe well when there may be some dark appearance, if the evidence of ill be not clear.
LOVE HOPES ALL THINGS
Love is not pessimistic but shows a godly optimism. Supernatural love does not have negative and critical spirit, but always positive and hopeful. This love hopes for what is good for another, even when others have ceased to hope.
S. J. Kistemaker has an interesting note writing about the Christian triad of faith, hope, and love. Of these three virtues, hope is often the neglected member overshadowed by faith. Nevertheless, when a tripod loses one of its legs, its fall is inevitable. When a Christian nurtures love and faith but neglects hope, he fails and falters in his spiritual life. Paul frequently wrote the verb to hope which appears in his epistles nineteen time out of a total of thirty-one occurrences in the New Testament. Hope is patient, waiting for positive results that eventually may be realized. Hope is the converse of pessimism and the essence of healthy optimism. Hope is never focused on oneself but always on God in Christ Jesus.
Albert Barnes explains “hopes all things” by saying that all will turn out well. This must also refer to the conduct of others; and it means, that however dark maybe appearances; how much soever there may be to produce the fear that others are actuated by improper motives or are bad men, yet that there is a hope that matter may be explained and made clear; that the difficulties may be made to vanish; and that the conduct of others may be made to appear to be fair and pure. Love will hold on to this hope until all possibility of such a result has vanished, and it is compelled to believe that the conduct is not susceptible of a fair explanation. This hope will extend to all things, to words, and actions, and plans; to public and to private intercourse; to what is said and done in our own presence, and to what is said and done in our absence. Love will do this, because it delights in the virtue and happiness of others, and will not credit anything to the contrary unless compelled to do so.
John MacArthur heard the story of a dog who stayed at the airport of a large city to over five years waiting for his master to return. Employees and others fed the dog and took care of him, but he would not leave the spot where he last saw his master. He would not give up hope that someday they would be reunited. It a dog’s love for his master can produce that kind of hope, how much longer should our love make hope last?
LOVE ENDURES ALL THINGS
A. C. Thiselton writes that this refers to an endurance of setbacks and rebuffs which never gives up on people, whatever they do.
Albert Barnes explains that agape love bears us under, sustains, and does not murmur. Bears us under all persecutions at the hand of man; all efforts to injure the person, property, or reputation; and bears all that be laid upon us in the providence and by the direct agency of God.
Ray Pritchard gets to the heart of the matter by asking, “How can we live this way?” How can we truly love without envy, without a quick temper, without seeking our own interests, and without thinking evil of others? The answer is, we can’t! In ourselves we have no power to live this way. That is why it doesn’t work to say, “Let’s give it the old college try and really to out there and love everyone we meet.” We will never talk ourselves into loving like this, and the sooner we admit that fact, the better off we will be. This isn’t some kind of rah-rah competition where we try to prove our love by our enthusiasm.
Sooner or later we have to get down to the bottom of things and admit the truth, “O God, I hate my husband. I hate my wife. I can’t stand my children. My parents are driving me nuts. I hate the people I work with and I don’t like the folks at church. I don’t love my neighbors and I can barely stand to see my own family. O God, help me. I don’t love anyone right now. And even though no one else knows it or sees it, I am an angry person, fill with bad thoughts and completely lacking in any kind of love. If You don’t help me, I will never love anyone because I know I can’t change the way I am. Lord, God, please help me. Change me. Let your love flow through me. If you want to love others, you’re going to have to do it through me because I can’t do it myself.” That’s the kind of prayer God loves to answer.
I also think it helps to replace “love” with “Jesus” in this passage: “Jesus is patient, Jesus is kind, Jesus does not envy, Jesus thinks no evil, Jesus is not quick tempered, Jesus does not rejoice in what is evil.” If we want to love, we need more of Jesus in our lives. Run to the Cross. Stand there and behold the One who died for you. Look to Jesus. Stand next to Him. Let His live fill your heart. If you will come close to Jesus, His love will begin to fill your heart and you will find yourself filled with supernatural love for others. Your life will begin to change as Jesus become preeminent in your heart.
Now as we come to the end, I’d like to give you some homework. Take some time this week to consider the eleven qualities of love in this passage. Think about them one by one. How do you measure up? Where are you strong and where are you weak. Which three qualities stand out as the greatest need in your life right now? Circle those three and begin to pray about them. Write down one practical step you can take in each of those areas this week. And ask God to help you grow strong in love.
There is a second part to this assignment. During December we are slowly climbing toward Bethlehem. On December 25 we will celebrate the supreme expression of God’s love by the birth of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. I’d like to challenge you to read 1 Corinthians 13 every day this month. December is a wonderful month to learn about love. If you read these 13 verses 31 times, Paul’s words will be tattooed on your soul. And as these words become part of your life, you will find love becoming a daily reality. May God help us to live in love.
William Barclay summarizes this section writing that one things remains to be said, when we think of the qualities of this love as Paul portrays them we can see them realized in the life of Jesus Himself.
K. L. Chafin sums up this description of agape love writing that when I hold this list of the characteristics of love up before my life like a mirror, I am immediately shaken by the many ways in which I fall short of the perfect love that Christ modeled for me. But I also know that nothing will be more important to my life than letting God perfect the gift of love in me, not in some abstract theological way but by helping me learn to truly love every person as God loves me. These fifteen characteristics of God’s kind of love would make a good outline for prayer, meditation, and study as we attempt to live the Christian life.
LOVE NEVER FAILS
The Greek word for “fails” is “pipto” which means to fall, fall down, under judgment, under condemnation, be prostrated or fall prostrate, to fall into ruin, to perish, lose authority, no longer have force.
LOVE NEVER FALLS INTO RUIN.
Metaphorically as used in this verse it means to fall away, to fail or to be without effect. “Pipto” usually denotes to fall and that which falls ceases its activity and that is what love never does.
Paul’s’ point is that through all the ages to come, love will go on in that we will love the Lord and one another. Unlike the leaf of a tree, love never falls off but will abide forever. Paul strengthens this point on the permanence of love by comparing it to the spiritual gifts which Corinthians so highly prized, all these spiritual gifts eventually coming to an end.
Albert Barnes comments that Paul here proceeds to illustrate the value of love, from its permanency as compared with other valued endowments. It is valuable, and is to be sought, because it will always abide; may be always exercised; is adapted to all circumstances, and to all worlds in which we may be placed, or in which we may dwell. The sense is, that while other endowments of the Holy Spirit must soon cease and be valueless, love would abide, and would always exist.
The following are some real life stories from Our Daily Bread and some writings of Oswald Chambers from this book My Utmost for Highest.”
THE CRY FOR LOVE
A father sat at his desk pouring over his monthly bills when his young son rushed in and announced, “Dad, because this is your birthday and you’re 55 years old, I’m going to give you 55 kisses, one for each year!” When the boy started making good on his word, the father exclaimed, “Oh, Andrew, don’t do it now, “I’m too busy!”
The youngster immediately fell silent as tears welled up in his big blue eyes. Apologetically the father said, “You can finish later.” The boy said nothing but quietly walked away, disappointment written all over his face. That evening the father said, “Come and finish the kisses now, Andrew,” But the boy didn’t respond.
A short time after the incident the boy drowned. His heartbroken father wrote, “If only I could tell him how much I regret my thoughtless words, and could be assured that he knows how much my heart is aching.
Love is a two way street. Any loving act must be warmly accepted or it will be taken as rejection and can leave a scar. If we are too busy to give and receive love, we are too busy. Nothing is more important than responding with love to the cry for love from those who are near and precious to us. Henry G. Bosch.
Lord, teach us the secret of loving,
The love You are asking today;
Then help us to love one another,
For this we most earnestly pray. Anon.
LEARNING HOW TO LOVE
Tracey Morrow, who goes by the name of Ice-T, delights in his role as a controversial rap singer whose lyrics are blasphemous and obscene. Yet, inspired by a truce between two violent gangs in Los Angeles, the Crips and the Bloods, he wrote a surprisingly sentimental song, “Gotta Lotta Love.”
Orphaned when young and brought up by relatives who considered him a burden, Ice-T never experienced loving care. “I first found the word love in a gang,” he told an interviewer. “I learned how to love in a gang, not in a family atmosphere.”
No matter how little or how warped the love we may have known in childhood, it is never too late for any of us to learn to love. In God’s sovereignty we may catch a glimpse of love through some individual or a support group, even a gang. But to learn the full meaning and reality of true love, because Jesus laid down his life for us (John 3:16). The death of Jesus, in all of its sacrificial unselfishness, discloses the heights and depths of love. Unfailing is Christ’s matchless love, so kind, so true; and those who come to know that love show love in all they do. Dennis J. DeHaan.
WE LEARN THE TRUE MEANING OF LOVE WHEN WE LOOK AT HOW MUCH CHRIST LOVES US.
THE ESSENTIAL INGREDIENT
A third grade science teacher asked one of her students to describe salt. “Well, um, it’s,” he started, then stopped. He tried again. “Salt is, you know, it’s.” Finally he said, Salt is what makes French fries taste bad when you don’t sprinkle it on.” Many foods are like that, incomplete without a key ingredient. Imagine pizza without cheese, strudel without apples, a banana split without bananas.
The Christian life also has an essential element: love. Paul emphasized its value as he wrote his letter to the Corinthians. Right in the middle of a section about spiritual gifts, he paused to say that even if we have gifts of service, speech, and self-sacrifice but don’t have love, we are nothing (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). We’ve missed the “more excellent way (12:31). A follower of Jesus should love his family, his friends, his fellow believers, those who don’t know Christ, and even his enemies. A true Christian is known by his love.
Doctrinal purity is important. Faith is a magnificent quality, as are actions of obedient service to the lord. But without love, we are about as bland as French fries without salt.
Ask God to help you grow in love until it flows from your heart to others. That is the essential ingredient.
Lord, grant me a loving heart,
A will to give and share,
A whispered prayer upon my lips,
To show I really care. Brandt
Oswald Chambers writes in “My Utmost For His Highest:
Spontaneous Love
Love suffers long and is kind . . . —1 Corinthians 13:4
Love is not premeditated— it is spontaneous; that is, it bursts forth in extraordinary ways. There is nothing of precise certainty in Paul’s description of love. We cannot predetermine our thoughts and actions by saying, "Now I will never think any evil thoughts, and I will believe everything that Jesus would have me to believe." No, the characteristic of love is spontaneity. We don’t deliberately set the statements of Jesus before us as our standard, but when His Spirit is having His way with us, we live according to His standard without even realizing it. And when we look back, we are amazed at how unconcerned we have been over our emotions, which is the very evidence that real spontaneous love was there. The nature of everything involved in the life of God in us is only discerned when we have been through it and it is in our past.
The fountains from which love flows are in God, not in us. It is absurd to think that the love of God is naturally in our hearts, as a result of our own nature. His love is there only because it "has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit (Romans 5:5).
If we try to prove to God how much we love Him, it is a sure sign that we really don’t love Him. The evidence of our love for Him is the absolute spontaneity of our love, which flows naturally from His nature within us. And when we look back, we will not be able to determine why we did certain things, but we can know that we did them according to the spontaneous nature of His love in us. The life of God exhibits itself in this spontaneous way because the fountains of His love are in the Holy Spirit.
'Love One Another'
Love is an indefinite thing to most of us; we don’t know what we mean when we talk about love. Love is the loftiest preference of one person for another, and spiritually Jesus demands that this sovereign preference be for Himself . Initially, when "the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit", it is easy to put Jesus first. But then we must practice the things mentioned in 2 Peter 1 to see them worked out in our lives.
The first thing God does is forcibly remove any insincerity, pride, and vanity from my life. And the Holy Spirit reveals to me that God loved me not because I was lovable, but because it was His nature to do so. Now He commands me to show the same love to others by saying, ". . . love one another as I have loved you". He is saying, "I will bring a number of people around you whom you cannot respect, but you must exhibit My love to them, just as I have exhibited it to you." This kind of love is not a patronizing love for the unlovable— it is His love, and it will not be evidenced in us overnight. Some of us may have tried to force it, but we were soon tired and frustrated.
"The Lord . . . is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish . . ." . I should look within and remember how wonderfully He has dealt with me. The knowledge that God has loved me beyond all limits will compel me to go into the world to love others in the same way. I may get irritated because I have to live with an unusually difficult person. But just think how disagreeable I have been with God! Am I prepared to be identified so closely with the Lord Jesus that His life and His sweetness will be continually poured out through Me? Neither natural love nor God’s divine love will remain and grow in me unless it is nurtured. Love is spontaneous, but it has to be maintained through discipline
"Will You Lay Down Your Life?"
Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends . . .. I have called you friends . . . —John 15:13, 15
Jesus does not ask me to die for Him, but to lay down my life for Him. Peter said to the Lord, "I will lay down my life for Your sake," and he meant it. He had a magnificent sense of the heroic. For us to be incapable of making this same statement Peter made would be a bad thing— our sense of duty is only fully realized through our sense of heroism.
Has the Lord ever asked you, "Will you lay down your life for My sake?". It is much easier to die than to lay down your life day in and day out with the sense of the high calling of God. We are not made for the bright-shining moments of life, but we have to walk in the light of them in our everyday ways. There was only one bright-shining moment in the life of Jesus, and that was on the Mount of Transfiguration. It was there that He emptied Himself of His glory for the second time, and then came down into the demon-possessed valley. For thirty-three years Jesus laid down His life to do the will of His Father. "By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren”. Yet it is contrary to our human nature to do so.
If I am a friend of Jesus, I must deliberately and carefully lay down my life for Him. It is a difficult thing to do, and thank God that it is. Salvation is easy for us, because it cost God so much. But the exhibiting of salvation in my life is difficult. God saves a person, fills him with the Holy Spirit, and then says, in effect, "Now you work it out in your life, and be faithful to Me, even though the nature of everything around you is to cause you to be unfaithful." And Jesus says to us, “ . . . I have called you friends . . ..” Remain faithful to your Friend, and remember that His honor is at stake in your bodily life.
As we have come to the end of the study of the first fruit listed in Galatians chapter 5, love, I have a little study for you to do and some thought provoking questions:
Fruit-Producing Principle/What We Should Do
Matthew 3:8-10
Matthew 7:15-20
Matthew 13:23
John 15:1-8
John 15:16
Romans 7:4
Galatians 5:22,23
Ephesians 5:8-11
Philippians 1:9-11
Colossians 1:9-10
Hebrews 12:11-13
James 3:17-18
How important is “love” to our value as a human being?
How does “love” think about others? What attitudes does it NOT have?
How does “love” regard the needs and feelings of others?
How does “love” react to irritating minor daily incidents?
How does “love” react to lies, scams, schemes and deceiving and tricking others?
How does “love” handle the tough times?
In what important way is “love” different from things such as admiration, lust, passion and liking?
1 John 3:16-18. This is how we have come to know love: He laid down His life for us. We should also lay down our lives for our brothers. (17) If anyone has this world's goods and sees his brother in need but shuts off his compassion from him--how can God's love reside in him? (18) Little children, we must not love in word or speech, but in deed and truth.
How is the love of God to be reflected in the love Christians have for each other? What is wrong with ignoring the obvious needs of others?
John 4:7-12. Dear friends, let us loves one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. (8) The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love. (9) God's love was revealed among us in this way: God sent His One and Only Son into the world so that we might live
through Him. (10) Love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (11) Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another. (12) No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God remains in us and His love is perfected in us.
Who is the source of love?
How was love revealed to us?
What should we do as a result?
How does love change or improve us?
The next fruit in our study is JOY.
DAN WILSON
Ephesians 4 Teacher
ephesians4teacher@hotmail.com
LOVE DOES NOT REJOICE IN UNRIGHTEOUSNESS
To rejoice in unrighteousness is to justify it and make wrong appear to be right as Israel turned God’s righteousness upside down in Isaiah’s day.
“Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil; Who substitute darkness for light and light for darkness; Who substitute bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter! (Isaiah 5:20)
The Pulpit Commentary notes that the rejoicing at sin, the taking pleasure in them that commit sin, the exultation over the fall of others into sin, are among the worst forms of malignity. (Romans 1:32)(2 Thessalonians 2:12). The Greeks had a word “epichairo,” to rejoice over, exult over, mostly of malignant joy; “kakia,” evil, to describe “rejoicing at the evil, whether sin or misfortune, of others. (Proverbs 24:17). It is the detestable feeling indicated “that there is something not altogether disagreeable to us in the misfortunes of our best friends.
Ray Pritchard writes that love does not delight in evil. It takes no pleasure in wrongdoing, is not glad about injustice, and is not happy when evil triumphs. And it takes not joy in hearing evil openly discussed.
Love is never glad to hear bad news about another person. Love never says, “Well, they finally got what they deserved.” Love is never happy to hear that a brother or sister fill into sin. Loves does not enjoy passing along bad news. This certainly goes against the grain of modern life. We all know that “bad news sells,” and that good news goes on page 75. That’s why they put those supermarket tabloids right by the checkout counter. We all want to heart the latest juicy gossip about our favorite celebrities. True love isn’t like that. It turns away from cheap gossip and unsubstantiated rumors. And even when the rumor turns out to be true, love takes no pleasure in the misfortunes of others.
Albert Barnes has a thoughtful comment writing that love does not rejoice over the vices of other me; does not take delight when they are guilty of crime, or when, in any manner, they fall into sin. It does not find pleasure in hearing others accused of sin and in having it proved that they have committed it. It does not find a malicious pleasure in the report that they have done wrong; or in following up that report, and finding it established. Wicked men often find pleasure in this, and rejoice when others have fallen into sin, and have disgraced and ruined themselves. Men of the world often find a malignant pleasure in the report and in the evidence that a member of the church had brought dishonor on his profession. A man often rejoices when an enemy, a persecutor, or an alandeter, has committed some crime, and when he has shown an improper spirit, uttered a rash expression, or taken some step which shall involve him in ignominy. But love does none of these things. It does not desire that an enemy, a persecutor, or a slandered should do evil, or should disgrace himself. It does not rejoice, but grieves, when a professor of religion, or an enemy, when a personal friend or foe, has done anything wrong. It neither loves the wrong, nor the fact that it has been done. And perhaps there is no greater triumph of the gospel that in its enabling a man to rejoice that even his enemy and persecutor in any respect does well; or to rejoice that he is in any way honored and respected among men. Human nature, without the gospel, manifests a different feeling; and it is only as the heart is subdued by the gospel, and filled with universal benevolence, that it is brought to rejoice when all men do well.
LOVE REJOICES WITH THE TRUTH
To rejoice with the truth means to be glad about behavior in agreement with the truth of God’s Word. So if someone falls into sin, don’t gloat, grieve, because that is God’s attitude toward over sin. And if they repent, love rejoices.
William Barclay writes that Christian love has no wish to veil the truth; it is brave enough to face the truth; it has nothing to conceal and so is glad when the truth prevails.
Ray Pritchard writes that loves takes joy in what is true and good and right and holy and pure. Love cheers whenever the truth wins out. It is glad to know that suspicions were unfounded. Love believes the best and is glad when the verdict is “not guilty.”
Albert Barnes has a lengthy comment in that the word of truth here stands opposed to iniquity, and means virtue, piety, goodness. It does not rejoice in the vices, but in the virtues of others. It is pleased, it rejoices when they do well. It is pleased when those who differ from us conduct themselves in any manner in such a way as to please God, and to advance their own reputation and happiness. They who are under the influence of that love rejoice that good is done, and the truth defended and advanced, whoever may be the instrument; rejoice that others are successful in their plans of doing good, though they do not act with us; rejoice that other men have a reputation well earned for virtue and purity of life, though they may differ from us in opinion, and may be connected with a different denomination. They do not rejoice when other denominations of Christians fall into error; or when their plans are blasted; or when they are calumniated, and oppressed, and reviled. By whomsoever good is done, or wheresoever, it is to them a matter of rejoicing; and by whomsoever evil is done, or wheresoever, it is to them a matter of grief.
The reason of this is, that all sin, error, and vice, will ultimately ruin the happiness of anyone; and as love desires their happiness, it desires that they should walk in the ways of virtue, and is grieved when they do not. What a change would the prevalence of this feeling produce in the conduct and happiness of mankind! How much ill natured joy would it repress at the faults of others! How much would it do to repress the pains which man often take to circulate reports disadvantageous to his adversary; to find out and establish some flaw in his character; to prove that he has said or done something disgraceful and evil! And how much would it do even among Christians, in restraining them from rejoicing at the errors, mistakes, and improprieties of the friends of revivals of religion, and in leading them mourn over their errors in secret, instead of taking a malicious pleasure in promulgating them to the world! This would be a very different world if there were none to rejoice in iniquity; and the church would be a different church if there were none in its bosom but those who rejoiced in the truth, and in the efforts of humble and self-denying piety.
S. J. Kistemaker comments that love takes notice of the evil in this world but never gloats over it. Instead it grieves over the sins that human beings commit against one another. These wrongdoings may appear in numerous forms: intentional and unintentional evils, sins of commission and omission, harsh persecutions and mild neglect, and last, national conflicts and personal controversies. On the other hand, one of the characteristics of love is the constant attempt to discover good and praiseworthy words, thoughts, and deeds in a person. Love searches out the truth and rejoices when that truth is triumphing over wrong. Love and truth are inseparable partners residing in God Himself. God shares these characteristics with His people. He endowed them with love and truth, which though tainted by sin, are renewed in Christ Jesus through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.
LOVE BEARS ALL THINGS
The word “bears” comes from the Greek word “stego” from “stege,” a thatch or roof or covering of a building. It derives its first meaning from “stege” and thus means to cover closely, to protect by covering and them, to conceal and then, by covering, to bear up under.
The core meaning of “stego” denotes an activity or state which blocks entry from without or exit from within.
Love is that beautiful virtue that throws a cloak of silence over what is displeasing in another person. From this meaning one derives the picture of covering things with the cloak of love and protects.
Spirit controlled and empowered believers love as a lifestyle by choosing as an act of their will to cover over in silence, to “hide” the faults of others, to bear with or endure. Love doesn’t broadcast another’s problems to everyone. Love doesn’t run down others with jokes, sarcasms or put-downs. Love defends the character of the other person as much as possible within the limits of truth. Love won’t lie about weaknesses, but neither will it deliberately expose and emphasize them. Love protects.
Authentic agape love continually seeks to cover and protect the object that is love and for husbands this applies especially to our wives! Love protects other people. It doesn’t broadcast bad news. It goes the second mile to protect another person’s reputation. Love doesn’t point out every flaw of the ones you love. Love doesn’t criticize in public.
F. F. Bruce comments that love covers unworthy things rather than bringing them to the light and magnifying them. It puts up with everything. It is always eager to believe the best and to “put the most favorable construction on ambiguous actions.
John Wesley writes that whatever evil the lover of mankind sees, hears, or knows of anyone, he mentions it to none; it never goes out of his lips, unless where absolute duty constrains to speak.
W. MacDonald adds that love does not needlessly publicize the failures of others, though it must be firm in giving godly discipline when necessary.
John MacArthur adds that the verb “stego” basically means to cover or to support and therefore to protect. Genuine love does not gossip or listen to gossip. Even when a sin is certain, love tries to correct it with the least possible hurt and harm to the guilty person. Love never protects sin but is anxious to protect the sinner. Fallen human nature has the opposite inclination. There is a perverse pleasure in exposing someone’s faults and failures. As already mentioned, that is what makes gossip appealing. The Corinthians cared little for the feelings or welfare of fellow believers. It was every person for himself. Like the Pharisees, they paid little attention to others, except when those others were failing or sinning. Man’s depravity causes him to rejoice in the depravity of others. It is that depraved pleasure that sells magazines and newspapers that cater to exposes, “true confessions,” and the like. It is the same sort of pleasure that makes children tattle on brothers and sisters. Whether to feel self-righteous by exposing another’s sin or to enjoy that sin vicariously, we all are tempted to take a certain kind of pleasure in the sins of others. Love has no part in that. It does not expose or exploit or condemn. It bears; it does not bare.
Matthew Henry writes that love will cover a multitude of sins (I Peter 4:8). It will draw a veil over them, as far as it can consistently with duty. It is not for blazing nor publishing the faults of a brother till duty manifestly demands it. Necessity only can extort this from the charitable mind. Though such a man be free to tell his brother his faults in private, he is very unwilling to expose them by making them public. Thus we do by our own faults, and thus love would teach us to do by the faults of others; not publish them to their shame and reproach, but cover them from public notice as long as we can, and be faithful to God and to others.
It will pass by and put up with injuries, without indulging in anger or cherishing revenge, will be patient upon provocation, and long patient, holds firm, though it be much shocked, and borne hard upon, sustains all manner of injury and ill usage, and bears up under it, such as curses, slanders, prison, exile, bonds, torments, and death itself, for the sake of the injurious, and of others, and perseveres in this firmness. What a fortitude and firmness fervent love will give the mind! What cannot a lover endure for the beloved and for his sake! How many slights and injuries will he put up with! How many hazards will he run and how many difficulties encounter!
LOVE BELIEVES ALL THINGS
Paul is not saying that love is gullible and believes everything and does not exercise qualities such as wisdom and discernment. What he is saying is that love will believe well of others unless convinced otherwise. It seeks to put the best possible construction on another’s words and actions.
In this context, “believes all things” implies that love sees the best in others or gives the other person the benefit of the doubt.
The love that believes has faith in God, who will work out His divine plans even when all the indicators seem to point in different directions. To “believe all things” means that love believes the best that is possible as long as that can be done. Love gives the benefit of the doubt. It takes people at their highest and best, not at their lowest and worst.
Augustine interprets this as “believing the best” about all people.
John Calvin writes that Paul is not saying that a Christian, strips himself of wisdom and discernment, not that he has forgotten how to distinguish black from white!
C. F. Pfeiffer writes that this aspect of love does not include gullibility. It means, rather, that the believer is not to be suspicious. If, however, sin is evident, the believer must judge it and support its discipline.
Albert Barnes writes that “believes all things” cannot mean that the man who is under the influence of love is a man of universal credulity; that he makes no discrimination in regard to things to be believed; and is as prone to believe a falsehood as the truth; or that he is at no pains to inquire what is true and what is false, what is right and what is wrong. But is must mean, that in regard to the conduct of others, there is a disposition to put the best construction on it; to believe that they may be actuated by good motives, and that intend no injury; and that there is a willingness to suppose, as far as can be, that what is done is done consistently with friendship, good feeling, and virtue. Love produces this, because it rejoices in the happiness and virtue of others, and will not believe the contrary except on irrefragable evidence.
William Barclay writes that this characteristic has a twofold aspect: (1) In relation to God it means that love take God at His Word, and can take every promise which begins “Whosoever” and say, “That means me.” (2) In relation to our fellow men it means that love always believes the best about other people.
Matthew Henry writes that love believes and hopes well of others. Indeed love does not by no means destroy prudence, and out mere simplicity and silliness, believe every word. It is apt to believe well of all, to entertain a good opinion of them when there is no appearance to the contrary, nay, to believe well when there may be some dark appearance, if the evidence of ill be not clear.
LOVE HOPES ALL THINGS
Love is not pessimistic but shows a godly optimism. Supernatural love does not have negative and critical spirit, but always positive and hopeful. This love hopes for what is good for another, even when others have ceased to hope.
S. J. Kistemaker has an interesting note writing about the Christian triad of faith, hope, and love. Of these three virtues, hope is often the neglected member overshadowed by faith. Nevertheless, when a tripod loses one of its legs, its fall is inevitable. When a Christian nurtures love and faith but neglects hope, he fails and falters in his spiritual life. Paul frequently wrote the verb to hope which appears in his epistles nineteen time out of a total of thirty-one occurrences in the New Testament. Hope is patient, waiting for positive results that eventually may be realized. Hope is the converse of pessimism and the essence of healthy optimism. Hope is never focused on oneself but always on God in Christ Jesus.
Albert Barnes explains “hopes all things” by saying that all will turn out well. This must also refer to the conduct of others; and it means, that however dark maybe appearances; how much soever there may be to produce the fear that others are actuated by improper motives or are bad men, yet that there is a hope that matter may be explained and made clear; that the difficulties may be made to vanish; and that the conduct of others may be made to appear to be fair and pure. Love will hold on to this hope until all possibility of such a result has vanished, and it is compelled to believe that the conduct is not susceptible of a fair explanation. This hope will extend to all things, to words, and actions, and plans; to public and to private intercourse; to what is said and done in our own presence, and to what is said and done in our absence. Love will do this, because it delights in the virtue and happiness of others, and will not credit anything to the contrary unless compelled to do so.
John MacArthur heard the story of a dog who stayed at the airport of a large city to over five years waiting for his master to return. Employees and others fed the dog and took care of him, but he would not leave the spot where he last saw his master. He would not give up hope that someday they would be reunited. It a dog’s love for his master can produce that kind of hope, how much longer should our love make hope last?
LOVE ENDURES ALL THINGS
A. C. Thiselton writes that this refers to an endurance of setbacks and rebuffs which never gives up on people, whatever they do.
Albert Barnes explains that agape love bears us under, sustains, and does not murmur. Bears us under all persecutions at the hand of man; all efforts to injure the person, property, or reputation; and bears all that be laid upon us in the providence and by the direct agency of God.
Ray Pritchard gets to the heart of the matter by asking, “How can we live this way?” How can we truly love without envy, without a quick temper, without seeking our own interests, and without thinking evil of others? The answer is, we can’t! In ourselves we have no power to live this way. That is why it doesn’t work to say, “Let’s give it the old college try and really to out there and love everyone we meet.” We will never talk ourselves into loving like this, and the sooner we admit that fact, the better off we will be. This isn’t some kind of rah-rah competition where we try to prove our love by our enthusiasm.
Sooner or later we have to get down to the bottom of things and admit the truth, “O God, I hate my husband. I hate my wife. I can’t stand my children. My parents are driving me nuts. I hate the people I work with and I don’t like the folks at church. I don’t love my neighbors and I can barely stand to see my own family. O God, help me. I don’t love anyone right now. And even though no one else knows it or sees it, I am an angry person, fill with bad thoughts and completely lacking in any kind of love. If You don’t help me, I will never love anyone because I know I can’t change the way I am. Lord, God, please help me. Change me. Let your love flow through me. If you want to love others, you’re going to have to do it through me because I can’t do it myself.” That’s the kind of prayer God loves to answer.
I also think it helps to replace “love” with “Jesus” in this passage: “Jesus is patient, Jesus is kind, Jesus does not envy, Jesus thinks no evil, Jesus is not quick tempered, Jesus does not rejoice in what is evil.” If we want to love, we need more of Jesus in our lives. Run to the Cross. Stand there and behold the One who died for you. Look to Jesus. Stand next to Him. Let His live fill your heart. If you will come close to Jesus, His love will begin to fill your heart and you will find yourself filled with supernatural love for others. Your life will begin to change as Jesus become preeminent in your heart.
Now as we come to the end, I’d like to give you some homework. Take some time this week to consider the eleven qualities of love in this passage. Think about them one by one. How do you measure up? Where are you strong and where are you weak. Which three qualities stand out as the greatest need in your life right now? Circle those three and begin to pray about them. Write down one practical step you can take in each of those areas this week. And ask God to help you grow strong in love.
There is a second part to this assignment. During December we are slowly climbing toward Bethlehem. On December 25 we will celebrate the supreme expression of God’s love by the birth of His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. I’d like to challenge you to read 1 Corinthians 13 every day this month. December is a wonderful month to learn about love. If you read these 13 verses 31 times, Paul’s words will be tattooed on your soul. And as these words become part of your life, you will find love becoming a daily reality. May God help us to live in love.
William Barclay summarizes this section writing that one things remains to be said, when we think of the qualities of this love as Paul portrays them we can see them realized in the life of Jesus Himself.
K. L. Chafin sums up this description of agape love writing that when I hold this list of the characteristics of love up before my life like a mirror, I am immediately shaken by the many ways in which I fall short of the perfect love that Christ modeled for me. But I also know that nothing will be more important to my life than letting God perfect the gift of love in me, not in some abstract theological way but by helping me learn to truly love every person as God loves me. These fifteen characteristics of God’s kind of love would make a good outline for prayer, meditation, and study as we attempt to live the Christian life.
LOVE NEVER FAILS
The Greek word for “fails” is “pipto” which means to fall, fall down, under judgment, under condemnation, be prostrated or fall prostrate, to fall into ruin, to perish, lose authority, no longer have force.
LOVE NEVER FALLS INTO RUIN.
Metaphorically as used in this verse it means to fall away, to fail or to be without effect. “Pipto” usually denotes to fall and that which falls ceases its activity and that is what love never does.
Paul’s’ point is that through all the ages to come, love will go on in that we will love the Lord and one another. Unlike the leaf of a tree, love never falls off but will abide forever. Paul strengthens this point on the permanence of love by comparing it to the spiritual gifts which Corinthians so highly prized, all these spiritual gifts eventually coming to an end.
Albert Barnes comments that Paul here proceeds to illustrate the value of love, from its permanency as compared with other valued endowments. It is valuable, and is to be sought, because it will always abide; may be always exercised; is adapted to all circumstances, and to all worlds in which we may be placed, or in which we may dwell. The sense is, that while other endowments of the Holy Spirit must soon cease and be valueless, love would abide, and would always exist.
The following are some real life stories from Our Daily Bread and some writings of Oswald Chambers from this book My Utmost for Highest.”
THE CRY FOR LOVE
A father sat at his desk pouring over his monthly bills when his young son rushed in and announced, “Dad, because this is your birthday and you’re 55 years old, I’m going to give you 55 kisses, one for each year!” When the boy started making good on his word, the father exclaimed, “Oh, Andrew, don’t do it now, “I’m too busy!”
The youngster immediately fell silent as tears welled up in his big blue eyes. Apologetically the father said, “You can finish later.” The boy said nothing but quietly walked away, disappointment written all over his face. That evening the father said, “Come and finish the kisses now, Andrew,” But the boy didn’t respond.
A short time after the incident the boy drowned. His heartbroken father wrote, “If only I could tell him how much I regret my thoughtless words, and could be assured that he knows how much my heart is aching.
Love is a two way street. Any loving act must be warmly accepted or it will be taken as rejection and can leave a scar. If we are too busy to give and receive love, we are too busy. Nothing is more important than responding with love to the cry for love from those who are near and precious to us. Henry G. Bosch.
Lord, teach us the secret of loving,
The love You are asking today;
Then help us to love one another,
For this we most earnestly pray. Anon.
LEARNING HOW TO LOVE
Tracey Morrow, who goes by the name of Ice-T, delights in his role as a controversial rap singer whose lyrics are blasphemous and obscene. Yet, inspired by a truce between two violent gangs in Los Angeles, the Crips and the Bloods, he wrote a surprisingly sentimental song, “Gotta Lotta Love.”
Orphaned when young and brought up by relatives who considered him a burden, Ice-T never experienced loving care. “I first found the word love in a gang,” he told an interviewer. “I learned how to love in a gang, not in a family atmosphere.”
No matter how little or how warped the love we may have known in childhood, it is never too late for any of us to learn to love. In God’s sovereignty we may catch a glimpse of love through some individual or a support group, even a gang. But to learn the full meaning and reality of true love, because Jesus laid down his life for us (John 3:16). The death of Jesus, in all of its sacrificial unselfishness, discloses the heights and depths of love. Unfailing is Christ’s matchless love, so kind, so true; and those who come to know that love show love in all they do. Dennis J. DeHaan.
WE LEARN THE TRUE MEANING OF LOVE WHEN WE LOOK AT HOW MUCH CHRIST LOVES US.
THE ESSENTIAL INGREDIENT
A third grade science teacher asked one of her students to describe salt. “Well, um, it’s,” he started, then stopped. He tried again. “Salt is, you know, it’s.” Finally he said, Salt is what makes French fries taste bad when you don’t sprinkle it on.” Many foods are like that, incomplete without a key ingredient. Imagine pizza without cheese, strudel without apples, a banana split without bananas.
The Christian life also has an essential element: love. Paul emphasized its value as he wrote his letter to the Corinthians. Right in the middle of a section about spiritual gifts, he paused to say that even if we have gifts of service, speech, and self-sacrifice but don’t have love, we are nothing (1 Corinthians 13:1-3). We’ve missed the “more excellent way (12:31). A follower of Jesus should love his family, his friends, his fellow believers, those who don’t know Christ, and even his enemies. A true Christian is known by his love.
Doctrinal purity is important. Faith is a magnificent quality, as are actions of obedient service to the lord. But without love, we are about as bland as French fries without salt.
Ask God to help you grow in love until it flows from your heart to others. That is the essential ingredient.
Lord, grant me a loving heart,
A will to give and share,
A whispered prayer upon my lips,
To show I really care. Brandt
Oswald Chambers writes in “My Utmost For His Highest:
Spontaneous Love
Love suffers long and is kind . . . —1 Corinthians 13:4
Love is not premeditated— it is spontaneous; that is, it bursts forth in extraordinary ways. There is nothing of precise certainty in Paul’s description of love. We cannot predetermine our thoughts and actions by saying, "Now I will never think any evil thoughts, and I will believe everything that Jesus would have me to believe." No, the characteristic of love is spontaneity. We don’t deliberately set the statements of Jesus before us as our standard, but when His Spirit is having His way with us, we live according to His standard without even realizing it. And when we look back, we are amazed at how unconcerned we have been over our emotions, which is the very evidence that real spontaneous love was there. The nature of everything involved in the life of God in us is only discerned when we have been through it and it is in our past.
The fountains from which love flows are in God, not in us. It is absurd to think that the love of God is naturally in our hearts, as a result of our own nature. His love is there only because it "has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit (Romans 5:5).
If we try to prove to God how much we love Him, it is a sure sign that we really don’t love Him. The evidence of our love for Him is the absolute spontaneity of our love, which flows naturally from His nature within us. And when we look back, we will not be able to determine why we did certain things, but we can know that we did them according to the spontaneous nature of His love in us. The life of God exhibits itself in this spontaneous way because the fountains of His love are in the Holy Spirit.
'Love One Another'
Love is an indefinite thing to most of us; we don’t know what we mean when we talk about love. Love is the loftiest preference of one person for another, and spiritually Jesus demands that this sovereign preference be for Himself . Initially, when "the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit", it is easy to put Jesus first. But then we must practice the things mentioned in 2 Peter 1 to see them worked out in our lives.
The first thing God does is forcibly remove any insincerity, pride, and vanity from my life. And the Holy Spirit reveals to me that God loved me not because I was lovable, but because it was His nature to do so. Now He commands me to show the same love to others by saying, ". . . love one another as I have loved you". He is saying, "I will bring a number of people around you whom you cannot respect, but you must exhibit My love to them, just as I have exhibited it to you." This kind of love is not a patronizing love for the unlovable— it is His love, and it will not be evidenced in us overnight. Some of us may have tried to force it, but we were soon tired and frustrated.
"The Lord . . . is longsuffering toward us, not willing that any should perish . . ." . I should look within and remember how wonderfully He has dealt with me. The knowledge that God has loved me beyond all limits will compel me to go into the world to love others in the same way. I may get irritated because I have to live with an unusually difficult person. But just think how disagreeable I have been with God! Am I prepared to be identified so closely with the Lord Jesus that His life and His sweetness will be continually poured out through Me? Neither natural love nor God’s divine love will remain and grow in me unless it is nurtured. Love is spontaneous, but it has to be maintained through discipline
"Will You Lay Down Your Life?"
Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends . . .. I have called you friends . . . —John 15:13, 15
Jesus does not ask me to die for Him, but to lay down my life for Him. Peter said to the Lord, "I will lay down my life for Your sake," and he meant it. He had a magnificent sense of the heroic. For us to be incapable of making this same statement Peter made would be a bad thing— our sense of duty is only fully realized through our sense of heroism.
Has the Lord ever asked you, "Will you lay down your life for My sake?". It is much easier to die than to lay down your life day in and day out with the sense of the high calling of God. We are not made for the bright-shining moments of life, but we have to walk in the light of them in our everyday ways. There was only one bright-shining moment in the life of Jesus, and that was on the Mount of Transfiguration. It was there that He emptied Himself of His glory for the second time, and then came down into the demon-possessed valley. For thirty-three years Jesus laid down His life to do the will of His Father. "By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren”. Yet it is contrary to our human nature to do so.
If I am a friend of Jesus, I must deliberately and carefully lay down my life for Him. It is a difficult thing to do, and thank God that it is. Salvation is easy for us, because it cost God so much. But the exhibiting of salvation in my life is difficult. God saves a person, fills him with the Holy Spirit, and then says, in effect, "Now you work it out in your life, and be faithful to Me, even though the nature of everything around you is to cause you to be unfaithful." And Jesus says to us, “ . . . I have called you friends . . ..” Remain faithful to your Friend, and remember that His honor is at stake in your bodily life.
As we have come to the end of the study of the first fruit listed in Galatians chapter 5, love, I have a little study for you to do and some thought provoking questions:
Fruit-Producing Principle/What We Should Do
Matthew 3:8-10
Matthew 7:15-20
Matthew 13:23
John 15:1-8
John 15:16
Romans 7:4
Galatians 5:22,23
Ephesians 5:8-11
Philippians 1:9-11
Colossians 1:9-10
Hebrews 12:11-13
James 3:17-18
How important is “love” to our value as a human being?
How does “love” think about others? What attitudes does it NOT have?
How does “love” regard the needs and feelings of others?
How does “love” react to irritating minor daily incidents?
How does “love” react to lies, scams, schemes and deceiving and tricking others?
How does “love” handle the tough times?
In what important way is “love” different from things such as admiration, lust, passion and liking?
1 John 3:16-18. This is how we have come to know love: He laid down His life for us. We should also lay down our lives for our brothers. (17) If anyone has this world's goods and sees his brother in need but shuts off his compassion from him--how can God's love reside in him? (18) Little children, we must not love in word or speech, but in deed and truth.
How is the love of God to be reflected in the love Christians have for each other? What is wrong with ignoring the obvious needs of others?
John 4:7-12. Dear friends, let us loves one another, because love is from God, and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. (8) The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love. (9) God's love was revealed among us in this way: God sent His One and Only Son into the world so that we might live
through Him. (10) Love consists in this: not that we loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. (11) Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we also must love one another. (12) No one has ever seen God. If we love one another, God remains in us and His love is perfected in us.
Who is the source of love?
How was love revealed to us?
What should we do as a result?
How does love change or improve us?
The next fruit in our study is JOY.
DAN WILSON
Ephesians 4 Teacher
ephesians4teacher@hotmail.com
Tuesday, August 04, 2009
FIRST CORINTHIANS 13
1 Corinthians 13:4-8
Love is patient, love is kind, and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. (NASB)
I Corinthians 13:4-8
Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never is envious nor boils over with jealousy, is not boastful or vainglorious, does not display itself haughtily. It is not conceited, arrogant and inflated with pride; it is not rude, unmannerly, and does not act unbecomingly. Love, God’s love in us, does not insist on its own rights or its own way, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or fretful or resentful; it takes no account of the evil done to it, it pays no attention to a suffered wrong. It does not rejoice at injustice and everything that comes, is ever ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures everything without weakening. (THE AMPLIFIED BIBLE)
Love is the first quality listed in Galatians chapter 5. The best place to start our study on love is to go to 1 Corinthians 13.
We will start off with some insights from others and then I will have some comments at the end.
Paul begins with two positive aspects of love, love is patient, love is kind. The first is passive, not retaliating. The second is active, bestowing benefits.
This twofold opening statement stands as a daily challenge to every Christian! But the “descriptive definition” does not stop here but is followed with a series of primarily negative aspects of love; love never brags, is never arrogant and so on.
This description of “agape” should drive every believer to the foot of the Cross and to a complete surrender to our lord Jesus Christ, Who is the perfect fulfillment of “agape” and Who alone by His Spirit’s filling and control can enable us to work out this aspect of our salvation in fear and trembling to the glory of the Father.
Remember the context of the preceding three verses of this “crown jewel of Holy Scripture for there we learn that love is indispensable and is more important than eloquent communication, spiritual gifts, or personal sacrifice. We may have all the trappings of true religion but if we don’t have love, we don’t have anything at all.
The Corinthians were impatient with each other, suing each other, tolerating sin in the church, and creating problems because they did not have love. Paul emphasizes that whatever gifts and or qualities a believer may possess, they are nothing without love.
A. T. Robertson says that 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 pictures the character or conduct of love in a marvelous rhapsody.
Chrysostom adds that here Paul makes an outline of love’s matchless beauty, adorning its image with all aspects of virtue, as if with many colors brought together with precision.
C. F. Pfeiffer has an interesting comment writing that one might almost say that love is personified here, since the description is practically a description of the life and character of Jesus Christ. However, the picture is directly related to the Corinthians. The observance of the truths of this chapter would have solved their problems.
C. Hodge introduces this famous passage noting that almost all the instructions of the New Testament are suggested by some occasion and are adapted to it. This chapter is not a methodical dissertation on Christian love, but shows that grace is contrasted with the extraordinary gifts that the Corinthians valued inordinately. Therefore, the traits of love that are mentioned are those that contrasted with the Corinthians use of their gifts. They were impatient, discontented; envious, puffed up, selfish, indecorous, unmindful of the feelings and interests of others, suspicious, resentful, censorious. The apostle personifies love and places her before them and lists her graces not in logical order but as they occurred to him in contrast to the deformities of character that the Corinthians displayed.
John MacArthur explains that “agape love” is the greatest virtue of the Christian life. Yet that type of love was rare in pagan Greek literature. That’s because the traits of “agape” love portrays, unselfishness, self-giving, willful devotion, concern for the welfare of others, were mostly disdained in ancient Greek culture as signs of weakness. However, the New Testament declares “agape” to be the character trait around which all others revolve. The apostle John writes, “God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. (1 John 4:16)
LOVE IS PATIENT
The word “patient” used here is the Greek word “makrothumeo.”
“Makrothumeo” describes manifesting a state of emotional calm or quietness in the face of provocation, misfortune or unfavorable circumstances. Love never says, “I’ve had enough.” It suffers indefinitely. It is longsuffering and continues in spite of conduct likely to quench it. This continuance often, but not always, shows itself in restraining anger.
“Makrothumeo” describes especially patience towards people who act unjustly toward us. Another verb meaning to be patient is “hupomeno” which describes patience under circumstances, although there can be some overlap for circumstances often involve people. In other words the emphasis of “makrothumeo” is not so much a call to patience with circumstances as to patience with people. The action indicated by both verbs is essential to development of our Christian character, for patience with people is just as important as patience with circumstances. Patience is the righteous standard God expects all believers to conform to no matter what person he places, or allows, into your life or whatever trying circumstance you might face.
W. E. Vine has this note on “makrothumeo” writing that longsuffering is that quality of self-restraint in the face of provocation which does not hastily retaliate nor promptly punish; it is the opposite of anger and is associated with mercy.
L. O. Richards adds that the word group “makrothumeo” and “makrothumia” focuses our attention on restraint: that capacity of self-control despite circumstances that might arouse the passions or cause agitation. In personal relationships, patience is forbearance. This is not so much a trait as a way of life. We keep on loving or forgiving despite provocation, as illustrated in Jesus’ pointed stories in Matthew 18.
P. W. Barnett notes that “makrothumeo” is a metaphorical word, literally “long burning,” as of a decent log burning for many hours in an open fire, as contrasted with light pine kindling that fizzes and sputters, sending showers of sparks in all directions.
Chrysotom, and early church father, said that “makrothumeo” is a word which is used of the man who is wronged and who has it easily in his power to avenge himself but will never do it.
J. Vernon McGee writes that the idea is “long-burning,” it burns a long time. We should not have a short fuse with our friends and Christian brothers. We should not make snap judgments.
Illustration of love is patient:
Paul Tan illustrates this trait writing that during the late 1500’s, Dr. Thomas Cooper edited a dictionary with the addition of 33.000 words and many other improvements. He had already been collecting materials for eight years when his wife, a rather difficult woman, went into his study one day while he was gone and burned all of his notes under the pretense of fearing that he would kill himself with study. Eight years of work, a pile of ashes! Dr. Cooper came home, saw the destruction, and asked who had done it. His wife told him boldly that she had done it. The patient man heaved a deep sigh and said, “Oh Dinah, Dinah, thou hast given a world of trouble!” Then he quietly sat down to another eight years of hard labor, to replace the notes which she had destroyed. Next time you thing you’ve arrived at being patient, Dr. Cooper’s example will give you something to imitate!
LOVE IS KIND
The idea is that the kind person is disposed to be useful or helpful, even seeking out the needs of the other person to selflessly meet those needs without expectation of being repaid in kind! This quality of love inclines one to be of good service to others.
The Greek word for “kind” used here is “chresteuomai,” which basically means to provide something beneficial for someone as an act of kindness. It is an attitude of being willing to help or assist rendering gracious, well-disposed service to others. It is active goodwill. It not only feels generous, but is generous. It also describes one’s “gentle in behavior.”
“Chresteuomai” is not merely passive but it is actively engaged in doing good to others. It’s the picture of a person who spontaneously seeks the good for others and shows it with friendly acts. It is considerate and helpful to others, is gently and mild and always ready to show compassion.
Matthew Henry describes this kindness as benign, bountiful; it is courteous and obliging. The law of kindness is in her lips; her heart is large, and her hand open. She is ready to show favors and to do good. She seeks to be useful; not only seizes on opportunities of doing good, but searched for them. This is her general character. She is patient under injuries, and apt and inclined to do all the good offices in her power. And under these two generals all the particulars of the character may be reduced.
Ray Pritchard has the following thoughts on a selfless love that is always kind writing that “chresteuomai” means something like “sweet usefulness.” Love is quick to help others and eager to reach out to those in need. Perhaps you have seen this famous quote:
“I shall pass through this world but once. Any good thing, therefore, that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer it, or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.”
Mark Twain called kindness “a language that the deaf ear can hear and the blind can read.”
In one of his news reports, Paul Harvey told about a man named Carl Coleman who was driving to work when a woman motorist, passing too close, snagged his fender and hers. Both cars stopped. The young woman surveying the damage was in tears. It was her fault, she admitted. But it was a new car, less than two days from the showroom. How was she ever going to face her husband? Mr. Coleman was sympathetic but explained they must not each other’s license number and automobile registration. The woman reached into the glove compartment of her to retrieve the documents in an envelope. And on the first paper to tumble out, in a heavy masculine scrawl, were these words: “In case of accident, remember, Honey, it’s you I love, not the car.”
John MacArthur notes that the first test of Christian kindness, and the test of every aspect of love, is the home. The Christian husband who acts like a Christian is kind to his wife and children. Christian brothers and sisters are kind to each other and to their parents. They have more than a kind feeling toward each other; they do kind, helpful things for each other, to the point of loving self-sacrifice, when necessary. For the Corinthians, kindness meant giving up their selfish jealous, spiteful, and proud attitudes and adopting the spirit of loving-kindness.
Now Paul begins a series of 8 negative definitions that do not spring from love, for love and jealousy, etc, are mutually exclusive. Where one is, the other cannot be.
LOVE IS NOT JEALOUS
The Greek word used for “jealous” is “zeloo” which means to be fervent, to “boil” with envy, to be jealous. It can used commendably to refer to a striving for something or showing zeal.
Whether “zeloo” is constructive zeal or destructive envy depends on the context. In 1 Corinthians 13:4 “zeloo” clearly is used in a bad sense of a hostile emotion based on resentment which is “heated or boiling” with envy, hatred or anger.
“Zeloo” in the bad sense can be manifest in two forms, one is which the person sets their heart on something that belongs to someone else or a second form in which one has intense feelings over another’s achievements or success.
A. C. Thiselton adds that “zeloo” applies the notion of burning or boiling metaphorically to burning or boiling emotions, stance, or will for earnest striving, for passionate zeal, or for burning envy. Whether it is constructive zeal or destructive envy depends on the context. The envy which is carried over from a status seeking, non-Christian Corinthian culture into the Christian church is not of the Holy Spirit, and is deemed to be incompatible with love, which does not begrudge the status and honor of another, but delights in it for the sake of the other.
Augustine wrote that the reason why love does not envy is because it is not puffed up. For where puffing up precedes, envy follows, because pride is the mother of envy.
John MacArthur writes that the second sort of jealousy is more than selfish; it is desiring evil for someone else. It is jealousy on the deepest, most corrupt, and destructive level. That is the jealousy Solomon uncovered in the woman who pretended to be a child’s mother. When her own infant son died, she secretly exchanged him for the baby of a friend who was staying with her. The true mother discovered what had happened and, when their dispute was taken before the king, he ordered the baby to be cut in half, a half to be given to each woman. The true mother pleaded for the baby to be spared, even if it meant losing possession of him. The false mother, however, would rather have had the baby killed than for the true mother to have him. (1 Kings 3:16-27)
William Barclay phrases it this way writing that there are two kinds of envy. The one covets the possessions of other people; and such envy is very difficult to avoid because it is a very human thing. The other is worse, it grudges the very fact that others should have what it has not; it does not so much want things for itself as wish that others had not got them. Meanness of soul can sink no further than that.
How significant is the sin of jealousy? Proverbs explains that “Wrath is fierce and anger is a flood, but who can stand before jealousy? (Proverbs 27:4)
It is therefore not surprising to observe that the Bible is filled with illustrations that portray the disastrous effect of jealousy on personal relationships, beginning with Cain’s envy of Abel resulting in his murder of his own brother! (Genesis 4:3-8)
Moses records the jealousy of Joseph’s brothers writing:
And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind”
“Now then, come and let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits; and we will say, A wild beast devoured him. Then let us see what will become of his dreams.”
“Come, and let us sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; for he is our brother, our own. And his brothers listened to him. (Genesis 37:11, 20. 27)
In the New Testament Luke records other jealousy motivated acts (in Acts) writing that:
“The high priest rose up, along with all his associates (that is the sect of the Sadducees), and they were filled with jealousy and they laid hands on the apostles, and put them in a public jail. (Acts 5:17-18)
“But when the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy, and began contradicting the things spoken by Paul, and were blaspheming.” (Acts 13:45)
What you are filled with clearly will control you.
When one is filled with jealousy, their actions are controlled by that green monster. Not surprisingly we see that the divine antidote for one fill with jealousy is to continually be filled with the Holy Spirit.
Spirit borne Christian love does not manifest this attitude and this trait is never to be a part of the Christian’s “wardrobe.” Loves does not desire for itself the possessions of or control over people. A loving person is never jealous but is glad for the success of others, even if their success works against his own.
Ray Pritchard writes that jealousy is the sin of those who think others have too much and they have too little. By contrast, love is generous. It does not begrudge others their gifts. How do you respond to the good fortune of others? If they do better than you, if they prosper when you don’t, if their family seems happy while yours is torn apart, how will you react? If they achieve what you cannot, if they gain what you lack, if they win where you lose, then the truth will come out. Can you lose gracefully? Can you walk away from the contest without bitterness?
If you live long enough, you will probably find someone who does what you do better than you can do it. You will meet people with your talents and your gifts, only much more of them. You will find people who surpass you in every way. What will you do then? This one test of love. And if you live long enough, you are certain to encounter people who are less talented and less gifted than you in every way, yet they seem to catch all the breaks and end up ahead of you in the great game of life. How will you respond when an inferior person passes you by? This is even sterner test of love.
How do your react when other Christians receive blessings or benefits that we lack?
Do you allow the sparks of envy to burn and them to a full flame?
No one is more miserable than someone filled with jealousy or envy. They rob us of happiness and make our good accomplishments seem bad. Furthermore, they exact their own punishment.
On the wall of a chapel in Padua, an old city in northeastern Italy, hangs a painting by the Renaissance artist Giotto. The painter depicted envy with long ears that could hear every bit of news of another’s success. He also gave Envy the tongue of a serpent to poison the reputation of the one being envied. But if you could look at the painting carefully, you would notice that the tongue coils back and stings the eyes of the figure itself. Not only did Giotto picture envy being blind, but also as destroying itself with its own venomous evil.
If we resent the success and accomplishments of others and find ourselves striking out at them with damaging words or insidious innuendoes, we have a problem with jealousy. But God wants to administer the antidote of love. That alone will keep us from becoming jealousy’s victim.
LOVES DOES NOT BRAG
“Perpereuomai” is the Greek word for brag. It means to talk with conceit or to behave as a braggart or windbag, exhibiting self-display and employing rhetorical embellishments in extolling one’s self excessively.
Love does not try to prove itself and say, “Watch how loving I can be” but instead works behind the scenes.
Love does not parade it accomplishments. It does vaunt oneself so as to parade one’s imagined superiority over others.
Love does not vaunt itself even regarding gifts which it really possesses, which is clearly an indirect rebuke of those at Corinth who used their spiritual gifts for display. Love creates a self-effacing stance rather than giving in to the temptation to assume an air of superiority.
William Barclay writes that there is a self-effacing quality in love. True love will always be far more impressed with is own unworthiness that its own merit.
A. C. Thiselton comments that again the verb underlines the issue of status seeking and triumphalism at Corinth. Even believers seemed to have come to act the part of braggarts, which was at odds with cruciform, Christlike love.
S. J. Kistenmaker adds that such a person parades his embellished rhetoric to gain recognition. His behavior is marked by egotism, subservience toward superiors, and
Condescension toward subordinates. A braggart exhibits pride in himself and his accomplishments. But such bragging is devoid of love to God and to one’s fellow man, and is blatant sin. Further, bragging and arrogance go hand in hand.
John MacArthur has an interesting not explaining that bragging is the other side of jealousy. Jealousy is wanting what someone else has. Bragging is trying to make others jealous of what we have. Jealousy puts others down; bragging builds us up. It is ironic that, as much as most us dislike bragging in others, we are so inclined to brag ourselves. C. S. Lewis called bragging the “utmost evil.” It is the epitome of pride, which is the root of all sins. Bragging puts ourselves first. Everyone else, including God must therefore be of less importance to us. It is impossible to build ourselves up without putting others down. When we brag, we can be “up” only if others are down.
LOVE IS NOT ARROGANT
“Phusioo” is the Greek word for arrogant, which literally means to puff up like a pair of bellows, and is used figuratively to describe one who becomes “inflated”, proud, haughty or puffed up with pride.
It means to cause one to have an exaggerated self-conception.
William Barclay illustrates the complete opposite of arrogant writing that Napoleon always advocated the sanctity of the home and the obligation of public worship, for others. Of himself he said, “I am not a man life other men. The laws of morality to not apply to me.”
The really great man never thinks of his own importance. Carey, who began life as a cobbler, was one of the greatest missionaries and certainly one of the greatest linguist the world has ever seen. He translated at least parts of the Bible into no fewer that thirty-four Indian languages. When he came to India, he was regarded with dislike and contempt. At a dinner party a snob with the idea of humiliating him, said in a tone that everyone could hear. “I suppose, Mr. Carey, you once worked as a shoe maker.” “No, your lordship,” answered Carey, “not a shoe make, only a cobbler.” He did not even claim to make shoes, only to mend them. No one likes the “important” person. Man dressed in a little brief authority can be a sorry sight.
A. C. Thiselton comments that Paul hammers home the incompatibility of love as respect and concern for the welfare of the other and obsessions about the status and attention accorded to the self. How much behavior among believers and even ministers is actually “attention seeking” designed to impress others with one’s own supposed importance? Some “spiritual songs” may appear to encourage, rather than discourage, this preoccupation with the self rather than with others and with God.
Matthew Henry adds that those who exhibit “agape” will do nothing out of a spirit of contention or vainglory. 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. These ill qualities can never grow out of tender affections for the brethren, nor a diffusive benevolence.
LOVE DOES NOT ACT UNBECOMINGLY
“Act unbecomingly” comes from the Greek word “aschemoneo,” which means to behave in an ugly, indecent, unseemingly or unbecoming manner.
It means to be ill mannered or rude. This verb speaks of an act in defiance of social and moral standards, with resulting disgrace, embarrassment, and shame. It describes one who acts improperly or with rudeness. It means to behave unmannerly, disgracefully or dishonorably.
G. G. Findlay alluding to this verb writes that: Love imparts a delicacy of feeling beyond the rules of politeness.
A. C. Thiselton does not hold back commenting that love does not elbow its way into conversations, worship services, or public institutions in a disruptive, discourteous, attention-seeking way. The background here may allude to the intrusion of tongues or prophecies at inappropriate moments. But today it may also include any kind of monopolizing of a congregation’s time and attention in the service of the self; in the tone, style, and vocabulary adopted in notices or sermons, or worst of all, the minister over familiar chat show host or “prophet’ of ill mannered rebuke.
Steven Cole relates a tragic illustration. I read of a man who was generally lacking in manners. He never opened the car door for his wife. “She doesn’t have two broken are,” he would say. After many years of marriage, his wife died. At the funeral, as the pallbearers brought her casket out to the hearse, the husband was standing by the door. The funeral director, who knew the husband by name, called out to him and said, “Open the door for her, will you?” He reached for the car door and the, for one second, froze. He realized that he had never opened the door for her in life; now, in her death, it would be the first, last, and only time. A lifetime of regret came crashing down around him. Love is not rude.
LOVE DOES NOT SEEK ITS OWN
Seek its own means that the loveless person desires to have his or her own way, or the highway! Such selfish behavior is the polar opposite of sacrificial love. And the church at Corinth was rife with this sin for they were selfish in the extreme not sharing their food at love feasts, protecting their “rights” and even suing fellow believers in non-Christian setting and using their spiritual gifts not to benefit others but their own advantage.
They did not use their gifts to edify or build up the church but to try to build up themselves up.
Alan Redpath strikes a painful chord to most of us who have been married for any length of time writing that the secret of every discord in Christian homes, communities and churches is that we seek our own way and our own glory.
A. C.Thiselton adds that agape spells judgment on the life that centers round the ego and its interests. For when God’s agape I shed abroad in a man’s heart through the Holy Spirit his life thereby gains a new center. The emphasis is transferred from his own ego to Christ.
Elisabeth Elliot was once speaking on the subject of selfless love to an audience that included some young children who were sitting right in front of her. As she spoke, she wondered how she could make this plain to them, so that they could apply it. Later, she got a letter from one of those children, a six-year-old boy, who wrote, “ I am learning to lay down my life for my little sister. She has to take a nap in the afternoon. I don’t have to take a nap. But she can’t go to sleep unless I come and lay down beside her. So I lay down with my little sister.” That boy is learning to love! If husbands and wives, as well as children, would apply this verse as that little boy did, our homes would be free of conflict.
LOVE IS NOT PROVOKED
Figuratively “paroxuno,” the Greek word for provoked, came to mean to spur on, to cause to be upset, to stimulate as used in this verse to arouse of stir some to anger.
Paul is referring to sinful anger that is never provoked in one who is living out selfless, supernatural love. They are willing to endure slights and insults even as did the One Who is the essence of these attitudes of agape love. And it is His life in us as the Spirit of Christ that enables us to manifest this love, which is not possible in our own strength.
A. C. Thiselton notes that the heart of the word conveys the semantic force of to exasperate, to irritate, as metaphorical extensions of to make sharp, to make pointed, to make acid.
Virtually every lexicon and primary source indicates the notion of reaching a level of exasperation. But how does this express itself.
The English word “pique” combines the same range of nuances as the Greek: something between irritation and anger which takes offense because one’s self-regard has been dented, wounded, or punctured by some sharp point.
Love, Paul urges, does not become exasperated into pique, a transient feeling of wounded vanity, partly because patience delays exasperation and partly because of lack of self interest diverts a sense of self importance away from reacting on the ground of wounded pride: “it is not embittered by injuries, whether real or supposed.
J. B. Phillips paraphrases it well writing that love “in not touchy” which conveys the readiness of overreact on one’s own behalf.
Henry Drummond in “The Greatest Thing in the World” wrote the following about this negative trait noting that the peculiarity of ill temper is that it is the vice of the virtuous. It is often the one blot on an otherwise noble character. You know men who are but perfect, and women who would be entirely perfect, but for an easily ruffled, quick tempered, or “touch” disposition.
John MacArthur has some pithy thoughts regarding the individual who is easily provoked writing that the great colonial preacher and theologian Jonathan Edwards had a daughter with an uncontrollable temper. When a young man fell in love with her and asked her father for her hand in marriage, Dr. Edwards replied, “You can’t have her.” “But I love her and she loves me,” he protested. “It doesn’t matter” the father insisted. Asked why, he said, “Because she is not worthy of you.” “But she is a Christian isn’t she?” “Yes,” said Edwards, “but the grace of God can live with some people with whom no one else could ever live.”
Surely the number one reason both for mental and physical illness in our society today is the overwhelming preoccupation with our rights and the consequent lovelessness. When everyone is fighting for his own rights, no one can really succeed or be happy. Everyone grabs, not one gives, and everyone loses, even when one gets what he wants. Lovelessness can never win in any meaningful or lasting way. It always costs more that it gains.
We get angry when another person gains a privilege or recognition we want for ourselves, because it is our “right.” But to put our rights before our duty and before loving concern for others comes from self-centeredness and lovelessness. The loving person is more concerned about doing what he should and helping where he can that having what he things are his rights and his due. Love considers nothing it right and everything its obligation.
Telling our wives and husbands that we love them is not convincing if we continually get upset and angry at what they say or do. Telling our children that we love them is not convincing if we often yell at them for doing things that irritate us and interfere with our plans. It does no good to protest, “I lose my temper a lot, but it’s all over in a few minutes.” So is a nuclear bomb. A great deal of damage can be done in very short time. Temper is always destructive, and even small temper “bombs” can leave much hurt and damage, especially when they explode on a regular basis. Lovelessness is the cause of temper, and love is the only cure.
Love that takes a person out of himself and centers his attention on the well being of others is the only cure for self-centeredness
1 Corinthians 13:4-8
Love is patient, love is kind, and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails; but if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be done away. (NASB)
I Corinthians 13:4-8
Love endures long and is patient and kind; love never is envious nor boils over with jealousy, is not boastful or vainglorious, does not display itself haughtily. It is not conceited, arrogant and inflated with pride; it is not rude, unmannerly, and does not act unbecomingly. Love, God’s love in us, does not insist on its own rights or its own way, for it is not self-seeking; it is not touchy or fretful or resentful; it takes no account of the evil done to it, it pays no attention to a suffered wrong. It does not rejoice at injustice and everything that comes, is ever ready to believe the best of every person, its hopes are fadeless under all circumstances, and it endures everything without weakening. (THE AMPLIFIED BIBLE)
Love is the first quality listed in Galatians chapter 5. The best place to start our study on love is to go to 1 Corinthians 13.
We will start off with some insights from others and then I will have some comments at the end.
Paul begins with two positive aspects of love, love is patient, love is kind. The first is passive, not retaliating. The second is active, bestowing benefits.
This twofold opening statement stands as a daily challenge to every Christian! But the “descriptive definition” does not stop here but is followed with a series of primarily negative aspects of love; love never brags, is never arrogant and so on.
This description of “agape” should drive every believer to the foot of the Cross and to a complete surrender to our lord Jesus Christ, Who is the perfect fulfillment of “agape” and Who alone by His Spirit’s filling and control can enable us to work out this aspect of our salvation in fear and trembling to the glory of the Father.
Remember the context of the preceding three verses of this “crown jewel of Holy Scripture for there we learn that love is indispensable and is more important than eloquent communication, spiritual gifts, or personal sacrifice. We may have all the trappings of true religion but if we don’t have love, we don’t have anything at all.
The Corinthians were impatient with each other, suing each other, tolerating sin in the church, and creating problems because they did not have love. Paul emphasizes that whatever gifts and or qualities a believer may possess, they are nothing without love.
A. T. Robertson says that 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 pictures the character or conduct of love in a marvelous rhapsody.
Chrysostom adds that here Paul makes an outline of love’s matchless beauty, adorning its image with all aspects of virtue, as if with many colors brought together with precision.
C. F. Pfeiffer has an interesting comment writing that one might almost say that love is personified here, since the description is practically a description of the life and character of Jesus Christ. However, the picture is directly related to the Corinthians. The observance of the truths of this chapter would have solved their problems.
C. Hodge introduces this famous passage noting that almost all the instructions of the New Testament are suggested by some occasion and are adapted to it. This chapter is not a methodical dissertation on Christian love, but shows that grace is contrasted with the extraordinary gifts that the Corinthians valued inordinately. Therefore, the traits of love that are mentioned are those that contrasted with the Corinthians use of their gifts. They were impatient, discontented; envious, puffed up, selfish, indecorous, unmindful of the feelings and interests of others, suspicious, resentful, censorious. The apostle personifies love and places her before them and lists her graces not in logical order but as they occurred to him in contrast to the deformities of character that the Corinthians displayed.
John MacArthur explains that “agape love” is the greatest virtue of the Christian life. Yet that type of love was rare in pagan Greek literature. That’s because the traits of “agape” love portrays, unselfishness, self-giving, willful devotion, concern for the welfare of others, were mostly disdained in ancient Greek culture as signs of weakness. However, the New Testament declares “agape” to be the character trait around which all others revolve. The apostle John writes, “God is love, and the one who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him. (1 John 4:16)
LOVE IS PATIENT
The word “patient” used here is the Greek word “makrothumeo.”
“Makrothumeo” describes manifesting a state of emotional calm or quietness in the face of provocation, misfortune or unfavorable circumstances. Love never says, “I’ve had enough.” It suffers indefinitely. It is longsuffering and continues in spite of conduct likely to quench it. This continuance often, but not always, shows itself in restraining anger.
“Makrothumeo” describes especially patience towards people who act unjustly toward us. Another verb meaning to be patient is “hupomeno” which describes patience under circumstances, although there can be some overlap for circumstances often involve people. In other words the emphasis of “makrothumeo” is not so much a call to patience with circumstances as to patience with people. The action indicated by both verbs is essential to development of our Christian character, for patience with people is just as important as patience with circumstances. Patience is the righteous standard God expects all believers to conform to no matter what person he places, or allows, into your life or whatever trying circumstance you might face.
W. E. Vine has this note on “makrothumeo” writing that longsuffering is that quality of self-restraint in the face of provocation which does not hastily retaliate nor promptly punish; it is the opposite of anger and is associated with mercy.
L. O. Richards adds that the word group “makrothumeo” and “makrothumia” focuses our attention on restraint: that capacity of self-control despite circumstances that might arouse the passions or cause agitation. In personal relationships, patience is forbearance. This is not so much a trait as a way of life. We keep on loving or forgiving despite provocation, as illustrated in Jesus’ pointed stories in Matthew 18.
P. W. Barnett notes that “makrothumeo” is a metaphorical word, literally “long burning,” as of a decent log burning for many hours in an open fire, as contrasted with light pine kindling that fizzes and sputters, sending showers of sparks in all directions.
Chrysotom, and early church father, said that “makrothumeo” is a word which is used of the man who is wronged and who has it easily in his power to avenge himself but will never do it.
J. Vernon McGee writes that the idea is “long-burning,” it burns a long time. We should not have a short fuse with our friends and Christian brothers. We should not make snap judgments.
Illustration of love is patient:
Paul Tan illustrates this trait writing that during the late 1500’s, Dr. Thomas Cooper edited a dictionary with the addition of 33.000 words and many other improvements. He had already been collecting materials for eight years when his wife, a rather difficult woman, went into his study one day while he was gone and burned all of his notes under the pretense of fearing that he would kill himself with study. Eight years of work, a pile of ashes! Dr. Cooper came home, saw the destruction, and asked who had done it. His wife told him boldly that she had done it. The patient man heaved a deep sigh and said, “Oh Dinah, Dinah, thou hast given a world of trouble!” Then he quietly sat down to another eight years of hard labor, to replace the notes which she had destroyed. Next time you thing you’ve arrived at being patient, Dr. Cooper’s example will give you something to imitate!
LOVE IS KIND
The idea is that the kind person is disposed to be useful or helpful, even seeking out the needs of the other person to selflessly meet those needs without expectation of being repaid in kind! This quality of love inclines one to be of good service to others.
The Greek word for “kind” used here is “chresteuomai,” which basically means to provide something beneficial for someone as an act of kindness. It is an attitude of being willing to help or assist rendering gracious, well-disposed service to others. It is active goodwill. It not only feels generous, but is generous. It also describes one’s “gentle in behavior.”
“Chresteuomai” is not merely passive but it is actively engaged in doing good to others. It’s the picture of a person who spontaneously seeks the good for others and shows it with friendly acts. It is considerate and helpful to others, is gently and mild and always ready to show compassion.
Matthew Henry describes this kindness as benign, bountiful; it is courteous and obliging. The law of kindness is in her lips; her heart is large, and her hand open. She is ready to show favors and to do good. She seeks to be useful; not only seizes on opportunities of doing good, but searched for them. This is her general character. She is patient under injuries, and apt and inclined to do all the good offices in her power. And under these two generals all the particulars of the character may be reduced.
Ray Pritchard has the following thoughts on a selfless love that is always kind writing that “chresteuomai” means something like “sweet usefulness.” Love is quick to help others and eager to reach out to those in need. Perhaps you have seen this famous quote:
“I shall pass through this world but once. Any good thing, therefore, that I can do, or any kindness that I can show to any human being, let me do it now. Let me not defer it, or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.”
Mark Twain called kindness “a language that the deaf ear can hear and the blind can read.”
In one of his news reports, Paul Harvey told about a man named Carl Coleman who was driving to work when a woman motorist, passing too close, snagged his fender and hers. Both cars stopped. The young woman surveying the damage was in tears. It was her fault, she admitted. But it was a new car, less than two days from the showroom. How was she ever going to face her husband? Mr. Coleman was sympathetic but explained they must not each other’s license number and automobile registration. The woman reached into the glove compartment of her to retrieve the documents in an envelope. And on the first paper to tumble out, in a heavy masculine scrawl, were these words: “In case of accident, remember, Honey, it’s you I love, not the car.”
John MacArthur notes that the first test of Christian kindness, and the test of every aspect of love, is the home. The Christian husband who acts like a Christian is kind to his wife and children. Christian brothers and sisters are kind to each other and to their parents. They have more than a kind feeling toward each other; they do kind, helpful things for each other, to the point of loving self-sacrifice, when necessary. For the Corinthians, kindness meant giving up their selfish jealous, spiteful, and proud attitudes and adopting the spirit of loving-kindness.
Now Paul begins a series of 8 negative definitions that do not spring from love, for love and jealousy, etc, are mutually exclusive. Where one is, the other cannot be.
LOVE IS NOT JEALOUS
The Greek word used for “jealous” is “zeloo” which means to be fervent, to “boil” with envy, to be jealous. It can used commendably to refer to a striving for something or showing zeal.
Whether “zeloo” is constructive zeal or destructive envy depends on the context. In 1 Corinthians 13:4 “zeloo” clearly is used in a bad sense of a hostile emotion based on resentment which is “heated or boiling” with envy, hatred or anger.
“Zeloo” in the bad sense can be manifest in two forms, one is which the person sets their heart on something that belongs to someone else or a second form in which one has intense feelings over another’s achievements or success.
A. C. Thiselton adds that “zeloo” applies the notion of burning or boiling metaphorically to burning or boiling emotions, stance, or will for earnest striving, for passionate zeal, or for burning envy. Whether it is constructive zeal or destructive envy depends on the context. The envy which is carried over from a status seeking, non-Christian Corinthian culture into the Christian church is not of the Holy Spirit, and is deemed to be incompatible with love, which does not begrudge the status and honor of another, but delights in it for the sake of the other.
Augustine wrote that the reason why love does not envy is because it is not puffed up. For where puffing up precedes, envy follows, because pride is the mother of envy.
John MacArthur writes that the second sort of jealousy is more than selfish; it is desiring evil for someone else. It is jealousy on the deepest, most corrupt, and destructive level. That is the jealousy Solomon uncovered in the woman who pretended to be a child’s mother. When her own infant son died, she secretly exchanged him for the baby of a friend who was staying with her. The true mother discovered what had happened and, when their dispute was taken before the king, he ordered the baby to be cut in half, a half to be given to each woman. The true mother pleaded for the baby to be spared, even if it meant losing possession of him. The false mother, however, would rather have had the baby killed than for the true mother to have him. (1 Kings 3:16-27)
William Barclay phrases it this way writing that there are two kinds of envy. The one covets the possessions of other people; and such envy is very difficult to avoid because it is a very human thing. The other is worse, it grudges the very fact that others should have what it has not; it does not so much want things for itself as wish that others had not got them. Meanness of soul can sink no further than that.
How significant is the sin of jealousy? Proverbs explains that “Wrath is fierce and anger is a flood, but who can stand before jealousy? (Proverbs 27:4)
It is therefore not surprising to observe that the Bible is filled with illustrations that portray the disastrous effect of jealousy on personal relationships, beginning with Cain’s envy of Abel resulting in his murder of his own brother! (Genesis 4:3-8)
Moses records the jealousy of Joseph’s brothers writing:
And his brothers were jealous of him, but his father kept the saying in mind”
“Now then, come and let us kill him and throw him into one of the pits; and we will say, A wild beast devoured him. Then let us see what will become of his dreams.”
“Come, and let us sell him to the Ishmaelites and not lay our hands on him; for he is our brother, our own. And his brothers listened to him. (Genesis 37:11, 20. 27)
In the New Testament Luke records other jealousy motivated acts (in Acts) writing that:
“The high priest rose up, along with all his associates (that is the sect of the Sadducees), and they were filled with jealousy and they laid hands on the apostles, and put them in a public jail. (Acts 5:17-18)
“But when the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy, and began contradicting the things spoken by Paul, and were blaspheming.” (Acts 13:45)
What you are filled with clearly will control you.
When one is filled with jealousy, their actions are controlled by that green monster. Not surprisingly we see that the divine antidote for one fill with jealousy is to continually be filled with the Holy Spirit.
Spirit borne Christian love does not manifest this attitude and this trait is never to be a part of the Christian’s “wardrobe.” Loves does not desire for itself the possessions of or control over people. A loving person is never jealous but is glad for the success of others, even if their success works against his own.
Ray Pritchard writes that jealousy is the sin of those who think others have too much and they have too little. By contrast, love is generous. It does not begrudge others their gifts. How do you respond to the good fortune of others? If they do better than you, if they prosper when you don’t, if their family seems happy while yours is torn apart, how will you react? If they achieve what you cannot, if they gain what you lack, if they win where you lose, then the truth will come out. Can you lose gracefully? Can you walk away from the contest without bitterness?
If you live long enough, you will probably find someone who does what you do better than you can do it. You will meet people with your talents and your gifts, only much more of them. You will find people who surpass you in every way. What will you do then? This one test of love. And if you live long enough, you are certain to encounter people who are less talented and less gifted than you in every way, yet they seem to catch all the breaks and end up ahead of you in the great game of life. How will you respond when an inferior person passes you by? This is even sterner test of love.
How do your react when other Christians receive blessings or benefits that we lack?
Do you allow the sparks of envy to burn and them to a full flame?
No one is more miserable than someone filled with jealousy or envy. They rob us of happiness and make our good accomplishments seem bad. Furthermore, they exact their own punishment.
On the wall of a chapel in Padua, an old city in northeastern Italy, hangs a painting by the Renaissance artist Giotto. The painter depicted envy with long ears that could hear every bit of news of another’s success. He also gave Envy the tongue of a serpent to poison the reputation of the one being envied. But if you could look at the painting carefully, you would notice that the tongue coils back and stings the eyes of the figure itself. Not only did Giotto picture envy being blind, but also as destroying itself with its own venomous evil.
If we resent the success and accomplishments of others and find ourselves striking out at them with damaging words or insidious innuendoes, we have a problem with jealousy. But God wants to administer the antidote of love. That alone will keep us from becoming jealousy’s victim.
LOVES DOES NOT BRAG
“Perpereuomai” is the Greek word for brag. It means to talk with conceit or to behave as a braggart or windbag, exhibiting self-display and employing rhetorical embellishments in extolling one’s self excessively.
Love does not try to prove itself and say, “Watch how loving I can be” but instead works behind the scenes.
Love does not parade it accomplishments. It does vaunt oneself so as to parade one’s imagined superiority over others.
Love does not vaunt itself even regarding gifts which it really possesses, which is clearly an indirect rebuke of those at Corinth who used their spiritual gifts for display. Love creates a self-effacing stance rather than giving in to the temptation to assume an air of superiority.
William Barclay writes that there is a self-effacing quality in love. True love will always be far more impressed with is own unworthiness that its own merit.
A. C. Thiselton comments that again the verb underlines the issue of status seeking and triumphalism at Corinth. Even believers seemed to have come to act the part of braggarts, which was at odds with cruciform, Christlike love.
S. J. Kistenmaker adds that such a person parades his embellished rhetoric to gain recognition. His behavior is marked by egotism, subservience toward superiors, and
Condescension toward subordinates. A braggart exhibits pride in himself and his accomplishments. But such bragging is devoid of love to God and to one’s fellow man, and is blatant sin. Further, bragging and arrogance go hand in hand.
John MacArthur has an interesting not explaining that bragging is the other side of jealousy. Jealousy is wanting what someone else has. Bragging is trying to make others jealous of what we have. Jealousy puts others down; bragging builds us up. It is ironic that, as much as most us dislike bragging in others, we are so inclined to brag ourselves. C. S. Lewis called bragging the “utmost evil.” It is the epitome of pride, which is the root of all sins. Bragging puts ourselves first. Everyone else, including God must therefore be of less importance to us. It is impossible to build ourselves up without putting others down. When we brag, we can be “up” only if others are down.
LOVE IS NOT ARROGANT
“Phusioo” is the Greek word for arrogant, which literally means to puff up like a pair of bellows, and is used figuratively to describe one who becomes “inflated”, proud, haughty or puffed up with pride.
It means to cause one to have an exaggerated self-conception.
William Barclay illustrates the complete opposite of arrogant writing that Napoleon always advocated the sanctity of the home and the obligation of public worship, for others. Of himself he said, “I am not a man life other men. The laws of morality to not apply to me.”
The really great man never thinks of his own importance. Carey, who began life as a cobbler, was one of the greatest missionaries and certainly one of the greatest linguist the world has ever seen. He translated at least parts of the Bible into no fewer that thirty-four Indian languages. When he came to India, he was regarded with dislike and contempt. At a dinner party a snob with the idea of humiliating him, said in a tone that everyone could hear. “I suppose, Mr. Carey, you once worked as a shoe maker.” “No, your lordship,” answered Carey, “not a shoe make, only a cobbler.” He did not even claim to make shoes, only to mend them. No one likes the “important” person. Man dressed in a little brief authority can be a sorry sight.
A. C. Thiselton comments that Paul hammers home the incompatibility of love as respect and concern for the welfare of the other and obsessions about the status and attention accorded to the self. How much behavior among believers and even ministers is actually “attention seeking” designed to impress others with one’s own supposed importance? Some “spiritual songs” may appear to encourage, rather than discourage, this preoccupation with the self rather than with others and with God.
Matthew Henry adds that those who exhibit “agape” will do nothing out of a spirit of contention or vainglory. 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. These ill qualities can never grow out of tender affections for the brethren, nor a diffusive benevolence.
LOVE DOES NOT ACT UNBECOMINGLY
“Act unbecomingly” comes from the Greek word “aschemoneo,” which means to behave in an ugly, indecent, unseemingly or unbecoming manner.
It means to be ill mannered or rude. This verb speaks of an act in defiance of social and moral standards, with resulting disgrace, embarrassment, and shame. It describes one who acts improperly or with rudeness. It means to behave unmannerly, disgracefully or dishonorably.
G. G. Findlay alluding to this verb writes that: Love imparts a delicacy of feeling beyond the rules of politeness.
A. C. Thiselton does not hold back commenting that love does not elbow its way into conversations, worship services, or public institutions in a disruptive, discourteous, attention-seeking way. The background here may allude to the intrusion of tongues or prophecies at inappropriate moments. But today it may also include any kind of monopolizing of a congregation’s time and attention in the service of the self; in the tone, style, and vocabulary adopted in notices or sermons, or worst of all, the minister over familiar chat show host or “prophet’ of ill mannered rebuke.
Steven Cole relates a tragic illustration. I read of a man who was generally lacking in manners. He never opened the car door for his wife. “She doesn’t have two broken are,” he would say. After many years of marriage, his wife died. At the funeral, as the pallbearers brought her casket out to the hearse, the husband was standing by the door. The funeral director, who knew the husband by name, called out to him and said, “Open the door for her, will you?” He reached for the car door and the, for one second, froze. He realized that he had never opened the door for her in life; now, in her death, it would be the first, last, and only time. A lifetime of regret came crashing down around him. Love is not rude.
LOVE DOES NOT SEEK ITS OWN
Seek its own means that the loveless person desires to have his or her own way, or the highway! Such selfish behavior is the polar opposite of sacrificial love. And the church at Corinth was rife with this sin for they were selfish in the extreme not sharing their food at love feasts, protecting their “rights” and even suing fellow believers in non-Christian setting and using their spiritual gifts not to benefit others but their own advantage.
They did not use their gifts to edify or build up the church but to try to build up themselves up.
Alan Redpath strikes a painful chord to most of us who have been married for any length of time writing that the secret of every discord in Christian homes, communities and churches is that we seek our own way and our own glory.
A. C.Thiselton adds that agape spells judgment on the life that centers round the ego and its interests. For when God’s agape I shed abroad in a man’s heart through the Holy Spirit his life thereby gains a new center. The emphasis is transferred from his own ego to Christ.
Elisabeth Elliot was once speaking on the subject of selfless love to an audience that included some young children who were sitting right in front of her. As she spoke, she wondered how she could make this plain to them, so that they could apply it. Later, she got a letter from one of those children, a six-year-old boy, who wrote, “ I am learning to lay down my life for my little sister. She has to take a nap in the afternoon. I don’t have to take a nap. But she can’t go to sleep unless I come and lay down beside her. So I lay down with my little sister.” That boy is learning to love! If husbands and wives, as well as children, would apply this verse as that little boy did, our homes would be free of conflict.
LOVE IS NOT PROVOKED
Figuratively “paroxuno,” the Greek word for provoked, came to mean to spur on, to cause to be upset, to stimulate as used in this verse to arouse of stir some to anger.
Paul is referring to sinful anger that is never provoked in one who is living out selfless, supernatural love. They are willing to endure slights and insults even as did the One Who is the essence of these attitudes of agape love. And it is His life in us as the Spirit of Christ that enables us to manifest this love, which is not possible in our own strength.
A. C. Thiselton notes that the heart of the word conveys the semantic force of to exasperate, to irritate, as metaphorical extensions of to make sharp, to make pointed, to make acid.
Virtually every lexicon and primary source indicates the notion of reaching a level of exasperation. But how does this express itself.
The English word “pique” combines the same range of nuances as the Greek: something between irritation and anger which takes offense because one’s self-regard has been dented, wounded, or punctured by some sharp point.
Love, Paul urges, does not become exasperated into pique, a transient feeling of wounded vanity, partly because patience delays exasperation and partly because of lack of self interest diverts a sense of self importance away from reacting on the ground of wounded pride: “it is not embittered by injuries, whether real or supposed.
J. B. Phillips paraphrases it well writing that love “in not touchy” which conveys the readiness of overreact on one’s own behalf.
Henry Drummond in “The Greatest Thing in the World” wrote the following about this negative trait noting that the peculiarity of ill temper is that it is the vice of the virtuous. It is often the one blot on an otherwise noble character. You know men who are but perfect, and women who would be entirely perfect, but for an easily ruffled, quick tempered, or “touch” disposition.
John MacArthur has some pithy thoughts regarding the individual who is easily provoked writing that the great colonial preacher and theologian Jonathan Edwards had a daughter with an uncontrollable temper. When a young man fell in love with her and asked her father for her hand in marriage, Dr. Edwards replied, “You can’t have her.” “But I love her and she loves me,” he protested. “It doesn’t matter” the father insisted. Asked why, he said, “Because she is not worthy of you.” “But she is a Christian isn’t she?” “Yes,” said Edwards, “but the grace of God can live with some people with whom no one else could ever live.”
Surely the number one reason both for mental and physical illness in our society today is the overwhelming preoccupation with our rights and the consequent lovelessness. When everyone is fighting for his own rights, no one can really succeed or be happy. Everyone grabs, not one gives, and everyone loses, even when one gets what he wants. Lovelessness can never win in any meaningful or lasting way. It always costs more that it gains.
We get angry when another person gains a privilege or recognition we want for ourselves, because it is our “right.” But to put our rights before our duty and before loving concern for others comes from self-centeredness and lovelessness. The loving person is more concerned about doing what he should and helping where he can that having what he things are his rights and his due. Love considers nothing it right and everything its obligation.
Telling our wives and husbands that we love them is not convincing if we continually get upset and angry at what they say or do. Telling our children that we love them is not convincing if we often yell at them for doing things that irritate us and interfere with our plans. It does no good to protest, “I lose my temper a lot, but it’s all over in a few minutes.” So is a nuclear bomb. A great deal of damage can be done in very short time. Temper is always destructive, and even small temper “bombs” can leave much hurt and damage, especially when they explode on a regular basis. Lovelessness is the cause of temper, and love is the only cure.
Love that takes a person out of himself and centers his attention on the well being of others is the only cure for self-centeredness
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
THE FRUIT OF THE SPIRIT
Galatians 5:22-23
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. (NASB)
Galatians 5:22-23
But the fruit of the Holy Spirit, the work which His presence within accomplishes, is love, joy, (gladness), peace; patience, an even temper, forbearance, kindness, goodness (benevolence), faithfulness, gentleness, (meekness, humility); self-control (self-restraint, continence), against such things there is no law that can bring change. (The Amplified Bible)
In doing research for this series on the Fruit of the Spirit, I came across some articles by different people who give their interpretation of what the Fruit of the Spirit are. This will be my introduction to the series, and we will also take a look at this word “fruit.”
LEWIS JOHNSON writes the following summation of Galatians 5:22-23, which he classifies as the evidence of the leading of the Spirit. (Galatians 5:24)
“The evidence of the leading of the Spirit lies in a cluster of nine virtues that make up “the fruit of the Spirit.” This fruit is the product of the life of the Spirit in the believer. It is characterized by several interesting features.
First of all, in the fruit of the Spirit there is unity. We notice that the word “fruit” is in the singular. There is only one fruit of the Spirit, but it contains nine virtues. If one of the virtues is missing, then we do not have the fruit of the Spirit. The Spirit’s product is like a watermelon with nine flavors. Many commentators have suggested that the nine virtues illustrate the full-orbed, symmetrical character of the lord Jesus Christ. It is His life that the Spirit produces in the believer.
Second, the fruit of the Spirit possesses a notable harmony, the first triad of virtues being inward in nature, the second, outward, and the third upward.
Third, there is a necessity that believers have the fruit of the Spirit. The lack of the virtues indicates sin against the Holy Spirit who is engaged in producing the virtues in the lives of the saints.
Finally, in the concluding words of Galatians 5:23 there is an important point made by Paul. The Law of Moses finds no flaw in the fruit of the Spirit. The flesh may imitate or counterfeit certain of the virtues, but it can never produce them. The Spirit alone can do that, and the result satisfies all the demands of the moral law in the believer’s life. It is sometimes forgotten that life by the Spirit is not a lower standard that life by the moral law, or the Ten Commandments. It is, if anything a higher standard. Arthur Way has caught that in his rendering of Galatians 5:18, “But if you definitely surrender yourselves to the Spirit’s guidance, you are then not under the law, but ON A HIGHER PLANE.”
CHARLES SPURGEON says, “Brethren, the Spirit of God is not barren: if He were in you He must and will inevitably produce His own legitimate fruit.”
“Old leaves, if they remain upon the trees through the autumn and the winter, fall off in the spring.” We have seen a hedge all thick with dry leaves throughout the winder, and neither frost nor wind has removed the withered foliage, but the spring has soon made clearance. The new life dislodges the old, pushing it away as unsuitable to it. So our old corruptions are best removed by the growth of new graces. “Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” It is as the new life buds and opens that the old worn-out things of our former state are compelled to quit their hold of us. Our wisdom lies in have new to God, that by the power of His Holy Spirit all our graces may be vigorous, and may exercise a sin-expelling power over our lives; the new leaves of grace pushing off our old sere affections and habits of sin.”
W. WIERSBE notes that the contrast between works and fruit is important. A machine in a factory works, and turns out a product, but it could never manufacture fruit. Fruit must grow out of life, and in the case of the believer, it is the life of the Spirit (Galatians 5:25). When you thing of “works” you think of effort, labor, strain, and toil; when you think of “fruit” you think of beauty, quietness, the unfolding of life. The flesh produces “dead works” (Hebrews 9:14), but the Spirit produces living fruit. And this fruit has in it the seed for still more fruit (Genesis 1:11). Love begets more love! Joy helps to produce more joy! Jesus is concerned that we produce “fruit, more fruit, much fruit” (John 15: 2, 5), because this is the way we glorify Him. The old nature cannot produce fruit, only the new nature can do that.
Wiersbe emphasizes that the fruit of the Spirit has purpose. We must remember that this fruit is produced to be eaten, not to be admired and put on display. People around us are starving for love, joy, peace, and all the other graces of the Spirit.
When they find them in our lives, they know that we have something they lack. We do not bear fruit for our own consumption; we bear fruit that others might be fed and helped, and that Christ might be glorified. The flesh may manufacture “results” that bring praise to us, but the flesh cannot bear fruit that brings glory to God. It takes patience, an atmosphere of the Spirit, walking in the light, the seed of the Word of God, and a sincere desire to honor Christ.
In short, the secret is the Holy Spirit. He alone can give us that “fifth freedom” freedom from sin and self. He enables us to fulfill the law of love, to overcome the flesh, and to bear fruit.
It is unfortunate that an overemphasis on gifts has led some Christians to neglect the grace of the Spirit. Building Christian character must take precedence over displaying special abilities.
MARTIN LUTHER comments that the Apostle Paul says not, the works of the Spirit, as he said the works of the flesh, but he adorns these Christian virtues with a more honorable name, calling them fruit of the Spirit. For they bring with them most excellent fruits and maximum usefulness, for they that have them give glory to God, and with the same do allure and provoke others to embrace the doctrine and faith of Christ.
LARRY RICHARDS, asks, “Have you ever noticed that along the banks of a stream the vegetation is always abundant and luxurious?
This is what the Bible says about us. As the Holy Spirit flows freely in our lives, a rich and beautiful character grows. We are filled with love, with joy, with peace. In every relationship we exhibit that patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control that mark us as God’s own. There is no way, however much we plow and harrow, or cultivate and hoe our character, to produce this crop ourselves. This crop is produced by God the Holy Spirit, and only in those who live by Him.
He summarizes the Biblical concept of spiritual fruit writing that fruitfulness is a consistent concept in the Old Testament and the New Testament. The fruit God seeks in human beings is expressed in righteous and loving acts that bring peace and harmony to the individual and to society. But that fruit is foreign to sinful human nature. Energized by sinful passions, fallen humanity action in ways that harm and bring dissension. God’s solution is found in a personal relationship with Jesus and in the supernatural working of God’s Spirit within the believer. As we live in intimate, obedient relationship with Jesus, God’s Spirit energizes us as we produce the peaceable fruit of a righteousness that can come only from the Lord.
PHIL NEWTON introduces Galatians 5:22-24 with a question: Have you ever walked through a garbage dump?
I’m sure that none of us desire to take a casual stroll through mounds of garbage. But you almost get the feeling that you are doing this when you read through the list of the “deeds of the flesh” which Paul identifies in our context. I have noticed that in our day of environmental concerns companies which deal with garbage have changed the explanation of the work to “waste management.” They try to beautify their grounds surrounding garbage landfills. But whatever they do, they still have garbage. You still see and smell it.
Such is the case with the flesh. The unregenerate nature of man produces its characteristic deeds. An unbeliever can attempt to cover the “garbage” of sin in his life. He can give his actions new, improved names. But garbage is still garbage. Not so with the believer!
The contrast between the flesh and the Spirit are most evident when we observe what each produces. Neutrality does not exist between them. Those who remain in the flesh, the unregenerate condition, will generate the evidence of a life dominated by sin. In distinction, those who are in Christ will manifest the evidence of His character by the indwelling Spirit.
The fruit of the Spirit is not an option for a Christian but the necessary evidence that a person is truly a Christian. Here we see the character of Christ being demonstrated through those whom He redeems.
C. NORMAL BARTLETT comments on Paul’s use of fruit in the singular writing that the use of the singular “fruit” instead of the plural “fruits” is instructive. It suggests the common root and interdependence of these several spiritual graces mentioned. They can be produced only in a life that is rooted in the spirit; they cannot be hung outwardly upon a life like the toys and ornaments on a Christmas tree. Fruitage in the Spirit requires rootage in the Spirit. As is has been well put:
CHRISTAIN CHARACTER IS CHRIST’S EXCELLENCY REPRODUCED BY THE SPIRIT IN A RENEWED LIFE.
To bring forth the fruit of the spirit is not only the Christian’s happy privilege; it is his bound duty as well. In a soul born of the Spirit there is to be fruit borne in the Spirit. The fact that we could do nothing to earn our salvation is by no means to be interpreted as implying that, having been saved by grace, we can do nothing to show our gratitude for the salvation we have received. Dare we be unmindful of the words of our Savior to the effect that our heavenly Father is glorified when we bring forth much fruit. “Herein is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit; so shall you be my disciples (John 15:8)
JOHN EADIE adds that in regard to the fruit, its origin is “the Spirit,” not man’s spirit, or the new and better mode of thinking and feeling to which men are formed by the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit Himself, the Author of all spiritual good. Those who are led by the Spirit not only do not do the works of the flesh, but they bring forth the fruit of the Spirit.
J. VERNON McGEE quips that our problem is that we offer ourselves to God as a living sacrifice, but when the altar gets hot, we crawl off. We are to abide in Christ if we are to produce fruit.
Paul is stating the principle of fruit-bearing so that we can understand it. The fruit is produced by yielding, by yielding to the sweet influences that are about us. I am not talking about the world and neither is Paul. We are to yield to the Holy Spirit who indwells us. The Holy Spirit wants to produce fruit; it is called the fruit of the Spirit.
With all of this in mind, let’s look at the word “fruit” and find out exactly what it means and what we are talking about.
The word fruit used in the New Testament comes from the Greek word “karpos.”
It can be used in its literal sense to refer to fruit, produce or offspring, which describes that which is produced by the inherent energy of a living organism.
When used figuratively, “karpos” describes the consequence of physical, mental, or spiritual action. In the New Testament the figurative use predominates, especially in the Gospels, where human actions and words are viewed as fruit growing out of a person’s essential being or character. This is also the way Paul uses “karpos” in the present passage, as an expression for desirable, righteous qualities in one’s life, the fruit of the Spirit.
If you will notice the word “fruit” is singular, not plural. One fruit manifest by 9 spiritual attitudes. Fruit in the singular also underscores the unit of the 9 spiritual attitudes, and emphasizes that all work together to produce a Christ like believer, our Lord Jesus Christ being the perfect manifestation of the fruit of the Spirit. Paul does not say fruits, as though portions of fruit might be present in the believer and other portions might not. Instead, the sense of wholeness and unity in will be manifest in the one born of God. By contrast the deeds of the flesh are plural, and they hardly represent unity, nor do they produce unity but only produce strife between me.
In Galatians 5:22, “the fruit of the Spirit “is.” The verb “is” is in the present tense which indicates that this process of fruit bearing is continuous. It doesn’t end.
Just as natural fruit needs to be cultivated, so does spiritual fruit needs to be watered and fed the Word in the soil and atmosphere of the Spirit. And so Paul is very practical explaining that, “If we live by the Spirit let us also walk by the Spirit.” (Galatians 5:25).
Fruit is the manifestations of the character of Christ in the lives of believers in consequence of His ministry of the Word among them and of the care of the believers for poor, for this is the fruit, or outward expression of love, attesting its reality, and of the care of laborers in the gospel, for this is the fruit, or outward expression of thankfulness to God for spiritual blessings enjoyed, attesting its reality.
The fruit of the Spirit, not the fruit of believers per se, but the fruit which the Holy Spirit produces in and through the lives of believers as they walk in His grace and power. And His fruit is always the outward manifestations of the yielded believer’s inner life.
It is a clear marker of spiritual life, a sure proof that one has experience genuine conversion. A profession of faith in Christ cannot produce holy fruit. Only a genuine possession of the life of Christ can produce supernatural fruit.
Even as the flesh of unbelievers will always produce deeds of the flesh, so too believers now indwelt by the Spirit will always produce some good fruit. It is not unexpected that one aspect of the 9 fold fruit might be better than others, but the point is that all are present in every believer. Our lord’s desire for each believer is produce a “bumper crop” as He explained to His disciples in John 15:8: “By this is My Father glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.”
The amount of fruit borne by believers is dependent on one’s willingness to “abide in Jesus for as He said in John 15:5: “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me, and I in him, he bears much fruit; for apart from Me you can to nothing.” In Galatians 5:25 abiding translates to yielding to and living by or walking by the Spirit as opposed to the flesh.
Jesus explained to His audience that true inner character, and evidence of a new heart, a spiritually circumcised heart, is recognized by a person’s good fruit or conversely bad fruits, the only possible product of an unregenerate heart. When a tree is rotten it naturally produces rotten fruit. But when indwelling Spirit of God begins to express His mighty power in the inner being of believers, good, God glorifying things begin to happen. The nature of God Himself begins to manifest Himself in our lives and the result is the fruit of the Spirit.
Consider these two passages of Scripture:
Matthew 7:17-19
"Even so, every good tree bears good fruit; but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
Matthew 12:33
"Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the tree bad, and its fruit bad; for the tree is known by its fruit.
John 15:2
“Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit (karpos) He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit (karpos), He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit (karpos) of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.... “My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit (karpos), and so prove to be My disciples. “You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit (karpos), and that your fruit (karpos) would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you."
Jesus takes the image of the vine, with God as gardener, from Isaiah. We believers are carefully tended by the Father, pruned and cared for that we may "bear much fruit." Fruitfulness is possible, he said, if we remain in Him and His words remain in us. The point Jesus is making is that fruitfulness is rooted in our personal relationship with Him, and our personal relationship with Him is maintained by living His words: "If you obey My commands you will remain in My love"
John 15:10. God has chosen us. It is His intention that we be fruitful. It is for this reason that He has given us the most intimate of relationships and Jesus' own words to guide us, and it is our responsibility to walk in close fellowship with our Lord.
Newton comments that the fruit of the Spirit distinguishes the person who makes a profession of faith, acts excited about the lord for few weeks or months, then fades away. One of our lord’s parables clearly explains this:
“And the one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word, and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away.” (Matthew 13:20-21)
There may be a sense of joy, but it is temporary. There may be a love for others but it is temporary. It is in the demands of life, with all of its harshness and difficulties, that you see the true evidence of the character of Christ in someone’s life. The Christian is not like an “annual” plant which produces fruit for a while, then forever fades away. He has the spirit of a perennial, so that year after year, the same radiant fruit comes forth from his life.
Bearing fruit is natural for fruit trees. They need not strain to produce fruit. You never find a grove of apple or peach trees attending conferences on bearing fruit. Nor do you find fruit trees manipulating one another with browbeating words in attempts to convince a tree to produce fruit. The most natural thing in the world is for a fruit tree to bear its own fruit.
Hear the word of the Lord: "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace...." The prepositional phrase demonstrates the origin of the character of Christ in the life of the believer, the Holy Spirit. Such character is born through the regenerating and indwelling power of the Spirit in the life of the believer. In regeneration the Holy Spirit changes the nature of the sinner so that his new desire and passion is for Christ, rather than for sin.
Why must he be regenerated? Vaughan explains, "No stream can of itself ascend higher than its source; no nature can transcend itself in the manifestation of its energies, and if man is really dead in trespasses and sins, he can put forth no energy containing in it the element of real holiness, or true spiritual life". A person who merely 'makes a decision for Christ' but has not been regenerated by the Holy Spirit will find himself living in frustration while trying to produce a character which is not of his nature. Jesus told Nicodemus that "Unless a man is born again he cannot enter the kingdom of God" (John 3:3). The idea of "enter" means to experience or to see firsthand. Jesus explains that to be "born again" is to be born of the Holy Spirit (John 3:6). Apart from such a radical work of the Holy Spirit a sinner will never believe the gospel and repent of his sins. He will never experience the saving work of Christ personally. How can we describe the Spirit's work of regeneration so that the new believer begins to give evidence of a totally different character of soul and life?
It is a profound and radical change in the whole existing moral nature of the man. It makes him a new creature in Christ; it renews his nature; it re-colors his character; it transforms his will; it re-moulds his whole system of thinking, feeling, and acting. It gives him new objects to live for; new rules to live by; new principles to impel to action; and new sensibilities to success or failure in the progress and development of that new life. The new nature by the Spirit is unlike the old nature of the flesh. That is Paul's whole premise in this portion of Galatians. What the Holy Spirit does is to so change a sinner's nature that the most natural fruit of this person's life is the character of Christ. Is this true of you?
What is the fruit if it is not the character of Jesus Christ being manifested in the life of those whom He has redeemed?
Who has loved as has our Lord? Who has manifested joy supremely as Jesus Christ, "who for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, despising its shame" (Hebrews 12:2). Who has walked with perfect peace as our Lord or demonstrated such depths of patience?
What is the Godhead doing in everyone saved by grace?
Our Triune God is reproducing the same character which Christ naturally manifested in this world by giving us a new nature through the Holy Spirit's work. We see this so clearly in Paul's explanation of the dimensions of God's saving work in Romans 8:29, "For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren." By the birthing power of the Spirit and the ongoing work of sanctification, the life of the believer is continually "conformed to the image" of Jesus Christ. Such conforming manifests the fruit of the Spirit, the character of Christ.
In the following lessons in our series on the Fruit of the Spirit, we are going to take a look at each one of the 9 spiritual qualities one by one and discover what they are, and how they should be manifested in our lives.
I was at a chapel service prior to going to work as a prayer counselor at CBN, and Gordon Robertson was the speaker. He asked us the question that I am going to ask you, “If the fruit of the Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit belong to the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is in you, then where are the fruit and gifts of the Spirit?”
They are in you. They came in you the day you made Jesus the Lord of your life.
There is a difference between the fruit of the Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit.
In his letter to the Galatians, Paul made a list of essential qualities that make up the character of the King:
LOVE
JOY
PEACE
PATIENCE
KINDNESS
GOODNESS
FAITHFULNESS
GENTLENESS
SELF-CONTROL
Myles Munroe writes in his book, “The Most Important Person on Earth”:
“Any true manifestation of the kingdom of God on earth will have these characteristics. Paul referred to these qualities as “the fruit of the Spirit.” He was saying, wherever the Holy Spirit was, these qualities should be evident, indicating that the culture of the King was present.
Paul used this particular analogy of fruit because fruit doesn’t appear overnight; it develops over time, and he wanted them to know that they would have cultivate the culture of the King in their lives, under the example and leading of the Holy Spirit. First, the Holy Spirit teaches us the nature of the original government in heaven. Then He shows us that, because He lives within us, we have this original nature and need to manifest it in our lives. This is what is like in the Garden of Eden.
When you received the Holy Spirit, you also received the seed of kingdom nature. You develop this seed by putting into your life the kingdom elements that allow it to grow. For example, and apple tree doesn’t have to “work” to produce fruit. The seeds if the fruit are within it, and eventually, through a process of maturity, enabled by elements as the nutrients in the ground and sunlight, what is on the inside of the tree becomes manifested on its branches. The spiritual that enable the fruit to grow in our lives are maintaining a continual connection with the King, learning the Scriptures of the kingdom, and yielding to direction of the Holy Spirit in our lives. (John 15)(Matthew 5)
Just as apples are a natural outgrowth of apple trees, the fruit of the Spirit becomes a natural development in the life of a kingdom citizen because he is reflecting the nature of his King. For example, one of the fruits of the Spirit is goodness. It is therefore natural for us to be good if we are in the kingdom. If we are not good, we are unnatural. The Holy Spirit connects us to our original nature, which is true life for us as human beings.
The qualities or fruit of the Spirit embody the King’s culture so that, first of all, we see that is a culture of love, a culture of joy, and a culture of peace. Imagine a culture filled with all the qualities in the above list! It’s our culture to be faithful, to be loyal to our commitments. It’s our culture to be gentle. We’re never brash or rude with other people. As Jesus said, “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.” It’s our culture to be self-controlled. We never lose control of our tempers or our desires. No matter what happens in our lives, we sill live out and exhibit all these qualities.
The qualities or fruit of the Spirit are not only what the King does; they are what He is. The King doesn’t only act in love; He is love. He doesn’t only demonstrate peace; He is peace. And every aspect of the King’s nature is what we are to be in our essence, as well. This is what Jesus meant when He said, as recorded in the book of Matthew, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
We need to realize that we are to reflect the nature of our heavenly Father.”
To see the nature of our heavenly Father, all you have to do is look at Jesus. One of His disciples asked a question, “Show us the Father?” Jesus’ rely was that if you have seen Me you have seen the Father. Jesus is the exact representation of His Father’s nature. If someone were to ask you, “Show me Jesus,” we should be able to answer him or her; “If you have seen me you have seen Jesus.” We should be the exact representation of His nature.
Myles Munroe goes on to say, “There is a big difference between the fruit of the Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit have to do with the character of the King. It is the development of the King’s nature in us. The gifts have to do with the power of the King. (1 Corinthians 12)
One is character, the other is ability, but both are necessary for the kingdom life.
With these gifts comes great responsibility. Character is more important than power because it protects our use of that power. It keeps us from using it for the wrong motivations and purpose. It prevents us from using our power to hurt others rather than to help them. Everyone wants power, and when we are offered it, we don't often think about the need to regulate it. Many people seek the power without realizing how critical it is for them to develop the essential qualities of the kingdom at the same time. It is easier to receive the gifts of the Spirit that it is to develop the fruit of the Spirit. It is easier to obtain the power of God that it is to develop the character of God. Therefore, we must develop the qualities, such as love, kindness, and self-control, because the will moderate our use of the gifts.
Both the qualities and the gifts are important, therefore, but the qualities are vital because power without character is dangerous. A balance between the two is a challenge for all kingdom citizens. I believe this is why Jesus spent three-and-a-half years teaching His disciples how to live, how to think, and how to act as kingdom citizens.”
Two things come to mind. First, remember how James and John wanted to call fire down from heaven on the Samaritans that wouldn’t let Jesus pass through their country. This would have been an abuse of power. Second, remember how Paul instructed Timothy not to appoint a new Christian into a leadership position. Think of the consequences in that situation.
Jesus trained them first and then they received the power through the outpouring of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost.”
Several years ago, a religious painter painted two pictures of Jesus Christ and hung them together in a gallery.
The first picture was of the Jewish Christ; the one we are accustomed to seeing when see pictures of the Lord.
It was very beautifully done and would bring a sense of inspiration and worship to anyone who would look at it.
Next to that traditional picture of Christ, the artist hung a picture he had painted of the Lord Jesus Christ disfigured and ugly.
It was a misrepresentation of the genuineness of the Lord.
The artist was asked why he had painted these two pictures.
He said, “The first picture is Christ as He really is. The second is the Christ the world sees when they look at His Church. Those who represent Him in the world.”
The world does not see Christ physically as the disciples saw Him.
They see Christ through His body, which is the Church, made up of believers.
In studying the fruit of the Spirit we will be brought face to face with the kind of life God expects us to live if we are truly representing Him in the world.
This kind of living is supernatural, seeming impossible. In fact, it is impossible. This kind of life can only be lived with the help of the Holy Spirit.
In this series on The Fruit of the Spirit, we are going to take a look at each one and what it means to us as Christians.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law. (NASB)
Galatians 5:22-23
But the fruit of the Holy Spirit, the work which His presence within accomplishes, is love, joy, (gladness), peace; patience, an even temper, forbearance, kindness, goodness (benevolence), faithfulness, gentleness, (meekness, humility); self-control (self-restraint, continence), against such things there is no law that can bring change. (The Amplified Bible)
In doing research for this series on the Fruit of the Spirit, I came across some articles by different people who give their interpretation of what the Fruit of the Spirit are. This will be my introduction to the series, and we will also take a look at this word “fruit.”
LEWIS JOHNSON writes the following summation of Galatians 5:22-23, which he classifies as the evidence of the leading of the Spirit. (Galatians 5:24)
“The evidence of the leading of the Spirit lies in a cluster of nine virtues that make up “the fruit of the Spirit.” This fruit is the product of the life of the Spirit in the believer. It is characterized by several interesting features.
First of all, in the fruit of the Spirit there is unity. We notice that the word “fruit” is in the singular. There is only one fruit of the Spirit, but it contains nine virtues. If one of the virtues is missing, then we do not have the fruit of the Spirit. The Spirit’s product is like a watermelon with nine flavors. Many commentators have suggested that the nine virtues illustrate the full-orbed, symmetrical character of the lord Jesus Christ. It is His life that the Spirit produces in the believer.
Second, the fruit of the Spirit possesses a notable harmony, the first triad of virtues being inward in nature, the second, outward, and the third upward.
Third, there is a necessity that believers have the fruit of the Spirit. The lack of the virtues indicates sin against the Holy Spirit who is engaged in producing the virtues in the lives of the saints.
Finally, in the concluding words of Galatians 5:23 there is an important point made by Paul. The Law of Moses finds no flaw in the fruit of the Spirit. The flesh may imitate or counterfeit certain of the virtues, but it can never produce them. The Spirit alone can do that, and the result satisfies all the demands of the moral law in the believer’s life. It is sometimes forgotten that life by the Spirit is not a lower standard that life by the moral law, or the Ten Commandments. It is, if anything a higher standard. Arthur Way has caught that in his rendering of Galatians 5:18, “But if you definitely surrender yourselves to the Spirit’s guidance, you are then not under the law, but ON A HIGHER PLANE.”
CHARLES SPURGEON says, “Brethren, the Spirit of God is not barren: if He were in you He must and will inevitably produce His own legitimate fruit.”
“Old leaves, if they remain upon the trees through the autumn and the winter, fall off in the spring.” We have seen a hedge all thick with dry leaves throughout the winder, and neither frost nor wind has removed the withered foliage, but the spring has soon made clearance. The new life dislodges the old, pushing it away as unsuitable to it. So our old corruptions are best removed by the growth of new graces. “Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.” It is as the new life buds and opens that the old worn-out things of our former state are compelled to quit their hold of us. Our wisdom lies in have new to God, that by the power of His Holy Spirit all our graces may be vigorous, and may exercise a sin-expelling power over our lives; the new leaves of grace pushing off our old sere affections and habits of sin.”
W. WIERSBE notes that the contrast between works and fruit is important. A machine in a factory works, and turns out a product, but it could never manufacture fruit. Fruit must grow out of life, and in the case of the believer, it is the life of the Spirit (Galatians 5:25). When you thing of “works” you think of effort, labor, strain, and toil; when you think of “fruit” you think of beauty, quietness, the unfolding of life. The flesh produces “dead works” (Hebrews 9:14), but the Spirit produces living fruit. And this fruit has in it the seed for still more fruit (Genesis 1:11). Love begets more love! Joy helps to produce more joy! Jesus is concerned that we produce “fruit, more fruit, much fruit” (John 15: 2, 5), because this is the way we glorify Him. The old nature cannot produce fruit, only the new nature can do that.
Wiersbe emphasizes that the fruit of the Spirit has purpose. We must remember that this fruit is produced to be eaten, not to be admired and put on display. People around us are starving for love, joy, peace, and all the other graces of the Spirit.
When they find them in our lives, they know that we have something they lack. We do not bear fruit for our own consumption; we bear fruit that others might be fed and helped, and that Christ might be glorified. The flesh may manufacture “results” that bring praise to us, but the flesh cannot bear fruit that brings glory to God. It takes patience, an atmosphere of the Spirit, walking in the light, the seed of the Word of God, and a sincere desire to honor Christ.
In short, the secret is the Holy Spirit. He alone can give us that “fifth freedom” freedom from sin and self. He enables us to fulfill the law of love, to overcome the flesh, and to bear fruit.
It is unfortunate that an overemphasis on gifts has led some Christians to neglect the grace of the Spirit. Building Christian character must take precedence over displaying special abilities.
MARTIN LUTHER comments that the Apostle Paul says not, the works of the Spirit, as he said the works of the flesh, but he adorns these Christian virtues with a more honorable name, calling them fruit of the Spirit. For they bring with them most excellent fruits and maximum usefulness, for they that have them give glory to God, and with the same do allure and provoke others to embrace the doctrine and faith of Christ.
LARRY RICHARDS, asks, “Have you ever noticed that along the banks of a stream the vegetation is always abundant and luxurious?
This is what the Bible says about us. As the Holy Spirit flows freely in our lives, a rich and beautiful character grows. We are filled with love, with joy, with peace. In every relationship we exhibit that patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control that mark us as God’s own. There is no way, however much we plow and harrow, or cultivate and hoe our character, to produce this crop ourselves. This crop is produced by God the Holy Spirit, and only in those who live by Him.
He summarizes the Biblical concept of spiritual fruit writing that fruitfulness is a consistent concept in the Old Testament and the New Testament. The fruit God seeks in human beings is expressed in righteous and loving acts that bring peace and harmony to the individual and to society. But that fruit is foreign to sinful human nature. Energized by sinful passions, fallen humanity action in ways that harm and bring dissension. God’s solution is found in a personal relationship with Jesus and in the supernatural working of God’s Spirit within the believer. As we live in intimate, obedient relationship with Jesus, God’s Spirit energizes us as we produce the peaceable fruit of a righteousness that can come only from the Lord.
PHIL NEWTON introduces Galatians 5:22-24 with a question: Have you ever walked through a garbage dump?
I’m sure that none of us desire to take a casual stroll through mounds of garbage. But you almost get the feeling that you are doing this when you read through the list of the “deeds of the flesh” which Paul identifies in our context. I have noticed that in our day of environmental concerns companies which deal with garbage have changed the explanation of the work to “waste management.” They try to beautify their grounds surrounding garbage landfills. But whatever they do, they still have garbage. You still see and smell it.
Such is the case with the flesh. The unregenerate nature of man produces its characteristic deeds. An unbeliever can attempt to cover the “garbage” of sin in his life. He can give his actions new, improved names. But garbage is still garbage. Not so with the believer!
The contrast between the flesh and the Spirit are most evident when we observe what each produces. Neutrality does not exist between them. Those who remain in the flesh, the unregenerate condition, will generate the evidence of a life dominated by sin. In distinction, those who are in Christ will manifest the evidence of His character by the indwelling Spirit.
The fruit of the Spirit is not an option for a Christian but the necessary evidence that a person is truly a Christian. Here we see the character of Christ being demonstrated through those whom He redeems.
C. NORMAL BARTLETT comments on Paul’s use of fruit in the singular writing that the use of the singular “fruit” instead of the plural “fruits” is instructive. It suggests the common root and interdependence of these several spiritual graces mentioned. They can be produced only in a life that is rooted in the spirit; they cannot be hung outwardly upon a life like the toys and ornaments on a Christmas tree. Fruitage in the Spirit requires rootage in the Spirit. As is has been well put:
CHRISTAIN CHARACTER IS CHRIST’S EXCELLENCY REPRODUCED BY THE SPIRIT IN A RENEWED LIFE.
To bring forth the fruit of the spirit is not only the Christian’s happy privilege; it is his bound duty as well. In a soul born of the Spirit there is to be fruit borne in the Spirit. The fact that we could do nothing to earn our salvation is by no means to be interpreted as implying that, having been saved by grace, we can do nothing to show our gratitude for the salvation we have received. Dare we be unmindful of the words of our Savior to the effect that our heavenly Father is glorified when we bring forth much fruit. “Herein is my Father glorified, that you bear much fruit; so shall you be my disciples (John 15:8)
JOHN EADIE adds that in regard to the fruit, its origin is “the Spirit,” not man’s spirit, or the new and better mode of thinking and feeling to which men are formed by the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit Himself, the Author of all spiritual good. Those who are led by the Spirit not only do not do the works of the flesh, but they bring forth the fruit of the Spirit.
J. VERNON McGEE quips that our problem is that we offer ourselves to God as a living sacrifice, but when the altar gets hot, we crawl off. We are to abide in Christ if we are to produce fruit.
Paul is stating the principle of fruit-bearing so that we can understand it. The fruit is produced by yielding, by yielding to the sweet influences that are about us. I am not talking about the world and neither is Paul. We are to yield to the Holy Spirit who indwells us. The Holy Spirit wants to produce fruit; it is called the fruit of the Spirit.
With all of this in mind, let’s look at the word “fruit” and find out exactly what it means and what we are talking about.
The word fruit used in the New Testament comes from the Greek word “karpos.”
It can be used in its literal sense to refer to fruit, produce or offspring, which describes that which is produced by the inherent energy of a living organism.
When used figuratively, “karpos” describes the consequence of physical, mental, or spiritual action. In the New Testament the figurative use predominates, especially in the Gospels, where human actions and words are viewed as fruit growing out of a person’s essential being or character. This is also the way Paul uses “karpos” in the present passage, as an expression for desirable, righteous qualities in one’s life, the fruit of the Spirit.
If you will notice the word “fruit” is singular, not plural. One fruit manifest by 9 spiritual attitudes. Fruit in the singular also underscores the unit of the 9 spiritual attitudes, and emphasizes that all work together to produce a Christ like believer, our Lord Jesus Christ being the perfect manifestation of the fruit of the Spirit. Paul does not say fruits, as though portions of fruit might be present in the believer and other portions might not. Instead, the sense of wholeness and unity in will be manifest in the one born of God. By contrast the deeds of the flesh are plural, and they hardly represent unity, nor do they produce unity but only produce strife between me.
In Galatians 5:22, “the fruit of the Spirit “is.” The verb “is” is in the present tense which indicates that this process of fruit bearing is continuous. It doesn’t end.
Just as natural fruit needs to be cultivated, so does spiritual fruit needs to be watered and fed the Word in the soil and atmosphere of the Spirit. And so Paul is very practical explaining that, “If we live by the Spirit let us also walk by the Spirit.” (Galatians 5:25).
Fruit is the manifestations of the character of Christ in the lives of believers in consequence of His ministry of the Word among them and of the care of the believers for poor, for this is the fruit, or outward expression of love, attesting its reality, and of the care of laborers in the gospel, for this is the fruit, or outward expression of thankfulness to God for spiritual blessings enjoyed, attesting its reality.
The fruit of the Spirit, not the fruit of believers per se, but the fruit which the Holy Spirit produces in and through the lives of believers as they walk in His grace and power. And His fruit is always the outward manifestations of the yielded believer’s inner life.
It is a clear marker of spiritual life, a sure proof that one has experience genuine conversion. A profession of faith in Christ cannot produce holy fruit. Only a genuine possession of the life of Christ can produce supernatural fruit.
Even as the flesh of unbelievers will always produce deeds of the flesh, so too believers now indwelt by the Spirit will always produce some good fruit. It is not unexpected that one aspect of the 9 fold fruit might be better than others, but the point is that all are present in every believer. Our lord’s desire for each believer is produce a “bumper crop” as He explained to His disciples in John 15:8: “By this is My Father glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be My disciples.”
The amount of fruit borne by believers is dependent on one’s willingness to “abide in Jesus for as He said in John 15:5: “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me, and I in him, he bears much fruit; for apart from Me you can to nothing.” In Galatians 5:25 abiding translates to yielding to and living by or walking by the Spirit as opposed to the flesh.
Jesus explained to His audience that true inner character, and evidence of a new heart, a spiritually circumcised heart, is recognized by a person’s good fruit or conversely bad fruits, the only possible product of an unregenerate heart. When a tree is rotten it naturally produces rotten fruit. But when indwelling Spirit of God begins to express His mighty power in the inner being of believers, good, God glorifying things begin to happen. The nature of God Himself begins to manifest Himself in our lives and the result is the fruit of the Spirit.
Consider these two passages of Scripture:
Matthew 7:17-19
"Even so, every good tree bears good fruit; but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
Matthew 12:33
"Either make the tree good, and its fruit good; or make the tree bad, and its fruit bad; for the tree is known by its fruit.
John 15:2
“Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit (karpos) He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit (karpos), He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit (karpos) of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.... “My Father is glorified by this, that you bear much fruit (karpos), and so prove to be My disciples. “You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit (karpos), and that your fruit (karpos) would remain, so that whatever you ask of the Father in My name He may give to you."
Jesus takes the image of the vine, with God as gardener, from Isaiah. We believers are carefully tended by the Father, pruned and cared for that we may "bear much fruit." Fruitfulness is possible, he said, if we remain in Him and His words remain in us. The point Jesus is making is that fruitfulness is rooted in our personal relationship with Him, and our personal relationship with Him is maintained by living His words: "If you obey My commands you will remain in My love"
John 15:10. God has chosen us. It is His intention that we be fruitful. It is for this reason that He has given us the most intimate of relationships and Jesus' own words to guide us, and it is our responsibility to walk in close fellowship with our Lord.
Newton comments that the fruit of the Spirit distinguishes the person who makes a profession of faith, acts excited about the lord for few weeks or months, then fades away. One of our lord’s parables clearly explains this:
“And the one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word, and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away.” (Matthew 13:20-21)
There may be a sense of joy, but it is temporary. There may be a love for others but it is temporary. It is in the demands of life, with all of its harshness and difficulties, that you see the true evidence of the character of Christ in someone’s life. The Christian is not like an “annual” plant which produces fruit for a while, then forever fades away. He has the spirit of a perennial, so that year after year, the same radiant fruit comes forth from his life.
Bearing fruit is natural for fruit trees. They need not strain to produce fruit. You never find a grove of apple or peach trees attending conferences on bearing fruit. Nor do you find fruit trees manipulating one another with browbeating words in attempts to convince a tree to produce fruit. The most natural thing in the world is for a fruit tree to bear its own fruit.
Hear the word of the Lord: "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace...." The prepositional phrase demonstrates the origin of the character of Christ in the life of the believer, the Holy Spirit. Such character is born through the regenerating and indwelling power of the Spirit in the life of the believer. In regeneration the Holy Spirit changes the nature of the sinner so that his new desire and passion is for Christ, rather than for sin.
Why must he be regenerated? Vaughan explains, "No stream can of itself ascend higher than its source; no nature can transcend itself in the manifestation of its energies, and if man is really dead in trespasses and sins, he can put forth no energy containing in it the element of real holiness, or true spiritual life". A person who merely 'makes a decision for Christ' but has not been regenerated by the Holy Spirit will find himself living in frustration while trying to produce a character which is not of his nature. Jesus told Nicodemus that "Unless a man is born again he cannot enter the kingdom of God" (John 3:3). The idea of "enter" means to experience or to see firsthand. Jesus explains that to be "born again" is to be born of the Holy Spirit (John 3:6). Apart from such a radical work of the Holy Spirit a sinner will never believe the gospel and repent of his sins. He will never experience the saving work of Christ personally. How can we describe the Spirit's work of regeneration so that the new believer begins to give evidence of a totally different character of soul and life?
It is a profound and radical change in the whole existing moral nature of the man. It makes him a new creature in Christ; it renews his nature; it re-colors his character; it transforms his will; it re-moulds his whole system of thinking, feeling, and acting. It gives him new objects to live for; new rules to live by; new principles to impel to action; and new sensibilities to success or failure in the progress and development of that new life. The new nature by the Spirit is unlike the old nature of the flesh. That is Paul's whole premise in this portion of Galatians. What the Holy Spirit does is to so change a sinner's nature that the most natural fruit of this person's life is the character of Christ. Is this true of you?
What is the fruit if it is not the character of Jesus Christ being manifested in the life of those whom He has redeemed?
Who has loved as has our Lord? Who has manifested joy supremely as Jesus Christ, "who for the joy set before Him, endured the cross, despising its shame" (Hebrews 12:2). Who has walked with perfect peace as our Lord or demonstrated such depths of patience?
What is the Godhead doing in everyone saved by grace?
Our Triune God is reproducing the same character which Christ naturally manifested in this world by giving us a new nature through the Holy Spirit's work. We see this so clearly in Paul's explanation of the dimensions of God's saving work in Romans 8:29, "For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the first-born among many brethren." By the birthing power of the Spirit and the ongoing work of sanctification, the life of the believer is continually "conformed to the image" of Jesus Christ. Such conforming manifests the fruit of the Spirit, the character of Christ.
In the following lessons in our series on the Fruit of the Spirit, we are going to take a look at each one of the 9 spiritual qualities one by one and discover what they are, and how they should be manifested in our lives.
I was at a chapel service prior to going to work as a prayer counselor at CBN, and Gordon Robertson was the speaker. He asked us the question that I am going to ask you, “If the fruit of the Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit belong to the Holy Spirit, and the Holy Spirit is in you, then where are the fruit and gifts of the Spirit?”
They are in you. They came in you the day you made Jesus the Lord of your life.
There is a difference between the fruit of the Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit.
In his letter to the Galatians, Paul made a list of essential qualities that make up the character of the King:
LOVE
JOY
PEACE
PATIENCE
KINDNESS
GOODNESS
FAITHFULNESS
GENTLENESS
SELF-CONTROL
Myles Munroe writes in his book, “The Most Important Person on Earth”:
“Any true manifestation of the kingdom of God on earth will have these characteristics. Paul referred to these qualities as “the fruit of the Spirit.” He was saying, wherever the Holy Spirit was, these qualities should be evident, indicating that the culture of the King was present.
Paul used this particular analogy of fruit because fruit doesn’t appear overnight; it develops over time, and he wanted them to know that they would have cultivate the culture of the King in their lives, under the example and leading of the Holy Spirit. First, the Holy Spirit teaches us the nature of the original government in heaven. Then He shows us that, because He lives within us, we have this original nature and need to manifest it in our lives. This is what is like in the Garden of Eden.
When you received the Holy Spirit, you also received the seed of kingdom nature. You develop this seed by putting into your life the kingdom elements that allow it to grow. For example, and apple tree doesn’t have to “work” to produce fruit. The seeds if the fruit are within it, and eventually, through a process of maturity, enabled by elements as the nutrients in the ground and sunlight, what is on the inside of the tree becomes manifested on its branches. The spiritual that enable the fruit to grow in our lives are maintaining a continual connection with the King, learning the Scriptures of the kingdom, and yielding to direction of the Holy Spirit in our lives. (John 15)(Matthew 5)
Just as apples are a natural outgrowth of apple trees, the fruit of the Spirit becomes a natural development in the life of a kingdom citizen because he is reflecting the nature of his King. For example, one of the fruits of the Spirit is goodness. It is therefore natural for us to be good if we are in the kingdom. If we are not good, we are unnatural. The Holy Spirit connects us to our original nature, which is true life for us as human beings.
The qualities or fruit of the Spirit embody the King’s culture so that, first of all, we see that is a culture of love, a culture of joy, and a culture of peace. Imagine a culture filled with all the qualities in the above list! It’s our culture to be faithful, to be loyal to our commitments. It’s our culture to be gentle. We’re never brash or rude with other people. As Jesus said, “Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth.” It’s our culture to be self-controlled. We never lose control of our tempers or our desires. No matter what happens in our lives, we sill live out and exhibit all these qualities.
The qualities or fruit of the Spirit are not only what the King does; they are what He is. The King doesn’t only act in love; He is love. He doesn’t only demonstrate peace; He is peace. And every aspect of the King’s nature is what we are to be in our essence, as well. This is what Jesus meant when He said, as recorded in the book of Matthew, “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
We need to realize that we are to reflect the nature of our heavenly Father.”
To see the nature of our heavenly Father, all you have to do is look at Jesus. One of His disciples asked a question, “Show us the Father?” Jesus’ rely was that if you have seen Me you have seen the Father. Jesus is the exact representation of His Father’s nature. If someone were to ask you, “Show me Jesus,” we should be able to answer him or her; “If you have seen me you have seen Jesus.” We should be the exact representation of His nature.
Myles Munroe goes on to say, “There is a big difference between the fruit of the Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit. The fruit of the Spirit have to do with the character of the King. It is the development of the King’s nature in us. The gifts have to do with the power of the King. (1 Corinthians 12)
One is character, the other is ability, but both are necessary for the kingdom life.
With these gifts comes great responsibility. Character is more important than power because it protects our use of that power. It keeps us from using it for the wrong motivations and purpose. It prevents us from using our power to hurt others rather than to help them. Everyone wants power, and when we are offered it, we don't often think about the need to regulate it. Many people seek the power without realizing how critical it is for them to develop the essential qualities of the kingdom at the same time. It is easier to receive the gifts of the Spirit that it is to develop the fruit of the Spirit. It is easier to obtain the power of God that it is to develop the character of God. Therefore, we must develop the qualities, such as love, kindness, and self-control, because the will moderate our use of the gifts.
Both the qualities and the gifts are important, therefore, but the qualities are vital because power without character is dangerous. A balance between the two is a challenge for all kingdom citizens. I believe this is why Jesus spent three-and-a-half years teaching His disciples how to live, how to think, and how to act as kingdom citizens.”
Two things come to mind. First, remember how James and John wanted to call fire down from heaven on the Samaritans that wouldn’t let Jesus pass through their country. This would have been an abuse of power. Second, remember how Paul instructed Timothy not to appoint a new Christian into a leadership position. Think of the consequences in that situation.
Jesus trained them first and then they received the power through the outpouring of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost.”
Several years ago, a religious painter painted two pictures of Jesus Christ and hung them together in a gallery.
The first picture was of the Jewish Christ; the one we are accustomed to seeing when see pictures of the Lord.
It was very beautifully done and would bring a sense of inspiration and worship to anyone who would look at it.
Next to that traditional picture of Christ, the artist hung a picture he had painted of the Lord Jesus Christ disfigured and ugly.
It was a misrepresentation of the genuineness of the Lord.
The artist was asked why he had painted these two pictures.
He said, “The first picture is Christ as He really is. The second is the Christ the world sees when they look at His Church. Those who represent Him in the world.”
The world does not see Christ physically as the disciples saw Him.
They see Christ through His body, which is the Church, made up of believers.
In studying the fruit of the Spirit we will be brought face to face with the kind of life God expects us to live if we are truly representing Him in the world.
This kind of living is supernatural, seeming impossible. In fact, it is impossible. This kind of life can only be lived with the help of the Holy Spirit.
In this series on The Fruit of the Spirit, we are going to take a look at each one and what it means to us as Christians.
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