Galatians 5:22
Last week, we started a series
on list. And the list for this little
period of time is the fruit of the spirit. And in the list of
the fruit of the spirit, you’ll find nine features, nine virtues,
nine elements of what the Christian life ought to look like. We are
going to take them one by one. You could take them in groups
of threes, the first three, the second three, the third three.
You could do that. You could do all kinds of things. But at least
for our purposes we’ll go through them one by one. So tonight we
want to look at the fruit of the Spirit is love. Now back up for just a moment
and think about what we talked about last week. Last week we
considered living by the Spirit and not
the flesh. Remember verse 16 says this,
I say walk by the Spirit and you will not gratify the desires
of the flesh. Verse 17, the desires of the
flesh are against the spirit. And then skip down to verse 25,
if we live by the spirit, let us also walk by the spirit. And
so what we considered is that living out of God’s grace, living
out of the Holy Spirit, and living out of our flesh, living out
of our own desires or our own strength, they’re opposed to
one another. They don’t work. They fight against one another.
Think about the context of Galatians. Galatians is one of Paul’s letters
where he wasn’t real nice. He was Pastor Yelet in this particular
book. He’s upset with the Galatians
because they have abandoned Christianity and they have gone back to Judaism,
Judaizing, to legalism. And so he’s saying to them, if
you want to live out of legalism, you’ll kill each other. If you
want to live as legalist, you’ll die trying. You’ll never measure
up with each other or with God. And he says simply this, live
freely. Christ has set you free. So live
by the Spirit and not Not the flesh. I was reading a little
book this week. I inherited my dad’s Pastoral
library about ten years ago. And so I’ve got his books with
some of his markings in them and I’ve got his one of his books
is on the The Spirit-Filled Life, or the Spirit-Led Life, I think
it’s by Stuart Briscoe, famous preacher from England who was
over in the States, I think in, somewhere in Wisconsin at some
point in time. But it says under the fruit of the spirit is love,
it has a little section in the book that says church populations
shift. I think in this case it’s talking
about small groups. But it says church populations shift, you
know, people go from one church to the other, you know, a little
cross town shifting and changing, and it says, because we learn
how much we dislike one another. And my dad had that circled in
a little star by it. It’s his own little way of note-taking.
But I thought, you know, that’s a really sad truth. But the fruit
of the Spirit could change all that. The fruit of the Spirit
could fix all that. And so tonight we want to look
at the fruit of the Spirit is love. And love, if you note in
the New Testament, is the chief of Christian virtues. Did y’all
catch at the end of 1 Corinthians chapter 13? How does he end that
little section on love? He said, the least of these is
love. Oh, the greatest of these, yeah, so now faith, hope, and
love abide, these three, but the greatest is love. So there’s
a triad in the New Testament, faith, hope, and love, and love
is always the chief. How about in Colossians? Remember
in the book of Colossians where the Apostle Paul is telling the
Colossian church, you’ve been recreated in Christ Jesus, your
new creations, And he says, get rid of the malice that’s in you,
get rid of the hatred that’s in you. He’s almost saying, take
off your old clothes, your dirty clothes, and put on new ones.
What are those new clothes? Clothe yourselves with, you might
know it, compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, patience,
and above all, put on love, which does what? It binds us together
in unity. And so love is one of the chief
graces in the New Testament. It is a fruit of the Holy Spirit.
Only the Spirit of God at work in you can produce it, as well
as these other eight virtues that we’ll be making our way
through. Let’s talk for just a minute about this whole idea
of love. How many words in the English
language do we have for love? We have one. How many, this little
quiz for, You smarty pantses. How many words in the Greek language
are there for love? Four, okay. We got four. We got
three. Can everybody write? Tim, can
you settle it for us? I’ll hold my hand up. There’s four. There’s
four words for love. So when you read your New Testament
in the Bible in English, you don’t know which love is being
referred to. Well, let’s think about the word
love for just a moment as it’s found in the New Testament. Okay, if you say, I love, have
any of y’all been to Purple Penguin yet? Ice cream, I love Purple
Penguin, frozen yogurt, or what’s the shop at the mall, Fro-Yo?
Yozone. Yozone, have you been there?
No, I just brought my ice cream. Yeah, we believe you. Okay. I
know, I’ve never been. Okay. Well, we might say, I love
Yozone, or Purple Penguin. I love that kind of ice cream.
Now, how do you love that ice cream? Do you love it with the
love that you’ll never let it go? Do you love it with the love
that’ll send you to the cross to die for it? No, it’s not that
kind of love, is it? But we say, I love ice cream.
Will we sacrifice our lives for it? No. Does it offer you friendship? No. Does it fulfill you in ways
unimaginable? Okay, if you answer yes to any
of that, we’ve got a little bit of a problem. What’s that sometimes?
Yes. Depends on how bad the day with
the kids has been, right? She’s got the hogging dogs out.
You better pay some attention. But many of us have a natural
affection for ice cream. Anybody got just a natural affection
ice cream good? Okay, yeah, I know Gene does.
I’ve been to your table and eaten ice cream. But that’s good, right? I love ice cream. but it’s a
natural affection for ice cream, that milk and that cream and
those eggs and that sugar all whipped up together, boy, does
it taste good. Then there’s a love word in the
New Testament that goes from natural affection, it goes to
self-centered or selfish passion. Now, those of you who are married,
you know all about that, we don’t need to talk about it, but there’s
a word in the New Testament It’s actually not in the New Testament.
It’s in the Greek language, but not in the New Testament. And
it speaks of that specific form of love that the Bible says is
to be found only in the context of marriage. Now, how many of
you have friends that you do things with? Maybe it’s a golf
partner. It’s a co-worker that you like. A fishing buddy, a
shopping friend, a roommate, a neighbor, whatever. How many
of y’all have friends like that? Okay. What’s that city up in? Pennsylvania. Yeah, and we get
Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love, right? And so there’s a
50-50 love. You know, Jay and I are good
buddies because we play golf together. We don’t, but say we
did. That’s why we hang out with each
other. We may not socialize on any other
setting, but we’re golf buddies, right? Or we have friends that
we wouldn’t associate with otherwise except we’re stuck with them
at work. that kind of thing. There’s a friendship, a brotherly
love. But in the New Testament, the
greatest form of love is what we call agape love. I know y’all
have heard of that word, right? It’s the love that’s described
as giving of oneself to another. Now, lest you think it’s giving
of yourself to another for something in return, let me just go ahead
and tell you, it is not that at all. It’s saying, Maybe like
Glenn had to do today with the brother that visited. We’re going
to love you no matter what. And we’re going to give you everything
we got. You may be lying to us, you may burn us, you may be telling
the same story to the next church, whatever the case may be. But
at this moment in time, I’m going to love you in a way that you
need to be loved. And it’s a way of showing the
love of Christ. So we’re giving of oneself, giving
of ourselves one to another for nothing in return. This is what
Christ speaks of when he says, love your enemy, love your neighbor,
love your God. It’s what we are to do within
the church. It’s what we’re to do towards
other Christians. And it’s even, I think, something
we should do towards those in the world. Now, the Bible seems
to give a priority, and you get in trouble as a pastor for saying
this, but the Apostle Paul says it, so it’s safe. We’re to primarily
love the church. What does the Apostle Paul say
at the end of one of his letters? I can’t remember which one, but
he says, take care of those who are in great need, especially
those in the household of faith, right? We’re to love, there’s
a special love we have in the bonds of the communion of saints.
That’s why it’s important to belong to a church. But we should
also love non-Christians. If your neighbor loses a loved
one, take them a meal just as you would take a person in this
church a meal. Serve your neighbor, serve your
co-workers, serve the man who walks in the church who’s sitting
on our doorstep waiting for us to get here. We serve in that
way. There may be nothing in return But that’s how we are
to love one another. Now, this means that it shows
Christ in us when we do it. We give without expectation for
a thank you. We give without expectation of
something in return. And we show very well, I think,
what is sacrifice, what is generosity, and what is the fruit of the
Holy Spirit. Now, let’s go back to all these love words. I think
Americans have the whole love thing mixed up. And I think very
sadly, even the church has them mixed up. We will go all out
sacrificially. I mean, we will dive and move
over heaven and earth for what? Ice cream. Or to get the house
we want. Or what’s that? Or our favorite
sports team. You know, we’ll even have a little
fight in the back alley because so and so like one team over
the other. We play 50-50 in our covenant
relationships. I will serve the church as long
as the church does what? Serves me. We play 50-50 in our
other covenant relationships. I’ll serve my wife as long as
what? My wife serves me. Or I will serve the church in
my ordination vows as long as the church serves me. We have
that other word for love that speaks of passion. and we find
it taking place outside the context of marriage. Or nowadays we’re
redefining marriage and somehow trying to normalize it or make
it right. But what of the brotherly and sacrificial love? What of
the love that says I’ll love you no matter what? I’ll suffer
with you, I’ll die with you, I will I will give of myself
and think of you first.” What of that love? That’s what the
church needs to display. For if the world is going to
see the love of Christ, they first have to see it in us. Faithfully
growing and maturing and ever becoming the beautiful bride
of Christ who loved, which kind of love? Agape. He loved us so much that he died
our death. And so there’s something about
love, the Christian love, that’s found in the Bible that we need
to understand. The fruit of the Spirit is love. It’s not any
human version of it. It’s not any American dream version
of it. It’s simply what God says in the scripture. It’s love that
comes out of being new creatures in Christ Jesus and us living
that way. So how does our love as the fruit of the Spirit, how
does it manifest itself in the church? How does it make itself
visible in the world? When we have mutual affection
for one another, people ought to walk into our church and say,
boy, these people love each other. And it shouldn’t be fake love,
it shouldn’t be Sunday love, you know, our ties are straight
and we’re shaking hands and being nice. It ought to be that we’ll
die for each other. It ought to be that we will suffer
with each other. It ought to be that we’ll shed tears with
each other. It ought to be that whatever happens with one, it
happens with all. How does it manifest itself?
Well, it’s mutual affection for the brethren. Now, the apostle
Paul’s dealing with some problems in the Galatian church. And he’s
going to say to them, not far behind the love will be joy. And what else? Peace. What else? Patience. goodness, faithfulness,
gentleness, self-control, all those things, it’s not gonna
fall. If love is the chief one, the rest is gonna fall very quickly
behind. People are gonna see that Christ’s
love is the great example, that Jesus is the great example of
love, he’s the lawgiver. People are gonna see, if love
is manifest, that God himself is love. But what is the opposite
of love? Okay, we’re saying that the spirit and the flesh are
against each other. So we gotta say, you know, the fruit of the
spirit is love, but what’s the fruit of the flesh? Or the weed
of the flesh is a better way to put it. What are, what’s that? No, you can say it out loud.
The peanut gallery over here is generally quiet. It’s hatred. Paul actually goes on a list
in various places in Galatians. It’s factions, it’s pride, it’s
envy, it’s indifference. What’s that? Jealousy. Yeah,
it’s being selfish, it’s being self-absorbed. Now, did Jesus
not deal with this with the Pharisees? What was that great question
one of the Pharisees asked Jesus? Remember, love the Lord your
God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. Love your neighbor as yourself.
And what did the Pharisee very quickly say? Who is my neighbor? Wouldn’t you know it, the Pharisees
define neighbors very narrowly. Jesus comes and defines it very
broadly. But we pick and choose who we
love, right? We love the lovable, right? It’s easier to love somebody
who’s gonna love you in return. I mean, you wanna deal with a
hard case. Nothing in return is gonna cost
you some time. You’re probably gonna get burned and robbed from.
That’s more of what Christ says to do. But we only want to love
the lovable. We only want to love the people that are like
ourselves. We are only wanting to love those
that When we love them, it doesn’t cost us anything. So we exempt ourselves from loving
certain people. But we also have come to this
notion in our day and time where it’s not very loving to say the
truth. Right, we did the little, I have a friend who calls it
the hooky dance. We dance around things with people and we never
say what’s really true until we finally just blow up and say
it. What is Paul gonna say next chapter in Galatians? If anyone
is caught in a transgression, chapter six, what’s he gonna
say? Let him who is spiritual restore
him. And so one of the greatest acts
of love is to put your hands on somebody’s shoulders and look
them square in the eyes and say, you know, what you’re doing is
not godly. We’re supposed to do that with our children, right?
I mean, y’all heard Ted Tripp say it the other night, right?
So it’s legitimate, right? Went to hear him speak. Made
the kids sit there so they could see why we’re warping them the
way we are. But we put our hands on people’s
shoulders. We look them square in the eye and say, this is not
righteous. This is ungodly. So how do we love people? We
speak truth to them. What else did Jesus say, though,
about love? You remember in the Sermon on the Mount when he,
Sort of going through the ethics of the Ten Commandments. And
as he’s going through the ethics of the Ten Commandments, he’s
basically saying, you think you haven’t broken them. Oh, but
you have. And which one would be related
to the fruit of the Spirit is love? The opposite. If you hate,
what have you committed? You’ve committed murder in your
hearts. And so you see the radical nature
Jesus has in his teaching to show us that our hatred, even
our simple carelessness is like having murder in our hearts. And so what of this agape? What
of this Christian love? What should we think of? Well,
if you back up to chapter four in Galatians, the Apostle Paul
is going to tell of one of the greatest events in redemptive
history. He’s going to tell of the coming of the Lord Jesus
in the fullness of time. God sent forth his son, born
of a woman, born under the law to redeem those who are under
the law that we might receive adoption as sons. And so one
of the great blessings we have is that God himself has shown
us this agape love. The son of God became man and
suffered and died so that we could have a relationship of
love with him in heaven. What is that love that we experience
in heaven? It’s an experience of the Trinitarian love that
has existed since the beginning of time, since before the dawn
of time. It’s existed eternally. So here’s a challenge for you.
Here’s a challenge for us all. Two of them, actually. First,
think of how you use the language love. I mean, it’s okay to love ice cream,
isn’t it? I mean, for sure. I’ll have a little bit tonight,
I’m sure. It’s good. But do we love our neighbor?
Do we love our comforts over serving others? Then another challenge, look
in the mirror, and look in the mirror of God’s holy word and
say to yourself, does my love that I believe I’m faithfully
expressing, does it match the love of God in Christ Jesus?
Because if there is a disconnect, if there’s a difference, if there’s
a gap, and there’ll be some because he’s infinite and you’re finite, then we ought to think very hard
about how we do love. and how we do show the love of
God to others. Because guess what, folks? Jesus
is back in heaven. And how is he showing the world
what his love is like? He’s doing that through you,
through us at the church. Let’s pray together. Our gracious
God, we do pray that the fruit of the spirit in each of our
lives would indeed be manifest in the fruit of love. We pray,
Father, that you would help us to love with a love that will
not let go, just like Jesus has done. We pray that we will love
in such a way that we expect nothing in return, that we commit
the acts of love and we walk on only to do it somewhere else,
but we don’t sit with our hands out, we don’t sit waiting for
a thank you or a reciprocation of someone’s love back to us,
that we would just love and serve as has been done for us. Lord,
we pray also that we would not be like Those nine lepers, ten
were healed, nine didn’t return to say thanks. We thank you that
you’ve loved us with a great love that has saved us from our
sins, has purchased our freedom, and has even given us the ability
to love others in much the same way that you love us. Help us,
we do ask. In the name of Christ, our great savior, amen.