Loving One Another - Part 2

Today is essentially the kickoff of our ministry year and those elders, deacons, and deaconesses that were elected to, those offices in our annual meeting back in May, essentially began their ministry in that role, today. And we want to bring them before you, but I, I do want to just comment on, on something, at the congregational meeting where we gave you the ballots, with the names of all these individuals, we asked you to pray about how the Lord would lead you to, to, to vote on, on these individuals and, and all of them were overwhelmingly affirmed by the congregation.

The lowest vote total on any one of these individuals, the lowest was 98.3%. and I'm not going to say who that was, but.

but that's, I just marvel, like every year when, when I become witness to, to that, the unity that we enjoy here at Cornerstone. It's not perfect. We got a long way to go, but I am extremely blessed to be one of the pastors here and, and to be able to live amongst a congregation such, as you. what I'm going to do is read off the names of these elders, deacons, and deaconesses, and some of them were in the first service.

but if I, if I read your name and you're in this service, I want to have you come up and stand, stand here. Carlos Cuellar, Alvin Davis, and Bill Payne are the three elders whose, terms of service were, renewed and they were, oh, Bill's here. OK. and then some deacons, Chris Johnson, Mike Martinez, Jonathan Jones, Joe Sapko, Chris Kidder, Mario Lemmon, Daniel Ben Chandler, Ron Warkenton, Brian Gill, And Dave Schilling, John Schroeder, Seaburn Boone, John Esserturian, Eve Hansen, Jaap Van Barsel, Sean Feely.

And that's it for the deacons. And then for our deaconesses, Kim Davis, Donna Vincent, Eddie Gill, Mary Schilling, Meredith Schroeder, and Lillian Warkenton. OK. Great.

And some of these were in the first service too. So, thank you for sticking around. for us here in this service. Well, There you go.

I want to begin our ministry here with a word of prayer for these individuals and praying on their behalf as well, trying to give expression to what I know is the prayer on, on their hearts. So, let's, let's go to the Lord in prayer together. Father, we, we're, we're just, we're so blessed to be a part of this, church body here at Cornerstone. You've taught us so much.

You're, you're growing us deep into you and, and exposing, weaknesses and sin and areas where we still have so far to go, but your grace is amazing and, We thank you for every brother and sister who's a part of this church body. Every one of them is a precious gift, and we thank you for these men and women standing before us today. What a gift they are. And I know that their, their heart at this moment, Lord, is a heart cry to you.

That in the weeks to come, that you would, You would make your power, your arm exceedingly evident in them, in their lives, in their homes, in their ministry. We know, Lord, that we can do everything perfect. Everything perfect, and yet if you do not show up and demonstrate your power and do the work that only you can do, then all of our machinery of ministry is useless. But if you are among us and you do demonstrate your power, then even our flawed.

Most imperfect expressions of ministry and leadership can know a blessing that is extraordinary and clearly from you. Bless these men and women, Lord. And may they be filled with wisdom, filled with grace, filled with power. As they seek to provide leadership for their ministries in the days to come.

Use them as instruments in your hand to be a great blessing to others. We ask Lord that you would do such a mighty work in them and through them and such a mighty work in all of us and through us that all will know that this is the hand of God, that God is most certainly here and among us, and has looked upon this small body with grace and with mercy, and has chosen to put his blessing here. Lord, we, We, I promise you now that all that is done, we will give you all of the glory and take none of it undo ourselves.

And we say these things to you.

On behalf of these individuals, standing before us as, and as an expression of our own heart for them and for all of us, in the name of Jesus, and all God's people said, Amen. Thank you. You may be seated, guys. Let's give them another hand.

Well, let me invite you to turn in your Bibles this morning to Romans chapter 12. Romans 12 for our time of study and in God's word. This morning We have studied Romans 5 through 8. We've learned much about the glories and the grace of the gospel, and we're now asking the question, what then shall we do in response to these things and by way of unleashing these realities in their full operation.

In our lives. This is the beginning, as I said, of the ministry year, and so there's a lot of things that are getting ramped up in the month of September. Our care groups, the weekly meeting times will be starting, in a couple weeks. The Ina ministry will be starting up this month.

The men's Bible study and the ladies' Bible studies. are getting started this month. Our Sunday school program for our children as well as the adult equipping school, our youth Sunday school and, And our youth ministry is, is ramping up in the month of September as well. And I'm sure there's other things that I'm, I'm not even thinking about, but this is, coincidentally the month where we are asking ourselves the question, what then shall I do?

Lord, how do you want me to invest my, my, my time for the ultimate and eternal good of my brothers and sisters, here in the cornerstone, body. And, along those lines, I, I, I think we do well to just ponder how we do spend our time because I think often we can, without consciously intending to do so, we can end up filling up our days by doing things that are of no eternal account to where we end up not having the wherewithal and the time to really do those things that are of enduring and eternal quality.

And that will survive the fires of Judgment Day. 2 or 3 years ago, I was, I was asked to speak at a fundraiser banquet for a ministry in the Midwest, and when I was at that banquet, there was a point in the program where one of the board members got up and began to speak, and a couple of things stood out to me about this man before he even opened his mouth.

Number one, he was a very stately individual, very respectable looking. But I, but I also noticed that there was a an odd hue to his skin. It had a yellowish, darker quality to it that I couldn't quite. put my finger on, but something looked different, and as he began to share, I began to understand why.

That year he had been diagnosed with cancer in his lymph system, his lymphatic system. And he, began to share how when he received the diagnosis, it was, at first thought to be the kind that almost certainly would be, fatal. but then they received more news and then steps were taken and he ended up, going through some rounds of chemotherapy, and as he stood there on that evening, he was about to go into his final round of chemotherapy and things were actually looking promising for him.

But he began to share with us about how that, that season of trial had caused him to think about things more deeply than he ever had before.

And he, he said, as I look back over my life, I've just spent so much time doing things that really don't matter. He says, I don't know how much time I have left, but I want to give my days and my time to things that really matter. And he used the analogy of a decimal number. and he said, when you're looking at a decimal number like you see on the screen behind me, to the right of that decimal, those digits don't really have a whole lot of, value, but to the left side of the decimal, they have, considerably more, exponentially, more value.

for example, if, Let's just say theoretically, you made a little over $100,000 a year in income and your boss came to you and said, hey, I've got good news to you. I'm going to be adding another digit to your annual income. Well, you might then go, well, that's great, but which side of the decimal is the digit going to be? And if he's adding a digit on the right side of the decimal, then we're just talking pennies of an increase.

But if he adds another digit on the left side of the decimal, then we're talking a considerable amount of money by way of an increase. And what this guy ended up sharing is, he says, I've spent too much of my life on the right side of the decimal. And I don't want to do that anymore. I want to live on the left side of the decimal, and I want to do things that are exponentially valuable and of an enduring quality for God's kingdom.

I want to do things with my wife and with my children and, and in the church and for God's kingdom that will matter forever. And so the question I want to ask you guys is, are you living on the right side of the decimal or the left side? Is your time and energy going towards the right side of the decimal or towards the left side of the decimal? And if you're wanting to live on the left side of the decimal, Paul says, here's Romans 12.

Let me tell you how to live your life and give yourself to the doing of those things that are of eternal significance in heaven. if you live this way, you're just going to be laying up so much treasure in heaven. You'll be able to take these things with you. In glory.

The answer to the question that we've begun to look at last week, the question, what then shall we do in response to the gospel? And by way of unleashing the gospel is this, and that is love one another, love one another, and we began to see that in verse 9, and this morning we're really only going to get through verse 10. And on your handout, I think there's like 8 points. 3 of those are reviewed.

We're only going to get, to 4 and 5 this morning and we'll get to the other 3 on a, on a later occasion. But I pointed out to you, last week that beginning in verse 9 through the end of the chapter, Paul is using multiple words for love in the text. In verse 9, we have the word agape, verse 10, philos that speaks of love and affection, Astorge that speaks of family. affection and then again in verse 10 we see Philos and then in verse 13 Philos and then in verse 19 he refers to us as agapetas, meaning we are beloved ones, we are loved by God.

And so clearly Paul is talking about the theme of love in verses 9 and following and as one commentator says in verses 9 to the end of the chapter, this is Paul's recipe. For love. And we get to look at all the ingredients that go inside of agape love. Just reading through verse 10 in what is as close to a literal translation as I think we can manage.

let me just read what's on the screen here. Beginning in verse 9, Paul quite literally says, Agape, announcing his topic. This is the heading. Agape, and you can almost put an equal sign after that.

Agape equals no hypocrisy, hating the evil, clinging to the good, devotedness to one another in brotherly love, leading one another in honoring and diligence, not lagging in the spirit being fervent in and for the Lord. Serving And so what we see just in these verses are 8 ways that we are to show true agape love to one another. I think some of your handouts say 7 ways that should be 8, and the 1st 3 we saw last week, and let's just reiterate them very quickly. If you really want to walk in agape love and as an individual contribute to Cornerstone growing and maturing in our experience of agape love, then number 1, let go of hypocrisy.

put your mask down and stop, living with pretense and hiding your real self behind, those masks that we just all naturally tend to put up in relationship with, with other people and live without hypocrisy. One poet says about love, that love thrashes you to make you naked. He sifts you to free you from your husks. And that's, I think, an accurate statement that if you're going to walk in agape love, just realize what that love's going to do to you.

Over time, that love is going to be stripping you of those masks, and the, the dross that is in you and those things that serve as hindrances to you giving love and being able to receive love. And so let go of hypocrisy and be willing to live in relationship with others with authenticity, being real and being open. Number 2, hate evil vehemently. If you want to show true agape love, and to walk in agape in the community of faith, then hate evil vehemently.

Evil, we ought to hate it, for one reason, because it is destructive to us and to those that we are called to love. And so we hate evil. With proportionate passion to the degree to which we love those that we are called to love. We should despise evil, not tolerate or cope with evil or laugh at evil.

Because that's one of the tricks that the devil employs. He, there are things that maybe you would never think of doing, but he'll put that in a TV show or in a movie and try to make it funny and get you to laugh. At evil. And that's just the first step.

In his effort to get you to stop hating evil as passionately as you should. And also 3, cling to what is good. You owe it to yourself and to the people in your life to be clinging always to that which is good, cling to Jesus, cling to the scriptures, cling to the gospel and the truth and the mercy and the grace and the forgiveness that is in the gospel. Cling to anything that is good, and virtuous and morally praiseworthy in the eyes of God, cling to habits and to disciplines that, that make you day by day what you ought to be and that enrich your relationships with and your ministry to other people.

If you want to walk in Agape, these are the 1st 3 things that you want to do. What we're going to get into this morning now is the 4th. way that we are to show true agape love to one another. A 4th expression of this agape love to each other, and that is show devotion to each other as family.

Show devotion to each other as family. Paul is saying, look what he says in verse 10, be devoted to one another in brotherly love. so what he's saying is, if you want to walk in Agape, and you want to, as an individual contribute to the furtherance of Cornerstone's experience of agape love, then you make a decision that you will be devoted to your brothers and sisters in brotherly love. Now the interesting thing about this expression is that Paul, having already used agape, loads us up with additional terms for love.

The, the Greek that's underneath be devoted to is the word pylos, which already is a strong enough word. If he told us to fileo each other, that's a strong word and telling us to be affectionate towards each other. But he's not content with that. He, he adds another Greek word for love, and that is estorge that speaks of love, family affection.

It's a strong word. And then he takes these two strong words and he puts them together and says, I want you to be devoted to each other. You can almost by way of paraphrase, translate this, love, love one another. There's an emphasis here.

But this word fill a store game. tends to speak of family affection, the love that family members have for one another. in extrabiblical context, this word is used to speak of the love of a husband and wife for each other, the love of children for each other, the love of children for their parents. but more times than not, this is like the perfect word of choice for expressing the love of parents for their children.

And Paul is pointing to that innate natural love that parents have for their children, that deep feeling that parents have for their children. And Paul says, I want you to love each other with that intensity of love. That's, that's an amazing instruction. Those of us that have children, we know something of what Paul is, is talking about when he speaks of this love.

I remember when, when my wife was pregnant with Brooke, I had a heart, Brooke was not tangible to me, because I, I hadn't seen her. She was not as tangible to me as she was to Donna because my wife could feel her inside of her body, and I could see my wife's, belly growing, but I just, I had trouble wrapping my mind around the fact that there's a person in there. But I remember when, when Brooke was born and the first time I laid eyes on her, there was just this. Rocket-like explosion of love in my heart for her.

It just, it just sprang forth and immediately wrapped itself around her, and I was forever smitten and vulnerable to this, this child. That's what parenting is. It's rendering yourself forever vulnerable to that child, to every hurt, to every wound. You feel that with them and And with my 4 children, one of the things I've noticed as a parent is sometimes, when I even think of them experiencing hurt, I feel that physically.

I would see my children when they were younger, running down the sidewalk in front of our house and They didn't even trip and fall, but I thought they might. And it's like, I hope they don't trip and fall. And, but, and just the visual of them possibly tripping and falling, I would feel that in my gut. And all you parents know what I'm, I'm talking about.

We had a mailbox in front of our house that had sharp edges on the bottom of it that our kids never once hit with their heads, but there was a stage where their heads were about that high when they're on their scooters and, and so forth, and There were times they'd be going down the sidewalk and go by that mailbox. They're like 2 ft away from it, but in my mind as a parent, I'm like thinking, I, I hope they don't hit their head on the corner of that mailbox and just the thought of that.

would, I would feel something physical in my gut at the thought of them hurting. I have felt, and I know that, that, that virtually all of you have felt this, and I, I've heard parents talk this way, that when your child has something hurtful that happens to them as a parent, you, you not only hurt with them, but with everything in you, you, you would wish that that had happened to you instead of to your child.

You, you would happily, if God would let you, you would take that from them and have that on yourself. That's the way we as parents feel towards our Our, our children. And that's an intense love. And Paul says, let that be something that gives you your cue as to how you ought to feel deeply for one another, to where when a brother or sister is hurting, you feel that.

So love one another, but it's not just an intellectual or a decision to love, but over time, it is a love that becomes a deep Feeling love where you love them feelingly is the idea here, the way that a parent would passionately love a child. And then look what he says, be devoted to one another in brotherly love. And we have the word philos again. And along with the Greek word for brother, like the city Philadelphia is the city of brotherly love.

Brotherly love is a translation of Philadelphia, and that's exactly the word that Paul is using here. It's, you can almost translate this, love, love one another in love. And so what would you say is the theme there? Paul does not want us to miss this.

but in using the nuances that he uses, he's saying be devoted to one another with this family affection and brotherly love. And obviously, Philadelphos is the word that speaks of the love that siblings have for one another. In the best of situations, I know some of you that are younger are like, I don't know how much love I have for my siblings right now or how much love I'm feeling from them day by day, but think of it in the very best of, of ways, the best of circumstances, and even though as younger people you may fight with each other, your siblings now, that you would stand up for them.

And that you would die for them if push came to shove.

And Paul is saying that we need to love one another passionately and in a feeling way as family and understand, guys, that the reality, the theological reality that lies underneath Paul's instruction here is the fact that we are indeed family. Paul is not saying, hey, let me just give you an analogy. Love one another as if you're brothers and sisters, love one another as if you're family. No, Paul would only tell us to love one another in this way, if in fact, we are family in Jesus.

In fact, we in Christ, Having been born again into the family of God, we are brothers and sisters of each other in far more significant and eternally enduring ways than we are related to our blood relatives. That's a fact. in fact, we would say that, that the institution of family as we know it here on Earth is really but a shadow that points to the reality of what we experience in, in Christ. It's not just that family is an analogy, and we're like that.

No, the family institution actually points to and is merely a shadow of this reality that we experience in Jesus. John Piper says it this way, man, wife, children, families, which is the normal family structure, man, wife, children, families are temporary blessings for this age, but the church will exist as a family forever. It ought to pain our hearts to know this, but our blood relatives that do not believe in Jesus and are not saved, we will not spend eternity. With them.

They are not our brothers and sisters in Christ, and there will be an eternal parting of the ways. That's a reality that rips our hearts in two as we contemplate that and motivates us to want to reach out to them and share Christ with them that they might be true family in Jesus upon believing. In him and becoming our brothers and sisters in the Lord. But we are family, we will live together forever.

We are related to one another, in far more significant and enduring ways than we are related to our blood relatives. We are blood relatives, because it's through the blood of Jesus, that we have been saved and brought into the family of God and made brothers and sisters of one another. You think of Jews and Gentiles in the first century, how different they were, how the Jews loved their bloodlines and relationships and their history and their practices and rituals and religion, and, and they looked at the Gentiles as dogs.

They didn't want anything to do with them.

And then the Gentiles, they were just as proud of themselves and their lineage and their paganism and their religions and family relationships, and they were anti-Semitic just as many are today. There could not have existed a chasm between Jew and Gentile than what existed in the first century, and yet in Christ that chasm was eliminated, and Jew and Gentile were brought into one family as brothers and sisters, and the unthinkable happened. Jew and Gentile in the church of Jesus Christ are looking across the table at each other and saying, You are my brother.

You are my sister.

And I love you with a love that rivals and exceeds anything that would naturally be associated with blood relationship. That occurs often in families. We are family and we need to look upon every brother and sister. As A gift from God to us.

Think about it this way, when, when God This helps me. When, when God searches out a soul and draws that soul to Himself and saves that person. He's not just saving that person for himself. He's saving that person so that he might present that person.

As a gift to his brothers and sisters in Christ. He's not just saving that person for himself, he's saving that person for us. Does that make sense? Like when a couple finds out that they're pregnant and a baby is on the way.

part of the joy is that, as a, as a mother and father, we're thinking we are going to get another child. But if you've already had other children, part of the joy that you look forward to is that our other children are going to receive the gift of a new brother and a new sister. And you're excited at the thought of that. And then the baby is delivered and maybe the next day or whenever after things calm down, the other siblings come to the hospital and they get to meet their brother or sister for the first time.

And as parents, just the joy that you feel that this, this baby is not just ours, but look, look what you have. You have a new brother, a new sister. And so when God saves individuals, we, we need to understand that part of the pleasure of God in saving an individual is not just that he's saving that individual for Himself, but he's saving that individual as a gift to God's other children. And then he brings that person into, for example, the cornerstone body and says, here, I With joy, I present this brother or sister to you.

I saved this person, not just for me, but so that they can be a blessing and a gift, and a brother or sister to you. And so we receive one another. In this way, recognizing that a family is here and it's growing with every person being saved, and we grow in our love for each other and we treat each other accordingly. As family There's a 5th way that we are to show true agape love to one another.

And let's say it this way, we are to take the initiative in treating each other with honor. We're to take the initiative in treating each other with honor. In the New American Standard, it says, give preference to one another in honor. Give preference to one another in honor.

And using the word honor, understand that Paul is, he's not just talking about behaving honorably, he's talking about giving honor and showing honor to other people. For, for me to honor somebody. is to look at that person and to recognize their value, the value that God has placed upon them, and then to treat them accordingly, to see them as valuable and as precious, and then to treat them in a way that is consistent with that value that we place upon that person. And so Paul is calling us in our relationships with one another to honor each other.

He's wanting us to cultivate what we could call other esteem. See, in our culture today, there's a lot that is said about self-esteem, and that we have to cultivate and nurture and build up people's estimations of themselves. And for decades now, that's been the agenda. And even some of the leaders in the self-esteem movement are realizing That we brought some trouble on ourselves in making this our agenda.

I was reading an article not too long ago, where one of the leaders in the self-esteem movement was realizing the error. And he said, the problem that we have in our culture today is that people have a really high esteem of themselves, but they don't esteem other people. They have a low estimation of other people, and consequently, he cited a news story where somebody had such a high estimation of themselves that they actually killed another person because that person looked at them funny.

That's someone with a real high estimation of themselves, and a low estimation of other people.

Paul is saying in the church, yes, we have a self-esteem that is informed by all that we've learned in Romans 5 through 8. We see who we are in Christ, but we also have what could be called an other esteem. We look at one another and, and we see each other through the lens of who they are in Christ. Creatures of God who bear the image of God, who have been saved through the blood of Jesus.

We can look at our brothers and sisters and realize, my goodness, Jesus died for this person. That's how valuable. They are to Him with the value that he placed upon them through giving Himself for them. And if Jesus died for them and loves them so day by day, though they are so far from perfect, and if Jesus intends to love them forever in glory, then I need to love them and honor them as a son and a daughter of God and treat them.

Accordingly, it's the idea of what Peter says in First Peter 3:7 when he tells husbands to honor their wives as fellow heirs of the grace of eternal life. He says, Yes, you husbands, you're heirs of the grace of eternal life, but so is your wife, and you need to honor her as a fellow recipient. Of the grace of eternal life and as a precious daughter of God. Paul says in the church, we're to be a church where we look at all of our brothers and sisters, and we value them.

We see the value that God has placed upon them, and we treat them as precious in his sight. And then we serve them, we love them, we relate to them, we give ourselves to them and all the ways that we've been learning about, and all of that, you can wrap that together and say that's honoring. Your brothers and sisters in Christ. You may say, Pastor, I'm really glad you're preaching on this because, honestly, I think this is an area where many and cornerstone, are weak I, I've, I've been here for a while and And I, there, there are people in this church body that do not honor.

Others in this church body. They do not treat everyone as precious, and namely, they don't treat me as precious. They don't show me the honor that, that I think I'm entitled to as a son or a daughter of God, and I see other people and they're hanging out with others. They seem to be freely honoring others, but they don't, they don't treat me in the same way.

They don't honor. Me, the way that a passage like this would call believers too, and you may say I've been observing that for a while and I'm hurt by it. In fact, that's why I've been emotionally shutting down on the people in this church and why I'm just about out the door and out of this church anyway. But while I'm on my way out, I just want to say to you, Pastor Mount, I'm glad you're preaching on this because this church needs to hear it.

Actually, if I can speak to you with, with the grace and mercy that I think is evident in this passage, Paul would say, to you who actually have been genuinely hurt by the wrongs that others have done, who have failed to honor you as they should, Paul would say, you're the reason I worded this instruction the way that I did. Look carefully at what he says. He doesn't just say honor one another, but literally He's saying go before one another with honoring, lead one another in showing honor.

What Paul is saying by this is, don't let your decision to treat other people with honor be dictated by how they treat you.

If they're not treating you the way that you feel that they ought to be treating you, you step forward and show them how it's done, and you treat them with honor and with respect, and you love them. Part of what Paul would be saying is don't wait around for others to honor you first. Honor them before they honor you. One commentator suggests translating this outdo one another and honoring one another.

but literally it's lead one another. Literally we are all commanded not just to honor one another, but to be leaders and honoring. Others in the family of God. We all have this instinct within us.

I would call it the 50 yard line mentality, where in our relationships with others and in our marriages, where our attitude is basically, what, I'm standing here on the 50 yard line. And when you clean up your act, and you change your behavior, and you start treating me the way that I deserve to be treated, and you meet me on the 50 yard line, then, then you'll get some love from me and you'll get some respect from me. But if you're not going to meet me there halfway and do your part, then you're not getting nothing from, from me.

Any of you ever had that attitude, my hand is up.

OK, 345. Every eye closed, That, that attitude is in all of us. And there's been hundreds, thousands of instances where, where I've displayed that where someone's not respecting me the way that they should. So what, I'm not going to respect them.

They're not going to respect what's important to me. So what, I'm not going to respect what's important. To them And we withhold honor. And its full meaning from others because they're not treating us the way that we deserve.

But here's the insidious thing about that, that when we say, When we say I cannot obey this command to honor this other person and treat them the way that I should, I know I'm supposed to, but I cannot treat my spouse or this other person with honor and respect and treat them as precious. I cannot do these things that I know I should do until they change their behavior and start giving me the treatment I deserve. When we say that by our actions, it's such a powerless way to live, is it not?

You're basically giving your power away to that person.

You're letting them be your master. And you say Christ is your master, but no, no, that person's your master. They're the ones who dictate the way you live, and the way you go about relating to them. And if they never clean up their act and start treating you the way that you deserve, well, you're just, you're their slave.

And if they don't, if they don't change, then you're never going to change. You you're taking your power and you're handing it over to that person. Don't do that. When we act this way, also, I remember years ago, I was counseling a man and was having terrific marital difficulties and, and I was counseling him and saying, here's what, here's what God expects of you.

You got to love your wife like Christ loves the church, and I'm going through Ephesians 5 with him. And as I'm talking, this guy, I could, I could see it. He wasn't listening to me. And he was waiting for me to take a breath because he just had Something to say.

And so I saw that he was wanting to jump in whenever I took a breath. So I didn't take a breath, and I just kept talking as long as I could. But eventually, I had to come up for air. And as soon as I did, this guy exploded and said, But what about her?

He couldn't even abide being told what God expects of him. Without obsessing on, but what about her? And she wasn't even in the room. And I said, your wife's not here.

You're the only one here. You're the only one I can talk to right now. But whether your wife ever changes and is the wife that she needs to be towards you, if she never changes, God is telling you to love her the way that Christ loves the church. And don't let her failure to be the wife she should be, end up dictating your behavior.

And when someone in a situation like that basically conveys, which is what this guy did, and that is, I know I'm supposed to be this. I know I'm supposed to do these things for her, but I can't, if she's not going to change her ways. What you're really saying by that is, Jesus is not enough for me. Yes, I need Jesus to come into this world and to die for my sins, and to be buried and to be raised from the dead and ascended to the right hand of God and to send me His Holy Spirit.

I need that and Jesus has done all that and he's given me that in order that I might do these things. But this is not enough. I need Jesus plus this other person changing their behavior. I need Christ plus.

This person doing something. That's heretical thinking. That's theological heresy. It's salvation from my sin as a husband.

That requires Christ plus. Some other person to do something or to change. Paul says, don't sit around and wait for everyone else to change in the way that they're treating you. Don't sit around and wait for your spouse to become the spouse that they ought to be.

Lead the way and show them how it's done. Be a leader, take the initiative in showing honor even towards those that are not honoring you the way that they should. Tied to this is also an additional idea. And that is, it's not just talking about, show honor to this person before this person may think or be transformed to show honor to you.

But the idea is also don't wait for others to honor someone else, show the way and lead them in showing honor to that other person. Maybe you're with some Brothers or sisters, and, and they're, they're just in a critical mode and they're running down this other believer and talking about, them and, and in your spirit, you're grieved over that, and you're like, man, this is not right. But maybe you're getting caught up in it. And you're adding to the pile up on this other believer who's not even present.

Or maybe you're not adding to it, but you're just standing there silent. You're afraid to speak up. Paul would say, in a situation like that where your brothers or sisters are not showing honor appropriately to this person they're talking about, lead the way. Speak up and lead the way in showing honor to that brother that The people you are with may be dishonoring in that moment.

Young people, this is something that I know is difficult because of peer pressure, but wherever you're at, whether it's school or the youth group, and you may see that people rather easily are falling into groups and, and then there are some that are being left out and they're not being loved and treated as precious sons and daughters of God. Maybe people laugh and snicker at those people and they're just, they just tend to be excluded. They're not being honored. Step out and be a leader.

And step away from the group and go to that person and honor them as a precious son or daughter. Of, of God. Is that not what Jesus has done to us? Guys, we probably all of us in this room are Gentiles.

And so we used to be on the outside looking in, thinking of a cafeteria, the Jews, they, they all sat together and never wanted to sit with us Gentiles and we're just off by ourselves, eating by ourselves rejects. of spiritual society. And Jesus, who was among the Jews, who was a Jew, he takes his lunch tray and picks it up and he walks across the cafeteria to our table, and he sits down with us. And befriends us.

We are the daily recipients. of the love of a savior. Who has honored us in this way. And Paul is calling us in our relationships with one another to reenact this honor.

Aren't you glad Jesus did not wait until we started honoring him before he chose to honor us with His love? Aren't you glad he didn't wait until we cleaned up our act, before he chose to treat us with this amazing love? He didn't wait for us. He moved towards us and honored us with the most amazing love imaginable.

And so how can we look at someone else and say, well, they're not being what they ought to be towards me. So what, forget them. How can we do that when we daily are the recipients of a love that did exactly the opposite. We are to be a community of honor.

Where we think highly of others, all others in the body. And we do not sit around and sit on our hands and wait for people. To be towards us what they ought to be, but we, if it's not being done the way it should be done, well, then we're going to step out and we're going to lead. And we're gonna start with the people that aren't even honoring us the way that they should.

I'm gonna treat them with honor. I'm gonna love them with the love that Christ has shown. To me, That's as far as we're going to get this morning, but let's, let's just go to prayer and, Paul is a realist, guys, God is a realist. He knows what we struggle with, and, and he speaks to us in language that is precise.

It's exactly what we need to hear the way we need to hear it. And I suspect that there are some in this room that there are things that God wants you to do. And you're sitting on your hands waiting for someone else to change first or to take the first step. And in the process, You're making that person your master.

Don't give away your power like that. Say I'm going to take the initiative and I'm going to love and I'm going to honor. I will need, In honor. Lord, you, you are such a gracious father to us.

You sit us down as family. With all of our problems and imperfections and, Weaknesses and immaturities and areas of brokenness in our lives and our hearts, and, and even the fractures in our relationships. All of us have those, Lord. And you sit us down at your feet and say, let me talk to you and I, I want to show you, I want to talk to you about how to live and walk in agape love.

And I'm just so glad you don't say, hey, love one another. End of lesson No, you break that open for us and say, let me tell you what this looks like. And thank you for Opening our eyes a little more to what the way of Agape truly looks like in the church. We live in a world that is hungry for community, Lord, so much brokenness.

People who don't even know what the love of a father or mother looks like, people who've been abused, they've, they've lived in And loneliness and despair and utter brokenness. And They don't even know what the word community means. They have no picture for it. Help us, Lord, to provide.

For a watching world, a picture. Of true Agape community. Let us begin with how we love one another. May the world see something very different than what they see out in the world.

Lord, we thank you for this opportunity to give of our offerings to you this morning. We ask that you would receive these funds and do much with them for the glory of, of Jesus and the spread of, of your gospel. And we ask these things in the name of Jesus, and all God's people said,