1 CORINTHIANS 13 PURSUE LOVE2020 Teaching by Jerry B Simmons

Teaching Transcript: 1 Corinthians 13 Pursue Love

You are listening to FerventWord, an online Bible study ministry with teachings and tools to help you grow deeper in your relationship with God. The following message was taught by Jerry Simmons in 2020. Well, as we look at 1 Corinthians chapter 13 this morning, I've titled the message, Pursue Love.

pursue love. This is a challenging chapter. It's a challenging passage because as the standard for what love is is set, we all can easily recognize that we fall short of that standard, that we don't measure up. There's a common practice. As you read through 1 Corinthians chapter 13, take out the word love and insert your name.

And you find there that it doesn't fit quite right, right? Harvey suffers long and is kind. Harvey does not envy. Harvey does not parade himself and is not puffed up. Why am I picking on Harvey? Well, he's a loving guy, but he's also not quite there yet. Rick. Rick.

He suffers long and is kind. Just ask his wife. Not, right? There's some growth to happen there. There's some growth available. George does not envy and he's not puffed up. He does not boast. He does not behave rudely. He does not seek his own. Jerry suffers long and is kind. Now that one's absolutely true, right? No, unfortunately not. This is, as we work our way through and as you try to insert your name in there, you recognize that

There's a standard there that is quite far above where we are when it comes to love. On the other hand, if you put in the name of Jesus, it fits perfectly, right? Jesus does suffer long and is still kind. And he is not puffed up and he does not parade himself. He does not behave rudely. He does not rejoice in iniquity. He does believe all things. It fits perfectly with Jesus, right?

And that's an important thing to take note of because, well, Jesus instructed us in John chapter 13, verse 34, that we are to love one another as he has loved us. He said, a new commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I have loved you, that you also love one another. This love that we are to have, in the Greek, it's the word agape.

And there is several different words that you could use for love in the Greek language. One was eros, which we get the idea of erotic from, and it's a fleshly kind of love. There's storge, which is a family kind of love. There's phileo, which is a brotherly kind of love or a friendship type of love.

But agape was a word that wasn't really used much in the rest of the Greek language, but the Bible really adopted this and the authors of the New Testament really took on the word agape and gave it meaning to define what God's love is and to define the kind of love that we are to have with one another. Pastor David Guzik describes it this way, agape love gives and loves because it wants to.

It does not demand or expect repayment from the love given. It gives because it loves. It does not love in order to receive. It's a sacrificial kind of love. It's a love that gives regardless of whether it receives or not. But it loves and it gives because of love and not out of any other selfish motivation. And so that's the kind of love that we are called to. That's the kind of love that God wants to develop in us.

Now, again, as we look at the standard that's set here in 1 Corinthians chapter 13, it can be challenging for us. And as we find ourselves falling short, we wonder, what do we do now? Okay, if I don't measure up to this, what do I need to do? And Paul answers that as you jump into chapter 14, verse 1. Paul says, pursue love and desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy. What we are to do is to pursue love.

Yes, we don't measure up. Yes, we are not quite there yet. We don't have the love that we need to have yet. We don't yet love one another as Christ has loved us. But we're to be on this pursuit continually, this endless pursuit and recognizing where we fall short and then moving towards the ideal, moving towards the example that Christ has set for us. And so I want to walk you through a few things to help us pursue love.

to try to grow and develop in the love that God calls us to have for one another. The first thing to consider this morning is found here in verses one through three, and that is to pursue love above all else. Pursue love above all else. Looking again at verse one and two, it says, "'Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy,

Here is Paul begins to talk about love. It's happening right in the middle of his conversation with the Corinthians about spiritual gifts.

1 Corinthians chapter 12 talks a lot about spiritual gifts and gives a lot of insight for us as the body of Christ and the different members and the different roles and the giftings that the Holy Spirit enables the members to be able to fulfill their role within the body of Christ.

But then in chapter 14, he goes on to address the use of those gifts, specifically within church gatherings and church services. And so chapter 12, chapter 14, we're talking about spiritual gifts. We understand this is important. This is valuable. This is an essential part of the Christian life for us as believers.

And we find here in the book of Corinthians that, well, they were actively engaged in spiritual gifts and their services were filled and abundant with the use of spiritual gifts. But the problem was there was a misuse of the spiritual gifts.

And as a result, their services were really chaotic. There was a lot of conflicting and competing things happening. And Paul here in writing chapters 12 and 14 of 1 Corinthians is trying to bring some order to the chaos and to help them understand the right balance and the right use of spiritual gifts. Now sandwiched right in between here is chapter 13. And here you have the guiding principle.

for the use of spiritual gifts and not related to spiritual gifts only, but specifically within this context, Paul is saying, look, the thing that will help you understand how to use spiritual gifts and when to use spiritual gifts and why to use spiritual gifts and which gifts to pursue, it really boils down to love.

Spiritual gifts are not a way for you to show off. They're not a way for you to feel spiritual or to impress anybody or to get attention. Spiritual gifts are a way for you to love people. And because you love people, you desire to be empowered by the Lord to minister to them. But a misuse of these gifts is not beneficial.

And so again, in verse 1, Paul says, Speaking in tongues was one of the gifts that they were exercising and kind of flaunting and misusing there within the church. The first, well, quite a few verses of chapter 14 is going to deal with and address the use of and the issue of tongues within a church service.

And Paul says, look, if I'm doing this, if I'm speaking forth in tongues, but I don't have love, then it's just noise. It's like a clanging cymbal. It's just a racket. It's not meaningful. It's not helpful. It's not loving. But if I love you and I want what's best for you, that's the way that I typically like to describe the word love. It means that I want what's best for you. I'm looking out for your good, for your eternal good.

then I'm not just going to make a bunch of noise and make a racket. I want to make an impact and bring forth something that is valuable to you. Paul says in 1 Corinthians chapter 14, as he's kind of wrapping up his discussion on the use of tongues within the church service, he says, I thank God that I speak with tongues more than you all. Yet in the church, I'd rather speak five words with my understanding that I may teach others also than 10,000 words in a tongue.

Because five words with a tongue is more loving. It's impactful. It's with understanding. But 10,000 words in a tongue is, well, not that helpful. And so it's not very loving. And so Paul says, if I speak with tongues, even though it's tongues of men, tongues of angels, even though it's beautiful, even though it's, you know, amazing display of the power of the Spirit, if it's without love, it's just noise.

In verse 2, he goes on to say, if I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I'm nothing. Imagine being able to have the knowledge of all mysteries, the understanding of all mysteries. Imagine having the faith that can move mountains. Remember, Jesus talked about that. If you have faith, there's a mustard seed. You can tell this mountain to be cast into the sea and it will go.

I saw one commentator said, well, if you have faith that can move mountains, but you don't have love, you're going to drop that mountain on somebody, right? That love has to be the motivation, has to be the driving force in the exercise of the gift of faith, the gift of prophecy, the bringing forth of the word of God. Love needs to be the motivation, right?

that it's to bring forth a word from the Lord that people might be impacted and changed and have opportunity to repent, have opportunity to go forward with the Lord, have opportunity to be encouraged and uplifted, that they would be able to endure the situations that they're going through. The gift of prophecy is an important gift. Paul says, pursue that above them all as you head into chapter 14. And if you have all knowledge, this is an important one.

And as Paul is walking through these things, this is not just random stuff, but he's really addressing situations right there happening in the city of Corinth. To have all knowledge without love, he says, it profits me nothing. In chapter 8 of 1 Corinthians verse 1, Paul said, Now concerning things offered to idols, we know that we have all knowledge, or we have knowledge. Knowledge puffs up, but love edifies.

As he's talking about having knowledge, he's addressing the situation where the liberties that he talked about in chapters 8, 9, and 10, the liberties that people were exercising to the hurt of others around them, they were insisting, well, I can participate in this. I can live this out because I know the truth about meat. I know the truth about idols. I know...

And I have this elevated knowledge and I'm sorry you're so ignorant that it hurts you, but I know and so I'm going to engage in these things, but it was causing damage. It was hurting people and causing people to stumble. And so there Paul makes the point, knowledge puffs up, but love edifies. Yeah, you might have great spiritual insight. You might have incredible knowledge, but Paul says, if I don't have love, even though I have this great insight and understanding, I'm nothing, right?

It doesn't really benefit me to have all this spiritual insight and knowledge if I don't love, if I don't look at you and want what's best for you. In verse 3, he says, Pretty radical stuff here. If I give everything, I sell everything I have, I give it to the poor, do the poor benefit if I do that? Yeah, they get the material things that we're given.

But Paul says it profits me nothing if it's not done in love. It's interesting to consider because we could look at someone who is incredibly generous and automatically, you know, assume and consider that, well, that is love. We can look at our own generosity perhaps and maybe assume and think that, well, that is love.

But here Paul is saying, look, there's the possibility. You can be generous. You can give everything to the poor. You can be incredibly generous in that way. But if it's not love that's motivating you, he says, it profits me nothing. Even if I give my body to be burned, if I am a martyr for the Lord, if I don't have love, it profits me nothing. Imagine that, being burned at the stake in the name of Jesus, but having no value, no profit, no reward from that.

Because it wasn't done with the motivation of love. Paul is saying, look, love is the source of all things for us as believers. And we tend to measure ourselves and measure others by the external things, the use of spiritual gifts perhaps, or the generosity, or this or that, and we can make conclusions about that. But the reality is, the core issue is their love.

Are we loving like Christ loved us? Pastor David Guzik says, each thing described is a good thing. Tongues are good. Prophecy and knowledge and faith are good. Sacrifice is good. But love is so valuable and so important that apart from it, every other good thing is useless. Every good thing is useless apart from the love that God has for us and the love that God has called us to.

to extend to others around us. Here, Paul is really calling us to love people as God loves you. If we fall short in this, if we find ourselves not measuring up to the standard, it's just like any other sin. First of all, we repent. And so if love is not the source, love is not the thing that you pursue above all else, well, then there needs to be repentance. And then we ask God for help. And then we get up and we pursue love.

And we try again and we attempt to put the love of God first, to put the love of others first. Well, to get into a little bit more details, Paul now goes into a little bit of the definition of what this kind of love is. And we're going to walk through some of these things pretty quickly. But point number two is to pursue love while suffering. Pursue love while suffering. It starts out in verse four saying, "'Love suffers long and is kind.'"

And talking about falling short, right? Like that's, we could easily just stop there and ignore the rest of the passage and be challenged by this first line for, you know, many years to come. To suffer long and be kind is incredibly difficult. It can only be done from love that comes from God. Here, Paul is removing all of our excuses for not loving. You know, sometimes we are really grumpy when we're tired.

or when we're hungry, right? And we all kind of understand, and we chuckle, we laugh a little bit, like, hey, you know, you're really grumpy, you're being rude, you know, you're being unkind, you know, maybe you need something to eat. And that's a normal thing. But that's not love. Love suffers long, and still, in the midst of it, and at the end of it, is kind. This word to suffer, it's the kind of patience, it's the kind of suffering that's regarding people, right?

There's another kind of endurance and patience that is going through circumstances that are difficult. But this is regarding people. That is, you're suffering a long time because of this person. Because this person is difficult. Because this person is challenging and annoying. Love suffers long. Love carries through relationships with the most difficult people for a very long time and still is kind.

and still shows kindness. The structure of the verse is that love is kind even after suffering for a long time. Now again, Paul is addressing here the body of Christ. We can apply this to our marriage relationships, and there's certainly much room and need for us to do so. But within the body of Christ, within those of us who are gathered as living water, there is to be this kind of love.

love that suffers long with those who really irritate and annoy and bug and bother and hurt and afflict, that there is to be this long-suffering with kindness that is between us. And as Paul is addressing the Corinthian church, remember he's addressing a church that is, well, I've referred to it a couple times over the past few weeks, that there is this immaturity in Corinth,

And it's demonstrated by their lack of love for one another. Back in 1 Corinthians chapter 6, Paul is rebuking them for their going to court against one another. And they were, you know, battling out legal matters in the courts. He says, before unbelievers, you're being a bad witness, you're fighting each other. He says, why would you not rather accept the wrong? Why would you not rather let yourself be cheated than to

attack your brother and misrepresent the Lord before the world around you. You're suffering. They've cheated you. You've done wrong. But why not rather be cheated? Because there was this immaturity. Instead of suffering long and still being kind, they were going to battle. They were going to court. They were fighting it out.

That's not love. Paul here is addressing the Corinthians and calling them to maturity, calling them to love, even in the midst of injustice and wrong and suffering and hardship and hurts. Well, moving on to the rest of verse four, on into verse six, here's point number three, pursue love, not self. Pursue love, not self. Here he goes on to list some things that love is not or that love does not do.

So first, what love does is it suffers long in his kind. Then love does not envy. Love does not parade itself, is not puffed up, does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, seeks no evil, does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth. This is an example of the things that love is not. And they're all rooted in selfishness, self-centeredness,

And love is not self. Love is others. It's not a focus on myself. It's a focus on others. What's good for you? What is of eternal value for you? And so love does not envy. This word envy speaks about this idea of not wanting others to have benefit or joy or good. And in fact, because I want that, because I can't have that, I'm going to sabotage you

So that you don't have it because I don't get to have it. That's the idea here of envy. It's destructive. Love does not envy. Love doesn't look at others and say, oh, I want to take that good away from you. I want to take that joy away from you. I don't want you to have good things. If you ever have those kinds of emotions or feelings or thoughts, that's not love.

And when we fall short in these things, we need to repent. We need to ask God for help. And then we need to get back up and pursue love and want what's best for people around us. Love does not parade itself. Do you ever throw yourself a parade? Maybe once a year on your birthday, it's okay. But other than that, love doesn't parade itself. The idea here is that it doesn't flaunt itself. It doesn't have to be seen.

Acts of love are not done in order to be seen by others. Pastor David Guzik puts it this way. Love in action can work anonymously. It doesn't have to have the limelight or attention to do a good job or to be satisfied with the results. Love gives because it loves to give, not out of the sense of praise it can have from showing itself off. Love is not motivated by the praise that you get from doing it.

It's not motivated by, you know, what you get out of it. You ever do something and you're like, wow, that was really good. And you look around and you're like, man, nobody was watching. It wasn't even worth it. You pick up the piece of trash. It's like, ah, I didn't get it. Okay, so put it back on the ground. Wait for somebody to watch. Okay, now pick it up, right? Because I want the reward of the praise, the celebration. Paul says, that's not love. Love doesn't parade itself. It's not out for the glory. It does it even if nobody ever knows.

Because the motivation is, I want what's best for you and I want to do good for you. He goes on to say, love is not puffed up. This is along the same lines, but being the parade, it's outward. The puffed up is inward. The same kind of idea. The better than you attitude. The impressed with ourselves, you know, being proud and arrogant. Love is not puffed up. It's not proud. It's not arrogant. If we fall short...

There's need for repentance. Ask God for help and get back up and now pursue love, putting God first and others before yourself. Love does not behave rudely. It's not insensitive. It doesn't disregard others. It doesn't disregard the experience of others or the feelings of others. Love does not seek its own.

The word seek its own, it means to seek in order to find. It really comes across much stronger in the Greek, and that is it's a demanding, demanding my way. The New Living Translation puts it this way, it does not demand its own way. Love does not demand its own way. It doesn't insist it has to be my way. We have to go where I want to go. We have to do what I want to do. We have to

Even if we, you know, think we're no best and we're convinced our way is better, right? But it's not after its own way. It doesn't demand that you satisfy me. Love is, hey, I'm here to serve you. Love is not provoked. Older translations used to say love is not easily provoked. And always had to be pointed out and corrected because the easily is not there. Love is not provoked. The idea of provoked is stirred up to anger. Love doesn't get stirred up to anger.

You can't make me mad because I love you. You can't make me hurt you because I love you. You can't make me attack you because I love you. That's the idea of love. It's not provoked. Can you be provoked? It's amazing when you get to know one another how you learn how to push each other's buttons, right? All you got to do is flaunt the angel's gear before Jonathan and he's provoked immediately because he doesn't love you that much. Love is not provoked. Are you provoked? Do you fall short in that?

Well, again, there's need for repentance. Ask God for help. Get back up and pursue love. Love thinks no evil, he goes on to say. Thinks no evil can be understood in two ways. The typical way to understand it is that it keeps no record of wrongs. It doesn't hold on to those wrongs that others have done. It doesn't have a list of, this is how many times you've hurt me in the past. This is how many times you've done this to me in the past. Love doesn't do that. But another way to understand this is that, well, instead of...

Your actions being implications to me of, well, there's secret motivations that are happening, right? The word thinks, it means to impute. So I can charge to your account goodness, right?

that, hey, you did this out of the goodness of your heart and you didn't have evil motivation. Or I can look at what you did and I could say, oh no, there's evil behind there, right? That we're reading into the situation the things that could take place. The commentator, Adam Clark, can explain it better than I'm explaining it right now. He says, in things no evil, it never supposes that a good action may have a bad motive.

It implies that he does not invent or devise evil. So I don't look at your actions and assume that and think that there's bad motivations or there's evil behind it because I love you. It thinks no evil. It does not rejoice in iniquity but rejoices in the truth. Love does not rejoice in iniquity. Iniquity that's done to someone. Iniquity that's done by someone. Love can't rejoice in iniquity because...

The wages of sin is death. That's not good for you. Iniquity, it's not good for you. I can't celebrate in that. Even if you're celebrating that iniquity, I can't because it's not good for you. The wages of sin is death. Now again, Paul is addressing the church. In 1 Corinthians chapter five, he has to write to them and correct them for celebrating this sin of immorality that was taking place right there within their midst. And Paul is saying, look, you can't celebrate that. Love does not celebrate that.

Because sin destroys, it's not good for you. Pursue love, not self. We need to put the Lord first. We need to put others first and have his love for others around us. Verse seven gives us point number four to consider this morning, and that is pursue love in all things. Verse seven says, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. You'll notice there, all things, all things, all things, all things.

To bear all things, the word bear, it means to put a roof over, to protect or to cover. And so the New Living Translation translates it, it always protects. Love always protects. Love bears one another's burdens, covers a multitude of sins, protects the people in

in its focus. Pastor Thomas Constable says, love covers unworthy things rather than bringing them to light and magnifying them. Instead of highlighting the weaknesses, instead of highlighting the worthless things or the hurtful things, love covers those things and protects from those needless hurts, those useless pains. Love believes all things to believe the best, to give the benefit of the doubt.

That is, considering the circumstances, I'm going to believe the best possible interpretation. Now, Pastor David Guzik says, love believes all things. It doesn't mean that we believe lies, but that we never believe evil unless the facts demand it. We choose to believe the best. We don't believe evil. We don't believe wickedness of people unless the facts demand it. Instead, we choose to believe the best. We choose to give the benefit of the doubt.

Love hopes all things. Hope is that waiting with joy and confidence. As you look at, you know, people around you, that there's this hope, that there is this understanding God is not done yet. There's still a great work that can be done. Pastor Thomas Constable puts it this way, love is hopeful that those who have failed will not fail again, rather than concluding that failure is inevitable.

This is one of those areas where love gets challenging because when there is failure consistently, repeatedly, we can immediately jump to failure is inevitable. Yeah, they're saying those same things. They've said those things a thousand times. They're going to fail again. They're not going to continue on. But love hopes all things. Love has the hope. It doesn't give up. It knows that God is still able to transform even the worst of the worst, even those who have been stuck in the same ruts for years and years.

And so love endures all things. To endure is to sustain a load of miseries. Love is hopeful and believes all things. All of these things combined under this load of miseries, these circumstances that are difficult, these circumstances that are challenging. Pursue love in all things.

Bear all things, believe all things, hope all things, endure all things. This is a call to love people as God loves you. This is the way that God is towards us. Well, finally, one last thought from verse eight, and that is pursue love forever. Because right at the beginning there, he says, love never fails. And there's more to the verse and more that we could go into, but love never fails. The word fail, it means to drop away, to fall away.

The New Living Translation puts it this way, love will last forever. I like the way that G. Campbell Morgan described this. He said, the thought in the word translated faileth is failing off like the leaves of a flower. Love never loses its life. Falling off like the leaves of a flower. Maybe it's kind of weird, but Kim and I just recently watched the live action version of Beauty and the Beast. You know, the famous rose inside the jar. I'm sure there's a better word than jar for that, but you get the point.

And the petals are falling off, right? When the last petal falls off, you know, that's when the story's over, right? Love, it doesn't fade. You buy your spouse flowers, right? And they are nice for a little bit, but the petals fall, the flower wilts, it fades. Love doesn't fade. It's not a feeling. Feelings fade. It's a commitment. It's a commitment for a husband and wife to love one another. It's a commitment for us as the body of Christ to love one another. And it's a commitment that doesn't have an end.

It's a commitment to never give up, to never quit, to have unconditional love for one another. Pursue love forever through all the miseries, through all the difficulties, through all the challenges, believing all things, hoping all things, enduring all things, suffering long, but still being kind. This is the kind of love that God has for us. And here in 1 Corinthians 13, Paul says, this is the kind of love that God desires to give us for one another.

And so this morning, I would encourage you, I would remind you, we need to pursue love. As I've been reading through 1 Corinthians this time around, going through the Bible in three years, it's really just been standing out to me how much Paul is talking about us as the body of Christ. How much he's been talking about us and our need for one another and our service towards one another and our relationship with each other. It needs to be filled with, motivated by, surrounded with love. We need to love each other.

the kind of love that God has for us. Pursue love above all else. Pursue love even while you're suffering. Pursue love, not yourself, but others first. Pursue love in all things and pursue love forever. One last quote from Warren Risby.

He says the main evidence of maturity in the Christian life is a growing love for God and for God's people, as well as the love for lost souls. That's the main evidence for maturity, he says. It's love. Not spiritual gifts, not all the things that were really impressive spiritually about the Corinthians. No, the main measure of maturity, the evidence of maturity, it's love. Later on in Galatians, Paul will say,

The fruit of the Spirit is love. We need the empowering of the Holy Spirit that we might love one another as God loves us. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your word. We thank you for the challenge and the reminder of how much you love us. And as we consider all of these different things in regard to your relationship to us, oh, we're so thankful.

Thank you, God, for your love for us, for putting us first, serving us and doing what's best for us and putting up with us in the midst of our difficulties, Lord, that we bring to you and our challenges to you and are running from you. Thank you, Lord, for loving us so completely and thoroughly. God, I pray that you would allow this reminder of your love towards us to inspire us and encourage us and help us.

to turn around and love others around us. You call us to a high standard and we're gonna fall short. And so Lord, help us in those areas of weakness. Help us to recognize them and not to give up on them and stay in that state of unlovingness, but Lord, that we would pursue love, that we would develop the love that you desire for us to have toward those around us. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen.

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