The 1 Corinthians 13 Marriage

Our Heavenly Father is the sovereign of the universe, and He has created all that exists, and as we know, He never makes the mistake. From the beginning, when human beings came along, we read how He made us in the image and likeness of God. And then He established laws that govern relationships, and the most intimate relationship that there is, is the relationship called marriage. I want to talk about that today. I was here of late looking at and I've been listening to a lot of our messages that we have given in five different congregations, and it is very heavily weighted toward Christian living-type topics. There are different categories. I think when they're posted on the church website, there's prophecy, Christian living, doctrine, holy days, family and marriage, and then other. And we have lots of sermons that fall into Christian living, and I believe most of them should be, but there's a time to rehearse doctrine, and there's a time for prophecy, and there's a time for marriage and family. And so today I want to give a sermon on the topic of marriage. Let's go to Genesis 2. Genesis chapter 2. Because here it is a matter that the first six days are covered in chapter 1 and then day 7, the early verses of chapter 2. A little later, it's like God goes back and revisits and gives some of the details that were not included about day 6. So we have the creation of Adam from the dust of the ground, God breathing life into him, instructing him about these two trees. But let's just go down to verse 18. And the Lord God said, it is not good that man should be alone. Now have any of you ladies here found that is to be a true statement? I will raise my hand for my wife. Denise would want this to be, it is not good for a man. Yeah, yeah, some of you know what that is, painfully. Not good for a man to be alone. I will make him a helper comparable to him. So the intention of the creation is to have these two individuals totally separate and yet to learn to come together, that there's a synergy where two individuals become greater as one unit than they ever would have been separately. So the garden, okay, that's up above. We then go to the naming of the animals, and then Adam is put into a deep sleep. The rib taken, verse 23, Adam said, this is now my bones and flesh of my flesh. She shall be called woman because she was taken out of man. Therefore, eventually, father and mother, and be joined to his wife, they shall become one flesh.

The way by which God exists, the way by which he lives, is defined by the word love. He created laws that break down love. We have marital laws, and when we break laws that govern marriage, we pay a price. When we keep those laws, we reap blessings. It always works that way. It's cause and effect. Now, love is the way by which God lives, and love makes or breaks a marriage. We realize that we have a chapter called the love chapter, and we'll get to that a little bit later. The chapter is 1 Corinthians 13. And in that chapter, the apostle Paul takes that word love. He stresses how there's faith, and there's hope, and there's love. The love of God, the love of God, agape is the word used there. The greatest is love, but he breaks it down into a variety of pieces. And we're going to get to that in just a little bit. But let's first define love. Love is a challenge to define. In one sense, there are many ways by which it can be defined. Love is outgoing concern for others. If we apply it specifically to marriage, it is outgoing concern chiefly for one's spouse. Love focuses away from self toward others. Love is cooperation, working together as a singular unit, a team. We could also say love is a choice. It is a conscious choice. And we could say love is a commitment because it is. There is an exclusivity to a relationship when it is bound together by the bond of marriage. Love is the law of God in action. Love is keeping a commandment. All of the commandments. Love is centered on the other person. Love is higher than hormones. A lot more is involved. Let's look back at 1 John. The topic of love we generally think of the writings of John, and he rightly has called the apostle of love. We are introduced to him in the Gospel accounts, and he and his brother were called the sons of thunder because they came saying, Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven on them? But you know, John changed. We only follow his brother James for a number of years, and he was killed by the sword. But John is around a long time, and he changes, and he grows. And he writes, you can go to the most chapters that we read on the Passover night, and you can find 30 sometimes the words love, loved, loves. And it's just emanating from him. 1 John 4 verse 7. Beloved, let us love one another. Again, for today's purposes, we're going to focus that specifically on a marriage for those who are married, but it applies to any relationship. For love is of God, and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God, for God is love. You know, sometimes human beings tend to think that we know more than God does, and we start going off and doing things that begin to deviate away from the law of God. And lo and behold, we always bring a curse on ourselves. We bring pain and suffering. God is love. God is the one who has, well, the scripture says there Romans 5 verse 5. The love of God is shed and brought in our hearts by the Holy Spirit. That part of the very mind of God is given to us and hopefully grows and develops throughout the years of our calling. Verse 9, in this, the love of God was manifested toward us that God has sent his only begotten Son into the world that we might live through him.

All right, let's look at, oh, here. Verse 19. Chapter 4 verse 19, we love him because he first loved us. If anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he's a liar. Now again, let's focus that within the realm of the family, specifically a marriage. If we say we love God, but then we're having a running battle. If we have screenfests, if we have better arguments, sometimes people come to blows. And there's a disconnect there. We can't have it both ways. We can't say, I love God, and then be in these bitter arguments with the one we have given our word to love above all others on earth. He says, I love God and hates his brother. He is a liar, for he who does not love his brother, whom he has seen. How can he love God whom he has not seen?

Chapter 2, verse 10. He who loves his brother abides in the light, and there's no cause for stumbling in him. We read that Passover night. Well, probably it was read, John 15, verse 13, greater love has no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends. And then Jesus, in the hours that followed, literally did that. But hopefully, we do that every day within our marriage. We give of ourselves. We defer to our spouse. We think, first of all, what does my spouse need, and how can I provide that for him or her?

Let's now go to 1 Corinthians 13. You know, when Christ walked the earth, one of the things that he did during the Sermon on the Mount was to take the Ten Commandments. You've heard of old time that it has been said. And then he expanded those. He put more into those words. It is more than just the literal letter of what the words say. It's not just, you don't take someone's life, you don't murder. It is the way that we think toward them. He even built to the point where he said, you love your enemies. Pray for those who despitefully use you and persecute you. And there are times when that has to be considered with respect to a marriage.

In 1 Corinthians 13, we have here contrast. We have a breaking down of the word love. And as we look at this, we should use these different ingredients. I'm going to use this little book written by Henry Drummond. Henry Drummond was a pastor from back in the 1880s. He gave a famous sermon titled, The Greatest Thing in the World. And that comes from how this chapter ends. The greatest of these is love. But he takes 1 Corinthians 13 and he breaks it down phrase by phrase. And he identifies 9 different ingredients. And I want to use his words. The terms, rather, that he chose. And as we go through this, let's think of our own marriage, if that applies to you. And if not, your own family, your friendships, your work relationships, because it applies across the board. Children, grandchildren, all of the above. Verse 1, though I speak with the tongues of men and angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brats or clanking timbals. Simple. So here he contrasts love with eloquence. And if all I'm doing is speaking empty words, it is of no value.

Verse 2, though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, though I have all faith, so that I can remove mountains but have not love, I am nothing. And again, throughout this chapter, the Greek word is agape. We're talking about the love of God here. But then it's applied to human relationships. So, verse 2, we read, there is a strength, a synergy that comes by two coming together to be one, bound together in love.

Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor and give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. I'm just spinning my wheels. I'm stuck in the red clay in Alabama in April after it rains. I'm spinning my wheels. I'm not going anywhere. You've had experience with that, I see. Verse 4, we're just going to go phrase by phrase. And from time to time, I'm going to turn to something that Henry Drummond pointed out and just read little excerpts here or there. The first ingredient that he identifies is patience. And in verse 4, it says, love suffers long. And so, if you want to bring love into your marriage or whatever human relationship, one dimension that is so important is that of learning patience. We know that when Paul listed some of the fruits that are given from the Spirit of God, that long suffering, as the King James says, or patience, I think some even say endurance, is one of the manifestations of the Spirit of God working, living, thriving within us. So many problems as human beings, so many times our problems can be traced back to the fact that we just simply lack patience. We read, some of you were there in the Bible studies we went through in the book of James. James 1, you can just make a note of James 1 verses 2 through 4. And that's where he talks about count it all joy when you fall into various trials and tribulations. But he talks about the trying of our faith working patience. There are things we go through and within the realm of a marriage and within a family, over the years, God provides all kinds of opportunities for us to have a self-examination to be tried, to be tested with the prayer that it will lead to patience. Now let's think back of some of the scriptural examples of people who waited a long time. We can't really relate to what Job went through. Job, he's spoken of so highly in those earliest verses. And yet, obviously, as you read through the story, God's there behind the scenes. Of course, Satan is going to charge in to try to overthrow and trip up one of God's servants. But you begin to realize there's something here the man doesn't see. And of course, the end of the book, he says, you know, I used to think I know you, but now my seeds. But with Job, he had his whole family, his property, so much of it, just blown away, destroyed overnight. And then Satan is allowed to touch his physical health, his body. And he ends up in the horrible state of just this pile of ashes about the softest thing you can imagine. And he sits there with something to scrape pus from the boils. And on top of that, he has three friends that come and play pylon. Be careful when you quote the book of Job. Sometimes you might say, well, back in Job 13, it says less and such, and it might be one of his nutty friends who's way off track. So just be aware of that. If it's Job, you know, like Job 14, if a man dies, shall he live again? All the days of my appointed time, I'll wait until my change comes. You'll call, I'll answer. That's okay. You get to chapter 32 when the younger man, Elihu, comes along, and he begins talking some sense. And then chapter, what is it, 38, God starts speaking and it's good material. Can't go wrong there. But just a side point, be careful in quoting the scripture from back in Job, and it might be one of his friends who were just, they didn't have a clue what they were saying was horrible.

But Job went through all of that. Abraham, we're introduced to Abraham when he was a young spring chicken of 75, and Sarah was barren, and he wanted a family, wanted to have an inheritance. You know, he prayed to God, you know, I want to pass this on. The head of my household is Eliezer, Damascus. And God said, you're going to have that son. And a year passed, and 10 years passed, and a couple more passed. I think it's, I forget, something like 13 years down the line. They decide that God needs to be helped out. Dangerous. I mean, we humans are a curious bunch. Sometimes problems within a marriage can go a long time. I mean, it takes us years to get into it, and then we think it's going to just disappear if it's not up to the fingers. And it takes a long time to patiently work our way out. But, yeah, that led to the story of Hagar and Ishmael. 24 years down the line, he's a less than spring chicken of 99, and Sarah's 89. God says, at about this set time next year, you're going to have that son. 25 years, he had to wait for Isaac. But thankfully, you know, he lived to be 175, so he had a lot of decades with that son. And of course, then somewhere down the line, God said, take that son and go and offer him to me. Well, he learned a lot through those years. David, we introduced King David. He's tending the flock. Samuel comes to the house. He is to anoint the next king. They call David in. But it was a long time before he inherited the kingship. He was anointed to become the next king, but he wasn't told when. The present king was still living. But after the story of David and Goliath, Saul has killed his thousands, David has tens of thousands, and that's when things start going sour with Saul's attitude toward him. Tried to pin him to the wall with the javelin once. Chased him far and wide. David and men, supporters hiding in a cave. And God's given him into your hand, and he wouldn't lift his hand against God's anointed. But in God's due time, David was placed in the office, but he had to wait a long time. It took a lot of patience. Hannah, what about Hannah? How long did she go and pray her heart cried out because she was barren, and she wanted to have that son that she could devote to the service of God. Eli saw her, her mouth moving. He thought she was drunken, but she was given that son. So you've got one example after another of men and women of God who had to wait and wait. As a kid, I remember I was probably about nine. I wanted my dad to let me go buy it. I wanted a 12-gauge shotgun. Well, at age nine, I didn't need a 12-gauge shotgun, but I'd been saving my money. He reminded me, as he did many times, anything worth having is worth waiting for. An eternal life is worth having, and so we have to be patient.

Marital happiness is worth having, and it takes patience. It takes patience. I think when I was 12, he let me spend my money and buy a shotgun. That shotgun and I have had a good life together, although I haven't fired it, and I don't know how many years now, but we had a lot of good experiences.

All right. I'll tell you what. Let's glance and keep your place here throughout, but James 5, verses 7 and 8. James 5, verses 7 and 8. Therefore, be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the Father waits for the precious fruit of the earth, waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain. You also be patient. Establish your hearts for the coming of the Lord as at hand. We still look to the return of Jesus Christ. We wait patiently, but within a marriage, a lot of times, we simply have to be patient. We sometimes think we can change our spouse, and we cannot. We can change ourselves. We let God work with our spouse. Sometimes, they may never change, or so it may seem, and we still continue working on ourselves.

There is that sign you'll sometimes see hanging on a wall somewhere. Be patient with me. God is not through with me yet, and that is true. That is true. Henry Drummond. Henry Drummond here, page 20. Love is patience. Love waiting to begin. Love not in a hurry. Calm. Ready to do its work when the summons comes. Love understands, and therefore, it waits. Number two, second ingredient, is kindness. Kindness. 1 Corinthians 13 verse 4. Love is kind. Henry Drummond again. This is love in action. And then he asked, have you ever noticed how much of Christ's life was spent in doing kind things? In merely doing kind things. Good point. The life of Jesus Christ. Stephen was about to be killed. About to be stoned. One place there, he referred back to Jesus of Nazareth, who, quote, went about doing good.

So you read about Christ. He healed a man with a withered hand on the Sabbath. He healed the centurion's servant, the servant that said, you don't have to come to my house. Just say the word. I know how it works in authority. Say the word and it'll happen.

He fed 4,000. He fed 5,000. Well, actually, I think that was the account where it said the number of the men were about 5,000. He raised Lazarus from the dead. He more than once healed one with leprosy. He went to Samaria and listened to and gave some hope to the woman at the well.

The woman caught in the act of adultery was brought to him. Everyone else wanted her stoned dead. But he, at the end, after everyone had left, said, neither do I continue to go and sin no more. He gave her another chance. He gave her hope. He gave sight to the blind, even in John 9, the one who was born blind. One act of kindness after another. And, you know, acts of kindness are so important within a marriage. So important. Kindness is directed toward the other one with no intent or motive of doing something so that you can get something in return.

It may be the tone of voice we use. It may be the words we choose and how they're used. It may be the feeling behind words. It may be the look that we give to each other. It may be something like valuing our spouse's opinion above anyone else's. I have heard that complaint many times. I've heard it from my own marriage. You listen to everybody else but not me. I mean, it's a common complaint. You know, we're strange. We can disregard the one we've given our life to. We show kindness by placing the other one high on a pedestal. We show kindness by the way we talk to other people about our spouse. We show kindness by the way we talk to our mate when there are other people around. Without kindness, marriage will short-circuit. Breaker is going to get kicked somewhere. How much kindness do you bring into your marriage? Number three is what Drummond calls generosity. Generosity. Here in verse four, the next phrase, love does not parade itself. Drummond says, your love envy's not.

Okay, I got a head there. Love does not envy. That's the phrase I wanted to read. Love envy's not.

Whenever you attempt a good work, you will find others doing the same and probably doing it better. Envy them not. Envy is a feeling of ill will to those who are in the same line as ourselves, a spirit of covetousness and detraction. Generosity. Sometimes there is envy. Sometimes a marriage becomes a competition. You have two people kind of doing this one-upmanship, who can outdo the other one. And it's of no value. A marriage is cooperation. Envy is hazardous to our health in more ways than one. It is a spirit of covetousness. It falls into the realm of lust. To envy is to feel uneasiness or discontent with what someone else has done or has achieved, has accomplished. Envy. We basically have the focus on self, certainly not the other. Think back and we have the example of the first murder. We have Cain and Abel. We have their story. Only a little bit is given. A few of the high points. But it is obvious that God had revealed to Cain and Abel a certain amount about how you approach me, how you offer and give thanks to me. Abel took of the flock. And I think that's because this offering of a lamb was the very beginning of God teaching the human family this idea of an ultimate sacrifice to come in the person of Jesus Christ. He honored Abel's sacrifice. Cain did, apparently, obviously did not obey what God had told him. He was a farmer and it was easiest to grab some produce and bring an offer to God. And God rejected that. And then we find God going to Cain. And he said, if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. He warned him this is where it's going. And then, lo and behold, it follows it on through. And then he rose up and Cain killed his brother.

Let me just read this one to you real fast. 1 John 3 verse 12. It is just said that we should love one another, not as Cain who was of the wicked one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his works were evil and his brother's righteous. Abel was righteous, Cain was evil. And surely we see this spirit of envy setting up and it destroyed him. We are told we ought to think more highly of the other. We ought not think more highly of ourselves as we ought. So the emphasis within a marriage is on spouse. Within a relationship is on the other person or persons involved. And to the degree that envy comes into a marriage, a marriage or any relationship is going to suffer.

Number four. The ingredient number four is humility.

Humility. 1 Corinthians 13 does not parade itself, is not puffed up.

Henry Drummond says, humility is to put a seal upon your lips and to forget what you have done. It's not about me. It's about giving to others in that relationship.

He says, Drummond says, after you have been kind, after love has stolen forth into the world and done its work, go back into the shade and say nothing about it. Love hides even from itself. Love vants not itself. It is not puffed up. So love is humble. Love does not pat itself on the back. Love does not place emphasis on self. Love puts the other first. Love does not boast. It does not exhibit to one's own gifts or works or sacrifice. Love is blind. Excuse me. Pride, being puffed up, is blind at self-centeredness.

And love is the opposite. King Saul would be an interesting one to ponder in this regard. We were introduced to King Saul when the people of Israel, the elders, went to Samuel and said, give us a king. We want to be like the world around us. And he told them what would happen. He said he will tax you. And boy, do we know that. He will conscript your kids for his. He'll take the best of what you have. And the people said we wanted any of them. Bring it on. So they ended up with a king. God told Samuel who to look for. Saul obviously didn't want the job. Well, he was given the job. And then as time goes on, we find things went to his head. There is that old saying by Baudelaire, power corrupts. And absolute power corrupts absolutely. And in time, Saul is different. And it leads to 1 Samuel 15 where God says, go to Amalek. They ambushed Israel. Go kill every man, woman, child. All their livestock don't spare a soul.

Well, they were waiting on Samuel, but he didn't come when they thought he was going to be there. And so Saul went ahead and acted on his own. And yes, they were given a victory. And Samuel came up and Saul says, I have fulfilled the commandment of the Lord. And Samuel said, what's this lowing of the oxen I'm hearing and the bleeding of the sheep? And it's kind of the ancient honor among kings. I guess if we go to battle, if you win, then keep me alive and then put me out in pasture. And if I win, I'll do the same for you. He has spared Agag the king. And Saul at that point is rejected from being king. He's going to be replaced. And I think it's verse 17, Samuel says, that's 1 Samuel 15 verse 17, When you were little in your own eyes, I made you king over Israel. But you see, he became, he changed. He wasn't little in his own eyes. He became puffed up and he couldn't be used. We have other examples. Nebuchadnezzar. Fascinating study to follow Nebuchadnezzar. Nebuchadnezzar chapter 2 has that dream. Daniel interprets it and he at least gives lip service that this God of Daniel, he's all right. He's the most high and he rules in the kingdoms of men. Then the next chapter you've got the image. You've got three friends of Daniel. They won't bow down. They're thrown into the fiery furnace. Nebuchadnezzar looks and says, you know, there's four of them. That one looks like the son of man. And some of the things he says there, you think, yeah, maybe he's, maybe the window to his mind is being opened.

But, you know, it leads to the point where he walks out of the balcony and behold this great Babylon that I have built and God yanks the spirit and man apparently. And he lives like a beast. But some of the things he says after that, at least in the resurrection, I think Nebuchadnezzar will be ready to listen. But it destroyed him at that point. Two men going up to prayer. The one was his own gift to God. The other one wouldn't. He stood back.

Father, forgive me, a sinner. So with humility, there can be a proper submitting one to another in the fear of God, as we are told. There can be respect. Respect builds stronger marriages. When humility leads our thinking, we will be less prone to being impatient or critical or judgmental or condemnatory. Number five is courtesy. We shift to verse five here in 1 Corinthians 13. Love does not behave rudely. Drummond calls it courtesy.

Courtesy. Henry Drummond. This is love in society, love in relation to etiquette. Politeness has been defined as love in trifles. Then listen to this. He says, courtesy is said to be love in the little things.

Love in the little things. I like that. You think about any relationship, but mainly here, we're focusing on marriage. Courtesy is a major factor in bringing happiness and love into a marriage. Do we use good manners? When I'm around an ace, it makes me a better man.

There are things I want to make that get over that higher bar because I married a lady. You know that. Some of you have known her longer than I have. I can't say enough good about her. There are magic words. Like in making a request, do we use the word please? And do we use the words thank you? Little things. It's so important.

Each time we show common courtesy and kindness, that's love in the little things. It builds a marriage. Do we open doors? Do we... One or the other comes in with some supplies for the house. Do you get up and go and help unload? Time to clean up after a meal? Is it just one? Or do you jump in there and help? Time to tell you trash is about to overflow and you just get the trash. Take it out. Somebody has to do it. And then there are those times of giving flowers. You know, we men, we just don't think that way.

And a little card, a little note, just little things go a long way. And certainly, if we've been out somewhere and for whatever reason we're running late, you know, a call, a text, an email, you know, things like that go a long way. That, you know, hey, I thought I'd be in at 10, but, you know, I'm going to be pushing 11 by the time I get there. Just so they know.

Courtesy involves being sensitized toward the other's feelings and needs. And, you know, person with an inflated picture of self is going to feel above these little courtesies of life. But you think of Christ. Was he ever accused of being discourteous? No. You have examples of people like, I mean, Paul could stand before kings when he did. Esther, and you have this beauty page, and I guess you can call it, and she ends up marrying the king, and she fits right in because of the strength and the beauty of the character that was already there. There's a story that's told from back in the days of the Revolutionary War. George Washington and General Lafayette from France were traveling, well, they were moving through the camp among the troops. And yes, that was the day and age when, sadly, there was slavery in this country. And as the two, you know, great men passed by, there was a slave, and as they went by, the slave just stopped what he was doing and just bowed. And General Washington stopped, took off his hat, and he bowed down even further back to the slave, which puzzled Lafayette because, you know, his thinking is not to be done. And as they went on and Lafayette asked him about that, Washington said, essentially it was reported, he said, could I allow a slave to be more gentlemanly or more courteous than I? And, you know, he was a man of a lot of class. He had slaves, but when it's time for his death, he gave orders there to be freed. And he paid his slaves. So he was, at that day and age, a cut above. So courtesy, that is an ingredient. We have that so many times we see in Christ's dealing with people. So bring courtesy into your marriage, where there is courtesy, there is honor, there is respect, there is love, and courtesy tends to be get courtesy in the other person as well. Number six is what Drummond calls unselfishness.

Unselfishness. 1 Corinthians 13 verse 5.

Does not seek its own. Love seeks not her own.

Now, Henry Drummond, again, he's writing a long time ago, and he's writing from over in Britain. And he says, in Britain, the Englishman is devoted, and rightly so, to his own rights. Kind of sounds like this country, doesn't it? We have rights that the Bill of Rights provides that are marvelous. I don't want to give them up either. And we see an all-out assault upon the values and the founding and just the whole fabric of the country.

Then Drummond says, there come times when a man must exercise even the higher right of giving up his rights. Now, you think back the book of Genesis, you had the time when Abraham and Lot, or Abram at that time, and Lot were very rich, tremendous herds and flocks. They needed a little laban's realm, elbow room, and the time came there was strife. And so Abraham said to Lot, there are the hills of Judea and there are the well-watered plains. He could have, as family patriarch, made the decision and made the decree, and it would have been done. But he did the classy thing. He gave Lot the choice. But then Lot did the classless thing, and he chose what was best. But then you read that it tags on, that the men of Sodom were exceedingly wicked. And there was a price, and he was about to pay dearly for that price.

Abraham was being unselfish.

We have Christ setting that example. He often said, I came here, my meat is due to the work of the Father has given to me. Even there in the height of his agony that night as he prayed, prayed his heart out, drops as it were blood coming from his face. And he cried to his father, if there's any other way, let this pass from me. But then he said, nevertheless, not my will, but your will be done. Unselfish, because long before they devised a plan that involved the fact that one, a member of the family of God would have to come and pay a price. The Apostle Paul, at one point, I think it's Romans 9, those first few verses, he's really moved about his own people. And he essentially said, I give up my eternal life for my own people. But of course, that led to, in his discussion, he knows there's a time when all Israel shall be saved, as he said. So all of this is being unselfish. It is love is focused away toward the other person or persons.

Number seven is what Drummond calls good temper. Good temper. And here at the end of verse five, we read, love is not provoked. Thanks? No evil. Excuse me, I'm getting ahead of myself there. Love is not provoked.

Oh, I think the King James says it is not easily provoked.

Henry Drummond. Nothing could be more striking than to find this here. We are inclined to look upon a bad temper as a harmless weakness.

We speak of it as a mere infirmative nature, a family failing, a matter of temperament.

But here, in the heart of the analysis of love, Paul finds a place. The Bible again and again returns to condemn this uncontrolled anger, bad temper, as one of the most destructive elements in human nature.

The later Drummond says, no form of vice, not worldliness, not greed of gold, not drunkenness, does more to un-Christianize a society than an evil, ill temper.

We have examples in the Bible. We're familiar with the story of the prodigal son.

The prodigal received his inheritance and went off, squandered it, woke up when he was slopping the hogs one day and wanted to come back home. The father, and he's a parent, can relate to that. You have a child that goes off and then they call and they say, I want to come home. You welcome them, your heart, everything you have. You share everything you are with them. But then it follows through. The story is not through. It goes to the other son and he was angry at what was going on.

Well, and then the story just kind of abruptly ends with what the father says to that older son. But what was in his mind? Surely it was jealousy, pride, resentment, kind of a holier-than-thou attitude, a sullenness. And he became angry and it would have destroyed. You know, if the story would have continued, I suspect it would have been of the destruction of the family or the older son getting so mad he got what he had and he would leave. But we don't know. Which are harder to deal with? Outward sins or inward attitudes of mind? You know, we all had struggles. When we were called of God, lots of people have had addictions of different types and had to address it or are in the process. I guess I should say it is a process because that battle is not going to go away in this life. Hopefully we can be winning that battle. But there are the ways we think, the way the mind operates. You know, at one point Christ told some of those religious leaders that the tax collectors and the harlots are going to go into the kingdom before you. Because we looked recently at the story of Rahab, and a harlot can change her ways and be welcomed into the very family of God. And a tax collector like Matthew had been a man who took tax money from Jews to give to Rome and they were notorious for abusing that. He can change. But it gets tough when we start dealing with the way the mind thinks. And when we get into just this attitude where we are angry, we've seen people in the church of God so many times they just get angry. It's like they don't even know what they're angry about, but they're angry. And they just have to leave. One man in recent years said, one man in recent years said to me, you know, somebody had left and we were talking about the situation. He said, you know it, unless you're angry about something, it's hard to leave the church. Because in your heart of heart, you know this is the truth and this is right. But if you get angry, then you can justify the fact that, well, I have to leave for this and this and this. They're going to change that and they're going to do that. Well, how many problems come along because of uncontrolled temper? Jesus was angry. You read the story where he shredded the Pharisees, the scribes and Pharisees there in Matthew 23. You read the story of him driving the money changers out of his father's house. He was angry. Anger is not sin if it's controlled. But humanly, we often don't control it. Or we don't address it at that time or that day. Paul said, but don't let the sun go down on your wrath. There are things we should be angry about. The Old Testament says, got angry with sinners every day. Love is not easily provoked. Love doesn't just with a snap of a finger fly off the handle, throw a fit.

Love doesn't give silent treatment when we get upset with the other one. Love struggles for control. Ask God for strength to continue mastering the mind. Number eight is guilelessness. Number eight is guilelessness. And for here we have the last phrase of verse five. Love thinks no evil. Marginal note, love keeps no accounts of evil. Thinks no evil. What a beautiful quality that is.

This morning in the sermon, I thought of there there's some place where Christ said, you know, behold so and so, and Israelite in whom there is no guile. Who is that? Does anybody remember Nathaniel or I don't know, I'm drawing a blank. The accessing doesn't work the way it once did. But to be guileless is a beautiful, beautiful treat. Henry Drummond, again, it's a little work of his. Guilelessness is the grace for suspicious people. The people who influence you are people who believe in you. It is in an atmosphere of suspicion. Men tend to shrivel up. But Paul says, love thinks no evil. It imputes no motive. It sees the bright side. It puts the best on every action. It's well said there. It puts the best on every action. To me, times people are just suspicious. Impute motives read things into actions or words. And that leads to criticizing, if not condemning. Love looks for the best in the other. Love believes the best. Love is a happy one. Others make mistakes. Sadly, there have been marriages where one or the other, you get into trouble at work and the other one takes a little bit of glee. They're just kind of happy. He had that coming. He did that to himself. Love is never happy over an injustice. Love takes no pleasure in hearing gossip about someone. Love certainly doesn't repeat it. The proverb says, love covers even transgressions. All right, the last one, ninth ingredient, is what Drummond calls sincerity. Sincerity. Verse 6, does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth.

Rejoices in the truth. He says, Drummond, that says, sincerity, it includes the self-restraint which refuses to make capital out of another person's fault.

It is the love that delights not in exposing weaknesses of others, but covers all things.

It is a sincerity purpose which endeavors to see things as they really are, and rejoices to find them better than we may have suspected. Well, that's as far as I'll read there.

One of the most... well, love covers transgression. Love is eager to believe the best. Love is slow to expose. It is quick to cover.

One of the most powerful words in the English language is the word love, and it is the business of our lives. God is loved, and God has called us to become as He is. And in the church, I think especially in our marriages, we should be trying to outlove each other. But I've never sat in the living room with a couple arguing over who loves the other one most. I like to sometimes tell Denise that I love her more than she does, just because I want to get hit on the shoulder, but she knows I'm just playing.

I also like to tell her that I married better than she did, and you and I know that I'm right when I say that, but she disagrees with that, too. Verse 8, it says, love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail. Oh yeah, it wasn't that many years ago. I remember all the hoopla about the year 2000s coming and Y2K, and I'm still fuming because my Quicken program that I keep our checking accounts on, I finally thought, well, you know, maybe there's something to it, so I need to buy.

I have Quicken 2000 that I bought, but my Quicken, whatever it was, 95 would have still worked just fine. And I now have Quicken 2011 because there were, you know, 11 years it's a fossil. So you have to upgrade somewhere along the line. They plan it that way so they can open our wallet ever so often and take out stuff.

Not that long ago, there was a Mayan calendar. You know, the poor guys just ran out of stone to make their calendar on, and you know, is it the end of all life as we know it at the end of 2012? Well, prophecies come and prophecies go. Whether there are tongues, they will cease.

Well, tongues, Greek, Gossa, languages. There are languages that have come and they've gone. You know, Latin. They don't teach it in school. They didn't teach it in school when I was there, and it would have done me a lot of good to have had some training in Latin because it's so much the basis of the English language, along with others. Whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. You know, there was a time when people seriously thought, you get in that ship and you go out on the Atlantic Ocean, you're going to go so far and fall off the end.

We know better now. But the best scientific knowledge at that time, they couldn't help but look up at night and they see all these stars and everything rotating around, and they thought the earth is the center of the universe. And we realize we're just one little tiny speck way out somewhere, and there is a universe beyond anything we can dream. So just in the area of scientific knowledge, you've got a junior high science student who knows more than some of the great minds from hundreds of years ago in many areas.

We know in part, we prophesy in part. Verse 11, when I was a child, I spoke as a child, time to man up and put those things away. Verse 12, for now I see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I am known it, I am also known. Now these abide, faith, hope, love, these three, but the greatest of these is love. Love is the tie that binds two into one within a God-ordained marital relationship. And through marriage, we're given so many opportunities to learn about the very nature and the character of God Himself. And so if we do it rightly, if we strive to take all of these ingredients and information other places in the Bible and put it into our marriage, we can have happy marriages.

I pray. I pray we can. It takes two to do that, though. And if we do it rightly today and grow together in love, one day we have a Father. His Holy Days teaches that. It's pointing to the time at the end of Revelation, those last couple of chapters, that marvelous time, when, as it says, you will inherit all things. You'll be my sons and daughters, says the Almighty.