Love

In 1907, Albert Einstein published a paper that contained a formula that most school children learn, although we don't know what it means, that changed everything. E equal mc squared. Energy equals mass times the speed of light squared. It changed everything. Because of that formula, scientists were able to start unlocking nuclear energy. You know, the power of the stars. Of course, today we understand that that has been used for both good and evil because it gave mankind a remarkable access to something that was beyond our thinking. People still look at Albert Einstein and say, how did he come up with this? How did he think this through? How do you think through concepts of physics that you can't even see, but you can work out in your own mind? He was able to break through conventional thinking and able to come to a deeper understanding of the way the universe actually works. You and I have been called by God to receive His Spirit to give us a power to understand spiritual reality, to unlock things in our minds that you and I cannot do on our own. We cannot understand and we cannot achieve, but that power is given to us that we can. We submit and God will work it out in us. We have a part to play. We submit to it, but the understanding and the power comes from God and it comes from God's Spirit. Sometimes we have to be careful that we don't begin to think that all our religion is, and we get locked into this way of thinking that religion is doing a few good things, treating my neighbors right, coming to church on Sabbath. We are forgetting that true religion is the very change of our nature. It's unlocking. It's doing something in us that God does. And that's when we get into the fruits of the Spirit, because they're the fruits of the Spirit. When we really understand the fruits of the Spirit, we realize that this incredible combination of attributes cannot be developed on our own. Human beings sometimes develop a little bit of peace here and there, but the development of these attributes and the way that they're described in the Scripture cannot be done without the formula. And the formula comes from God. It's not something we can do on our own. I've given a series of sermons on the fruits of the Spirit, and I haven't finished the ninth one. I've had a number of people ask me, when are you going to do the ninth Spirit? And there's been so many other things I've wanted to cover or issues that we were dealing with that I haven't gone and completed this. But we're going to do that today. So let's go to Galatians 5. Galatians chapter 5.

And look at the list again, because we started with the bottom and worked up through this list. Galatians 5.22. But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. So we've done eight sermons on each of these attributes, starting with self-control.

The crowning fruit of the Spirit, which actually takes all these other fruits to produce. You can't just pull this out by itself and say, okay, I'll have this love, and you can have self-control. Or I'll have love, and you can have gentleness. Or I'll have love, and you have goodness. Remember, we talked about how goodness can be an act of goodness, the way that word is, and it literally can mean standing for goodness at a great personal price.

That kind of goodness takes a lot of courage. Okay, you can have that goodness. I'll have love. No. All these fruits work together. In the crowning fruit of this, what it all produces, is this concept of love. Now, we have an immediate problem because the way we define in our culture and in the English language love isn't what Paul meant at all. We have a real problem with that word. Now, we all know that there are different Greek words that are translated love.

Some of the few Greek words we all know are these Greek words that are translated love. We know that this one here is agape. But we have to understand the power of how Paul, and actually all the New Testament writers, because John does the same thing, how they use this word. Because agape was a philosophical word. Agape was used to mean a lot of things. I have one Greek dictionary at home. It's a 10-volume Greek dictionary. And I think the section on agape, if I remember right, is over 50 pages. It's a huge concept. The way Paul specifically uses it is, agape is the character of God.

It is everything that God is. And it is a relationship word. Now, that's the one thing we know about it. It is a relationship word. This is how God relates to us as His creation. It is this concept of love. What does that mean? When we look at agape, what we understand is it is an attitude. Now, there are emotions involved in agape, but it is not primarily motivated by emotions. So when we think of love, it's how I feel, right? When we say, I love you, usually there's a feeling behind it. Now, agape has emotions involved with it, but it is motivated by something more than emotions.

And this is where this becomes very difficult because agape many times means doing something out of a motivation that is actually different than what you may be feeling. It's doing something at times because it's very expressive. Agape has to be expressed. It is a relationship, there are actions to this relationship, that many times are the opposite of what you feel. But you're motivated to do this.

It is what you want to do. It is ultimately how we interact with God and how we interact with each other. I think agape is probably best... Well, I'll tell you what. Let's start with 1 Corinthians 13. And I'm just going to read through this because this is the great definition of agape. I gave a sermon on this one time, this section, and it took me seven sermons to do it, just on these few verses to really understand what this means.

Because you start reading through this and it seems to contradict how we would even define love. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13, part of this, we sing it at weddings. This part of Scripture is almost a cliché. If we really stop to analyze what it's saying, it's overwhelming. This is describing how God is and what we are supposed to be becoming. This is a fruit. This is what God wants you to have in your life, to exhibit and experience, just like He wants you to exhibit and experience long suffering and joy and peace and mercy and gentleness.

All these things He wants in your life, this is what He wants to produce. This is what we must ask Him to produce. He wants to produce this. Paul says, Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not, agape, I become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. I can have this miracle where I speak in the language of angels. That's hyperbole there. Even if I had that, if I don't have this love of God, I'm nothing. And though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith so that I can remove mountains that have not love, this love of God, I am nothing.

Think about that a minute. How much weight do we put on our knowledge? And God has given us remarkable knowledge. How much weight do we put on the prophecies that we know? Faith. We know that our faith is what leads us to salvation. We believe in God and we trust God and we move towards God because He calls us. And He says, you know what? You can move mountains with your faith. And if you don't have this, you're nothing. Isn't that a frightful statement?

Isn't that a frightful statement? He says, "...as though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, as though I give my body to be burned, but have not agape a province me nothing." Wait a minute. If I give all that I have to the poor, doesn't that prove I have love? What greater proof do you have? If I let myself be burned. If I die for God, doesn't that prove I have love? See, I don't know about you, but I wrestle over these verses. I struggle over these verses. I have for years. We're supposed to struggle over these verses. We're supposed to wrestle with, wait a minute, God, His character, His attributes, what He is, agape, what He's using here. You know, this is where Paul uses this word in a very unique way. This is God. This is the way he thinks. This is the ultimate of what we're supposed to become. It's beyond anything you and I can even dream of or understand. And yet, it is one of the fruits of the Spirit. We must be growing in this. We must be moving towards this. This fruit, God says, I want you to learn how I am, how I think, how I feel. We don't think of God's emotions, but how I feel. Remember we talked a couple weeks ago about Christ's empathetic response to us? Remarkable! Both Christ and the Father have an empathetic response to us. When other people cried, Jesus cried. It's empathy. This is part of this agape. He goes on, He says, love suffers long, is kind, does not envy, does not parade itself, is not puffed up, does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails. Wow! Now, I don't have that, and none of you do yet either. But this is what we're moving towards. This is what we're supposed to be in the change. These fruits become to full fruition when we're changed. This is what it is to wake up in the resurrection. It's to be like this, but it's now being developed in us. The fruits of the Spirit, according to what we're reading in Galatians, is being developed in us right now. That's when the harvest time comes. This is what it's like to be in that resurrection. How in the world do we get there? It's God working in us. It's God doing this, and it's submitting to it. And it can only be by His Spirit in us. I can't do this. You can't do this. God can't. But we have to submit. That's our part in this. It's, yes, Lord. It's giving in. It's submitting. So He does this in us. Love, then, is an attitude. It's an approach to life. It's how we think. So I say, okay, that's sort of broad, how I think. Okay, but describe that. If I love my children, I know what that means. I give them a big hug. I feel for them. I'll protect them. I want the best for them. You know, people also could love their children, get very angry, and all often hit their children, too. Do some very terrible things to their children. So what is this kind of love? The best explanation of agape is in Philippians 2.

When you see this crowning fruit, you realize, here we are trying to develop all these other fruits and how difficult it is. Every sermon I've given, either here in Murphy's Row, I've had some or people who are on the hookup, I'll get emails from people who say, wow, do I have a long ways to go.

And then we realize, wow, where he's really taking us.

It's beyond our imagination. So we have to look at examples. I can't explain agape. I can only look at what it does and sort of how it thinks, what this fruit produces, and how it makes us feel. I'm going to read this from the New International version just because this reads really nice out loud. Verse 1, if you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, so we need this encouragement because we're united with Christ through God's Spirit to the Father also. If any comfort from His love, if we need comfort from His love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, right? We had this interaction between God, this fellowship, because of His Spirit. If any tenderness and compassion, Paul says, then make my joy complete by being like-minded, having the same love, the same love as what? As Christ. Having the same love being one in spirit and purpose. Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility, consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should not look not only on your own interest, but also on the interests of others. Now it doesn't say you don't look at your own interest. We're all human. We're all thinking, feeling beings, and we all have interests, we all have needs. And He doesn't say you don't consider that. You don't take care of yourself.

But He said, we also have to be outward. And what we see as the basis of agape is this, that nothing is done out of ambition. Nothing is done for yourself, to promote yourself. Nothing is done out of conceit. This need for esteem, this need, I feel better about myself because I do these things. But humility, you consider others better than yourselves.

You consider other people as having value before God. It's one of the great things that we know as we become truly understanding what God's doing with humanity, every person has value. To God. And we are to see every person as having value to God. And He says, oh, explain that to me. Well, He does. He says, verse 5, your attitude, agape is an attitude. An attitude is an approach to life. It's how you think, it's how you feel, it's an approach. It's how you look at things. Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus, who being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made Himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness, and being found in appearance as a man He humbled Himself and became obedient to death, even death on the cross. Therefore God exalted Him to the highest place and gave Him the name that is above every name. Okay. What is agape an action? It is the Son of God, who did not, who by nature was God, equal to God, gave that up to become like us for our sake. That is agape an action. It is, I give up everything to become like them, to die for them, for them.

He didn't do it because any of us were worthy of it. He didn't do it because He said, you know, I'm just such good friends with everybody, because according to the Scripture, it says Christ died for us while we were all enemies. Enemies. What is the motivation here? And this is the motivation of agape. I must do this sacrifice, this service, for the good of these others, even though it cost me a great price.

This is at the heart and core of what agape is. I must do this for their good, for this person's good, even though I pay this great price. It is a sacrifice. It is a willing sacrifice. Like I said, I've tried to explain agape in six or seven sermons. Maybe I'll give them here someday. I never did a good job of it. Now we're talking about the mind of Christ. But we do get an example. If you want to have the mind of Christ, Paul says, then let's look at the example. Agape is, I give it all up, and I go suffer, and I die because even though I am equal with God, I am the very Son of God, I do this for them. The Father sacrificed him. I mean, we forget the Father was involved in this. He sacrificed him. Why? Why did he go through that pain? Because it is his nature to do so. That's what I find so fascinating is, it is who he is. That's how he thinks. If this is what it takes to get them to be my children, this is the price I pay.

Because none of us, it wasn't us that caused that to happen. Well, it was us that caused it because of our sin. But what I mean, it wasn't us that motivated him to do it because, what? We were good? See, we tend to love people who what? Who are like us? Who supplies a thing for us? Who are good to us? Agape is, what is good for them?

What is good for them? This is a level of love that you and I will never totally obtain in this life. I believe that. But we will be growing towards it in this life. That's what this is all about. So how do we apply this? Instead of trying to describe agape, I want to talk about how it works. What do we see and what do we feel? What motivates us when we do agape? So let's look at just a couple of things. Here's where you really, really begin to see agape in action. First of all, in your life. You know where it is? It's in your marriage and your family. Why? Why do you say that? I mean, this is about agape. Why do you bring up marriage and family? Because it is in marriage and family that we are who we really are. Right? You know more about your children than anybody knows. You know more about your husband and wife if you've been married very long than anybody knows. You've seen each other at the absolute worst. Kids have seen their parents at the absolute worst. Right? It is here inside this marriage and family that God gave us, and that's one of the reasons we have the family, to teach us to be a place where we learn and we develop the fruits of the Spirit. It's why you have a congregation, by the way, too. It's why just being an independent Christian living by yourself isn't what God wants. It is here and a group of people who takes a miracle of God for us to get along. Right? It does. It takes a miracle from God for us to get along. It happens because this is where we learn it, and it is in our families where we learn it. And this is why Christian family is so important. It's here where we have the opportunity to make 1 Corinthians 13 real. And it's amazing because 1 Corinthians 13 is sung at half the weddings I do.

But is it lived? But is it lived? Sometimes. Is it lived? Remember, this is a fruit of the Spirit. In your family, you can't control everything that's going on, and you sure can't control everybody else. What you do have the ability to do is have God control you. You have the ability, even in a bad situation, to have God develop in you the fruit of the Spirit. And in fact, sometimes, think about it. We went through how gentleness, you know, to be gentle, you have to be in a situation where you have to learn it. It's hard to do it. Long suffering means you have to suffer. All these fruits are developed in us in awkward and bad situations. They're not developed, and it's always in the good situations. It would be nice if it was. Oh, good. God, give me patience by letting nothing come along in my life that isn't exactly the way I want. But give me patience. So you pray for patience, something really bad is going to happen. Right? It's got to. You can't learn patience unless something bad happens. You can't learn long suffering unless some suffering happens. But you can't learn joy, either. Joy is developed in us through these things. This is the same way with agape. It is developed in us in these relationships. And applying this fruit to our relationships goes exactly against the way we feel most of the time. You have to understand that. Applying agape in our relationships many times is the exact opposite of the way we feel. What did Christ feel while He was crucified for us? You see why that's the example? So what motivated Him? Our benefit. How did He think of motivating?

He wasn't looking down on the Roman soldiers or tied up on the Roman soldiers beating Him, saying, what nice guys! Hey guys, when we get done, can we maybe go, you know, let's go have a glass of wine together. I'm not sure it would be facetious. I'm just, you know, think through this. What is He feeling at the moment? This is agape. Every time they beat Him. This is beyond us, but it is a fruit that God wants to develop in us.

This is hard stuff. And it's in our families that we have the greatest opportunity to learn it. It is in the trials of our family. It's in the trials of our marriages. It's in the trials when the other person doesn't do what they're supposed to do. That you and I learn this stuff. We learn it in those situations. I mean, go back. Just think about what we read here in Philippians 2. Let's go back there again. Look at verses 1 and 2 here.

Just think about what He says here. If you have any encouragement from being united with Christ, if any comfort from His love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any tenderness and compassion, then make my joy complete, Paul says, by being like-minded, having the same love, being one in spirit and purpose, having the same love of Jesus Christ. So let's now apply this to family. Again, this is a marriage and family sermon. This is a sermon on agape. But we get to start with where we learn it. This is where it starts. It starts there. It starts when I go out and work on a soup kitchen. It starts when I go help the homeless. No, it does not. It starts in your family. This is where children begin to learn it. This is where we begin to actually develop the fruit, and then it goes outward. And it's here where we learn this. But this isn't what we feel. We have the same purpose now that Christ has. Pleasing God and creating His children. Do nothing out of selfish ambition. See, whatever the issues are in your life, the first point of agape is that you stop your focus on the other people, and you shift your focus to God. We stop being focused on other people, and we shift our focus to God. And when we shift our focus to God, He begins to develop the fruit in us. What we say is, God, if you could just develop your fruit in that kid, God, if you could just develop your fruit in my husband, that would fix everything. But when we shift the focus from this person to God, what happens is God says, oh good, I've got your attention now. Let me develop some fruit in you. But God, I would rather you produce it to my uncle over here who's just ruining my life. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. Let's stop. Stay focused on me, and let me do this in you. But if you do that, oh, my problems are staying the same. You say, well, I'm not here to fix your problems. I want you to understand this. God isn't here to fix our problems. He's here to fix us.

God isn't here to fix all of our problems. There's no place in the Bible that says, I'm here to fix all your problems. I wish it was. I've looked for it. Believe me, I have. I wanted to say that, but it doesn't say that. What it does say is God is here to fix us. He's here to fix you. So in the midst of your family chaos, stop and get focused on God. You see, when my parents don't understand me, stop and get focused on God. And God fix you? Oh, no. He needs to fix you. Don't stop.

Stop. Because now's what we must do here if we're going to understand Agape. We see here this example of Christ. Do nothing out of selfish ambition. So if you and I want to experience Agape, we have to examine ourselves to say, am I doing anything in this relationship that's selfish? And if you're honest, I know in my own life and in the lives of hundreds of marriage counseling and counseling with people with other issues and issues between each other in the church, issues with people, whatever it is, most of the time. Are you contributing anything out of selfishness? If we examine ourselves, the answer is, well, yeah. But, okay, stop the but. God will deal with the other person, but focus in on God and say, God, help me with my selfishness. Because when we deal with Agape, we deal with a selflessness that is not normal for us. And we cannot totally obtain it in this life. You see a few examples. Stephen, as they're killing him, say, God, please forgive them so they don't know what they do. And he was close. I'm not there. Right? And they're killing me. I'm saying, God, bring down fire from heaven. Do anything here. Stop this. Right? That's me. Stephen was there. That's what makes those...when we see those situations, it's like, wow, he's there for the rest of us who aren't there yet.

It says, or vain conceit. God, am I being motivated by my own vanity, my own pride, my own stubbornness, my own self-righteousness? A lot of times we can be just so self-righteous. You know, it's possible to be right in a relationship and still be doing the wrong thing. Because when you're right and motivated by self-righteousness, that makes it even worse. It's so hard to deal with self-righteousness when you're right. Right? When you're right, boy, am I good. In humility, consider others better than yourselves. Well, I can't consider, you know, my wife better here. I can't consider my husband better. Look, he's a jerk. How can it be better?

That doesn't mean that...you say, well, we erase somebody's sins. What it means is we look at their good, and we say, their good is what I am aiming for. That's so hard, because sometimes you're sacrificing yourself, aren't you?

That's why we have to go back to Philippians 2, because that's the example of agape in the Bible. It is a sacrifice of self for the good of the other.

Can you imagine what might happen in a relationship, inside any relationship in a family? Extended family members, husband, wife, children, parents, aunts and uncles? If there was ever any conflict before anybody complained, before anybody got angry, before any spiteful things were said or did, before they attacked each other, before they were filled with bitterness and anger and hurt? If each person said, well, wait a minute, let me look at myself here. Am I being selfish? Am I being stubborn and conceited and self-righteous? Am I really caring about the good of the other person?

Can you imagine what would happen if that's what we all thought before we ended up in the argument, in the dysfunctional fighting, if every person stopped and that's what went through their mind first? Paul says, if you want to be Christ-minded, see, he doesn't have to do that process because it's his nature. You and I have a corrupt human nature we're dealing with, so we have to learn this divine nature. And so we have to say, am I doing that? Paul says in Philippians, if you have any consolation, if you want any comfort, if you want to have the love of Christ in you, we've got to ask this question. We've got to ask ourselves, is this what I'm doing? Agape gets real hard because now it gets down to the very core of every motivation you and I have. And basically at the core, most of our motivations are wrong. They simply are. This is where God takes us. I'll tell you what it does. For one thing, it keeps driving you back to God and saying, I need help. Well, we really understand as we keep going back to God, saying, God, I can't do this because I know. Just keep working away at it and keep submitting and keep obeying and I will do it. We can't walk away and say, okay, God, I can't do this. Goodbye. That doesn't work. Just keep plugging away and I will do it in you. You just keep pushing forward. You just don't give up. You can see what happens in our homes. It's the greatest microcosm of Agape.

It's where we're at our best and where we're at our worst. Now, this brings us to a second point of Agape that I want to go through. If our home is our macrocosm, we have to have a certain attitude. We start there, but then it moves outward. It moves outward. We have to serve others with a pure heart to have Agape. At the core of Agape is, I will serve others. It doesn't mean, by the way, you serve others to your own detriment. It doesn't mean, well, it does that a sacrifice. What I mean is, you don't serve others so that they can do evil. There's nothing in the Bible that says, serve others so they can do evil. Christ did not serve us so that we can do evil. Christ's service towards us and His death was so that we can learn to do good. You never sacrifice so somebody can do evil. The idea that, well, I love my child, so I have to be the designated driver of the world. Be the designated driver when he gets drunk or she gets drunk, and I've actually had parents tell me that, is absolutely bizarre. That is not love. Love is, I'm going to put you in jail, or I'm going to take you to a hospital, or I'm going to do whatever it takes to get you over the alcohol problem. But it isn't, I'm going to drive you around from bar to bar while you get drunk, and then go take you home so at least you don't have an accident. That's not love. Love is keeping them from going out. Love is fighting the problem head on. It is very sacrificial, but it never, love never, somehow allows the other person to do self-destructive behavior. God doesn't do that. That's not agape. But it is based on the fact that I am going to sacrifice for someone who is not worthy.

The person is not worthy of it. Well, that's never the point. Do you love that person enough to sacrifice for that person? That's in the family, but how about outside the family? Let's go to Luke 10. All we know this story, we know it inside and out, but there's a point I want to make here that maybe you've never thought of before. Luke 10. Verse 25. Probably the most well-known parable in the entire New Testament, the parable of Jesus.

Verse 25. Let me hold a certain lawyer stood up and tested Christ, saying, Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life? This is what's written in the law. What is your reading of it? Okay, if you want to have eternal life, how do you spend your life? And he answered and said, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and all your strength, and with all your mind, and then he tacked on to and your neighbors yourself. He put these two scriptures together. Now Jesus had put those two scriptures together in other places. There were other Pharisees and other rabbis who put these two verses together. This is it. This is what everything is about. And so this man took this great truth, and there's nothing here that says he didn't believe this, by the way. This was his great truth. He comes asking a question. What do I do? He says, What does the scripture tell you? It says, I have to love God with everything I have and love my neighbors myself. Okay. And he said, You have done answered rightly. Do this and you will live. Jesus says, Okay, that's right. Do it. But you know, how do I do it? Now he's got a problem. So one thing to say to do it, how do I do it? But he wanting to justify himself. That's a little added thing. I love the way Luke puts in comments. The other ones tend to just report what they saw. Luke wasn't there. Okay. So Luke's getting the stories and he adds in little comments. This man wanted to adjust himself, justify himself. In other words, he wanted to say, Look, I'm right with God. I've done these things and I'm right with God. And it's my doing of these things that have made me right with God. So he asks a question. Who is my neighbor? I mean, surely you don't mean pagans. I mean, I understand. I have to love fellow Jews. Surely you don't mean the Romans, the occupiers of our country. You don't mean that I'm to love them. They're brutal. My cousin Joseph's in jail because of them. Surely you don't mean, you can list. Tax collectors, Jews who work for the Romans, that's the lowest scum you can ever get. Surely we don't love them. People who worship idols and eat pigs. Come on, we don't love them. Do we? Who's my neighbor? Jesus answered and said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho and fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead. Now, he doesn't say who this man is. He doesn't say he's a Jew. All we know is he's a man who seems to have some wealth and he gets lay-waved by a bunch of robbers who beat him up, strip him, and take everything he has and leave him half dead, beat up on the side of the road. Now, by chance a certain priest came down that road. When he saw him, he passed by on the other side. Like was a Levite when he arrived at the place, came and looked, and passed by on the other side. Now, it's so easy to say, oh, what evil people these are.

If you're a Levite, what if it's a dead body? If he goes and touches a dead body, he can't serve in the temple. He can't serve God for a week. He's down clean. What if it's a pagan? I mean, obviously, someone out here getting beat up on the street, they're probably a bad person, right? What if it's a decoy? I go to help them and I get attacked by other people. I mean, you can think of a thousand reasons why, you know, so we just condemn these people. But if you and I were in the same situation, we have to ask ourselves, how many of us would stop? I've been walking down the street, especially in places in Houston where I used to have to go and visit people. There'd be people passed down on the street all the time. Drunk, on drugs. I never stopped to see if any of us were alive. I can honestly say I never stopped. I just walked by and looked. I didn't know what to do.

Who is my neighbor? Human love defines neighbors in a narrow sense. Agape defines everybody as my neighbor. Everybody I come in contact with is my neighbor. Now, that doesn't mean you're to go out the lunch with people who are sinners. That's not the point here. It doesn't mean, okay, well, let's go just invite everybody at the office who are drunks and horror mongers and homosexuals. Let's just go party with them. No, that's not what he's saying here. Notice the point. The point is a person in need. Now, I want you to know something about Jesus. He didn't go around fixing everybody. He couldn't, even as God in the flesh, okay, as a man. He couldn't go fix everybody. But he did reach out who was right in front of him. It's the next thing that's so interesting here. We know it says, but a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came where he was. So he bandages his wounds. He pours oil and wine. He sent him on his own animal, brought him to an inn and took care of him. This is obviously a wealthy man. He takes care of him. He says, on the next day when he departed, he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper and said, take care of him, and whatever more you spend, then when I come, I will repay you. Oh, good. We have a hero come along and he takes care of the man. So the story is, you know, you should help people who are right in front of you who need help. Now, he didn't give him money to go get drunk, right? I've told many a person, hey, there's a McDonald's right here. I'll buy you some food. No, no, she's not going to give me money. Okay, well then, no, I'm not going to give you money to go get drunk.

So we argue the points of this. When do you help and don't you help? And those are legitimate discussions. Jesus is just making a point. But you know what's really amazing about this is He uses a Samaritan as the hero. Samaritans were people who believed in God but worshiped Him in a pagan way. I mean, to put it in our modern context, and the Catholic priests came along and helped Him and is the hero of the story.

What? What? Yeah, the Catholic priests came along as the hero of the story. His point is, the point He's making is, you know what? Who is my neighbor? Let's just use a whole bunch of people here and throw them together. And then you tell me, like He says in verse 36, so which of these three do you think was the neighbor to Him who fell among thieves? And the Jewish rabbi says, well, it's obvious. He who showed Him mercy. Now, once again, Jesus isn't giving us an explanation of how to deal with every situation. I mean, I'm not saying you should stop. Get out of your car. I mean, there are times people use people as decoys, right? But the point is, is if I have the ability to give help, should I? And His answer is, then Jesus said to Him, go and do likewise. Now, this is agape. It's so easy to put blinders on and just sort of live our lives zeroed in on our, you know, I mean, my neighbors are you. I mean, I have some neighbors at home, but we help each other. I don't know most of their last names. Hey, Wayne, hey, I know their first names. We talk. We stand outside. Sometimes we'll talk for a half hour. Good. Nice yard. Yeah, your yard's looking good. You know how you have those conversations.

I have one neighbor so nice to me because he found out I was a pastor and then he bought it. Did I tell you this? He bought a lot riding lawnmower. One day he comes over and he says, hey, do you mind if I cut your grass? That's buff. I said, well, it doesn't look that bad. I mean, nice. I mean, I mean, my grass looks a whole lot better, you know, it took me two years, but I finally get decent yard. He said, hey, do you mind if I cut your grass? And I said, well, I'll pay you for it. He says, no, I bought a new lot riding lawnmower. And he said, I just love riding this thing and your yard's bigger than mine. And there's no, you know, there's no, he has all this children's stuff out this playground stuff. I can just whip it. I'd like to drive it. Well, I want to be a good neighbor. I said, so he cut my grass. Now I come, I haven't cut my grass in a month. But the bad part, I came home one day after services and thought, oh no, he cut my grass on the Sabbath. I told him, I'm going to have to mow my grass now, every Friday morning, before the Sabbath starts, because he's going to get, well, today, fortunately, he didn't cut my grass. I hope not. I don't think he did. I know how I got off on that, but he's my neighbor, okay? And he's a good neighbor. You're my neighbors. Christ says, everybody in one way or another is your neighbor, because when they're right next to you, you're your neighbor. We live life. We live life trying to show the love of God to everybody in whatever context we're in. Man, that's tough. That's hard. That is really hard. This is the fruit of God's Spirit, that in every moment of any time, we are showing something that is of God. Now, it's again, I know we're not all there. I'm not there, but it's where we're headed. It's where God wants to take us. So here he uses the person that we would see as a pagan Christian. He's a pagan Jew. They were considered pagan Jews. Because they weren't Jews. The Samaritans weren't Jews. There were people that were brought into the land after the Israelites were taken out. So they claimed to be Jews, but they weren't. And he's the hero of the story on purpose. He's not saying, oh, the Samaritans are God's people. That's the point he's making is. If this person can treat this person as a neighbor, shouldn't we? That's the point. He's not holding the Samaritans up as spiritual examples. It's an analogy. He can do it. Can't you? And the rabbi said, yes. Notice that the Jewish man's response is, yeah, he's the one who was his neighbor. He got it.

There is a sacrifice, and there is a joy in serving others. Agape is an attitude of service that is absolutely free from the need of recognition. It is simply based on serving for the benefit of the other.

It is based on serving the benefit of the other. In the end, your reward is, they got a benefit. This was good for them, and that's all you need. Remember, we read in 1 Corinthians that agape does not parade itself and does not seek his own. It is the selfish motives that we have to deal with. It is the selfish motives. In the leadership classes I have every once in a while, which we need to have another one here before the feast sometime after I get back from Germany, but in Matthew 20, when I worked with all the men and wives, the men who give sermonettes and sermons, I read this because they said this has to be our viewpoint of how we are to enter. This is actually a principle of leadership.

Verse 29, Now as they went out of Jericho, a great multitude followed him. The old two blind men were sitting by the road, and when they heard that Jesus was passing by, they cried out, saying, Have mercy on us, O Lord, son of David. Then the multitude warned them that they should be quiet, and they cried out all the more, saying, Have mercy on us, O Lord, son of David. So Jesus stood still and called to them, Here's the Son of God. I want you to think about this. Thousands of people, he's got lots of things to do, and he's got lots of important things to do, and there's these two blind guys yelling out, yelling out, and people saying, Be quiet, be quiet. This is embarrassing. And what does he do? He stops and says, What do you want me to do for you? That's amazing. He stops and says, Well, what can I do for you? What is the motivation here?

How can I help you? What is the benefit that I can give you? What is it you need? It's a gopi. Have you ever seen a tree that's attacked by a blight? A disease tree? It'll eat up the leaves and eat up the fruit. Just eat it up like a cancer. This is what happens to us when we view service as a means to a reward. As a means to recognition. The fruit of God gets eaten up by a blight. It cannot be for recognition. I've had people say to me, Well, I've served all my life in the church, and this other person got recognition, and I didn't, and they're bitter.

And the problem is that they deserve some recognition? Yeah, but that's not the problem. If we're doing it out of a gopi, if that's the fruit, the why we're serving, that's why we're helping others, it's why we do it. Whether anything else happens is immaterial. Whether else anything happens is absolutely immaterial. Whether anybody else knows is immaterial. Here's the problem we have, and most of us have this issue. I mean, I think every human being I know has this issue. We deal with these feelings of inferiority or problems that we have because of our own weaknesses or need for recognition that we serve because it somehow helps our self-esteem. And the truth is, when you do serve, you get a benefit. Every time I go anoint somebody, and I go in and I talk to them and I lay hands on them, and we pray and they smile and they say, thank you, I know God's involved, I get in the car, I'm on a high. Every time! Every time. Now, there's times where it's 10 o'clock at night and I don't want to go to the hospital. That's the human part of me. You say, oh, wow, what a terrible guy. At 10 o'clock at night, you know, it's like, I'm tired. That's nothing wrong. I'm not saying evil. That's the human part. If I give into the human part, it does become evil. Right? But if we allow God's Spirit to build that agape, we go. We go do. And when we do, there's this huge reward. Recognition or your own self-esteem isn't now what is promoted. What is promoted is God and the good of the other person. And there's a joy in that. There's a joy in it. Remember, agape is sometimes doing exactly the opposite of how you feel. In fact, much of the time it's doing exactly the opposite of how you feel.

Because the person, you know, especially if it's the person mistreating you, whether they're not worthy of me doing this. Sure. Remember, do you want Christ to say that to you? Or you're not worthy of my sacrifice? Well, actually, He does. And our response is, I know. That's our response. I know. So we can't destroy this fruit with a blight of being driven by a need for recognition, other people's acclaim, being driven by our own self-esteem, what makes me feel good. We have to understand that this has to become part of our very character. It is who we are. It is what we do. And when we do, the reward is in the service itself. Nothing else matters. Nothing else matters. When we look at the nine fruits of the Spirit listed by the Apostle Paul, it's a little overwhelming. Well, yeah, it is. We're looking at the attributes of God. We're saying, oh my, that's supposed to be happening in my life? And God says, sure it is. It's just happening in little bits and pieces. And it is not all there yet. He knows. But yeah, this is what's supposed to be happening. And every once in a while you'll have a breakthrough. You'll do something that's the exact opposite of what you want to do. And there'll be a great benefit to other people. And you'll say, huh, where did that come from? Where did that come from? And you realize, is God doing it?

Because these are fruits of His Spirit. Not something we do ourselves. It's Him in us. But if you rebel against this, you won't have these fruits. We have to keep submitting. We have to keep giving in. We have to keep saying, I didn't want to do this, but now that I did it, thank you. Thank you. Let's end with Philippians 1. Philippians 1. Philippians 1.

It's a very personal comment that Paul writes to the church at Philippi. And it's so personal, and yet we can read it today as if he's saying it to us right now. Verse 9, To the glory and praise of God.