Love endures all things

Now here's where the rubber meets the road.  Are you up to a real endurance test?   All you have to do is live in relationship with other people without blowing up, leaving, ignoring or avoiding them even when they cause you pain.   To endure means we will be persistent in our love through the hard times as well as the good times.

God demonstrated His endurance in Christ.    Obviously Jesus endured the mocking, the shame, the pain and torture of the cross "for the joy that was set before Him".  Read  Hebrews 12:1&2.   While on earth, He endured all the temptations and heartaches we endure.  He endured living and walking with a group of men who bickered about who was going to be the greatest and totally misunderstood His purpose for being there.  He endured the scrutiny of the Pharasees and the unbelief of people who'd seen His miracles and still couldn't see who He was.

God still endures.  Although it pains Him to see us when we sin and when we fail because we didn't put our trust in Him, still He says  "I will never leave you nor forsake you"  Hebrews 13:5

Love hopes all things

So what is hope.   I certainly hope someone just hands me a million dollars tomorrow or that Congress balances the budget, but that's very likely not going to happen.   Have you ever heard the phrase, "hope for the best, but expect the worst"?  That way you're always right.      

Is this what you think of when you think of hope?   Well, let's be clear.  That is not what the Bible means by using the word "hope". The word for hopes(elpizō) in the Greek has a meaning of expectation of good.   When you love others, you have an expectation of good in their life.  Not because they're good or because of their good circumstances, but because God is good.   As we love and pray for those God has placed in our lives, we look with expectation on what God will do to draw them to Himself.

Of course, unlike us, what Jesus expected would come to be, always came to be, and always comes to be.  Since He knows, His expectations are reality.   In I John 3:2, it tells us that "we know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is."   Let us live in that great hope and express that hope for others.

Love believes all things

Doesn't that sound rather gullible?  Keep in mind, this love thing has to do with relationships.  How do we fully love someone when we are suspicious of their thoughts and actions?  Are they giving me the straight facts?   What about their motives?   Are they really Christian?   Do they even care?


John 8: 3 - 11 tells a story about a woman caught in adultery.  The Mosaic law demanded that she be stoned to death.  After extending grace to this woman, Jesus told her to go and sin no more.   Jesus believed that to be a possibility.  He believed in the power of God to keep this woman from continuing in adultery.

Jesus believes in us too because He knows the power of His Holy Spirit to change lives.     I believe He wants us to believe in others and believe on their behalf.   That's why we can then forgive many times over, because we believe in the power of God to help those seeking forgiveness to overcome the sin that continues to plague them.

So, to "believe all things" doesn't mean to believe every lie that comes along, but rather to believe in the power of God to change lives.  

Love bears all things

            Did you ever wonder why I Cor 13 uses the words bears all thing and endures all things in the same sentence?   Aren’t they the same?  Well, I did even if you didn’t.   As our house church studied the passage last year, it came to us that the two words express two very different ideas.   “Bears all things” has to do with bearing burdens as Gal. 6:1-3 says.

Brethren, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who [are] spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, considering yourself lest you also be tempted. Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.  For if anyone thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceives himself.

So what is the “law of Christ”?  It is the law of love and as we see, love bears all things.   It has been said that the church is one of the few institutions where we shoot our wounded.   We need to go after the wounded, bear their burdens with them and help them get their lives back in focus with the one who loves them more than they will ever know.

Regarding Jesus, Isaiah 53:4 in the NAV says “Surely our griefs He Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted”

No one who has walked this earth has ever loved like Jesus loved.   Jesus took on our sins, our grief, our sorrows.  Jesus told us

 “"Come to Me, all [you] who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you and learn from Me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For My yoke [is] easy and My burden is light.”  Mathew 11:28-30.

Why is His yoke easy, His burden light?  Because He is yoked with us; bearing our burden with us.

Clearly, Jesus bears all things.  

Love does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth

Well everyone knows the big news of the day.  Osama Bin Laden is dead and there is rejoicing in the streets.   On 9/11/2001, there were others in this world rejoicing over the loss of many lives here in the US. Top among the celebrators was  the infamous Osama, believing that Allah was blessing them with victory.   I must say, I did not shed a tear at the news of his demise. 

We must ask ourselves,  what does God feel?  What is His perspective?  

Eze 33:11

"Say to them: '[As] I live,' says the Lord GOD, 'I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. ….

I guess if God doesn’t take pleasure in the wicked’s death, neither should I. 

Today’s world has increased its rejoicing in iniquity many fold.   We are told to celebrate diversity in support of all sorts of perversions of what God intended for us.   We accept all religions and sects as equal, even when they go directly against what God has given us and enslave instead of free.  We have replaced love for something we call “tolerance” and in the name of tolerance, we find ourselves rejoicing over the very things that are destroying the objects of God’s love. 

Jesus demonstrated His intolerance of sin while clearly demonstrating His love of the sinner.    For instance with the woman caught in adultery,   He didn’t accuse her, but He did tell her to sin no more.   Truth and Love go together.

Jesus encouraged His disciples to rejoice in the truth as He said  "Nevertheless do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rather rejoice because your names are written in heaven."  Luke 10:20.

Did you know that God rejoices over us?   Zeph 3:17 says “The LORD your God in your midst, The Mighty One, will save; He will rejoice over you with gladness, He will quiet [you] with His love, He will rejoice over you with singing."

So, God does not rejoice in iniquity, but He rejoices in the truth.  

Love thinks no evil

Mat 5:21 - 22 "You have heard that it was said to those of old, 'You shall not murder, and whoever murders will be in danger of the judgment.' But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment”

Mat 5:27 – 28: "You have heard that it was said to those of old,  'You shall not commit adultery, But I say to you that whoever looks at a woman to lust for her has already committed adultery with her in his heart.”

Jesus made it clear that it matters what we think as much as it matters what we do.  Because we know Jesus was without sin, we know that unlike us, He had complete control over His thought life.  It is only by the power of the Holy Spirit living in us and loving through us that we will have victory over our thought life.  

Love is not provoked

He was oppressed and He was afflicted, Yet He opened not His mouth; He was led as a lamb to the slaughter, And as a sheep before its shearers is silent, So He opened not His mouth. Isa 53:7

Falsely accused and humiliated, yet He did nothing to fight back.

Then Pilate said to Him, "Are You not speaking to me? Do You not know that I have power to crucify You, and power to release You?" Jesus answered, "You could have no power at all against Me unless it had been given you from above. Therefore the one who delivered Me to you has the greater sin." John 19:10-11

In contrast, when James and John saw that a certain Samaritan village didn’t receive them,

they said, “Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them, just as Elijah did?” But He turned and rebuked them, and said, “You do not know what manner of spirit you are of. For the Son of Man did not come to destroy men’s lives but to save them.” And they went to another village. Luke 9:51 – 56

So we see; Jesus is not provoked.