-Transcript-
00:36 Amen. Thank you for joining me. Welcome to the cafe today.
00:40 It is a wonderful day today. Today we are continuing our study in brotherly love. Do you know that we can show God we love Him specifically by how we love our brothers and sisters in Christ? It’s a really interesting idea here that God gives us in His Word in 1 John4: 19 reading all the way through to chapter 5 verse 3 of 1st John.
01:07 We love Him because He first loved us. If a man say, I love God and hateth his brother, he is a liar. For he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen? And this commandment have we from him, that he who loveth God love his brother also.
01:28 Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God. And everyone that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him. By this we know that we love the children of God when we when we love God and keep His commandments.
01:46 For this is the love of God that we keep His commandments and His commandments are not grievous. And so we see here kind of a chain reaction of how we are to live as born-again Christians as those that have accepted Christ for salvation I should say and as Savior. What does this mean for us today? It means that we can show God we love Him.
02:08 We see here in 1 John 4:19 we love Him because He first loved us. We understand God’s great love for us while we were yet sinners. He sent Christ to die on the cross for us and be born again and when we are saved we’re born again to new life with Christ Amen.
02:26 And I’ll explain more about that in a bit but let’s look here at verses 20 and 21. If a man say I love God and hateth his brother he is a liar for he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen how can he love God whom he have not seen. And so we see here in verse 20 a very simple proposition that we must love our brothers and sisters in Christ to show to God.
02:52 Verse 21 in this commandment have we from him that he who loveth God love his brother also. And so part of God’s command for us is to love our brothers and sisters in Christ and we’re called to love the Lord our God with all our heart mind soul and body everything that we’ve got spirit included and then we are to love one another in that light and and really this is pointing out the contradiction that many people that call themselves Christians walk around with where they say hey I love my brother but they secretly hate them or envy them or want to hat covet for what they have or whatever it is and they don’t truly love their brother and we see that it’s this this interconnected relationship between how we act here on earth and our love for God in heaven. You know another scripture that comes to mind is the scripture that that’s in Matthew 6:14 – 15.
03:46 For if you forgive men their trespasses your Heavenly Father will also forgive you but if you forgive not men their trespasses neither will your father forgive your trespasses. You see how it works it’s a conditional here if we act as God has called us to act and how God is acting on our behalf Amen.
04:03 then we will be forgiven by God but if we don’t and then how can we be forgiven by God because we are essentially hypocrites and there is a great parable in the scriptures about a man who owed more money than he could pay and his master and he was gonna he was in jail and his master forgave him and he went and found someone that owed him money and he refused to forgive that person and it was a great hypocrite there
04:28 and God does not like that he wants us to be honest and true and if we say we understand his loving and forgiving nature we must exhibit that in our behavior.
04:37 So we’re Romans 12:10 be kindly affection to one to another with brotherly love in honor preferring one another.
04:47 Hebrews 13:1 let brotherly love continue we should love our brothers and sisters in Christ if we’ve known him a day or a decade we should love them with all our heart mind and soul as we love the Lord
04:59 we should love them with that sacrificial love Jesus speaks of this John 13:34 a new commandment I give unto you that you love one another as I have loved you that you also love one another and in a recent episode we spoke about how Jesus exhibited this behavior through his obedience and through his condescending down to humanity and to his living in a way that he was humiliated
05:24 and that He was disrespected and that He was abused and yet he was the creator of all and is a creator of all and the Lord of all in the King of all and He did that because He loved us and He loves us
05:36 John 13:35 we see a byproduct of our love for each other John 13 35 by this shall all men know that year my disciples if you have love one to another so we will show the world that we are serving the true and real living God when we love each other because when we love each other the world will see that and say
05:59 well that’s impossible to do there’s nothing in it for them and they have a giving spirit and I respect that I don’t understand that they must serve the real and true God and in our prayer meeting last night which was more like a preaching service we were talking about this message and I explained to the congregation the idea of what’s in it for me and how people often will not want to have in any part with anything that they don’t get something in return tangible
06:26 and that’s why you see so many of the vital ministries in the world are run by Christians or have a Christian foundation whether it be Salvation Army or any of the other ones out there Goodwill there’s so many and you think of the international missions out there like Voice of the Martyrs like those that build schools like those that build orphanages like those that build doctors clinics and so forth they’re not all Christian but many of them are and the reason why is they live out this commandment to have a love to each other even if there’s nothing to gain for themselves
07:02 other than a heavenly reward nothing on earth and that’s how people see that we are the true disciples of the real and living Christ
07:10 and we talked about what this looks like recently in 1 Corinthians 13 4- 8 there’s that very familiar passage on charity or love suffereth long and is kind and it doesn’t envy and it’s not puffed up it doesn’t vaunt itself up it doesn’t behave itself unseemly it’s not seeking her own we just spoke about that it’s not easily provoked
07:32 you know when we love we’re not easily provoked and this is something that really I think kind of steps on my toes a little bit because as a preacher of God’s Word I try to hold myself to a high standard and I honestly fall short often you know and what happens I become easily provoked I become temperamental and I don’t love that about myself and I asked the Lord to help me with it maybe this little testimony here will help you to recognize that if you maybe share that trait
08:04 but we see here that charity sacrificial love is not easily provoked amen if the idea is that we are long suffering and that we understand the end from our beginning or from our time here that the end is great that there is a peaceful end a heavenly end that place is called paradise there’s mansions there Amen
08:25 our Savior is there we can see Him face face to face we can kind of take off our robe of faith if you will because we won’t need our robe of faith and we can put on our robe of righteousness because we’ll see Jesus eye to eye face to face Amen
08:38 of course we’ll fall at his feet and worship Him that’s why I say eye to eye and then I always say fall at his feet and worship Him I was reading in the book of Revelation this morning and when He Jesus appeared to John he had the gold breastplate on and the and the boots of iron and all I said to myself man I’d fall on my face in the next next verse there John falls on his face Amen
08:57 like he’s dead that’s the glory we’re gonna see but we’re gonna be able to handle that because we’re gonna have the resurrected body we’re gonna have a new fully resurrected body we will depart from this sinful flesh Amen
09:08 and we’ll be able to handle seeing the Lord face to face and we’ll see loved ones again I believe it Oh David says that child that was miscarried that he would see that child again in heaven and then David was a man of God a man after God’s own heart so I take that to believe that I’ll see my child that was miscarried in heaven I cannot wait I cannot wait Oh Lord come soon
09:28 and you know charity or sacrificial love as we treat the brothers to respect honor and care it thinketh no evil it thinketh no evil and it rejoices not in iniquity or sin but it rejoices in truth think about this so much evil in the world today so many plots you know we see that in the Bible Judas Iscariot plotting to betray Jesus
09:51 and Jesus knew it Amen and and Judas Iscariot gave him a kiss would have said oh I love Jesus but that’s not love of the brethren to think evil in the plot evil look you know if you’ve been in the ministry for any time there are people that you will encounter that have evil on their mind
10:07 and they may act charitable but they have evil on their mind either in the church out of the church whatever it is you you know you’ve seen it we’ve all seen it the Bible instructs us to show love to turn the other cheek to let them do what they’re going to do we are sheep as for the slaughter trust in Jesus to care for us Amen
10:25 and so that’s what we do we don’t accuse people and so forth it like if you think about someone’s taking advantage of a church ministry or something you’re not quick to accuse them you’re quick to listen to hear to show them love and be long-suffering
10:37 but as a person that’s showing charitable love to the brethren you shouldn’t think evil you shouldn’t rejoice what does that mean to rejoice that means like having great joy and you say do people have great joy in sin some people do some people promote sin just look on social media some people revel in sin some people rejoice in the ways of the world and celebrate the ways of the world we’re called to rejoice in the truth what’s the truth that’s God’s Word
11:04 matter of fact I’ve got right above my computer here a piece of printer paper with some scotch tape that this only thing on this wall right here besides some sound panels that that repeats Philippians 4: 8 what to think on we think on what’s true and honest and just and pure and lovely
11:21 and of a good report that has any virtue that has any praise that is what we are to think on Amen and that is the idea behind not rejoicing in iniquity or sin but rejoicing in truth that is the truth thinking on the true honest pure lovely Savior Jesus Christ
11:38 and then we see that charity or sacrificial love never fails so we love our brothers and sisters in Christ it’s never failing in fact it can cover a multitude of sins the Bible says charity never faileth and then it lists a few things here in verse 8 of 1 Corinthians 13 but whether there be prophecies they shall fail whether there be tongues they shall cease whether there be knowledge it shall vanish away right and
12:06 I’ve heard great preaching on this in the past about brother Adrian Rogers I believe it was preached a really good message on on the idea of a someone with a great intellect and a poor uneducated illiterate person and the and the person that was high up in society with a great intellect
12:21 and the illiterate person they both end up in the grave and where did that knowledge go you know and you say oh well they wrote a book well where does that book go when the world’s on fire and go very far does it and it will all be burned up but brotherly love will continue because we will have a heavenly reward for that and we will have a testimony before God for that and we will be testifying to others of God’s great love that’s what we do
12:42 when we do something in the ministry we are saying this is done in the name of Jesus not in our name our rewards in heaven we’re not gonna publish what we’re doing for praise or for adoration or anything we’re gonna give that to God
12:55 and we’re gonna be a witness to others that Jesus is real that their prayers are heard that God is a real God and that they should turn to him immediately and forever more live for him Amen
13:06 overcome for Him overcome this wicked world for him we are so blessed to have this commandment to love our brothers and sisters in a charitable way and we have scripture outlining what that means detail by detail step by step all the things here in 1 Corinthians 13 :4- 8
13:23 we can apply to charitable love to our brothers and sisters in Christ and when we do that remember the topic of this message when we do that we show God that we love Him
13:32 so to show God that we love Him to show our Heavenly Father that we really do love Him we must love our brothers and sisters in Christ what can you do today to show that love
13:43 do you know a brother and sister in Christ that needs a lending hand a listening ear a pat on the back some encouragement just someone to spend time with go ahead and do it
13:55 you will not regret it and you will show God that you love him by doing that
13:59 thank you so much for listening I really appreciate it take care God bless and Amen