Romans 12:9-13 (Ten Characteristics of Love, Pastor Jeff Kliewer)

He is worthy of all the praise we could ever give, isn't he?

Amen.

Let's pray.

So Father, we thank you so much for the love that you have shown us, that you would give your one and only son to die in the place of sinners like us. It is the perfect love. Help us now, Lord, as we contemplate that example, to love like you do.

Change us today, Lord, as we hear your word, that we would become more like you, that our love would become more like your love. This is not a work that we can do in and of ourselves. We can't change ourselves.

We need you working in us. And so do it by the power of your Holy Spirit through the preaching of your word and the hearing of your word. Change us now, we pray, in Jesus' name.

Amen.

David and Heather Henry have given us an example of what love looks like. Love means that you hate fentanyl and tranq and every drug that would destroy a life, and that you love the people who are made in the image of God and that you would take the time to go and rescue those who are being taken away to the slaughter, that you would rush the gates of hell to try to rescue those who are going to destruction.

C .T. Studd was a missionary and a theologian, and he said, some want to live within the sound of a church or chapel bell. I want to run a rescue shop within a yard of hell. I'm not sure I agree with Studd.

I think I'd like to hear the sound of a chapel or church bell in my neighborhood. Wouldn't that be great if we still lived in those days where there were church bells calling people to worship on Sunday morning?

The truth is the suburbs have become almost as dark as the inner cities where the drug abuse is so rampant. It's not only there, it's also here. And the truth is we should try to build up wherever we live.

We should try to love people wherever we're called to live. Not everybody is called to go live in the inner city. Some are, but wherever each one of us is called, we are called to love. Today, we're going to see 10 characteristics of genuine love, the pattern that we see in the Apostle Paul as he describes for us, and that we see in the lives of so many.

But first understand that love is a summary of God's law. When you think of the 10 Commandments, is love the first thing that comes to mind? Notice that the 10 Commandments are expressed negatively. Thou shalt not, thou shalt not, thou shalt not.

And yet when Jesus was asked, what is the greatest of the commands? He said, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And he said, the second is like it to love your neighbor as yourself.

So if you would think about it this way, the 10 Commandments are applications of love. The first four are vertical towards God, not making idols and not taking his name in vain and remembering a day of worship and having no other God but him.

Those are vertical commandments. To love God. Loving neighbor means that you don't kill your neighbor. You don't steal from your neighbor or bear false witness against your neighbor or commit adultery with his wife.

All of these things are examples of love expressed in the negative. But Jesus came and showed us a higher love. Don't think of the song, Bring Me a Higher Love. That's a different example. But what Jesus showed us was love personified.

How many here know the old Christian artist, Rich Mullins? Rich Mullins, who died in 1997. In fact, he died in a car crash, totally unexpectedly, in his early 40s. Just like that plane crash in Washington, D .C. or the plane crash in Philadelphia not long ago, we never know the moment of our departure from this world into the next.

You never know. And so every day you're given is precious and valuable, and it is to be lived, that time is entrusted, that you would love God and love others.

Amen?

Well, Rich Mullins had a line in one of his songs that goes like this. We didn't know what love was until he came. And he gave love a face and he gave love a name and he gave love away like the sky gives the rain and sun.

The idea here in Mullins' lyric is that until Jesus Christ came, we had only seen shadows of what love really is like. But in Jesus Christ, we have the full expression. Like the sky gives the rain and the sun, the Lord Jesus gives love.

He gives love a face. What does love look like?

Jesus.

What is his name?

Jesus.

He is the perfect example of love. Greater love has no one than this, the one who lays down his life for his friends. Jesus showed us what love is. Not only in what he refrained from doing, he never broke any of the commandments, even at the heart level.

But he also taught us positively what love looks like. The son of God, the son of man, came to seek and save that which was lost. He was active in pursuing and rescuing sinners who were on the way to destruction.

Now, Jesus gave the example, and Jesus gave a command. Notice what he said. A new command I give you, that you love one another. Doesn't that sound like the old command of the Old Testament in John 13, 34?

But he said this in that verse, just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. Now that takes this to a whole different level. As Christ loved us, we are called to love each other. Now that is a high command, a high level of love to which none of us will ever attain, but it is the goal.

And we ought to be growing in likeness to Christ. So what then would it look like if we genuinely loved one another? What are 10 characteristics of genuine love? You guys are familiar with Exodus 20, right?

10 commandments. There are 10 commandments. Thou shalt not. Did you know that the New Testament gives us 10 commandments of love? Stated positively, not in the negative, what you shall not do, but positively what you must do.

Turn with me to Romans 12, verses nine to 13. Almost everybody believes that they are loving people. We have in ourselves a self-justifying mechanism that we always assume our own best intentions, and maybe not the best intentions of others, but we tend to give ourselves the benefit of the doubt.

And when asked if you're a loving person, almost everybody thinks, yeah, I'm generally loving. They'll admit their own faults, but they think that they're loving. The question is by what standard? And whereas people generally believe themselves to be loving, there are certain characteristics of genuine love, certain characteristics that mark the genuine article.

Let's read them.

Romans 12, verses nine to 13. Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil. Hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. Do not be slothful and zeal, but be fervent in spirit.

Serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope. Be patient in tribulation. Be constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.

Amen.

This is the word of the Lord. 10 descriptions or characteristics of genuine love. We live in a world that is constantly pulling us away from God's standard, trying to conform us into worldly thinking.

I like to picture it like being on the River Delaware. You know, up by the Delaware water gap, you can get a inflatable tube and just float down the river on a sunny day. That's a great picture of being carried along by the current of the river.

But a swimmer who seeks to go in the opposite direction would have to exert a lot of energy to swim up current in the Delaware River. In the same way, the world is always trying to press us into its mold, to carry us along in worldly ways, but it takes great love and great effort active love to move in the opposite direction.

Love then becomes the test of how well we're swimming. How well are we moving in the motion that God has for us? The first thing the Bible says in this section, verse nine, let love be genuine. What does it imply if Paul says, let love be genuine?

It implies that there's a such thing as counterfeit love, something that feels like love to the person who's doing it, but isn't the genuine article. If Paul must exhort, let love be genuine, he's exhorting against the counterfeit.

Let love be genuine. Have you heard the expression, love is love? Love is love. You've heard that on television, right? And what they mean is if a man has some affection for a woman that's not his wife, or perhaps for another man, whatever that affection is needs to be affirmed because the person feels it.

Love is love. Nothing could be further from the truth. Not everything that passes itself off as love is genuinely loving. If someone is experiencing a sense of gender dysphoria, a poor young person who thinks that they're caught in the wrong body, someone might feel loving to come along and say, listen, God made you different than your body.

And they begin to affirm the person in that wrong thinking, thinking that they're offering them love because they're accepting and they're affirming, but what they're actually doing is hate. It feels like love.

It's warm and cuddly, but it does not benefit the person. Love, genuine love always rejoices with the truth. I'm sure some of you are gonna watch the big game today.

Go birds.

Mount us up with wings like eagles, right? Many of you will watch the game and I will too. And it will be a little bit frustrating to see how often they feature Taylor Swift and their love story with Travis Kelsey.

She has a song called Romeo and Juliet and you know the story of Romeo and Juliet. That song has a lyric, this love is difficult, but it's real. The world always feels that what they feel love to be, love is love, must be real.

No, it's counterfeit. Even the story of Romeo and Juliet is not a love story. It's a story of infatuation between two people who hardly know each other. Romeo steals his way into a ball. He ends up murdering somebody, later murders somebody else and then finally murders himself.

He's not even obeying the 10 commandments. And then Juliet murders herself as well. This is not a love story. This is counterfeit love. When the Bible says, let love be genuine, it's calling us to a standard.

So what is genuine love? And a better question, because it's easy just to make fun of Taylor Swift, I could do that all day. I'll be here all day, folks. We could do that all day. But when someone is preaching the word of God, the right posture before the word of God is to examine our own hearts.

So often when the word is preached, we think, oh, I wish so-and-so would hear what the preacher is saying because this applies to them. But how loath we are to say, Lord, examine my heart. And so now as we get into the 10 characteristics of love, what we ought to do is say, how loving am I really?

Is what I display in how I love people the genuine article or is it just self-justifying of my own opinions? Here's the first. Genuine love abhors what is evil. That should be a stark opening because the word abhor means hate.

Isn't hate the opposite of love? But Paul says here in verse nine, abhor what is evil. You cannot love unless you hate what is destructive of human flourishing. You cannot love a person who's addicted to a substance unless you hate fentanyl and tranq because it destroys them.

You have to have a genuine hatred for what is evil. I would go so far as to say that nobody in this room hates Darwinism the way it ought to be hated. When a young person in ninth grade is being taught biology and the scientist teacher says that there is no God but that everything evolved by chance and happenstance, survival of the fittest, what he's really saying is that there is no meaning or purpose in life.

They don't like to talk. They only speak in whispered tones about where this universe ends in the Darwinistic worldview. You wanna know where it ends? In absolute death, heat loss of the universe, what they call the deep chill or the deep freeze.

As entropy runs its course, the universe expanding, everything runs out. Everything comes to nothing. And without God, that's the scientific position, the cosmology of things to come. And I would say to you that that is the most devastatingly destructive thing that you can teach a young person, that there is no God, that you have no purpose.

You wonder why there's school shootings? We had a guy speak here a number of years ago named David Wood. He's an apologist, amazing apologist, just tears down Islam, which is a necessary thing to do. You have to hate what is evil, abhor what is evil.

Well, David Wood, when he was raised, he was raised a Darwinist by his public school. And so when he got angry with his father, his brilliant mind, and he is brilliant, calculated that there is no purpose.

I hate my father. Nothing keeps me from smashing his head to pieces with the hammer, and he did. But in jail, he got saved, and he discovered the God of the universe, and he got set free from the psychopathic mindset that Darwinism led him to.

You see, purposelessness results in destruction. And so many young people growing up today have no sense of purpose or meaning in life because they're deceived by a deceitful ideology that needs to be torn down.

You see, the first mark of genuine love is hatred for what is evil. You must abhor what destroys the things of God. And this is defined by God. Secondly, genuine love upholds the good. Hold fast to what is good.

You don't need to hold fast to something if it's not under attack. If there isn't someone trying to rip it from your hand, you don't need to grip it tight. But to hold fast what is good means to have such a love for the good things as defined by the Bible.

In sexual ethics, in how a husband should love his wife, in how a mother should love her child, these things are defined by the Bible, and you must hold on to the good. Do you realize that this world is against you?

It is trying to rip the good right out of your hands. To love, to genuinely love means to uphold the good, to hold fast to it. That means sometimes you have to say hard things. Paul would say to the Galatians, have I become your enemy by telling you the truth?

He told them a hard truth regarding the way of salvation. They were teaching that someone had to be circumcised in order to be saved. In other words, they had to become Jewish first in order to trust Christ for salvation.

And Paul said, no. He stood against that strongly, and they hated him for it. But he held fast to the principle of the word of God. Church, how do you know what is good and what is a lie? There's many teachers out there, everybody claiming to have the truth.

You know the truth, you know what is good by the word of truth. It is also written into natural law when there's a baby in the womb, just minutes from being born, and a baby outside of the womb, just minutes old.

Everybody knows that this baby and that baby are both human babies. They are living people. Common sense, knowledge built into man affirms that the baby in the womb is a human person worthy of life and protection.

But in the convoluted reasoning, in the fallenness of human thinking, people suppress that knowledge. And so we have the Bible, Psalm 139, that the Lord has fashioned us together in our mother's wombs.

All that to say, we know the truth by natural law, but the word of God makes these things more clear. This is what we hold on to. We hold fast the word of truth. Third, and this is a tough one because it's a little bit counterintuitive.

Love one another with brotherly affection. It's difficult because many people teach you don't have to like that guy, you only have to love him. In other words, the 10 Commandments. Maybe there's somebody in the church that has offended you, that has hurt you, and you think, you know what?

I'm just not gonna murder him.

Well, good for you.

The 10 Commandments, I'm not gonna steal his car. I'm not gonna lie about him. I'm not going to commit adultery with his wife. Good for you, the 10 Commandments. But listen, these laws that Jesus is giving us here are a higher standard of love.

They're not just what you aren't to do, but what you must do. And this is the harder part. It is one thing for me to say that I'm going to act right before this person. I'm going to do them well. But in my heart, I'm still not gonna like him.

Ever been there? I have to love him, but I don't have to like him. This tells you, you must have affection for them.

Isn't that hard?

Love one another with brotherly affection, Philadelphia. Remember the story of Jesus and Peter? Peter had warm affection for his savior, the resurrected king with whom he was dining with fish by the fire.

And Jesus asked him a question. Do you agape me? What does agape mean? It's love, but it's that self-sacrificing love. In the same way that Jesus died on the cross, Peter, are you willing to die for me?

Are you willing to die for the sheep? Feed my sheep. Peter answers, Lord, you know that I phileo you. You know my heart. You know how I have warm affection, dear love for you, God. Jesus asked him again, do you agape me?

The action, would you be willing to die in my place? Peter said, you know that I phileo you. You know how warm my heart is to you. Finally, Jesus said, do you phileo me? Acknowledging that that warmth of heart, that affection is valuable.

And Peter then hurt by this said, you know that I phileo you. You know the warm affection. Here's the point. Both agape, the actions, how you treat the person, and the heart, the phileo, the brotherly affection matter to the savior.

Here it says, love one another with brotherly affection. You are responsible to cultivate the warmth and the affection of your own heart towards people in the church. You cannot let a root of bitterness overtake you.

Even if you purpose with all the willpower that you can muster, I won't do anything wrong back to them, you still haven't obeyed this verse. It's not enough. Not when Christ is the standard. You must phileo them.

You must be willing to pray and seek the Lord and seek reconciliation and forgiveness until you genuinely from the heart have affection for them. Isn't that more difficult? Sure, it would be a lot easier if all you had to do was not kill their wife.

But this is a call to brotherly affection. Number four. Outdo one another in showing honor. Protect the honor of the brother or the sister in church. And I think this is why Matthew chapter 18 verses 15 to 18 are so important.

Sometimes in church, there will be a private offense and the temptation would be to talk to anybody and everybody besides that person. What happens when you talk to others about somebody else? Their honor is harmed, but the person is left unaware of the private offense.

What does Matthew 18, 15 to 18 say? If your brother offends you, go to him just between the two of you. The desire here is to protect the honor of the other person. You think, why would I wanna do that?

They're the one that hurt me.

I should blast them on Facebook. Before you vague post about them in a way that would hurt their honor, but cause 20 other people to think you're talking about them too, and then you hurt everybody, before you click send on that email, before you post that thing to get something off your chest, pray about these words.

Outdo one another in showing honor. Remember that Christian love gives honor to the brother. And remember the pattern that is set for us. If you have something against a brother or they against you, what are you to do?

Go to them and them alone. It only expands from that private inner circle of one-on-one to a couple others, and then finally to the church if the person remains unrepentant. If we would do this in the church, the church would thrive.

Sadly, what happens is we disobey and we dishonor one another. We must give honor, do everything we can to preserve the honor, to say as little as possible against anybody else in the church or in the world, as possible protecting the honor of another.

Number five, genuine love is zealous. Now notice there is one negative command in this passage, and it's the beginning of verse 11. Do not, thou shalt not be lazy. Don't be slothful. Don't be a sluggard.

Don't be like the slug. But it's only a setup for the positive other side of the coin, for it says, be fervent in spirit. Serve the Lord. Genuine love is zealous in Christian ministry. We're all familiar with virtue signaling love, virtue signaling the goodness of one's own heart.

The beauty pageant queen is famous for this. When asked what her great desires are in life, what will she say? World peace. But that's only the appearance of love. That's loving the idea of love. She doesn't have a plan to usher in the millennium.

She wants to appear on the stage to have inner beauty just like she has outer beauty. And so she loves the idea of love. How do you know the genuine love versus the counterfeit? It's activity in ministry.

It's taking that Saturday morning to go to Kensington and rescue someone versus sleeping in that Saturday morning or maybe you're called to be on your knees praying for those going to Kensington or elsewhere to the prison rehab ministry.

These kind of devotions of time and effort, this is a sign of love. Zeal in Christian ministry is genuine. And here's the irony of it. The more slothful we are in ministry, the more insular we become in our lives.

Laziness begets laziness. And before long, the duties of this life, paying the bills and getting the groceries and getting the kids from this place to that, they so swarm your life and take over that you have nothing left to give.

But when you step out to serve, it says here, serve the Lord. When you do something in Christian ministry with zeal, what ends up happening, ironically enough, is you gain more energy. The sluggard gets more and more lazy, sloth overtakes them, but the one active in ministry becomes more and more zealous.

When you see the hand of God in your ministry, when someone's getting saved, over the last few weeks, we've had three people get saved that we know about. When you see that or when you go and baptize in the ocean and there's this glory of ministry, seeing the hand of God move, what does it make you wanna do?

Go out and preach the gospel all the more. Ministry begets ministry. And here, you must step out and be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord, because the opposite is to fall back in sloth. Number six, rejoice in hope.

What is hope? Hope is the future-oriented aspect of faith. It's regarding what's, things to come, what you expect will come. But rejoice means joy. So if you're joyful in things to come, this means you are an optimist.

This means you see the world and what's coming in the future with bright eyes. Your joy is unaffected by thoughts of the future. You're not afraid of things to come. You look forward to things to come.

A genuinely loving person is joyful. If you mope around your house and everybody has to tiptoe around you, are you loving your neighbor? Are you loving your family? If you're the guy at work that nobody wants to come and visit because you know you're gonna be bitter, they know you're gonna be bitter and upset all the time, are you a loving person?

No, joy is a mark of love. Joy, the joy of the Lord. If you wake up in the morning and you're thanking God, you're grateful, and you go about your day with expectation that God is going to bless because he's good, doesn't mean you won't have trouble.

We'll see that in a moment. But a general optimism about life, that's what Paul calls love. It's a characteristic of love. And again, when we see that we struggle in certain areas, this is not to condemn us because none of us are Christ.

He's the standard, he's the example. If you see yourself falling short, take this as a word from the Lord. How do you cultivate joy? With gratitude, with prayer, let's go on. It says be patient in tribulation.

Genuine love is not only optimistic, it's sturdy. Fragility is not a mark of love. A person who is genuinely loving is standing on solid ground, and that rock is Christ Jesus. When you're standing on the rock, when you know that you're in the center of God's will, it's not that there won't be trouble.

What does Jesus say? In this world, you will have trouble, but take heart, I have overcome the world. When your feet are planted on the rock, you're not wandering off into sin, you stand secure, and even the earthquake doesn't shake your faith.

Sturdiness is a sign of loving God. When you're walking with God, when you're in love with God, yes, the trouble will come, the ground will begin to shake, but you will not be shaken because you're standing on the rock.

In the most difficult times, the diamonds are forged. Diamonds are only forged under pressure. Darkness makes the light shine all the brighter. Tribulation is designed by God to be a refining fire, and as you go through that fire, he purifies you.

The dross is removed and the pure gold remains. Welcome the tribulation for that reason. Don't ask for it, don't pray for trials, but know that he has said that they will come, and know that he's the God of those trials, and when you're standing in the presence of God, you're in the will of God, you're sturdy, your feet are set upon the rock.

Number eight out of 10, genuine love is prayerful. It says be constant in prayer, constant in prayer, praying all the time. You should be praying right now. Yes, you're listening to me, but praying, Lord, help me hear what he's saying because my mind is prone to wander.

You should be praying all day long. You're going about your task, maybe you're an engineer, and you're drawing up some sketch, and you're having trouble with it, and you say, Lord, help me. Then your mind is occupied, then you get in the car, and you're going from place to place, and you're praying while you're driving, constantly praying.

It can get to the point where you're praying every hour and even every minute of the day. 1 Thessalonians says, pray what? Unceasingly. Paul says it here, be constant in prayer. It's a day-by-day, minute-by-minute conversation with God.

Pray without ceasing. This cultivates love because when you're bringing everything to God, your heart is filled with his love. You have an enemy who's said something bad about you, pray for them, pray that God would bless them, and the next thing you know, your heart begins to warm.

You begin to have affection for the very person that wounded you. Prayer is the key. Praying all day long and praying together. There's a prayer meeting here. There's even one tonight at six o 'clock.

I commend you if you come to that because that's the start of the Eagles game. But every Sunday night at six o 'clock, we have a prayer meeting. Come and pray constantly. Number nine, genuine love makes generous financial contributions.

Contribute to the needs of the saints. Malachi the prophet will say, "'Will man rob God? "'Yet you are robbing me.'. "'But you say, how have we robbed you?'. "'In your tithes and contributions.'". Giving financially is a strong form of love.

Having been entrusted with resources as a steward for you to give that for the needs of the saints, you are entrusting yourself to God for the sake of others. "'Will a man rob God? "'Yet you are robbing me.

"'How have we robbed you? "'In your tithes and contributions.'". But giving should not be a mere matter of obedience to the old covenant law, 10 commandments. Thou shalt not steal from God. Beyond that, love in the Christian sense.

Is cheerful.

You want to contribute to the saints as they go to Kensington, get somebody off the streets and into an addictions program. You desire to do that. You wanna give to a compassion kid or Samaritan's Purse for Operation Christmas Child.

You delight to support a missionary. You're happy to give the tithe because it's where your heart is. This is what Paul is describing as love, contribute to the needs of the saints. And then lastly, number 10, seek to show hospitality.

Hospitality does include place, namely your house, but more than that, it refers to time. Love means making time for people. When someone expresses a need that you're not too busy, and you wanna know that the key to being hospitable, it is to be disciplined and simple in your own life.

The person who is very simple in life, who wakes up at the same time every day, keeps his room clean, eats generally the same kind of food, exercises regularly, doesn't need a bunch of extra stuff, does what he's called to do, develops discipline and cultivates discipline in his life.

Guess what he soon discovers? That you become efficient. You become highly efficient in the simple things that you do, and the result is you have extra time for people. You become more and more efficient in your work, more disciplined in your daily habits, and every habit creates a routine, and with that self-discipline, now you have room for people.

The person who is inhospitable is generally the person who mismanages their own life. It's why they're inhospitable, because they're constantly chasing things left undone, and usually it's the want that creates such a mountain of things to do.

A simple life, dedicated to God, done with excellence, leaves great margin for others, and this is where love comes in, because if you're not willing to give them your time, you don't love them. When you say you're gonna pray for somebody,.

Do you pray?

Do you spend that time? Do you have that time to pray for them? The more simply we live, and the more disciplined we are, the more hospitable we will be to others. So in application, I want us to think soberly about the 10 characteristics of love.

Again, it's very easy to hear a sermon about love and think, I wish my spouse was hearing this. I wish my kids would hear this. They're the ones who need it. The truth is none of us look like Christ to the degree we should, and this genuine love is personified in his face.

He gave love a face, and he gave love a name. We ought to be sober about what we're really like, judge ourselves by this description of love, not love is love, whatever I feel or think. No, these objective measures tell us how we're doing.

Do you hate the things that destroy? Do you hold on to what is good? Do you cultivate warm affections one for another, or do you let your heart grow cold? Do you preserve the honor of those around you?

Do you serve with zeal, rejoice in optimism, remain sturdy in the face of trials? Do you pray all the time, contribute generously, and make time for people? Let's ask the Lord for more grace in our lives that we would love more like he does.

Father God, we thank you so much for your word to us today. We're only here today because of your love. We love because you first loved us. While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. So we are motivated to present ourselves as living sacrifices by the mercies of God.

And Lord, we are pulled in many different directions. We're pulled down the river, conformed to the world, but help us to know what is your good and acceptable and perfect will that we would do it. And Lord, here preeminently, you are calling us to love.

So Lord, help us to love one another. Let your love be shed abroad in our hearts that we would love one another well. Teach us how to forgive because you have first forgiven us. Teach us how to bless when we are cursed.

Teach us how to pray. Pour out your Holy Spirit in us and warm our hearts with your love. Help us, Lord, to be more disciplined in our time, to build the right habits that leave margin for other people.

Teach us how to love in Jesus' name, amen.