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Superlative Theme of the Christian Life
A sermon by Dr. Russell Dilday
First Baptist Church, Richmond, Virginia
Sunday, February 11, 2007
The worship theme this morning is focused on a familiar
passage in 1 Corinthians 13. It’s very familiar to you. Some of you could quote
this from memory. I’m going to read just a few of the verses as the text for the
message today. You’ll notice that Paul actually begins his paragraph at the end
of verse 31 of chapter 12. Your copy of the scripture probably shows that
paragraph division. The person who came along later and put in the verses may
have missed it there a little bit, because actually Paul’s words begin with, “.
. . and I will show you a still more excellent way. If I speak in the tongues of
men and of angels, but have not love I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And
if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge and if
I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If
I give away all I have and I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I
gain nothing. Love is patient and kind, not jealous or boastful, not arrogant or
rude. Love doesn’t insist on it own way, but it is rejoicing at right rather
than wrong. Love bears all things. It believes all things. It hopes all things
and it endures all things. Love never ends.” And then that majestic last verse;
“So faith, hope and love abide—these three—but the greatest of these is love.
This sermon addresses the question, What is the supreme
theme of the Christian faith? There was a gospel song we used to sing “. . . of
the themes that men have known, one supremely stands alone . . .” What is the
one supernal, transcendent theme that stands above all others in Christian
experience? Well, this text and all the worship service today has pointed to the
answer—LOVE is the theme. The supreme theme of the Christian faith.
You probably have noticed that all through the New
Testament, when these writers wanted to talk about what was supreme, when they
wanted to speak about superlatives, when they wanted to talk about what is
greatest and best, without exception, practically, consistently they point to
love as the supreme concept.
Look at 1 Peter 4:8. “Above all things have love among
yourselves . . .” it says. And in Paul’s letters to the Romans and the
Galatians, he expresses it twice. Love is the fulfillment of ALL the law. Every
bit of it fulfilled in that one concept. Jesus himself when asked what’s the
greatest commandment gives us the superlative expectation from God. What is the
ultimate, imperative from deity? And Jesus answered, “Love.” The greatest
commandment is love—love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. Love
your neighbor as yourself. And then John, in his gospel, says simply, “God is
love.” Over and over again you can turn here and there and consistently the
scripture points to that.
Well, to understand how such an exalted position could be
given to this one idea, you have to understand what the Biblical term love
really means. These writers of the New Testament in the first century had at
their disposal from the Greek vocabulary a wide variety of words for love from
which they could choose. Each one of them with a different nuance; each one of
them with a little shade of meaning. They could have chosen the word eros.
They knew about erotic--physical love--in the first century. They had their
worship of Diana in the city of Ephesus, the goddess of carnal love. They knew
about her over in Corinth. They called her Aphrodite there and worship her in
carnal worship services. They knew about that. But the word eros is not
here in the New Testament. And that’s not the word the biblical writers chose as
the supreme theme.
Time Magazine a couple of years ago at Valentine’s Week,
like this is, had a front-page story about love. In fact, the question was
there, What is this thing called l-o-v-e? And they shared a scientific study
about physical love and they said it is simply a chemical reaction. They said
this kind of love when you have that dizzy feeling of being swept away by love,
it’s just a dose of chemical amphetamines in your brain. In fact, when somebody
says in love, I get a kick out of you, they’re telling the literal truth.
According to Time Magazine their brain is being swamped by a rush of dopamine
and
norepinephrine and
phenelethylamine..
Isn’t that romantic? Probably not going to make it in Hallmark’s valentine card
this year. Said they have even discovered a cuddle chemical that’s called
oxytocin. Makes mothers want to nuzzle their little babies and makes husbands
and wives want to hug each other. It’s just a chemical. We might call this kind
of love amphetamine love. Physical love. Erotic love. That’s not the one
the Bible points to. Not here.
Well, if it isn’t erotic, what is it? Not physical love,
what is it? Well, they also had the word phileo, they could have used and
it is in the New Testament. It’s a higher form of love—not physical, but
emotional. It’s not erotic, but romantic. It’s that kind of sentimental,
emotional, romantic love of enduring relationships. An amorous kind that writes
poetry and composes music and buys candy and sends those valentine cards. I read
where last year valentine a hundred and eight million valentine cards were sent
in this country. And that didn’t include the ones in school where the kids all
exchange them. That’s amazing. Found one the other day, an unusual one, called
an MP3 valentine. Had a picture of an iPOD on the front of it and it was written
to Downloadable You. And it said inside,
“If you were a song, I would never fileshare
you.
I’d play you through earbuds so your sound
would be true.
I’d click-wheel your volume from loud, then to
muffle.
You’d stream in my heart, never lost in my
shuffle.”
Then it was signed, “Wild thing, you make my heart sing.
Your Valentine.” You can get all kinds.
But that’s not the theme, that’s not the word for love that
the New Testament elevates as the supreme theme of the Christian life. You might
call that valentine love and it’s not amphetamine love, not eros, not
phileo, not physical, not emotional—but spiritual love. And the real love
that the bible focuses on uses the word agape.
We’ve become familiar with that word. We’ve brought it
right into English. Wasn’t used much in the first century. In fact, these New
Testament writers, inspired to write the New Testament, pulled that word down
from the shelf of sparsely-used vocabulary and put it into practice here in the
New Testament to express this unique idea.
And when you read, “God is love” it’s agape. When
you read that Jesus loved us so much he gave himself, that’s agape. And
here in this passage where Paul say’s “now abides faith, hope and love, but the
greatest of these is love” that’s agape. It’s a different form of love.
Not amphetamine. Not valentine, but maybe we could say Christine or
Bibline or Pauline love. Not physical. Not emotional, but spiritual.
And this kind of love is unique.
That word agape doesn’t speak about an emotion or a
feeling. We have to kind of get over that one when we read the biblical word
l-o-v-e. It’s not sentiment. It’s not a mushy, blurred word. Agape is sturdy.
Has to do with attitude and will and decision and action. Agape is an attitude
or a world view that you adopt intentionally—on purpose—toward other people of
unselfishness and outward-giving concern. That’s what agape means. It means to
relate to people in an outward giving, open, trusting, unselfish way. And it
describes what that term really means. In fact, the King James version, when it
translates this word uses the word charity—now abides faith, hope and charity.
And that’s really closer to the idea of action and involvement and in reaching
out to help. This is a Good Samaritan word. This is radical love.
I have a book in my study entitled Love Is Something You Do
and the title suggests that it isn’t a feeling, it’s not an emotion, it’s not a
sentiment. This love has to do with an attitude of unselfish regard for others.
What a powerful concept. That helped me with the New Testament. I always had
trouble with the Bible commanding love. How do you command somebody to
feel affection? It didn’t make sense. Loving even your enemies, we’re to love
our enemies and I had this picture of I had to grit my teeth and work up a warm,
sentimental, affectionate feeling for people I didn’t even like. How do you do
that? Well, it’s because agape love in that command is not a feeling or a
sentiment, but an attitude. It’s a deliberate approach you take toward other
people of unselfishness. Wishing them the very best. Working for their regard.
Giving, helping and you can obey that. When the Bible commands it you do that.
You can even love your enemies. You can wish for them the best. You can reach
out to them. You can attempt to negotiate a peace. You can do something because
agape love is something you do.
So when the Bible commands it, it reminds us that this is
without a doubt the most important expression of the Christian faith possible.
That’s a big claim, But Paul says faith is important, hope is important,
love--but the greatest of these is agape.
It’s greatest in many areas of life. It’s important to a
lasting marriage. A marriage and a family has to be based not on romantic love
altogether, not physical love, but commitment, intentional desire one to
another. There’s a lot of debate today in Baptist life. Should wives be
submissive to their husbands? And, yes, the Bible commands that. But it also
commands husbands submit yourself to your wife. In fact, it says submit yourself
to each other. And then it says husbands agape your wives and that says give
yourself up for them, give up your desire, give yourself away, be open and
responsive to her. And that’s that mutual kind of not fifty-fifty, but
overlapping 100 percent commitment that makes for a strong marriage and family
life.
Agape is the most important tool we have for witnessing.
You want to share your faith with somebody, tell them what Jesus means to you or
you might be kind of reluctant to do that or fell you have to be a Bible expert
or able to answer questions or kind of be debater or be able to have a charisma
like a salesman like Donald Trump or somebody. No you don’t, you simply have to
have a faith that is genuine, authentic concern for somebody. And when that’s
authentic it comes through. And it answers questions and it helps overcome
mistakes and that feeling that you really and genuinely are interested in their
spiritual welfare is an affective took in witness.
This kind of agape love is important, too, because it’s the
expression of the Christian faith which is above all others. How do you prove
you are a genuine follower of Jesus? How do you show people you’re a Christian.
Jesus said, “Love one another.” He used that word agape. He said, “Love one
another. By that will all men know that you are my disciples.”
John Stott is a British theologian and he asked that
questions—What’s the authenticating mark of a true believer, What’s the chief
distinguishing characteristic that lets a person know you’re a follower of
Christ. Well some people say it’s truth—you have to believe the right things,
you have to be orthodox, you have to have a theology that’s correct and to an
extent that’s true. You do have to believe the Bible, you do have to know the
truth. But, did you hear what Paul said in our biblical text,1 Corinthians
chapter 13? He said that even if I understand all mysteries, and even if I have
ALL knowledge, but I don’t have love, I’m nothing. Love is greater than truth
and knowledge in expressing Christian faith.
Well, isn’t the way to prove you’re a Christian personal
experience? We all have to have a personal encounter with God. You can’t depend
on the experience of your parents or your friends or church members. You have to
know God for yourself, experiencing him through your faith in Christ. That’s
true. Some people say your experience to be authentic has to include speaking in
tongues or glossolalia or prophecy or miraculous gifts. Paul’s dealing with that
in chapter 13. And he says in the very first verse, “even if I speak with
tongues of men and of angels and even if I have the gift of prophecy and I don’t
have love I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.” Empty. Love is greater than
experience in expressing faith.
Well, what about faith? Isn’t that the mark of a Christian?
We would say “yes.” Baptists believe in the reformation principle of sola
fidei—faith alone. You come to God not by works but by faith. That’s very
crucial and very important. But Paul goes on here to say, “If I had all faith,
faith enough to move mountains, and I don’t have agape it matters not.” Love is
even greater than faith.
Good works. Sure. That proves you’re a Christian. By their
fruits you will know them, the Bible says. Faith without works is dead, the
Bible says. But Paul goes on there in this wonderful passage to say, “Even if I
give away all that I have to feed the poor; even if I deliver my body to be
burned, I gain nothing.”
Love encapsulates all of that. If you reach out to God in
open, unselfish, surrendering, giving response—that’s faith. And here is a
passage that tells us that the way to prove your Christian identity is by living
as Jesus did this agape principle of self giving, open love.
But not only is it important in all of these, but this
agape principle is important because it’s the secret ingredient of a full and
meaningful life to you. Not just to the people you love, not just to those you
reach out to; but adopting this attitude, adopting this spirit, this world view
of open, outward concern for others and for God is the secret of a full and
joyful and meaningful life here. It’s a way to be full and contented. In fact,
the Bible says that you will never be the person God intended you to be unless
you learn this secret. You’ll never fulfill you full potential for God unless
you deliberately choose to be open and outward and unselfish to others to him.
You’re life will be empty. In fact, modern psychologists and psychiatrists are
discovering that and sharing it. Alfred Adler said, “It’s either love or perish.
If you don’t learn this principle, something in you dies. You are not
complete.” Smiley Blanton said, “It’s the individual who isn’t open, interested
in his fellow man who has the greatest difficulties in life.” Then he said it is
from such people that all human failure springs. A powerful conclusion. Your
life will be fulfilled and joyous and meaningful if you include that secret
ingredient of an open, unselfish, outward regard for others.
See, the Bible says life tends to pay you back with the
attitude you give it. You go into life selfish, interested only in number one,
looking out after your own turf, not really worried or interested in other
people and life’s going to pay you back with that same kind of narrow-minded,
closed, inadequate feature. But if you go into life outward, open, unselfishly
giving, concerned agape love, some people may take advantage of you and you’re
gonna have some disappointments, but generally life’s going to pay you back with
a fullness and an openness and an abundance that’s a part of God’s law in his
creation.
There was a very eloquent old country preacher who put it
like this. He said it’s like living life on a spiral. He said if you live life
only interested in yourself--selfishly, closed—you’re gonna end up at that dead
end with no place to go. But if you live your life openly, outwardly,
unselfishly concerned about others, your life will take on the unlimited
dimensions and the beautiful symmetry of that geometric symbol of the spiral.
Beautiful way to picture it. Life pays you back with the attitudes you give it.
Some of you older members here will remember a Baptist
preacher from Florida names C. Roy Angel. He may have preached here at your
church years ago. Preached at our church. He was a great story teller. I
remember him telling about a young boy that grew up next door to a grouchy old
farmer in the rural area. This old man just terrified him, terrorized him. He
chased him off his property if he happened to get over across the line. He
tattled on him if he got into trouble. Told his parents—everything he did made
the little boy despise him. He was the meanest man he had ever met. He just
hated him. He wanted to pay him back for all the bad things that old man had
done. He figured out a plan. He waited until the old farmer next door plowed up
a beautiful piece of land down near the river, ready to be planted. And that
night the little boy took a tow sack full Johnson grass seed and he planted that
field all night long from one fence to the other, back and forth with Johnson
grass. Then waited while his vengeance came up and it did. And he took great
delight year after year, watching that old man fight that Johnson grass. He
would plow the field and it would just spread it and make it worse. He would
burn it and it was just like fertilizer, made it greener. He would, uh, poison
it and that just seemed to make the roots go down and make them harder to dig
out. It was wonderful. He just enjoyed it. And as he grew up he hadn’t paid much
attention to it over the years, but the old farmer had a beautiful daughter. He
began to notice her and he fell in love with her and married her. And he
inherited that piece of land down on the river bottom and he spent the rest of
his life fighting that Johnson grass that he had planted when he was a little
boy. Dr. Angel would tell that story and then he would say, you know what the
Bible says, “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.”
And the Bible says that. And this great secret that the
scriptures give us about the full and meaningful life includes this idea that we
are to follow the example of Jesus and live that life of outgoing, giving,
forgiving, sharing concern for other people in agape love.
Gillard deShard put it like this. He said once, after
mastering the winds and the waves and the tides and gravity, after all the
technological achievements, we will harness for God the energies of love. And
then he said, for the second time in history man will have discovered fire.
Will you bow with me for a moment of prayer. We are going
to pray about this and think about it a little bit before we sing our hymn of
commitment. 1 Corinthians 13 is such an important passage. Psychiatrists and
scientists say that there are toxic emotions that can make you ill. They can
identify psychosomatic illness brought on my jealousy and envy and
self-centeredness and ambition and frustration and rage and 1Corinthians 13
deals with all of that. Love is not jealous. It doesn’t envy, isn’t boastful,
isn’t puffed up or arrogant, doesn’t insist on its own way, not resentful, not
irritable, bears all things. It never ends. If we didn’t have that passage to
tell us about it, our Lord Jesus demonstrated it like no one else has. There is
no one else in all the checkered history of the world in whom agape love
is so perfectly lived out. Jesus loved as no one did before or has since. He’s
the perfect fulfillment of this text. He could have come as a conqueror forcing
us to following him. He didn’t. He could have created us like androids, robots
automatically programmed to respond to him. He didn’t. He created us free and
then he came into the world in the power of agape love reaching out to us
in love and drawing us to him. Loving us so much that he gave his life for us.
Everything we’ve said today could be perfectly illustrated at the cross, the
death of our savior.
If you’re not a believer, I doubt we could do much good
trying to bribe you or persuade you with debate and argument to give your life
to Christ. But when you realize that this perfect, sinless, son of God loved you
and gave his life for you, died in your place, took your punishment, allowed you
to be forgiven and be free, when that happens that kind of love melts your heart
and moves you to receive him—he won’t force his way into your life, but he
knocks at the door of your heart and waits for your response.
We pray that everyone of us in this service will open that
door and let the King of Love come in and let him plant within you this greatest
of the spiritual gifts—agape love. The greatest thing in the world.
Father, not only for your clear words that describe it, but
thank you, Father, for living it before us through your son. We can’t miss that
example. It is so convincing. Now we pray that we may, in turn, learn this
secret, apply it, adopt it, obey your command to love one another and love you
with all our heart, soul, and mind in a complete, open, giving, unselfish way.
In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
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