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  I AM NOTHING WITHOUT LOVE
  by James Jennings
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Summary: This sermon emphasizes the importance of love as the most
excellent way, highlighting how even with extraordinary spiritual gifts,
lacking love renders one as nothing. The speaker uses hypothetical
individuals to illustrate how lacking love nullifies all other spiritual
accomplishments, urging listeners to pursue love above all else. The
message challenges Christians to self-assess their love towards others
and strive to imitate Christ's sacrificial love in their actions.

Duration: 54:46 Topics: "The Primacy of Love", "Imitating Christ's Love"
Scripture References: 1 Corinthians 13:1, 1 Corinthians 13:4, 1 John 3:14, Romans 12:9, Philippians 1:9, 1 Timothy 1:5

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DESCRIPTION
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This sermon emphasizes the importance of love as the most excellent way,
highlighting how even with extraordinary spiritual gifts, lacking love
renders one as nothing. The speaker uses hypothetical individuals to
illustrate how lacking love nullifies all other spiritual
accomplishments, urging listeners to pursue love above all else. The
message challenges Christians to self-assess their love towards others
and strive to imitate Christ's sacrificial love in their actions.

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CONTENT
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Well, before I have you turn to the passage I'm going to speak out of, I
want to kind of set you up, get your mind thinking. And I'm sure some of
you, as I speak, are going to know where we're going to be. But I want
to start out by describing to you four types of people who could
theoretically be found in an evangelistic church that is zealously using
their spiritual gifts.

And I'm just going to explain to you one aspect of these individuals and
leave out the other side of the story until later. But as I describe
these individuals, you should ask yourself, how truly spiritual are
they? Does it sound like they're truly spiritual? Or do I actually not
have enough information to make a judgment based on what I share? So,
the four people. And I'm not going to say their names right now.

At the end I'm going to mention their names. Their names are found in
our text. You don't know about yet, but we'll see how well you know your
Bibles.

Let's pray. Lord, I thank you for the absolute privilege to be a
Christian this morning. Lord, to actually want to sing those songs and
have any impulse inside to yell, Amen or Hallelujah.

Lord, we're grateful. We do praise Yahweh this morning. And we thank you
that there is a name above every name, that every knee will bow.

And we confess, Lord Jesus, you're altogether lovely. We want to be like
Christ. Father, I pray you'd use this message to help make the saints
and myself more like the Lord Jesus.

Amen. So, four people. Number one.

This person was a preacher. They were so clear when they spoke. Very,
very gifted communicator.

People would say of him, if you looked up the word eloquence in the
dictionary, you would find his name right next to the word eloquence.
And it was not just that he was a gifted communicator, but he often
would speak in tons and actually bring out some revelation and knowledge
that was of great benefit after he interpreted it. The notes his speech
made were distinct and clear.

Like Apollos, it could be said of him, he was an eloquent man. So that's
person number one. That's all I'm going to say about him right now.

Person number two. The second person we have is a church member who at
times they have spontaneously stood up in the meeting. They gave an
exhortation to us that could not have been more timely.

I mean, it hit the spot. It was obvious God had given this man a
prophetic word that even the unbelievers who were in the meeting fell
under conviction when he spoke. Even some of the children who were lost,
their attention was riveted as he spoke.

This brother also had an understanding of all the hard passages in the
Bible. And I mean all the hard passages. There was not one passage he
did not understand.

He had the right view of Romans 7, whatever that right view is. And in 1
Corinthians 15, 29, he exactly knew what it meant to be baptized on
behalf of the dead. Out of the 30 views out there, he had the right one
for that.

He knew what it meant that Christ proclaimed to the spirits in prison.
This person wrote and published a commentary. And this commentary was on
the whole Bible.

And every explanation was right. He plunged all the depths of every hard
text. When it came to pointing out the types and shadows of Christ from
the Old Testament, he brought out insights no one had ever seen.

This is the second person. Third person. This is an older man in the
church.

This man, he has faith like Elijah of old. We even saw his answered
prayer with our own eyes. We were having an outdoor fellowship at the
park, lightning and rain, 100% on the forecast to come.

And this man led us all in prayer. And instantly the clouds went away.
And we knew he had access.

It appeared. He reminded us of Mark 11, 23, which says, Truly I say to
you, whoever says to this mountain, be taken up and thrown into the sea,
and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will
come to pass, it will be done for him. If you wanted someone praying for
you, you wanted this man praying for you.

Number four. Fourth person. The last person was a single sister in the
church.

In view of the present distress, she had determined never to get married
so that she could not have the cares of this world distract her. The
deacon said that she was not just a big giver, but she had actually
given everything away. Then years later, she received a large
inheritance of $16 million from her dad, and you know what she did with
that money? She gave it all away.

Every last penny. As time went on, she went on a brief trip to India to
visit missionaries there. And she and others were actually held hostage.

She was given the opportunity while being a hostage to go free. But
instead she chose to stay that others might go free. And she ended up
being killed and was declared a martyr for the gospel.

Her life was so impactful, great interest arose in the church to write a
biography about her. And someone took up the task to do so. They really
wanted to get a full perspective of every aspect of this sister's life.

Now later we'll look at what they found out about her. Now, don't these
four people sound like those we should imitate and strive to be like?
But I only described one aspect of their life, of their lives. What if
there was an aspect that if I described would entirely undo everything I
just mentioned about them? What if there was one thing lacking that
would make all four of these individuals in God's sight to be nothing?
Nothing at all.

Let's find out. What's my text? Yeah, let's turn there. 1 Corinthians
13.

I obviously want to speak to you this morning on love. Here in this
passage, Paul describes these four theoretical people in the first three
verses. Paul says, If I... If I... So let's look.

1 Corinthians 13. If I, speaking to tons of men and of angels, but have
not love... Interesting. Have not love, I am a noisy, gone, or a
claiming symbol.

That was person number one. Verse two. And if I have prophetic powers
and understand all mysteries and all knowledge... That's person number
two who wrote the commentary.

And if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I
am nothing. That's person number three. Person number four.

Verse three. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to
be burned, but I have not love, I gain nothing. Those are some
incredible statements from Paul.

Incredible statements from Paul. And Paul makes it personal by saying if
I, if this was true of me, imagine all these spiritual gifts were true
in my life. And Paul doesn't say imagine if I had some form of those
gifts.

Notice what he says here. And if I understand all mysteries, all
knowledge, if I have all faith. Paul's not just saying you have some
form.

He's saying you've got it to the max extent you can possibly have it.
And Paul doesn't here divide this up into four individuals. He says what
if I had all of these into one individual, and if that one individual
had all the spiritual gifts to the max extent, but they have not love.

Paul says they're nothing. Nothing. They gain nothing.

They are nothing. It's incredible. This absolutely puts a massive
importance on love.

And let's quickly read verse four. Paul says love is patient. So
obviously he's talking about our love towards others.

Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast. He's describing
it in 15 ways right here.

It's not arrogant or rude. It doesn't insist on its own way. It's not
irritable or resentful.

Love does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love
bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all
things. Love never ends.

Love never ends. So imagine if I had the entire range of spiritual gifts
to their max degree, but have not love. But have not love.

So Paul is telling us emphatically that if there's one person, they have
all the higher gifts to the max degree, but the one characteristic of
love is gone. It's all nothing. It's waste.

It's something to be put out to the curb and collected by the trash
collector. It does not matter. It does not profit.

It's no good. All that appeared to be good, its value is entirely
stripped away. He says in verse 1, I am a noisy gong, or a clanging
cymbal.

Here the person with all this ability to speak and communicate clearly,
people can't hear that individual because of the lack of love. All of
those gifts of tons and all of that, it's not profitable. And then he
says the next hard statement he said right there is that I am nothing.

Wait, the guy with all knowledge, all mysteries who could write a
commentary on all of the difficult passages of the Bible? Isn't that guy
something, Paul? I mean, even if he doesn't have love, isn't there
something to him with all the knowledge? Paul says no. He's nothing.
Just lacking love makes him equal to nothing.

And then he says, verse 3, this person who is so sacrificial, they gain
nothing. They give everything away, including their life, and it
actually gains them absolutely nothing. Now Paul is making these extreme
hypothetical people to drive home a strong point to those at Corinth.

Before this chapter, if you know this letter, Paul has dealt with
multiple issues, all of which in some way have a root of a lack of love
that this church had that led to all sorts of problems. In a way, Paul
has kind of been instructing in different ways, and then he's getting to
chapter 13, and it's like he's finished instructing the child, and he's
giving them a really hard spanking, trying to wake them up. Because he
recognized those at Corinth had an opposing view of who was truly
spiritual.

They didn't actually view true spirituality correctly. They had too much
of an emphasis on the spiritual gifts. Look at chapter 12, verse 31.

Paul says here, we should earnestly desire the higher gifts. He's not
doing away with that. And then he says this, and I will show you still a
more excellent way than these higher gifts.

And it's the way of love. It's the way of love. Love is a big thing.

Love is not a cheap word that we should let the world hijack and take
from us as Christians. If you want to be known as anything, if I want to
be known as anything, I hope people would say, James Jennings, he's
loving. He sacrificially serves others.

He's not about himself. That's how we want to be known. So they had an
imbalanced view.

And you can imagine that happening, right? You have all these spiritual
gifts taking place, and different imbalances can creep in. And love can
lose its proper place. And these people can be too focused on the
spiritual gifts.

But Paul, he finishes chapter 13 and look at the start of chapter 14. He
then tells them, pursue love and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts.
So Paul's not saying, don't desire the spiritual gifts.

Paul's trying to get them balanced again. And so in a similar way,
that's my hope this morning. All of us to some degree are lacking in the
area of Christ-like love and service to other believers.

And we all have our blind spots. And I hope this can help correct some
imbalance with this emphasis of love. And you'll see it as important as
it truly is.

And Paul here is not saying you need the gifts or love. Paul is saying
you need the gifts and love together. That's how they function.

It's through love that these gifts function and you actually build up
those in the church. Right? It's as you use your gift, coupled with
love, that it's really going to be beneficial and helpful for
individuals. So let's first right here, let's think briefly about how
Paul describes love in chapter 13, verse 4 to 7. And honestly, you could
do an entire sermon on every single one of these phrases here.

And so I by no means am going to exhaust this. I'm just going to say a
few things. Now as I describe these things, I'm also going to point out
a few areas prior to chapter 13 where the church at Corinth lacked the
very thing that Paul is mentioning here.

And these are going to be some of the reasons why Paul was led to say
what he did in chapter 13. So let's think of that. The first one right
here.

There's 15 descriptions of love. Verse 4. Paul says love is patient and
kind. This describes how we should respond to people.

How do you respond to people? Do you respond in patience? Kindness? Do
you get frustrated? Love is patient. It's kind. To be kind is to be
long-suffering, slow to anger, slow to punish.

There's so much that could be said just on that one phrase. Love is
patient. Anytime you're not being patient, the issue is you're not being
loving.

You're thinking all about yourself and your timing and your schedule and
you're frustrated that someone else is not meeting the standard that you
have set. Now, after he says love is patient and kind, Paul mentions how
love does not behave towards others. And I'll mention as well, all of
these words here in the Greek language which the New Testament was
written in, they're all verbs.

They're action words. Because love is not just some idea, it's an
action. And Paul here is describing these actions.

So the next thing he says is love does not envy or boast. Love does not
envy or boast. Think about envy.

Envy is when you are discontent because of the qualities of another and
you desire those qualities. You want them for yourself. It's not a godly
jealousy of wanting to be more like Christ.

Envy is painted as something. It's simple. Love does not envy.

And this was happening at the very start of this letter. What were
people saying in chapter 1? I follow Paul. I follow Apollos.

And he goes on to describe this in chapter 3. He says that brought about
jealousy and strife among the brethren. So they were having this envy
about, well, this guy, he preaches the best and I follow him and I
follow this other guy and there's all this division being created
because of envy and jealousy and strife in the church. The next thing
Paul says here in chapter 13, not just does it envy, but it does not
boast.

Love does not praise one's self excessively. How many times have we... I
mean, look, we all enjoy when someone says something encouraging to us
and that's a good thing. The Bible says, let another's lips praise you
and not your own.

But how many times we can subtly seek to praise ourself? That's not
love. You're not thinking of others. You're thinking about yourself.

You get in a conversation with an individual and all they want to talk
about is themselves. And this was happening for those in Corinth. In
chapter 4, it says they were being puffed up in favor of one against
another.

They were being puffed up. They were clearly thinking too excessively
about themselves and they were boasting about themselves. And Paul, he
says to them, who sees anything different in you? Isn't what you have
something you receive from God? And if you've received it from God, why
do you boast as if you did not receive it? So Paul is tearing down this
unloving mindset, this boasting that they were doing in chapter 4. And
he goes on here.

Chapter 13, verse 4, he says, love is not arrogant. What chapter does
Paul tell those at the church, are you not arrogant? Chapter 5. And what
was going on in chapter 5? The church wasn't putting a sexually immoral
man out of the church. And Paul looked at that as arrogant.

They had a log in their own eye. They were leaving a poisonous man in
the church who was corrupting the church. They should have put him out
and they didn't do it.

And clearly here, love burying all things doesn't mean you keep someone
living in sin in the church because it was affecting the whole church.
So Paul says to them, are you not arrogant? Why are you not putting this
man out of the church? So that was going on for those at Corinth. They
thought they were okay as a church with a massive blind spot that they
were unwilling to deal with.

The next thing he says here, he says love is not rude. Rude. Rude.

The idea of that word is love doesn't do something that's shameful.
Right? I mean, when someone actually does something that we consider
rude, you tend to think that was shameful. That conduct, it was
embarrassing, it was shameful.

And this happened as well in 1 Corinthians. The letter. What chapter do
we see something clearly rude taking place in? Something shameful that
other Christians were doing? Okay, 6, yes.

We'll get to 6. Yeah, 11 is what I was thinking about. In 11, you find
them coming together to take the Lord's Supper and they're having a
meal. And what was going on? Some people who had food were going ahead
and eating while others who did not have food were sitting over there
without food being humiliated.

They should have been ashamed. See, if their love was abounding, they
would have went and shared their food with the other people and not just
went on eating while others had none. And Paul says they were despising
the church of God by their actions.

You see, all these situations, they lack love. Not spiritual gifts.
That's not what they were lacking.

So, think of this. Love does not insist on its own way. What a statement
that is.

Love does not insist on its own way. What chapter was that taking place
in? Yeah, 8. Chapter 8, you have people who they did not care about the
weak Christians in the church who had previously been involved in
different cults where meat was sacrificed to idols and they viewed if
you eat that meat as a Christian, you're partaking of this idolatry.
Their conscience was weak.

And stronger Christians who had all knowledge, they came along and they
looked and they thought, well, it doesn't matter if the weaker guy is
bothered by it, I've got a liberty, I'm free to do whatever I do. That's
insisting on their own way. And we see this happen.

There are people, they have a liberty that is absolutely a God-given
liberty, but they don't discern how to exercise that liberty, in that
case, to eat the meat, and they do it around a weaker Christian. And
what does Paul say you're doing to your brother when you do that? You're
destroying him. Is destroying your brother walking in the most excellent
way? No.

That's the strongest statement. The idea of destroy, the idea of
stumble, means to push towards hell. That's the idea.

You're not helping them by doing that. It's not loving to destroy your
own brother. So that was happening in this letter as well.

Christians were insisting on their liberties, and by doing so, were
pushing younger Christians in a horrible direction. Now, what's the next
thing he says here? We're just briefly looking at these 15 descriptions
of love that Paul gives here. Love is not irritable.

Love is not irritable. What a word that is, right? Get irritated. That
irritates me.

How many of us have said that this week? And what we mean is that
provoked me to a point of frustration, to a point of an angry response.
Even if there's no response, it might just be in my heart that I have
sinned with a sinful irritation, an unrighteously angry response. Paul
says love, it's not irritated.

It does not get irritated. Then he goes on and he says love is not
resentful. Resentful.

What does it mean to be resentful? One of the translations could be love
does not count up wrongdoing. It doesn't make a list of wrongs. And
clearly where we see this happening, which was already mentioned, was in
1 Corinthians 6. You have two members go to court to sue one another.

Let's make a practical example here. The Lucianos are my neighbors.
We're both members in the church.

What if David, when he's parking his truck, he crushes my car, it's
damaged, and I decide we can't resolve the problem, no one in the church
can help us resolve the problem, so I'm going to sue the Lucianos and
take them to court. You'd think that's ridiculous. Now I realize, a car,
it's not as big of an issue.

What if it was something far more serious? Paul, you know what he said
to those in chapter 6? What did he say? Why not rather suffer wrong? You
see, what keeps us from suffering being wrong and bearing with it? Well,
resentment. I've got to get payback. I need to do something to get them
back.

I mean, I can't just let them do that to me and do nothing about it,
right? Then that might look like I'm actually loving, and I wouldn't
want them to think that I'm really loving and just going to forgive them
for anything, because then that might enable them to take advantage of
me. Well, you know what Christ got taken advantage of, and He was the
most loving person to ever walk on the face of the earth. Our issue is
not that we get taken advantage of too much.

That's not our problem. So love is not resentful. Why not rather suffer
wrong? And then Paul, he says the next thing, I mean, it does not
rejoice at wrong doing.

Oh, it's horrible when we might rejoice at the failures of others
because it makes us look good. And sometimes it's such a subtle thing.
Something bad happens to someone who you might feel competitive towards
in the spiritual realm, and rather than feel genuine sorrow for them,
you subtly have some type of rejoicing at something wrong that's
happened.

Paul says love, what does it do? It rejoices with the truth. The loving
person rejoices with those who rejoice. Even if it hurts them, they're
going to rejoice with others.

Even if it's a sore spot because of the trials they've gone through in
their own life, they recognize this is the most excellent way. I'm going
to rejoice with those who rejoice. I'm going to rejoice with the truth.

I'm going to think about what's true. And then Paul goes on to say these
phrases. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things,
endures all things.

Bears all things. What is Paul meaning there? The believer does not give
up easily under pressure, but they keep loving. It's very easy to not
want to bear.

This is too hard. This is too difficult. For ten years, I've kind of had
this test with this other Christian in the church.

Do I really need to keep bearing with this for another ten years? Can't
God just sanctify them now and deal with the problem and we get done
with it? No, God might actually allow them to have the blind spot to
keep using it to sanctify you and your own blind spots. Am I going to
keep going and loving under pressure? Believes all things. Obviously, he
doesn't mean believe what is obviously false.

But you know what? As Christians, we've got to assume the best. Rather
than think evil about another, we should see what they do and believe
the best. Again, so much more could be said on all of these.

But love hopes all things. It's often easy to give up in the midst of
our frustrations, but we need a hope for the best. We need a hope for
change.

Love endures all things. Again, love perseveres in the face of those who
are mean to you. What did Christ endure? It says He endured hostility
from sinners.

He endured a lot. The things that we have endured for being a Christian,
it's not that much. We've got to keep going the second mile, the third
mile.

We need to keep pressing on. We need to show love in a miraculous way
that we have in many ways failed. So in every one of these situations
mentioned from the letter leading up to this chapter, if love was
abounding, the problem would be over.

Every one of those situations. If they were living out these 15
descriptions of love in chapter 13, those problems would have been taken
care of if they had these realities. Now, who did this whole list
perfectly? Who's the one man? Jesus Christ.

Yet, Paul doesn't go here like he does in Philippians 2, and he says,
have this mind among you which is in Christ Jesus, right? And let each
of us look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of
others. Have this mind that Christ had. That's what Paul's ultimately
pointing to.

This is us seeking to imitate Jesus Christ. Christ is our example. John
13, verse 34, Jesus says, Love as I have loved you.

He appeals to Himself as the example for how we are to love individuals.
And here, Paul, he says love is superior because love is never going to
end. Even into heaven it will be there.

And he says in verse 13, Now faith, hope, and love abide. Right now here
in this present life of the church, and he says the greatest of these is
love. What he prayed for for the Philippi church in Philippians 1-9, he
prayed that their love would abound more and more with knowledge and all
discernment so that they might approve what is excellent.

You see, you can't approve what is excellent if you're not abounding in
the most excellent way, which is to have these characteristics of love
be at the forefront of how you're living your life. You know, without
love, they who appear to have all have nothing and are nothing. It's
incredible.

Doesn't that feel like an imbalanced statement? Doesn't it feel a little
imbalanced? Someone might feel like saying, but Paul, isn't there some
good from all of those apparent spiritual gifts? And Paul says no. If
there is not a life of love, it's nothing. It's nothing.

Now that obviously brings up this question. Is this person even a
Christian? Are they even saved? Now remember, Paul's not talking about a
liberal person here, right? He's talking about a theoretical, imaginary
person that he's giving as an example to make a statement. If I had all
of this true of me, Paul is saying he would be nothing.

Right? And many, no doubt at Corinth, would have longed to be the person
who had all the spiritual gifts to the max extent. I mean, everyone
would have been saying I follow that man. I follow him.

But that man would have been nothing. How severe of a deficiency is
lacking love for the brethren? Who can think of a text that says it in a
very strong way? 1 John 3.14 We know that we've passed from death into
life because we manifest all these spiritual gifts? No. Because we walk
in purity? No.

Because we love the brethren. John gives one test of assurance that we
know we're a Christian is that we love the brothers. We love our fellow
Christians.

And he says whoever does not love abides in death. So John is saying if
you don't love others, you're lost. If you don't love others, you're
lost.

It doesn't matter what manifestations of the Spirit are going on in your
life. And you might say, well, a lost person doesn't have the Spirit.
How are they going to have a manifestation of the Spirit? Well, remember
Jesus' words in Matthew 7.21 On that day, many will say to Me, Lord,
Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name? Their prophecy is did we not
cast out demons in Your name? And do many mighty works in Your name?
That sounds like all faith.

See, mountains moved. And what does Jesus say to those people? He
declares to them, I never knew you. Depart from Me, you workers of
lawlessness.

So these people apparently did supernatural things, and yet they were
devoid of the love of God in their hearts. So obviously, if you live a
life without love, the person is not a true Christian in the sense that
they're literally absolutely nothing in the sight of God. You can really
appear to have a lot going on in the spiritual realm and be nothing and
be lost.

And we've had that come through the church. We've had people come here
who they believed they had all sorts of words from God. They thought
they were spiritual.

And it became to nothing. They could not love the brethren. They had
such pride and arrogance, refused correction.

So, mighty works are not a sign you have the Holy Spirit. I think that's
pretty obvious. But Christian love is.

Isn't that amazing? That's usually not what people are going to say. And
Christian love is rooted in knowing Christ. You know what Paul says at
the end of this letter? If you're on chapter 13, just flip to chapter
16.

Paul says in verse 22, if anyone has no love for the Lord, that's the
Lord Jesus, let him be accursed. You see, love for Christ is going to
lead me to love the brethren. It's going to lead me to love as Christ
has loved.

1 John says we love because He first loved us. Jesus says in John 14-15,
He says, if you love Me, you will keep My commandments. And Paul says in
2 Corinthians 5, the love of Christ controlled him.

He no longer lived for himself, but he lived for Christ. So are some of
those prophesying at Corinth lost? Yes. But I want to mention another
person.

This is the person that we can fall into at times, Christian. Think of
what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 3. He talked about a picture of judgment
day and some of what the Christian has done being burned up as wood,
hay, and stubble. That sounds like you gained nothing, right? You get to
the judgment bar and you think a certain work in your life as a
Christian was going to be worth something, and then you find out what?
It burns up.

It didn't really have. It wasn't gold, it wasn't silver. It burns up.

And Paul's not saying that the person's lost. They are still saved. They
are a true Christian.

They do have good works. But there were specific works in their life
that because they did them devoid of love to God and love to man, that
work was worth nothing. Nothing.

What they did was just a selfish act that was all about themselves and
it burns up. It's wood, hay, and stubble on that final great day. And
brethren, that is so sobering.

Because like Paul said, we can't ultimately say we're truly acquitted
when we look to judge ourselves. We can say I don't know of anything
against myself. But there are things that I've done in my life that I
imagine will burn up on that great day that I do not recognize at this
point in my Christian life.

That I did not really see how much self was involved in what I did. And
come that day, it's going to end up being absolutely nothing. But
obviously the true Christian, they have works.

He's saved us for works that He's prepared beforehand that we should
walk in them. But there are certain actions, specific works, that will
prove to be nothing because they were done devoid of love. So, what does
a strong passage like this do for you, the Christian? Paul's making this
extreme example of one person having the max extent of all the spiritual
gifts.

And he says they're nothing, they gain nothing, they're noisy gone when
they speak, it's just all hollow sound. You cannot hear what they're
saying despite all the gift because they lack love. What does that do to
a Christian to hear Paul speak like that? What does it do to you? You
know what it does to me? It makes me want to have more love.

Right? It makes me say I have deficiencies and I am not content. I want
to press on to higher ground. I want to be more loving.

I want my love to abound more and more. I'm sick of selfishness. I'm
sick of despising certain Christians for specific things.

I'm tired of being too critical for certain individuals when it's
unjustified. I want to be kinder. I want to have more patience.

I want to have a sinless car ride as I go to Missouri with my family and
not be frustrated in a carnal way. I want to love like Christ loved.
That's what this does to the true Christian.

The lost person who's truly nothing, they hear all of this and they
don't ultimately care. Because they just want to clean on to all of
these gifts and all of this supposed thing where they're getting their
praise before man in this life. The Christian, they say, yes, I want to
be a more loving Paul.

I don't want to be nothing. And those with gifts, they recognize, you
know what, my gift is pretty pathetic and unimportant if I fell in this
one area. And it gets you right back in balance.

In balance. In balance, not imbalance. Because again, does Paul drive us
from the ditch on the right side of the road onto the road into the
ditch on the left side of the road? No.

He gets us back in the middle. And he ends and he says, you pursue love
and you desire earnestly the spiritual gifts. Paul's not saying do away
with these things.

So, Paul desires love be the way in which the gifts function. We don't
pick between the two. Rather, we use our gifts in love.

So let's relook briefly at these four people that I mentioned at the
beginning of my message. The first preacher's name, his name is Noisy
Gone. Though this person had the gift of tons, he gave distinct notes,
people knew what was being played, yet because of his lack of love, the
people could not sit in the concert hall and listen.

Everyone left. It is as if the entire orchestra was people smashing a
noisy gone or a claiming cymbal. And as many people who've preached on
this text have done, if they have a band, a drum set up here, they will
go and they will smash the cymbals.

And as someone said initially, it's funny, right? Everyone kind of
laughs. But then you keep smashing it and people don't think it's funny
anymore, right? They're thinking my ears hurt. Can you please stop that?
And then if you don't stop, if I don't stop it, I'll clear this building
out pretty quickly.

If you don't have love, that's what happens. The second person's name
was Know-It-All. You bought his commentary.

You began to read it. Yet one Sunday, you witnessed his rudeness towards
someone. And it troubled you.

You later came to find out that many people sought to address him on his
harshness, and he defended himself and showed no humility, full of
pride. All of a sudden, his commentary that was like none ever written
is unreadable to you. Know-It-All was always quarreling.

He wasn't kind to anyone. He's correcting his opponents with harshness.
Yet now you view him and all of his insights as nothing and would rather
hear an unlearned man speak who manifested the love of Christ.

Third person. Their name was All-Faith. He kept seeing answers to prayer
again and again.

He got praise before men for this. His name spread among the churches as
the big prayer warrior. Then in our church, someone else had a major
breakthrough on a specific matter of prayer.

And when that member was honored about the answered prayer and people
thanked God in the assembly, All-Faith did not rejoice together. He did
the opposite. He wanted wrongdoing to happen to them.

He tried to make it look like they already knew it was going to be
answered anyways. It was a setup. He hoped they would leave the church.

He envied them. Because now they were becoming known as a person whom
God hears. The fourth person.

And then there's the fourth. Her name was entirely sacrificial. Remember
her? Someone was looking into doing a biography on her.

Wonder what they found. As they began to interview people, it shockingly
kept coming up again and again that she was irritable and always
insisting on her own way. She burned bridge after bridge.

But here she had apparently died a martyr. Apparently died a martyr. I
mean, 1 John 3.16 says, By this we know love that He laid down His life
for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.

Well, didn't she lay down her life? Isn't that what love does? Yet her
whole life was not one of genuine love. It was a religious zeal and
selfishness motivating her every act. Like Ananias and Sapphira, her
motives were all about self and being sane before men.

The biographer, he couldn't publish the book, and on his draft he
changed the title to entirely sacrificial was entirely nothing at all.
So those are shocking ends to these theoretical people. And Paul says,
If I, and we should do that, right? We should have a self-assessment.

If you have all these powers and do all these things and lack love, you
are nothing. What am I? What are you? Paul says if you're like that, I
would be nothing. What are you? What am I? You know what Paul says in 1
Corinthians 15? He says, By the grace of God, I am what I am.

And that's where we come back to time and time again. By the grace of
God, we are what we are. And it's because of the grace of God that we
should expect Him to enable us to grow in this area of love.

That's why Paul prayed for those at Philippi that their love would
abound more and more. He prayed that in faith that it would be answered.
You pray for your love to abound, God will give you opportunities to
show patience and kindness and not insisting on your own way.

Romans 12 v. 9 It says love must be genuine or without hypocrisy. You
can have a supposed love that is hypocritical and not genuine. Paul says
you can give yourself to be burned and it all be fake.

1 Timothy 1 v. 5 says, the aim of our charge is love that issues from a
pure heart, a good conscience, a sincere faith. We're being sincere in
what we do. See, love is a big deal.

This passion should cause you to do, as Paul says at the end in 14.1, it
should cause you to pursue love in big ways, in small ways. I don't even
need to mention, there are some small ways right now in this pandemic
that could be a way for you to love the brethren. Figure that out.

What is something I could do to love the brethren? Paul says love is
more excellent. Paul says it's the greatest. Do you say that? When you
think about love, do you say, man, that's the greatest.

I want more love. Boy, that's the most excellent way. I want to be on
that path.

Here, an example. Well, before I get this example, let me just mention
this, and I already quoted this, but Philippians 1. Was the church at
Philippi a missions-minded church? Yes. Paul says they had been laboring
together in the Gospel from the first day until now.

And yet, isn't it amazing what Paul prayed for them? This missions
church that had been supporting him since the beginning, and Paul prays,
it's my prayer that your love would abound more and more. That's what
Paul wanted. With knowledge and discernment, but love, it was the big
thing.

It was the big thing there. So let me give an example. This is from
Robert Chapman's biography.

Robert Chapman was known as the Apostle of Love. That's the name on the
front of the biography. This is an example of love.

Chapman would go and street preach. He says this. Someone wrote this.

Some people were greatly offended by his plain preaching on sin and the
need for repentance. A touching story is told of his love and concern
for one of those critics. A grocer in Barnstaple became so upset when
Chapman was preaching in the open air that he strode up to where Chapman
was standing and he spit on him.

Later, one of Robert Chapman's wealthy relatives came to Barnstaple to
visit him and to try to understand his activities. Arriving by a horse-
drawn cab at the address given to him, the relative at first would not
believe that Chapman lived in such a simple abode in such a poor
neighborhood. Chapman ushered him into the clean but simple interior and
explained what living dependence on the Lord meant and how the Lord had
provided for all his needs.

The relative asked, Can I purchase groceries for you? Chapman gladly
assented, but stipulated that he must buy food from a certain grocer.
What grocer do you think that is? The man who spit on him. The relative
went there, made a large purchase, and paid the bill.

When the grocer learned that the food was to be delivered to R.C.
Chapman, he said that the visitor must have come to the wrong shop.
Chapman's relative, however, replied that Chapman himself had
specifically directed him to that shop. The grocer, who had viciously
attacked and castigated Chapman for years, broke down in tears.

Soon he came to Chapman's house, asked forgiveness, and yielded his life
to Christ. You see, that's what love does. Was it his prophesying and
gift of tons and all his knowledge? Is that what broke the man down? No.

Do we desire earnestly the spiritual gifts? Yes. But what's excellent is
love. The greatest of these is love.

Love. We need to view love as excellent as it actually is and truly
spiritual as it is. If we were picking spiritual teams in Paul's day, so
to speak, and I know that would be wrong in and of itself to be picking
teams, so maybe that's a bad example, but to get into your mind, who
would you pick? Right? We line everyone up.

And you've got the four people I mentioned. You've got Noisy Gone.
Obviously, his name back then was a really eloquent preacher.

Then you've got All Faith, and you've got Entirely Sacrificial. Who
would you pick? And then you've got the little person over there who you
can't really discern what spiritual gift they have. But man, you know
they're loving.

You've seen their patience with you in incredible ways. Who would you
pick on your team? You know who Paul would pick? The little person.
Because he says the other people, if they don't have love, they're
nothing.

Do we view true spirituality as it is? How discerning are you in regards
to that? Brethren, love is superior to all extraordinary gifts. If one
person had all the gifts to their max extent, but they lacked love,
they're nothing. It's incredible.

Love is an ingredient. You do not want to lack that. If you do, you're
not ultimately a Christian if that's the character of your whole life.

For us true Christians, we fail at times. But the true Christian, they
get up. They keep on going.

They want to love more. They want to be more like the Savior. They clear
their conscience.

They call that person they sinned against and say, will you forgive me?
That was harsh of me to say what I said or that was unloving of me to do
what I do. So I hope this message does what Hebrews 10 and other places
tell us to do. To stir up one another to love and good works.

I hope this stirs you up to love. Because that's what you and I need
more of. And if you don't think you need more of it, then you first need
more humility.

Alright, let's pray. Father, we thank You for Your Word and even the
Apostle Paul, Lord, we're so thankful to have these different letters as
he deals with different churches and deals with different problems.
Father, I pray that we would see more spiritual gifts genuinely taking
place in our day.

Lord, even though these things, we don't claim that they're normative as
they were in Acts, but Lord, we do desire greater manifestations of Your
power that are genuine. But Lord, more than that, we desire what is most
excellent and that is more love. And so Lord, I pray that our love would
abound more and more.

That our kindness and patience and not insisting on our own way,
rejoicing with the truth, Lord, help us not be envious or rude or
arrogant. Lord, take pride away. Lord, help us to love more.

Lord, help us to excel in this. Help us to pursue it, to go after it, to
hunt it down, to look for opportunities. Lord, I pray that You would
stir up the brethren, that You would stir up my own heart to love in a
greater way.

Lord, supernaturally stir up our hearts to make us more like the Lord
Jesus Christ. We thank You for His example and we want to imitate Him.
And so we ask for Your power to do that.

In Jesus' name, Amen. Okay, we are dismissed.

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Video: https://sermonindex2.b-cdn.net/Ee5g6_2-fT8.mp4
Source: https://sermonindex.net/speakers/james-jennings/i-am-nothing-without-love/
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