Love for Real - Part 2

Turn with me to Romans chapter twelve. Romans twelve. While you turn there,

I'll just I'll just remind you this is part two, part two of

our time in the second two thirds of Romans chapter twelve. Last week we

looked at love for Real Part one, and the way we started it was

if if we wanted to learn to how to do something like we want to

learn how to love better. We want to learn genuine, real love for

God and love for others. But if we wanted to learn something like I

don't know how to make a lasagna or fix a lawnmower, we would go

to YouTube and we would study there, and we would break down the action

that is demonstrated there. We would want to see the elements of the action.

Show me, step by step, element by element, what all is

involved in making a lasagna or whatever. And that's kind of what we get

in Romes twelve. What we get is Paul, after giving us eleven chapters

of theological understanding, he pivots in twelve and gets really, really practical.

He says, based on the mercies of God, because Jesus has died to

include you in the people of God, give yourself entirely to God and renew

your thinking. And it's going to look like this. And one of the

things that's going to look like is genuine love. And genuine love gets broken

out into all of these constituent parts. Last week we just saw a simple

list eight items from verses nine through thirteen. This week very similar, a

simple list, simple breakdown of our YouTube video so to speak of what it

looks like to genuinely love. However, here at the end, Paul zooms

in on a particular aspect of genuine love. He zooms in slows down,

so we can look very carefully at this aspect of love that is probably most

associated with Jesus Christ, and that is loving those who do us wrong.

Genuine love should be the obsessive study of our lives. And I know for

you, like for me, the flesh will tempt us to instead of love,

neglect instead of love, to act in selfishness instead of love, to

be prideful, or to exact a fleshly sense of justice instead of love.

Let's read it Romans twelve. I'll start in verse nine for context sake that

our text this morning starts in fourteen. Let love be genuine. That's the

imperative that starts this whole thing. Everything after this are just participles and infinitives,

just elements of the action. Just to break down to the constituent parts.

Abhore what is evil, hold fast to what is good. Love one

another with brotherly affection. Out do one another in showing honor. Don't be

slothful and zeal 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. Bless those who persecute you.

Bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice. Weep with

those who weep. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be haughty,

but associate with the lowly. Never be wise in your own sight.

Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable

in the sight of all, if possible, so far as it depends on

you, live peaceably with all beloved. Never avenge yourselves, but leave it

to the wrath of God. For it has written vengeance is mine I will

repay, says the Lord. To the contrary. If your enemy is hungry,

feed him if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. For

by so doing you will heap burning coals on his head. Do not be

overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. So my aim this morning,

as it was last week, is that we would have such a clear

picture, clearer than ever before, of what it looks like to genuinely love

God and love others. And so with that clear picture in faith, by

the power of the Holy Spirit, we would make big strides right away in

genuine love. Wouldn't that be amazing to just go from here making big strides

to genuine love, even loving those who wrong us. So what does love

look like? Well, right away Paul sets us up for the slow motion

zoom in that he's gonna do at the end, and he just gets started

with this. Bless those who persecute you. Bless and do not curse as

verse fourteen. Verse fourteen, Bless those who persecute you, Bless them.

What does that mean? To desire good for them and to even ask God

to provide good things for those who persecute you. It's reminiscent of what Jesus

taught. It's recorded in Matthews recorded in Luke Pray for your enemies. It's

the opposite of spiritual neglect. Love your enemies, opposite of hate, do

good to them, opposite of harm. Bless them. I mean, that's

that's gonna take the Holy Spirit, that is gonna take the character of Christ,

if we're gonna truly take this seriously. Furthermore, furthermore, we have

here in this passage itself, this abhor what is evil. Hate evil,

Love your enemies, so we are called it is biblical for us to hate

what is evil, but to bless those who do it, not bless us

in affirm or applaud or say hey, that's great, but rather to pray

for them. So it is right for us to hate. Sexual perversion.

Is right for us to hate the pressuring to accept an applaud sexual perversion,

the pressuring that even sometimes becomes a persecution, the pressuring that happens in politics

and advertising and society and schools that will probably become even more persecution. It's

biblical that we would abhor what is evil and hate that stuff, both the

perversion and the persecution. And then here is your Lord's command as well,

Bless those who persecute you. Don't curse them as if it wasn't going to

take enough Holy spirit power just to bless my enemies. I have to discern

with wisdom and spiritual insight how to hate what is evil and yet bless and

pray for those who do it. Jesus help me, and he will,

because He's the one who gave us these instructions. Love your enemies, pray

for them, do good to them, Bless them. He will would if

we would step out in the obedience of faith. But sometimes I think we

have so much Christian passion to stand on the right side of issues that we

missed the Christian compassion that we're commanded to show to the people on the wrong

side of issues. And if we miss that, If we miss them,

then will more resemble Saul the Pharisee in his zeal against Christ. Then we

will resemble Paul the Apostle in his zeal for Christ, because zeal for Christ

results in real love, not just right stances. We'll come back to this.

It's okay, We'll do some easier ones, and then Paul's going to

bring us up back around at this. So we're all ready, let's move

to what else does real love look like? It looks like rejoicing and weeping

together, rejoicing and weeping together. Verse fifteen says this, rejoice with those

who rejoice, weep with those who weep. What I love about this is

it's simple. What a simple way to love. Be with people and feel

with them. Be with people and feel with them. If they are rejoicing,

be with them and rejoice. If they are weeping, be with them

and weep. It is a simple expression of love and ministry. We can

all wrap heads around that, like, can we make a step? Can

we make a simple step of genuine love today? Yeah? Yes, with

a commitment to be with people and feeling with them. But let me just

warn you. Simple ain't easy. This takes energy, This takes capacity,

like prayer. So I want to challenge us. I want to challenge us

just to expand our capacity to be with one another and feel with one another.

You know, if you're a part of this church community, if you're

a part of this congregation, you know how well this family does at being

with and feeling with one another. It's beautiful. Can you imagine what it

would be like if that was to triple? What it would be like to

be a part of a community that loves one another in just such a simple

way as this, as to be with and feel with. And I would

say this as we endeavor in this way. As we endeavor in this way,

let me encourage you to be joinable, be with able. People can't

weep with you if they don't know what's going on. I'm not saying you

have to share everything with everybody, not that. But don't rob all of

your brothers and sisters from the opportunity to obey this command and take a step

of obedient genuine love to just be with you and cry. They need it,

you need it. Let's learn to rejoice and to weep with one another.

And let's learn also to live in harmony. Live in harmony. Here's

another element of the action. As we look at how Paul describes what genuine

love breaks down into, part of it is living in harmony. Verse sixteen

says, live in harmony with one another. Other translations might put it this

way, be of like mind or have unity. I like the word picture

of harmony because in harmony, you're not all singing in the same note.

You're singing notes that fit together. Right, And Paul has just finished saying,

we're not all the same. We're different, we're different body parts,

we have different functions, but we fit together as one, we operate together.

We're not the same. Unity and uniformity aren't the same. In fact,

there's a kind of unity you can't have if you're uniform. The unity

of collective functioning together as a body is impossible if you're all eyeballs. You

can't have harmony if you're all singing the same note. But what it does

mean is that we strive for a wee way of things more than a me

way of things. We work and asking ourselves, how can I adjust so

that we can walk together? How can I accommodate so that we can work

together? How can I give up some of my preferences so that we can

have harmony as a body. That's real love. That's real love. Someone

who isn't interested in loving isn't interested in giving up their preferences. Someone who

is interested in loving is asking how they can give up their preferences in order

to live in harmony. Here's what else it means. If we're going to

live in real love, we won't be haughty. Real love isn't haughty,

says in verse sixteen, Do not be houghty, but associate with the lowly.

There's a little bit of debate whether that's lowly people right, like associate

with lowly people or do lowly tasks? Right? What's what's meant by lowly

there? And in practical terms, I'm not sure that it matters is a

lot because the haughty. The haughty is only interested in hanging out with people

who think who they think are going to make them look better. And the

haughty are only interested in doing those things that they think make them look important

or valuable. But those who are pursuing real love, they'll hang out with

anybody, and they will roll up their sleeves and do whatever is needed.

Real love is not haughty, and real love is not wise in its own

eyes. Real love is not wise in its own eyes. Don't be wise

in your own eyes? So what verse sixteen says, never be wise in

your own sight? This is an aspect of love. This is an aspect

of love. The best illustration I have regarding being wise in your own eyes

came from Seamus Drake. He said, yeah, you know what the technical

breakdown of the word idiot means. It's one who can only see their own

point of view. All they have is what's in between these two ears,

their own ears. This is what they have. They have their own mind

and nothing else. They have their own viewpoint and nothing else. They believe

their own skill set and their own experience will provide everything that they need.

They are literally an idiot. Wise in their own eyes, they have nothing

they need to gain from the input of others. Now, this means that

if such a person is blind about something, they can't see something, they're

truly lost because they can't see it and they won't hear it. That's the

fatal flaw. That is the fatal flaw. You can't see it and you

won't hear it. Now, all of us have blind spots. There are

all kinds of things that each one of us can't really see about ourselves.

One person says, you know, your nose is this close to your mouth,

and you're the one who doesn't know that your breath stinks. And that's

just being a person. That's just the way it is. You got blind

spots. We all have blind spots. There are things we can't see,

But will we hear it? That's the question. Please tell me you know,

hey, hey, honey, She's like yeah, here's some gum.

Thank you, thank thank you for being there for me. But the idiot,

the idiot won't hear it. The wise people I know listen to the

wise The wise people I know listen wisely. Listening wisely means you don't just

listen undiscerningly, like just whatever you have to say, I'm gonna just take

it at face value. That no consider think of it like a judge.

A judge doesn't think he has all the answers. A judge asks the lawyers

on both sides, Hey, explain to me the evidence as you see it.

Explain to me the law as you see it. How are you thinking

about this case? And you explain to me the evidence as you see it,

and the law and the way you're thinking about this. And I want

to understand, and I want to ask you questions. Maybe I'll poke some

holes, maybe I want to get into your mind and evaluate. I want

to understand. This is how a wise person conducts themselves. The foolish person

listens as little as possible. They don't ask anybody or or And I learned

of this recently. This is the church person's version of being a fool The

church person's view church person's method of being a fool because they know that supposed

to ask for advice and counsel. They make up their mind of what it

is they want, and then they go ask as many people as they can

what they think until they find somebody who agrees with them, and that's what

they're going with. They got cover. Now, I learned that one the

beginning of wisdom is this, you know what. The beginning of wisdom is

seek wisdom. The beginning of wisdom is seek wisdom and the fear of the

Lord. Yeah, it's actually it's both, and it is presented to us

both that way in scriptures. The beginning of wisdom is this fear of the

Lord and seek wisdom. Seek wisdom, which often means questioning your own thinking.

It doesn't mean you can't come to a conclusion, It doesn't mean you

can't make a decision. But it does mean that you regularly ask yourself,

especially when you want something really badly, you regularly ask yourself, especially when

you're angry, or especially when you're afraid. You regularly ask yourself. Am

I being a literal idiot? Am I just going with what's in between these

two ears? That's actually part of really learning how to love. It's a

part of learning to love. Now, I wonder if you've noticed that all

of these aspects of genuine love feel somewhat vulnerable. Let's just walk back up

the passage. Consider. You don't just listen to yourself. You open yourself

up vulnerably to the input of others. You don't think highly of yourself.

You vulnerably open up yourself to us to go low. You strive for unity,

and you vulnerably open up yourself to give away your preferences so that you

can live in harmony. You open yourself to feel with others. All of

it is vulnerable, but especially this that you would bless those who persecute you.

That's quite vulnerable. And so Paul returns to the concept. He slows

down, and he focuses in. And so we will too. We'll go

right back. What about those who wrong us? First of all, the

Bible says in verse seventeen, repay no one evil for evil, but give

thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. In other words,

it's never right to do wrong, or to put it in another way.

If you're wrong in the way that you're right you're wrong. Even if

you're right, it's never right to do wrong. It's never right to retaliate

with evil. And even unbelievers can see that. It's that it's as honorable

that you would refuse to retaliate against evil by fighting fire with fire. They

can see that that's honorable. But then he moves on and he says this

also, live as peaceable as possible Verse eighteen, If possible, so far

as it depends on you, live peaceably with all. I love that parenthetical,

as far as it's possible, if it's possible, Comma, so far

as it depends on you. Comma so realistic. Right, some people just

want to fight, don't be one, But sometimes you will come across them,

and as far as it depends on you, you will live peaceably with

all. But sometimes there's nothing you can do about it. Or sometimes there

is a time where you have to stand up against injustice and maybe even bring

other people into it, and there's no living peaceably with this. And this

is especially where I would want to communicate to anyone who's in an abusive relationship.

Don't let an abuser take these verses in this paragraph and manipulate them to

cause you to feel like you have to stay in harms way. He stand

up, call it out, get other people involved, do it in a

God honoring way. But don't let an evildoer manipulate God's word. Here's the

thing. Here's the thing. Remember, God handles justice. God handles justice.

Verse nineteen says, beloved, never avenge yourselves, but leave it to

the wrath of God, for it is written vengeance is mine. I will

repay, says the Lord. You don't have to repay. God is in

the payment business. Paul's quoting Deuteronomy, where God has said that he is

going to bring discipline against his people, and he's going to use other nations

to do it. But but I will repay. I am in the payment

business. My people don't need to take justice into their own hands and seek

vengeance. I am in the payment business. And when someone wrongs you,

it is one of the strongest temptations the flesh will ever feel to just dish

out justice the way you see it. If you're going to have the strength

to resist that temptation, it's going to come from remembering that God is in

the payment business. He takes it even further. He says in verse twenty.

To the contrary, if your enemy is hungry, feed him. If

he's thirsty, give him something to drink. For by so doing you will

heep burning coals on his head. By so he commands not only this,

don't take vengeance, but also do good, and that by doing good,

you'll heep burning coals on his head. What's that? This is a phrase.

It's a phrase to indicate the judgment of God. That phrases used elsewhere

in other religious texts about this time. In that way, here's a quote

from one of them. God will burn coals of fire on the head of

everyone who says I have not sinned before God and his glory. That's not

a biblical text, that's another religious text. But nonetheless, what we see

is that that phrase was commonly used in terms of just discussing the judgment of

God. That's what Paul is saying is the starkness and the clarity of the

judgment the evil doer deserves will stand out in all the greater contrast because of

the good that you show them. The judgment will be clear, the judgment

will be deserved beyond a shadow of a doubt, and in fact, they

may see it ahead of time and be convicted and repent. Either evil will

be overcome through repentance or evil will be overcome through God's judgment. But either

way, our place is to do good and His place is to judge,

and we ought to reverse that. God, you just keep doing good.

I'm gonna judge as if we have the wisdom. And so Paul says,

don't repay evil with evil because God is in the payment business. Instead,

do good because God is in the payment business. And if we take it

into our hands instead of entrusting it to the one who judges justly, we

will be in danger of being overcome by evil. Being overcome by evil.

You have to understand being overcome by evil is not suffering harm. Being overcome

by evil is not sort of losing the day. Being overcome by evil means

letting the evil done to you cause you to turn to evil, vengeance,

cursing. As one person said, he who fights with monsters should take care

that he not thereby become a monster. It's pretty important, especially in our

day of outrage, as slights and persecutions, real and imagined tempt us to

just fight fire with fire and completely forget that God, our God, the

ancient of days, is in the payment business, and we can leave it

to him. This is exactly what our Lord did. He entrusted himself to

the one who judges justly, and so he was not overcome by evil.

He died at the hands of evil doers. He was crucified at the hands

of evil doers. But that's not what it means to be overcome by evil.

In fact, it was in that work of entrusting himself to the one

who judges justly, that he overcame evil with good. He let his life

be payment for all who would repent and believe in him, and the judgment

for those who would not. Became all the starker and all the clearer because

of the grace that could have been theirs, brothers and sisters. It is

not fitting that we, who have had payment made for us, and who

have seen what judgment from God looks like on the cross, to forget that

God is in the payment business. How could we forget that? It may

seem vulnerable, But by faith, by the power of the Spirit, by

the character of Christ, we can refuse the fleshiest temptation to repay evil with

evil. We can open ourselves to the council of others and not be wise

in our own eyes. We can learn to love by getting low instead of

thinking of ourselves highly. We can learn to set aside our preferences and walk

in harmony. We can open ourselves to being with and feeling with others,

weeping with them, rejoicing with them. We can grow in living to learn,

learning to live in real love. We can learn how to love,

and I pray that we will