What the World Needs Now is Love, Sweet Love - Part 1

1 Corinthians 13:4 - Love suffers long and is kind…

Love suffers – Isn’t it fascinating that the very first thing Paul says about love is that it will suffer; it will undergo and experience some form of pain, hurt or hardship. It almost seems as if love must suffer and it must undergo testing, in order for it to be proven to be real love. Love cares and feels deeply; hence it has the potential to suffer. If I do not love someone or care for them, then their hurtful actions towards me, or their negligence of me, could not cause me to suffer. Genuine love is completely exposed and vulnerable. It removes any defences and drops its guard, thus exposing itself to the possibilities of being hurt and suffering pain and damage.

    C. S. Lewis, in his book, The Four Loves, writes something very pertinent regarding this; “…There is no safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable…”.  There is something about love that allows itself to suffer; it never defends itself, but takes each blow as it faithfully absorbs the pain. Paul says earlier to the Corinthians, ‘Why do ye not rather take wrong? why do ye not rather suffer yourselves to be defrauded?’  I believe it is important, because many people live in abusive and boundary-less relationships, that we are clear about what it means to walk in love. While we know that love is so strong that it can stand any kind of treatment, that doesn’t mean that one is supposed to stay in an abusive relationship. Every person needs to allow the Holy Spirit to lead them; there is different guidance from God for different situations.   

Love suffers long – Love suffers, but not just a momentary, fleeting suffering, but it suffers for a long time. It is never tired of waiting, it is never in a hurry, and it will continue to undergo suffering however long is necessary. The reason that love suffers long is that, by nature, it is committed and therefore the thought of quitting on that relationship cannot be considered. Time is irrelevant to love. It is a spiritual strength that causes one to rise above the daily grind of time. The two words suffer and long, are actually one compound word in the original text; macrothumia is the word in the Greek and it is translated longsuffering. We use the word ‘macro’ to describe the big picture. It is a word of perspective. We sometimes say, ‘He can’t see the forest for the trees’, in other words, he is too close to the situation to see it in perspective. He has a micro view and needs to step back and look at it from a distance. That is the word ‘macro’, it means ‘from a distance’. Love has a macro view, it sees the big picture, and it suffers long. When your teenager is struggling with various temptations normal to those years, you, as a parent, have a bigger picture and so, therefore, you can calmly deal with it. The word ‘thumia’ is the word for temper or anger. The opposite of long-tempered is short-tempered and we know how quickly that gets us in trouble. Love is not short-tempered; it doesn’t easily blow a fuse, we might say. Being short-tempered demonstrates that we do not have a big picture and proper perspective of what we are facing. If we respond to our circumstance too quickly we can make matters worse. Proverbs tells us, He that is slow to wrath is of great understanding: but he that is hasty of spirit exalts folly. Expressing love comes easier to those who have developed the skill of understanding another person. Stephen Covey has left us a powerful legacy in his book on the ‘Seven Habits of Highly Effective People’. One of those habits is to ‘seek first to understand, then to be understood’. The macro view enables us to have perspective which, in turn gives us an understanding of the person or situation we are having conflict with. Many years ago I heard the phrase, ‘Understanding is the key to forgiveness’. If we can truly understand how that person could do what they did, then compassion can flow unhindered. I understand how that could happen. Given all the same circumstances and pressures, over time, any one of us could have done that very same thing or worse. Perspective and understanding are linked. Perspective shows how things are connected and how they stand in relation to another. Once you get that bigger picture, understanding occurs.  Understanding engenders sympathy and sympathy releases compassion.

Love suffers long and is kind – Love never draws attention to the fact that it is suffering, it suffers long and it suffers quietly and it is kind through the whole process. To suffer long, in this context, is more than simply to put up with something or someone; the most noble of us can do that. But to suffer for a long time and to be genuinely kind while one is enduring the suffering, this is a supernatural trait. Kindness is a very rare quality in this world of cynical bitterness. Our world is not a kind place; it can actually be quite the opposite. It is one thing to be kind to people who are kind to you, but God’s love is kind even when it is being mistreated and is suffering from the abuse of another. Jesus said that our Heavenly Father is always kind, even to unthankful and evil people. The stark reality is that there is no one who has suffered like God has. He continues to suffer as he endures with silence and with kindness the misunderstanding, the mocking, the insults and the slander of people. Kindness looks past the mistreatment. It looks past the insults and the injury. According to J. B. Phillips, kindness looks for a way of being constructive. Anyone can be destructive. Have you noticed how easy it is to destroy something that may have taken years to build? When we are in the midst of hardships and disputes can we respond calmly and not react quickly? Can we be constructive? Can we be someone who, even while being slandered, misunderstood or misjudged, does not become defensive, or vengeful, but instead looks for an opportunity to solve the relationship trouble and the confusion?  God’s love, as it grows within us and is released through us, causes us to be precisely that type of person, and that type of person is the one whom God and this world will notice; they do shine as lights in the darkness.

Three Necessary Elements of Faith

Mark 11:22-25  And Jesus answered them, "Have faith in God. 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. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. And whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone, so that your Father also who is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses."

    I remember years ago, as I read these words early in the morning, in a flash I saw that there were three necessary and connected elements of faith and they corresponded to verse 23, 24 and 25.

Faith to Remove

    There are some things that need to be removed from our life and, it will take this aspect of faith for progress to be made. The mountain represents anything that stands in the way of the plan of God and is not His will for our lives. A mountain is a large and looming obstacle that blocks sight of anything lying beyond it. We are hemmed in by the mountain and quite often we get used to seeing it and then surrender to the lie that it will always be there and that there is nothing we can do about it. However, in contrast to this way of thinking, Jesus said that we must confront the mountain, face it and speak to it directly. Many times the mountain on the inside may be bigger and more of a challenge than the mountain on the outside. The mountain on the outside represents a gigantic problem. It may be a financial debt or huge need, it may be a sickness or physical limitation, or it could be opposition to a dream that God has put in your heart to accomplish. One thing that we know for sure, the mountain must be removed and in order for that to happen, our attitude has got to change; first we must deal with the mountain of doubt and uncertainty that is on the inside of us. We certainly cannot be mountain-movers if we see ourselves as helpless victims of the circumstances of life. We definitely cannot be mountain-movers if we also constantly blame others for their existence.

    In Jesus’ day if you were considered a ‘mountain-mover’ that meant that you were known as ‘a solver of great difficulties’. It has been pointed out that we are known either for the problems we create or the problems we solve. Solving problems eliminates mountains, creating problems builds them. In the Book of Psalms we are told that the mountains melt like wax at the presence of the Lord; talk about solving or dissolving them; once they melt there is no proof that they even existed.

Faith to Receive

    Not only will we need to face mountains, remove hindrances and solve problems but there are going to be many things that we will need to receive from God and then implement in our lives. These are things that we desire from God and even more so; we require from God. That word translated desire is a Greek word that actually is much stronger than a simple desire; it is a requirement; it is a necessity; we must have it. Like the oxygen in our lungs, it is not an option. Most of our praying is based on a fleeting wish or a vague hope that life could be better; but this kind of prayer that Jesus speaks of springs from an intense desire to fulfil the will of God. We have a destiny and a calling from God; He has designed for us to cooperate with Him in the bringing about of His will and purpose for our lives. He will not overpower us and force His will on us; He wants us to want His will. Jesus teaches us that in order for us to receive what God has promised and about which we have asked, we must believe.

    What is it that we are to believe? We are to believe that we have received the things desired and asked for. We are to believe that the answer has been given and that we now have it on the inside. Again, this strongly infers that, previous to our prayer, we have been walking with the Father and we have been reading the Word of God so that we are intimately acquainted with His will. This kind of faith proceeds from a revelation of security; I know my Father’s heart towards me. We do not doubt what He wants for us. We know the will of our Father because we know the Word of our Father. A minister from a previous century once wrote that faith begins where the will of God is known. If we do not know the will of God, we have not yet begun to ask in faith. First, we must step back and discover the will of God. Settle the question before we ask. So, the other thing that we are to believe is implied; we are to believe that it is the will of God for us to have the thing that we desire. At the beginning of verse twenty-four Jesus says, therefore; because of what I have previously said. It is possible that He is teaching us that because we have been moving mountains and solving problems, we are now able to see more clearly what God desires for us.

    Receiving from God is not passive or automatic; we must be taught how to receive; we must be informed of the laws of reception. In football there is a player who fulfils the position of a Receiver and it is not a passive role. The Receiver must be knowledgeable of the play-book; he must be well-versed in the strategies of the team and then he must actively get in a position to receive. There are many similarities to our walk with God; answers are not automatic; we must situate ourselves so that we are in a place to receive. The old Pentecostals used to say, ‘You gotta get under the spout where the glory comes out’. The Greek word for receive is also translated take; taking is an action on our part. We are to grasp the answer and take it by faith from the hand of God. God’s will to give is subject to His law of reception; it is a transaction between two parties; no giver without a receiver and vice versa.

Faith to Release

    Right on the heels of some of the most amazing statements and promises in the Word of God, Jesus strategically connects the command to forgive. The reality is that we live in a less-than-perfect world and forgiveness will always be necessary for the maintenance of any relationship. Our relationship to God, our marriage to our spouse, our friendships, and any association with others will require the exercise of forgiveness in order for that connection to remain healthy. Life is full of disappointment, hurt, difficulty and offenses and forgiveness is the only effective antidote to their poison.

   To forgive is to let go of whatever we are holding on to or holding against someone. It might be something big or it might be something small; it matters not; Jesus said ‘anything against anybody’. We are not downplaying or making light of the hurt that people have experienced; we have indeed suffered in many ways, however, we are commanded to forgive. If I am holding on to something in my hand and I want to get rid of it, I simply let go. That is basically what forgiveness does; it lets go; it removes its grip and releases control. We have all heard the phrase ‘Let go and let God’ and it certainly applies here. The fact is that forgiveness is not a feeling or emotion per se; it is a choice; it takes a security in God; it takes faith. The day Jesus was crucified he forgave his enemies while painfully hanging from the cross; He released his enemies from their sin, and He released Himself from binding their sin to Himself. A refusal to forgive keeps all parties involved bound to the incident in question. The fact that these words on forgiveness are located where they are it would imply that the biggest hindrance to a robust faith life is an unforgiving spirit.

   Father, teach us and empower us to walk by faith and not by sight! Amen!