"Do You Know How To Love?"

I love that song by the Civil Wars, “Poison and Wine.” “I don’t love you but I always will… Your mouth is poison, your mouth is wine… your hands can heal, your hands can bruise.” It’s an accurate picture of complicated relationships where we love someone but we also hurt them—with our words and how we treat them. Most relationships are complicated at least part of the time.

One time I went to lunch with a group of people but I didn’t really want to. It’s a job hazard. Ha. All the way there I was thinking, “Okay, I’m gonna just make this the best lunch they’ve ever had! I’m gonna delight in them, ask them questions, be interested in their answers, ask more questions, laugh and smile—I’m gonna treat them like they’re the most interesting people in the world, like they’re a guest on the Tonight Show and I’m Jimmy Fallon!”

It’s good to have goals, right?

So, I get there and they’re already seated and complaining about stuff. Not big stuff, just the usual things. I think, “I can turn this around, I’ll find some clever way to ask a question and lead the discussion in a positive direction.” And I tried. Several attempts later, “Well, that didn’t work—try something else. I’ll just take control of the conversation and tell a funny story about something that happened to me recently.” I tell the story, someone remarks on a negative aspect of the story that reminds them about something boring and terrible that happened to them. Their story is not funny but at least it does take them a really long time to tell it. I continue to try and find ways to turn the conversation into something that doesn’t make me want to shove screwdrivers into my eyes and ears—but they’re more committed to bumming me out than I am to cheering them up—so I give up and eat all the bread. Just sit there thinking about how my appreciation for Jimmy Fallon has never been higher. I couldn’t do it. I tried so hard.

Anything like that ever happen to you?

I was at lunch with my wife and daughter the other day, Von was telling us a complicated story about a conversation she had with a friend, and my wife asked a question showing that she had misunderstood who Von had been talking about. It really wasn’t a big deal but I blurted out, “Really?” Even as it came out of my mouth I wished I could grab it and stick it back in there—unsay it. Delete! Command Z. But no, it was too late, I saw it in her eyes. I had let Frank the Jerk basically call her stupid. Very uncool. Completely unwarranted, too. Kim wasn’t sure who Von meant by “she” in a story where she wasn’t using any proper nouns and she confused she with she, losing track of which she, she referred to in the story she was telling. Sheesh.

“Really?” So dumb. 

But when things like this happen, what you do next is what separates the men from the boys—immature babies from mature Christians. You have a choice. Do you ignore it? Let it grow into resentment? Do you dig in your heels? Blame someone else? Get upset because they’re getting upset? Make it even worse?

But I didn’t do any of those things THIS time. I apologized. Immediately. Admitted that it was a dumb thing for me to say and that I was sorry. Kim accepted the apology—the whole bump in the road lasted about five seconds. I hurt her feelings, noticed it, apologized, was forgiven, and we were back trying to decipher our daughter’s antecedents in no time at all. 

Well, ‘tis the season for these kinds of things. The holidays are upon us. Maybe you got a jump start on super awkward conversation time over turkey and dressing on Thursday. Maybe you had high hopes for a peaceful meal with loved ones until a few disappointments left you feeling grumpy and shoving dinner rolls into your mouth before you said something else you were going to regret. Or maybe other people were fantasizing about shoving something into your mouth to shut you up.

This is the last Sunday in November, the month of Thanksgiving, so I thought we’d have a little one-off message about the thing most of us would say we are the most thankful for—the people we love. Especially the ones who love us back.

We talk about Law and Gospel a lot around here. The Law is what God expects us to do, His commandments, His wisdom. The Gospel is everything He does for us, especially through Jesus.

So, what about Love? Is it Law or Gospel?

“For God so loved the world He gave us His one and only Son to save us.” That’s the Gospel, right?

“Love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength”—that’s the greatest commandment. And the second is just as important, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” So, Jesus says love is the whole point of The Law.

Which is it? Law or Gospel?

Both, right? It’s both. It depends on whether we’re the one receiving the love or giving the love. When we’re the one doing the loving, then it’s Law. When we’re the one being loved by someone else, then it’s Gospel. I think that’s pretty interesting.

It all comes back to our understanding of what love is. What is love? I don’t mean the kind of love we learn about from romantic movies or love songs—not the concept of love as our culture understands it. Our culture actually has love completely upside down. People think love is the way you feel about someone or something. That’s why you can love your mom and dad, but you can also love chocolate cake and football. People think they love something if it makes them feel a certain way, if it’s something they want, something they enjoy. 

Love is Not Feelings That’s not what God means by “love.” Jesus is not telling you to feel a certain way about God or to feel a certain way about your neighbor. It’s not about feelings at all. You can’t promise to feel a certain way about anything. That’s a complete misunderstanding of everything God ever said. Seriously, this is a big deal. 

A lot of churches spend way too much time trying to manipulate people’s feelings. Trying to drum up emotions. Making people believe they have to try and feel a certain way or they’re not worshiping, not doing it right. I’m going to say all this and some of you just can’t hear me, you’ve been programmed so hard in the other direction. How we feel has nothing to do with it.

God is telling us, commanding us to treat people a certain way—to act a certain way toward Him, even. It’s not about feelings—other than doing our best to control our feelings so we don’t hurt people with them. With our anger, sadness, etc.

When we love people we’re going to feel it, but the feeling isn’t what love is—it’s a byproduct.

1st Corinthians 13 is called the love chapter. Not the lovers’ chapter—it’s just as much about how we treat our family and friends and strangers as it is about how we treat our lover. It about how when we’re connected to Jesus by the Holy Spirit—when we’re filled with the Spirit, baptized, born again, saved, redeemed—whichever of those phrases you want to run with—when you have the Father’s name on you as an adopted child of God—when you’re in the kingdom of God, part of God’s family—when you’re a Christian (all these things mean the same thing)—then He expects you to treat people like this—with love—and this is what love is:

“Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.”
1 Corinthians 4-7

Can you say any of that about yourself? You say you love people, do you love them like that? 

I sure can—I’ll tell you what—I’m patient with people, that’s for sure, especially when I’m driving—and if there’s one thing people say about me it’s that I’m always really kind. “Kind” is kinda my middle name. And I’m always happy for people when good things happen for them but not me, because I never envy their cool new job, or their beautiful house, or how they still have a nice full head of hair. Nope, not me. I’m amazing at that. Also, I don’t brag about anything because I’m not arrogant or rude—because I’m better than you. Humble is my other middle name. Plus, I’m generous—it’s just part of how kind I am—I’m a giver. I never feel compelled to try and get my own way, I don’t try to win arguments. I know I already mentioned how patient I am but seriously, I just never get irritated with people. Not when they make mouth noises while chewing, or click pens in meetings, or show up late, or spill a drink on my couch or in my car—nope, I’m not irritable and certainly not resentful. I just can’t seem to hold a grudge. It never crosses my mind about the people at my last job who took everything away from me that I had worked so hard to build and kicked me out of the door the same week my mom died—those nightmares I still have about it are clear proof that I have completely moved on in every way. I never rejoice at wrongdoing, I don’t even fantasize about it, I never think about revenge or vindication. There’s never been a time when I felt like I was being treated disrespectfully and started imagining how easy it would be to punch them in the throat, smash their face on the counter, and hold them by the neck until they pass out. See, that kind of thing has never crossed my mind. If I’m ever tempted to do something wrong, even in my weakest moments, I take no pleasure in temptations and immediately shut them down. And on the rare occasion that I might say anything wrong in a conversation, I love when people correct me. Because I rejoice in the truth! I’m always like, “Thank you for interrupting my story to clarify that it actually happened at 3:15 on Thursday instead of 3:30 on Tuesday. Thank you for correcting me, what would I ever do without you?” I effortlessly bear all pain, all setbacks, all snide remarks people make under their breath. I’m just saying I’ve got this love thing down.! 

Also, everything I just said—NOT! It’s ridiculous to even say it out loud. That’s the struggle! We say we love people but everything God says defines love is really hard to do.

But it’s easy to do whatever the opposite of love is—which is just selfishness. 

Philippians 2:3-4 says,

"Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others."

That’s what God means when He says to love people. Mutual submission. Laying down our lives for the people we love. Not just being willing to die for them but also being willing to live for them. Moment by moment. Living is a lot harder than dying.

Jesus said, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” That’s what it means to love someone—figuring out what they want and doing it for them.

The 1st Corinthians passage is a great picture of what it means to love, to be full of the Spirit of God and love people, but most of it’s stated in the negative. What love isn’t.

Galatians 5:22-23 is a very similar verse but it’s all stated in the positive. It works like this: if you’re a saved follower of Jesus then the Holy Spirit dwells in you, and if the Holy Spirit is planted in you then there’s going to be certain things that grow out of you. God calls this the fruit of the Spirit. And just like any fruit, the fruit is not for you, it’s for others. The apples on the apple tree are not for the tree. So, this is a list of things God is growing in you that you’re supposed to give other people, listen to this,

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control." Galatians 5:22-23

The first word is love but it’s just the box the rest of the fruit is packed in. All of these things are what it means to love someone: You will give them joy. That’s what you should be trying to do when you walk into a room, when you answer the phone, when you text someone, when you make small talk at a store, when you’re sitting across the table from them at a meal—be deliberate—how can you give them joy? How are you uniquely wired to give away joy? My joy is going to look different than your joy—that’s a good thing. It’s not one size fits all. How do you express joy? How can you give it to other people? For starters, don’t be a dud. A gloomy gus. An energy vampire. Don’t be grumpy and mean. Irritable. Don’t make jokes at other people’s expense. Don’t put people down. Don’t say hurtful things. Get out of your own head and be the joy you want to see in the world. This is what loving people is supposed to look like.

And peace. Jesus said “Blessed are the peacemakers.” Make peace. Don’t argue with people. If you end up in an argument, then find a way to get back on track. This is what it means to love people. Be patient with them—which is hard. Don’t snap at them, don’t make them feel stupid. This also applies to driving: don’t honk at people or make angry gestures at them or aggressively pass them while glaring at them—drive as if there are real, live, human beings in those shiny metal boxes. Drive as if other people are more important than you are. 

I’ve told some of you this before. When I start to feel a little road rage coming on, and I’m alone, I yell, “MEEEE!” Which usually makes me laugh. Because it’s like, “MEEE! I’m mad at you because I’m being a selfish baby! MEEE!” Try it.

Kindness. You know, you really don’t have to correct people online. Or in person. You can let them be wrong. I mean, of course there are times when the loving thing to do is to point out a dangerous error—stop them from walking off a cliff, or into a burning room, or growing a mustache before they’re thirty.

This is what loving people looks like: Joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness—this is how we’re supposed to treat people. All people. Especially the people we say we love. But none of that is going to happen without the last thing in the list—self-control. Love is the first word and it’s the box that contains the rest of them but the last one is how we’re going to put these things into action. Control your emotions and be good to people. Control your anger and be gentle with people. Control your lust and be faithful. Control your temper and don’t yell at your kids or your spouse—don’t snap at them. Treat them with kindness. Love is sacrifice. Which is going to be hard. It’s going to feel a little like death—love is sacrifice.

I was praying the Lord’s prayer the other day and one of the lines struck me in a way that I hadn’t seen before. “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

I had always seen this as a call to live out my faith and be faithful—be the person God called me out of the world to be. And that’s true but all of sudden that idea just exploded and got more glorious.

How can we create heaven on earth? How can we treat people on earth the way they are treated in heaven? I mean, it’s everything I’ve been talking about today. God’s will is that we love people, and when we do, we create little pockets of heaven on earth.

When we do whatever we can to encourage people to live in the light instead of creating darkness with our words and attitudes, live in joy instead of despair, live in hope instead of apathy, discouragement, negativity, criticism, and discontentment. When we do everything in our power to surround the people in our lives with love: controlling our words and actions toward them, that’s giving them just a little taste of heaven on earth. 

And I’m not talking about utopia, clearly we’re not going to be perfect at it. I started by talking about a couple times when I wasn’t able to pull it off. That’s why this next part is so important…

God is love. He does all these things perfectly toward you because that’s who He is. He is infinitely patient with you, supernaturally kind and gentle with you, keeps no record of your wrongs, He loves you perfectly. You are completely forgiven for all the ways you have failed to treat the people in your life with love. Clean slate. You know what’s good about a clean slate? You get to start over. Every day is a fresh start to love people the way God told you to.

Jesus came to earth and showed us exactly what this is supposed to look like. What love looks like. It’s basically self sacrifice. The night before He went to the cross He said,

“Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” John 15:13

And then He did, He laid down His life for you. And He said, “Beloved, a new commandment I give you, love one another as I have loved you.” 

That’s what love is. Love is sacrificing your life, your desires, your preferences for the people in your life—especially the ones you say you love. This is what following Jesus looks like. This is what worshiping God looks like. He laid down His life for you and now you are to lay down your life for the people you love. Yes, be willing to die for them but more importantly, and far more difficult—be willing to live for them. 

Whenever people say what they’re thankful for, they almost always say the top thing on their list is the people they love. Picture those people—who are the first ones that come to mind? Who’s at the top of that list? Pray for God to give you the self-control to love them the way He has told you to love them. Lay down your pride and control your emotions—and truly love them. Pray for God to soften your heart and remind you of what it means to love them in those moments when you don’t want to. In those moments when you feel selfish, when your pride swells up, when you get angry, when you’re irritable and grumpy, when your stupid little heart is pushing so hard to make you act like a selfish baby instead of a person who wants to follow Jesus and live in His wisdom and love people. Pray for God to give you a glimpse of what it could look like if you treated people in your life the way He wants you to treat them. On earth as it is in heaven. AMEN