SELFISH!

Even as I write a series on genuine love, I am without a desire to put others before myself. I desire to please myself and pursue my own desires. I lack care for anyone else. I don't want to serve others. I don't want to be least of all. I need the genuine love that God showed to me! For grace is my strength. I entrust my power to serve and love as I should to come from the strength of Jesus Christ. I will boast in Jesus Christ! Without whom, I have no power, no strength to love. Holy Spirit, I am dependent on Your directions. Without them, I want to revel in my own desires, even my own pitiful emotions: anger, sadness, pain and hurt, jealousy, and others. How absurd-yet true-that I love to dwell on, better yet immerse and engross myself in, anger and selfishness! I am so very thankful for the propitiatory death of Jesus Christ, who died for these very sins! How can I not pledge all my love (and service) in light of all that He has done? God, I look to Your truth!

Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.

Romans 8:26

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.

2 Corinthians 12:9-10

The Sympathy of the Savior

For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are-—yet was without sin. Let us then approach the throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

Hebrews 4:15-16 (NIV)

Let us notice that verse 15 does not say: "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to have pity...." or "For we do not have a high priest who is unable to have compassion...." Rather, it says that Jesus is able to sympathize with us.

Often times, I think we tend to think of pity, compassion, and sympathy as being more similar than they are. Pity implies tender or sometimes slightly contemptuous sorrow for one in misery or distress. Compassion implies tender or sometimes slightly contemptuous sorrow for one in misery or distress along with a desire to alleviate it. Sympathy in the Greek means common (syn-) feelings, emotion, or experience (pathos). Sympathy is much more personal than pity or compassion. You can have pity or compassion for someone without suffering the same burden as them; however, you cannot have sympathy without suffering the same burden.

Therefore, verse 15 is saying that Jesus has a tender sorrow for our burdens, but, more than that, He went through the same burdens that we do.

It is pity; but it is something more than pity: it is the pity which a man of kind affections feels towards those who are suffering what he himself suffered....
The Son of God, had He never become incarnate, might have pitied, but He could not have sympathized with His people. To render Him capable of pity, it was necessary that He should become man that He might be susceptible of suffering, and that He should actually be a sufferer that He might be susceptible of sympathy.

Dr. John Brown, An Exposition of Hebrews, p. 231

I suspect, however, that many of us, especially when we are experiencing physical or emotional pain, question whether or not Jesus suffered in the same way we are suffering. After all, He never experienced prolonged unemployment, or had a child die in an auto accident, or endured the debilitating effects of a crippling disease, or watched a spouse die slowly and painfully from cancer.

Jerry Bridges, Transforming Grace, p. 175

While Jesus may not have experienced the exact same burdens as us, He suffered more than any of us will ever know. He was forsaken by God. The creation totally void of involvement from the creator, the sustenance of the creation. None of us have ever been cut off from the Creator, who sustains us. As God's creations, we cannot bare to be removed from the Creator. I believe this to be the biggest pain and sorrow of Hell, total separation from the Creator who is knitted into our very being. Jesus suffered such a burden.

So Jesus does fully understand and sympathize with us in our times of trials. We can be sure, whatever the nature of our hurts, they are not new to Him. Because Jesus can enter into our hurts and does sympathize with us, we can approach God's throne with confidence, without being ashamed to lay our weaknesses before Him. He understands and He cares.

Jerry Bridges, Transforming Grace, pp. 175-176

Genuine Love, pt. 2

Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does not know God, because God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

1 John 4:7-11 (ESV)

1. What does genuine love look like?
Genuine love is rooted in God, without whom there is no love. In order to love, we must know God because love was manifested by and began (before creation) with the love expressed to us that God would pour all of His wrath on His Son for us, sinners. While grace is for some (Exodus 33:19), His love is for everyone. Jesus' propitiatory death is for everyone. Whether God is being gracious or just, He is still being loving. We are commanded to love God with all our heart, with all our soul, with all our strength, and with all our mind and to love our neighbor as ourselves (Luke 10:27). Notice that these two commands go together because we could not do one without doing the other. We could not love our neighbor without loving God because love is from God, and we could not love God without loving our neighbor because then we would not know God.

2. Why should we love?
Because God so loved us. Since God's love has so affected us, we should not want to do anything but love one another out of gratitude. Love is an outward expression of the "knowledge" of Jesus Christ in our heart. I say "knowledge" because we don't learn or obtain wisdom of the saving grace of Jesus Christ that changes our hearts, but we are born of God and then know Jesus Christ by grace through faith, making our hearts of stone into hearts of flesh (Ezekiel 36:26). So, we should love not as if God said, "Because I told you to," but because His loving kindness is more than we deserve for sinning against a holy God who cannot have sin in His presence.

3. How can we love?
Because love is from God. All love that is genuine that we express to each other is based in the original act of love shown to us from God. Therefore, God works in us to show genuine love, because apart from God we do not know love because we do not know God. To know love is to know God. Therefore, the power to love comes from the Holy Spirit. In order to know love better, we must know God better. The more we read God's Word and learn more about Him, the more we will love. I dare say that we cannot love more than we proportionally know God because Jesus was God, and He showed the greatest expression of love that ever will be. Simply put, How much we know God = How much we can love. I don't think that we are capable of loving more than how much we know God. Otherwise, that "extra love" would be based in something other than God, and that is impossible since love is God.

Genuine Love, pt. 1

Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. Do not be slothful in 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.

Romans 12:9-13 (ESV)

We are called to genuinely love one another. Let us look at the aspects of genuine love.

1. Genuine love is marked by abhorring evil.
We cannot love evil and genuinely love each other. Our nature is to love that which is opposed to God (Psalm 14, Romans 3:10-18). Why is abhorring evil before holding fast to good? I would say that it is because, in order to genuinely love each other, we must rely on the grace of God and the work of the Holy Spirit because abhorring evil goes against our sinful state.

2. Genuine love is marked by holding fast to good.
Since we have "put off" loving evil, what now do we "put on"? Loving that which is good (Philippians 4:8). Because of the grace that God has shown to us in saving us from our sins by the death of Jesus Christ on the cross, we, in gratitude, desire that which is good and of God. Therefore, we can (are able to) love because God first showed us genuine love.

3. Genuine love is marked by loving one another with brotherly affection.
As brothers and sisters in Christ, we should honestly care about the state of each other's souls and earnestly yearn that each lives a life worthy of the Gospel. That means we should continually encourage, correct, and spur on one another. What brotherly affection looks like will be addressed in other parts of this series.

4. Genuine love is marked by outdoing one another in showing honor.
Genuine love is not the task of one person. Because of the grace that we have been shown, we should want to love showing honor and encouraging each other so much that we do it more and more with each time and more than someone just did. Be careful! This is not to be rooted in pride. It is based in glorifying God. That is why we should "compete" in doing it, for God's glory.

5. Genuine love is marked by not being slothful in zeal, being fervent in spirit, serving the Lord.
Be passionate! Zeal is the enthusiastic devotion to a cause, ideal, or goal and tireless diligence in its furtherance. Focus on the last part of the definition: tireless diligence in its furtherance. Genuine love is displayed by tirelessly devoting our lives to the Gospel and its furtherance. That is how we show genuine love to unsaved people. We share with them the greatest news that they could hear! The news that can save their souls! Also, genuine love is rooted in serving the Lord. As we serve the Lord, genuine love will flow from our actions.

6. Genuine love is marked by rejoicing in hope, being patient in tribulation, being constant in prayer.
In other words, genuine love is marked by faith! [Application: Seek to apply this point to Howard's message from last Sunday (8/6).]

7. Genuine love is marked by contributing to the needs of the saints and seeking to show hospitality.
Love that is genuine does not commit the sin of partiality (James 2:1-13). Love does not have "sides" or "favorites." Genuine love is humble and sacrificial. Acts 2:45 demonstrates the care and desire (Philippians 2:3-4) that is needed in genuine love. There is no room for selfishness in genuine love.

Ninja Mak

Josh Groban

I have been a fan of Josh Groban for a long time. If you have never heard of him or listened to his work, you are missing a great vocalist with amazing talent. He sings so powerfully, and when he sings in other languages, he does it fluently. All of his music is filled with a captivating passion.


My favorite songs would have to be:
Oceano
Per Te
Mi Mancherai

Find out more about Josh Groban: here.

Tutorial Tuesday

Colors

I have a shirt that guys call "pink." Girls, on the other hand, properly call it "salmon." Well, it's time that someone educated guys on colors. Salmon is as different from pink as maroon is from red. Or green yellow from yellow green for that matter.

pink

salmon

Here is a list of colors (well, HTML colors but a general understanding can be obtained) and what they look like:

alice blue
antique white
aqua
aquamarine
azure
beige
bisque
black
blanched almond
blue
blue violet
brown
burlywood
cadet blue
chartreuse
chocolate
coral
cornflower blue
cornsilk
crimson
cyan
dark blue
dark cyan
dark goldenrod
dark gray
dark green
dark khaki
dark magenta
dark olive green
dark orange
dark orchid
dark red
dark salmon
dark sea green
dark slate blue
dark slate gray
dark turquoise
dark violet
deep pink
deep sky blue
dim gray
dodger blue
fire brick
floral white
forest green
fuchsia
gainsboro
ghost white
gold
goldenrod
gray
green
green yellow
honeydew
hot pink
indian red
indigo
ivory
khaki
lavender
lavender blush
lawn green
lemon chiffon
light blue
light coral
light cyan
light goldenrod yellow
light green
light grey
light pink
light salmon
light seag reen
light sky blue
light slate gray
light steel blue
light yellow
lime
lime green
linen
magenta
maroon
medium aquamarine
medium blue
medium orchid
medium purple
medium sea green
medium slate blue
medium spring green
medium turquoise
medium violet red
midnight blue
mint cream
misty rose
moccasin
navajo white
navy
old lace
olive
olive drab
orange
orange red
orchid
pale goldenrod
pale green
pale violet red
papaya whip
peach puff
peru
pink
plum
powder blue
purple
red
rosy brown
royal blue
saddle brown
salmon
sandy brown
sea green
seashell
sienna
silver
sky blue
slate blue
slate gray
snow
spring green
steel blue
tan
teal
thistle
tomato
turquoise
violet
wheat
white
white smoke
yellow
yellow green