Dennis Tuuri

# Sermon Transcript – Reformation Covenant Church

Sermon scripture is 1 Thessalonians 3:6-8. We return to that passage for the third time. 1 Thessalonians 3:6-8. Our subject is love and standing firm in the Lord. But now when Timothy came from you unto us and brought us good tidings of your faith and charity and that you have good remembrance of us always, desiring greatly to see us as we also to see you. Therefore, brethren, we were comforted over you and all our affliction and distress by your faith.

For now we live if ye stand fast in the Lord.

Couple of months ago, there was a short article in the Chalcedon Report about budgets written by R.J. Rushdoony and he basically asserted in that article that budgets were evil. Now you may say how could a man say such a thing? Well, if you read the article carefully, essentially he redefined what we would normally think of as budget to mean a budget is something by which men say we have absolute requirements for x amount of money this year and God must provide those funds or somehow he is lacking.

In other words, it’s to work outside of the providence of God and certainly that is evil. Definitions are very important and most people would not probably agree that is the current definition of what a budget is and so you wouldn’t agree with the conclusion of the article but it’s not really the conclusion you’re not agreeing with. It’s the definition of budget. It’s very important as we consider most things in our lives that we understand the definitions of the terms that we use on a regular basis.

Now I’ve returned again to First Thessalonians 3:6-8 and may well next week or the following week as well. I don’t know yet probably well at least one more week to talk about standing firm in the Lord. Two words are used in the context of standing firm in the Lord. One is love and the other is faith—charity in the King James version, love in more modern translations. And it’s very important that we understand that to stand firm in the Lord is an easy thing to understand.

It means not getting blown over, means not caving in on our obedience to Christ. And that’s what the Thessalonians were doing. And the way they were doing that was through the exhibition of their faith and love. Those things we may not have common definitions on. And that’s particularly true today when we have a society that is essentially redefined the big terms of the Christian faith. We talked before about this, but it’s worthwhile to repeat it again that early on in this epistle.

We talked about grace and peace, the typical Pauline expression of greeting to the church that he writes to. And then we talked about faith, hope, and love. One week each on each of those three Christian virtues or graces is a better word for it, since they are graciously given to us by God. The world has its own definitions today of grace and peace. The Christian church itself sees grace as cheap grace is another way to think of it.

Grace that winks the eye at sin and doesn’t have any requirements of a movement away from sin or the people that are acted graciously upon by God. And so grace is redefined as some sort of vague thing that just forgives anything anybody ever does past, present, or future regardless of their mindset, regardless of whether or not they intend to obey the Lord. That isn’t the grace of the scriptures. Grace is given that we might obey the word of God.

Certainly our works don’t merit salvation. But our salvation must be evidenced by the fruit of grace which is obedience.

Peace. Our world has redefined peace to mean the peace of the graveyard. Cessation of hostilities. The old Greek idea of peace. Death essentially is peace to them. But peace in the scriptures relates to God’s all God’s blessing upon a people or a world or a community. Peace is God’s order.

That’s one good short definition. Incomplete but a good working one. And when we are being peacemakers are bringing God’s order to our environment.

Now this last week many Christians work together. Some as point men, others as working behind the scenes making calls to legislators, others praying, others contributing money to assist these efforts. And I believe that there were blessings from God on peacemakers last week.

The homeschool bill we introduced several months ago passed the House of Representatives in Oregon here. 50 to zero, not a vote against it. And that although the bill isn’t perfect by any means, and it’s not the resting place for Christians who want to see God’s order in the civil state, it brought a degree of order, God’s order, and peace therefore to the homeschooling community that will be affected if the Senate also passes this bill and Governor Roberts passes on it.

Help you understand what biblical peace is all about and what being a peacemaker is.

The three virtues, faith, hope, and love. We’ve talked about this last couple of weeks. Faith today. It’s kind of wish upon a star faith. Have enough faith and you can bring reality to pass instead of biblical faith which says you must have faith in God’s interpretation of reality as found in his scriptures. That’s what faith is.

It says reality is not determined by the physical universe. Ultimately reality is determined by God’s word and that word interprets the situations that we see and the physical order we see. And it is the reality that helps me understand what this world is all about. And all my life must be lived on faith in the word of God explaining God’s definition of what reality is and how to interpret the things that we see and observe.

Hope also is given a different connotation other than its biblical connotation. The assuredness is what hope speaks of God’s blessings to those who are in covenant with him. Again, hope becomes kind of a wishful thinking sort of thing in our world.

But love is also important to understand the definition of it. If love is important to standing firm in the Lord, it’s important that very concept that we correct and confirm our understandings of what love is according to biblical definitions.

And again, we live in a society if it’s if love is such a core of the Christian faith. And it is. God is love. The scriptures tell us it is an essential aspect of who he is as is his truthfulness or his veracity, his faithfulness, and as is the blessings. God is love. It’s a very critical key concept throughout the scriptures and satanic attack and those who move away from God’s definition will attack that definition of course very strongly and it’s been attacked today love is seen as a sexual libido sort of drives what love is used for very frequently songs on the radio that’s what love means it’s kind of a euphemism now.

Love is seen through other aspects of some sort of romantic desire apart from the reasoning of a person’s mind it’s an attempt to get rid of reasoning and instead jump into a world of subjectivity and so the idea of romantic love moves away from the mind and the will.

Others swinging back to the other way may say love is just actions. And while the scriptures stress that love indeed is actions, it is certainly more than that. And so it’s important that we conform our images to what love is to God’s word, our understanding of it, our definition of it.

Love has relevance to every aspect of our lives. Love is relevant to the understanding of how to interact with other members of the Christian community, with friends, with our spouses, with our children, with our extended family. All these things are objects in the scriptures of our love and we’re supposed to understand how to interact with one another with love at the basis of those interactions.

Now, Deuteronomy 7:7, we read that God the Father has set his love upon his people. The father set his love upon you not because you were more numerous, but because he just decided to do it. God’s volition is a part of his love, his choice.

There is volition, will actions involved with it. And what I want us to try to do is understand by going through some definitions here or expressions rather of love is found in the scriptures to help us get our definition of what love is in our mind, our heart, and our soul in conformity to God’s word.

Most of this outline the first 10 points of this outline really come from George Scipion in his counseling handbook, the class that Roy and I were at a couple of weeks ago. This is and I’ll explain how he uses this in counseling at the end of going through these 13 characteristics. I’ve added several at the bottom that I think are important as well. Two from 1 Corinthians 13 and then another one that is I think extremely important particularly in terms of marital relationships, delegated responsibility.

But the purpose of this then is to look at biblical expressions of love that the scriptures say this is what love is and conform ourselves to it to conform our actions or understanding to these things.

Okay. First of all, the scriptures tell us that love involves things. Deuteronomy 10:18 says that God executes the judgment of the fatherless widow and loveth the stranger. And then he doesn’t tell us what that mean. He doesn’t leave that to our understanding. Rather, he tells us what it means. He loves the stranger in giving him food and raiment. So God’s love is expressed in the giving of food and raiment.

And of course, those of you who have been here sometime understand that those words are pretty connotation loaded as well. Food nourishes and develops. Raiment guards the stranger. And so he required that the stranger be nourished in the faith and understand the faith as he was part of the covenant community in the Old Testament. And he be guarded by the laws of the covenant community as well. But in any event, God’s love for the stranger finds itself expressed in the actual expressions of food and raiment.

God tells us in the next verse that we’re to love therefore the stranger, for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt. Well, how are we to love the stranger? Well, God has just told us the definition in this passage. The expression is in things.

Again, in 1 Timothy 5:8, if any man provide not for his own, especially for those of his own household, he denies the faith is worse than an infidel. The understanding is that love will issue forth in the giving of things, the physical substance. It’s an act of faithfulness. But it’s also an act of love defined by the scriptures.

Paul in 2 Corinthians 8:24 essentially sums up the love of the Corinthians. He says, “Wherefore show you to them and before the churches the proof of your love and of our boasting in your behalf.” And if you look in the context, Paul’s talking about money. He’s saying, “Send some money. Prove your love by sending money or things.”

1 John 3:17, “Whoso have world’s goods and seeth his brother have need and shutteth up his bowels of compassion from him. How dwelleth the love of God in him? Obvious inference is the love of God is expressed in giving food to those who are hungry things. So one of the ways that we should love one another and expression of love according to these verses and others that are on the outline is in the giving of things one to another providing people with things.

Now all these most of these expressions of love I should just point out are relevant to most of the relationships we have.

Now this list was originally produced the first 10 items specifically for the husband wife relationship and I’m going to make some application to the husband wife relationship but these things are not restricted to that. These things also as you go through these should be used to evaluate not just how loving are your expressions to your spouse but you could also use it to evaluate how loving your expressions are.

How do you express your love for other people that you have? Friends, extended family, children, parents, or other members of the covenant community and other members of the body of Christ that you’re in relationship to. All these things have some application there, too. And most of them do.

So, this is one of those things. I want to read a couple of practical illustrations. And these sheets, these illustrations we’ll be using today are also from Mr. Scipion. Actually, these are not from him. These are from Wayne Mack. Remember, I used some of Wayne Mack’s material two weeks ago, a week or two ago, and you know, I guess I guess it wasn’t obvious, but the idea of that list that I read before on faithfulness in terms of being a husband or or a wife, the idea was to rate yourself. It wasn’t you do these things perfectly or you were a bum. but we were supposed to rate ourselves.

These are some practical ways to think through the giving of things as expressions to love. And I’ll just read a couple of these. First, in relationship to how a husband may express love to his wife. Wayne Mack uses this of 94 things as a diagnostic tool that you’ll give to a husband to say how are you expressing your love to your wife. See if you do these things. Not that all of them are required, but that these are some ways you can express love.

One of the things he says is to give her a regular amount of money to spend in any way she chooses. Do you do that for your wife? Do you express love through the giving of things?

Another example that Mack uses is, do you do the fix-it job she wants done around the house. You know, if something doorknob broke and she wants you to fix the doorknob or if the banister needs work or whatever it is, you may say, “Well, it’s just a thing. That’s nothing to do with love.” But giving her that thing, the repaired item is an expression of love according to by way of extension from these verses we looked at. And she may be looking for your love is expressed in those ways.

That works the other way too, for wives as well. You know, one of the things regularly that most wives give to their husbands by way of things as a cooked meal. You know, it’s a thing. And it is important to realize that and important to see your labor in the kitchen, if you’re doing that in your household, that’s one of your assigned responsibilities as a loving act of giving a gift to your husband and to see it that way and to present it that way and for the husband understand it that way as well.

The giving of things is an expression of love.

Secondly, personal sacrifice. There are obviously some verses that could come to mind here. By the way, in terms of the giving of things, of course, those of us who understand the scripture requirement of the dowry that is the establishment of a particular mode of expression of love within the context of marriage that the husband does at the beginning of the marriage as a pattern what he’s be doing throughout the marriage. He gives her that money that Mr. Mack talked about and the giving of gifts is an important element of expression of love.

Secondly, personal sacrifice is an expression of love. Genesis 29:20 says that Jacob served 7 years for Rachel and they seemed unto him but a few days for the love he had to her. Jacob’s love for his wife led him to sacrifice personally for her. 7 years a lot of work big expression of self-sacrifice on the part of the husband and love for his wife. Of course we have a greater example the greater Jacob did much more work than seven years worth of work, didn’t he?

The greater Jacob, of course, the true Israel of God is Jesus Christ. The scriptures tell us that greater love hath no man than this than a man laid down his life for his friends. And so again, our savior himself gives us the example of what he gives as an expression of his life. And it is self-sacrifice. It is his very life. And so one of the ways you can express love for other people, for people in your church, friends, for your husband, husbands or wives is to be self-sacrificial with them.

Let me read a couple of practical illustrations of that again from Mack’s book. He says, husbands, do you take care of the children for at least 3 hours every week so that she has free time to do whatever she wants? A tough one, huh? But see what it is it’s the husband setting aside what he would like to do, his life for the sake of the wife and being self-sacrificial.

I would say that there’s another element to that you can make that even a little bit better by saying that hopefully what the wife would do with those 3 hours if you decide to do that in your household and I don’t mean to cause any problems with some of these suggestions this morning or this afternoon who knows what will happen when you get home but if you decide to do this between the two of you mutually not under coercion for the wives to have 3 hours a week now most the wives in our church of course have a lot of children And this is very relevant to them.

Now all the wives in our church as well are gifted in various ways from God to do various things. And some of those giftings are not really can’t be worked out in the context of little children running around the house. And so maybe the good way to look at this too is if you can free up the wife self-sacrificially for 3 hours a week, she could use those hours to develop the God-given talents that God has given to her that she may not be able to use in the context of those children.

For instance, some of the wives may want to do something in terms of art decoration maybe even taking some sort of class in the arts or something I don’t know who maybe one of your wives really likes to do automotive repair work I don’t know there’s nothing wrong with that necessarily and for her to really she has a desire in that area and seem to have a gifting and maybe that’s 3 hours a week she could go to some automotive repair class or maybe work on somebody’s car I don’t know but the point is that it’s an expression of love to set aside those three hours of your week and for the sake of your wife and to help her in that way.

Another example that Mack uses is to be reasonably happy to go shopping with her. He says reasonably happy. But she may want your companionship. Your companionship is important. It’s good to be self-sacrificial, putting your interest for that period of time aside for the sake of showing her that you’re so sacrificial in going and being happy with her shopping with her.

Okay, let’s go to the other route. Now, what can wives do in this regard? Let’s see. Well, this is kind of an easy one. Actually changing where you should. And he actually has it on both lists. Self-sacrificial, actually changing where you should. If there are things in your life that should be changed for the sake of the well-being of a marriage, that may be perfectly appropriate on your own and yet for the sake of the marriage should be changed.

The wife should be willing to set aside those things self-sacrificially for the sake of the husband and actually change in the places where she can change. I hope I didn’t pick out illustrations all these that are so weighted on the husband’s responsibility. But that’s good, right? Because the husband sets the tone for the marriage.

Okay. Personal sacrifice obviously the scriptures tell us is that the is a valid expression an important expression of love doing another’s will.

Exodus 20:6 says that God shows mercy in the thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. And you find this I have there’s a list I have I don’t know how many over and over 20 30 verses in the scriptures you can find where there’s these relationship where God talks about loving me and keeping my commandments over and over it’s repeated that biblical love is expressed in obeying the will of the person that you love.

Of keeping their commandments, making yourself pliable to their will and it’s kind of relation works off of this personal sacrifice but doing their will instead of your own in the context of the relationship or the context as I said before of the other relationships we have in terms of friends etc.

Now here practically speaking an example of what the husband can do to accomplish this Mack says that you could fulfill her implied or unspoken desires and wishes as well as the specific request she makes of you. Anticipating what she might desire and surprise her by doing it before she asks. There’s nothing wrong with a husband obeying the desires and wishes of the wife.

Now, you know, there’s a mutual submission that’s taught in the scriptures. Now, obviously, there’s a covenantal relationship here where the husband is the head of the family and he shouldn’t and couldn’t and it would be denial his guarding responsibilities of his wife to allow her to move into sin or to get her to encourage him to sin.

But the point is many things in life do not ponder prohibitions from God’s word and the wife may well have a desire to do a particular thing and it’s important that the husband recognize that one of the models of expression of love is doing the will of somebody else and doing will of the wife on occasion and conversely of course the wife doing the will of the husband. So it’s very important to see if that’s another biblical expression of love.

Fifth, constant loyalty. John 13:1 Now before the feast of the Passover when Jesus knew that his hour had come that he would soon depart out of the world unto the father having loved his own which were in the world he loved them unto the end. So constant loyalty. Jesus didn’t love them here and there and he didn’t stop loving them at a particular point. Constant loyalty to those whom he loved was demonstrated through his ministry.

And again there that’s an expression a way to express our love one to another to be constantly loyal toward those that God has brought us into our marriage relationship too.

Some examples again in terms of the husband talking about her that is your wife favorably to the children, children when she can hear you and when she cannot talking to talking about her favorably to the children. And what you want to do there is to demonstrate to the children the loyalty that you have to your wife whether she’s with you or whether she’s not.

You want to be loyal to the end. You want to be loyal in her absence as well as in her presence. And the children should know that mom and dad are dedicated to be loyal to each other in this relationship and to be constant to that until the end.

Another one bringing about her or bragging about her good points as a wife in every other area to others, letting her know you are proud to have her as your wife. And again, that demonstrates loyalty to your wife in the context of other people. And those of you who watch you and your wife operate together, who know you should recognize and should have demonstrations of your love for your wife and your wife’s love for you by expressions of loyalty to them and building them up in the context of other people. It’s a demonstration of loyalty.

Those sorts of words on the part of the wife and that brings out two or actually several points but a couple of them are offering constructive suggestions when you think that is your husband could improve or become more productive. Don’t push or preach or do this in such a way that you belittle him but see positive and non-threatening ways to help him become more fully the man God wants him to be. And that is loyalty to your husband to encourage him and to build him up is being a loyal helpmate to him in the context of the relationship. And so that’s part of the way a wife can demonstrate loyalty to her husband in the areas where he needs help to encourage him, not belittle him, to move from A to B.

We talked an illustration several years ago, but it’s a good one, I think, that in the days of the knights, the way that the knight’s lady his wife would buckle his armor on was all important in terms of him going out and doing battle. You obviously couldn’t put those suits of armor totally by yourself. So the wife put it on well, he was equipped for battle. If she was loyal to him and getting that cinched up tight and whatever he’s got on there in terms of preparation for battle and if she didn’t do that job well, then he may well fall.

And so the wife can demonstrate her loyalty in that way.

Another way is to seek to complete, not compete with him. Being the best member of the team and seeking to convince him that you are just that you want to be the best member of the team that he has the people that surround him that help him with the task. You should be the best member. God has called you to be this completer, not a competitor. You as a wife are here to demonstrate your love by expressing to him your loyalty to him and to the God who’s called you to be his helpmate.

And when you do that, that’s an expression of true biblical love to your husband. And he should receive it as such.

Constant loyalty. Fifth, forgiveness. Hatred stirreth up strife. The Proverbs tell us, “But love covereth all sins. Love forgives things.” Revelation 1:5 is from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness, the first begotten of the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. Unto him that loved us and washed us from our sins in his own blood.

And there it says he loved us. The expression of that love is in washing us from our sins with his own blood. Self-sacrificial action. But more than that, forgiveness is talked about here. And to forgive somebody for a petty fault without making a big deal of it is to cover up sins the way that Proverbs 10 talks about. And to forgive somebody for something they have done wrong and confessed to and repented of in a major sin area is also an expression of biblical love according to the scriptures.

It’s at the heart of God’s love for us. is forgiveness of our sins in Christ Jesus. And so mates as well as friends are going to have problems. They’re going to have sins one against another. It’s unavoidable in this world. And those sins will kill love. We’re going to talk about that at the end of this end of the sermon.

An example of where those sins can kill love if forgiveness is not a part of the relationship that a biblical expression of the love that governs the relationship between husband and wife. And so forgiveness is essential part also of is an essential expression of biblical love.

Next, honest helpful words. Proverbs 3:12, for whom the Lord loveth, he correcteth, even as a father his son in whom he delighteth. I’ll probably spend more time on this next week, the importance of correction to biblical love. But it is a very important part. Honest, helpful words even when those words are needed to correct somebody else.

To be honest about them and forthright with your speech is a loving expression to them. And children, I know you’ve heard this time after time after time, but it’s true that your parents when they spank you, when they correct you with their words, they’re doing it because they love you. They’re doing it because they know that God corrects us as part of his love for us.

Honest, helpful words, even when they need to be corrective words. Romans 12:9 says, Let love be without dissimulation. Abhor that which is evil cleave that which is good. Love be honest and above board without dissimulation without deceit involved in these expressions. And our love means that we’re going to be honest with each other.

Now that doesn’t mean being honest about the sinful feelings or attitudes you may have in your heart toward your mate or toward another person. Honesty is defined in terms of God’s word. Again, if I If I know that there’s something about you that has really made me mad and I it’s a sinful thing on my part, honesty doesn’t go up and say, “Well, you lousy so and so. I hate you. What a terrible fellow you are.” That’s not being honest. If I want to be honest, that’s sin. Sin should be confessed to God and repented of. Shouldn’t be communicated to other person.

But on the other hand, if I have a real problem with somebody something somebody’s done, I should be honest enough to share that. More importantly, on the positive side, frequently when we when we believe good things about our wife or our husband or about friends, we don’t communicate those. We use our communication only for problem correction. But the scriptures say that honest helpful words are important part of loving those that God has called us in relationship to.

Words are extremely important. Of course, words are what God gives us to help us understand as we said before the definition of reality. He gives us a printed word, spoken word as it were. and our words become very important one to another and also in guiding and directing our own feelings.

I believe that the Song of Solomon is an important book for us. It’s important to us to correct our thoughts and our words about our mates specifically in the context of marriage. Now to the patterns that are given to us there. I think Reverend Schaeffer last summer made some very good points about the fact that if we believe in a sovereign God that we must believe that regardless are the means that he has used to bring us to the particular position we’re in right now in terms of our mate.

Maybe there was sin involved in you and your mate getting together at first so that you’ve repented of it. It doesn’t make any difference. At this point, God has brought you into a marriage relationship with the very best wife that you can possibly have and with the very best husband. That’s God’s best for your life, for your life, and for your marriage. And you should think of your mate the way that the Song of Solomon describes two people in love with each other. That’s the way you should train your thoughts and your words.

And I would say that training your words helps to train your thoughts. That’s the way you should train your words and your thoughts toward those that God has called you in relationship to do. And so, it’s very important that we practice, you know, the scriptures say you’re supposed to put on love. Verses that talk about that in the scriptures in Colossians 3:14 says, “Above all things, put on charity.” Put on love.

1 Thessalonians, then in this book, 5:8, put on the breastplate of faith and love. And then in Hebrews, we’ve we’ve read this before frequently from book of Hebrews 10:24, let us consider whether to provoke unto love. Well, I bring that up to say that love isn’t just something that happens. If it was, God couldn’t give us instruction to put it on. And he couldn’t tell us provoke each other to do to love one another.

See, he could say, “Well, pray that you might get this feeling welling up in your bosom of love.” But he doesn’t say that. He says, “Put it on.” And I’m saying as we go to these biblical expressions of love, we’re commanded by God to put on these expressions, to act in this way, and to conform our thoughts and our words and our actions to what the will of God reveals to us. And in terms of your marriage, God reveals that you are to treat your mate.

You are to be beloved. They’re to be beloved in your sight and you’re to be beloved in their sight. And you know, if you don’t feel that way, the way to get there is to start putting on these expressions, these words, and these attitudes that the word of God tells us are valid biblical expressions and definitions to what love is.

Now, some practical illustrations in terms of the words that Mack uses. This may sound a little silly to you, but I don’t think it is. One way to express love to your wife is to write love notes or letters to her. Well, that sounds silly, huh? But, you know, that’s what the Song of Solomon again is all about, right? There are expressions. There are poems that are spoken there to one’s mate. There are expressions, love letters, love notes, love sayings that are repeated one to another.

And I might just broaden that out a bit in the context of your friends and the other people that are you’re supposed to see as beloved in the church. I’m getting a little ahead of myself, but the scriptures, it’s interesting that in the gospels, the word beloved refers exclusively to the son Jesus Christ. And in the epistles, except for one reference where it’s quoting from the gospels, the word beloved is used exclusively of other believers, either individual believers or churches corporately.

And while we’re kind of focusing here on the marriage relationship in some ways, these things have much application to those if we’re to conform our thoughts, our words, and our deeds in terms of our mate to God’s understanding of God’s love is defined in the scriptures. Also, that’s true in terms of the church covenant community itself and other believers. And so this writing of notes of love to your wife, of course, they take a different cast if you wrote it to a friend. But notes of expression communication of words through notes or through writing or through verbal statements one to another in terms of your friends are also a very important way of expressing and I think developing love in the context of the church.

Okay. Another example that Mack uses frequently telling her you love her. Simple, huh? Frequently saying, repeating and affirming to your wife you love for her and vice versa the wife to the husband. But it’s important and it’s something that we need to remember that it’s an important thing to do according to the scriptures to use honest helpful words and then to evaluate ourselves in this and begin to put it into motion in our lives in obedience to God’s word.

In terms of the wife he says to express your love express your love words and notes. Okay, pretty straightforward.

Next positive attitude and encouragement. Matthew 5:44 But I say unto you, love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute you. Positive attitudes. Romans 5:5. And hope maketh not ashamed because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.

God has already given us love and we’re to express it through positive attitudes and encouragements. 2 Corinthians 9:7, “Every man according as he has purposed in his heart so that and give not grudgingly nor of necessity for God loveth the cheerful giver. Now there the idea of course is talking specifically about the collection for the saints but the point is that it is the cheerful giver that God loves not the stingy one and it is to use positive attitudes and encouragements toward our mate and our faithfulness.

You can see faithfulness is just fulfilling the requirements of the covenant. But this verse and others like it tell us there’s an additional requirement to Christian love. It must go beyond the bland fulfillment of the covenant terms, obedience and actions to a positive cheerfulness in the giving of God requires of us one for another in the context of the marriage relationship, families and then the extended family of the church.

Verse 7 says, “For we have great joy and consolation in thy love because the bowels of the saints are refreshed by thee, brethren,” bowels of the saints are refreshed their love to visible expression with positive attitudes and encouragements one toward the other.

Again, several things from that sheets in terms of how to apply this or evaluate yourself. I’ll make these available to you in the future the next couple of weeks for anybody who wants them.

Let’s see. Again, this is husband to wife letting her know that you appreciate her and that and that you are appreciative about her. Do this often and for things that are sometimes taken for granted. Pretend you are trying to convince her to think she is great and very important to you. Again, it kind of puts a kind of a funny cast there at the end, but visible expressions of appreciativeness with a positive attitude is very encouraging to your mate. It is a is a legitimate biblical expression of love.

Smiling and being cheerful when you come home from work. Again, a simple thing. But as you know, Scipion was saying One of the things he gets does when he gets home from work is when he works late at night and I should do this myself. When he comes to the door, he’s easily distracted by food and by reading. So when he gets to the door of his house, he’ll tell himself, “I came home to sleep.” So he doesn’t then get distracted into reading a book.

You know, it’s this is when he’s worked late and gets home real late. He’ll remind himself when he gets to the door of the house, I came home to sleep. Don’t stop and start eating and reading. Go to bed. And it might be a good thing for us to try to build a pattern, man, when you get home from work to think, “One of the things I’ve come home to do is to love my wife and to express that love toward her.” And so when you come in the door, you’re cheerful and you greet her and you express your love toward her through that positive attitude of encouraging her when you get home from work.

Being willing to talk to her about her concerns and not belittling her for having those concerns. Okay, it is it is it is the opposite of encouragement and having a positive attitude toward your mates. To belittle the concerns that they may have that you may not think are legitimate or needful or whatever else, but to belittle those concerns and not take them into account and attend to them is very discouraging and is the opposite of the biblical expression of encouragement.

The biblical expression of love that is encouragement. Being willing to talk to her about her concern.

In terms of women now, some of the things he recommends supporting them and cooperating with him enthusiastically and positively when he’s made a decision. This is kind of the other side of the coin. You’ve expressed concerns maybe about a decision that’s made. He acting biblically in his role as the head of the household has made a decision after hearing your input and whatnot or maybe not after your input, but he’s made the decision.

And for you to encourage him means to be positive in terms of what you’ve that he has decided to do and to build him up and to express your love by encouraging him in the decisions that he made letting him know how much you appreciate him and what you appreciate it’s the flip side we said about the husband and the wife but the same thing letting your husband know the things you appreciate about him.

I think it would be an excellent thing to do and we also we I often advise couples to do this to make a list of the positive characteristics of your mate or if you’re having problems getting along with somebody else at church make a list of the positive characteristics of that person, you know, and then reminding yourself of that and even then moving to compliment and encourage the person and what God has done in their lives in that particular area.

It’s a biblical expression of love to encourage your mate in that way.

Next, tender affections. And as I said, love is more than the simple obligations of the covenant being fulfilled. Tender affections are a part of this. The scriptures tell us in 1 Corinthians 4:21, uh Paul says, “Should I come to you with a rod or in love and in the spirit of meekness?” Now, sometimes the rod can express love. So, what’s Paul talking about here?

Well, he’s wanting to come to them with tender affections, a spirit of meekness as his expression of love to them. He would rather express it that way than if they push him and get so far out there in their sin that the only expression of love left to him is the rod. And if we don’t express love through tender affections one to another or to our children for instance that may be that may be why they’re not encouraged to act in obedience and why we then have to express love in terms of the administration of the rod.

Philippians 1:16 one preaches Christ of contention not sincerely supposing the question of my bonds but the other of love knowing that I am set to the defense of the gospel and he says what then notwithstanding this the gospel is preached Philippians 2:1 If there ever be any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, any fellowship of the spirit, if any bowels and mercies, then he says, “Let this mind be in you to consider each other.”

So love has this aspect of tender affections in it that should be part of how we express love in the context of our relationships. By way of evaluation, Mack asks husbands if you have greeted her when she comes home with a smile, a hug, a kiss, and am I glad to see you? I really missed you today. To express the affections, the tender affection you have for your wife when she is gone.

Maybe you go off shopping. She comes home. Are you then tender to her when she comes home? Do you express love to her in that way?

Another example, do you look at her with an adoring expression? You know, again, I suppose, you know, some people may think that’s kind of corny. I don’t think it’s so corny. The scriptures talk about God’s eyes, the way he is His eye is upon his people. His eye is upon us to love us. And we’re the apple of God’s eye. God’s eye does look adoringly at us in a particular way, in a particular sense in the scriptures.

And if we’re image bearers of God, the way we look at people, the expression we put on our face is extremely important. You can with an expression express a severity. And some it is appropriate to do that with people. The way God’s expression turns kind of stays to us when we become rebellious in our sin. And but you can also look upon people with a longingness and a love.

And I know I have, you know, I have I have probably most of you can think of ways that your mate has looked at you in the past, maybe when you were first married before you were married, that look meant something to you. And God wants us to conform our actions now to the reality that love is still in place and it should be deeper and more full than it was then.

Even if we’re growing and maturing in Christ, God is love. When we’re maturing in God, that means we should be maturing and deepening in our love for each other. That’s what the Epistle of First John is primarily about. So that means that we should be deepening in our expressions of adoring looks to our mates as well.

Tender affection time and companionship. We’re doing okay.

Time and companionship. Zephaniah 3:17, “The Lord thy God is in the midst of thee. He is mighty. He will say he will rejoice over thee with joy. He will rest in his love. He will joy over thee with singing. God spends time with his people. And he does so in a happy context of companionship.

Now, obviously, he’s our God. We don’t want to diminish that in any way and say that bring him down to our level, but it’s true. The scriptures say he rejoices over us with joy. That’s his love for us at work. And he is in the midst of us. And if we’re going to be loving toward our mates or toward our friends, it means you got to spend time with him.

Now, Many churches today, people don’t particularly want to spend time with another because they don’t understand or become rebellious against biblical concepts of love. If we’re to love the brethren, God says that his love means he’s in the midst of them. It means we should be in the midst of each other. I don’t think that’s related to just sitting in a sermon once a week. I think it means spending time with one another. And certainly in the context of the family, it means spending time with one another.

Very important to see that time and companionship is a biblical expression of love.

John 14:23 Jesus answered and said unto him, “If a man love me, he’ll keep my words, the obedience aspect, and my father will love him, and we will come unto him and make our abode with him.” Now, you know, we have