All in Love (2-18-12)

1 Corinthians 16:14 - "Let all that you do be done in love."

Near the end of Paul's first letter to the Corinthians he gives them five short exhortations one after the other, four of which are in verse 13 which says - "Be on the alert, stand firm in the faith, act like men, be strong." Verse 13 sounds like an exhortation given to soldiers who are preparing to march off to war, but this short list concludes in verse 14 where we read - "Let all that you do be done in love." An almost surprising change in tone. We don't consider love to be a very manly quality and we wouldn't tell soldiers preparing for battle to do all that they do in love, but if we look into it we realize that a good soldier actually is motivated by love. The dictionary defines patriotism as: 'Devoted love, support, and defense of ones country.' A good soldier isn't motivated by hatred of the enemy, but rather by love for his family and his country. And so this final exhortation isn't out of place at all, it's perfectly placed here by God for our instruction. Nothing in verse 13 can be accomplished apart from verse 14.
This verse is a challenge. I'm very good at deceiving myself into thinking that I'm acting out of love in a given situation when really my motivation is selfish. This verse seems impossible to obey, and it is, by our own efforts. The only way that we can do everything that we do out of love is if we surrender our lives completely to God and allow Him to live His life through us. The most well known chapter on love in the Bible is 1 Corinthians chapter 13, and this is what it says in verses 1-8 - "If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge; and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing. Love is patient, love is kind and is not jealous; love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly; it does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails." So in everything we do we are to meet the criteria given in this chapter. That's a tall order. In fact there is only one person in human history that has ever met this description in everything that He did, and that person, of course, is the Lord Jesus Christ who desires to live His life through you.
In Romans 13:8-10 we read - "Owe nothing to anyone except to love one another; for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. For this, “YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT ADULTERY, YOU SHALL NOT MURDER, YOU SHALL NOT STEAL, YOU SHALL NOT COVET,” and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying, “YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.” Love does no wrong to a neighbor; therefore love is the fulfillment of the law." Christ said that He came to fulfill the law and the prophets and here we read that love was the fulfillment of the law. True love doesn't look out for itself but for what's best for others. We're told in Philippians 2:3 - "Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind regard one another as more important than yourselves." And directly following this verse Paul tells us that this is exactly what Christ did when He came into the world. He regarded Himself as nothing and regarded us as more important than Himself. This is how pure love acts. Not selfishly, but selflessly. Pure love always wants what's best for the one loved. If I truly love someone with a pure love then I am going to seek what's best for them even when it conflicts with my own desires. Pure love isn't selfish, it's self sacrificing. We need to crucify our own desires and take up our crosses daily and follow Christ, and only then, when we're dead to the flesh and alive to the Spirit, only then will this exhortation be accomplished through us. "Let all that you do be done in love."

 1 Timothy 1:5 - "But the goal of our instruction is love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith."