Love Believes the Best of the Brethren

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life Leave a comment

Love…believes all things… – 1 Corinthians 13:7

Love works miracles which only grace can enable her to perform. Here is the second of them-love “believeth all things.” In reference to our fellow Christians, love always believes the best of them. I wish we had more of this faith abroad in all the churches, for a horrid blight falls upon some communities through suspicion and mistrust. Though everything may be pure and right, yet certain weak minds are suddenly fevered with anxiety through the notion that all is wrong and rotten. This unholy mis-trust is in the air, a blight upon all peace: it is a sort of fusty mildew of the soul by which all sweet perfume of confidence is killed. The best man is suspected of being a designing knave, though he is honest as the day, and the smallest fault or error is frightfully exaggerated, till we seem to dwell among criminals and to be all villains together. If I did not believe in my brethren I would not profess to be one of them. I believe that with all their faults they are the best people in the world, and that, although the church of God is not perfect, yet she is the bride of One who is. I have the utmost respect for her, for her Lord’s sake. Where Christ is King, she who stands at His right hand is “the queen in gold of Ophir.” God forbid that I should rail at her of whom her Lord says, “Since thou wast precious in My sight, thou hast been honourable, and I have loved thee.” True love believes good of others as long as ever it can, and when it is forced to fear that wrong has been done, love will not readily yield to evidence, but she gives the accused brother the benefit of many a doubt. When the thing is too clear, love says, “Yes, but the friend must have been under very strong temptation, and if I had been there, I dare say I should have done worse;” or else love hopes that the erring one may have offended from a good though mistaken motive; she believes that the good man must have been mistaken, or he would not have acted so. Love, as far as she can, believes in her fellows. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1617.cfm 

Bear All Things for Christ’s Sake

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, salvation 2 Comments

Charity beareth all things… – 1 Corinthians 13:7

If you should meet with some extraordinary sinner who opens his mouth with cruel speeches such as you have never heard before, and if by attempting to do him good you only excite him to ribaldry and blasphemy, do not be astonished; have at him again, for charity “beareth all things,” whatever they may be. Push on and say, “Yes, all this proves to me how much you want saving. You are my man; if I get you to Christ there will be all the greater glory to God.” O blessed charity, which can thus cover all things and bear all things for Christ’s sake.

Do you want an example of it? Would you see the very mirror and perfection of the charity that beareth all things? Behold your divine Lord. Oh, what He has covered! It is a tempting topic, but I will not dwell on it. How His glorious righteousness, His wondrous splendour of love has covered all our faults and all their consequences, treating us as if He saw no sin in Jacob, neither perversity in Israel. Think what He bore when He came unto His own and His own received Him not! What a covering was that when He said, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” What a pitying sight of the fearful misery of man our Lord Jesus had when holy tears bedewed those sacred eyes! What a generous blindness to their infamous cruelty He manifested when He prayed for His bloodthirsty enemies. O beloved, you will never be tempted, and taunted, and tried as He was; yet in your own shorter measure may you possess that love which can silently bear all things for the elect’s sake and for Christ’s sake, that the multitude of the redeemed may be accomplished, and that Christ, through you, may see of the travail of His soul. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1617.cfm

Still Speak Concerning Christ

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, salvation Leave a comment

Love bears all things… – 1 Corinthians 13:7

Those who love the souls of men must be prepared to cover much when they deal with them, and to bear much from them in silence. When I begin to seek the conversion of anyone, I must try as much as ever I can to ignore any repulsiveness that there may be in his character. I know that he is a sinner, else I should not seek his salvation; but if he happens to be one who has fallen very low in the esteem of others, I must not treat him as such, but cover his worst points. You cannot possibly bring the Samaritan woman who has had five husbands into a right state of mind by “wondering that he spake with the woman.” Thus, the disciples acted, but not so their Master, for He sat on the well and talked with her and made Himself her willing companion that He might be her gracious Saviour; He ignored her sin so far as to converse with her for her good.

You will not long have begun this holy work before you will discover in the heart you seek to win much ignorance of the gospel. Bear with it and bring forward the text which sheds light on that darkness and teach the truth which will remove that error. Ere long you will have to contend with hardness of heart, for when a man knows the truth, he is not always willing to receive it. Bear it and be not vexed…You are sent to turn men from darkness to light and from the power of Satan unto God…In addition to this perhaps you will have ridicule poured upon you; your attempts to convert will be converted into jests. Bear it; bear all things! Remember how the multitude thrust out the tongue at your Lord and Master when he was dying and be not you so proud as to think yourself too good to be laughed at. Still speak concerning Christ, and whatever happens, bear all things. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1617.cfm

Love Covers

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life Leave a comment

Charity…beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. – 1 Corinthians 13:7

Let us survey the triumph of love’s labour…in bearing all things. The word here rendered “bear” might as correctly have been translated “cover.” “Covereth” is the meaning of the word in ordinary Greek, but Paul generally uses the word in the sense of “bear.” (L)ove bears all things in silence, concealing injuries as much as possible even from herself. True love refuses to see faults, unless it be that she may kindly help in their removal. Love has no wish to see faults. She painfully fears that there may be something wrong, but she is loath to be convinced of it: she ignores it as long as she can and wishes that she could deny it altogether. Love covers; that is, it never proclaims the errors of good men. There are busybodies abroad who never spy out a fault in a brother, but they must need hurry off to their next neighbour with the savoury news, and then they run up and down the street as though they had been elected common criers. It is by no means honourable to men or women to set up to be common informers. Love stands in the presence of a fault, with a finger on her lip. If anyone is to smite a child of God, let it not be a brother. Even if a professor be a hypocrite, love prefers that he should fall by any hand rather than her own. Love covers all injuries by being silent about them and acting as if they had never been. She sitteth alone, and keepeth silence…I would, brothers and sisters, that we could all imitate the pearl oyster. A hurtful particle intrudes itself into its shell, and this vexes and grieves it. It cannot eject the evil, and what does it do but cover it with a precious substance extracted out of its own life, by which it turns the intruder into a pearl. Oh, that we could do so with the provocations we receive from our fellow Christians, so that pearls of patience, gentleness, long-suffering, and forgiveness might be bred within us by that which else had harmed us. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1617.cfm

Love to Jesus

Sherry sermon 2 Comments

You who are King of kings and Lord of lords, we worship You. Before Jehovah’s awful throne we bow with sacred joy.

Sermon Text

Love Overcomes Evil

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation 1 Comment

Charity…beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. – 1 Corinthians 13:7

Happily, though love has many difficulties, it overcomes them all, and overcomes them four times. There is such vitality in evil that it leaps up from the field whereon it seemed to be slain, and rages with all its former fury. First, we overcome evil by patience, which “beareth all things.” Let the injury be inflicted, we will forgive it, and not be provoked: even seventy times seven will we bear in silence. If this suffice not, by God’s grace we will overcome by faith: we trust in Jesus Christ, we rely upon our principles, we look for divine succour, and so we “believe all things.” We overcome a third time by hope: we rest in expectation that gentleness will win, and that long-suffering will wear out malice, for we look for the ultimate victory of everything that is true and gracious, and so we “hope all things.” We finish the battle by perseverance: we abide faithful to our resolve to love, we will not be irritated into unkindness, we will not be perverted from generous, all-forgiving affection, and so we win the battle by steadfast non-resistance. We have set our helm towards the port of love, and towards it we will steer, come what may. Baffled often, love “endureth all things.”

It seems to me that I might read my text as if it said that love conquers in all stages of her life. She begins in conversion, and straightway those that mark her birth are angry, and the powers of evil are at once aroused to seek her destruction. Then she “beareth all things.” Let them mock, love never renders railing for railing: Isaac is not to be provoked by Ishmael’s jeers. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1617.cfm

The Difficulties of Love

Sherry Attributes of God, Christian Life, promises, salvation Leave a comment

Charity…beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. – 1 Corinthians 13:7

He that loveth is born of God, and he that is born of God loveth. He loveth Him that begat, even God, and he loveth him that is begotten of Him, even all the saved ones. He commences to obey the great command to love his neighbour as himself…No sooner is love born than she finds herself at war. Everything is against her, for the world is full of envy, hate, and ill-will. I would warn the most loving-hearted that they have entered upon a war for peace, a strife for love: they are born to hate hatred, and to contend against contention. As the lily among thorns, so is love among the sons of men. As the hind among the dogs, so is charity among the selfish multitude.

Evidently the difficulties of love are many…For, my brother, you will have to contend with all that is within yourself. Nothing in your original nature will help you. God has put within you a new life, but the old life seeks to smother it…Besides that, you will have to contend with “all things” in the persons whom you are called upon to love. You must have fervent charity towards the saints, but you will find very much about the best of them which will try your patience for, like yourself, they are imperfect…As for the ungodly whom you are to love to Christ, you will find everything in them that will oppose the drawings of your love, for they, like yourself, by nature are born in sin, and they are rooted in their iniquities…(Y)ou will have to contend with “all things” in the world, for the world lieth in the wicked one, and all its forces run towards self, and contention, and hate…And then remember that “all things” in hell are against you. What a seething mass of rebellious life, all venomous with hate, is seen in the regions of darkness…See, O my brother, what a battle is yours! ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1617.cfm