The God Kind of Love (part 10)

Fifteen Characteristics of the God Kind of Love (5)

Love keeps no lists of wrongs!

7.7.2024

2 Timothy 3:1-5 (NLT)

The Dangers of the Last Days

1 You should know this, Timothy, that in the last days there will be very difficult times. 2 For people will love only themselves and their money. They will be boastful and proud, scoffing at God, disobedient to their parents, and ungrateful. They will consider nothing sacred. 3 They will be unloving and unforgiving; they will slander others and have no self-control. They will be cruel and hate what is good. 4 They will betray their friends, be reckless, be puffed up with pride, and love pleasure rather than God. 5 They will act religious, but they will reject the power that could make them godly. Stay away from people like that!

We can choose to let the world dominate us or, we can counter with the God kind of love.

1 Corinthians 13:1-8 (MSG)

1 If I speak with human eloquence and angelic ecstasy but don’t love, I’m nothing but the creaking of a rusty gate.

2 If I speak God’s Word with power, revealing all his mysteries and making everything plain as day, and if I have faith that says to a mountain, “Jump,” and it jumps, but I don’t love, I’m nothing.

3-7 If I give everything I own to the poor and even go to the stake to be burned as a martyr, but I don’t love, I’ve gotten nowhere. So, no matter what I say, what I believe, and what I do, I’m bankrupt without love.

Love never gives up.

Love cares more for others than for self.

Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.

Love doesn’t strut,

Doesn’t have a swelled head,

Doesn’t force itself on others,

Isn’t always “me first,”

Doesn’t fly off the handle,

Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,

Doesn’t revel when others grovel,

Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,

Puts up with anything,

Trusts God always,

Always looks for the best,

Never looks back,

But keeps going to the end.

1 Corinthians 13:4-7 (NIV)

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

15 Characteristics of Love from 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

We’ve covered seven of the 15 characteristics:

1. Love is willing to suffer a long time – Love suffers long…

2. Love treats people kindly.

3. Love is not jealous.

4. Love does not brag.

5. Love is not proud.

6. Love is not rude.

7. The God kind of love puts others first.

Today: A bit more on:

8. Love will not respond with anger and offense.

Is not provoked.

Amplified:

it is not touchy or fretful or resentful;

Last week, I mentioned that there is both overt and covert anger.

There is anger that is obvious, like sharp responses in return with someone you disagree with.

And then anger that shows in more subtle ways – like giving the silent treatment, snide, critical remarks, sarcastic responses.

Perfectionism

(Life Application Study Bible NLT- Study Bible Notes)

Much irritability comes from a love of perfection, a deep desire that programs, meetings, and structures be run perfectly. A desire to run things perfectly can erupt into anger at events or people who get in the way or ruin that desire. Those who are easily irritated need to remember that perfection exists only in God. We need to love him and our fellow Christians, not the visions we have for perfection here on earth.

Touchiness, fretfulness, and resentment are all rooted in anger.

Anger in itself is not wrong. It’s what you do with it that makes it wrong.

Jesus was angry but never sinned. He got upset with the religious Pharisees of His day because they were using the Temple as a way to make money. He overturned the money changers’ tables, let the animals go, and slashed a whip in the air as He confronted their deceitful and blasphemous way of making money.

When is anger wrong?

Anger that is based on self-centered motives is wrong.

Like when you don’t get your way in a group of people, or when you are held up by circumstances beyond your control.

Anger is right when it is directed toward injustice done to someone else!

Ephesians 4:26-27 (NLT)

And “don’t sin by letting anger control you.” Don’t let the sun go down while you are still angry, 27 for anger gives a foothold to the devil.

Proverbs mentions anger several times:

Proverbs 14:29 (NLT)

People with understanding control their anger; a hot temper shows great foolishness.

Proverbs 25:28 (NLT)

A person without self-control is like a city with broken-down walls.

Proverbs 29:11 (NLT)

Fools vent their anger, but the wise quietly hold it back.

Proverbs 29:22 (NLT)

An angry person starts fights; a hot-tempered person commits all kinds of sin.

Ecclesiastes 7:9 (NLT)

Control your temper, for anger labels you a fool.

Ask God to help you control anger.

Deal with bitter roots!

If your response to someone is off-the-chart larger than the issue at hand, then a bitter root, or an unforgiveness issue with a person who has harmed you may be under the surface pushing you.

Don’t respond to someone until you have love, joy, and peace inside.

Philippians 2:1-4 (NKJV)

Therefore if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, 2 fulfill my joy by being like-minded, having the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. 3 Let nothing be done through selfish ambition or conceit, but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself. 4 Let each of you look out not only for his own interests, but also for the interests of others.

In my young years, I would go into a room and shut the door until I could control my emotions.

Even now, I tell the people around me if something makes me upset.

9. Love does not keep lists of wrongs.

Thinks no evil

(God’s Word) It doesn’t keep track of wrongs.

(Contemporary English Version) It doesn’t keep a record of wrongs that others do.

(East to Read Version) Love does not remember wrongs done against it.

(New Living Translation) it keeps no record of being wronged.

(New Century Version) Love does not count up wrongs that have been done.

(The Message Paraphrase) Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,

(Amplified) – Takes no account of the evil done to it: pays no attention to a suffered wrong.

Greek – logizomai

to take an inventory, i.e. estimate (literally or figuratively):

Despise, esteem, impute, lay, number, reason, reckon, suppose, think (on).

Love keeps no record of wrongs.

The Greek word here is logizomai and means to take an inventory. It means to make a list in your mind of what someone does to harm or bother you or to remember when someone does you wrong.

God’s love in us keeps no record of wrongs.

 

This characteristic is perhaps one of the best gauges of whether or not we’re walking in love.

We have left the love realm when we start holding others’ offenses against them and start making lists in our minds of their offenses against us.

The exception to this rule:

The other side of this, which I will address in detail later, is that there is a place for discipline that calls a person out for behavior that harms others.

2 Thessalonians 3:6 (NLT)

And now, dear brothers and sisters, we give you this command in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ: Stay away from all believers who live idle lives and don’t follow the tradition they received from us.

Titus 3:10-11 (NLT)

If people are causing divisions among you, give a first and second warning. After that, have nothing more to do with them. 11 For people like that have turned away from the truth, and their own sins condemn them.

Acts 20:29-30 (NLT)

I know that false teachers, like vicious wolves, will come in among you after I leave, not sparing the flock. 30 Even some men from your own group will rise up and distort the truth in order to draw a following.

1 Corinthians 5:9-11 (NLT)

When I wrote to you before, I told you not to associate with people who indulge in sexual sin. 10 But I wasn’t talking about unbelievers who indulge in sexual sin, or are greedy, or cheat people, or worship idols. You would have to leave this world to avoid people like that. 11 I meant that you are not to associate with anyone who claims to be a believer yet indulges in sexual sin, or is greedy, or worships idols, or is abusive, or is a drunkard, or cheats people. Don’t even eat with such people.

 

On the other hand, in our daily relationships, we are to pay no attention when others do things that we don’t like.

I was ministering to a man many years ago who had problems in his marriage. He sat in my office and began to tell me how difficult it was for him to live with his wife. He began to mention a plethora of problems he had with her. I decided to sit back and let him talk for a bit. I was taken aback by his next move. He stood up from his chair with a stack of computer paper in his hand, the kind used years ago that was joined and folded together. As he stood he said, Here is a list of each offense my wife has committed against me. As I examined the page after page of paper, I saw for each offense one line with a date, a time, and the nature of the offense. His action to indict his wife of all these “crimes” against him proved his own guilt of self-centeredness! This is a great example of the opposite of what we should do to others. Instead of remembering his wife’s offenses, he should have made a decision to take no account of them, and to treat his wife as if she had never done wrong.

 

The flesh loves to brood over past offenses. But love will move us away from the past, and will lead us to forget what others have done to harm us, and will urge us to treat them as though they had never harmed us in any way.

 

Many years ago while attending Bible school, I worked for a large grocery chain that was unionized. The winter of my first year there, a section of the labor force in the grocery chain decided to go on a strike to protest their benefits package. I was in charge of the night crew at the store, and decided to cross the picket line and go to work in spite of the opposition of union employees. One of the men who worked in the area that called the strike was holding up a sign in the picket line. He challenged me as I went to work, calling me all sorts of names. I just smiled at him each day as I crossed the line and went to work.

 

When the strike was over, this man who had made the harsh comments to me came to the front door of the store the first morning back from the strike and knocked so I could open it and let him in for work that day. When he saw me open the door and heard me greet him with good morning, he acted as though I was the invisible man, and walked past me without speaking. Later, before I left work, I saw him in a circle of people talking and walked up to the group and briefly entered the conversation. I made a comment to this man, and on purpose he acted as though I had said nothing and began abruptly talking to another person in the circle of people. For weeks thereafter, I was invisible to him. He never acknowledged my presence or spoke to me. He intended to ignore me to rub in the fact that I crossed the picket line.

 

I remembered the first day he acted this way that I was to walk in love and treat people as though they had never wronged me, that I was to take no account of the evil done to me, that I was to pay no attention to a suffered wrong. I decided to see what the love of God would do in this situation. I remembered that 1 Peter 4:8 (Amplified) says that love forgives and disregards the offenses of others.

 

I greeted him each morning for weeks with a hearty good morning as I called him by name. I spoke each time I saw him in the store. And I said not one word to anyone else about how he was treating me. He continued his invisible man treatment towards me for many weeks.

 

One day weeks later, I opened the door for him expecting the same cold shoulder I had received in the past. But this time, He greeted me with a good morning Mitch, and a hearty handshake. And thereafter, he was warm and pleasant again, and conversed freely with me and others. I never mentioned the incident, and I did not bring it up to him. Love had won!

 

As a young man in my early twenties, this incident taught me an invaluable lesson as to the power of agape love. Love never fails! We do have the ability to love the unlovely and the cantankerous!

 

You may be involved in a difficult home relationship or a troubled relationship at work.

It may be a relationship with a family member or neighbor that has become testy.

Be the person that chooses to walk in love, choosing not to take account of the wrongs committed against you.

Treat the offending party as though they had done no wrong.

Treat them the way you want to be treated yourself.

Act in love towards them. Ignore the emotions of revenge or ill-will.

Focus on loving with this supernatural agape that God has placed in your spirit.

Meditate on 1 Corinthians 13:4-8 until it oozes out of you in words, tones, thought, motives, and actions.

Action Points:

1. How do you control your anger?

2. Are you easily offended?

3. Do you keep lists in your mind of others’ wrongs against you?