I'm going to turn to the book of 1 Corinthians chapter 13. 1 Corinthians chapter 13, kind of go with what we preached on this morning about holiness because A lot of what's in chapter 13 is getting us into a state of holiness. It's trying to help us to see, to move forward, to move on. And there's a lot of things mentioned. Of course, the context of this is back in the early church there were some special apostolistic gifts in that age that people had guessed that they were able to do miraculous things. I know it was for the furtherance of the gospel to give evidence that God was with them. But of course, anything that a church can do, you know, as you see even going back into Moses' day there in Egypt, you had the magicians that would try to copy whatever Moses would do. Take a staff, turn it into a snake, you know, things of this nature. And so, these were only meant to be for a time until the church, you know, got established and got going, and then they were to be done away with. And that's even talked about in 1 Corinthians 13. But because you had people thinking, well, you know, I got this gift. I can speak in tongues. Well, I can interpret. Well, I can lay hands on somebody and they be healed. Well, God gives me prophecies and things of this nature. Because of those things, A lot of envy got in the church. And, you know, people wanted to have the most excellent gifts, and that's even covered if you want to go and study it into chapter 14, which gives a clarification of all that. But God is trying to say, I'm trying to get you mature to desire something better. I'm trying to get you to focus on the things that are better. And as you look into chapter 13, he's going to go through a list of things, and we'll read it here in just a moment, but he's trying to get down to the point, if we need to focus on what's really important, and not be so captivated by things that we think are important, and not be distracted by even the gifts that existed at that time in the church. But I want to pick up in verse 1 of 1 Corinthians chapter 13, but before we do, we do want to look to the Lord in prayer. Heavenly Fathers, we come to you this day. Father, we're so thankful for the many wonderful things that you've done for us. And Father, you have been far better to us than we deserve. And Father, as we walk with you, help us to seek those things which are better. Help us, Father, to focus on being Your children, Your people, that, Father, we could let others see Christ within us, and, Father, even at this local church, that we could be a light in this community for others. Father, we desire to accomplish Your will, and we know it takes Your Word and the leadership of Your Holy Spirit to accomplish these things. Help us to yield to You, that we can see Your blessings, and for the good that is accomplished, Let us step aside and give you the praise, for it's in Jesus' name we do pray. Amen. In verse 1 of chapter 13 of the book of 1 Corinthians, he said, though I speak with the tongues of men, and what he's saying there, if I could speak all languages, you know, I've come across some people, I'm amazed when they can speak two or three languages. I've met some people, I think, six or seven languages they could speak, and I'm going, how do you even remember what goes where? What word fits with what language? I'm amazed by all that, when people do that. I pray for one day that I can learn to speak too, and at least have conversations with people from a different country in some way. But to be able to speak, he said, if I could speak with all the tongues of men, though I speak with the tongues of men, and he added on, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become a sounding brass or a tinkling cymbal. And so again, He's focusing our attention. He's saying, you need to understand how important charity is. And charity, one of the reasons I love the King James Bible, it's one of the few that doesn't change this to the word love, nor should it. Because we think of love a lot of times, and we think about it from a humanistic standpoint. And God wanted to let us know that this is a different word. This is something different. In fact, charity is the maturity of God. It is the love of God. It's on a level that's higher than man. But it is the level that we pursue towards as Christians. Again, we're pressing toward that mark of the high calling in Christ Jesus. And He says, if I don't have charity, I'm become as a sounding brass or tinkling cymbal, just something that makes noise. Instead of having something that's distinct and makes sense, it's just something that makes noise. He says, and though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries, and let me just stop there and think about that for just a moment. How many of you would like to know all the mysteries of the Bible? I mean, how many of you would really like to understand all the weeks back in the book of Daniel? How many of you would like to understand all the things written in Ezekiel and Revelation and things? And I mean, you know it from beginning to end. You have all that knowledge. And notice he's saying, you could have all that. You could understand all mysteries and all knowledge. And though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains. We think faith, I mean, it's impossible to please God without faith. Faith is this big, gigantic thing. But He says, if I don't have charity, I am nothing. That's a powerful statement. Sometimes we lift people up because they say, man, the intellect that this person has, this person's ability to understand scriptures and to lay them out where I can understand them and their ability to communicate, to speak, their knowledge in things. And then we think about faith. This person believes God with all their heart. They follow God with all their heart. And man, they've got everything. He says, not if you don't have charity. You don't have charity. He says, I am nothing. That's how important charity is. He says, and though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor. See, this is what we declare as charity in our understanding. We think about as charitable giving. He says, well, you can bestow all, you know, your goods to feed the poor. And though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profit me nothing." And thinking about giving your body up. You know, I love reading accounts when people give up their body for different reasons. You know, somebody jumps in front of somebody else to take a bullet or push them out of the way of a moving car, you know, does something that we consider greatly heroic. He says, you can be heroic. You can even have sacrificial love, but that's not the same as the charity of God. It's not the same. And if I don't have charity, it will profit me nothing. He says, charity suffereth long. And here's where I want to dig in. I want to start digging in to what charity is. Charity suffers long. How long are we willing to suffer? See, Christ suffered for us. Christ suffered for us. And not just a little bit, I mean, He gave it all. He suffered. was willing to endure, and not just on the cross. You can go back before that. He suffered the reproaches of the Pharisees and the scribes and, you know, the Sadducees and all that. He dealt with them rejecting Him, you know, telling lies upon Him, mocking Him, all these things. How much are we willing to suffer? Some people talk about, oh, I have charity. Okay, how much are you able to suffer? Because that gives evidence of it. There's a lot of times people think they're a lot more spiritual than they are, but you start to look at it from a scriptural standpoint, and all of a sudden, I think every single one of us could say, I can see places where I need to grow. But charity suffereth long. Then it says, and is kind. Now, some people think, you know, kindness is, well, I'm just smiling all the time, and I have this kind of welcoming attitude, and there's part of that that's involved, but you don't have to smile all the time to be kind. And I'll say this, we as Christians, I had somebody ask me one time, he says, as Christians, are we supposed to just smile and grin all the time? I said, if that's the case, I said, Jesus wouldn't fit it. Because there were times that he wept. There were times that he mourned. There were times that he was grieved. There were times he was even angry. I mean, he overthrew the money changers table. I don't think he did that with a big ol' smile on his face. You know, there's no evidence of those things. You gotta look at what's being given here. When you're suffering long and you're being kind, You're enduring some things, and I know endurance will be mentioned a little bit later, but you're not seeking revenge. You're not seeking to get even. You're not seeking to win. You're trying to be good for the right reason. You're trying to treat others the way you'd want them to be treated, the way you would want them to treat you, even if that's not the way they treat you. It's a different standard. Jesus loved us in such a special way that when He went to the cross, He was saying, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do. That's kindness, isn't it? He could have brought wrath, but instead He showed kindness. He showed mercy. He looked upon the multitudes and had compassion upon them. And so that's the kindness that He's referring to there. Are we kind? It says, charity envieth not. I don't want what belongs to somebody else. I don't want somebody else's life. I don't want somebody else's look. I don't want somebody else's possession. I don't even want somebody else's gifts, talents. I want to use whatever God's given me to the best of my ability. Charity doesn't envy. It doesn't look out and wish for something different than what it has. Charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up. Pride is the opposite of charity. There's a lot of people today that they want attention, they want recognition. There's even sometimes, even in pulpits, that people want recognition. Recognize me for my talents, recognize me for my abilities. I don't need to be lifted up. Christ needs to be lifted up. You know, Jesus came and He said, I didn't come to do my own will, but the will of Him that sent me. You know, He sought to do His Father's will. He could have lifted Himself up in so many ways, but He didn't seek that personal attention. He didn't seek those things. He was certainly not puffed up in arrogance. Nor do we need to be. We need to have the charity of God where we're not seeking recognition, attention. We just want to do what is right. Doth not behave itself unseemly. We've almost lost the meaning of that in our society today. What that means. But it means a manner that's unbecoming. What's unbecoming of a Christian? Well, I don't want to act in a way that's ungodly. I don't want to act in a way that, again, distracts, does damage, does harm. As a Christian, I want to behave myself as that, as a follower of Christ. And so I am putting on the characteristics of Christ that I do not behave myself unseemly, out of character, out of order. It says, seeketh not her own. Y'all ever notice how individual focused we are? You know, we create trophies for everything, and we create awards for everything. I mean, it's gotten so bad that, you know, they have, like, transition things at some schools for, like, you go to the fifth grade to the sixth grade, we gotta have a ceremony for it. I gotta get some recognition, you know, in some way, shape, form, or fashion. Look, you go 18 years, I mean, you get to 18 years old and you've gone 12 years, 13 years of school, if you want to count kindergarten, you graduate, nobody minds a little ceremony. You actually go through the four years, or, you know, six years, or whatever degree you're getting in college, on up to doctorate, yeah, you did something real big, you know, we got that. But it's just another day. It's just another movement. I'll even say this, as for myself, I don't have to have a big thing for my birthday. You know, there's people that think, oh man, you gotta have a birthday party, have a big thing. Look, I don't mind going out and eating with my family and visiting a little bit, having a little time, but somebody's like, you gonna take off for work on your birthday? Why? I mean, I get it if it's my 50th birthday or my 100th birthday, yeah, I got that. But, you know, it's like people are stuck sometimes in this perpetual childhood state that they've got to have attention. And also, in the world we live in, y'all ever notice how people, well, here's the money I've got to make, and here's the job I've got to have, and here's all these other things. And look, having a good job is not wrong. Somebody going to college to chase a career that they feel like God would be honored in them having, there's certainly nothing wrong with those things, but to chase things for personal agenda is not good. The thing we need to even teach our young people is don't seek an income, don't seek a certain amount of money or things. Find out how you can be useful And I'll say this, if you've ever been to the doctor, a good doctor is useful. He's helpful if he actually does his job and does it well. I mean, you've probably had good doctors and bad doctors, all of us, in our life. A good one is worth something, isn't it? I mean, one that really cares, really wants to find out what the problem is, and wants to get it cured. Doesn't want to just give some pill to cover up whatever symptoms there are, but actually wants to cure it. Actually is hoping I don't see you for a while. I want you so cured that I don't have to see you for a while. That's the goal. Those people are valuable. You know, there is laws in our land. I'll tell you this, I'm not the biggest fan of lawyers because most lawyers we have is how much money can we get, how much settlement can we get, how much can we sue for or do different things and that's done a lot of damage to our nation. But when you really get in a bind and you actually have to go to a lawyer and they actually care about what your case is, what your grievance is, how it is affected by law, and they're actually trying to help you. Well, that person can be valuable. I'll tell you this, have your car break down. How valuable is a good mechanic? If you've ever had a bad one, and we've probably all had some bad mechanics before that didn't fix the problem, you have a good one, you want to visit them again, again, again, anytime you have a problem because you know they're going to try to fix it. They're not going to try to take advantage of you. They're not going to just throw something out there that they hope might work. I mean, somebody that actually knows the vehicle and can fix whatever problem you're dealing with, that mechanic is actually helpful to other people. They have a skill. They have the ability. And look, you could go to a painter, somebody that can paint well, somebody that builds good cabinets. It doesn't matter what direction you go in, good teachers. I mean, you can go through a list of things. But what we should teach our children is learn a skill. Learn something in your life where you can actually use your life to be a help to somebody else. in some way, shape, form, or fashion. Are they ever going to be out of work if they can do that? Will they probably make enough money to provide for their family? Yes. But yet a lot of times, you know, the way we think about things in Western society is we're seeking how do I get things for me without considering the consequences for other people. But when we're seeking charity, we're not thinking about what's in it for me. We're thinking about how to help somebody else. And that's the attitude that we need to have as godly people. We're not seeking our own, but we're seeking how we can be used. And I'll say this, that goes to the highest level, doesn't it? How many congressmen do you think we have that actually seeks to help the citizens? When they make that, you know, oath, I swear to uphold the Constitution of the United States of America, which is a constitution set on a limited federal government. Self-governance is the principle that we were founded upon. How many of you think that's in Congress that actually believes that? That the people know how to run their lives better than the government does. And that they need limited government rule and what the government should do is make sure that they have access to chase helping others in their life and living their life free. How many believes in that? Or how many is there for their own personal reasons? But as a Christian, we shouldn't seek our own. We're seeking what's good for everybody. Not one group of people, not this particular group of people that might put money in my account or whatever else. What's right for freedom, for liberty, for everybody? Very few look at it that way. And the reason that they don't is because that's not the way that we as a society have taught. And to get that further on down, that's not the way that churches have actually taught its people to live. Seeketh not our own is not easily provoked. And that's one that always needs to be looked closely at. How easily are we provoked? How easily can somebody bring us to anger, get us ready to fight? And fighting doesn't just mean with a fist, it can mean with words. How easy is it for somebody to provoke us to anger, to wrath, to lust, whatever it might be? How easily are we provoked? Then it gets to the mind. Thinketh no evil. It didn't say doeth no evil. It gets deeper than that, doesn't it? Thinketh no evil. That I want to be good to other people. I don't think about doing them wrong. Think about taking advantage of them. Think about cheating somebody, lying to somebody, misleading somebody. As a Christian, our hearts are not to be on evil. And yet many say, well, as long as we don't do something wrong, it's fine to think this way or look at things this way. No. If I'm really chasing charity, I want my mind to be pure. The battles that we fight always begin in the mind. And if you're losing the battles in your mind, you will lose them in the flesh. As a child of God, we need to focus on how we think, how we look at things, how we look at other people. We need to make sure that our mind is not thinking evil. If we're accepting sin, we're not helping somebody. Let me give us a small example. I've had this experience about five times in the last month, and people, I guess, think that they're doing something good, but they're actually not. You ever get to a four-way? Somebody beats you to the four-way stop. And they wait on you to get there for you to stop. Then they flash their lights to say they want you to go first. I've had that happen probably five times in the last month. They didn't help me. They actually delayed me. It's what they did. And that's the way a lot of people do with their thinking when they get out of the will of God. They say, well, my way, I'm actually trying to help this person. If it's against God's word, you're not helping them. If I say I'm showing kindness to people because I let them live in sin or I even uphold their sinful nature, if I uphold somebody living in fornication, homosexuality, adultery, vile language, whatever it is, I'm not only not helping them, I'm not helping all of society. I'm actually doing a disservice. Well, I'm long-suffering with them. I'm, you know, I'm accepting. There's another word for that that you need to throw in there. You're enabling. You're enabling bad behavior. You're enabling things that are wrong. And there's sometimes that people get so caught up in what they think is love that they actually don't realize that they're hurting people. You know, we got into the transgender movement. When you physically change somebody's body, there's people who say, oh, we're letting them be whoever they think they want to be. That's not helpful. That's hurtful. It leads to a higher suicide rate, and it usually leads to things in people's lives where they regret. Because, just because you think something for a day or time doesn't mean you want to take things in life or have surgeries in life that will totally transform you for the rest of your days. It's not good. And yet there's people that think, oh I'm so loving and compassionate and I'm all these things and you're not. You're actually enabling evil because you're actually enabling people to live in a false reality, in something that's not right. When we're on the things of God, thinking no evil means I think of what is righteous, what is holy, what is good. If you're thinking about what's righteous, that's what is right. We forget that if we don't help people move towards that which is good and right, We're not helping them and we're actually thinking evil towards them. We mentioned about chastening, spanking this morning. What does the Bible say about a father that doesn't chasten his son? The Bible says he hateth him. He hateth him. There's a lot of people out there that says, oh, I'm just so loving and caring for my children. No, you're not. You hate them. And so when our mindset goes contrary to the mind of God, we're thinking evil, whether we realize it or not. Everything looks good in our own mind, but we're to be focused on the righteousness of God, and we need to make sure that our thoughts are not against the thoughts of God, or else we're thinking evil and doing harm. In verse 6 it says, "...rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth." What causes us to rejoice? Is it a dirty joke? Is it seeing somebody else fail? Is it seeing somebody we don't like have something bad happen to them? Does that cause us rejoicing? Or to re-rejoice in things that are true? You know, there's times when people are not happy because somebody else had something good to happen to them. We don't have charity right if we can't rejoice when somebody else has something to rejoice over. You know, in all the years it took Susan and I to have our first child, I was always happy when I heard somebody else, you know, that was married that got pregnant. I was never going, well, I wish that was me. I never thought bad about somebody else having something good there. There's other faults and failures I have, but on that note, I didn't think that. I didn't think, well, if I can't have something nice, then nobody else should. Man, you can't think that way. There's some people that do. When they're struggling financially and somebody else gets a good job or gets a promotion or something else, instead of rejoicing for that person, they're angry at them or jealous of them. I've even seen this before with a person, you know, that their friends get married before they do. Now they get kind of jealous of them and say, why is it them and not me? I shouldn't think that way. I should be happy for them. I'm happy when they get married. I want them to have a successful marriage. I want things to go well. I want, you know, somebody got a job before I did or got a better paying job or whatever came about. I shouldn't be jealous. I shouldn't be envious. I shouldn't rejoice in iniquity. I should rejoice in the truth. And that mostly goes to the Word of God. When people are doing what's right, that should rejoice me. When somebody's doing something that's wrong, that should be painful for me to see. If we're not careful, we can rejoice in things that are ungodly. And we can be upset of things that are godly, and we shouldn't be. We don't rejoice in iniquity, but we rejoice in the truth. Verse 7 gets a little bit deeper here, "...beareth all things." I've told young men several times, I said, learn to have broad shoulders. And I don't mean that from necessarily a physical standpoint, but a spiritual standpoint. You know, the Bible teaches us to grow in such a fashion that we can not only bear our own cross, but we can help somebody else with their cross. We're supposed to grow and mature to the place that I can be a help and a blessing to somebody else. But a lot of times people are saying, I don't want to bear my own cross. But we're supposed to bear our cross and follow the Lord. We need to teach, have broad shoulders. The weight of life is heavy, isn't it? Life is heavy. Life is hard. It always has been, always will be. Is marriage easy? No, it's work. There's a lot of people who go into marriage and say, oh, this thing should be the easiest thing in the world. I don't care how much in love you are with the person you get married with, to continue it on for 50, 60 years, or however long you're going to have with that person in life, you're going to have to work at it. Now, it's a lot easier when your heart is in it, and when you're willing to put forth the work. It actually makes it easier. I'll tell you this, working a job is hard, isn't it? How many of y'all have ever struggled with bills? No matter how hard you work and what you do, it's still a struggle to get by. And it seems like as soon as you get a little bit of air somewhere, something else happens. You know, years ago, I set out a budget that I gave to my dad before I got married. I said, this is how much I'll have to make. This is how much everything costs. And dad said, you need to put another column in there. You left something out. I said, what do you mean? He said, you haven't put anything in there for miscellaneous. He said, you think those tires are going to run forever on your vehicle? He said, where's that in your budget? He said, you think you're ever going to get sick and miss some work some weeks? You don't get paid? He said, you don't have that in your budget. What about going to the doctor? He said, when you have children, you don't know this yet, but when you have children, they're going to get stitches at some point and you're going to have to pay out of pocket for it. He said, even if you've got a good insurance plan, it's usually 80-20. He said, you're going to have to come up with that 20%. If it's a good doctor bill, that 20% can get a little bit. What about your deductible for your insurance when you get in a wreck? You've got to put something aside for what you don't see coming. Because what do we know about life? The unexpected will happen. It just will. Well, guess what? When it happens, you've got to bear it. You've got to bear your failures. You've got to bear your mistakes. You've got to bear what other people deal with, what they face. You've got to bear their feelings, their emotions, all kinds of things. And that's just even within your own home, let alone the people you work with, what you deal with, with maybe your boss or whatever might come. But you've got a weight that you've got to carry. And not everybody's weight is the same, but I'll tell you this, we all gonna have a weight to carry in life. Are you gonna be able to bear it? What about this? Can you bear failure? Can you bear heartache? How many of you have had a broken heart in life? How many of you have had a family member even treat you wrong? You ever have somebody take advantage of your kindness and it cost you something? Those are things you have to bear. And if we're growing in the Lord as we should, we bear those things. We say, that's my burden. That's mine to deal with. I'll take it up." And as we grow in the Lord, we not only learn how to do that for ourselves, when we see somebody else hurting, you go to Galatians chapter 6 and look there. You know, He said, "...bear ye one another's burdens." You have to get to the place that you not only bear what you have to deal with in life, but you care enough that you see somebody else hurting, somebody else going through difficult times, difficult situations, and you take that up. You ever known somebody to have to step in and, my goodness, in our day and time, you ever known grandparents that have had to raise the children? They not only had to deal with the natural things they were dealing with in their life, then they had to bear something else. You ever known somebody that saw somebody maybe at work or in maybe extended family that was going through hard times and they might not have let anybody really know about it. They didn't try to make it acknowledgeable, but they may have helped that person with their water bill or their power bill or something else they stepped in and took an extra burden on. And sometimes that's emotional things we have to take on. What about people that finds out that one of their friends are being abused? Is there women that have not only had to take care of their problems at home but then had to help out a friend because this woman over here was being abused and they tried to step in and help her out? You had all this weight on you already but then you had to step in for somebody else and sometimes that's even a child stepping in for a parent that's become disabled. Stepping in for a child that's gotten sick or whatever might happen and that doesn't just happen when they're young, does it? We've seen families have to make extra sacrifices. You have to know how to bear all things, don't you? And we do it, and we do it gladly. We beareth all things. Next one's even harder, believeth all things. And I think you can connect believeth all things, hopeth all things, but I know they're two separate things, but you can join those together a little bit. Believing all things is trusting God even when things look hopeless. I trust in the promises of God even if I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. And I promise you, your faith will be tried to the point that at some point in time you won't be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but you just have to say, God, I'm going to put one foot in front of the other and just trust you. I believe all things. And that all things is from the Lord, all the promises that He's given. Holding on to them even when people say you have no reason to hold on. No, I believe Him. Job made a great statement when he said, though He slay me still will I serve Him. That means I believe Him no matter what comes. Hope with all things. There's so many times that people say, well, there's no hope. There's no joy. There's nothing to look forward to. Everything's doom and gloom. As long as there's breath, there's hope. There's lost people that I still believe that God can deal with them and they can turn and trust in Christ. There's saved people that have walked away from God and they're living for self instead of the Lord. I still believe that they can turn and come back. I haven't given up on them. I even have hope for America. I even have hope for society. People say, you're wasting that. As long as God is giving us an opportunity, there's an opportunity for repentance. We've got to have hope. Hope with all things. And the last part of verse 7 is this. Endureth all things. What can I endure? A lot of people in life have a little bit of pain and they quit. The cares of life God talked about has choked out a lot of people. Choked out that good seed that's been laid down. The longer you live in life, you understand it's not the fastest that always wins. It's not the strongest that always wins. It's not the smartest that always wins. It's those who just never quit. Those who just never give up. Y'all ever go back and look at Jacob in the Bible? And somebody correct me if I got the name wrong, but I believe it's Jacob that wrestled with the angel. Y'all ever notice that he didn't quit in the fight? His thigh got out of place? How many of us would quit? He said, I'm not letting go. My dad told me years ago, he found out that I got the nickname in high school, and y'all don't ever have to use this on me, but for the sake of the message, I'll let it be known. I got the nickname when I played football as Turtle. The reason I did is because with the shoulder pads that went up to here on me, my head barely sticking out. I looked like a little head of a turtle sticking out of its shell. Dad got a kick out of that. He said, do you know my nickname used to be Turtle? I said, but you didn't play football. He said, I didn't get it from football. He said, if I got in a fight, I'd bit people. And he said I wouldn't let go. And you know, I've always thought about that. Sometimes it's good when you don't let go. when you don't quit easily. You just endure. I'll tell you what, some of the best messages, uh, messages, not that, some of the best marriages probably have got to be successful because somebody wouldn't quit. Years ago, Brother Doug Barber was preaching in a message, and he talked about early in his marriage, his wife got so upset at him that she was ready to leave him. She started packing up her suitcase. I mean, it was serious. I mean, she was packing up her suitcase, ready to go back home. And he grabbed his suitcase out and started packing his clothes. She said, what are you doing? He said, I made a vow that we're sticking together for life. He said, if you go, I go. We ain't quitting. I tell you, there's a lot to be said about endurance, isn't there? What we can endure, what we can go through and not quit, not give up. And a lot of the reasons that we get somewhere in life is we just never quit. I'll tell you what, God's never quit on us and we should never quit on the Lord. A lot of times the greatest blessing we find in life is not quitting. Again, that goes back to even what Job said, though He slayed me, still will I serve Him. I'll endure this. I'll go through it. There's a lot to be said about what we are willing to endure. What we are willing to face and go through. And again, it all comes back to Christ. In verse 8 it says, "...charity never faileth." You might as well replace that with, "...God never fails." Because that's what it's really getting to here. Charity is that perfect love, righteousness, mercy. Every quality you can find about God, that's who it is. We are pressing toward a mark that God has given for us. God never fails. And if I'm a follower of Christ, what does that mean for me? I don't quit. I don't give up. I forgive as God, for Christ's sake, hath forgiven me. I'm long-suffering, I'm merciful, compassionate, stand up for truth. All the things that God is, we put that on because God never fails. And I'm going to point this towards us men here for just a moment. Who's the head of the home? By Scripture, the man is. Men, how important is it for you to let your children know that you are dependable, you are trustworthy, They can rely upon you. You know, our neighbors are to rely upon us to love them as ourselves, as a Christian. Our bosses are to rely upon us because we're to work not as unto them, but as unto the Lord. Our wives are supposed to depend upon us because we're to love them as Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it. A lot of sacrifice is put forth in that. It should be known I don't fail. You say, preacher, it's impossible for me as a man not to fail. Yeah, but that's the mark I press toward. You can depend upon me. You can rely upon me. You can trust me. And the only reason that we do that is because it's what Christ did for us. He set the example. And we're following Him. If I'm a true Christian, a follower of Christ, I'm following after His attributes, His qualities. If it says charity never fails, what that means is as a Christian, I want others to see Christ living within me. And if I want them to see Christ living in me, you can depend upon me. You can trust me. You can rely upon me to get the job done. If Christ never fails and He's our example, God never fails, He's our example, and I'm a follower of His, it is my goal. I don't let people down. I don't fail. I don't quit. I don't give up. I endure. That's what Christ did all the way to the cross for me. It is what I'm to do with my life. The hardships come, they go. But we as Christians are to remain the same. He said, charity never faileth. But whether they be prophecies, they shall fail. Whether they be tongues, they shall cease. Whether they be knowledge, it shall vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part, but when that which is perfect is come, that being the Word of God, the completed Word of God, then that which is in part shall be done away. When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But when I became a man, what does that statement mean? Child to manhood. It's a state of maturity, isn't it? maturing in the Lord. I thought as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things. I stopped seeking what I wanted. I stopped seeking attention. I stopped seeking, you know, things that were about envy, covetousness, all these other things. I put that away so that I could put on Christ. When I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then shall I know even as I am also known. And now abideth faith, hope, charity. These three, but the greatest of these is charity, because the greatest of these is the fullness of Christ. Charity is the fullness of Christ. And that's the goal that we press toward. Even when you go to 2 Peter chapter 1, what's the last thing on the list that we add to our faith? Charity. It is a state of full maturity in the Lord. That's the mark that we're pressing toward. That's the mark that we want to obtain and to as a child of God. And I pray that we will. Pray for me that I press toward that mark. and aim to achieve it. Got a long way to go, but it's the mark that I'm pressing toward. Let's press toward it together. This is the burden that God has given us. If you'd have anything upon your heart, we'd invite you to come. I have verse for some.