Amen. Thank you, Gary, and good morning, everybody. Well, if you're not already there, I'd invite you to turn to 1 Corinthians 13, and we are, if you were here last week, you know that we're spending a few weeks in this great chapter just revisiting these glorious truths of the nature of God's holy love and what that means for His purposes to be worked out among His people, even in the context of a local church. So we're in 1 Corinthians chapter 13. Before we get started, I want to remind many of you, especially those of you who are members here, we sent out in our e-newsletter this last week just a little note, among other things, about a brief members meeting that we're going to have next Sunday morning, the 16th, immediately following our service. Just to touch base on a few brief items, but we felt like that was probably the best context in which for that to happen. So a week from today, immediately following the service, a members meeting. Again, it's particularly for those of you who are members. If you're not a member here, you're certainly welcome to hang around and kind of eavesdrop on what we do, but we want to make sure that you're aware of that and able to be a part of that. well, 1 Corinthians chapter 13. Our world, as we know, is filled with many beautiful places. Certainly here in California and within just a few hours of us, we can find some of the most extraordinarily beautiful places on the planet. Lake Tahoe, the Great Redwoods, Carmel, Monterey, Pacific Grove, that whole area, Yosemite, the list could go on and on. Now, of course, we acknowledge nothing in California can compare with the stunning beauty of somewhere like, say, Oklahoma, but we do the best that we can with what we've got, right, and we try to try to make it work. But we intrinsically understand beauty, don't we? And like metal drawn to a magnet, we instinctively are drawn to beauty, aren't we? Whenever you visit a captivatingly beautiful place, don't you want to stay there as long as you can and just kind of drink it all in? Such places can indeed provoke and enliven all of our senses and leave us overwhelmed with a sense of awe and wonder and delight. And as we know, visiting such places can indeed be profoundly refreshing. And yet, for all of the magnificent, breathtaking beauty that God has displayed throughout His creation, His Word reveals to us that there is no beauty like the extraordinary beauty of His holy love. God is love. And the radiant, life-giving, soul-redeeming beams of His holy love in Jesus Christ for sinful, helpless men and women like you and I, it's unlike any love in this fallen world that this world could ever conceive of. And Christians are those who have come to drink of the riches of God's holy love through faith in Jesus Christ. Christians are those who have tasted and seen that God is good and that we live in the permanent hope of all of the promises of his word. Promises like John 3, verse 16, for God so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life. And of course, nothing is more fundamental for we who are Christians than the blessed obligation that because God has first loved us in Jesus, we're to respond in love to him with our heart and our soul and our mind and our strength, and we're to love our neighbors as ourselves. This, of course, is basic, and this is what the Apostle Paul calls the Corinthians, the Corinthian Christians, back to in 1 Corinthians chapter 13, the passage that Spencer read a few moments ago. And Paul's aim throughout this entire chapter, and really throughout the entire letter, is to call Christians to live a life of holy love in the church. Beloved Christian, if you are one who has come to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, God calls you, as he calls me, as he calls every Christian, to live a life of holy love in the church. And in this chapter, Paul drives home the obligation and the urgency of this call in chapter 13 with really three points. The first, in verses one to three, is that holy love is essential. The second that we're gonna begin to look at in some detail today in verses four to seven is that holy love is extraordinary. I think last week I said it was exacting, and it is exacting, but even more, it's extraordinary, and it's exacting. Holy love is extraordinary. That's verses four to seven. And then the third point that Paul makes in verses eight to 13 is that holy love is eternal. Now, just a little bit of review of what we looked at last week in verses 1 to 3, that holy love is essential in the church. What we saw in those verses is that the responsibility of God's people to love one another is vital, it is indispensable, and it's non-negotiable. And Paul makes this point with the exaggerated hyperbole of what he says in verses 1 to 3, emphasizing the essential necessity of holy love. Now this exhortation, of course, connects with the metaphor that Paul introduces in chapter 12 about the local church being the body of Christ. And it includes the fact that God has given every Christian different spiritual gifts and functions within his body. Every part matters. And it is God's holy love that is to motivate, animate, and energize every part of the body to care for and to build up the entire body. And when this holy, supernatural, spirit-empowered love is present in a local church, it powerfully shows the world that Jesus is real. And Paul is making clear that a local church without love is tragically dysfunctional and tragically dishonoring to God. And so loving Jesus means loving His body. If you don't love His body, you don't really love Him. And so, love in the local church is like our physical bodies. It's like blood in our physical bodies. It must be present. You can't live without it. And if you or I think that we're, as a Christian, think that we're something because of our spiritual gifts, or because of our knowledge, or because of our ability, or because of our sacrifices, or whatever else it may be, if we think all of that, but we don't have love, what Paul's saying in verses one to three is that we're nothing, and we're ultimately useless. In fact, as we learn elsewhere in Scripture, in 1 John 4, verses 7 and 8, John says there that the one who doesn't love doesn't know God, regardless of what you might profess. Love is the mark of authenticity, holy love. And so, this is Paul's first point, that God's holy love is essential. Well, of course the question then comes, if this holy love is essential, what does it look like in action? And this is what Paul goes on to explain in verses 4 to 7. And again, the point here in verses 4 to 7 is to say that holy love is extraordinary. It is exacting, it's also extravagant, but maybe all of that can be lumped together in saying holy love is extraordinary. So in verses four to seven, Paul gives a rich, multi-layered, penetrating picture of God's holy love in action in his people. And what he says here is not so much a definition of love as it is a vivid description. It's an exquisite portrait of holy love. In other words, Paul is painting a masterpiece of what the extraordinary beauty of God's holy love should look like among his people in a local church. Now, this description is comprehensive, but it's not exhaustive, because the entire New Testament, in interfacing with the Old Testament, has much to say about the many nuances and the many dimensions of God's holy love among His people. Nonetheless, Paul is describing the beautiful and extraordinary and extravagant ways that believers are to manifest God's holy love with one another in the local church. And let me just read verses 4 through 7 again. Let's hear these magnificent words. Love is patient and kind. Love does not envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, it believes all things, it hopes all things, and it endures all things. Now in the structure of this passage, of these verses, notice how Paul begins verse 4 with really a two-sided positive summary of the essence of holy love. It is patient and kind. Everything else that Paul will say really elaborates on that summary at the beginning of verse 4. And so from the end of verse four through verse six, what we find is a series of eight negative statements that reveal what holy love is not and what holy love does not do. And Paul uses these negative statements to highlight the difference between true and false love. And he does this because the Corinthians were all too guilty of displaying this false love. Well, Paul then concludes his description in verse seven with four all things statements. And these all things statements show how comprehensively this holy love of patience and kindness is to be lived out. Now this morning, we're just gonna look at the summary, Paul's opening summary of holy love at the beginning of verse four, this two-sided statement, love is patient and kind. And with the force of Paul's loving exhortation, it is very straightforward. And here's the point of all of it. It's very clear and straightforward. Christians must overflow with the patience and kindness of Jesus to one another. Christians must overflow with the patience and the kindness of Jesus to one another. Now what I want to do this morning as we consider this is really just ask three questions. What Why and how? That's how we're gonna consider this passage. What, why, and how? So the first question, what? What is the meaning of patience and kindness as the summary of holy love? Well, when he says patient, what that means is to be patient. And the noun form of that word, here it's in a verbal form, but the noun form literally has to do with being long-suffering, willing to suffer a long time. One grammarian has explained this word in this way in its original Greek form. He says it is a state of emotional calm in the face of provocation or misfortune and without complaint or irritation. Let me say it again. This sense of patience is a state of emotional calm in the face of provocation or misfortune and without complaint or irritation. It means to keep one's heart from jumping. It means to have a waiting heart. And so to be patient means to demonstrate this patience, this emotional calm in the face of provocation, despite whatever difficulties may be bringing the provocation. That's the sense of patience. Now, this term is used many other places in the New Testament. We find it in Ephesians 4, verse 2. We find it in 1 Thessalonians 5, verse 14. We find it in 2 Timothy 2, verse 24. 2 Timothy 4, verse 2. Many other places and in many other contexts. It's a very common word. It's evident. It's very distinct as a fruit of God's Spirit. Now the opposite of patience, of course, we know this not only intellectually, but sadly we all know it experientially because we've all been guilty of it. The opposite of it is what? Impatience, being quickly irritable, being quickly given to anger and frustration and explosiveness and just flying off the handle as we say. One of the early church fathers, John Chrysostom, he says this about patience, quote, it is a word which is used of the person who is wronged and has it easily in their power to avenge themselves, but will never do it. And so in other words, this sense of patience is not just biting your lip while you're boiling inside, but it means that there's no boil on the inside. It's a calmness, an inner emotional calmness, a peace that flows from trusting God and from bearing with whatever difficulties may come from others. Now in the Old Testament, this concept of patience is usually expressed as being slow to anger. That is one of the ways that God describes himself in Exodus 34, verse 6, that he is slow to anger. Picking up on that theme, King David, in Psalm 86, verse 15, says that God is gracious and merciful. He is slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. And that little phrase, slow to anger, is frequent in the book of Proverbs, with many encouragements and exhortations that a mark of wisdom in the fear of God, just like God, is to be slow of anger. And so that's the sense of patience, a state of emotional calm and the provocation of miscomplaint or irritation. Well, then related to that, he says love is also kind. What does kindness mean? Well, again, it's pretty self-evident, isn't it? We understand kindness. It's doing that which is good, helpful, beneficial, courteous, and profitable for another person. It's doing that which is good, helpful, beneficial, courteous, and profitable for another person. One of the richest and most profound commentaries regarding the Lord Jesus Christ as He walked this earth is found in Luke chapter 10 verse 38 when the writer says that Jesus went about doing good. And consider that with the incarnate God, perfect in every way, tempted yes, but without sin, He did nothing but what was good. All of His miracles were a manifestation and display of His goodness, as was all of His words, all of His actions, everything that He did was kind. And we find that word also in many other places in the New Testament. In 1 Peter 3, verse 3, when Peter talks about tasting and seeing that the Lord is good, the term that is used in most English translations there for good is the same term, kind. The Lord is kind. Now, of course, again, we know the opposite of kindness, don't we? What is it? Well, it's harshness. It's meanness. It's cruelty. It's abuse. It's to intimidate or to irritate or to bother other people to be anything but kind. And sadly, all too many of us know that because we've been guilty of being unkind and we know it because of the unkindness that we sometimes experience from others. And so to be kind is to have an eager, eager and a generous orientation towards others. It's really the attitude and the disposition and actions that say, I am here to do you good. Now consider that in the Lord Jesus Christ who always went about doing good. That was his heart. That was what was natural to him. It was his nature to do others good in the fullest and in the most complete, eternal way. So to have a heart of kindness is to have a heart that says, I'm here to do you good. I'm here to benefit you. I'm here to bless you. I'm here to encourage you. Now as Paul speaks of patience and kindness, again really as a summary of the essence of this holy love that he's exhorting, we understand that patience and kindness are really two sides of the same coin of holy love. Patience is more passive in that it has to do with bearing or enduring the evils, the injuries, the offenses, the inconveniences, the weaknesses of others. That's patience. Kindness, of course, is more active. It has to do with purposefully blessing and benefiting and doing good to others. And so as a summary or essence of holy love, patience and kindness together mean that holy love cares more for the good of the offender than for the hurt of the offense. Through patience and kindness, God's holy love cares more for the good of the offender than it does for the hurt or the pain of the offense. In other words, holy love doesn't seek revenge for the wrong, but it seeks rescue for the wrongdoer. Holy love isn't irritated or inconvenienced by people, but rather it invites the opportunity to serve and to bless other people. That's the work of holy love in its expression of patience and of kindness. I wanna tell you just a little story about a crisis that my dear wife, Lori, had just this last Friday morning. I call it the Big Little Potato Crisis. And this happened at the Costco near where we lived. She had gone shopping, and just in God's providence, she happened to park in the most coveted spot at any store. You know that spot. It's the one closest to the entrance, and she got that spot. Well, when she had finished all of her shopping and had come back to the car and was loading all of the groceries, as is often the case, there was another person in another car, it happened to be a man, who was waiting for her to finish so he could take the coveted spot. Well, among other things, as Lori grabbed a five-pound bag of these delicious little potatoes, they're called creamers. Oh, they're so good, too. They sound just like that. They're so good. So she grabs this bag of five-pound potatoes and somehow it accidentally opened and all the little potatoes went rolling all over the blacktop around the car. Every single one of them. It was a big crisis for her and it was a big crisis for the guy that was waiting for her spot because now all of a sudden this beautiful woman has got all these potatoes out on the ground. Well, as Lori, and I wasn't there, I'm just recounting the story that she told to me, but as she was standing there trying to figure out what to do, an employee saw this happen and kindly and immediately ran over and started helping Lori to pick up all of these little potatoes. And then instantly another employee who saw this also happen kindly runs over and tells Lori that yet another kind employee is already on their way to grab another bag of little creamer potatoes, which by the way are so good. And anyway, all three of these employees instinctively and kindly jumped into action to help my beautiful wife in this big little potato crisis. And by the way, as all of this was happening, the man who was waiting for the place just drove off. And Lori said she didn't know if he was upset or angry or irritated, but my goodness, the least he could have done was gotten out and help pick up a potato or two, but he just left. But the point I share that is that, the reason I share that is the employees instinctively went into action when there was a crisis. Okay, it was a small crisis, we understand that. But they instantly went into action and they did what was necessary to help. Now if that can happen with Costco employees in that kind of a setting, how much more should that be the instinctive response for God's people to any and every opportunity when there is a need for patience and kindness? So that's what patience and kindness is. Inner calmness and a quick disposition to want to do others good and purpose to do others good. Well, that leads to the second question then, namely, why is it imperative for Christians to be overflowing with this kindness or patience and kindness to others? Why is it imperative for Christians to overflow with the patience and the kindness of Jesus to others? Let me just highlight a few reasons that we can glean both from 1 Corinthians as well as a few other places in Scripture. Reason number one would be because it is one of the fruits of God's Spirit. 1 Corinthians 13, as I've already mentioned, of course, follows chapter 12. And near the beginning of chapter 12, in verse 3, Paul says that no one can say that Jesus is Lord except in the Holy Spirit. And what he goes on to speak of there and elsewhere in his letter is that anyone who comes to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, who repents of their sin, recognizes their sin in light of God's holiness, and they flee to Christ in faith to receive forgiveness and to be reconciled to God, that only happens through the work of the Holy Spirit. No one says Jesus is Lord in and of themselves. It is the work of His Spirit. And given that, then, what Paul goes on to speak about throughout 1 Corinthians 12 and into chapter 13 is that all of this fruit of love is the result of God's Holy Spirit. In other words, if you're truly spiritual, you'll be exhibiting, to greater or lesser degree, it's something we constantly grow in, but you'll be exhibiting and desiring to exhibit this kind of holy love, and specifically this patience and this kindness. Of course, many of you are familiar with Galatians chapter 5, verses 22 and 23, where Paul speaks specifically about the fruit of God's Spirit. And he says the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, there they are, along with goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. And so we understand that this patience and this kindness in connection with all of these other aspects of the glory of God's holy love, they exhibit Christ-like love. And so Christ-like patience and Christ-like kindness are marks of true spiritual maturity. because it's the fruit of the Spirit. Well, another reason very much related to that of why this is so vital for Christians to exhibit this is because it's essential for the health and the unity of the entire body. It's essential for the health and the unity of the entire body. And we talked a little bit about this last week as Chapter 13 is sandwiched in the middle of chapter 12 and chapter 14 and everything is dealing with what life and health and unity and fruitfulness looks like in the body of Christ. And even within the context of all the varieties of spiritual gifts and ministries and ways that God uses his people, love has to be the central reality of it. And this love, as it's summarized, with patience and kindness is essential for the unity and the health of the whole body. And it reminds us that the local church is a community of people centered around Jesus. A church is not fundamentally about any one part of the body. It's not about a popularity contest, which is what so many of the Corinthians were guilty of as they were taking sides with Paul or Apollos or Cephas or other people, and they're arguing about who's got the greatest spiritual gifts. And Paul's saying, you're missing the point entirely. It's about Jesus. And it's about living and loving, not only to build one another up, but to build the whole body up. In fact, a little bit earlier in chapter eight, verse one, Paul says, knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. And then in chapter 14, he talks about the building of the body, the health and the growth and the maturity of the whole body a lot. And so, and for instance, in verse 12 of chapter 14, he says, so with yourself, since you are eager for manifestations of the spirit, he says, strive to excel in building up the church. And as we mature and as we grow as believers, that should be our concern as well. Not just for ourselves, but for the health and the unity and the maturity and the fruitfulness of the entire body. Well, let me give you another reason that certainly implied of why we need to be diligent to overflow with the patience and the kindness of Jesus. A third reason is because the needs of others require constant patience and kindness, don't they? And we could even say our own needs require constant patience and kindness from others. You see, people, other Christians in a local church, and we know this, don't we, can easily be mean, hurtful, indifferent, insensitive, ignorant. We can be preoccupied and miss opportunities with others. We can say and do things that are inappropriate. We can just be flat out irritating. I mean, all of us have quirks, don't we? And we all get bothered by other people's quirks, but we all have them. We can be rude. We can be weird. We can be inconveniencing. We can be disruptive. We can say and do uncomfortable things. We can be scary. We can be terrifying. We can be dishonest. We can be forgetful or judgmental or selfish or stubborn or unteachable or rude or inconsistent or undependable and on and on and on and on. And you and I know this, don't we? And I guess you and I know that we can be these ways as well. How easily, isn't it not true? How easily we can say and do things that can hurt and frustrate one another, sometimes knowingly, oftentimes unknowingly. But for instance, we can give each other unsolicited and insensitive advice, like how you should raise your children, or how maybe you need to change your appearance, or why you should vote in a certain way. Now, none of those things are unimportant, but we can be rather insensitive in how we talk with others at times. We can be impatient with people, can't we, who are genuinely struggling in some area of life, maybe a functional area, maybe a spiritual area, but they're struggling and we can be impatient and we can have a hard time bearing with them. We can easily judge one another and jump to all kinds of wrong conclusions. We can easily have unrealistic expectations for each other, not giving each other room to grow and even room to fail, just as we need that room. And don't we all need to be patient and kind to one another in the same way that we would hope people would be patient and kind with us? And let alone all of those things, just think about in a local church, we also have to be patient and kind with one another in view of all the ways that we are different from one another. We have different spiritual gifts, different natural abilities, different levels of spiritual knowledge and maturity. And we also have different kinds of sins and temptations that we face and that we fight. There's all kinds of areas that we can have different convictions and preferences about non-essential things. We can have all kinds of different backgrounds, different circumstances, different strengths, weaknesses, ethnicities, age, our socioeconomic status, our education, and again, on down the list. And so in other words, all of this points to the fact that we have no lack of opportunity for why patience and kindness is so needed. So that's another reason. Certainly another reason that we need to be diligent to manifest and overflow this patience and kindness of Jesus is because of his own patience and kindness with sinners. And we won't take time to trace through all of it, but if you read through the Gospels and you see elsewhere in Scripture just how patient and kind Jesus is with his enemies. Even as Jesus instructs His followers to love enemies and to do good to them and to pray for people who mistreat you, Jesus exemplified that Himself. Even on the cross, when He's looking into the eyes of people who He created, who hate Him and who are murdering Him, what does He pray? Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing. So think of how patient and kind Jesus is with his enemies. Think of how patient and kind he is with his own people. We're told in John chapter 13 verse 1 that Jesus, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end. And specifically there in the context is referring to those disciples, those men who were with him and who followed him and who learned from him. Having loved them who were in the world, he loved them to the end. And the chapters that follow from John 13 really show us the full extent of Jesus' love as he teaches, as he corrects, as he commands and promises and comforts these very, very imperfect men. and how he even ultimately dies for them, drinking the cup of God's wrath in their place. We know that these men, as we see them in John's Gospel and in the other Gospels, they were filled with doubts and with fears and with ignorance and with pride and with selfishness and with confusion and unbelief. And of course we know that the Apostle Peter himself would even deny Jesus in the hour of Jesus' greatest need, Peter would deny him. And yet Jesus loved these men to the end, to the fullest extent, eternally. He was patient and he was kind with them, even as he worked very honestly and very skillfully to mature and to strengthen them. And so Jesus is with each and everyone who comes to him by faith. Well, not only is Jesus patient and kind to his enemies, not only is Jesus patient and kind to his people, but just personalize it even more to understand that Jesus is patient and kind with you. If you're here this morning and you're not a follower of Jesus Christ, he wants you to know him. He wants you to be delivered from the Father's righteous and just wrath for your sin and rebellion, just as is true for every single one of us. And He's patiently, even today, calling you to turn from your sin and to trust Him, but He is expressing patience to you even now. And if you're here this morning and you are a follower of Christ, you've come to faith in Christ, do you know that God the Father and God the Son's ongoing continual disposition toward you through the Holy Spirit is nothing but this holy love, nothing but this patience and this kindness. for all who would come, for all who have come to Jesus. Listen to what Jesus says of himself in Matthew chapter 11, verses 28 to 30, and of his permanent heart and his permanent disposition towards you. He says this, come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, he says, and my burden is light. Did you catch how Jesus speaks of his own eternal heart towards his people? And as he is in his character, he says, I'm gentle and lowly. Now that tells us, even as it's echoed in Hebrews, the book of Hebrews chapter 2 and also in chapter 4, that for all who believe, Jesus is our eternal and sympathetic High Priest. He's the Eternal One who mediates between us and the Father, and through his righteous life and through his substitutionary death, In the Father's good and loving design, He's provided the eternal sacrifice, and so now He appears in the presence of the Father on our behalf. And because He is a Great High Priest, He is sympathetic, and He understands the fullness of your weaknesses, and of your temptations, and of your sins. Did you know that Jesus never lashes out or He never flies off the handle toward you? He never explodes in a verbal tirade over your sin and your weaknesses. No, He is always patient and kind. Now does that mean He tolerates sin? Absolutely not. He's like the most skillful, most loving surgeon that you could imagine who knows exactly what needs to happen to cut into your heart, to cut away the cancer of sin that yet remains. And he does that quite painfully at times and yet with the fullness of his patience and his kindness. And so his aim is to correct and to cleanse us from sin, but he does so with a gentle and a lowly heart. He's always patient and kind. And think of it, this is his instinctive, natural, knee-jerk reaction, if you will. It is always one of patience and kindness. And it flows from his gentle, tender, sympathetic heart. And this is the only way that he knows how to be. The only way he knows how to be. So beloved, for these reasons, because it is a fruit of the spirit, because it is essential for the health and the unity of the body, because the needs of others constantly require patience and kindness, and because of the patience and kindness of Jesus himself, that's why it's imperative for us who belong to him to overflow with the patience and kindness of Jesus to others. Well, that leads to the third question, how? We've talked about what, we've talked about why, now how. How are Christians to demonstrate this patience and kindness with others? And let me just briefly mention a few tangible items. Number one, patience and kindness begins in your heart. It's not just about acting patiently or acting kindly. It is about a heart disposition that is eager to be patient, that is eager to be kind. For instance, in Colossians 3, verse 12, in a similar passage where the Apostle Paul is encouraging how believers are to live with one another, listen to what he says in verse 12 of Colossians 3. He says, Put on then, as God's chosen ones, holy and beloved, compassionate hearts, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. And so you see at the heart of being patient and kind is having a heart to be patient and kind. Which again is only possible through the indwelling Spirit of God in your life. And we can only put on such a heart if we've truly been born a God. And to be assured that we are of His holy and beloved chosen ones. And so we're to have a patient and a kind heart and disposition, and in other words, an eager and a generous orientation to be compassionate, to be kind, to be humble and meek and gentle and patient with one another, knowing that we're gonna have lots of opportunities to exhibit such patience and kindness. So it begins in our heart. A second way that we can demonstrate this patience and kindness is in how we pray for one another. In how we pray for one another. We know that we're called to pray, we know that we're called to seek the Lord, and over and over again we're told to pray for one another. And in many places throughout his letters, the Apostle Paul teaches us how to pray for one another. As he tells believers, like at the end of Ephesians 1, the end of Ephesians 3, also in Colossians chapter 1, and Philippians chapter 2, and elsewhere, he teaches us how to pray. One of the most patient and kind ways that you can love others is to pray for them. Because the more you pray for God's people, according to God's purposes, the more you begin to see people the way God sees them. And the more you begin to want to be patient and want to be kind and want to help further God's purposes in their lives and in the whole church. One of the things at River City here that we frequently do is to be encouraging all of us to be praying through our church directory on a regular basis. To be praying through the weekly prayer guide that we make available so that we can be caring for one another in that way. So it begins in the heart, it issues forth in our prayers. Another way that patience and kindness is expressed is with our words, with our words. And there's so many truths in all of scripture regarding the significance and the power of our words. A few weeks ago, you might've been here when Paul preached from James chapter three about the importance of our words. And again, we know by experience, both of what we've been guilty of, as well as what we've experienced from others, that words can be used either for powerful hurt or for powerful healing. Let me just mention a few passages. Proverbs 12 verse 18 says, there is one whose rash words are like sword thrusts. but the tongue of the wise brings healing. Proverbs 15 verse one says a soft answer turns away wrath but a harsh word stirs up anger. Proverbs 25 verse 11 says a word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in settings of silver. Which is to say it is sweet and it is rich, it is valuable. the New Testament in Ephesians chapter 4 verse 29 Listen to what Paul says here. He says let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths But only such as is good for building up as fits the occasion that it may give grace to those who hear So patience and kindness begins in the heart. It's to be manifest in our prayers. It's to be manifest in our words. Another way it's to be manifest is in our actions. All kinds of ways, all kinds of deeds in which we can exhibit patience and kindness. And certainly one of those fundamental is in forgiving one another when there is sin that has been committed against us and when that sin has been confessed and owned. We're to have an eager heart to forgive and a quickness to grant that forgiveness when it is asked for. And so in Ephesians chapter four, verse 32, Paul says, be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you. One other way that we could highlight, there's a lot that we could, of how patience and kindness can be manifest is it involves our ears. Not only our hearts, not only our prayers, not only our words, not only our actions, but it involves our ears. And by that I mean it means learning to listen to one another. and listening with an eye toward really understanding, really taking time to hear what another is saying, asking questions that help expose and clarify things, and really wanting to listen to understand. Proverbs chapter 18 verse 13 says this, if one gives an answer before he hears, it is his folly and shame. You know, perhaps Job's three friends in the book of Job needed to do a lot more listening rather than being so quick to give answers to Job in the midst of all of his trials. And maybe you and I need to do a lot more listening than talking as well, especially when we're with others who are going through trials and griefs and difficulties. Well, beloved, for Christians, holy love must overflow with the patience and kindness of Jesus Christ to one another. As we draw this to a close this morning, think about this. If you're going to overflow with the patience and kindness of Jesus, then you need to be drinking deeply of Him. This is not a moralistic thing that you can just kind of drum up this kind of patience and drum up this kind of kindness. This is supernatural. This is God's holy love. And if you and I are gonna overflow with this patience and kindness of Jesus, then we need to be drinking deeply of Him, being filled up by Him, drowning ourselves, as it were, in the fullness of God's patience and kindness to us in Jesus. And we don't have time to do it, but throughout Paul's letter to the Corinthians, even as he is dealing with big sin issues in their lives, big things that are burdens, big things that are problems, big things that need to be confronted and corrected, he is doing so constantly from a heart of love. He again and again refers to them as his beloved children. And he's doing so constantly with reference to the Lord Jesus Christ and to all that these believers have in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so he's continually, implicitly making reference to the holy love of Christ and his patience and his kindness. For instance, he says near the end of 1 Corinthians 6, he says in verse 9, do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? He says don't be deceived, neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God. Paul's crystal clear about how you get in or how you may remain out of the kingdom of God. But then he goes on to say, verse 11, and such were some of you. He says, but you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of God. In other words, you've tasted the patience and the kindness of God. And he wants them to keep drinking deeply of Christ. And Paul kept magnifying Christ before the Corinthians because Paul himself, in his own experience, understood and had tasted of the patience and the kindness of Jesus. We won't go there, but in 1 Timothy 1, verses 15 and 16, Paul gives his own testimony. This is the Paul that used to arrest and kill Christians. This is the Paul that identifies himself as a blasphemer, as a persecutor, as an insolent enemy of Christ. But what he says in verse 16 of 1 Timothy 1 is, he says, I received mercy for this reason that in me as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display His perfect patience as an example of those who were to believe on Him for eternal life. And even in this context, Paul identifies himself as a chief of sinners. He says, there's no greater sinner than me. And beloved, if you know yourself, that to be true for yourself this morning, Jesus Christ has perfect patience to save you. and He has perfect patience to keep you. And so, come to Jesus now and keep coming to Jesus. Coming to Him is a one-time thing in terms of the work that the Spirit of God does in causing us to be born of Him and causing us to repent and trust Him, but then He intends for us to continually come to Him, to draw on Him, to drink from Him, to continually hear His words as I read in Matthew 11 when He says, come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden. Keep coming, keep drinking, keep feeding on Christ. And so as we close, I ask you, have you been to the extraordinarily beautiful place of God's holy love in Jesus Christ? Have you had your sins forgiven and cleansed and washed by the blood of Jesus through his life and his death and his resurrection? Have you drunk and have you tasted of the sweet and life-giving waters of his patience and of his kindness? And even now, wherever you may be in your life, that is his heart, that is his disposition to you. And what he says again and again is, come, come, come. by faith in all that he is and has revealed himself to be in his word. Beloved child of God, by faith keep drinking deeply and being filled with his holy love, with his patience and with his kindness, and then humbly and faithfully overflow with this patience and kindness to your brothers and sisters in this local church and to every person that God brings into your life. Let me lead us in prayer. Father, we thank you for the riches of your patience and kindness with ones such as us. We pray that you would help us to drink ever more deeply of the fullness of your holy love in Jesus, that you have given us an eternal wellspring. No matter how much you give, you deplete nothing of who you are, and every moment you are eager and ready and sympathetic to forgive and to cleanse and to renew and to revive and to help if we would but come. Help us to do so, and in that very coming, may we be all the more eager to overflow with your patience and your love to others. And in specific ways in which you intend for that to work out in our lives, may you direct us and lead us. We thank you for this time, in the name of Jesus, amen, amen.