1 Corinthians 13, we're going to be looking just at part of verse 5 this morning. But I'm going to read 1 Corinthians 13, verses 1-8. 1 Corinthians 13, verses 1-8. If I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but do not have love, I have become a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. And if I give all my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, it profits me nothing. Love is patience. Love is kind and is not jealous. Love does not brag and is not arrogant, does not act unbecomingly. It does not seek its own, is not provoked, does not take into account a wrong suffered, does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. never fails. But if there are gifts of prophecy, they will be done away. If there are tongues, they will cease. If there is knowledge, it will be done away. Let's pray. Father God Almighty, God of love, we pray for your help during this next hour. Give us a deeper and better understanding into love But Lord, help us not to just study this passage in an aloof, academic way. But God, I pray that You would move and motivate us to a deeper love towards one another and a deeper love towards You. May we follow the example of our Lord Jesus Christ who was the incarnation of love. In His name we pray, Amen. This morning, although this is a familiar passage, I will be teaching you some things that no doubt for some of you will be brand new. For others of you, it will be something you've heard before, but you may find yourself feeling a little bit uncomfortable with some of the things I'm going to say this morning. And I trust that you will search the Scriptures to see if they are true, as the scripture teaches them. This is a teaching that will be contrary to much of the evangelical world, but I'm convinced that it is extremely important for you to understand this principle. And I'm also convinced that it is an extremely liberating truth. It's been one of the most liberating truths in my own life. We have been studying the doctrine of love, the Bible's teaching on love. And this is the most explicit section on the doctrine of love, I believe, in the whole of the Bible. And if you remember, we looked at the first three verses in chapter 13 and we called that the priority of love. In other words, if you don't have this necessary element, everything else is useless and worthless. He makes that explicitly clear in verse 1. If you have amazing gifts to speak in the tongues of angels and of men, but you do not have love, you're just an irritating noise, a clanging cymbal. In verse 2, if you have the gifts of prophecy, you have all knowledge of biblical revelation of mysteries and all knowledge and all faith so as to remove mounds, but you don't have love, you're just nothing. Verse 3, if you do the greatest acts of self-sacrifice, the greatest acts of giving, so that you give all your money to the poor, so that you die a martyr's death and give your body to the flames, but even in those great acts of sacrifice, if you do not have love, that most essential element, it profits nothing. And then in verses 4-7, we've been looking at what I'm calling the practices of love. And then in verse 8, we're going to see the permanence of love. But in this section, in verses 4-7, on the practices of love, we're seeing Paul give a description of love, and he uses 15 verbs to describe the practices of love. In your English translation, they come out as adjectives, but make no mistake about it, this is Paul's description of what love does and it does not do. And we looked, if you remember, several weeks ago in verse 4, that love is long-suffering. Love is willing to endure ill-treatment from others. And also, love is kind. It's willing to respond with usefulness and kindness towards others even when they would seek to do us ill or harm. Also, we saw several weeks ago that love is not jealous. Love is not pulling for position. Let's get that out of the way. Love is not pulling for a position. Love is not seeking to do a kind of one-upsmanship on other people. Seeking to have the place of preeminence. Love is not jealous. And then we also see in verse 4 that love does not brag. It does not talk a lot about itself. And also love is not arrogant, but love is humble. Love seeks the low road. Love seeks the position of lowliness and humility to serve others. And in this week, in verse 5, we're going to look at the next two practices of love. Love does not act unbecomingly or rudely, and it also does not seek its own. So first of all, let's see that love does not act unbecomingly, or love is not rude in verse 5. The idea of acting unbecomingly. One commentator says that this means that love does not act with ill-mannered impropriety. Alexander Salk says it means to act disgracefully, contrary to the established standards of conduct and decency. Robert Thomas says, quote, poor manners and rude conduct are not a part of love's repertoire. Good deportment is. And this seems like a strange transition. If you remember, just in the previous verse, Paul is plumbing the depths of the human heart and the profundity of the human heart and showing that love is not jealous. It cuts to the recesses of the heart and those internal inclinations to seek our own honor and our own glory. And he says that love does not practice arrogance. And then it seems like he makes a little shift here and says, Love does not behave rudely. As if he's gone from the profundity of the depths of the human heart to the mundane of belching and other activities. But this is the practicality of the section, that it's deeply theological, yet it's intensely practical. That it really does matter how you behave before others, because you can act in such a way that is inconsiderate and rude, which demonstrates you are not loving others. You're not considering others. You're not thinking about the well-being, the happiness of those around you. And this was typical with the church at Corinth. Remember, in chapter 8 of this book, in chapter 8, some of those people there were eating meat that had been sacrificed to idols. In a kind of rude way, they were flaunting their Christian freedoms before others and defiling the consciences of their brothers. That was rude. That was unbecomingly. In chapter 11, some of the women were attending the worship service with great displays of rudeness and unbecoming behavior. They were not coming in with a head covering. Now that may not mean much in our society, but in that society it meant a high-handed flaunting of your own liberation as a woman. And even it was common for the prostitutes not to cover their heads. And so this was rude behavior. This was acting in an unbecoming manner. Also in chapter 11 of 1 Corinthians, there was some who at the Lord's table, this kind of a love feast, were eating all the food before everybody else got there. And Paul says, love's not rude. Love doesn't eat all the food before everybody else gets a chance to eat. Not only that, love does not act unbecomingly in the sense that they were getting drunk at these feasts as well. And Paul says, love does not act rude, it does not act unbecomingly. This is the idea that Paul is seeking to communicate. And then even in the context of these chapters, in chapters 12, 13, and 14, Paul is in the middle of a context in which some people are flaunting their own spiritual gifts in a very rude manner. And their public worship service had become something of a circus, so everybody was elbowing their way in to try and exercise their own spiritual gifts. exhorts them in this section on love. He says at the end of 1 Corinthians 14, in 1 Corinthians 14.40 he says, but all things must be done properly and in an orderly manner. The idea of properly is the idea of decently. It's the opposite of rude. And so this was definitely a problem in the church at Corinth. So you see that love is intensely practical. It does not behave in a rude and unbecoming manner. You see, love is contrary to acting in a rude and unbecoming manner. Alexander Strock says, Thus, inappropriate dress, inconsiderate talk, disregard for other people's time or moral conscience, taking advantage of people, tactlessness, ignoring the contributions and ideas of others, running roughshod over others' plans and interests, inappropriate behavior with the opposite sex, Basic discourtesy and rudeness and a general disregard for proper social conduct are all evidence of a lack of love and have no place in the local church. You see, rudeness only cares about self. Acting in an unbecoming manner only cares about self and what you want to do. But being courteous, is considering others, thinking about others, thinking about how they might respond to this, thinking about how they might be annoyed about this certain behavior. This comes as well in the manner of our speech and the way in which we talk to one another, that we can talk to each other in a rude way, in an unbecoming manner. There's a man who once said to his pastor, my talent is to speak my mind. The pastor replied, that's a good talent to bury. Proverbs 18.2 says, A fool does not delight in understanding, but only in revealing his own mind. And somehow we've considered it a virtue in our culture to say what we want, when we want, and how we want to. It's been considered a virtue to be able to speak your mind whenever. Friends, that's no virtue. That's rudeness. Love considers others. This manifests itself in marriage relationships, because there's hundreds of issues that are not found as principles from the Scripture, but areas of preference in which we must seek to prefer one another. So whether you're a person who likes the toilet paper roll going over or under, love would seek to be considerate towards others and let it be the way that it is. Love is considerate in regards to slurping soup or sipping coffee. Love is not rude. In fact, John MacArthur, in his teaching on this section, tells of a story when he was younger, he couldn't understand why his mom would always yell at him when he would slurp his soup. Until he heard somebody else slurping their soup. And he realized his mom wasn't just instructing him in this way so that he would keep from soup getting on his clothes, but because it was intensely annoying to listen to somebody else slurp their soup. And the Bible says that love does not act in an unbecoming manner because it seeks to be considerate of others. This happens in our friendships. This is intensely applicable in the way that we treat our friends because it becomes easy to kind of step on our friends and act in a rude fashion because we know, well, they'll forgive us anyways. It's better to ask for forgiveness later. And so we can be discourteous and unbecoming in regards to people's time, in regards to wearing out your welcome, in regards to talking in a right way and right manner towards your friends. In fact, I love this proverb in Proverbs 27.14. It says, He who blesses his friend with a loud voice early in the morning, it will be reckoned a curse to him. You bless your friend with a loud voice early in the morning. In other words, there is a time and a place to speak with people. And you can speak in such a way that's rude towards others, that's unbecoming. This happens in many of our churches. There will be church splits over different styles of music where you have a younger generation of people who want to listen to more contemporary music and behave in a rude and unbecoming fashion towards the older people in that congregation. And then you have the older people in the congregation who think that A mighty fortress is our God, as written by the Apostle Paul, and they're acting rude towards the younger people, and there can't be any harmony because there's no love. But love behaves in a considerate, courteous manner towards one another. Also towards unbelievers. The Bible commands us to be considerate and not rude towards those who are unbelievers. So if somebody is a homosexual, that does not mean that we talk about them behind their back in an evil kind of way, make jokes about them. We behave in a courteous manner. Or even if you're a neighbor who's an atheist, we behave in a courteous manner, in a considerate manner. Love is not rude. So, we see that rudeness or unbecoming behavior is contrary to love. It's contrary to love towards others. But also, not only does love not behave rudely, but love does not behave selfishly. Look at verse 5, the next phrase. does not seek its own. It does not seek its own. This is the controversial section. And I've listened to a handful of sermons on this passage, read probably about ten different commentaries, and there's only a couple who I believe do a right treatment of this phrase in 1 Corinthians 13. Because there is a way in which you can interpret 1 Corinthians 13.5, love does not seek its own, in a kind of way that I believe does not do full justice to the immediate context and to the whole of Scripture. So let me, first of all, start by saying what this does not mean. The common interpretation of love does not seek its own can be summarized by an old theologian by the name of Charles Hodge, a man that I greatly respect. But in his commentary on this section, he gives his comment on love does not seek its own, and he calls it disinterested benevolence. Now, that's a big word. The idea is that in love there is no self-interest. And this is common in our thinking today. If there's any kind of motives towards self in love, then it's not true love. It's sometimes spoken in philosophical terms with the idea of altruism, that it's just seeking to do good for the sake of good without any benefits towards self, without any self-motivation. And I'm going to give you five reasons why I think this is not true. Because, first of all, the immediate context. The immediate context of this would demonstrate that love does not seek its own, does not mean that there's no self-interest, no benefits in love. Look at verse 3. He says, And if I give my possessions to feed the poor, and if I surrender my body to be burned, but do not have love, what's it say? It profits me nothing. What do you mean there's self-profit in love? What do you mean? I thought it says love does not seek its own. Well, we're going to try and tackle exactly how those two blend together. But when the Bible speaks of love, there is profit in love. It may be an eternal profit. It may be the joy and delight of the sacrifice of the love. But there is self-profit in love. Also, look at verse 6. It says, Love does not rejoice in unrighteousness. But notice this, but rejoices with the truth. Love is glad and happy and rejoices in the truth, so there is a kind of self-benefit to love. There is a self-happiness, a self-interest in love, and based upon just the immediate context, there must be this kind of self-interest in love. But not only because of the context, but because Natural self-love is assumed in all our actions in the Bible. A kind of natural self-love. What do I mean by that? In Matthew 22, verse 38, remember Jesus says, the first and greatest commandment is what? To love God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And the second is like unto it what? To love your neighbor As yourself. That self-love is implicit in the Bible. It's assumed in the Bible that there is a kind of inherent self-love, that the people in heaven, the people on earth, and the people in hell all love themselves. In Matthew chapter 7 verse 12 it says, Do unto others, how? as you would have them doing to you. Implicit in that is that you love yourself. You don't want somebody to treat you nasty. You don't want somebody to do you harm. That there is an implicit self-love in all that we do. Also, Ephesians chapter 5 verse 28, that exhortation to husbands, so husbands also ought to love their own wives as their own bodies, as their own self. He who loves his own wife loves himself, for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes it and cherishes it just as Christ also does the church. So when Paul exhorts husbands to love their wives, he's saying, love them as your own body. He's assuming that in each and every human heart, it's natural to the existence of us as creatures that we always pursue our highest happiness. But the question is, where do we pursue our highest happiness? And are others included in that happiness? Jonathan Edwards, who I lean heavily on in this teaching, also John Piper as well, Edwards says that a man should love his own happiness is as necessary to his nature as the faculty of the will. And it is impossible that such a love should be destroyed in any other way than by destroying his being. The only time any creature will stop loving him or herself is when they cease to exist. That's a kind of natural self-love and it's inherent in the will and the things that we choose. We always choose that which will bring us the highest happiness. What do I mean by that? Well, let me give you an example. If I choose to go home and eat Rocky Road ice cream, I'm making a choice. for my highest happiness at that moment, what I think is going to bring me the most happiness. So I go home and I scarf down this bowl of ice cream. Okay, in that decision I'm seeking my happiness, but even if I made the opposite decision, if I looked at the bowl of ice cream and I said, no, I'm not going to eat that ice cream. It'd probably be because I decide I'm on a diet and I'm trying to lose weight, and I see that my higher happiness, even than the enjoyment of eating the ice cream, will be in losing weight. That there will be a greater happiness in me losing weight than there will be in eating that ice cream. So I choose to not eat the ice cream. In every single decision that we make, we are always pursuing our greatest happiness. But the question is, are we on that right path to happiness? Are we on God's path to happiness? Or are we on our own selfish path to happiness that only pursues our own happiness, not in the happiness of others, not in loving others? See, the Bible is shot through with motives that work on the principle of self-love. Did you ever think about that? That every promise and every warning in the Scripture assumes that you want to do what's best for yourself. I mean, that simple and basic promise of John 3, verse 16, For God so loved the world, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but will have eternal life. You say, well, you look at that and you say, I want to go to heaven. I want to be with God in heaven. I want to be there with Jesus. I don't want to be in hell. So you choose to believe. You place your faith in Christ and it's based upon what you think is best. You believe that this is what's best. This will bring you the highest happiness. So you choose to follow Christ. The same thing with the threats concerning hell. Because the Bible also says in John 3, verse 36, He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God abides upon him. So you see verses like that and you say, well, that looks like it's not a happy place. Jesus talks about hell where there's weeping and gnashing of teeth, where the worm never dies and the fires never quench, and all those are driving and appealing to the reality That you don't want to be miserable. You don't want to be in a place of eternal torment. You don't want to be under the hand of God's wrath for all eternity. And so the Bible, the principle of self-love is inherent in each of us in the very faculty of the choices that we make. Once again, Edwards says, Such are all the promises and threatenings of the Word of God, its calls and invitations, its counsels to seek our own good, its warnings to beware, to misery. These things can have no influence on us in any other way than that they tend to work upon our hopes, or upon our fears. For to what purpose would it be to make any promise of happiness or to hold any threatening of misery to him who has no love for happiness or dread of misery? In other words, to hold forth those promises without the implicit assumption that we want happiness and don't want misery would be a farce. So, when we see this verse, love does not seek its own, we know that it can't mean that there's absolutely no self-interest in love, because there's always some kind of self-interest in any choices that we make, whether good or bad. And also because the context of this passage won't allow it. But also because of God's character Himself. When you think, about the happiest being in the world, the one who pursues his own happiness, that's God. In fact, in 1 Timothy 1.11, it speaks of the blessed or the happy God. Mercurius, the idea of the blessed or happy God. We also see that at the end of 1 Timothy, in 1 Timothy 6. In Psalm 115 verse 3, it says, But our God is in the heavens, and He does whatever He pleases. And yet, who is the most loving being in the universe? The same God who pursues His own happiness is the same God who is the most loving being in existence. In fact, the Bible says in 1 John 4, verse 8, that God is love. And 1 John 3 verse 1 says, Behold what manner of love the Father has lavished upon us. That there is a strange and kind of foreign love with God's love, because it's unlike our human love. So the character of God demands that this kind of love, which is a love that comes from God, does have some kind of self-interest. So that love, when it says love does not seek its own, it does not mean that there's no self-interest in love. But also, because of God's commands towards our own happiness. Did you know that? God commands you to be happy. You don't have an option with that. In Psalm 2, verse 11, it says, "...worship the Lord with reverence and rejoice with trembling." Those seem like contradictions, trembling and rejoicing, but God commands us to rejoice with trembling, to pursue our own joy in the Lord. Also, In Psalm 37, verse 4, a familiar verse, it says, "...delight yourself..." In who? "...in the Lord, and He will give you the desires of your heart." Delight yourself in the Lord. You're commanded to pursue your own delight and joy in God. Philippians 4, verse 4, another command, "...rejoice in the Lord always, And just in case you didn't get it the first time, and again, I say, rejoice. We are commanded over and over, shot through the whole of the Bible, to rejoice in God, to pursue our own gladness and happiness in God. But it also should be noted that to pursue your happiness outside of God and His commands in the Bible is considered high and cosmic treason against God. When we seek our own happiness apart from God's ways, that's when we get into trouble. But the problem is not pursuing our own happiness, the problem is not self-love, but it's self-love our own way rather than God's way. In Deuteronomy, there's a stern warning. Deuteronomy 28, 47 and 48. It says, because you did not serve the Lord your God with joy and a glad heart, therefore you shall serve your enemies whom the Lord will send against you in hunger, in thirst, in nakedness, in a lack of all things, and He will put an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you. God's promise to Israel for their lack of obedience with a glad and joyful heart. So that this is intensely important that we understand that this kind of love is not a disinterested love. It is a love that we can reach out towards others, and in our reaching out towards others, we can be pursuing our highest happiness. But not only because the context of 1 Corinthians, not only because all the Bible's implicit commands, warnings, and threats that imply our self-love, not only because the character of God Himself, not only because God's commands to pursue our own happiness, but also because what I'm calling just some sanctified common sense. I mean, imagine if you got very sick and we're sent to the hospital. You're in the hospital, very ill, they check you into the hospital, they put you in a room, and I come and visit you. and read some Scriptures to you, pray with you, try to encourage you during your difficulties, during your trials, and you're just very encouraged, you're happy and joyful that I came to visit you, and it was just a breath of fresh air, and you just thanked me for coming to visit you, and I respond by saying, Yeah, I know that I took a class when I was in seminary on pastoral ministry, and it said that we're supposed to do these kinds of hospital visits. I'm really not happy doing this, I didn't enjoy it, but here it is. How do you think you would respond to that? Would you be very happy about that kind of love? That disinterested love? I know it's my duty, but I'm doing it. I'm not enjoying it, but I'm going to do it. That's a disinterested love. But what if, rewind the clock, and you thank me and everything, and I say, you know what? It was a joy for me to be here. In fact, I think I may be more blessed by this than you were. And this has just been a blessed time. Which one of those is biblical love? I think the Bible would teach us the latter. That the love that the Bible portrays is not a self-disinterested love. It's a love that is pursuing our highest happiness in reaching out towards others. Somebody may say about this time, Well, what about self-denial? Doesn't the Bible teach self-denial? In fact, you could turn to Matthew 16, verse 24. Matthew 16.24, it says, then Jesus said to His disciples, if anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow Me. A verse about self-denial, slay yourself, deny yourself, and you say, well, Matt, how does that fit into the idea of self-love? I mean, this is like a Marine Corps verse. Self-denial, take up your cross. Read the next verse. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits its soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? You see, self-denial in the Bible is always denying self for something better, for something that will be more happy, something that will be more joyful, so that you deny yourself. In other words, you deny yourself of the temporary pleasures of sin for the ultimate joy and satisfaction of following Jesus Christ, and then to be able to go to heaven and enjoy pleasures forevermore in the presence of the Lord God. So that this kind of self-denial is not, God wants you to be miserable in this life. No, this is a self-denial that is calling you to deny the glitter of the world. To deny the carrot of sin that hangs before you. To deny the sad reality of playing in the sand when you could be having a wonderful feast. It's denying yourself of these lesser pleasures. So, in other words, if you really want to love God and love others, then it's going to include your own love of self. Also, let's flip over to Matthew 13, verse 44. This is one of the kingdom parables that Jesus gives. Matthew 13, verse 44, it says, The kingdom of heaven is like a treasure hidden in the field, which a man found and hid again, and from joy over it he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. Here's the situation. Jesus likens the kingdom of heaven to a man who's just walking down the road and all of a sudden he trips over something. He brushes the dirt on the ground. He sees this is a treasure. This is amazing. He opens it up. This is worth a lot of money. And he realizes that what is in this treasure trove here is worth more than everything he has. But he doesn't have the money to buy the field. So he goes. sells everything he has, self-denial, gives it all up. But for what? For a far greater treasure. It's something that is far more valuable, far more precious than anything he could possibly imagine. So God is not in the business of being a kind of a cosmic killjoy who wants us to be miserable. No, God wants us to be happy, but He wants us to pursue our own happiness in Him. He doesn't want us to be duped and deceived by the trinkets of this world, but He wants us to enjoy the fullness of joy His way. One more passage in Mark 10, verse 28. Remember the situation, this conversation Jesus has with the rich young ruler who was not willing to part with the trinkets for the greater joy of eternity in heaven. He was not willing to forsake his money for the joy of eternal life. And the disciples are baffled by this and they say, who then can be saved? And Jesus says, with God all things are possible. Verse 28 of Mark chapter 10, Peter wants to make this statement about how sacrificial they've been. Perhaps even he may have been thinking how selfless and disinterested we were in our own prosperity and success and our own happiness. In verse 28, he says, Peter began to say to him, Behold, we have left everything and have followed you. What sacrifice? And it was a sacrifice. But notice verse 29, Jesus said, "...truly I say to you, there is no one who has left house, or brothers, or sisters, or mothers, or father, or children, or farms for My sake and for the gospel, but that he will receive a hundred times as much now in the present age houses, brothers, sisters, mothers, children, and farms, along with persecutions, and in the age to come, eternal life. In other words, Jesus is telling Peter, it seems like a great sacrifice, it seems like there was no self-love or self-interest, but Jesus reminds Peter, oh, there is self-interest. That those who have denied the pleasures of this life, the houses they've made sacrifices, they will experience a hundredfold the joy in this life. And we know it's not just material possessions, because notice lodged within all those things is the word persecution. Persecution. And Peter himself, whom Jesus promised this to, who made this great sacrifice, was one who was crucified upside down. We don't even know if Peter had a home to lay his head in. But yet the promise here, and if we read in 1 Peter 1, Peter speaks in the midst of the fiery trials, he speaks of this joy unseekable and full of glory, that amidst the difficulties of the trials, he was able to have an unutterable happiness in God. That's what this passage is talking about, so that God wants us to pursue our joy, our highest happiness in Him, so that the love in the Bible is not a disinterested love. We could go on and on with different passages like that, and perhaps we can discuss some of them during our question and answer. But the question is, so what does this mean? I told you what it doesn't mean. But turn back to 1 Corinthians 13, verse 5. does not seek its own. So we've established the fact that we are always seeking our own in some kind of sense, so then what does it mean that love does not seek its own? I think the best way to understand that is that love is not selfish in that it seeks its own to the exclusion of others. Love does not pursue its own agenda outside reaching out to others. But love, biblical love, can pursue its highest happiness in loving others. That you can reach out in love towards others and that is where your greatest happiness will be. But it's not a kind of selfish love that pursues your own happiness to the exclusion of others, or pursues your own happiness outside of God Himself. It's a kind of disproportionate self-love, a self-love that excludes any love towards others. And if you remember, even before the fall of man, Man was born innately with a kind of self-love. But there was also a divine love that was in the Garden of Eden. But then after the fall of man, the divine love from God departed and man was born into this world only left with self-love and no love towards man and no love towards God. And so that it's not until the miracle of the new birth that God plants and infuses a love towards others and a love towards God that can help balance out that love towards self and that can enable man to pursue his love towards himself, his pursuit of his own happiness in loving others. And friends, we are all born into this world with this kind of seeking its own. to the exclusion of seeking the good of others. This past week I had the opportunity to babysit my niece and my nephew, two of some of the cutest babies you'll see. And yet even now, as they're not even two years old, Just when we were babysitting them, Bernie was trying to hold on to both of them, and the one did not want the other one to enjoy the same satisfaction and happiness that they were enjoying in the arms of my wife, and began to push away the other one. That's what it means to seek your own. Seeking your own to the exclusion of others. And you know the wonder of that? The idea of seeking your own, it's always the most miserable people in the world who are the most selfish people. It's always the people, the person who's only concerned about self and not concerned about others who's the miserable person. And yet if they really wanted to pursue their own happiness, their own joy, then they would begin to reach out in love towards others. Because the Bible says that it's more happy to give than it is to receive. It's more blessed. Mercurius again, the idea of happiness, it's more blessed, it's more happy, it's more joyful to give than it is to receive. So that if you really want to be happy, then you reach out in love. But this kind of love, this kind of idea that Paul is against, is the kind of idea that pursues only your own self and not others. pursues only your own happiness without the happiness of others and outside the plan of God. But Philippians chapter 2 verse 4 says, do not merely look out for your own personal interests. Once again, it assumes self-love that we all seek our own personal interests. Do not merely look out for your own personal interests, but also for who? The interests of others. You see, that's biblical love that finds its own interest in the interest of others, finds its own happiness and joy in serving others. We see this even if you flip back to 1 Corinthians 10. Verse 24, Paul makes a similar statement. Let me start with verse 23. He says, all things are lawful, but not all things are profitable. All things are lawful, but not all things edify. Let no one seek his own, but that of his neighbor. Eat anything that is sold in the meat market without asking any questions for conscious sake. What is he talking about here? Let no one seek his own good, but that of his neighbor's well. The Corinthians were exercising their freedoms in the Lord in a way that was not being considered of others. They would eat this meat that had been sacrificed to idols without acknowledging the fact that this may defile another person's conscience. And Paul was saying to them, this is what it means to seek your own. It's a kind of selfishness. Edwards once again says, If you are selfish and make yourself and your own private interests your idol, God will leave you to yourself. That's a scary thought. God will leave you to yourself and let you promote your own interests as well as you can. But if you do not selfishly seek your own, but do seek the things that are of Jesus Christ and the things that are of your fellow beings, then God will make your interest in happiness His own charge. And He is infinitely more able to provide for and promote it than you are. Don't you love that? The resources of the universe move at His bidding, and He can easily command them all to subserve your welfare, so that not to seek your own in a selfish sense is the best way of seeking your own in a better sense. Did you get that? So that not to seek your own in a selfish sense is the best way of seeking your own in the better sense. It is the most direct course you can take to secure your highest happiness. So, if you want to pursue your own happiness, then you need to pursue it in seeking to reach out in love towards others. To seek the cause, the good, the welfare of others. To seek the salvation of others who don't know the Lord. And in doing that, you will be pursuing your greatest happiness. Isn't that beautiful? Isn't that liberating? That God does not want us to be miserable. But He wants us to abandon the foolish trinkets of the world, the fleeting pleasures of sin, so that we can understand the fullness of joy that is in Him in reaching out to others and in serving Him. This is a liberating truth. So how are you doing in this area of selfishness? You find yourself a miserable person because you look only to your own interests and not also to the interests of others? I commend you to really pursue your own interests by pursuing the good and happiness of others. If you want to pursue your own joy and happiness, then pursue it in God's way in reaching out towards others. This kind of selfishness manifests itself frequently in our lives. It manifests itself in the home, in our own personal agenda. I mean, every time I've ever counseled a married couple who were miserable, always at the root of everything was that both of them were extremely selfish. Both of them wanted their own agenda, their own way. None of them wanted to seek the good and happiness of others. It was all about me, myself and I, that unholy trinity. This manifests itself. even in our children from the youngest age. So I plead with you parents to admonish teacher children in the way of love. Don't cultivate that kind of selfishness in them, but show them that there's joy and there's happiness in reaching out for the good of others. That there's joy and happiness in serving the Lord. Paul rebukes this selfishness even in marital relationships. Did you know that? In 1 Corinthians 7, the Bible gives exhortations for husbands and wives not to seek their own interests in the marriage bed, but to seek the interests of others. It's the only passage in the Bible that I know that speaks of a woman having authority over a man. A woman having authority over a man's body in that relationship. You didn't know the Bible talks about that kind of stuff, did you? It's very clear. Very clear. And Paul cuts to the heart of that and says, love does not seek its own in that sense, but it seeks its own in the sense of seeking the good of others and reaching out in love. This manifests itself in the church as well. Even in the church at Corinth, remember once again, the church in Corinth, they were trying to exercise their own Christian liberties at the stake of others. They were only looking for their own personal interests and not for others. When they would come to the Lord's table, each and every one of them, they all stuffed their face before the others got there. That's selfishness. That's seeking your own. But if they really wanted to pursue their own happiness, then they would have and more courteous in sharing towards the others. And so, friends, this is glorious and wonderful news, but it is a gut check to each and every one of us. It's a gut check to see, are we pursuing our own personal interests at the exclusion of others? And then to evaluate if we are going to really pursue our own personal interests, then we better start reaching out in love towards others. Because the highest place of happiness is the place of reaching out in love towards God and in love towards others. And friends, there's no greater example of this than the Lord Christ himself. See, on the one hand, we can look at what He did, and we could say, boy, it seems like there's no self-interest in that. In fact, we see in John chapter 15, Jesus Himself says, greater love has no one than this, that a man should lay down his life for his friends. That's great love. He reached out in love for the good of others. He reached out in a sacrificial way for others. And even when you look at the Garden of Gethsemane, as he contemplated the very wrath of God that it was about to be poured upon him on the cross, and he's in the garden, and there's the agony there so much that he's sweating drops like blood. He gave up the glories and splendor of heaven to embrace the poverty of this earth, so that he would say, Foxes have holes, birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has not a place to lay down His head. In other words, He didn't even have a home. He endured the mockery on the cross. The mockery. Making fun of Him. Putting a robe on His body. Acting like He was the King. Putting a crown of thorns on His head. People wagging their head at Him as they walk by, as He's hanging on the cross, saying, He saved others, let Him save Himself. That was great sacrifice. That was great demonstration of love. That was the greatest demonstration of love of all time. And yet even in that demonstration of love, the book of Hebrews gives some of the motivation of why Jesus did it all. It says in Hebrews 12, verse 2, It was for the joy that was set before Him that He endured the cross, scorning the shame that His highest happiness was reaching out in this kind of sacrificial love to redeem a race of people, to have the wrath of Almighty God poured out upon Him so that He could give the forgiveness of sins to those who repent and believe. and that you too can secure your highest happiness, not in the temporal pleasures of this world, but in the joy of knowing the Creator God as you forsake, deny self, but for something that is entirely more precious, so much better. Turn to Philippians 3. Philippians 3, verse 4, Paul gives his own testimony. He says, Although I myself might have confidence even in the flesh, if anyone else has a mind but confidence in the flesh, I far more. I was circumcised the eighth day of the nation of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews, as to the law of Pharisee. Paul was one of the most religious, devout people on the face of the earth. Verse 6, as to zeal a persecutor of the church, as to righteousness which is found in the law, found blameless. But whatever things were gained to me, those things I have counted loss for the sake of Christ. In other words, at one point in his life, he valued these things above all else. His own self-righteousness, his own religiosity, his own sin. But then he came to a brink point in his life. And he says in verse 7, but whatever things were gained to me, those things I have counted lost for the sake of Christ. He would deny himself and follow Christ. But notice what he denies himself for in verse 8. More than that, I count all things to be lost in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord for whom I suffered the loss of all things and count them but rubbish. Why, Paul? So that I may gain Christ. You see, friends, Deny yourself of the sin, the selfishness of this world, for something that's far more enjoyable, that will secure your highest happiness in God, knowing the Lord Christ. And I plead with you this morning, if you've been enticed and duped by the lies of this world, and think you can find your happiness in things outside of the Lord Christ Himself, I want to tell you this morning, you've been deceived. You've bought into a lie. But if you really want to secure your highest happiness, deny yourself of the ugliness of the fleeting pleasures of sin, to have the Lord Christ Himself, which is far better, not thinking that somehow you're going to have the promises of prosperity in this life. But amidst the trials, amidst the difficulty, you will have joy unspeakable and full of glory. Charles Spurgeon said, if I had 50 lives to live, I would live them all for the Lord Jesus. Because there's more joy in that than in anything else. Let's pray. Father God, Lord, I know a lot of these things are challenging to our thinking. But Lord, I glory in You that You have worked it out so that our highest happiness is found in You and glorifying You and reaching out in love towards others. So God, I pray that You would help us, You would move us, You would motivate us to reach out in love. Lord, forgive us for the selfishness of our own hearts. May we cast them upon the cross this morning. And find the forgiveness of sin that you offer from that Calvary experience. God, forgive us for pursuing happiness outside of You. Lord, liberate us to pursue our own joy in You. In Jesus' name, Amen.