I ain't girl, old, I died about this dream, there a flirt within the king.
In the clouds of Jesus' sky, and the天 is lighted by, still I stand in temptation,
Song number 136 is two pages over.
Song number 100.
Now that we've perished, how can't self-righteous be?
We've oversawed that we just let him, our day is the end we need.
The winter is over and I don't need to sleep.
When the wrath of the storms on sea, or demons or men,
Follow the ship where life, the master of the ship, and earth and sky.
They all shall see thee obey my will.
Peace be still.
They all shall see thee obey my will.
Peace be still.
I'm not sure what you think we should see
I'll see your demons, or men, or whatever, and me.
No water can swallow the ship where life, the nature of the gendered and spied.
They all shall sweetly obey my will.
Peace be still, peace be still.
They all shall sweetly obey my will.
I'll see your demons, your men, or whatever it be, no water can swallow that ship.
Right at this time we're going to ask the offering place as we're passing around the offering place
Please turn your Bibles to 1st Corinthians chapter number 13 1st Corinthians chapter number 13
First Corinthians 13 the Bible reads though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels and have not charity
I am become a sounding brass or a tinkling symbol
And though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge,
And though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains and have not charity, I am nothing.
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor,
And though I give my body to be burned and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
Charity suffers long and is kind. Charity envies not.
Charity, vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh
not our own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil.
Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceeth in the truth.
Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeeth all things, endureth all things.
Charity never faileth, but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail.
Whether there be tongues, they shall cease.
for we know in part and we prophesy in part.
But when that which is perfect is come,
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, 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 also I am known.
And now abide a faith, hope, charity, these three,
but the greatest of these is charity.
Jesus Christ, who suffered on the cross for our sins,
he died to pay for all our past, present, future sins,
was bared and then resurrected in spirit and in flesh.
Father in heaven, I also thank you
for the earnest of the Holy Spirit
in the hearts of your children,
for they are those that have believed
in your son, Jesus Christ.
Father in heaven, I pray that you comfort those
that grieve in this tragedy.
Father, I pray that you please bless Pastor Anderson as he preaches your word, Lord.
Help him preach what you would have him preach.
In Jesus' name I pray, amen.
Man 1 Corinthians chapter 13 is known as the great charity chapter or love chapter of the Bible
It's it's considered one of the greatest
Chapters in the Bible and I agree
It's just another testament of how powerful God's word is how much this chapter has
affected people over the years and and how many people have meditated upon these words
Memorized these words been inspired by these words. It says in verse number one though. I speak with the tongues
of men and of angels and have not charity,
I have become as sounding brass or a tinkling symbol.
And when we think of maybe what would make a great preacher,
right, we would think that we would want someone
to have a great way with words or be very eloquent.
And of course, there are many.
eloquent speakers in this world and there are classes that people can take
to become a better speaker and different books that you can read to help you out with that.
But what the Bible is saying here is that at the end of the day, you know, if you just have
a great way with words and you're a great speaker, but if you don't have charity in your heart,
if you don't have love in your heart for other people, then you're nothing. You're nobody.
You know, it's all meaningless. It doesn't matter.
And I guarantee you that there are a whole bunch of preachers across this country
that are super eloquent, very good with words, and they can speak with the tongues of men and of angels,
but yet they are a bunch of nothings in the sight of God because they don't actually love people.
And here's the thing, loving God and loving people go hand in hand. They can't be separated.
Because you know the Bible says if a man say that he loved God and and he hates his brother
He's a liar right if he that love is not his brother whom he has seen
How can he love God whom he had not seen and this commandment have we from him that he who love of God
Love his brother also. So, you know, you got people out there. They don't love God. They don't love their brother in Christ
They don't love the loss. They don't love people. It doesn't matter how good they are at speaking
You know, they're not going to be able to be used greatly by God and in God's economy he marks them with a big old zero as being nothing.
They don't matter. They might as well not even exist, right? Just nothing, nobody, zilch, zero.
It says in verse 2, though I have the gift of prophecy.
and understand all mysteries and all knowledge,
and though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains
and have not charity, I am nothing."
Now when it talks about the gift of prophecy
or prophecy in this context is talking about
the ability to preach or proclaim for God's word.
A lot of people will get mixed up by the word prophecy,
thinking that it's always some kind of a foretelling
of the future, but often in the Bible,
prophecy is not foretelling, it's forth telling.
You know, it's speaking forth God's word.
And there's a lot of evidence of that.
For example, you go back to Proverbs 31
and it says the words of King Lemuel,
the prophecy that his mother taught him.
And that prophecy that Lemuel's mother taught him,
none of it predicts the future.
It's really just, you know, she's preaching.
to her son about right and wrong,
about, you know, the pitfalls that a young man could face
with alcohol and with women and things like that.
You know, so what we would think of today
as just preaching, right?
The ability to preach God's word with power.
And, you know, that's what it means here, the gift of prophecy,
understanding all mystery and all knowledge, right?
So, having all this education, all this learning, all this knowledge,
and then the ability to just proclaim that with power.
You know, the Bible is saying, but if you don't have charity, you're nothing.
You have nothing. You're nobody.
In the same context of the book of 1 Corinthians,
there's a passage where it's talking about spiritual gifts,
and it talks about, because here we said, you know, the gift of prophecy,
and the Bible is kind of explaining in...
chapter 12 that that's in chapter 14 even that that's kind of in some ways like the ultimate gift
you know like like the bible talks about coveting the better gifts or or that you know
you know yeah it's great to speak in other tongues or other languages but rather that you would
prophesy that seems to be like the you know the best gift that you could have would be the gift
of prophecy and yet the bible says if you have to give to prophecy and you don't have charity
You're nothing. You're nobody.
But the thing I wanted to point out is that when it brings up the gift of prophecy,
I don't have the exact reference in front of me,
but it says that the one who has that gift of prophecy,
let him prophesy according to the proportion of faith.
Because here's the thing, part of what it takes to be able to preach with power
and to proclaim God's word with power
is to actually have a strong faith in what you're saying.
and to actually believe deeply in the truth of God's word
and to really thunder forth God's word with authority
because of that proportion of faith
that actually comes out in the preaching.
But the Bible is saying, even that as important as that is, as much as that is something that God wants us as Christians when we preach or when we go soul-winning, you know, to have that proportion of faith
that is then going to translate into a powerful presentation of the Gospel at the door, a powerful presentation of the Gospel from the pulpit, right at the end of the day though, he says, even if I do have that gift of prophecy,
and understand all mysteries and have, you know, great Bible knowledge,
understanding difficult texts and Scripture.
And even though I have all faith so that I could remove mountains and have not charity, I am nothing.
I mean, it sounds like this is the most essential ingredient to the Christian life.
It sounds like it's the most essential ingredient to being a pastor, to being a preacher,
or even just being a successful layman.
It seems like this is the most important ingredient to being a great soul winner
is having love in your heart, having charity in your heart. It's everything.
I mean, these are some very strong statements that Paul's making here.
Then he goes even further in verse 3, he says,
And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor,
And though I give my body to be burned,
And have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
And when we think about those kinds of sacrifices,
there are a couple of sacrifices here.
One sacrifice, the financial sacrifice, right?
Bestowing all my goods to feed the poor, just a total...
financial sacrifice and then we have even just a physical bodily sacrifice of just saying you know
I could give my body to be burned and have not charity it profited me nothing and you and it's hard to understand
You know well if someone didn't have charity then why would they give their body to be burned and
Why would they bestow all their goods to feed the poor but there are sometimes other reasons why people do those kind of things
Like there could be a reason of just doing it for personal glory or self-aggrandizement like oh
I'm gonna go die for these people or I'm gonna sacrifice myself for these people or I'm gonna go be a martyr or whatever
so that I can be
Famous or people will think I'm great or something like that
There could be all kinds of reasons why people could do those things that are not motivated by charity and you know sometimes
people, even, you know, wealthy billionaires and people will give these these incredible gifts
and things and it's not really out of love in their hearts. Some of it could be because they
just have such a bad conscience about horrible, evil, wicked things that they know they've done.
They're trying to like do penance for it.
Right like oh, well if I give all this money
It'll make up for the people that I hurt to get where I am the people that I killed the people that I harmed
You know if I just give this money then that'll somehow make up for it
Or maybe if I can just you know if I can sacrifice myself over here
Maybe that'll make up for these other bad things that I did or whatever
And you know there could be all kinds of motives that go into that and you do see some of these really evil rich wicked kind of
people
giving a bunch of money to these, quote unquote,
charities, but you know, that doesn't mean
that they really have charity in their heart.
You know, maybe their accountant is telling them
to do that for tax purposes, and you know,
they want to look good, and they want to get the glory,
and they're thinking about their legacy, you know,
but here's the thing, real charity in your heart
isn't thinking about the legacy,
because what does the Bible say a few verses later?
It says, charity seeketh not her own.
You know charity is about loving other people, caring about other people,
think about other people, not like,
ooh, I'm going to do this charitable act so that I can get my name engraved over here
and get credit over here and be glorified over here,
be absolved of my crimes over here.
No, it's really supposed to be motivated by love and generosity
for those who you're bestowing those goods upon,
for those for whom you are suffering and dying.
You know, we think about Jesus Christ dying on the cross for us. He did that because he loved us
He did that because he cared about us
You know, God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believe it than him
Should not perish but have everlasting life
greater love hath no man than this that a man laid down his life for his friends.
So yeah, there is going to be a time when love motivates us to give financially,
where love motivates us to even sacrifice ourselves,
to even die for someone. You know, the Bible says that
you know, some of us would even die for people that we love, die for
good men, die for good people. You know, but Christ committed his love toward us
and that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
And so, even though, at first blush, it might seem strange when we read verse 3,
how could someone bestow all their goods to feed the poor and not have charity?
You know, that's the very definition of charity,
but the Bible is actually talking about having real charity in your heart, love in your heart,
and people could do those things for wrong motives.
or for just other ulterior motives besides having love.
And you know, apparently God just looks down from heaven
upon people who don't have charity in their hearts
and just thinks that, you know what, you guys,
you just don't really count.
You're just not, you know, you're nobody, you're nothing.
You failed as a Christian if you don't love God
and if you don't love people, you failed.
I mean, that's the first commandment.
First commandment is to love the Lord your God with all your heart mind soul and strength and the second is like unto it to
Love your neighbor as yourself. It's like if you don't get that you missed everything because that's the law on the prophets
the Bible says and
So you can't be a good Christian
Without having love in your heart that is a fiction and I've heard people even say this like oh so-and-so
He's a really great Christian
He does all kinds of great works for God and he really loves God, but he just doesn't love people you're a liar
That doesn't exist
If he loved God, he'd love people.
If he's doing great works for God, if God's using him in a mighty way,
if he's truly filled with the Spirit of God,
then he must be a loving person.
He must love God, he must love his fellow man
because it is impossible to be greatly used by God
without having love in your heart.
And if you do have love in your heart,
then you know what, God is going to use you
and God is going to do great things with you
because that is the most critical ingredient
to the Christian life.
The Bible says in verse four,
charity suffereth long.
So here's the thing is that a lot of people
might skew the definition of what love even is,
or maybe they don't even understand
what love even looks like.
So they might say, oh, this person over here is loving
and this person is not,
or maybe they think they're loving when they're not.
or what have you, or they think someone's not loving when they actually are,
you know, the Bible goes on to describe
what real love looks like. What does charity actually look like?
And the Bible says, charity suffereth long and is kind,
charity envyeth not, charity vaunted not itself is not puffed up. And so these
first few things that are listed here,
we see that charity or love for other people is going to manifest
in the way that we act.
Right, we if we suffer long and are kind right people basically people who have love in their heart
They're gonna be nice to other people
You know, they're not they're not gonna treat other people like dirt and just be a jerk and be rude
You know, obviously if we have love in our heart out of the abundance of heart to mouth speak it
And so that should manifest in the way that we act
Charity suffered long
That means that charity puts up with a lot, right?
Suffer it long means, you know, puts up with a lot,
endures a lot, and it says,
charity is kind, talking about the way
that we treat other people.
And then it says, charity envious, not.
Now, if you think about it,
envy is when you wish that you had what someone else has and this is just an
inherently selfish way to feel because you're basically thinking like well I
don't want them to have that success I want to have that success you know I
don't want them to have that blessing I want that you know oh instead of being
happy for other people you see an actual loving charitable person is happy when
things go well for other people
You know, they want to see other people succeed,
they want to see other people thrive,
and they don't just think, well, why wasn't that me?
You know, that should be me,
I should be the one that's having those blessings
or that success.
No, a person who loves you is happy for you when you succeed.
You know, it basically, you know, whatever the blessings.
Right and let me just say something maybe maybe this is like a little bit uncomfortable or maybe this is you know
Gonna step on somebody's toe or something, but frankly, I don't really care because it's true
You know, what about you're a woman who's struggling to get pregnant
Struggling to have kids you don't have kids and then someone else around you gets pregnant has a baby
And then you're all upset about it. You know what it sounds like you have wickedness in your heart
That you envy that person who has been blessed with a child because like oh this isn't fair because I can't have a child
Why does she get to have a baby and I've seen women malfunction over the years because some other woman
Got pregnant when they were trying to get pregnant
You know what if you really want to get pregnant so much then why wouldn't you just be happy that someone else got
What they wanted instead of like well, I didn't get it so they can't be happy either if I can't have it neither can they
And you know what? I don't care who that offends.
That's a wicked heart. If that's you, you need to get right with God.
You know, because here's the thing. If you want something for yourself and you're like,
Oh, I just want this so bad.
And then you see someone else get it and then you're upset.
It's because you're wicked. That's why.
Get that wickedness out of your heart. Get some charity in your heart.
Because charity envied not.
Charity doesn't look and say, Oh, there's that person got what I wanted.
How dare they no the charity says hey that person got what I wanted. Amen
Praise God for them. Hey, if I can't have it, you know at least at least she can
Right, I mean and we could probably apply this to any area of life, you know
Let's say, you know, you're single and your buddy's single and you both want to get married and then he finds the right person
And now he's getting married if that doesn't make you happy then you don't love your friend
You know what I mean? You like like he should be happy for you when you get married
You should be happy for him when he gets married if it's like oh, this isn't fair
You know, he's good. Why does he get to get it's like if you love people you want good things to happen to them
If you love people you want them to succeed you want to be blessed you want them to thrive
You don't sit there and say well, why is it them and not me right because charity envy is not
You know, as a pastor, I want to see all my pastor friends succeed.
I want to see other churches thrive and succeed and be blessed by God.
I'm not sitting there thinking, well, why did they get this success and I didn't?
Why did they get this? You know, that would be a wicked way to think.
And, you know, I just gave a few examples and maybe those hit.
close to home for certain people
that maybe are struggling in those areas.
But you know what, sometimes the truth hurts
and what I just told you is the truth, okay?
And you can plug in whatever other situation you want.
You know, when someone else makes it financially,
when someone else's family is doing well,
when someone else achieves something,
you should be happy for that person.
If you love people, you want them to be blessed.
We shouldn't hate it when our friends have successes.
You know, that's not charity.
because charity is not seeking her own.
Charity, envy is not.
Charity is happy for other people
when they do well and get blessings.
Charity vaunted not itself is not puffed up, right?
So egotistical people,
people that are full of themselves,
braggarts, boastful people,
these are not people that are filled with charity, right?
A charitable person is gonna be humble
and not bragging about themselves.
and boasting about themselves and thinking of themselves more highly than they ought to think.
So 1 Corinthians chapter 13, the Bible says as we go down through this list,
you know, it says what charity actually looks like and when we look down this list
and we can see if these things are absent, then charity is probably absent.
And if these things are present, then that's a sign that charity is there.
The Bible says in verse 5,
does not behave itself unseemly.
Now what does unseemly mean?
Unseemly means something that is inappropriate
and just behaving in a wrong way basically.
So the charitable person behaves the right way,
according to the Bible.
Charity does not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil.
You know, when I think about being not easily provoked, right?
You think about these people that just turn on you at the drop of a hat, right?
And then you wonder, like, did these people ever even love me?
Like if somebody could just be provoked to just turn on you like that and just become your enemy like that
They just drop you they just get so mad at you over some stupid little thing and then all of a sudden
They're just an enemy. You know, it should take a lot
Obviously to get us that mad
And when people just turn on you at the drop of hat, it's because they don't actually love you
The Bible says does not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not our own, is not easily provoked,
thinketh no evil, rejoiceeth not in iniquity, but rejoiceeth in the truth, right?
This person doesn't enjoy hearing bad things about people, hearing about their sins, hearing
about their iniquities, hearing about their failures and transgressions, right?
Because they want to hear that other people are doing well.
and doing right and being blessed by God.
They don't rejoice in iniquity, but rejoice in the truth.
Beareth all things, believeeth all things,
hopeeth all things, and doereth all things.
And you know, if somebody is really your friend,
they're going to be there through thick and thin for you.
Right the Bible says that there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother a man that has friends must show himself
Friendly and there is a friend that sticketh closer than a brother, right? So in in our lives as Christians
We should be there for our friends even when their family is not there for them
You know, we should be a friend that sticks closer than a brother to them
because they are brothers in Christ, sisters in Christ.
And so there's a friend that sticks closer than a brother.
If you wanna have friends like that,
you gotta show yourself friendly.
You gotta be friendly in order to have friends.
When I say be friendly, I don't mean you just smile
and big handshake and hey, yeah, you know,
we're talking about actually being there
for people when they need ya.
Being a friend to people.
And here's the thing, if you're not a friend to people,
you're gonna come to a place in your life
where you don't have any friends.
And the reason you don't have any friends
is because you didn't show yourself friendly.
And you say, well, that's just kind of how I am.
I'm just kind of that way.
Well, here's the, you know,
you're just kind of a non-charity kind of person,
is what it sounds like.
You know, because a person who really loves God
and loves their neighbor and has charity in their heart,
you know, they're gonna have those relationships.
They're gonna have those friendships.
They're gonna have people.
that they're looking out for, that they're taken care of,
that they want to see succeed, that they're praying for,
that God would bless those people,
that they're doing things for them, loving them,
caring about them, being there for them,
and not seeking their own.
You know, and if you think about it,
why do friends forsake other friends?
Why do they do that?
You know, why does someone's friend walk away from them?
And I think sometimes when you go to like children
or even babies, you know, you can kind of see like
raw human nature on display,
immature, just the most raw, immature human nature
on display among children, right?
Because children, obviously, they're more open
about who they are.
They're not good at hiding who they are.
Okay, and if you think about a baby like when a baby is born, it's only really thinking about itself
Right, it's just it wants to eat. It wants to be held. It wants its diaper change
It doesn't really understand the fact that other people have needs to you can't tell the baby like hey
I know you need
something but
Give me give me 20 minutes because I got needs to oh
Mom take as much time as you need mom. I'm just gonna go play over here. You say well
They're just too young to understand the language. Okay, two-year-old
Two-year-old, you know three-year-old right my three-year-old. I feel like he understands virtually everything. I say to him
But there are going to be times when you tell the three-year-old hey, is it all right if we just you know wait a little while on on that?
Serial that you wanted you know or you know you think you could wait about 20 minutes for that glass of water
So that so that I could take care of this other person or do this
You know
You know the thing about that is that as we get older, right as we get older
We mature and then especially after we get saved
And we're Christians, and we've got the Holy Spirit
living inside of us, and then we mature as Christians.
And you know, we grow to a point
where we're caring about other people.
We're sacrificing for other people.
We're worrying about other people.
We're thinking about other people,
and we're putting other people first.
Look, kids are not necessarily as little toddlers
and children say, oh, I insist, you take the front seat.
You know how many times do our kids fight over saying no, no, no, I insist. I really want you to have the front seat
But no kids are the opposite aren't they kids are saying it's mine. I want a front seat. I call shotgun
I gotta get the best seat. I want to be over it. But then you know what you see adults arguing the opposite
How many times have we as adults said,
no, no, no, I insist I want you to sit in the front.
No, no, no, you sit in the front.
No, no, no, please, please, you sit up front.
And we have those arguments, right?
Where we want to take the humble seat.
We want to go in the back.
We want to make other people more comfortable.
We go to a restaurant and it's like,
hey, let me take the check.
Let me take care of that, right?
As we grow up and we get older, we're more concerned,
or at least we're supposed to be more concerned
about other people, thinking about other people.
And you know what the Bible even says a little bit later in this same chapter?
It says in verse 11, because you say, well, I don't think you're right, Pastor Aniston.
I think children are just so perfect and wonderful and pure.
That's not what the Bible says.
You know, we're born with a sinful nature.
The Bible says foolishness is bound in the heart of a child.
But the rod of correction will drive him far from the Bible says in verse 11 when I was a child
I speak as a child. I understood as a child. I thought as a child
But when I became a man, I put away childish things and what is he saying? He's saying look I
Have matured in charity
You know, I used to act like a kid being selfish
Now I'm more mature and I put away that childish mentality because that's I mean look
We quote this verse all the time for a variety of reasons just because it's a great verse
You know when I was a child. I speak as a child. I
Understood as a child. I thought as a child but when I became a man, I put away childish things and obviously there are many
legitimate, really good applications of this verse.
This verse could be applied in a bunch of really good ways.
It's a very profound thought,
and it has other contexts in this passage,
you know, just basically talking about
how we know in part, we prophesy in part,
when that which is perfect has come,
and that which is in part shall be done away.
But let's not forget the greater context
that it's in the charity chapter
that is being mentioned.
And in fact, as soon as we're done with that verse,
he goes back to talking about seeing through a glass darkly,
but then he, you know, he still ends up on verse 13 saying,
now abide of faith, hope, charity, these three,
the greatest of these is charity.
So we still, this is still in the charity chapter.
Because you know kids unfortunately they have to learn they have to grow in this area
They have to mature in this area because they're born being selfish. We're all born being selfish
We all have that natural tendency and as we grow and mature, you know, we can grow in charity
and so
That's all a preface of what I want to say next which is to point out, you know, why do friends forsake their friends?
Well, let's go back to the playground. Let's go to the kids because they you know, it's all just on display with kids
Okay, why does one kid stop being friends with another kid?
I'll tell you what one of the reasons is because it's bad for their image
I mean, how many times have you seen this?
I mean, did you guys grow up going to school or what?
Junior high, high school?
It's like, oh, well, I can't hang around with this person.
Because if I hang around with this person,
then people aren't going to think I'm cool.
Or I won't be in the cool group.
And I remember I went to a particular school,
and there was a group of kids that
were known as the cool group.
I'm not just.
Using these were literally what they said. This was what it was called the cool group and then there was the nerd heard
You know and so the idea is if you start hanging around with people from the quote-unquote nerd heard
People are gonna start thinking that you're in the nerd heard
You know and then if you're hanging around with people in the cool group now
You're in the cool group or whatever and I remember you know when I first got to that school on my first day of school
You know, I knew this one girl in the cool group
From a previous church relationship school relationship, and so she was kind of like my ticket into the cool group
So it was like I was able to kind of eat lunch on that first day with the cool group because I had you know
I don't want to say a man on the inside, but I had a gal on the inside
that basically got me into that cool group, you know?
And here's the thing, those bunch of people in the cool group,
they weren't any better than the people in the nerd herd.
In fact, a lot of them were just rotten people, stupid,
you know, looking back,
why did I even want to be in that group at all?
Why, just because someone called it the cool group,
just because someone called this other group the nerd herd,
there was really no difference in the quality
of the people in these two different groups.
You know, it's just it's just children though. This is how they think they just want to fit in they just want to conform
They just want to be accepted and you know what that's how I thought too when I was 13 years old walking in there
Hey, I don't want to be in the nerd herd. I want to be in the cool group
There's there's no logical reason for that other than that
I was dumb and immature and young and that's how teenagers think
You know and it's like people would just kind of get locked into one group or the other and it's just it's just kind of their destiny
It's like it's like we're in India. It's just it was just it was like a different cast, you know
And it was just you're just born into it, you know, maybe next life you get reincarnated into the cool group
Instead of being born of the nerd herd. I'm kidding of course, but the point is that you know looking back. It's so stupid
But then you look at today in
2025 and what have you got you've got a bunch of pastors
That literally want to be in the cool group with their city with their community
with the bit, you know, they want to hang around with the police chief, and they want
to hang around with the mayor, and they want to hang around with the governor and the congressman
and the senator, and you know, oh, I got to ride in the back of a limo with Donald Trump for 90
seconds, and it was the greatest moment of my life, and you know, I got to go over and, you know,
It's immature and stupid
And you know, it's really sad is someone who would have a good friend that they supposedly love and then they'll discard their friend
Because they're like oh well this guy's bad for my image
This guy's a bad look. Look, you know, I understand that talk is cheap, but I know I'm telling the truth
You know what if I had a friend and I knew that my friend was in the right
And I knew that standing up for my friend would would hurt my reputation
And maybe even make half the people in our church get mad at me and leave or something
You know what that's not even a decision. I wouldn't even have to think about that. It's not even it's like give me something hard
Give me a hard question because that's not even hard because you just do what's right
You do what's right and the Bible says that I know friend and my father's friend for sake not
You just do it because it's right. You don't think like well, how's this gonna affect my image?
And you know what? That's exactly what happened in the Bible with the Apostle Paul and Onesiferous.
Because, you know, the Apostle Paul went through a time where he was in prison, he was being slandered,
and the Apostle Paul was falsely accused of a lot of things.
He was falsely accused of stealing money, he was falsely accused of by the Jews, of preaching heresy,
and so he was falsely accused of these things.
And so everybody forsook him virtually and he said, you know, all they which are in Asia be turned away from me
But he said the Lord give mercy under the house of Onesiferus
For he oft refreshed me and was not ashamed of my chain
But when he was in Rome, he saw me out very diligently and found me the Lord
Grant unto him that he may find mercy of the Lord in that day
And in how many things he ministered unto me in Ephesus thou knowest very well and so notice Onesiferus
The good friend in the Bible
He's not ashamed of the chain. He's not worried. Oh, what are people gonna think if I hang around with the Apostle Paul?
They're gonna maybe think that I'm in on it or that I'm bad or something
Maybe I'm guilty of the things that he's being accused of and so he wasn't ashamed of the chain
He said no the Apostle Paul is my friend. I love the Apostle Paul
I'm gonna stand with him because it's the right thing to do and he ministered unto him often
He's often helpful under the Apostle Paul and it says when he was in Rome, he sought him out very diligently
You know, he made a point to be there for his friend. It was important to be there. And you know what?
I don't know much about Onesiferous
When we know the Apostle Paul is a great man of God. We know about all his exploits. We know great detail about his life
We know almost nothing about Onesiferous, but I don't know about you
But I would love to get a shout out in the eternal word of God even if it's just a couple verses about something positive
You know, greatest friend in the Bible, Onesiferous.
You know, that's all we know about this guy.
The guy's a legend.
The guy's a hero.
He's in the Bible.
Millions and hundreds of millions of people
are talking about this guy.
I'm talking about him right now.
Thousands of years later,
people are gonna keep talking about him forever.
You know, what are some other great friends in the Bible?
You know David and Jonathan are great friends and look obviously it cost Jonathan a lot to stand with his friend David
Even when David is considered an enemy. Oh, he's bad. You know, he knew that David wasn't bad
He knew David was right. He knew he was right with God and Jonathan's like, oh, well, how's this gonna affect me being the next king?
How's this going to affect my situation?
No, Jonathan, he just flat out said,
well, I know that David's going to be king and that's fine.
Jonathan was okay with David being the next king.
And by standing up for his friend,
he literally risked his own life by standing up
for his friend because when he stood up for David,
King Saul literally threw a javelin at him
and tried to kill him.
So he could have been killed just for standing up for a say if he didn't have those cat-like reflexes
He would have already been dead
But he was a great warrior Jonathan was a powerful warrior is a great warrior
He knew how to dodge those javelins and so thankfully he didn't get killed, but you know what he risked his life for his friend
And you know, David, he loved his friend, Jonathan.
And even long after Jonathan's dead,
even after Saul's dead, you know,
what can Saul and Jonathan do for David
once they're dead, nothing.
But yet, even after they're dead,
David is saying, hey, is there anybody left
from that family that I could just be a blessing
to that family because I just want to do something good
for someone related to Jonathan,
even though they can't do it, but why?
But he loved Jonathan.
And you know, those are the kind of friends
that you wanna have in life, don't you?
You wanna have those friends that really love you,
that really care about you,
that are always gonna be there through thick and thin.
Well, guess what, if you wanna have friends like that,
you have to be a friend like that.
And if you are a friend like that,
then you'll have friends like that.
because a man that half friends must show himself friendly,
and there's a friend that's taking it closer than a brother, because guess what?
Sometimes your physical siblings are going to be rotten people,
and they're going to turn on you, and they're going to forsake you.
You know, God forbid that your parents would ever forsake you.
You know, but it happens. It's out there.
And so you want to always make sure that you are a friend to other people.
But at the end of the day, you know,
if you have charity in your heart,
it's probably just gonna come automatically anyway.
The more loving of a person you are,
you're just gonna be like, well, yeah,
of course I'm gonna be there for my friend.
Of course I'm gonna help people.
Of course I'm gonna think about them first
instead of just, you know,
oh, well, how's this gonna help me, you know?
Or hey, let's be friends,
but just never say hi to me in the hallway.
Right, let's be friends, but I just don't want anybody to know that we're friends
So if you say hi to me in the hallway by the lockers, you know, I'm just gonna ignore you
Because I don't want people to know that we're friends. That's not friendship
It's not love. It's not charity
Charity bears all things verse seven believes all things hopes all things endures all things
Right, so charity is in it for the long haul
For God and for other people
right
Bears everything right endures everything puts up with everything right hopes all things
Charity never faileth
Verse 8 of 1 Corinthians 13,
but whether there be prophecies,
they shall fail.
Whether there be tongues, they shall cease.
Whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
You know, you think about how many things
in this life are temporary.
But charity's not one of them.
You know, charity is supposed to last forever.
God's love for us lasts forever.
And our love for God and our love for other people
should also be a constant.
And if we truly do love God, and if we truly do love people, then we will love them forever.
You know, the people who used to love you, you know, it's like, well, what is that?
Charity never fails, but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail, right?
So there are sermons that are preached, powerful sermons are preached, and they're gone now.
Or if you wanted to think about it as you know predictions that are made and and don't come true
You know, but but it's probably more the attitude of you know
Things that are preached and then they're no longer relevant. They're forgotten
They didn't pan out whatever, you know, whether there be tongues
They shall cease and you know some people will misinterpret this they think it has to do with like
You know the gift of tongues or something in
In the Bible as far as like oh tongues shall cease or so that's not what the Bible is saying here
What the Bible says is just whether there be tongues just saying like whatever tongues are out there
Whatever languages are out there. They will cease every language ultimately goes away
So are the languages that we're speaking now on this earth the same as the languages we were speaking?
3,000 years ago
No, not at all, right?
Because tongues will cease.
Think about English.
English, as we know it, has only been around for a little over 500 years.
It's really only been around for like 600 years.
If you go back a thousand years, our language does not exist at all.
You know, if we were to go back to the year 1,025 AD,
that language that we now call Old English or Anglo-Saxon
is 100% of foreign language.
You would not, if I read you a sentence,
you wouldn't be able to understand any of it.
You'd be lucky to pick out one or two words.
It is a totally foreign language.
It's funny, a lot of college students will sometimes
because they have a foreign language requirement.
and, you know, for graduate school or whatever,
they'll think like, oh, I'm gonna take old English
to fulfill my foreign language requirement
and it's like a way to beat the system
because I mean, it's English, right?
When in reality, like, they'd probably do better in Spanish.
You know what I mean?
Like taking German or Spanish
is not gonna be any less foreign,
literally, than old English
because old English is way out there.
It's a totally different language. You know think about all the languages that have ceased
Okay, oh, you know the languages that were spoken in Bible times don't exist anymore all of our modern languages. They're all new
German Spanish, you know, they weren't around back then right because back then there was Latin
Now latin the dead language and now you got Italian French Spanish Portuguese well
Here's the thing a French person a Spanish person, you know, they're not necessarily going to be able to communicate very well
And those are even related languages, but they're just, it's too different.
That's just the way where, so, so tongues are going to cease, right?
Things in the, like, life goes on.
in this world, like this world changes and life goes on, the centuries pass,
empires rise and fall, countries come and go, people are born and they live and they die,
and as everything marches forward, prophecies fail, tongues cease, knowledge vanishes away.
How many times in history has technology been lost or forgotten or knowledge vanishes away?
technologies that used to be in existence or forgotten and then have to be rediscovered.
That was what the whole renaissance was about.
You know, they'd lost a lot of knowledge in Europe during the Dark Ages,
and then they're digging out all these old texts in Greek and Latin, right?
And they're pulling out all this old knowledge about science and astronomy and everything.
And it was like before they could really advance in science,
they had to relearn a lot of stuff they'd forgotten.
because knowledge can sometimes vanish away,
things can be forgotten, knowledge can be forgotten.
You know, there's a lot of knowledge in our country
that used to be common knowledge just about,
you know, how to take care of children,
how to make food, like home making knowledge,
and then technology came in and kind of replaced that,
and then you have a lot of women now
who are having to relearn some of the ancient skills.
of like making sourdough bread and everything, you know,
and actually going back and learning how to churn butter
and how to make things, you know,
in order to maybe get a higher quality of food
than what's out there or to save money
or whatever the reason,
but it's like things that people knew how to do in the past
and then have forgotten how to do,
because, you know, there's some ancient technologies
that are pretty impressive that have been totally forgotten.
Like for example, I remember I used to be in the fire alarm business and in fire alarm. It's all electronics
It's all computers and stuff. It's all very you know up to date technologically speaking
I mean literally 20 some years ago
I was like jacking my laptop into a fire alarm panel
But this is back when like people didn't have laptops like I didn't have a lot nobody had a laptop
But like I had one for work
And I'm like wiring into the fire alarm panel and programming on my laptop back before now now everybody's got a laptop
But back then it was more rare
But I remember working on the fire alarm at the University of California in Davis also known as the People's Republic of Davis
It's kind of a liberal, left-wing, commie school, at least it was back then.
But we'd go to the People's Republic of Davis and they had this ancient fire alarm system.
I kid you not, it was like a hundred years old, if you can imagine that.
It says no electronics at all and you open this thing up and it was filled with like
gears.
So it's like this ancient technology of all these gears and it was super complicated and nobody understood it
Nobody could work on it. It was just we jacked into the thing
But if it broke it just had to be replaced because no one even under like what is this thing?
And of course, there's a there's a famous thing
I'm trying to remember what it's called. I think it's called like the anti-kithura mechanism
Who knows what I'm talking about anybody one person two people three
Four five. All right, so five people know what I'm talking about this. It's it's basically like an ancient quote-unquote computer
But it's from literally like a couple thousand years ago
And it's just super complicated gears and this thing could predict all the solar and lunar eclipses.
And it was on like the cycle of 19 years or I don't know, it was really a complicated piece of equipment.
They found it in the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea and it's thousands of years old and it's this really incredible technology.
You know, it's not electronics, it's not what we think of as technology, but it's a different...
It's a different technology that, you know, that was pretty amazing in its time.
And there are lots of other things like that, different technologies that have become obsolete and forgotten.
You know, and even if you think about, you know, the moon landing in 1969, it's 2025,
and it's like we're struggling to go to the moon in 2025 with humans, that is.
We're struggling to go to the moon in 2025, and it's like, well, how'd we go in 1969?
But then I saw a picture where it's like, oh, here's the computer code that this woman
wrote that took us to the moon or whatever, and it was taller than her that she wrote
this code by hand.
It's all this old, archaic technology.
So it's not like, yeah, let's just pick up right where she left off or whatever.
It's like, what the heck?
Nobody's going to be able to go through all those papers and figure out,
because it's all different now, it's all new.
So it's like that's why they have to kind of start over,
and sorry, you moon landing deniers out there.
But the point is that knowledge can vanish away.
Like, well, how could we have lost the ability to go there?
Because people lose technology all the time throughout history.
When Easter Island was discovered by Europeans,
the people who lived there had no idea how they got there.
They had no ability to leave the island. They didn't know how to make a boat
They didn't know how to sail anywhere and then there were these giant statues who knows what I'm talking about the big stone heads and
The Europeans are as well. Where did these come from? We don't know how'd they get here? We don't know
They couldn't figure out who made them how they got there
We they couldn't get off the island because all the smart people already boated away a long time ago
And the people that were left are just like people who don't know anything.
It'd be like if you were put in a time machine, you know, and sent back in time like 2,000
years or something, you wouldn't be able to just like build an iPhone.
You know, it'd be like, hey, help, future traveler, help us with technology.
You'd just be like, I don't know, man.
How do you make electricity?
Why? Because knowledge vanishes away. Prophecies fail. Tongues cease. Knowledge vanishes away.
And here's the thing about that is that charity doesn't fail, right? Charity is something that endures.
Okay? Long after we're all gone, the love of God and the love of Christ are still going to be preached after we're all gone.
The gospel will continue, Christianity will continue, and there will be people who love God and love other people
filled with the Spirit of God, carrying the torch of Christianity, loving God, loving one another, loving truth, preaching the gospel,
and that's going to go on even after, you know, the English language, if, you know, and I don't think the English language will probably ever cease to exist,
although, you know, whether there be tongues, they shall cease.
You know and here's it but but look if things go on long enough in the English language ceases to exist or maybe during the Millennium
We're all gonna you know switch to something else. I don't know
But the bottom line is you know when English language is gone
When you know technology that we know is gone
you know when at when when every pastor Anderson sermon on every hard drive and thumb drive and
CD is gone
You know charity is still going to be there
God is still going to be working the Holy Spirit is still going to be there love is going to endure
And so charity is eternal and so
The idea here with this is that if that's the way God looks at it,
hey, knowledge ceases, language ceases, but charity never fails,
you know, then we should have this attitude that also says, you know what?
If everything else falls apart in my life, if I lose this,
if I lose that, if I go through this, if I go through that, if this changes, if that changes,
the one thing that's never going to change is I'm still going to love God
and I'm still going to love people, right?
Because if God is saying from his perspective, you know,
charity is what endures from generation to generation,
even as empires rise and fall, then in our own lives,
how about in our lives as circumstances rise and fall?
Charity just should never fail in our lives.
We need to keep on loving God and keep on loving people no matter what.
He said in verse 8,
And we prophesied in part, you know, and again, part of the reason why knowledge vanishes away is because knowledge becomes obsolete, because it turns out we didn't know as much as we thought.
You know, why do prophecies fail? Because, you know, maybe the sermons weren't totally accurate, maybe some preaching that we listened to is a little bit dated.
Because it wasn't totally accurate because we only know in part and then it's like, yeah
Now those prophecy, you know, Brother Hiles used to joke around and say, you know
I got a whole bunch of prophecy sermons that I wrote when I was young and I'm selling them real cheap
Because basically they've all been proven wrong they're obsolete now because we know in part
Knowledge is gonna pass away knowledge is gonna vanish away, you know, who's the father the father of biology?
Aristotle and if you study any science if you read any science book and they usually like to give you the history of
You know whether it's physics biology chemistry, you know usually there's a section that tells you hey
Let's give you the history of science. It's it almost always starts with Aristotle
You know that's kind of always the starting point
But here's the funny thing is that Aristotle was was wrong about like literally everything
But yet he goes down in history as hey this guy was super smart. He's the father of biology
He did all this great work on this that and the other he ended up being wrong about everything
But it's like but for his time. He was doing pretty good
You know and interesting the genius of you know the scientific revolution or at least one of the many geniuses Isaac Newton, right?
Say like oh man Isaac Newton is the great one, but here's the thing Isaac Newton ended up being wrong about a lot of stuff
Because then his stuff got replaced with all the relativity stuff, you know?
Because he did the classical, what we call now like classical mechanics, classical physics.
But it's like, well, now you got to adjust that with all the modern understanding of quantum physics and
relativistic physics and all this stuff like that.
And so here's the thing, knowledge vanishes away.
You go from being the guy with all the answers,
To now being like, oh, yeah, that was quaint,
but here's the real stuff, what we know now.
It's way beyond that.
You know, we think we're so smart, but you know what?
There's always somebody gonna be smarter.
There's gonna be other things that we don't know.
You know, the preaching's never gonna be perfect.
Our knowledge is never gonna be perfect.
You know, was the English language perfect in 1611?
You know, the peak of the English, that's what people say.
But here's the thing, you know, it's just a language.
The language we speak now is just a language
and it's gonna keep changing.
It's continuing to change and it will change. It's slowed down on how it's changing, but it will change
But you know what charity is the one thing that is constant and so in our lives
It should be one constant in our lives too no matter what situation we're in
Don't ever let your love for God wane or your love for other people wane. It's supposed to be the constant
So, even if you, you know, have to tighten up a little doctrine over here, even if you
have to tweak your understanding over here a little bit, maybe you have some friends
stab you in the back, let you down, maybe you make a geographical move to the other
side of the world, maybe you end up losing your job and having to go into a totally different
industry, maybe you lose someone that you love and you have to rethink your life and
what you're going to do, you know, all of these different things in life are going
to change.
You know, we need a constant in our lives.
And I just preached about it on Friday night in Indianapolis.
I preached about how, you know, some things don't change.
God doesn't change. God's word doesn't change.
Right and wrong doesn't change. Well, you know what?
Here's another constant to add to the list is charity.
Love, we need to love God, we should always, you know, and here's the thing, I've gone
through some bad things in my life, I've had all kinds of tragedies in my life, and there
have been so many times in my life when I, you know, I don't want to say I got angry
at God, but there are times when I, you know, got frustrated with things that God allowed
to happen.
And, you know, how many times have I quoted, I find myself quoting this constantly.
Though he slay me, yet will I trust him.
And what, you know, in our modern vernacular, because we don't really use the word slay,
it's, you know, though he kill me, yet will I trust him.
It's saying, you know what, even if God kills me, I will trust him.
But, you know, not only that, not only though he slay me, yet will I trust him.
You know, I'm never going to stop loving God and there have been times when I've there have been many times when I thought about quitting
Pastoring many times. I mean pretty much the whole year of 2006. I pretty much thought about quitting every week
Okay, you know and and so but many many times many many times
I have thought about quitting pastoring meant there have been times when I just said that's it. I'm done. It's over
I've called friends and loved ones and I'm done. It's over
You know I've thought about that many times, but you know what? I've never thought about you know
I've never said I never said I'm quitting on God never said that I
Never said I'm gonna quit serving God never
I've never said or even thought you know what I'm gonna quit going to church
That no no no no
Never I never thought that's it. I'm done reading the Bible
Never that's how I'm done praying
Never! That's never on the table.
Not serving God is never on the table.
Though he slay me, yet will I trust him.
You know, even if I thought about quitting this particular job or this particular ministry,
I never thought about quitting on God.
Because you know what? I would rather die than to quit on God.
And if he kills me, as I'm dying, I'll be saying,
into thy hands I commit my spirit."
And so charity is the constant.
It needs to be the constant in our lives.
Never stop loving God.
You know, God may do things that we don't like.
His ways are not our ways.
and his thoughts are not our thoughts.
And as the heavens are above the earth,
that's how high God's thoughts are above our thoughts.
And his ways are above our ways.
And his ways are past finding out,
and we can't understand why things happen
the way that they do.
And we're often confused by the way things happen in life.
But we know that all things work together for good,
to them who love God,
to them who are the called according to the purpose.
So you still believe that?
Yep, I still believe that.
I still believe that and I will believe that all the way to the grave and even if my life or your life
Just turned to complete crap. I would still believe that and
I'll just say well God's gonna have some explaining to do when I get there, but
You know, I'm sure he's got an answer
And I still love and I love him, you know, I'm not gonna get bitter toward God
Not gonna get bitter toward God. I love God. I love the Bible
That should be a constant in our lives. You know, why don't you just decide? You know what? I love God
I love the Bible and I'm gonna love other people no matter what
And you say well, I don't know if I have that cherry what you know what if you don't have charity
Then pray for God to give you more charity
Pray for the fullness of the Holy Spirit. Pray that God will give you real love in your heart
Pray that God will make you a loving person a better person and how about this?
Why don't you start doing some of the things on this list here?
and working on these attributes in your life
while at the same time praying for God to give you charity.
Now like, oh God, give me charity.
Oh here, let me just cast aside my friend
because he's not good for my image.
Oh God, give me charity.
Oh here, let me envy people who are succeeding
and actually, you know, not be happy for them.
Oh God, please give me charity.
Oh here, let me just be self-serving.
Let me be a rude jerk.
Let me just only think about myself.
You know, obviously that's, you're not sincere.
But I think if you're sincere and you're trying to do the things on the list,
and most importantly, you're praying to God and spending time with God,
spending time in His Word reading, spending time in prayer,
spending time asking God to give you love,
to fill you with the Spirit, to help you be a better Christian,
you know, I believe He's going to answer that prayer.
Because right now, if you're thinking to yourself,
man, I don't have charity at all.
I'm kind of a nothing right now.
Well, you know what? You don't have to finish life as a nothing.
maybe you are kind of a nothing this morning
and I bet in a crowd this size,
I bet there's some real nothings here today.
I'm not singling anyone out
because I don't have anyone in mind at all.
But you know what, in a crowd this size,
I bet there's a bunch of people in here that are a nothing.
And you know what that means?
You're a nothing.
It means you only care about yourself.
And it's just what can I get?
How can I get more for myself?
And how can I get the things that I want?
You're a nothing.
You're a nobody, but you know what? You don't have to live your life as a nothing. Nobody nothing burger non-entity
You could actually become somebody
By loving God and loving your neighbor
You know, we all started out as a child
We all started out as a selfish baby screaming and crying about every little thing only caring about ourselves
But you know what? It's time to become a man and put away childish things
and grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ,
and to grow in charity, and to have love one for another, and to love God.
Now, by the faith, hope, charity, these three, but the greatest of these is charity.
The last thought I want to give you is that these three things,
you know, are critical, key things for the Christian life. Faith.
We got to believe God's word no matter what. Hope.
You know, you know why hope is so important because often there's a temptation to despair
To give up to despair and say that's it. I'm done. It's over
I've had it
Hope is what keeps you going
You keep going because of hope
but
Even greater than having the faith to believe God's Word even greater than having the hope not to despair
is having charity.
These three, this is what it's all about,
faith, hope, and charity,
but the greatest of these is charity.
That's the most essential ingredient.
Let's bards and have a word of prayer.
Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord.
Thank you so much for the opportunity to be in your house.
And we pray that you would bless us
as we go our separate ways, Lord.
Bless our church.
And in Jesus' name, we pray amen.
Song number three hundred and eighty nine bring them in
Parked is the shepherd's voice I hear out in the desert dark and dreary song number three hundred and eighty nine
Bring them in sing it out on the first
Part is the shepherd's voice I hear out in the desert
In the desert, dark and drear, Calling the sheep who find us stray,
Far from the shepherds, fold away, Bring them in.
Thank you.