A Crucified Life - - Loves Sincerely

2 Corinthians 6:6

In purity, knowledge, patience, and kindness; in the Holy Spirit, and in Sincere Love.

*Strong's Ex. Conc. No. 505

Sincere: unfeigned, unhypocritical, unselfishly

From the Greek word 'anupokritos' (pronounced an-oo-pok'-ree-tos): free from hidden agendas.

Love: benevolence, good will, love-feasts

From the Greek word 'agapé' (pronounced ag-ah'-pay): divine love [what God prefers].

    To love sincerely is to love the whole person, not just their best qualities, but to love them in spite of their faults: the way God loves us. So how does God love us? What is this Sincere Love?

               God loves us with an Everlasting Love: Jeremiah 31:3. 

God loves us with a Forgiving Love: Ephesians 4:32.

          God loves us with a Generous Love: Exodus 20:6.

        God loves us with a Faithful Love: Isaiah 54:10.

      God loves us with an All Encompassing Love: Psalm 32:10.

     God loves us with a Fair Love: John 3:16,17.

The first thing we need to do, before we can love one like God loves us, is to have the love of God living in us. For love is of God and it's Alive, an actionable Love. It pursues a person relentlessly until that person accepts the Love. Therefore, knowing love is of God, we seek out how to obtain this wonderful Love and we find Jesus, the embodiment of God's extensive Love for both the people who knew Him and the people who knew Him not. 

The second thing we need to do, before we can love on one another the way God loves us, is to receive His Spirit into us. When I was younger, I was saved but not filled; nor was I discipled. So I did not know how to live out my salvation. Nor did I know about this wonderful Spirit God was so generously handing out to those who sought Him. But now that I do I want you to be aware that the Holy Spirit of God is not Someone you should be afraid of, but rejoice that God has sent a Helper to help us in our works for Him. 

As we begin to live for God in Christ through the Holy Spirit, we learn that God has loved us all along and was just waiting for us to love Him back. We find that He wants us to love one another the way He loves us. So we search out His Word to see how He loves us and we pray that we can love like that. We ask Him how we can love like He loves us? God is Spirit and He can love like that. How do we love with this Sincere Love which God has and has given us? 

It's one thing to read a Bible verse about loving each other, it's quite another thing to apply that Bible verse to our lives. But when the Spirit is living in us, He directs us: we just need to listen and be obedient to that nudge on our hearts, that Word in our thoughts.

    For instance, when I got divorced from my first husband, I realized I had to forgive him before I could move on, before I could grow in my relationship with Christ. His actions and his words caused the divorce, the death of our marriage, and rendered our family torn apart. So, I forgave him. 

    Our boys were getting baptized, so I invited him and his  girlfriend to the service and the dinner we had afterward. There I forgave them both; hugging them and meaning every word I said. That's how we forgive those who have sinned against us.

    It's the same way the father forgave the son who returned home after squandering all of his inheritance on frivolous living (Luke 15:11-32). Though the son approached his father with a humble heart, ready to be a servant, his father approached him with joy and covered him with new clothes. He gave him a seal (signet) of approval and had a great celebration: for his son who was lost was now home. That's Sincere Love.

   

When someone hurts us, we don't hurt them back. We bless them with kindness. When someone attacks us, we don't attack them back. We remain silent; God will fight for us, if need be. We bless them with our silence. And we pray for them. 

    God says we should not only bless those people who sin against us for Christ's sake, but that we should pray for them. Pray for their salvation. Pray for them to be filled with His Spirit. Pray for them to receive this Sincere Love which God has for them. Pray for their needs to be met in Christ. 

    How we treat each other in the sanctuary of our prayers is how we are to treat each other in public. The words we speak to each other must come from a heart filled with the Sincere Love of God in Christ through the Holy Spirit. There is no other way to love each other purely and with integrity. 

    Lord, let Your Love grow in me and flow through me. 

SINCERE LOVE

Heart & Soul - - Sincere Love

 

Romans 12:9

Love must be sincere. Detest what is evil; cling to what is good.

*Strong's Ex. Conc. No. 505

Sincere: unhypocritical, unfeigned

From the Greek word 'anupokritos' (pronounced an-oo-pok'-ree-tos):  describing sincere behavior free from hidden agendas (selfish motives) – literally, "without hypocrisy".

Used only six times in the New Testament: Romans 12:9; 2 Corinthians 6:6; 1 Timothy 1:5; 1 Peter 1:22; James 3:17.

Sincerity: freedom from hypocrisy, deceit, duplicity; honest intentions; candor, genuineness, truthfulness, reliability, impartiality (fairness, unbiased). 

INSINCERE LOVE

   While the word "sincere" itself is only used six times in the New Testament, the intent is given throughout the Bible. For instance, in Matthew 23:27-28, Jesus rebukes the scribes and the Pharisees for their appearance of righteousness: visible to those who watched them and heard their words. Their supposed love for others was not sincere. It was a "look at me" cloak, covering the intent of their hearts. This is not Christlike love. 

    The Pharisee, for us, is the symbol of hypocrisy. Charlie Daniels had a song called, New Pharisees, that describes the word pretty good. It is the gossiper, the malicious intent to destroy, tear down, put down, the bully. 

    The Pharisee is attention-seeking, self-serving and self-promoting. They are the strict and restrictive religious sects concerned with hollow tradition and empty hearts. While the Pharisaical heart seeks the return of the Messiah, it lives its life according to its own rules and vain beliefs, denying Jesus and His power to forgive sins (Mark 2:1-12).

SINCERE LOVE

    Knowing our hearts, we are encouraged throughout the New Testament to be sincere, genuine, real. We remain in Christ and Christ remains in us when we remove the hateful hypocritical attitudes and mores with which we have grown up around. 

>Stop lying to each other - Ephesians 4:25

>Remove malice and envy - 1 Peter 2:1

>Get rid of bitterness, anger, rage,  - Ephesians 4:31

>Stop slandering one another - James 4:11

>Get rid of all moral filth - James 1:21

>Covet not - Exodus 20:17

IT'S WHAT'S INSIDE THAT COUNTS

    Mark 7:21-23 (21) "For from within the hearts of men come evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, (22) greed, wickedness, deceit, debauchery, envy, slander, arrogance, and foolishness. (23) All these evils come from within, and these are what defile a man."

    We can only change ourselves so much. We can determine to be better people, we can be kinder, more tolerant of differences, and we may actually like each other. But we can't love each other the way God wants us to love each other unless we first love God the way He wants us to love Him.

    Jesus says, "Love one another as I have loved you." John 15:12. So, we must ask, How has Jesus loved us? 

>With an Everlasting Love - Jeremiah 31:3

>He loves His enemies - Matthew 5:44

>He forgives His enemies - Luke 23:34

>With His prayer for us - John 17:20-26

    We need Jesus on the inside, filling us with Himself, His love, that we may grow in His love and be able to live this life in honor, in His righteousness, in His love and through His love. We desire to glorify God in everything we do and everything we say. 

    If I have hurt you in any way, I ask your forgiveness now. If I have fallen short of your expectations of being Christlike, I ask that you forgive me: every single time. Jesus is Life and I want Him to fully thrive in me, shining His Light of Love into your view of me. I don't want to be a superficial Christian, which is actually an oxymoron because "Christian" means Christ-liver. And if a person says, "I'm a Christian" but they aren't living for Christ, then they really aren't Christians, are they?

    The Word says that we are known by our fruits, by what grows in us and on us and through us. Where our root is, there our growth is. It is why we say that we need to be rooted and grounded in the Word. 

    Colossians 2:6, 7 "Therefore, just as you have received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue to walk in Him, rooted and built up in Him, established in the faith as you were taught, and overflowing with thankfulness."