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Galatians chapter 5, verses 22 and 23 tells us: "But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law."
Today, we're considering what I believe is the toughest command and the toughest fruit of the Spirit. Many people define "spiritual" in different ways—as a belief in a higher reality, a personal internal connection, or a journey of self-discovery. But everyone is spiritual. The question isn't whether we're spiritual, but what kind of spirit do we have?
The Bible tells us in 1 Thessalonians 5:23 that we are spirit, soul, and body. We all live from our spirits outward. The kind of spirit we have determines the kind of life we live.
Let's go back to the beginning. In Genesis 2, God told Adam: "You can eat of every tree here except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The day you eat it, you will surely die."
Adam and Eve disobeyed and ate the forbidden fruit. Here's what's important: even though God said they would surely die, their bodies didn't die immediately. They lived for almost a thousand years. Their souls didn't die either—when God asked them, "Where are you?" they responded with emotion and made intelligent decisions. So it was their spirits that died that day.
Physical death is the result of an absent spirit. Spiritual death is the consequence of a separated spirit—disconnected from God. It is possible to be physically alive with a vibrant soul and yet have a dead spirit because you're disconnected from God.
When Adam and Eve disobeyed, their spirits were disconnected from God, making them spiritually dead. Romans 5:12 explains: "When Adam sinned, sin entered into the world. And Adam's sin brought with it death. And this death spread to everyone. For everyone had sinned."
Everybody was born with their backs turned to God, disconnected and separated from Him. This disconnection left us vulnerable to the dominion of another spirit—the devil. We went from being living spirits connected to God to being dead spirits disconnected from God.
Isaiah 59:2 says, "For it is your sins that have cut you off from God." Romans 6:23 establishes: "The wages of sin is death"—disconnection from God. Colossians 2:13 says: "You are dead because of your sins. You are spiritually dead because of your sins because your sinful nature has yet to be cut away."
Then God made a move. He made us alive with Christ. How? Colossians 1:19 tells us: "For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ. And through him, God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ's blood on the cross."
We have been made alive by the death and resurrection of Jesus. We have been made alive by the blood of Jesus shed on the cross. We have been reconciled to God because of the sacrifice of Jesus.
Colossians 1:21 says: "You were once far from God. You were God's enemies at some point because of sin, separated from him by your evil thoughts and your actions. Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body. As a result, he has brought you into his presence."
This is the gospel. We were once dead in sin, separated from God. God saw our need and made all the moves necessary to reconcile us back to Himself. It was not our righteousness. We did not know to pray for this. We did not know to desire this. God made all the moves.
1 Corinthians 15:22 says, "For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive." 2 Corinthians 5:17 declares: "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new."
Ezekiel 36:26 describes what God promised: "I'm going to give you a new heart. Then I'm going to put a new spirit on the inside of you."
Everybody is spiritual. It just determines what kind of spirit you have—dead or living. Because the kind of spirit you have determines the kind of life you have.
Dead spirits disconnected from God produce dead works of the flesh. Living spirits connected to God produce the fruit of the spirit.
A fruit changed Adam and Eve's nature. Then God gave us a new nature that changes our fruits. That's the gospel. Somebody ate a fruit and changed their nature. God reversed the equation and said, "I'm going to give you a new nature so that it can change your fruits."
2 Peter 1:4 says: "We have this precious promise by which we can share in the divine nature of God."
So when you and I say we're spiritual, we mean living out of the divine nature of God in us. It's not some higher power or the universe. It's living out of the nature of God. I am most spiritual when I'm living like God, when I'm living out of the nature of God.
The nature of God in us is expressed through the fruit of the spirit. The fruit of the spirit is the expression of the nature of God in us. And I believe that the greatest expression of the nature of God is love.
How do I know? 1 John 4:8 says, "God is love."
John 3:16 tells us: "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life."
Ephesians 2:4 says: "But God who is rich in mercy because of this great love with which he has loved us—even when we were dead in trespasses—he made us alive together with Christ."
1 John 3:1 declares: "Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God."
It is God's love, the great extent of God's love, that compelled him to make all the moves necessary to reconcile us to himself. We did not pray for this. We did not even know to desire this. This was not the answer to a prayer. He made all the moves. He made all the moves to show how much he loves us while we were yet sinners.
He didn't just save us. He gave us his nature. And what is his nature? God is love. It's not actions that he does. God doesn't do things and those things are love. No, God is love. And because he is love, he does these things. It's not just actions for him—not empty actions. It's the expression of his being. Because of who he is, he does what he does.
Galatians 5:21-22 says: "But the fruit of the spirit is love."
Point Number One: Love is the first fruit of our divine nature.
Love is the first expression of this divine nature that anyone who has said yes to Jesus has. Love is the first sign of the divine nature. God asks us to express this fruit not because of the capacity of what we can do, but because of the capacity of who he has made us.
You cannot be patient without love. You cannot be kind without love. You cannot have self-control without love for God and for the person. Love makes it possible and holds the door for the rest of the fruit of the spirit to flow. None of them flow without love.
Colossians 3:14 says: "But above all these things, put on what? Love, which is the bond of perfection."
Point Number Two: Love is the greatest command.
Matthew 22:36-37 records: "Teacher," they asked, "what is the most important commandment in the law of Moses? Jesus replied, 'You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. This is the first and the greatest command.'"
The second commandment is equally important. That word "equally" means you cannot say you love God and you hate the person beside you. One equals one.
The way we know you love God is how you love the people around you. You cannot say it's just me and God. We don't know how much you love God. God can't even tell. He looks at your neighbor and how you love them to see how much you really love Him.
Jesus said: "Love your neighbor as yourself." The way you love yourself is the reference point. How do I know you love God? It's the way you love people. How you love people is referenced from how you love yourself. Sometimes in praise and worship, when people don't clap or sing, they can't celebrate God because they probably don't celebrate the people in their lives, or they probably don't celebrate themselves.
Galatians 5:14 says: "For the whole law can be summed up in one command: love your neighbor as yourself."
Then Jesus comes into the scene and introduces a new dimension. In John 13:34 he says: "So now I'm giving you a new commandment: Love each other. And the reference changes: just as I have loved you."
In the Old Testament, the way we loved ourselves was the reference. Then God realized, "You guys don't even know how to love yourself. Okay, you know what? Forget about you. Love yourself the way I love you. Love your neighbor the way I love you. Love God the way I love you."
Jesus's love becomes the reference. That's why love is a fruit of the spirit. It's the Holy Spirit making you like Jesus because he becomes the reference.
John 15:12 says the same thing: "A new commandment I give you."
1 Corinthians 13:13 says: "Three things will last forever: faith, hope, and love. And the greatest of these is love."
Love is everything. Everything revolves around love.
When you say yes to Jesus and Jesus comes into your heart, the next step the Bible says is to be rooted in love. Ephesians 3:17 says: "That Christ might dwell in your hearts through faith—that you being rooted and grounded in what? In love."
Even faith doesn't work without love. Galatians 5:6 says: "What matters is faith that works through love."
Even answered prayers depend on your love work. 1 John 3:22 says: "And whatever we ask, we receive from him. Because we keep his commands. And this is the commandment: that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus. And we love one another."
This means the answers to your prayers depend on how you love your coworker. God is watching the way you love them.
Our obedience is powered by love. John 14:15 says: "If you love me, you will obey me."
Our love for people opens them up to receive the love of God. When we don't love people, we shut them off. There are people whose salvation, people whose life in Jesus, is dependent on how we love them.
Everything revolves around love. Everything.
1 Corinthians 13:1 says: "If I could speak in all the languages of the earth and of angels, but don't have love, I would be a noisy gong and a clanging cymbal."
The danger of being a noisy gong is that we draw attention to our loveless life. If you had just kept quiet, maybe nobody would know. But you're doing all the loudness and I look at you past the gifts of God and I said, you don't have fruit. The fruit is different from the gift. You don't need love to prophesy, but you better have love when you prophesy.
Verse 2 says: "If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God's secret plans and possessed all knowledge, if I had enough faith to move a mountain, but I didn't love others, I would be nothing."
Verse 3 says: "If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body—if I gave them one of my kidneys and could boast about it—but if I didn't love others, I would have gained nothing."
Everything we do is nothing if it's not done with love. In church, giving your tithe, being in a small group, praying for people, owning a business, making 10 figures, missions, outreach—it does not matter if it is not done with love.
When I say love, I'm not talking about a compilation of actions. Love is the expression of the divine nature of God in you.
I want to be clear when I say love, because nowadays words don't mean what they used to mean. In the English New Testament, four Greek words are translated as love:
Agape was a word that was not commonly used in Greek literature. It seems as if Jesus and the Christians adopted this word to capture God's kind of love. This rarely used word almost made it capture the love of God.
That word agape comes from another Greek word that means to take pleasure in a thing, to prize it above other things, to be unwilling to abandon it or do without it, to welcome it with desire, to have preference. It is as if love, or this agape love, is selfish and unconditional. It's a love that is concerned with the greatest good of the other person. This love is not born out of emotions or feelings or sentiments or familiarity or attraction. It is born out of will. It's a decision I make to prefer and to love this person.
When Jesus said love, he meant agape. Selfless, unconditional love, regardless of reciprocity.
Point Number Three: God's kind of love is sacrificial.
This is the toughest command because you're asking me to love somebody who doesn't deserve it from my estimation. To love somebody who actually deserves the exact opposite. To love somebody who doesn't care about my love. To love somebody who is not going to reciprocate my love. It is tough to love sacrificially.
This love is self-giving. It's not self-seeking. It's willing to love and give unconditionally, regardless of reciprocity. This is what God meant when he said, "I love you." This is how he showed us.
John 3:16 says: "God so loved that he gave."
Romans 5:8 says: "But God demonstrated his love towards us while we were yet sinners, when there was no guarantee that we would accept his love." There was no guarantee because we had trashed his love already in Genesis. When there was no guarantee that you and I would say yes to his love, he demonstrated his love towards us and sent Christ to die for us.
God loves us with this agape love and turns around and commands us to go and love other people the way he loved us. 1 John 4:11 says: "Beloved, if God so loves us, so also we ought to love one another."
God is saying: "Love others the way I love them. Love like me. Love like me because you are like me. Love like me because you have my nature."
I can hear the objections: "How? Show me what that looks like."
1 Corinthians 13 gives us the answer. Let me bring it together in 2025:
Matthew 5:43 says: "You are familiar with the old written law: 'Love your friend and hate your enemy.' I'm challenging that. I'm telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst."
God is saying: "I want you to be in your best behavior when somebody upsets you. When you have every reason to knock them out, God says, 'Heaven is looking.' God is like, 'Watch her. Watch him. He's going to be the best behaved right there.'"
How is that possible? Jesus was in his best behavior when man was in their worst behavior. If I was the one who could call angels, the first guy that whipped me, I'd be like, "Kill you instantly. Do you know who I am?" But Jesus was in his best behavior. He brought out the best out of him when man was in their worst.
Matthew 5:44 says: "When someone gives you a hard time, respond with prayer. Pray for them. Sometimes it's not for them. It's for you. Say, 'Lord, help your son. Help your daughter.' Then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves."
This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun and the rain—to everyone, regardless: the good, the bad, the nice, the nasty.
Verse 46 asks: "If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, even in church, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that."
I saw something that triggered me. There's something called the Nine Satanic Statements from the Satanic Bible, 1969 edition. Statement number four says: "Satan represents kindness to those who deserve it instead of love wasted on ingrates."
Let me make this clear. Satan does not preach hate. Satan preaches: Love those who love you. Restrict your love to those who appreciate your love. So when we do that, guess who we are like?
Matthew 5:48 says: "In a word, what I'm saying is grow up—your kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out of your God-created identity."
Live generously, graciously towards others the way God lives towards you. The fruit of the spirit enables us to respond the way God responds, the way Jesus would have responded.
I can hear the objection: "Pastor, you don't know what they did to me. I've tried. They are not exactly who I thought they were. They are not."
I tried very hard not to balance this message. But I want to say this: sometimes love can mean physical distance.
God loved man so much that if you look at the design of the Tabernacle—the outer court, holy place, holy of holies—God made sure that whenever anybody finally got there, love demanded that all kinds of things were done so that you don't die there. If you come into my presence carelessly, you will die. So he kept his distance so that man does not die in his presence. That's love.
Sometimes love might mean skipping the family reunion for Thanksgiving. But that's not love in itself. Love is while they are there and you're home fasting and praying for them. It is not the physical distance that is the love. It's the prayer that is the love.
Do you understand? It's not just staying away. It's what you do while you're away that is the love. That's what God did from the moment Adam sinned and was separated. What did God do? From that same chapter, that same verse, God already began planning how he was going to bring him back. It says, "The seed is going to bruise your head."
God already began making plans. While he was here, separated in the background, he was making plans. The Bible says, "In the fullness of time, when everything had aligned, Jesus came."
So he wasn't just absent. He was working in the background. That work is his love.
It's a very high bar to be set. And it's high because it's set by the Most High. It's impossible without help. Hence the Holy Spirit.
Because sometimes some of us need the Holy Spirit to hold us, just to hold your lips and tell you, "Walk out of this room now." You're like, "Let me air my mind." Don't air your mind. Leave it unaired. Just walk out. You need something that's going to remind you to love the way God loves you.
You need to find a way to keep the fruit of love flowing. How do you do that?
Number One: Spend time with the One that is love.
God is love. Spend time in his presence. 2 Corinthians 3:18 says: "And we all with unveiled faces, beholding the glory of God, are transformed into the very same image."
How do we behold the glory of God? Read your Bible. You can't get there any other way. There's no shortcut. Read your Bible. What happens when you read your Bible? The Holy Spirit works within us to make us more like Him.
The Holy Spirit aligns our hearts. If you've driven any car after a while, you want to know how aligned your car is—just let the steering go. Most cars will just turn left immediately or right, and then you go for a wheel alignment. That's what your daily devotion is. You have a rough Monday. Then Tuesday morning at 5:00 AM you go back to God. "Okay, so yesterday happened." The Holy Spirit is like, "Yep, yep, yep. Remember when I was telling you? You know what, never mind. Let's start again today."
And then he begins to align your heart. When you said that, when you thought that, when you did that, he begins to convict you and challenge you and confirm you and make sure that you're aligned to express that divine nature.
Consistent connection with God keeps the fruit flowing. The more fellowship we have with God, the more fruit of the spirit we produce.
Number Two: Pray in the spirit.
If you have a prayer language, learn how to do that often. What it does is strengthen your spirit against your flesh. And it's not the tongues that you pray when you're upset—like when somebody annoys you and you're speaking in tongues like that. It's not that one. It's already too late then. He's the one you prayed before that strengthened your spirit that made you walk away from the room, knowing you could have done something you don't want to regret.
1 Corinthians 14:4 says: "He that prays in the spirit edifies himself." That word means to build up yourself, to strengthen your spirit.
Number Three: Make consistent confessions.
Say what it is you want to believe until you believe it. Say it till you believe it. And then say it because you believe it. You say it till you believe it. Say it because you want to behave like it.
Proverbs 18:20 says: "A man's stomach is satisfied from the fruit of his mouth and from the produce of his lips he shall be filled."
We feed on our words. We become what we consistently say. We behave like what we profess. We believe what we say. Then we begin to behave like it.
And we have to do this every day. Choose love every day. The moment you don't choose love, you become vulnerable to offense.
I remember a brother and sister came to me. They were about to meet their mom, and the mom had been very hard on them. Not a good experience. Now they were in college and their mom was coming the weekend. They said, "Pastor Vic, I don't want her to come."
I said, "Yeah, but she's coming though. I don't want her to come." I said, "Okay, why don't we prepare for what that looks like?"
I told them, "Why don't you go home and describe what you would like it to be? Not what your mind wants it to be, but what God would like it to be. Let's get practical. Write something like, 'When I see mom, I'm going to smile. When I see mom, I'm going to hug her and tell her I've missed you. Even though I don't feel like it, I know there's a whole "mom-sized" hole that my resentment is blocking me from. But I'm going to say it when I see her. I'm going to help her with her luggage and it's going to be a wonderful ride back home. We're going to share memories of things.'"
They were side-eyeing me the entire time. "Tell me—should she not come?" I said, "No. She's going to come. Prepare. Why don't you confess it until you behave like it?"
I told them, "Every day, five times a day, write it out and say it."
Guess what? When the mom came from the airport—she hadn't even gotten to them yet—the smile on their faces broke her. She didn't even need to say anything. She broke down crying from just the smile on their faces. These were people five days earlier that did not want her to come.
That's the power of saying what you want to happen.
So you have Susie in the office. If you're Susie here, I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about the other Susie, and you have a rough relationship. Why don't you sit down and talk to yourself about that relationship and tell it what you want it to be? "I'm going to be kind. I'm going to think kind thoughts. I'm going to say kind words. I'm going to be kind to other people."
And you keep saying it: "I have the divine nature of God in me. I love like God. When I see Susie, I'm going to smile. In fact, I'm going to buy coffee for Susie for the next seven days."
Why? God so loved that he gave. Susie is going to be like, "Oh my god, there's not enough caramel in this."
Guess what you do tomorrow? Add more caramel. Most of you like, "Then don't give coffee." No, no, no. Then add more caramel. Why? It teaches your flesh that it cannot win. It can't win.
Jesus is hanging on the cross and he tells God, "Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing." Susie doesn't know what she's doing. It might seem like she knows what she's doing, but she doesn't know what she's doing. There's somebody somewhere to whom I am Susie, and they have to forgive me as much as I forgive the next person.
So every day you wake up, spend some time with Jesus, worship, and bring out 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. Read it in the Message translation and in the New King James or whatever version. As you read it, God will begin to convict you.
You're jealous. You're jealous because when everybody was celebrating, you just clapped like this and you were side-eyeing her. "You're not the only one to go to France." Like you're jealous. It begins to expose areas of your life where you don't love.
And then what do you do? You begin to say with your mouth what you want to act out.
Let's make a confession now. Stand on your feet and say these words. Think about everything you've learned:
I love like God because I am like him. I am patient, long-suffering, and kind. I am never envious, jealous, selfish, or proud. I am never irritable at any time of the day. I don't hold grudges or keep scores of wrongdoing. I forgive quickly. I never rejoice at evil or injustice, whether I agree with them or not. I believe the best about other people and I pray for them. I love like God because he first loved me. I love like God because I am like him.
Galatians chapter 5, verses 22 and 23 tells us: "But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness goodness faithfulness gentleness, self-control. Against such there is no law."
Today, we're considering what I believe is the toughest command and the toughest fruit of the Spirit. Many people define "spiritual" in different ways—as a belief in a higher reality, a personal internal connection, or a journey of self-discovery. But everyone is spiritual. The question isn't whether we're spiritual, but what kind of spirit do we have?
The Bible tells us in 1 Thessalonians 5:23 that we are spirit, soul, and body. We all live from our spirits outward. The kind of spirit we have determines the kind of life we live.
Let's go back to the beginning. In Genesis 2, God told Adam: "You can eat of every tree here except the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The day you eat it, you will surely die."
Adam and Eve disobeyed and ate the forbidden fruit. Here's what's important: even though God said they would surely die, their bodies didn't die immediately. They lived for almost a thousand years. Their souls didn't die either—when God asked them, "Where are you?" they responded with emotion and made intelligent decisions. So it was their spirits that died that day.
Physical death is the result of an absent spirit. Spiritual death is the consequence of a separated spirit—disconnected from God. It is possible to be physically alive with a vibrant soul and yet have a dead spirit because you're disconnected from God.
When Adam and Eve disobeyed, their spirits were disconnected from God, making them spiritually dead. Romans 5:12 explains: "When Adam sinned, sin entered into the world. And Adam's sin brought with it death. And this death spread to everyone. For everyone had sinned."
Everybody was born with their backs turned to God, disconnected and separated from Him. This disconnection left us vulnerable to the dominion of another spirit—the devil. We went from being living spirits connected to God to being dead spirits disconnected from God.
Isaiah 59:2 says, "For it is your sins that have cut you off from God." Romans 6:23 establishes: "The wages of sin is death"—disconnection from God. Colossians 2:13 says: "You are dead because of your sins. You are spiritually dead because of your sins because your sinful nature has yet to be cut away."
Then God made a move. He made us alive with Christ. How? Colossians 1:19 tells us: "For God in all his fullness was pleased to live in Christ. And through him, God reconciled everything to himself. He made peace with everything in heaven and on earth by means of Christ's blood on the cross."
We have been made alive by the death and resurrection of Jesus. We have been made alive by the blood of Jesus shed on the cross. We have been reconciled to God because of the sacrifice of Jesus.
Colossians 1:21 says: "You were once far from God. You were God's enemies at some point because of sin, separated from him by your evil thoughts and your actions. Yet now he has reconciled you to himself through the death of Christ in his physical body. As a result, he has brought you into his presence."
This is the gospel. We were once dead in sin, separated from God. God saw our need and made all the moves necessary to reconcile us back to Himself. It was not our righteousness. We did not know to pray for this. We did not know to desire this. God made all the moves.
1 Corinthians 15:22 says, "For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive." 2 Corinthians 5:17 declares: "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new."
Ezekiel 36:26 describes what God promised: "I'm going to give you a new heart. Then I'm going to put a new spirit on the inside of you."
Everybody is spiritual. It just determines what kind of spirit you have—dead or living. Because the kind of spirit you have determines the kind of life you have.
Dead spirits disconnected from God produce dead works of the flesh. Living spirits connected to God produce the fruit of the spirit.
A fruit changed Adam and Eve's nature. Then God gave us a new nature that changes our fruits. That's the gospel. Somebody ate a fruit and changed their nature. God reversed the equation and said, "I'm going to give you a new nature so that it can change your fruits."
2 Peter 1:4 says: "We have this precious promise by which we can share in the divine nature of God."
So when you and I say we're spiritual, we mean living out of the divine nature of God in us. It's not some higher power or the universe. It's living out of the nature of God. I am most spiritual when I'm living like God, when I'm living out of the nature of God.
The nature of God in us is expressed through the fruit of the spirit. The fruit of the spirit is the expression of the nature of God in us. And I believe that the greatest expression of the nature of God is love.
How do I know? 1 John 4:8 says, "God is love."
John 3:16 tells us: "For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believes in him will not perish but have everlasting life."
Ephesians 2:4 says: "But God who is rich in mercy because of this great love with which he has loved us—even when we were dead in trespasses—he made us alive together with Christ."
1 John 3:1 declares: "Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God."
It is God's love, the great extent of God's love, that compelled him to make all the moves necessary to reconcile us to himself. We did not pray for this. We did not even know to desire this. This was not the answer to a prayer. He made all the moves. He made all the moves to show how much he loves us while we were yet sinners.
He didn't just save us. He gave us his nature. And what is his nature? God is love. It's not actions that he does. God doesn't do things and those things are love. No, God is love. And because he is love, he does these things. It's not just actions for him—not empty actions. It's the expression of his being. Because of who he is, he does what he does.
Galatians 5:21-22 says: "But the fruit of the spirit is love."
Point Number One: Love is the first fruit of our divine nature.
Love is the first expression of this divine nature that anyone who has said yes to Jesus has. Love is the first sign of the divine nature. God asks us to express this fruit not because of the capacity of what we can do, but because of the capacity of who he has made us.
You cannot be patient without love. You cannot be kind without love. You cannot have self-control without love for God and for the person. Love makes it possible and holds the door for the rest of the fruit of the spirit to flow. None of them flow without love.
Colossians 3:14 says: "But above all these things, put on what? Love, which is the bond of perfection."
Point Number Two: Love is the greatest command.
Matthew 22:36-37 records: "Teacher," they asked, "what is the most important commandment in the law of Moses? Jesus replied, 'You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind. This is the first and the greatest command.'"
The second commandment is equally important. That word "equally" means you cannot say you love God and you hate the person beside you. One equals one.
The way we know you love God is how you love the people around you. You cannot say it's just me and God. We don't know how much you love God. God can't even tell. He looks at your neighbor and how you love them to see how much you really love Him.
Jesus said: "Love your neighbor as yourself." The way you love yourself is the reference point. How do I know you love God? It's the way you love people. How you love people is referenced from how you love yourself. Sometimes in praise and worship, when people don't clap or sing, they can't celebrate God because they probably don't celebrate the people in their lives, or they probably don't celebrate themselves.
Galatians 5:14 says: "For the whole law can be summed up in one command: love your neighbor as yourself."
Then Jesus comes into the scene and introduces a new dimension. In John 13:34 he says: "So now I'm giving you a new commandment: Love each other. And the reference changes: just as I have loved you."
In the Old Testament, the way we loved ourselves was the reference. Then God realized, "You guys don't even know how to love yourself. Okay, you know what? Forget about you. Love yourself the way I love you. Love your neighbor the way I love you. Love God the way I love you."
Jesus's love becomes the reference. That's why love is a fruit of the spirit. It's the Holy Spirit making you like Jesus because he becomes the reference.
John 15:12 says the same thing: "A new commandment I give you."
1 Corinthians 13:13 says: "Three things will last forever: faith, hope, and love. And the greatest of these is love."
Love is everything. Everything revolves around love.
When you say yes to Jesus and Jesus comes into your heart, the next step the Bible says is to be rooted in love. Ephesians 3:17 says: "That Christ might dwell in your hearts through faith—that you being rooted and grounded in what? In love."
Even faith doesn't work without love. Galatians 5:6 says: "What matters is faith that works through love."
Even answered prayers depend on your love work. 1 John 3:22 says: "And whatever we ask, we receive from him. Because we keep his commands. And this is the commandment: that we believe in the name of his Son Jesus. And we love one another."
This means the answers to your prayers depend on how you love your coworker. God is watching the way you love them.
Our obedience is powered by love. John 14:15 says: "If you love me, you will obey me."
Our love for people opens them up to receive the love of God. When we don't love people, we shut them off. There are people whose salvation, people whose life in Jesus, is dependent on how we love them.
Everything revolves around love. Everything.
1 Corinthians 13:1 says: "If I could speak in all the languages of the earth and of angels, but don't have love, I would be a noisy gong and a clanging cymbal."
The danger of being a noisy gong is that we draw attention to our loveless life. If you had just kept quiet, maybe nobody would know. But you're doing all the loudness and I look at you past the gifts of God and I said, you don't have fruit. The fruit is different from the gift. You don't need love to prophesy, but you better have love when you prophesy.
Verse 2 says: "If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God's secret plans and possessed all knowledge, if I had enough faith to move a mountain, but I didn't love others, I would be nothing."
Verse 3 says: "If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body—if I gave them one of my kidneys and could boast about it—but if I didn't love others, I would have gained nothing."
Everything we do is nothing if it's not done with love. In church, giving your tithe, being in a small group, praying for people, owning a business, making 10 figures, missions, outreach—it does not matter if it is not done with love.
When I say love, I'm not talking about a compilation of actions. Love is the expression of the divine nature of God in you.
I want to be clear when I say love, because nowadays words don't mean what they used to mean. In the English New Testament, four Greek words are translated as love:
Agape was a word that was not commonly used in Greek literature. It seems as if Jesus and the Christians adopted this word to capture God's kind of love. This rarely used word almost made it capture the love of God.
That word agape comes from another Greek word that means to take pleasure in a thing, to prize it above other things, to be unwilling to abandon it or do without it, to welcome it with desire, to have preference. It is as if love, or this agape love, is selfish and unconditional. It's a love that is concerned with the greatest good of the other person. This love is not born out of emotions or feelings or sentiments or familiarity or attraction. It is born out of will. It's a decision I make to prefer and to love this person.
When Jesus said love, he meant agape. Selfless, unconditional love, regardless of reciprocity.
Point Number Three: God's kind of love is sacrificial.
This is the toughest command because you're asking me to love somebody who doesn't deserve it from my estimation. To love somebody who actually deserves the exact opposite. To love somebody who doesn't care about my love. To love somebody who is not going to reciprocate my love. It is tough to love sacrificially.
This love is self-giving. It's not self-seeking. It's willing to love and give unconditionally, regardless of reciprocity. This is what God meant when he said, "I love you." This is how he showed us.
John 3:16 says: "God so loved that he gave."
Romans 5:8 says: "But God demonstrated his love towards us while we were yet sinners, when there was no guarantee that we would accept his love." There was no guarantee because we had trashed his love already in Genesis. When there was no guarantee that you and I would say yes to his love, he demonstrated his love towards us and sent Christ to die for us.
God loves us with this agape love and turns around and commands us to go and love other people the way he loved us. 1 John 4:11 says: "Beloved, if God so loves us, so also we ought to love one another."
God is saying: "Love others the way I love them. Love like me. Love like me because you are like me. Love like me because you have my nature."
I can hear the objections: "How? Show me what that looks like."
1 Corinthians 13 gives us the answer. Let me bring it together in 2025:
Matthew 5:43 says: "You are familiar with the old written law: 'Love your friend and hate your enemy.' I'm challenging that. I'm telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst."
God is saying: "I want you to be in your best behavior when somebody upsets you. When you have every reason to knock them out, God says, 'Heaven is looking.' God is like, 'Watch her. Watch him. He's going to be the best behaved right there.'"
How is that possible? Jesus was in his best behavior when man was in their worst behavior. If I was the one who could call angels, the first guy that whipped me, I'd be like, "Kill you instantly. Do you know who I am?" But Jesus was in his best behavior. He brought out the best out of him when man was in their worst.
Matthew 5:44 says: "When someone gives you a hard time, respond with prayer. Pray for them. Sometimes it's not for them. It's for you. Say, 'Lord, help your son. Help your daughter.' Then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves."
This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun and the rain—to everyone, regardless: the good, the bad, the nice, the nasty.
Verse 46 asks: "If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, even in church, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that."
I saw something that triggered me. There's something called the Nine Satanic Statements from the Satanic Bible, 1969 edition. Statement number four says: "Satan represents kindness to those who deserve it instead of love wasted on ingrates."
Let me make this clear. Satan does not preach hate. Satan preaches: Love those who love you. Restrict your love to those who appreciate your love. So when we do that, guess who we are like?
Matthew 5:48 says: "In a word, what I'm saying is grow up—your kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out of your God-created identity."
Live generously, graciously towards others the way God lives towards you. The fruit of the spirit enables us to respond the way God responds, the way Jesus would have responded.
I can hear the objection: "Pastor, you don't know what they did to me. I've tried. They are not exactly who I thought they were. They are not."
I tried very hard not to balance this message. But I want to say this: sometimes love can mean physical distance.
God loved man so much that if you look at the design of the Tabernacle—the outer court, holy place, holy of holies—God made sure that whenever anybody finally got there, love demanded that all kinds of things were done so that you don't die there. If you come into my presence carelessly, you will die. So he kept his distance so that man does not die in his presence. That's love.
Sometimes love might mean skipping the family reunion for Thanksgiving. But that's not love in itself. Love is while they are there and you're home fasting and praying for them. It is not the physical distance that is the love. It's the prayer that is the love.
Do you understand? It's not just staying away. It's what you do while you're away that is the love. That's what God did from the moment Adam sinned and was separated. What did God do? From that same chapter, that same verse, God already began planning how he was going to bring him back. It says, "The seed is going to bruise your head."
God already began making plans. While he was here, separated in the background, he was making plans. The Bible says, "In the fullness of time, when everything had aligned, Jesus came."
So he wasn't just absent. He was working in the background. That work is his love.
It's a very high bar to be set. And it's high because it's set by the Most High. It's impossible without help. Hence the Holy Spirit.
Because sometimes some of us need the Holy Spirit to hold us, just to hold your lips and tell you, "Walk out of this room now." You're like, "Let me air my mind." Don't air your mind. Leave it unaired. Just walk out. You need something that's going to remind you to love the way God loves you.
You need to find a way to keep the fruit of love flowing. How do you do that?
Number One: Spend time with the One that is love.
God is love. Spend time in his presence. 2 Corinthians 3:18 says: "And we all with unveiled faces, beholding the glory of God, are transformed into the very same image."
How do we behold the glory of God? Read your Bible. You can't get there any other way. There's no shortcut. Read your Bible. What happens when you read your Bible? The Holy Spirit works within us to make us more like Him.
The Holy Spirit aligns our hearts. If you've driven any car after a while, you want to know how aligned your car is—just let the steering go. Most cars will just turn left immediately or right, and then you go for a wheel alignment. That's what your daily devotion is. You have a rough Monday. Then Tuesday morning at 5:00 AM you go back to God. "Okay, so yesterday happened." The Holy Spirit is like, "Yep, yep, yep. Remember when I was telling you? You know what, never mind. Let's start again today."
And then he begins to align your heart. When you said that, when you thought that, when you did that, he begins to convict you and challenge you and confirm you and make sure that you're aligned to express that divine nature.
Consistent connection with God keeps the fruit flowing. The more fellowship we have with God, the more fruit of the spirit we produce.
Number Two: Pray in the spirit.
If you have a prayer language, learn how to do that often. What it does is strengthen your spirit against your flesh. And it's not the tongues that you pray when you're upset—like when somebody annoys you and you're speaking in tongues like that. It's not that one. It's already too late then. He's the one you prayed before that strengthened your spirit that made you walk away from the room, knowing you could have done something you don't want to regret.
1 Corinthians 14:4 says: "He that prays in the spirit edifies himself." That word means to build up yourself, to strengthen your spirit.
Number Three: Make consistent confessions.
Say what it is you want to believe until you believe it. Say it till you believe it. And then say it because you believe it. You say it till you believe it. Say it because you want to behave like it.
Proverbs 18:20 says: "A man's stomach is satisfied from the fruit of his mouth and from the produce of his lips he shall be filled."
We feed on our words. We become what we consistently say. We behave like what we profess. We believe what we say. Then we begin to behave like it.
And we have to do this every day. Choose love every day. The moment you don't choose love, you become vulnerable to offense.
I remember a brother and sister came to me. They were about to meet their mom, and the mom had been very hard on them. Not a good experience. Now they were in college and their mom was coming the weekend. They said, "Pastor Vic, I don't want her to come."
I said, "Yeah, but she's coming though. I don't want her to come." I said, "Okay, why don't we prepare for what that looks like?"
I told them, "Why don't you go home and describe what you would like it to be? Not what your mind wants it to be, but what God would like it to be. Let's get practical. Write something like, 'When I see mom, I'm going to smile. When I see mom, I'm going to hug her and tell her I've missed you. Even though I don't feel like it, I know there's a whole "mom-sized" hole that my resentment is blocking me from. But I'm going to say it when I see her. I'm going to help her with her luggage and it's going to be a wonderful ride back home. We're going to share memories of things.'"
They were side-eyeing me the entire time. "Tell me—should she not come?" I said, "No. She's going to come. Prepare. Why don't you confess it until you behave like it?"
I told them, "Every day, five times a day, write it out and say it."
Guess what? When the mom came from the airport—she hadn't even gotten to them yet—the smile on their faces broke her. She didn't even need to say anything. She broke down crying from just the smile on their faces. These were people five days earlier that did not want her to come.
That's the power of saying what you want to happen.
So you have Susie in the office. If you're Susie here, I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about the other Susie, and you have a rough relationship. Why don't you sit down and talk to yourself about that relationship and tell it what you want it to be? "I'm going to be kind. I'm going to think kind thoughts. I'm going to say kind words. I'm going to be kind to other people."
And you keep saying it: "I have the divine nature of God in me. I love like God. When I see Susie, I'm going to smile. In fact, I'm going to buy coffee for Susie for the next seven days."
Why? God so loved that he gave. Susie is going to be like, "Oh my god, there's not enough caramel in this."
Guess what you do tomorrow? Add more caramel. Most of you like, "Then don't give coffee." No, no, no. Then add more caramel. Why? It teaches your flesh that it cannot win. It can't win.
Jesus is hanging on the cross and he tells God, "Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing." Susie doesn't know what she's doing. It might seem like she knows what she's doing, but she doesn't know what she's doing. There's somebody somewhere to whom I am Susie, and they have to forgive me as much as I forgive the next person.
So every day you wake up, spend some time with Jesus, worship, and bring out 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. Read it in the Message translation and in the New King James or whatever version. As you read it, God will begin to convict you.
You're jealous. You're jealous because when everybody was celebrating, you just clapped like this and you were side-eyeing her. "You're not the only one to go to France." Like you're jealous. It begins to expose areas of your life where you don't love.
And then what do you do? You begin to say with your mouth what you want to act out.
Let's make a confession now. Stand on your feet and say these words. Think about everything you've learned:
I love like God because I am like him. I am patient, long-suffering, and kind. I am never envious, jealous, selfish, or proud. I am never irritable at any time of the day. I don't hold grudges or keep scores of wrongdoing. I forgive quickly. I never rejoice at evil or injustice, whether I agree with them or not. I believe the best about other people and I pray for them. I love like God because he first loved me. I love like God because I am like him.
