Relationships founded on love do look like this, and don’t look like that …

The Bible makes something about relationships painfully clear for us: Regardless of whether the relationship is with God, your spouse, your children, your family, your neighbors, your boss, your co-workers, acquaintances, strangers, or your enemies, ALL of your relationships are to be founded on love.

If asked, many people would say they really do want their relationships to be built on a foundation of love.

If that’s true, all you have to do is open your Bible to gain an understanding of what that is really like. We find in the pages of scripture that the Apostle Paul describes for us what relationships built on a foundation of love look like … and what they don’t look like! It’s likely not an exhaustive list, but it is an inspired one! So it’s worth our looking to and learning from.

As a part of the “love chapter” in 1 Corinthians, the Apostle Paul gives us in chapter 13 these golden nuggets about relationships founded on love:

Verse 4a – “Love is patient and kind …”
Paul begins by telling us love is two things many of us would say we aren’t:

Love is patient – There’s a popular meme on social media boasting of how a person has road rage … toward a person walking too slowly in the grocery store! That’s not patience. If we are impatient with how people walk or drive, we’ll never be patient with them in the complexity of any kind of relationship. But if we really love someone, we’re patient with them, in the same way God has been — and is! — patient with us.

Love is kind – When you study the life of Jesus, you come away with an understanding that He is profoundly kind. It’s no wonder, then, that Paul would teach us to throw off our bad behaviors in our relationships, and to take up new ways that would include kindness:

“Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you,” Ephesians 4:31-32.

VERSE 4b-5a – “Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude …”
To best understand what something is, it can be insightful to understand what something isn’t. So after starting by telling us two things love is, Paul now provides us with a burst of what love is not:

Love is not jealous – To be jealous is to envy the qualities, accomplishments, or even the possessions of others because we want what they have. Such an attitude breeds discontent with ourselves and our lot, and can foster resentment toward the other person.

That isn’t love.

But because of God’s perfect love for us, we can find contentment in our relationship with Him, which allows us to be happy for others when they enjoy good qualities, accomplishments, and blessings.

Love is not boastful – The Greek word translated for “boast” means to “brag to point to oneself.” Instead, real love is punctuated with an authentic humility. It would be difficult to love someone else when we think so much of ourselves that our own self gets in the way.

Love is not proud – The Greek word used for proud means to “puff up.” To be proud is to think too highly of ourselves — love doesn’t do that! When we love others, we humble ourselves and give others our primary consideration. Paul would write to the Philippians, “Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble, thinking of others as better than yourselves,” Philippians 2:3 — that’s what love does.

Love is not rude – This is a tough one for 21st century Americans addicted to social media. Rudeness rules the day! But that isn’t love. Love does not express itself in ways that are indecent, offensive, or dishonoring to others.

VERSE 5b-6 – “It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out.”
Paul continues with his list of what love is not:

“Love does not demand its own way” – From the first two human beings in the Garden of Eden, we’ve wanted our own way. From the moment you and I were born, we’ve wanted our own way, also. When we don’t love other people, we’ll demand that things be done our way; but we’ll make no such demands when we sincerely treat people with love. Love goes even beyond a willingness to compromise to a desire to collaborate with others, looking at their best interest with genuine interest and concern.

“Love is not irritable” – On any given day you can log into your social media and find memes warning people to not engage with you at least until after you’ve had your first cup of coffee for the day. For some, that’s truly nothing more than a joke … but for many, it isn’t. Many are just irritable people who make no real effort to change that other than tamp it down a little with the use of stimulants like coffee. But artificial fixes don’t truly change an irritable attitude. And an irritable, unengaging attitude isn’t an expression of love.

“Love keeps no record of being wronged” – When we harbor resentment and refuse to forgive, we keep a record of the wrongs people do to us. When we love others, we forgive them in the same way God loves and forgave us. Where there is that kind of love and forgiveness, there’s not resentment because no record of wrongs is kept.

“It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out” – Here Paul tells us something that love doesn’t do, and something that love does do. To love someone means we never rejoice over revenge, when evil happens, or even when something “bad” happens to someone we don’t like – love finds no joy or entertainment in any kind of evil or injustice. But love always rejoices, is happy, celebrates when truth wins.

VERSE 7 – “Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.”
Paul concludes his lesson on what love does and doesn’t look like by giving us four powerfully positive descriptions of love:

“Love never gives up.” – I’ve never seen in my life a time when people are more willing to quickly and recklessly abandon others for the slimmest of excuses than I have now. But real love doesn’t give up on people. Real love doesn’t have some “line in the sand” that says “I’ll go this far and no father.” This kind of love motivates the spouse or the friend to be there by your side not just through the best of times, but through the worst of times as well. That’s because the people who love you don’t give up on you.

“Love never loses faith.” – Some people are cynics. They’re untrusting and critical with everyone and always demand proof of everything — that you’re serious, that you love them, that you genuinely care about their best interest. Such lack of faith is not an expression of love. When we love someone, we start by extending to them a benefit of any doubt about their intentions, trusting that their intentions are good. Those who don’t love say such behavior is risky and foolish; those who do love are willing to expose themselves to possible false intentions in order to love the other person.

“Love is always hopeful.” The Greek word used for hope here means more than a wish, but a confident hope in the unseen. A tenuous wish is weak, but a confident hope in the unseen motivates us in many ways — to keep pushing forward, to persevere, to engage, to keep going. Love has a confident expectation of something good yet to be seen.

“Love endures through every circumstance.” One thing that has captured my attention are the number of memes splashed across social media that make some kind of claim that “nothing is stronger than … X.” That “X” usually isn’t the single strongest thing that exists. But love has a strength and tenacity to it that enables it to endure anything that comes its way. This is best demonstrated in the life of Jesus, who was motivated by love to endure all that He did to accomplish God’s mission of our salvation.

CONCLUSION
We like to think of ourselves as “loving” people, but when we take how we treat others and compare it what the Bibles teaches us what love is and isn’t, and what love does and doesn’t do — well, just how loving are we? For you to be a genuinely loving person compared to Paul’s teaching about what real live looks like, what changes do you need to make in how you treat people?

Scotty