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The Love of God: Longsuffering

God’s quality of love is defined in 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. Because we are in Christ, and Christ is in us, through being led by the indwelling Holy Spirit as we seek to fulfill His desires and feel at ease with who we are in Christ we are able to express this type of love towards other Christians, Galatians 5:22. This is not a love that is to be directed at unbelievers or the world, for it is by this love towards each other that they will know that we are disciples of Christ. Rather, we are to do good to all, but above all, love the brethren, Galatians 6:10.

The love is longsuffering … 1 Corinthians 13:4

Longsuffering is the long holding out of one’s anger against unreasonable people. It is not the same as patience, which is remaining under a circumstance as we wait for a resolution, Colossians 1:11.

Longsuffering is very important when it comes to dealing with other saints as we mature in our faith. For we are to warn the unruly, comfort the little souled, uphold the weak, and be longsuffering towards all, 1 Thessalonians 5:14. This does not justify a sharp or bitter person that everyone must put up with their “quirks”. If that is you, stop it, for this is not expressing love towards others; rather, it is selfish and has no place among the saints. We are to serve each other in humility and objectivity of mind with longsuffering, Ephesians 4:2-6. As a farmer is longsuffering concerning the fruit of the earth, we are to be longsuffering towards each other, James 5:7-9.

One of the aspects of being a Pastor is to be persistent in teaching the truth, convicting, rebuking, exhorting with […]

The Love of God: Longsuffering2023-12-14T12:26:19-08:00

The Definition of Love – Longsuffering

Love is an aspect of God’s nature which is manifested in seeking the best for the one loved. This attribute of His nature was shown to the disciples in the person of Jesus and shared with all those who believed their message so that even today we see the love of God manifested through the Church. This character is not from humans and in all actuality before God showed us love humans did not know what it was. At best our quality of love only seeks the best for the one loving – we sacrifice for something we want, not for the benefit of another. Now that the world has seen God’s quality of love through the Church, today the world has decided it can show this type of love without God. However, since the world can only mimic what is sees from Christians, for it does not know God, it perverts the love of God into that of human love and tries to claim it is at the very least as good of a love, if not better – for it is all inclusive. Sadly, many assemblies today have accepted this worldly love in place of God’s love. But allowing someone to continue doing things that are harmful to themselves is not love at all. Since we have a lot of “fake” love today, it is important for us to know what classifies as the love of God. That is, we need to know the real thing so that we can easily identify when it is being expressed by a Christian and when an unbeliever, or carnal Christian, is trying to mimic it with a human quality of love.

In 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 we are […]

The Definition of Love – Longsuffering2023-12-14T08:36:55-08:00

Praise

Praise (αἴνεσις) is defined within Scripture as the fruit of our lips confessing the name of God.

Therefore, because of this let us offer up a sacrifice of praise through all to the God, that is, the fruit of our lips confessing His Name – Hebrews 13:15

Confession means, “to say the same thing”, and “name” refers to the character of a person. This means we praise God when we verbally agree with Him concerning the manner in which He expresses His character towards us.

The angels are seen praising God when they speak of His good will towards men resulting in giving the world Christ, Luke 2:13. After heeding the voice of the angels, the shepherds found Christ and told all of what they saw and heard, praising God as they returned, Luke 2:20.

In the seventh Psalm, a Benjamite writes of praising God according to His righteousness. Righteousness is an aspect of God’s nature that is expressed through His character. David encourages the Gentiles to praise God for His mercy to His anointed, Psalm 18:48, and as his strength and shield he trusts in God singing praises to Him, Psalm 28:7.

Praise can be done with music and song (Psalm 33:2) or by word (Psalm 75:1), for in it we are speaking of God’s name and therefore confessing His character.

For a Christian, praise is a spiritual sacrifice. As priests, we have religious services that we perform before God. One of these sacrifices that is a part of our priestly service is praise. Through praise we express our admiration for God’s grace (Ephesians 1:6), which is based upon expressing a proper opinion of Him (Ephesians 1:12,14). This admiration also expresses itself in the way we live, not […]

Praise2023-11-25T07:52:03-08:00

It is God’s Desire that All Are Saved

This is proper and acceptable before the face of God, Who desires all men to be saved and come to a full experiential knowledge of the truth – 1 Timothy 2:3-4

God has not determined that some would perish, but rather is longsuffering towards all so that they can make room for a change of the mind (Repentance).

The Lord is not slow of promise as some regard slowness, but is longsuffering unto you, while not determining some to perish, but all to make room unto repentance. – 2 Peter 3:9.

However, this does not mean that humans can force God to save them by their works, for salvation is God’s choice, not by the desirous will of humans. He showed this through the selecting of Jacob over Esau before they were born. Rather than giving Esau the birthright to the promise given to Abraham, God chose Jacob before either one had done good or bad for the purpose of showing that it is not about what humans want, but God’s choice (Romans 9:11). This was done to prove a point, it is not the one who desires or the one who runs, but God who chooses to give mercy (Romans 9:16).

How God chooses to provide salvation is His choice, not ours. God states today that to be saved we are to take Him at His Word and believe that Christ died on behalf of our sins, was buried, and rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures (1 Corinthians 15:1-4).

God did determine that certain things would happen. He chose that Christ would die and be raised from the dead (1 Peter 1:20). He chose that all who would be in Christ would have their bounds […]

It is God’s Desire that All Are Saved2023-12-14T08:14:28-08:00

Conviction (ἔλεγχος)

Conviction, the evidence or proof that a belief is based upon. Faith is the substance of that which is hoped for, the conviction of accomplished works not seen (Hebrews 11:1). Since hope is always based upon a promise (Romans 8:24), faith in the one giving the promise is what undergirds the hope we have, even though we cannot at this time look at what was promised. When used in action it still carries the same meaning; therefore, Scripture, which is God-breathed, is profitable towards teaching and conviction, along with correction and child-training (2 Timothy 3:16). Which is why the Pastor is instructed to preach in season and out of season while convicting along with rebuking in all longsuffering and doctrine (2 Timothy 4:2).

There is so much great information in these passages and the meaning of the words, like teaching is different from doctrine, and child-training is specific to Christians, along with the fact that the Scripture is actually God-breathed, but we will have to look at these another time. Understanding conviction is important, because it is not about accusing a person, but about why we believe what we believe. The conviction is not judgment but laying out the truth so that our faith is shown to be based upon actual promises from God, not from humans. We see this with the Holy Spirit’s work concerning the unbelievers today. He convicts them of a sin – not believing in Christ’s death for sins and resurrection (John 16:8-11), righteousness – because Christ goes to the Father, and judgment – because the ruler of this world has been judged. He is not making them feel bad about their sins, but convincing them through truth of the facts of […]

Conviction (ἔλεγχος)2023-11-25T08:02:34-08:00
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