All right, let's turn then to 2 Peter chapter 1, and we will read from verse 3 down to verse 7. I'm tempted to include verse 8, but let's hang on to it. 2 Peter 1 and verse 3 down to verse 7. His divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of him who called us to his own glory and excellence, by which he has granted to us his precious and very great promises, so that through them you may become partakers of the divine nature, having escaped from the corruption that is in the world because of sinful desire. For this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, and virtue with knowledge, and knowledge with self-control, and self-control with steadfastness, and steadfastness with godliness, and godliness with brotherly affection, and brotherly affection with love. Oh, brethren, we're looking at the theme of Christian Grow Up. And basically all it is is an encouragement, a spur to each one of us not to take spiritual growth for granted, but rather to deliberately seek to ensure that we are growing, we are deliberately making progress in our Christian lives. We have been doing so by looking at 2 Peter 1. We saw how the apostle Peter began with the ingredients that make up our Christian faith, all of us at the same time, if we are Christians. But then he goes on to urge us to go beyond that which is foundational, that which is true of all of us, and to start making progress in various Christian traits, various Christian characteristics. And there are seven of them, and we have looked at the first six, and now today we are arriving at the seventh. The second last one was brotherly affection in verse 7. And godliness with brotherly affection. And then the last is brotherly affection with love. We noticed that the phrase, brotherly affection, is really just one word in the Greek, and it is a very common word, most of us will know it, the word Philadelphia, and it's really a composite word, phileo, which stands for love, and then adelphos, which stands for brother, and hence the phrase, brotherly affection, brotherly love. And we saw that it is one that is particularly applicable to a family growing up together in the same home, the kind of attachment that you end up having one with the other. But in the New Testament, it is deliberately applied to the family of God, the people of God. And so we appreciated something of that. We saw that it grows. Because the Holy Spirit is at work within us, and in bringing us to faith in Christ, he baptizes us into the body of Christ. Therefore, in belonging to that body, we then identify with one another in that family. And so you find that whereas previously you were an individual who simply went to church and then quickly went back home, you now find that you are actually interested in all the people of God, the individuals in whom you see. not only the image of God, but also the image of God's own Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. Well, we spent at least two weekends on that, and in dealing with the growth of this brotherly love, we said it is in terms of quantity, it is in terms of favor, and also we said it is in terms of purity. Those three aspects should be growing and maturing in us as a sign that brotherly love is growing within us. And we ended by saying that on the judgment day, Jesus will not be asking the question, did you accept me as your personal Lord and Savior? We saw it from the book of Matthew that you'll be looking for the fruit of it in our lives. And one major fruit, as we saw in a very lengthy passage of scripture, is whether his love, this brotherly love that the Spirit of God produces, was actually in us as we're living here on earth. Well, that's ground covered. We're now coming to the second, which is love. In fact, it's the very, very last aspect of these seven virtues, these seven characteristics, these seven traits. Now, strictly speaking, brotherly love and the word love, which is at the end there, really they are the same. They are both speaking about love. But it is not a mere repetition. The reason is that the Greek is richer than the English in terms of speaking about love. It speaks about love within the family using a different word. And then it speaks about this extra love that we'll be looking at this morning using a different word. And so I want us to quickly appreciate what this word is. We need to understand what Peter has in mind when he speaks about this love not being brotherly affection. He says in verse 7, ungodliness with brotherly affection and brotherly affection with love. We have said that brotherly affection is really the word Philadelphia. The word that he now uses for love here is the word agape. And most of us by now have heard of that word. And the major difference in the text itself is the fact that with respect to the former, that is brotherly affection, he has in mind that it is a love for the insiders. It is a love for the family of God. for the brothers, and in this case, obviously, the brothers and sisters. Okay, so he's having that in mind. And then when it comes to adding love to brotherly affection, all he is doing is saying, well, we must now go beyond that. And so this love being referred to now is a love that goes beyond the insiders. It is a love that flows to the outsiders, to everybody else. That's really what he's saying. So he's saying, love the insiders, love the people of God, but go beyond that and let your love touch everyone who is near you. What is agape? Well, basically, agape is a commitment to the welfare of others primarily because of a need on their part. Let me say it again. Agape is a commitment to the welfare of others primarily because of a need in them. And that's the reason why you cannot refer to it as brotherly affection, because brotherly becomes the emphasis on the first one. It is a commitment to the welfare of others because they are my brothers and sisters. But with this one now, it is a commitment to their welfare primarily because of a need on their part. And that's the reason why agape can be a love that you express even to your enemies. Because it's not a love that is dependent on your relationship with them, not at all. It is a love that primarily sees the need which is in them and consequently you reach out to them. Now, one of the ways in which this love has been referred to over time people refer to it as the God kind of love. That's the way they put it, the God kind of love. And the reason why they often refer to it that way is because of a passage such as John 3, 16. So let's just quickly peep there, John 3 and verse 16. The Bible says there, In fact, some of you don't even need to turn in your Bibles. It's the one verse you memorized from childhood. For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life. Now, the phrase, therefore, God so loved the world, that phrase is the same agape. And the point that you notice there is the object of that love. For God so loved the world. Now, you may say, well, it makes sense. After all, he made the world. He ought to love it. Well, that's not the point. The point here is that God so loved a fallen world. God has loved a sinful world. And because he's a holy being, we can add that God has so loved a disgusting world, a filthy world, because the world has sinned against him. And therefore, when you read these words, for God so loved the world, it ought to surprise us. Jesus would have been speaking these words to Nicodemus. And Nicodemus was a typical Jew that would have nothing to do with the Gentiles. The Gentiles were idolaters. The Gentiles were without the law. The Gentiles were outsiders. The Gentiles were Gentile dogs. That's the way in which an average Hebrew or Jew would consider you and me. Dogs. So when Jesus says, God so loved the world, he's not speaking in terms of quantity. In other words, he's not saying, you know, each and every individual that has ever been born on this planet. No, no, no, no. He's talking in terms of the non-Jews, Gentiles and Jews. And it's a qualitative statement. In other words, a fallen world, an adulterous world, a filthy world, a sinful world. And that's why he goes on to say that whoever believes in him should not perish. Why should they perish? Well, it's because his wrath should be upon them instead. They deserve his wrath because of their sin. Look at the very last verse of this chapter. John chapter 3 and verse 36. John 3 and verse 36. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, which is what we have read. Whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. That's what is supposed to be the case, because the world is in enmity against God. The world is in rebellion against God. And so you would be expecting that instead of God so loving the world, it would be God so hating the world. But God agapes the world. He acts for the welfare, for the well-being of a fallen world because of a need on their part. And the need is one of salvation. The need is one of reconciliation with himself. And so out of this love, God deliberately provides a way for him to himself. And what is that way he provides himself? It is a way at great cost and great sacrifice on his part. Great cost and great sacrifice. He gives his son the best of heaven for the worst on earth. He who has the capacity at a click of his finger to recreate the whole of this universe. to repopulate it with a completely new humanity. He doesn't do that. He instead brings the best of heaven in order to take the place of the worst on earth. That's the agape. And hence, the reason why so many people refer to it as the God kind of love. It is a word which in the New Testament is used many more times than the word filial, because it is the kind of love that in fact ought to be emanating or oozing out of believers, those of us who are God's children. And so many times when the Bible tells us to love and love and love, It is actually using this word agape. In other words, we are not to be thinking in terms of, is this my brother? Is this my sister? Is this someone who has done something good for me so that I can retain the favor? And so on. No, no, no. Those of us who are Christians are to be moved and motivated by the needs that are there in such individuals. That's why the Bible is able to say to us, love your enemies. Love your enemies. Can you believe it? Love your enemies. Those individuals that hate you, love them. And why should you love them? Because there is this need on their part. And then secondly, as we shall now see, it is because of the fruit of the Spirit working in you. But before we get to the fruit of the Spirit, I really want us to spend a little bit of time looking at how this love looks like. How this love looks like. And let's quickly go to 1 Corinthians chapter 13. 1 Corinthians chapter 13. But I think it's important for us to realize that this has very little to do with feelings. This is not about you taking a philometer and then putting it as if it were very close to your heart to see whether your heart is going pum-pute-pum-pute-pum-pute, you know, sort of sometimes when skipping a beat and then you are saying, yeah, I think I love this one. It's good. Nothing to do with that. It's beyond feelings. It is an entire characteristic of the person himself who is loving. Let me really give you the background. First of all, the church in Corinth was a church that was really blessed by God. blessed by God in terms of what God did among them in the individuals coming to repentance and faith in Christ through the Apostle Paul. He had also abundantly gifted them with all kinds of gifts and so on. But it was nonetheless a church that was being destroyed by inner fights. So they were quarrelling over their leaders, who were supposed to be the greatest among them. They were suing each other to court over whatever differences that they were having among themselves. They were fighting over each other's qualms and scruples. riding roughshod over each other, sort of, you know, I can't do that, I can't do that, so what, that's your own problem, me, I'm going to do it kind of thing. They were fighting over that and then as we also know, around the Lord's table, they were again fighting. And the fights around the Lord's table were largely to do with the fact that there was a love feast that used to take place before they had the Lord's supper. And in that love feast, those who came with abundance of food were eating alone. Those who were poorer were sort of just glancing over the tables to see what their friends were doing. Some in the process were getting drunk. Others were going away hungry, and so on and so forth. And then the worst situation was with respect to the gifts themselves. Those who were more gifted tended to think of the names they were making for themselves rather than how they were using those gifts to bless the people of God. So it was in terms of a church that's being split asunder, the church in Corinth was one of them. In addressing them, the apostle Paul dealt with a lot of other answers to this, but as he comes to chapter 13, he puts his finger on one of the major problems in the church, and it was simply this, a lack of love, a lack of love. And so he says, at the end of chapter 12, I will show you a still more excellent way, the best way to deal with this infighting that is currently taking place over issues of gifts. And so he says, if I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not agape, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers and understanding all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but have not agape, I'm nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not agape, I gain nothing." And then he goes into a description of the way agape is. First of all, he begins with a positive description. He says, the love is patient and kind. Two positive aspects there. One is its enduring nature. its ability to endure peacefully. That's what patience is. It's to endure peacefully to the very end. You can tell who an impatient driver, for instance, is. And it's somebody who is enduring, but while he's enduring, he's insulting everybody. Very stupid. And so on. Why doesn't he do this? But he's still enduring. But one who does so with a sense of peace, a sense of serenity. When you are with him in the car and finally after an hour or two you manage to get home, you'll be testifying that this person is very patient, very patient. Because you could not see on the outside the pressure that was coming on the person, the driver, from the circumstances that were around him as he was driving. That's love. Love is patient with people, patient with people, and enduring serenity. But it's also kind. opposite activity now. So there's pressure from the outside coming in, love endures peacefully. But what is it doing in the meantime? It is sympathetically benevolent. In other words, while enduring, it's acting for the good of those who are around, patient and kind. Not patient or kind, patient and kind. Seeking to meet the needs of those who are around, despite the relationship that is not so well between. So that's the first aspect of this love. The second is a negative description. And that's the longest, by the way. The negative description, look at this. Love does not envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It's not irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing. Quite a number of negatives. But remember what I'm saying. So it's not simply activities done. It's not simply feeling like love. It is the entire characteristic of the person through whom love is flowing. And we're noticing here that the thing about love is that it's dead. to the acquisitions of the world. It's dead. And that's the reason why there's the phrase, does not envy or boast. Envy has to do with when you see other people having the acquisitions of the world. And you begin to feel negative towards them. And therefore, when they are in need, you turn a blind eye. Busting is when the acquisitions have come to you now. And therefore you are now sort of just full of yourself because of what the world has bestowed on you. Love is blind to such things. It's dead to such things. So if it's already somebody who's wealthy and is in need, you still want to concentrate on them and to bless them. You're not so much thinking in terms of who am I and busting on what you have. That's something that love overlooks. And then we're also told there in the negative that it is not arrogant or rude. In other words, it's not an attitude that demeans other people, that deliberately wants to, as it were, drag people's names down in the mud. It doesn't do that. It's one that is instead respectful, one that is honorable, one that wants to uphold individuals in terms of their own ego, in terms of their own reputation, in terms of their positions. So there is respect and honor that is there. Love. does not insist on its own way. I don't need to try and describe that. It's descriptive on its own, insisting on its own way. Whatever I say, this is what must happen. Love is not like that. And then in reaction, it is not irritable or resentful. In other words, it's not, again, it's part of this love being patient. It is not one that once you criticize once, then you are paying for it for the rest of your life because of this irritability, this resentful nature. No, a person who is loving overlooks wrongs, just throws them at the back. Life must go on. That's a loving person. He's not the kind of person who corrects you and you can tell that this is not just a correction, this is revenge. You know, there's a Chinese proverb of a person who kills a fly on a friend's forehead with a 10-pound hammer. Okay, we think in terms of kilograms, all right, let's use that. using a 10-kilogram hammer to kill a fly on your head. Now, that's not a fly that person is having. The fly was an opportunity. Irritable, resentful. Wanting to prevent love is not love. And then love does not rejoice at wrong doings. That's not love. That's not love. In fact, it's the opposite. Love doesn't rejoice in wrongdoing also. It doesn't rejoice when it is true that somebody has done wrong. Rather, it's broken. It's broken. It doesn't rejoice when people are deliberately True love mourns at such realities. In fact, we can see it by the opposite. So we are back to the positive. Back to the positive. But love rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things. endures all things, love never ends. In other words, love is one that believes that God is at work. God is at work in the world. God is at work positively doing something with what is currently going on. God is at work. Otherwise, that would not be the case. And therefore, the love rejoices with the truth, that which is truthful. That's what love celebrates and consequently will bear all things because of this hope that in the end, All will be well. God knows what He's doing. Believes all things. Again, for the same reason. Hopes all things for the same reason. Endures all things for the same reason. That's the nature of love. But listen to this. It is not doing so while just seated watching. No. Love believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things in action. In action. Because remember, its nature is that of benevolence, is that of acting for the good of those who are the objects of love itself. And so all this is happening in the midst of action, action, action. And then the apostle ends by saying, love never ends. Now that statement is meant to be in contrast to the things that they were fighting over. What were they fighting over? These eight. never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away. As for tongues, they will cease. And as for knowledge, this is referring not to you knowing, but to the gift of knowledge. As you notice, prophecy is a gift, tongues is a gift, and there's also the gift of knowledge being spoken about here. It will pass away. In other words, the things you are fighting about, you Corinthians, They'll soon be gone. But there's one thing that will not go. Love. Love. Love. In fact, at the end of this chapter, Paul argues that love is, in fact, the queen of all virtues. He puts it this way in verse 13. So now, faith, hope, and love abide, these three. But the greatest of these is love. The greatest of these is love. In other words, up to the time when Jesus returns, there are these three characteristics which will continue. and love. But he says, of all these three, the queen is love. Agape. Agape. Agape. When we were young, our parents, maybe your parents do the same things today, I'm not condemning you. He used to take us to the agricultural show. And I've never forgotten how we used to envy and literally cry when we'd see another boy passing. And he has, you know, there were those sweet puffs that, you know, they would take a stick and then just roll it in the midst of what looked like a washing machine. And then finally, there's this big, big thing. And our children will be passing by with it. We really used to envy, because it looked big. But we're really missing out. Big! Once or twice, our parents sort of just try and heal us of those wrong thoughts. We'd actually say, OK, fine, let's go. and then make sure that there's something else that could have been the option. And yeah, how those things finish so quickly, man. Very quickly. Because as soon as you put it in your mouth, it's gone. It's gone. And we soon got to the point where even when you were seeing someone coming with that big finger, because you knew it would soon finish. So if there's anything Paul is saying here that you should be concentrating on, it's not that which will finish so quickly. Come on. Hang on to that which will endure to the end. And it is faith, hope, and love. And in the midst of all this, the queen is love. That's what you should hang on to. Friends. That's what agape looks like. It's not sort of waiting for an announcement that is in it there, and then you are thinking about what you could do. It's the totality of your life and person that is oozing out a certain characteristic. And it is love, love, love. It's unmistakable. on the part of those who know you. Well, where does such a love come from? I mentioned to you already, I betrayed the answer. It is a gift of the Holy Spirit. Look with me quickly at Galatians and chapter five. Galatians and chapter five. And then we must hurry on to close. Galatians chapter five. The Apostle Paul there contrasts love, rather the fruit of the Spirit, with the absence of the fruit of the Spirit, which is the way our lives are before Jesus saves us. So let's begin with that life. And that is chapter 5, beginning with verse 19. Chapter 5 of Galatians, beginning with verse 19. Now the works of the flesh are evident. Sexual immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions, envy, drunkenness, and odges, and things like these. You can't miss the fact that half of those Characteristics that are being mentioned here as works of the flesh are to do with the absence of love for others. They have to do with a self-centered and selfish life, such as sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions. That's life on earth. That's life on earth. It's more about bring them down than uphold them. It's more about what I can get out of that person than what I can put into that person's life. It's in terms of cursing the other person instead of being a blessing to that person. That's our world. Turn on your news today, buy your newspaper today, check your news on the internet, and that's what you will find. That's the order of life. The Christian faith is the opposite. And the reason is because of the fruit of the spirit. Verse 22. But the fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. It's the exact opposite. You see, when we become Christians, The Holy Spirit does not just save us from sin. He does it, that's important. But the Holy Spirit also comes to take residence in our lives. Yes, He actually comes to live in us. If you are a Christian, You are not alone. You are inhabited by the Spirit of the Living God. And when He comes to take residence within you, He uses you. He uses your mind. He uses your heart. He uses your will in order to fulfill the agenda that He Himself has. And he's got an agenda when he's bringing you into contact with the world around you. There's something he wants to do through you. Through you. So first of all, it's the immediate context, the family of believers together. You genuinely want to be a blessing to the brother there and the sister there and so on, because the spirit of God is energizing your being and consequently through you deliberately wanting to bless the brethren around you. But here's the point. He cannot be boxed in. And therefore, that energy that flows as brotherly affection breaks the boundaries of the box and pours out on the other people out there in the world that you meet, pours out on them this benevolent energy. as the Spirit of God is fashioning your person, your character, into that which we saw in 1 Corinthians 13, that then pours out onto the rest of the world. That's where agape comes from. It is the Spirit within you. So let me quickly say, that if yours is a selfish and self-centered life, it's the biggest proof, as we saw last week, that you are not yet a Christian. You may have been brought up in a Christian home. We're not denying that. You may have learned the doctrines of grace, which we teach quite regularly from this pulpit. We're not denying that. But what we are saying is this, that that love that has been described, if it's missing from you, it's because the Holy Spirit is not resident in you. Because if he is resident in you, his fruit will show. Well, sure, because you can't box him in. He is the omnipotent spirit of God. And that's a warning that we all need to heed as we look at these words, that we should add love to brotherly affection. We should add love to brotherly affection. So let me quickly wrap up by putting it this way. That's our task. What we have described today is what we should want to be in an ever-growing way. Notice how when we reached godliness, that godliness now began to, as it were, pour downstream. as a major torrent, a major flood, and it was pouring down from that godliness, it was pouring down in terms of brotherly affection, and it hasn't stopped there. It's still pouring down in terms of love. Is that change happening in you? Is it? Are your neighbors individuals who can say of a truth that they've got a loving neighbor? One who is patient and kind. Patient and kind. Are they afraid of you? Because you are so irritable. You are like a live wire. They have to keep safe distance from you. Because any wrongdoing, any! The volcano erupts. Mold and lava covers people around you. And for the others, it's ashes that they end up living. That's not love. Do they see in you a kind person? One who sympathizes with them in their afflictions. Sometimes afflictions they've brought on themselves. Yes. That's what the world has done, that God loves. We've brought that on ourselves. Is that what they see in you? A kind person? Or do they see in you a person whose first reaction is to beat, is to make others suffer. What we should be doing is basically praying to God that wherever we are, whatever stage we might be, that he'll help us to get better and better and better. that we should be pressing on the upward way, getting higher and higher every day. That should be our lives, that our husbands, our wives, our children, our parents should be able to say, over the years, we've seen the change, seen the change. Here's a person who's maturing, maturing. That's what we are seeing. Getting better and better and better. May God help each one of us to pray that way, that we might be identified as a loving people. Amen.