“Summer Love Series - Endless Love”
Pastor Jim Lowe III
Sunday Morning, 9:30am Stream 08/10/25 (2nd Sunday Message)
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{All scriptures are NIV84 unless stated}
Undergoing Construction Series Starts September!
We will pray for our students and teachers at the end of service. Today’s title is a song from 1981 - Lionel Richie
Message Title:
“Summer Love Series - Endless Love”
The bible tells us that we are actual disciples based on our love.
Christ told us to love one another… as he has loved us.
We’ve been talking about what love is. Not our definition…but the true definition.
1 Corinthians 13:4
4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
Love Doesn’t Delight In Evil
What is evil?
Evil - opposite of good.
Eerdmans Bible Dictionary:
Evil: Substantively and descriptively that which is offensive, perverted, or harmful; in the Bible indicative of both natural evil, such as physical disasters, and moral evil, such as deeds against God or one’s neighbor.
Evil is the thing that is against God.
Synonyms For Evil:
Sorrow, Corruption, Disaster, Calamity, Woe, Misery, Suffering, Sin
Love does not delight in disaster towards others. love does not rejoice in sorrow to others. love doesn’t find happiness in sin.
Le’s break this down into 2 points.
{Love Doesn’t Delight In Evil}
There’s a saying that it feels good to be bad.
It can feel good to do the things you’re not supposed to.
Sometimes you might feel the need to tell someone about themselves.
But there is a pleasure we can get from the wrong thing… and THAT is destructive.
Proverbs 14:9 (NCV)
9 Fools don’t care if they sin, but honest people work at being right.
A fool…
A fool doesn’t care if they sin or not.
Another version says they mock making amends for it.
This means that there are some of us who enjoy sins… and we MOCK making amends for it.
We tell ourselves it’s okay.
We’re “trying” to stop saying this. doing this…
thinking that…
We Are Great At Making Excuses For The Things We Like
We come up with all types of excuses depending on how we TRULY feel. We come up with excuses to do what we want to do.
When you’re asked to go somewhere… and you don’t want to.
you’ll make an excuse that SOUNDS important… but it’s not.
This is because we are protecting that thing that we value.
When you make an excuse not to go somewhere… you are “protecting” what you really want to do. if it’s time with your family…
your actual alone time.
But when we make a mockery of sin… we are protecting that sin…
for the sake of our pleasure.
The bible says THAT is not a characteristic of love.
{Love Doesn’t Delight In Evil}
This one can be rough…
Love doesn’t delight in evil… It includes the things we do…
but also the things that can happen to others.
We go through life…
we have people who help us.
we also have people who wrong us. when bad things happen to the people we like…
we don’t find pleasure in that. we should also not find pleasure
when bad happens to those who we do NOT like!
That isn’t in line with God’s heart! This is NOT what love is!
Proverbs 24:17
17 Do not gloat when your enemy falls; when he stumbles, do not let your heart rejoice, 18 or the LORD will see and disapprove and turn his wrath away from him.
Don’t gloat when your enemy falls… They might be your enemy…
but don’t you be happy to see bad happen to them!
That person who hurt you in life…
don’t be happy they lost their job.
they’re going through their own tough time. they may be sick
their marriage may be failing
they might be found guilty of a crime.
Verse 18
Or the LORD will see and disapprove…
Disapprove of who?? them??
no YOU.
Proverbs 17:5
5 He who mocks the poor shows contempt for their Maker; whoever gloats over disaster will not go unpunished.
The 2nd part of this scripture…
“whoever gloats over disaster will not go unpunished”
This is saying that when you make fun of the less fortunate… you are showing contempt for their maker.
We are supposed to be examples of God’s light here.
When You Find Joy In People Suffering, You Are Going Against God!
and
Proverbs 17:5 (b)
whoever gloats over disaster will not go unpunished.
We will NOT go unpunished when we spend time happy that others are hurting. We are earning punishment for US being happy when others are hurting.
Some Of The Things We May Be Dealing With Now COULD Be Punishment For Having The Wrong Heart Towards Others!
But what about when they hurt you?
“You don’t know what they did to me!”
“Maybe God is dealing with them BECAUSE of what they did to me!” He might, but the bible tells us what Christ says about this.
Matthew 5:44-45
44 But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.
Jesus says that good and bad happens to everyone.
Love your enemies…
pray for those who hurt you.
We Need To Stop Talking So Much About Others And Start Praying For Them!
We can talk about them when they hurt us… but can we use the SAME mouth…
to pray for them?
We never know why people are going through what they are… It’s not OUR job to take that as a time to be happy.
We are not supposed to get joy from the bad things that happen to others. That’s not God’s way!
that’s not love…
That’s not the way of his disciples either!
1 John 4:7-8
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Let us love one another… love comes from God.
We talked about two points about delighting in evil.
We should not take joy in the evil we do…
nor the evil that happens to anyone else.
Here’s another way to look at it:
We already know what the bible says.
Jesus died for our sins.
He died so that we might live. But we forget that Jesus suffered for our sins.
he was beaten and nailed to a cross.
OUR sins brought our Lord pain.
and we defend the right to keep doing it. or we see the bad happening to others…
and we’re happy that they’re going through it??
When We Rejoice in Sin, We’re Showing We’re Happy Doing And Seeing Things That Cause Our Lord Pain
But this isn’t just about pet sins.
it’s about making sure our hearts represent love. The Lord doesn’t take pleasure in evil…nor should we.
Psalm 5:4
You are not a God who takes pleasure in evil; with you the wicked cannot dwell.
We are working to show ourselves as followers of our God.
We show ourselves as Christ’s disciples… if we love…
So if we shouldn’t take pleasure in evil…
We should delight in the truth. So what does that mean?
{Love Finds Joy In:}
Psalm 1:1-4
Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers. 2 But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. 3 He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers.
The bible tells us that out of all the evil we can do…
the BLESSED person finds delight in the law of the Lord. the blessed person finds joy in the word of God.
why do we find joy in the word?
Because the word is an answer to whatever you’re dealing with. And when you see what the Lord has put there for you…
THAT is the reason to rejoice.
The bible says:
Going Through A Trial? - John 16:33
John 16:33 - you’ll have trouble in life…but your God is bigger!
Worried About Your Next Steps In Life? - Jeremiah 29:11
Jeremiah 29:11 - you might not know your next steps…but the Lord has a plan.
Are You In Need Of A Healing? - Psalm 103:2-3
Psalm 103:2-3 praise the lord…and don’t forget his benefits…one of them being he can heal ALL of your diseases!
Distraught Over Our Leaders? - Psalm 47:8
Psalm 47:8 - God is the one who reigns over the nations…he sits on his throne!
In Need Of A Financial Blessing? - Malachi 3:10
Malachi 3:10 - heaven has windows! The Lord can command the windows of heaven to open up and pour on you a blessing you won’t have room to receive
Are You In Need Of Some Breakthrough? - 2 Samuel 5:20
2 Samuel 5:20 - David wrote that when his enemies broke out against him…the Lord will “break out” as well against them!
All of this is in the bible!
This is where our joy comes from!
To know that our trouble won’t last always.
Psalm 30:5 says that weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.
We Should Get Our Joy From The Word Of The Lord!
But there’s a second way we should get our joy.
{Love Finds Joy In:}
Revelation 10:10-11b
10 Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: “Now have come the salvation and the power and the kingdom of our God, and the authority of his Christ. For the accuser of our brothers, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down. 11 They overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony;
We see that the accuser… he was defeated…
By the power of God.
And the stories of what he did!
When Moses brought the Israelites from Egypt…
they told Jethro all that had happened.
Exodus 18:9-11
9 Jethro was delighted to hear about all the good things the LORD had done for Israel in rescuing them from the hand of the Egyptians. 10 He said, “Praise be to the LORD, who rescued you from the hand of the Egyptians and of Pharaoh, and who rescued the people from the hand of the Egyptians. 11 Now I know that the LORD is greater than all other gods, for he did this to those who had treated Israel arrogantly.”
Your Stories Encourage And Build Faith For Others!
This is why we have to talk about what the Lord is doing! Someone might be praying for the very thing God just did for you!
Your Testimony Is The Truth Others Need!
Imagine having a prayer service and opening it with some of the stories you have!
Psalm 66:16
16 Come and listen, all you who fear God; let me tell you what he has done for me.
There are more stories to be told… More Ls we need to give the enemy.
Let’s use what the Lord has done for us… to help and encourage others!
Share Your Story:
{recap}
Love does NOT delight in evil
{Love Doesn’t Delight In Evil}
{Love Doesn’t Delight In Evil}
We have to be more serious about those things we continue to do.
But love rejoices in the truth. What truth?
{Love Finds Joy In:}
{Love Finds Joy In:}
Let’s start talking about the goodness of God!
