Pastor FortunatoWelcome to the podcast ministry of Pilgrim Baptist Church. Wherever you're listening from, welcome. We pray that the truth from the Word of God speaks to your heart during today's message. Romans 12, we looked at verse 1 and 2, and that was our relationship. with self and our response to God is one of sacrifice. So our bodies, our selves, we offer to God in sacrifice. We live for Him. In verses 3 through 8, we looked at our service and our relationship within the church, the church body, and we learned that our response is one of service. We are in God's family to serve Him. Now in Romans 9 through 21, there's another break and it talks about our relationship within society. And our response should be one of love, love. And it starts off in Romans chapter 12 in verse number nine, it says, let's love. You've got to allow it. You've got to let it, let it be without dissimulation. Our culture is dying of dry rot from lack of love. And we as Christians are to help stop the dry rotting by bringing the love of Christ to society, to our culture. And because this lost and dying world has refused God's love, they are foreign to it. They don't know about it. So God, he has made us ambassadors to go out and soak the world that's dry, rotted, and to soak them with Christ's love. Because we as Christians are the ones that have God's love. So it's not just for us. Well, I'm a Christian and I'm saved and I'm going to heaven. Great. We'll all be with each other in eternity. Praise the Lord. But if you really love, then we should want to bring others with us. Isn't that the idea? So we can't just keep it with among ourselves. We need to share it with other. What do young people need? Love. What do older people need? Love. What does our culture and society need? Love. We can't forget that, church. We can't. And then it says, let love be without dissimulation. Now, that word simulation is offering to others. What is not. That's a simulation. This simulation is concealing from others what actually is. And a simulation, it assumes the appearance of what is fake. So you all understand, and my son has done some aviation, and so there's what is called a flight simulation. And so you would go into this simulation machine, and it's not a real fight, flight. but it is assuming the appearance of one. That's called a simulation. It's assuming a false character. But dissimulation, that is the concealment of true character. And both words, look, dissimulation is you're going to disguise what is not fake. What does that have to do with love? Well, if you don't have love. and you know that it's expected for everyone to view you as loving, what are you going to do? You're not going to simulate it. You're going to dissimulate it. And there's a big difference. You don't have it, so you're going to take on the appearance of it. It's very different from a simulation. We know the simulation isn't real. But dissimulation, God says you better not allow your love to be that way. Now, the King James Bible uses that word very specifically because simulation and dissimulation, both of those words would and do fall under the category of hypocrisy. It's a faking or a feigning, but they're very, very different. And so God says, your love, my love as Christians, it better not be a dissimulation because you're lying to people. If you don't have it, stop trying to act like you do, God says. Get it. Get it. Now, all Christians should have it, but they don't. They don't. A dissimulation, you're assuming a false appearance. to hide your real purpose. How many have been on the receiving end of that throughout your life in some form or another? Now, doesn't that hurt? I would rather, wouldn't you rather just have someone come up and just punch you in the gut? Oh, wow. Wow. I know who that guy is. He don't like me. I'd much rather have that. At least I know where he stands. you get somebody that takes on that false appearance and tricks you. That's one of the most harmful things that somebody can go through. And church family, we have to work hard at letting our love be without that. We got to be true. We got to be genuine. We need to be real. And I believe we can all get behind that. Go to 1 John 3. 1 John 3. 1 John 3, look at verse 18. 1 John 3, 18, Bible says, My little children, let us not love in word, neither in tongue, but in deed and in truth. And hereby we know that we are of the truth and shall assure our hearts. before Him. And a heart is assured when it receives true love, something that is not fake, something that is not disguised. Because if your love isn't based on truth, all it is is hate disguised. That's what it is. And God does not want us to live that way. You want someone's heart to be assured? Love them with genuine, real Christian love. It's so easy nowadays. Well, I just don't agree with that brother. Well, can you love him? Can you agree to love him? If he didn't sin against you and there's nothing between you where it needs to be cleared out and there's some reconciliation, or if a crime hasn't been committed and if it's just, well, I don't like, I just don't see eye to eye with him on that passage. Well, can you see eye to eye to him on this passage? And can you just genuinely love that person when they don't see something the way you see it? That's the church we need to be. Let love be without dissimulation. I'm a preacher. There's plenty of opportunity for me to open my mouth and say something where someone's not going to agree with it. But I can tell you this, if you don't agree with me, from my heart, I want to and desire to love you where you are at. And I want you to love me where I'm at. I want us to love each other where we're all at. I've used this analogy before. A tree is a tree, right? And you can plant a tree. And the one over here only grew this high, but the one over here grew this high. And the one over here seems to be withering away. You know what? They all are trees. Each one needs a different treatment. Each one needs special care. Each one is part of the family of trees. And bless God, that should be us. That should be us. If you're a withered away tree, well, love on them. Help them grow. Don't leave them. Why would you do that to somebody? That's why God says, let your love be without dissimulation. All right, 1 John 4, go over one chapter. Look at verse number 8. 1 John 4, verse number 8. He that loveth not knoweth not God, for God is love. You can... be a hateful, mean person and call yourself a Christian. And all that will do is harm the cause of Christ and harm his church. Or, or you can be, look at this, verse 16. Or you can be this type of Christian. And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love. And he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God and God in him. Or you can let people see that. Because the main characteristic of Christ's church is you being right, isn't it? Oh, no, it's not. The main characteristics of Christ's church is the preacher is the one who's always right. Oh, wait, no, it's not. The main characteristic is L-O-V-E, love. And if we would quit it would happen to be this, you know, we systematize our argumentation to be able to win. and have people see us as somebody we're not. And God says, quit it. Start with love. Because if you can genuinely love somebody, that's the reach of Christianity. That's the true character of God, love. Do you know who disagrees with you more than anybody? And who disagrees with me more than anybody? God. and he sent his son to die for the disagreeable sinners. Are you ready to be that type of Christian to this lost and dying world? Just give of yourself, give of your time, give of your effort, give of your tears. That's love. Amen. Amen. All right, go to Galatians 5, and let's see. Let's see if we can read this verse correctly. Galatians 5, okay, the 16th verse. Watch what it says. This I say then, walk in the, what's the word? Spirit, okay. Look at verse number 18. But if you be led of the. okay now look at verse number 22 but the fruit of the okay so the fruit of the spirit is control oh no let me try it again let me fix my glasses hold on a second kids the fruit of the spirit is pride hey let me just dust them off a little bit um the fruit of the spirit is making everybody look like and act like and talk like me wait no wait does it say any of that it says the fruit of the spirit is what The fruit of the Spirit is what? Love! That's the first one listed. Well, that person's getting on my nerves. Love them. You picking up what God's Word's putting down? If you're going to walk by something, be led by something that's holy, He says you better love. That's what His Word says. That's what His Word says. whether we do it is up to us. What are you being led by? Because if you can't start with love, you're not being led by a spirit that's holy. Might be your own selfish spirit or my own selfish spirit, but not God's. It's love. And we're duty bound to show forth God's love as a form of Christian service. And it's the basis for real relationships in all circumstances. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. And true love dealt with sin. That's what Christ did on the cross. Sin ruins relationships. Our relationship was ruined with our creator God. Christ restored that relationship by giving of himself. And that is love. And when he showed his love on the cross, what did he pay for? he paid for our sin with his blood so he didn't just love isn't just glossing over sin Christ dealt with sin on the cross. Well, we're just going to love everybody. That might include dealing with some circumstances and dealing with some sin, because on the cross, for God so loved the world that He gave, He gave Himself as a sacrificial payment for sin. He dealt with it. He didn't just gloss over it. It was an act of dealing. And so sometimes we would call that tough love. this culture just is real sentimental. They take evil and they make it good. That's not love. Love takes evil and deals with it and removes it. And that's the next part of the... of the verse. So go back to Romans. Back to Romans 12. Look at verse, same verse, Romans 12, verse number nine says, let love be without dissimulation. Abhor that which is evil. Now that's the negative. You ever hear somebody say, man, that's horrid or, or man, that's horrific. That's a horrific thing. That's where we get the word abhor. it's to regard something with horror. And it's not just hate. You see some Bibles put in there that translate that as hate. It's not correct. It's to abhor. Is abhor to hate? Yes, but no. To abhor something is an extreme hate. There's hate, and then there's abhorring it. It's to hate extremely. and God says that concerning evil, you are to abhor that which is evil. So that would tell me if we're talking about love, you can't have true love unless you what? Abhor that which is evil. Now, a lost person cannot, it's impossible for them to do that. They can't abhor that which is evil. A carnal Christian can sometimes abhor that which is evil. But a Romans 12 Christian, we should be able to consistently and constantly be able to abhor that which is evil. To look at it with a contempt of hatred, an extreme hatred. I hate evil. Extremely. Do you? our church should hate it. We don't look the other way. We don't hide it. We don't conceal it. No, we do what Jesus did. We expose it. And we say that's evil. And that's biblical. And that is loving. Someone's doing something horrible. Oh, well, you know, we just love you. Don't worry about it, brother. We love you. If I loved him, I would try to help him get reconciled and get right. And if, and look, if there's a public thing, you've got to address it publicly. But you don't hide. okay you have to be able to abhor the evil you got to be able to call it out but oh but a preacher i'm going to be called a hater go to psalms i got to take this rabbit trail a little bit so if you bear with me i think it'd be a blessing do you love the lord do you love the lord amen all right let's look at psalms 97 if you love the lord you're going to have to be a hater you someone says don't hate i have to i have to be a hater i love the lord watch what it says psalm 97 you'll read the verse and it'll be familiar to you psalm 97 verse number 10 ye that love the lord hate evil. Does it make sense now? If you love the Lord, then you must. All good Christians that love the Lord are haters. Someone says, are you a hater? Yes, because I love the Lord. So I hate evil. I'm compelled by God to show true biblical love. Now go to the book of Isaiah. Go to the book of Isaiah. Look at chapter number one. Isaiah chapter number 1, look at verse number 16. Isaiah, first chapter, look at verse number 16. Bible says, Wash you, make you clean. Put away the evil of your doings. From before mine eyes, cease. learn to do evil. If you want to be clean, you've got to quit with the evilness. If I want to be washed, I've got to put away evil. That's the principle. That's the truth. And then it says, learn to do well. seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow. You see that? Seeking judgment is a good thing, but the Bible talks about you've got to learn to do well, and part of that learning to do well is that we must put away evil. How do you protect a church? Parents, how do you protect your children? Put it away. Put the evil away. Get it out. The evil. To protect your child, you put away the evil. You know what we have to do to protect our church? Put away evil. I don't want my family affected by it, and you don't want your family affected by it. So you know what we have to work together to do? Put it away. I am not going down the, hey, let's just start throwing people out of here. What I'm talking about, we've got to be able to deal with evil to get people washed and cleaned so they can live right. And that's fair. That's fair. and you can look back. If you've been saved any length of time, you can look back in your life where the Lord has worked some things out of your life because they shouldn't have been there. That's the idea. It's not attacking a person personally. What it is, it's taking a look at ourselves and asking the Lord to wash us and cleanse us, help us to be more like him. so that we'd be more on the good side, less on the evil side in how we live. Now go to Matthew 6, because here's the pressure cooker. Does anybody like pressure? I don't. I do not like it. If you're an athlete, you know that the more someone puts the pressure on you, the harder it is to win the game. Matthew 6 verse 24. This is true. For all of us, Bible says in verse 24 of Matthew 6 verse 24, no man can serve two masters. That's the pressure. You try to serve both. You can't. What's the outcome? For either he will hate the one and love the other, or else he will hold to the one and despise the other. And you have to. You got good and you got evil. You're either going to love the good and hate the evil, or you're going to hate the good and love the evil, but you can't serve both at the same time. You can't. It's impossible. So that's the negative. All right, that's the negative. Now let's go to the positive. Because also in Romans chapter number 12, and I'd like you to get Philippians 4 with this too. Romans 12 and Philippians 4. Let's see. Okay. Romans 12, end of that verse, we have the positive. It says, cleave to that which is good. And in Philippians 4, I'd like you to look at verse number 8. Philippians 4, verse number 8. This is the good part. This is the things that we should cleave to. The Bible says, Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, if there be any virtue, you're going to see any virtue in anybody, any of these things, if there be any praise, you see any of that, it should be these things. That's why it says, think on these things. Have you honestly tried to cleave unto these good things this week, this month, this year? That's the good. You can't abhor that which was evil and leave yourself in a spiritual vacuum. You have to cleave to something else. Have you done this? You don't have to turn to these verses. I jotted them down. Romans 16, it talks about, I would have you wise unto that which is good. When you cleave to something that is good, do you know what you get, brother? More wisdom. Then the Bible says in 1 Thessalonians 5, it says, hold fast that which is good. When you get some wisdom on something that's good, you know what you're going to do? You're going to really want to hold on to it. The Bible talks about, let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying. You start cleaning up how you talk, you're going to use your mouth for something that's good edifying words. Husbands, we don't speak down to our wives. We build her up. Christ is building His church. We are a reflection of how we should love our wives. We are to build her up. That's good. And then it talks about, in Romans 12, this idea of brotherly love. So let's move on to that. Brotherly love. It says, one to another. And I'd like you to get some... I think we have time to do this. I think we have time. You ready to do some thinking? All right. How many here, you have agape love and phileo love, and those are Greek words, by the way, that both mean love. Anybody ever hear those terms? Okay. You don't have to agree with this, but I'll ask you to consider it. Romans 12, look at verse number 10. So they say that the agape love is the true selfless love, and the phileo love is really the, you know. not so deep as the sacrificial love like Christ would have. Okay, so that's the teaching. And so they say, well, you have to have agape love and to really love. And they get that from Peter's denial and all that, and they teach that. But I want to show you something. In Romans chapter number 12, you tell me. It says in verse number 10, be kindly affectioned one to another. with brotherly love. Now, if you went to the Greek, what do you think that would be described as? Agape love or phileo love? That brotherly love. A deep, selfless, Christ-like love, meaning agape, or phileo, kind of like a friendship kind of love. What would you think the Greek word would be if you had to guess? It's actually phileo. it's actually phileo in the Greek. And why is that important? Hold that thought on that and go to 1 Thessalonians. 1 Thessalonians 3. 1 Thessalonians 3. And call out the answer. and that'd be just fine. 1 Thessalonians 3, on what you think it is. Now look at verse number 12. 1 Thessalonians 3, verse number 12. And the Lord make you to increase and abound in love one toward another. So again, and then it says, and toward all men. So what would you think that word would be for love when it's one toward another in 1 Thessalonians 3? What would you guess it would be? It's actually agape. It's actually agape. Now, why am I pointing that out? Because the agape phileo argument that people have heard all their lives, I don't believe it's biblical because it breaks down when you start running the other references that have to do with love. That word is used in the Greek interchangeably and you understand the context. based on the rest of the chapter, not necessarily going to a Greek dictionary. Does that make sense? It's love, and you have to get the context of that love by reading the chapter and understanding, okay, this is between my... So that love in Romans 12 is basically between a brother and a sister. So if my brother or my sister in Christ... offends me, for example, I am to love them because I'm a brother in Christ and they're a sister or they're a brother in Christ. That makes sense? That's the context of it. All right, let's do another couple because these are fun to do. Go to Titus chapter 2. We're talking about love. We might as well get some of this fun stuff. Titus chapter number 2, verse number 4. Now, the Bible says that they may teach the young women to be sober. to love their husbands. Now they might, after they've realized what they get, they might have to get off the bottle, you know, figure it out. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. But look, it says, they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands. So what type of love, if you were to go to the Greek, do you think it would be? What do you think the word would be? Phileo or agape? Okay. A couple of different ones. It's actually phileo. It's actually phileo. Look at Titus 3 because this is interesting. In Titus 3, verse 4, I know what you're going to guess. But, after the kindness and love of God our Savior toward man appeared. Now what type of love do you think it is from God? Except in the Greek, it's phileo. So you got to be careful that you don't just use a teaching in one section of Scripture. You have to make sure you look at it throughout all of the Scripture. Ephesians 5, it talks about, so men to love their wives. Now in Ephesians 5, that word love is agape. In Titus 2 that we just looked at, women loving their husbands, it's phileo. but in Ephesians 5, men loving their wives, it's agape. Does one have a deeper love than the other? No, they don't. It's just two different ways to translate that word, and the translator shows love, and then we get the context based on the relationship and context of the verse. So, just a few on that. Brotherly love, getting back to the text, is actively demonstrated through kind affection. one toward another. And it's only good when it's without dissimulation and when it prefers somebody else. You don't, and I don't, want to be the type of person, the Bible tells us we have to count the cost of things, but I don't want to end up to be the over-analytical, over-calculating person. I'll tell you why. you're going to pressurize yourself. You're going to end up blowing up. I'll give you a practical example. Us men, we go to work and we have to, a businessman, he will have to calculate what's going on with this competition. He's going to have to analyze prices and he's going to have to analyze inventory and he's going to have to go through all of that at the end of the day. for the whole day. At the end of the day, he gets to go home to his family. And when he goes home to his family, you know what he doesn't want? And you know what the wife doesn't want? Any of that calculating and analytical stuff. We just want to love each other. You get away from the long day of work. That's why it's called work. And you come home to your family and now you get to enjoy each other in love. You know how that relates to the church? We are going to go out in this lost and dying world, and we're going to have to calculate and analyze. We're going to have to be careful. But you know what we should be able to do when we come in with the corporate body and we're with the church family? We should be able to love each other. That's the idea. That's true love. that's brotherly love. You're my brother. That means we're not a stranger. We should love each other. All right, let's wrap up with honor. Romans chapter 12, verse number 10, the Bible says, let love be without, or be kindly affectioned one to another, in verse number 10, with brotherly love, in honor, preferring one another. I am going to give you first place preference. That's what it is. If you have a family reunion and your great-grandfather is there, who gets first place preference on where to sit? You prefer him. God says that's how we should treat each other as brothers and sisters in Christ. I'm just going to prefer you over me. And that's right. The teacher's pet Christian plays up to someone who is an authority to gain an advantage. and that person that teacher's pet christian realizes if they are a yes man long enough they can work their way up the ladder of denominational religion and so you can't play up to the authority or the leader or child can't play up to mom and dad and then be ruthless to brother and sister an employee can't play up to his employer and be ruthless to all the other folks involved does that make sense We ought not act like that at all. We are to Paul says in honor. So if you have a special elite class in the social ladder, we shouldn't care. If you are very, very high in the political power of the local community, guess what we shouldn't do? Care. It doesn't mean we don't care about the person. It's just that we're not going to use that as our basis for love. We are going to love everybody equally. If you make a million dollars a year, we're going to love you just as well as someone that makes $30,000 a year. That's true love. It's without dissimulation. We're not trying to appear so we can get the honor and the glory. We are preferring another, and that's true leadership. We're not trying to gain a selfish advantage. You know what's ruining churches all across America? That type of attitude. I'm just going to try to gain a selfish advantage. And the results are, you end up with dishonorable men in honorable positions. and it shouldn't be so. Glory and honor are in his presence. Strength and glory are in his place.
