Dale Partridge - Romans 13_8-10 The Unpayable Debt of Love

00:00:00.000 Amen. Well, what a blessing it is to preach this powerful passage of scripture that was

00:00:15.500 more difficult than I expected. For the past several weeks, we have learned about the intersection

00:00:22.820 between the family, the church, and the state.

00:00:28.860 We've called them the spheres of sovereignty.

00:00:32.220 I offered a sermon on the theology of authority,

00:00:36.580 where I talked about how Jesus reclaimed the earthly authority

00:00:41.260 that was lost in the fall through Adam.

00:00:44.820 We also discussed how that authority has been restored in Christ,

00:00:49.980 And it is why, in the Great Commission, Jesus says,

00:00:53.840 All authority has now been given to me.

00:00:56.520 Go, therefore, and disciple the nations.

00:01:00.920 In other words, in the gospel, the authority has been restored and sanctified,

00:01:06.620 and now all authority flows from Christ.

00:01:10.880 Now, we learn that authority and civil government are inherently good.

00:01:15.440 They are intrinsically good in and of themselves.

00:01:18.640 They are part of God's design to punish evil, to reward what is good, and to maintain order in society.

00:01:26.660 Now, we also learned that while God is the source of all authority or power,

00:01:32.700 that we have to learn how to separate power from persons.

00:01:36.500 And that essentially, persons can be corrupted, which is called tyranny.

00:01:41.960 When rulers are not ruling according to God's law, we call that tyrannical.

00:01:47.160 now we have the freedom in god's word to resist tyranny we are called to reject tyranny and to

00:01:59.020 obey god but we are also called to obey just and right authority even if it is in opposition with

00:02:09.820 our own desires. Now, if we refuse, God promises in chapter 13 that he will use civil authorities

00:02:18.340 to bring his wrath and his judgment upon us. If you want to disobey one of the civil magistrate's

00:02:26.980 rightful legislative laws, God can and might punish you for that reality.

00:02:35.720 Now part of our submission was to give these authorities what is owed to them

00:02:43.080 In verse 7 Paul told us, render therefore to all what is owed

00:02:48.920 Taxes to whom taxes are owed, customs to whom customs are owed

00:02:54.140 Fear to whom fear is owed and honor to whom honor is owed

00:02:58.720 Today in verses 8 through 10 we shift from our obligations to authorities

00:03:05.380 and now our obligations to one another.

00:03:08.720 That is the shift that is occurring in this transition.

00:03:12.640 So in verse 7, it was give to the authorities what is owed.

00:03:16.600 But in verse 8, it is saying, follow along.

00:03:21.800 Oh, no one, anything except love to one another.

00:03:27.600 For he who loves another has fulfilled the law.

00:03:31.100 i'll tell you what this is a very difficult passage because there is a lot of camps of

00:03:38.120 interpretation on it there are two primary views on this passage and i'm going to give them both

00:03:45.980 to you the first is that this passage oh no one anything except to love one another is saying

00:03:54.100 there is a complete prohibition on christians borrowing or accumulating debt

00:04:00.740 some of the most profound theologians that you all respect have landed at that position too.

00:04:07.360 So it's not like a strange position. Great Puritan thought leaders, some great, you know,

00:04:14.280 18th, 19th century reformers have landed at that position. That would mean no mortgages,

00:04:21.580 no credit cards, no loans. The second position at which I hold to is that Christians should hold 0.99

00:04:31.380 or should not withhold any man their due. Now it's going to take me a minute to bring out the

00:04:38.520 exposition on this position. So just bear with me for a minute. Calvin says, quote, the apostle does

00:04:44.820 not forbid us to contract debts, but requires us to render to every man his due so that no one

00:04:51.280 should be defrauded, end quote. So the rationale for this position is that borrowing and lending

00:04:58.020 are consistently permitted throughout the Old and New Testament. So when we think about something

00:05:06.960 isolated, it's easy to come to a particular conclusion if you don't take into consideration

00:05:13.720 the whole counsel of the Word of God. Now, when you look at the whole counsel of the Word of God

00:05:18.500 on the matter of lending, of debt, of loans, of borrowing, you quickly realize that this passage

00:05:26.060 interpreted in the first view would come into conflict with the rest of the Bible. And I'm

00:05:30.760 going to give you a handful of verses, but Jesus, for example, in Matthew 542 says, give to the one

00:05:36.320 who begs from you and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you. End quote. Deuteronomy 15,

00:05:42.880 seven through eight speaks on those who are in the covenant. And it says, you shall not harden

00:05:47.540 your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother, but you shall be open or you shall open

00:05:53.040 your hand to him, generosity, and lend to him, loan, a sufficiency for his need, whatever it

00:06:02.860 may be, end quote. Psalm 37, 21 says, the wicked borrows, but does not pay back. Okay, so I think

00:06:13.700 that really is the crux of what Paul is getting to in this particular verse. Do not owe and be

00:06:21.560 unable to pay back. That's the principle I think at hand here. Do not owe and be unable to pay back.

00:06:30.840 Now you might be thinking, well, wait a second, Dale, I'm looking at the verse here in verse eight.

00:06:34.860 And if Paul really means do not withhold a man's due, then why does he say, except to love one

00:06:40.700 another. Are we supposed to withhold love too? You're going to get into like a logical,

00:06:45.900 linguistic conundrum. If you just kind of go on that passage of scripture, I was doing this

00:06:52.120 as I was studying. No, this is the crux. This is the key to understanding this passage of

00:06:57.280 scripture. Now, Paul is saying, pay attention here, do not borrow and be unable to pay back.

00:07:04.240 the only time you can be unable to pay back is with the debt of love which can never be paid back

00:07:12.920 okay it takes a bit to get there but that is what this passage is saying the only time you can

00:07:21.100 be unable to pay back is with the debt of love which is unable to ever be fully paid back so

00:07:30.120 there are two lessons, two lessons here. First, it is not inherently sinful to borrow money.

00:07:37.480 I will say that. But it is sinful to have debts that are not paid unless it is the debt of love

00:07:45.060 in which we are all in debt and unable to pay back. Second, love is the currency that should

00:07:52.820 always be in circulation. This is the currency that should be in circulation among one another,

00:07:58.320 A debt that can never be fully repaid, but continually owed to one another.

00:08:05.020 So then in the second half of verse 8, we see the word for.

00:08:08.660 Now we are smart Bible interpreters here.

00:08:10.980 We understand grammar.

00:08:12.420 We know that the word for is a signal that you're about to have an explanation.

00:08:17.260 Whenever you see the word for, it's an explanation clause.

00:08:21.480 And so it tells us, for he who loves another has fulfilled the law.

00:08:28.320 So Jesus tells us that the sum of the law is to what?

00:08:32.980 It's to love God and love neighbor.

00:08:36.120 That's the sum of the law.

00:08:38.420 Now our duty as Christians is to love.

00:08:41.840 Your duty as a Christian is to love.

00:08:43.940 To love like we owe it to people.

00:08:47.240 To love like we are indebted to one another.

00:08:50.840 To love like we are indebted to God because we are.

00:08:53.960 we are indebted to love one another because of the love of God given to us in Christ

00:09:00.260 1 John 4 11 gives us the reason for our indebtedness it says beloved if God so loved us

00:09:07.320 we also ought to love one another right fundamentals basics you start to see that Paul is

00:09:14.280 in alignment with the systematic teaching on this particular matter Jesus in John 13 34 to 35 says

00:09:20.340 quote, a new commandment I give to you, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you,

00:09:27.020 you also are to love one another. But notice that Paul does not tell us that law keeping

00:09:36.360 is what fulfills the law, but love. He's not talking about moralism. It's not law keeping

00:09:46.480 that fulfills the law. It's love that fulfills

00:09:50.540 the law. I appreciate what Calvin

00:09:54.660 said on the verse. He says, quote, Paul's design is to

00:09:58.500 reduce all the precepts of the law down to love

00:10:02.340 so that we may know we are rightly obeying the

00:10:06.440 commandments when we are maintaining love for God and for

00:10:10.520 men. I don't know about you, but it can become difficult

00:10:14.520 constantly interpreting if the way that I'm behaving is actually according to God's will.

00:10:19.140 The greatest way to determine that is to kind of dumb down everything.

00:10:25.000 Am I loving God and loving people?

00:10:28.560 I know it's difficult when you're in a particular complex situation to determine,

00:10:33.380 am I doing God's will?

00:10:35.740 The question may be unable to be answered clearly with the kind of surrounding realities.

00:10:44.520 But what you could ask yourself is, am I loving God and man in this particular decision?

00:10:52.420 And I think that's a really simple and very helpful way to examine motive.

00:10:58.200 Is what you're doing loving?

00:11:03.860 Calvin's observation, I believe, is confirmed in the next verse when Paul sums up and says in verse 9,

00:11:09.660 for the commandments quote you shall not commit adultery or you shall not murder you shall not

00:11:16.140 steal you should not bear false witness which is lying you should not covet and if there is

00:11:23.080 any other commandment all are summed up in this saying namely you shall love your neighbor as

00:11:30.320 yourself. In verse 10, he says, love does no harm to a neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfillment

00:11:40.640 of the law. There's some rich theological depth here. You're welcome to continue to study this

00:11:47.120 on your own. I'm going to try to pull out a little bit of it for you. Again, we see that

00:11:51.940 this passage begins with the word for again. This is important. Again, we are smart Bible

00:11:57.880 interpreters we don't want to be 10 20 30 years in and not understand how grammar works so that

00:12:03.700 we can make right and faithful interpretations of the scripture and so when we see the word for

00:12:08.660 it's a term of explanation you can almost sometimes put the word because in place of for

00:12:13.760 but we start off with chapter 9 or verse 9 with for the commandments well you go oh what is he

00:12:19.420 talking about so if you go up to verse 8 oh no one anything except to love one another for he who

00:12:25.960 loves one another has fulfilled the law term of explanation for the commandments you shall not

00:12:33.120 commit adultery shall not murder you shall not steal you should not bear false witness

00:12:36.880 you shall not covet he's going on bringing explanation to what he said

00:12:40.960 that is this is an explanation or the rationale for the phrase for he who loves another has

00:12:52.260 fulfilled the law. What does that mean? Okay, the Ten Commandments, just a little bit of theology

00:13:01.460 here, is broken up into what's called two tables of the law. The first table is the first four

00:13:06.760 commandments and our relationship with God. The second table is the last six commandments and

00:13:12.520 it's our relationship to one another. And so you might hear a theologian talk about the first table

00:13:16.740 or the second table of the law. And that's what they mean by those realities. Now, Paul cites

00:13:22.820 commandments six through 10, which is, he leaves out honor your father and mother, which is kind

00:13:29.040 of a unique law because it has to do really with the family. But he's dealing with commandments

00:13:36.260 six through 10, which make up basically the entire second table of the law, speaking to how

00:13:42.260 we should deal with one another outside of a family unit. And the point that Paul is trying

00:13:47.100 to make is that to love is to law keep and to law keep is to love. Okay. To love is to law keep

00:13:56.360 and to law keep is to love. Now, if you have a perverted view of love or law keeping,

00:14:03.300 then you mess this up. But if you have a biblical view of love and of law keeping,

00:14:07.540 then this gets really clear quickly.

00:14:11.360 He's not calling for moralism.

00:14:13.940 He's not also calling for legalism.

00:14:17.320 Christ has fulfilled the law on our behalf.

00:14:20.240 All righteousness has been fulfilled in Christ keeping the law perfectly

00:14:25.180 in which we receive that righteous record given to us by faith.

00:14:29.720 So we are justified.

00:14:31.500 We are perfect law keepers not by our own works

00:14:34.320 but by the perfect work of Christ.

00:14:37.540 Which is wonderful, right?

00:14:39.080 So we don't have to work for salvation.

00:14:41.860 We work from salvation, which is a big distinction in the way and the reason that we obey.

00:14:48.660 And so Paul is calling for love that is displayed in obedience toward your neighbor.

00:14:56.220 A form of love, a form of obedience that is displayed in your relationship to your neighbor by law keeping.

00:15:07.000 By loving, they're the same thing.

00:15:09.900 To love is to law keep.

00:15:11.180 To law keep is to love.

00:15:13.160 Again, if you have it in the right Christian framework.

00:15:16.280 It's not moralism.

00:15:18.380 It's I'm loving God.

00:15:19.820 I'm loving others because God loved me.

00:15:23.840 It's allowing the works and the love for others to overflow from the love of God given to you.

00:15:31.320 You may have heard me say, a great way to love your neighbor is to make sure it's illegal for

00:15:36.020 them to kill their baby. A great way to love your neighbor is to make sure that it's illegal to

00:15:42.520 commit adultery. A great way to love your neighbor is to make sure that they are not ruled by pagan

00:15:49.800 God-hating politicians. It's a great way to love your neighbor is to actually

00:15:56.820 produce a society which is in alignment with God's law.

00:16:06.200 That is to say, true love seeks God's standard of good.

00:16:12.560 True love seeks God's standard of good, his law, and he seeks it for others.

00:16:19.700 I seek God's standards of love and good for others who are not even saved.

00:16:27.300 I want this city to be ruled by Christian laws and principles.

00:16:32.220 I want this nation to be ruled by Christian laws and principles.

00:16:35.660 I think it is the best thing for the Muslim. 0.51

00:16:37.820 I think it is the best thing for the Hindu and the best thing for the atheist that this nation is ran by people who are Christian.

00:16:45.560 It is a loving thing, a good thing.

00:16:49.080 And that is in alignment with God's law, which is loving.

00:16:54.780 This is why I believe Christians ought to be theonomists,

00:16:58.640 what we call general equity theonomists.

00:17:01.180 It's not a theocracy, it's a theonomy.

00:17:03.900 A theonomy is that we take the general principles and extract them from God's law

00:17:07.520 and apply them to the modern legislative realities.

00:17:11.340 We want to be theonomists.

00:17:13.200 Because if we don't base man's laws off of God's law,

00:17:18.620 what are we basing on? Ourselves. We become a law unto ourselves. No, we should have every law

00:17:25.340 that we have should be based in scripture. We should have arbitrary laws that we create. No,

00:17:31.940 we need to be fighting as Christians to make sure that the laws, the government is in submission

00:17:37.120 and alignment with God's will. Now, loving people through law is an important argument for a culture

00:17:47.260 who first hates God's law and thinks that it's evil, and a church who calls obedience legalism.

00:17:55.940 Okay, we got two enemies, two foes. You got one side where you got the world that says

00:18:00.320 God's law is wicked because it doesn't allow me to do what I want to do. And then in the church,

00:18:07.100 you get a whole group of people that says your calling for law-keeping and obedience is legalism.

00:18:11.920 okay i forgot the phrase but it's like for most people legalism is when someone tells me to do

00:18:18.600 anything i don't want to do um that that's pretty common in the church you tell someone to obey

00:18:23.380 and they go legalism no you would never survive in the pearson era under that perspective

00:18:30.820 paying back the debt of love paying back the debt of love which we can never be

00:18:39.140 fully paid back

00:18:40.820 because it's the amount of debt

00:18:42.880 we are in through Christ

00:18:44.000 requires Christians to uphold

00:18:46.620 and promote God's standard of righteousness

00:18:48.520 toward God and toward others.

00:18:50.840 Now honestly, I would argue that

00:18:52.560 law keeping is a great way

00:18:54.580 of modeling Christ's love.

00:18:57.460 Again, we

00:18:58.120 you know, what would Jesus do?

00:19:02.720 We want to follow Christ.

00:19:04.120 We want to model Christ.

00:19:05.480 You want to know a great way to model Christ?

00:19:07.360 is keep the law.

00:19:10.360 Now, you're not keeping the law to earn justification.

00:19:12.660 That's a key point.

00:19:14.040 You're not keeping the law to be a moralist, to be a legalist.

00:19:17.300 You're keeping the law to love the Lord.

00:19:20.860 It's a great way to model Christ.

00:19:22.880 Who kept the law perfectly?

00:19:24.820 Jesus.

00:19:25.520 So if you want to be like Jesus, then try to keep the law.

00:19:28.440 Now, again, you'll never be able to keep the law.

00:19:30.460 We know that we all fail.

00:19:32.520 He who fails at one point has become guilty of all of it,

00:19:35.000 is what James says.

00:19:36.700 We need the righteousness of Christ.

00:19:38.420 It doesn't mean that we just kind of give up on the law.

00:19:41.920 No.

00:19:45.180 Christ secured our salvation through keeping the law.

00:19:51.240 Again, our law keeping does not secure, it does not maintain, it does not sustain our salvation.

00:19:58.560 None of it.

00:20:00.360 Six times in the book of John, Jesus speaks of the relationship of law and obedience.

00:20:05.700 John 14 through 15, it says, if you love me, you'll keep my commandments.

00:20:11.840 If you love me, you'll keep my commandments.

00:20:15.500 Now, I don't think that this is necessarily a contingency phrase.

00:20:18.500 I think this is more of an observation.

00:20:20.280 Those people who love me, they'll keep my commandments.

00:20:22.720 I think that's really what it should be read.

00:20:26.100 John 14, 21, whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me.

00:20:32.640 There's another way of kind of seeing the observation nature of it.

00:20:34.900 See those law keepers over there who do it from love, from gospel motivation, resting in Christ?

00:20:42.480 Those are mine.

00:20:45.760 It's not a contingency like, hey, if you stop keeping the law, you're out, man.

00:20:49.660 You failed.

00:20:51.040 It's not a contingency.

00:20:52.420 If you don't keep the law, you've lost your salvation.

00:20:54.540 That's not what's being said here.

00:20:58.960 John 14, 23.

00:21:00.200 If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him.

00:21:07.060 And we will come to him and make our home with him.

00:21:09.820 John 14, 24

00:21:10.820 Whoever does not love me does not keep my words.

00:21:19.880 John 15, 10

00:21:21.120 If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love.

00:21:28.300 Huh!

00:21:28.580 Sounds like I want to be like Christ

00:21:31.300 So if you're going to be like Christ

00:21:33.620 What do you get to do? 0.50

00:21:34.360 Well it says it right here

00:21:35.160 If you keep my commandments

00:21:36.200 You will abide in my love

00:21:37.720 Just as I have kept my father's commandments

00:21:40.700 And abide in his love

00:21:42.240 Now the greatest way to abide in the commandments

00:21:47.360 Is to abide in Christ

00:21:48.520 Okay

00:21:49.820 You have to divide these things

00:21:51.680 Quickly you become a legalist if you don't

00:21:54.860 And then if you don't

00:21:57.240 if you fall in the other ditch,

00:21:59.360 you're going to become antinomian, 0.93

00:22:01.040 which is anti-law Christianity. 0.91

00:22:03.500 So you've got to run down the narrow, 0.85

00:22:06.380 knowing that we want to keep the law,

00:22:08.580 but it doesn't justify us.

00:22:11.020 Knowing that we love the law,

00:22:14.080 but it is not our salvation.

00:22:19.600 Knowing that if we hate the law,

00:22:23.300 we will fail in our obedience and loving others.

00:22:25.440 and all of these dimensions are vital to interpret clearly

00:22:31.020 John 15 14 you are my friends

00:22:35.140 if you do what I command you so again too often

00:22:39.220 we abuse we abuse grace this was certainly

00:22:43.300 a problem in the early church Paul speaks to it pretty often Romans chapter

00:22:47.200 6 verse 14 should we keep on sinning that grace may abound

00:22:51.180 certainly not but the point is

00:22:55.220 in that verse, grace does abound.

00:23:00.280 And the reality is, you do keep sinning.

00:23:04.360 But Paul's talking about, should you intentionally?

00:23:07.740 There was a group, the antinomians, that were actually saying, let's be as bad as we can

00:23:11.620 be, because if the worse we are, it will actually

00:23:15.320 magnify God's grace. How amazingly stupid that is. 1.00

00:23:19.780 god's god's law is so good or sorry god's grace is so good i'm gonna actually be so bad to show 1.00

00:23:29.080 how good it is because look grace will cover it all and and truly i it will but that's not

00:23:37.300 what jesus taught or what paul is teaching

00:23:39.860 should we keep on sinning that grace may abound no no keep the commandments

00:23:47.940 not for justification i'm not calling for people to go and keep keep all the festivals and all the

00:23:54.960 things that have been fulfilled in christ i'm not i'm talking about the moral law the decalogue

00:23:59.740 The Ten Commandments.

00:24:06.480 We also need to be reminded of the words of Jesus in Matthew 5, 17.

00:24:11.920 Do not think that I have come to abolish the law or the prophets.

00:24:14.840 I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them.

00:24:19.060 Okay.

00:24:20.400 This is a very important verse.

00:24:23.160 That is, the righteous requirement of the law has been fulfilled in Christ.

00:24:28.180 Jesus didn't just come to die for you.

00:24:29.900 He also came to live for you.

00:24:31.920 He didn't just come to die for your sins.

00:24:33.940 He came to live to make you righteous,

00:24:36.240 to meet the righteous requirement of the law that you can't keep.

00:24:42.820 But the standard of the law is still here.

00:24:48.960 What is the law doing?

00:24:49.940 If Christ didn't abolish the law but fulfilled it,

00:24:55.320 what does that mean?

00:24:57.580 Well, it means the law is still here, and it's doing something.

00:25:01.420 Well, what is it doing?

00:25:02.900 Well, it's condemning sinners, that's for sure.

00:25:05.480 It's reminding us of the state of grace that we are in.

00:25:10.780 I'll tell you what, because the law is still out there condemning sinners,

00:25:14.200 it reminds me, such were some of you.

00:25:18.500 I used to be wicked.

00:25:21.880 I used to not think soberly about the standard of righteousness.

00:25:27.580 that God has. God didn't come through Christ to abolish the law, but to fulfill it. Now,

00:25:36.420 the law is still good. It's so good that Christ kept it. It's good for society.

00:25:43.020 It's not how we're justified, but it's good for society. It's good for us to uphold.

00:25:51.280 Now, since we're talking about love, I want to just shift for a second

00:25:54.000 to a little bit more practical and I think pastoral

00:25:56.600 on what I believe is the test of true love.

00:26:01.720 In my experience, a person's love for their neighbor

00:26:04.020 is often more reliable of a measure

00:26:06.240 than a person's love for God.

00:26:10.620 And I'll explain why and what I mean by that.

00:26:13.200 I believe that looking at someone's love for their neighbor

00:26:16.500 is more revealing and more telling

00:26:19.480 than looking at someone and trying to determine their love for God.

00:26:25.560 Let me explain.

00:26:27.600 Anyone can display love for God through religious acts.

00:26:31.020 It's very difficult to determine the motive, the intention of the heart.

00:26:35.840 Man cannot look at the heart, but we only see the outside.

00:26:39.520 But when it comes to a person's relationship with other people,

00:26:43.580 those actions are more easily tested because they are felt.

00:26:48.300 They are experienced.

00:26:49.820 They are seen.

00:26:51.720 They are observed.

00:26:54.000 We can see it in our kids.

00:26:56.080 We can see it in one another.

00:26:58.540 The vast majority of gossip in the church is around this particular matter.

00:27:04.320 The point is, is that if you actually love God, you'll actually love people.

00:27:10.520 If you actually love God, you'll actually be patient with people.

00:27:14.920 If you actually love God, you'll actually be kind to people.

00:27:17.840 If you actually love God, you'll actually be joyful toward others.

00:27:23.200 If you actually love God, you'll actually seek peace with other people.

00:27:28.780 If you actually love God, it'll show in how you treat other people.

00:27:33.840 It is the revelation, the mirror, the response, the reflection.

00:27:39.420 It's easier to see.

00:27:42.540 1 John 4.20 says, 0.94

00:27:44.060 If anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he's a liar.

00:27:50.580 For he who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, who he has not seen.

00:27:59.040 There's a person in my life, not a member of this church, who calls themselves a Christian,

00:28:04.420 but the pattern of their behavior toward others gives me serious doubts.

00:28:07.300 again the only reason and the only way that we can examine somebody else's state

00:28:13.520 is by their fruit we've given no other metric by god to determine if someone is a believer

00:28:21.140 other than profession of faith and fruit i don't know where your heart is there are probably lots

00:28:27.140 of people who i don't think are saved or saved and there are probably lots of people who i i think

00:28:31.320 are saved and aren't saved. That's why Jesus says, don't separate, uh, the, the wheat from the

00:28:39.440 tares. You're going to, you can mess it up. Wait until I return and I will separate them because

00:28:46.100 I can see clearly. So we don't know we're bad judges, uh, bad judges of this type of reality.

00:28:55.000 But that being said, this person in my life does not operate toward others in a way

00:28:59.700 that seeks to pay back a debt of love.

00:29:03.160 Rather, they operate in a way that seeks to extract

00:29:06.120 what they believe is owed to them.

00:29:10.800 Think about that for a minute.

00:29:14.320 That is two radically different ways of operating.

00:29:22.800 Do you seek to pay back a debt of love?

00:29:25.360 or do you seek to extract what you believe is owed to you?

00:29:34.100 Is that principle in your life in any way?

00:29:40.180 We see this in entitlement and bitterness,

00:29:44.920 complaining, frustration, anger.

00:29:53.140 These people are ungrateful.

00:29:55.360 they operate from a place of scarcity which reveals they do not have the riches of Christ.

00:30:02.680 Key point.

00:30:04.320 They operate from a place of scarcity

00:30:07.120 which reveals that they don't have the riches of Christ.

00:30:16.660 You know when you meet someone who knows Christ

00:30:19.520 because they operate from a reservoir of riches.

00:30:25.360 they're not constantly pulling from you.

00:30:32.080 They're actually trying to give.

00:30:34.880 They're trying to overflow into your life.

00:30:40.200 The born-again believer does not operate in a pattern of bitterness or grumbling or ungratefulness

00:30:46.240 because they see themselves as unworthy heirs of the kingdom of God.

00:30:50.160 Now, I'm going to read a passage of Scripture.

00:30:57.160 Let me pull it up real quick here.

00:31:02.280 It's long.

00:31:03.720 Not that long.

00:31:06.360 Ephesians chapter 1, if you want to follow along with me, it's verse 3 through probably 14.

00:31:14.160 It says,

00:31:14.940 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ

00:31:18.300 who has blessed us in Christ

00:31:20.760 with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places

00:31:22.880 even as he chose us

00:31:25.100 there's a blessing

00:31:26.460 in him before the foundation of the world

00:31:28.840 should put you in awe

00:31:29.800 that we should be holy and blameless before him

00:31:32.740 praise the Lord

00:31:33.400 in love he predestined us for adoption to himself

00:31:37.080 amazing

00:31:38.000 as sons through Jesus Christ

00:31:40.180 according to the purpose of his will

00:31:41.920 to the praise of his grace

00:31:43.480 with which he has blessed us in the beloved too much.

00:31:49.020 In him, we have redemption through his blood.

00:31:51.460 There's a blessing.

00:31:52.440 The forgiveness of our trespasses, another blessing.

00:31:55.140 According to the riches of his grace,

00:31:56.700 which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight,

00:32:00.460 making known to us the mystery of his will

00:32:02.380 according to his purpose,

00:32:03.520 which he set forth in Christ

00:32:04.920 as a plan for the fullness of time

00:32:07.140 to unite all things in him,

00:32:09.480 things in heaven and things on earth.

00:32:11.120 okay this is already starting to get overwhelming overwhelming in him we have obtained an inheritance

00:32:20.480 more blessing having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things

00:32:26.920 according to the counsel of his will so that purpose clause so that we who were first to

00:32:35.060 hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory.

00:32:39.600 In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel

00:32:43.120 of your salvation, more blessing, and believed in him

00:32:46.980 were sealed with the promise of the Holy Spirit, more blessing, who is the guarantee

00:32:51.260 of our inheritance, more blessing, until we acquire possession of it to the praise

00:32:55.220 of his glory.

00:33:00.220 What do you do with that?

00:33:01.300 the well-fed man

00:33:06.320 does not beg for scraps

00:33:08.920 the well-fed man does not beg for scraps

00:33:12.920 they offer the bread freely

00:33:14.780 and likewise the man or woman who has Christ

00:33:16.840 does not demand and take from others

00:33:19.480 instead they delight in giving

00:33:22.580 knowing that they lack nothing

00:33:24.800 and that they owe everything in love

00:33:27.080 that's a shift

00:33:30.040 is that your life and yes you know what there are times where we do need from the body but we do it

00:33:41.280 because it's real not because we're entitled for it not because we we we're asking for it when we

00:33:47.940 don't really need it no every one of us has needs there's no weakness in asking for help in time of

00:33:56.980 need. That's not what I'm talking about. Believers do not have conditional generosity or conditional

00:34:07.360 kindness or conditional joy or conditional love. We have unconditional joy and unconditional love

00:34:15.180 and unconditional kindness. There is no circumstances or conditions by which will

00:34:20.760 change our joy and our hope and our generosity and our love to one another because we are

00:34:26.420 resting upon Christ who is

00:34:28.560 in an immovable condition.

00:34:32.540 Unconditional.

00:34:34.420 You can operate the same in all circumstances

00:34:36.620 because Christ is fixed.

00:34:39.320 Your salvation

00:34:40.480 is fixed. You can

00:34:42.620 love one another and oh

00:34:44.380 man and God

00:34:46.580 love with an

00:34:48.440 unending supply

00:34:49.760 because you are drawing from this

00:34:52.280 reservoir of Christ that has been

00:34:54.340 given to you that will never end.

00:35:04.320 The crux of what

00:35:06.320 Paul is saying is that if you love God, you will love others. If you love others,

00:35:10.200 it's because God loved you. That's

00:35:13.800 what's being taught. 1 John 4, 7-8 says,

00:35:17.960 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God.

00:35:21.740 And whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

00:35:27.180 Observation.

00:35:29.280 Anyone who does not love does not know God because God is love.

00:35:39.220 If you want to know why that person in your life who calls themselves a Christian but isn't loving, doesn't love,

00:35:45.240 it's because they don't know God.

00:35:46.920 people who know god love people there are varying degrees of maturity and

00:35:57.020 manifestation of that reality there's sanctification in this process i don't expect

00:36:03.360 the maturity from a nine-year-old that i do from a 28 year old i don't expect the maturity from

00:36:08.120 a new believer that i do from someone who's been in the faith for 40 years

00:36:11.580 the reality is

00:36:14.440 if you want to know why people in your life

00:36:17.380 who call themselves Christians don't love

00:36:19.340 and are bitter and are ungrateful 1.00

00:36:21.220 and are frustrating and are

00:36:23.320 anger it's either because

00:36:25.180 they are completely unaware of what

00:36:27.200 scripture teaches about the gospel or

00:36:29.160 they are not actually saved

00:36:31.280 which is

00:36:35.260 not to shock anyone in America

00:36:36.880 who has spent the last 40 years doing 0.82

00:36:38.980 inactive spectator Christianity

00:36:41.140 with everybody's heads bowed and eyes closed except Jesus

00:36:44.400 with no repentance and no understanding of the biblical gospel.

00:36:51.820 As I conclude here, Robert Haldane summarized this passage of scripture in an interesting way.

00:36:56.540 He said, love prevents everything the law forbids.

00:37:06.780 I had to sit on that one for a minute.

00:37:09.760 Love prevents everything the law forbids.

00:37:15.820 In other words, true love, where that love reigns, there's no room for hatred.

00:37:22.580 There's no room for dishonesty.

00:37:25.980 There's no room for theft.

00:37:28.140 There's no room for adultery.

00:37:30.280 There's no room for any transgression.

00:37:32.260 Because true love prevents everything the law forbids.

00:37:41.380 When we truly love, it makes obedience to God's command a joyful response to grace rather than some burdensome duty.

00:37:54.140 It allows us to love from the gospel.

00:37:59.140 it allows the love

00:38:02.860 for us to appreciate the law

00:38:06.120 not because it's the way that we are saved

00:38:10.560 but because Christ kept it for us

00:38:14.060 we operate from that

00:38:16.680 it really makes the gospel shine

00:38:19.280 amen let's pray

00:38:21.220 oh father we thank you lord

00:38:24.620 that the debt of love is so big

00:38:30.500 that it can never be fulfilled or paid back.

00:38:35.000 That we are to owe man nothing except for love.

00:38:44.740 And Lord, we ask that you would give us wisdom

00:38:46.660 on these passages of scripture,

00:38:48.720 that they would permeate our hearts and souls,

00:38:52.820 that they would actually manifest

00:38:53.780 and the way that we live.

00:38:56.880 There would be some sort of change

00:38:58.200 that happens in our own families,

00:38:59.440 in our own lives,

00:39:00.160 in our own church,

00:39:01.220 in our own city.

00:39:03.540 Lord, we pray that you would do a work

00:39:05.080 in this congregation and in this town

00:39:07.680 by the power of your son, Jesus Christ.

00:39:11.440 Amen.

00:39:12.240 Amen.

Dale Partridge - February 25, 2025

Romans 13_8-10 The Unpayable Debt of Love

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