Dressing Up Your Life

Well, I'm not going to ask you to answer this audibly, but if I were to ask you tonight, which is more important, doctrine or practical living? How would you respond? Just think in your mind. How would you respond? Which is more important, doctrine or practical application, practical Christian living? For those of you who would say, both, you're right, because both are equally important, and one of the ways we can tell that is because in most of Paul's epistles, Paul gives an equal balance to doctrine and practical Christian living. Colossians is one of those epistles as we're looking on Sunday evenings. At that book, we have seen that it is almost evenly divided between doctrinal section and practical application section. The doctrinal section, the first two chapters, practical application, the last two chapters. You've seen that the theme of the book is the Lordship of Christ. In chapter 1, his Lordship in creation and the church, in chapter 2, his Lordship in doctrine, as Paul deals with a false cult and false teaching there in Colossi. And then in chapters 3 and 4, his Lordship in the Christian life. Now for Jesus to be Lord in our Christian life demands a change in our lifestyle. And that's what we're seeing in chapter 3. Tonight we find ourselves in verses 12 through 14. But the last time we were in Colossians, we found that Paul said, the old lifestyle needs to be put to death. The old self, all of the exhibits of the old nature, the characteristics and qualities of the old nature, need to be put to death, they need to be put off. And the sins of that Paul mentioned were sins of sexual immorality, sins of attitude, sins of speech, all of those needing to be put away, put off. And we saw that the terminology was really terminology of change of clothing. Take off that old clothing. That doesn't fit anymore. That goes with the old life. That doesn't go with your new life in Christ because we are new people once we come to no Christ. We're new. And so the old clothing doesn't fit anymore. We need to take that off. But it's not enough just to put away things. You know where a lot of folks get in trouble is that they really seek God's help to put away some things, to overcome some bad habits or bad qualities of life, but they're not spending an equal amount of time working on those things which should take the place of those old habits. So Paul very quickly balances out taking off the old with putting on the new. So it really is like a change of clothing. Taking off the old putting on the new. In verses 12 through 14, Paul talks about that which we should put in the place of the old clothing that we've taken off. Put on the new lifestyle, he says. And he really does continue the imagery of clothing. You can see there in verse 12. He says, therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with. And he lists all these qualities that we're going to look at in the moment. So it is really taking off the old putting on the new. In other words, dressing up your life. This is like going to a fashion show. I've never been to one of those. You know, it's not really my kind of thing. But it's kind of like going to a fashion show and saying, the old is out, the new is in. What's the latest fashion? Well, for us, biblically, the latest fashion came out about 2000 years ago. It's found here in Colossians 3. And that is the quality of life that we should put on as new people in Christ. What I want us to do tonight is take a look at verses 12 through 14. And we're going to look first of all at the reasons for a new lifestyle. And then we're going to look at the qualities of a new lifestyle. Let's look at the reasons first of all. The reasons for a new lifestyle. Paul once again argues from our position in Christ. It is our position in Christ that is the reason why we should be living a new lifestyle. Notice how he does this in verse 12. He says, therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with these qualities. It's because we are these things that we should do these things. It's because we are chosen people, holy and dearly loved, that we should live a different kind of lifestyle. So our position in Christ dictates how we are supposed to live. That's exactly what he talked about in verses 5 through 11 as well. He talked about our position in Christ and what that means about what we should take off. For instance, he said back in verse 10. He says, you have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge and the image of its creator. And in verse 9, he said, you've taken off the old self. So our position in Christ dictates how we should live negatively, things we should put off, but it also dictates how we should live positively. Now what is our position in Christ? He says three things there in verse 12. We are a chosen people. Quite simply, quite plainly, that means that God chose us to be His own and that Bible makes it clear that choice was made before the foundation of the world. I don't fully understand that. I don't know enough about God's mind and purposes and how He works all of that out to really understand His choice of us. All on those it the Bible says it. And so I believe it. What I like to do is simply say, God, that's just a matter of your grace. And I realize that it is totally of your grace that I am in your family. It's not because you look down and said, you know, John looks like a pretty good guy. I think I'll go let him into heaven or I think I'll save him because I think he's worthy of that. God chose us simply out of His grace. And so that doctrine, that position of being chosen people should not be one that frightens us as believers. It ought to be one that humbles us to thank God for His matchless grace. I don't understand why He chose me or He chose any of us, but I know He did. And so I'm thankful for His grace. We're chosen. Secondly, we are holy. He doesn't say here to be holy. That's our practice. That's how we should be living. He says we are holy. He says as God's chosen people, holy and dearly love. You see there is a practical side to holiness about how we should live. But there's also a positional side. And that is that when God saved you, he immediately at that moment set you apart from this world to be one of His children, to start living like He is and acting like He does and living out His character, not supposed to live like the world anymore, but supposed to live like a child of God, to reflect who He is, like the Father where to live as His child, to act out like He does. And so that's positional holiness. We have that position in Christ. We are holy. Now we should be holy and live that out in our lifestyle, but we be holy because we are holy. We live out holiness because of our position of holiness. So we're chosen, we're holy. And then thirdly says we are dearly loved. God has fixed His love on us and we will be the eternal objects of His love. Again, I don't understand that either. I don't know how God could look down and love people like us, but He did. Knowing my own heart, knowing my own wickedness, it's hard to understand how God could love me. But He does. And we are dearly loved. It's not just that He loved us. It's that we are dearly loved. We're so dear to His heart. Now it is because of that special position He's given us that we should live out a new life. In other words, the encouragement to live as we should should come for us from the fact that God has placed us in Him. We are holy, dearly loved, chosen because of our position. That's the motivation to live like we should. We do what we do because we are what we are. Paul really does this in all of his epistles that have this natural change from doctrine to practical living. Listen to this in Romans chapter 12. Paul has spent the first 11 chapters of Romans talking about doctrine, talking about how we are justified by faith and we're removed from being sinners to being justified by faith. In Romans 121 where he starts the practical section, he says, therefore, I urge you brothers in view of God's mercy. Okay, that looks back to the first 11 chapters. In view of all that, how God has mercifully saved you. In view of that, offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God. This is your spiritual act of worship. So in Romans the bridge between doctrine and practice is because you are who you are, live like you ought to live. Now, Paul does that in every epistle where he makes this change between doctrine and practice. He does the same thing in Galatians chapter 5. First four chapters, he's talked about the doctrine of freedom in Christ, freedom from legalism. And so he begins chapter 5 by saying, it is for freedom that Christ has set us free. That's a summary statement of the first four chapters. The next statement is, stand firm then and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery. The next two chapters tell us how to live out that freedom. There's doctrine, there's practice because we are what we are, we do what we do. He does the same thing in Ephesians. There's three chapters of Ephesians talk about our position in the body of Christ. That's doctrine. Chapter 4 verse 1, where he makes the change, listen to what he does. As a prisoner for the Lord, then I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you've received. He says, I've just described this calling that you have in Christ, this position, now live like it. You know, live a life worthy of that position that you have. That's the same thing in Ephesians. Here it is in Colossians again. In fact, in chapter 3 of Colossians where he starts this practical section, he says this, since then you have been raised with Christ. Looking back to the doctrine, first two chapters he's talked about, the doctrine of being in Christ raised with him. Since that's true, he says, set your hearts on things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God. So there's doctrine, there's practice. We always do what we do because we are what we are. My wife has an interesting saying that she will often say to our children as they go out the door, as they, you know, first two went through the teenage years and we're working another one to get through that right now. But whenever they would leave the house to go out with friends or to go out and do something, Jeannie will often say to them, don't ever forget, you are a child of the kings and more important you're a child of the king. She has this little saying, she says to them all the time, and I don't know if they ever think about it or not, but I think they do. I think she wants them to leave the house with that ringing in their minds. They are a child of the kings, they will carry our name with them wherever they go and whatever they do. But more important than that, they are a child of the king, Jesus Christ, and they will reflect on him wherever they are and whatever they do. At least that's what we want them to remember. What she's saying basically is, do what you're going to do based on who you are. Your position dictates your activity. That's exactly what Paul's telling us. Because we are chosen, holy and dearly loved, now put on the right kind of clothes. Let's get dressed up right. Let's do what we're supposed to do. Now those are the reasons for the new lifestyle. Let's look at the qualities of this new lifestyle in verses 12 through 14. The different qualities that Paul lists, and he lists about seven of them as we'll go through this, eight of them maybe, and they're divided into four categories. The first category of positive virtues that we should put on, character qualities that we should dress up in. The first one has to do with our treatment of others. First two actually have to do with our treatment of others. Look at verse 12 again. As God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion. The first one is compassion. Compassion, I like, I still like the way the King James translate, the bowels of mercies. The idea literally is when you feel it in your gut, the Greeks and the Hebrews often saw the emotions coming from the midsection because when you're frightened that's where you feel it. When you feel something deeply for someone that's where you actually feel it. And the gut, and so bowels of mercies, your stomach gets tight, your stomach gets fluttered, whatever you're nervous, those kinds of things happen. You feel it right there. So bowels of mercies or tenderhearted compassion is the idea. The idea really is, and I know this has been overused, but the idea really is, I feel you're pain. I really do hurt when you hurt, I rejoice when you rejoice. Our treatment of other people should be that we literally can enter into the depth of feeling of their emotions. When we can do that, that's compassion. That's compassion. Jesus did that. The Bible says that Jesus went to a graveside one day in John chapter 11. His friend Lazarus had just passed away a few days before. And Mary and Martha are both weeping as they followed his feet and saying, Lord, if you'd been here, our brother wouldn't have died. And by the time Jesus got to the graveside, I say this reverently, he was a mess. The Bible says Jesus wept. And before that, it says he was moved inwardly, deeply troubled in his spirit at what he was seeing. The amazing thing to me about that is Jesus knew that in a few moments he was going to speak the words it would bring Lazarus out of that tomb. And yet he so entered into the depth of agony that that family was going through, that he wept with them. He felt with them. That's the kind of compassion that Paul is talking about here in Colossians. Jesus also exhibited that kind of compassion when he crested the Mount of Olives, writing on that donkey coming down into Jerusalem just shortly before he would die. And the Bible says people were waving palm branches and putting them on the ground and proclaiming, Hosanna, the Lord is here, the day of the Lord is here, proclaiming him to be king. But Luke 19 verse 41 says that Jesus was weeping as he looked over the city. And the word for weeping is to sob uncontrollably. You know why? Because he looked at them and said, oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, if you had only known, if you had only known the day of your visitation. And then he talks about the judgment that city will go through because they have not received him. And his heart wept, his heart was crushed because of those people who would be judged because they'd never received him. That's compassion. That's compassion. And we can have that kind of compassion too. And enter into the lives and hearts and feelings and hurts and joys of other people and really feel those in ourselves. Joe Stoll tells this story, former president of Moody Bible Institute, tells the story of a Jewish Christian friend of his who went to visit the country of Denmark. And he came back and was talking to Dr. Stoll about his visit. And Dr. Stoll was very interested to hear. He'd never been to Denmark. He wanted to hear about the visit. And the guy was telling him all kinds of things. And then he said, you know, the highlight of the trip was when we visited the palace where all of Denmark's kings lived. And he said, we were going through and the tour guide was explaining some things to us. And then he said, you know, there's a story about this balcony out here at the palace. In the days of the conflict in Europe and World War II, when Hitler had taken Denmark, he required King Christian the 10th to get up on that balcony and proclaim to his people who were gathered in the courtyard below that every person of Jewish descent would have to wear a yellow arm band to identify himself or herself. And obviously, you know, the history of what was happening in Europe at that time, you understand why that would take place. And the tour guide explained that King Christian the 10th said those words with tears running down his face. And when he finished that speech, which he was required to make, he reached into his pocket. And he pulled out a yellow arm band. And he put it on his own arm. And the people of Denmark were so moved by that act of courage and compassion that many non-Jews in Denmark went out and did the same thing. The show they were won with the feeling and the hurt of the Jewish people. That's compassion. That's the kind of deep feeling of compassion and moving of the heart with someone else that Paul is talking about here. So he says, in your treatment of others have compassion. Secondly, he says in your treatment of others have kindness, kindness. That's a bland word to us, I guess. But the word kindness really means to be gentle. It means to have a gracious disposition towards someone to be courteous, to be kind in your speech, gracious in your speech to other people, gracious in your action toward other people. It's the exact opposite of being crabby and sullen and harsh and cold and bitter. It's a warm, hearted, gracious attitude toward others that results in the way you speak to them and the way you treat them being kind. A woman was shopping in New York City. And as she walked down one of the streets of some of the stores there in New York City, she saw a little boy with his nose pressed up against the window. It couldn't have been more than five or six years old. She walked over to him and said, what are you doing? And he said, I'm asking God to give me a pair of those shoes in there. She took a quick glance at his feet and saw that there were holes in the end of his shoes and his socks were all tattered. It was November, it was cold. So she put her arm around him and took him inside the store. She bought him several pair of socks and asked for the store clerk to get that very pair of shoes that he was looking at in the window. She took him over to the counter, paid for everything and she knelt down and said, now son, you'll feel a lot more comfortable now. She got up to walk away and the little boy looked up at her and said, are you God's wife? You know, would that more people would say that about us because we are the bride of Christ? We know that more people would have occasion to say, are you God's wife? Do you really reflect the kindness of your Savior? Do I? Paul says in our treatment of others, we should be characterized by compassion and kindness. But notice, there's a second set of qualities that are involved in this new life, this new ward robe that we're to put on. It's our estimation of ourselves, not only our treatment of others, but our estimation of ourselves, the next two qualities deal with that in verse 12. Look, the next one is humility, humility. Now humility is a really slippery thing. I mean, if you think you've got it, you just lost it. You know, it's really slippery. It's hard to get hold of what humility really is. But I think the key to humility is I understand the scriptures, not necessarily practice it, but as I understand the scriptures, I think the key to humility is to understand that we are objects of God's grace. That may sound too theological or something, but I really mean that. I really mean that in order to understand humility, we have to understand that we have really nothing to offer, that we are objects of God's grace. Everything we are, everything we do, whatever good comes of it, is because God has been gracious to us. And a really deep-seated understanding of that, I think, is what humility is all about. Now humility is so slippery because humility is not the kind of thing that is put on or can be exhibited on purpose. In fact, if you try to exhibit humility, you're probably trying to impress people with how humble you are, which means you're not really humble. There is a very subtle deception to pride. And I speak this only because I know the wickedness of my own heart. I mean, I know that there are times when all of us, I'm sure, are trying to impress others with how humble we are. And that in God's eyes is terrible pride. And we ought to be smitten in our hearts whenever we find ourselves thinking that way. See, this humility thing is really slippery. It's really difficult to get a grasp on. I believe that it involves balance. Humility means that you don't overrate yourself, but you don't underestimate yourself either. It means that you have, like Paul said in Romans 12-3, that you evaluate yourselves according to the measure of faith that God's given you, that you understand areas he's gifted you in. You're not ashamed of those. You don't blatantly blow the horn on those, but you're not ashamed of those. You understand how God's gifted you, but you also understand there are serious weaknesses that you have. And you're not all down in the face about that. You just recognize something I've got to work on. And God's grace will have to help me through. I think true humility has that kind of balance to it. Humility always leads away from yourself. Another thing that's so slippery about it is anytime we have a preoccupation about ourselves as to whether or not we're proud or humble. Where am I on this scale? We're probably nowhere near humility. Humility is always seen in service to others. That's why Paul said in Philippians 2, when Jesus humbled himself, what was the next thing? He humbled himself and became a servant. Jesus demonstrated that. You know, like at the last supper, the final meal with his disciples, when everybody comes into this room that does not belong to any of them, so no servant is there to wash the feet. And the disciples are arguing about who's the greatest. Luke 22 says, so none of them are going to volunteer to go wash feet. That's a job of a servant. Who's going to volunteer to do that? And Jesus doesn't say anything. See, this is true humility. Jesus doesn't try to impress people and say, okay, I'll show you what real humility is. He just gets up and does it. And that's, you know, humility is always seen in service to others, not in proclaiming something about ourselves. So humility, although it's so slippery and difficult to get a grasp on, I think there are evidences of it in the life of Christ that we can see that can teach us what it really means. Humility. The second quality that it has to do with the estimation of ourselves is this quality of gentleness. You see it there in verse 12? Gentleness. That's an interesting word. We've already talked about that in relationship to kindness. This is a different word though. This word probably should be translated meekness. And that doesn't help us a lot because we don't really understand what meekness is. Meekness is not being real timid and weak. Meekness, the best description I've ever heard of it, is that it's power under control. Meekness is the ability to say something that will put yourself in a good light but refraining from doing it. Meekness is the ability to do something that will make yourself look really good and make yourself shine and hold back. That's meekness. It has power. It has the ability but it does not flaunt that ability. That's meekness. Meekness before God is a spirit that says, God, I know what you're doing and I accept whatever it is in submission to you. That's meekness before God. Meekness before men is being confident that in yourself you could do something to show how much you know but refraining or you could do something to show how good you are but refraining simply because you are considerate for the feelings of other people and you don't want to embarrass them, you don't want to humiliate them. That's what gentleness is. That's what meekness is. It's the opposite of arrogance. It's the opposite of being self-assertive. It's the opposite of being harsh in our treatment of other people. Meekness, gentleness. In our estimation of ourselves, Paul says, be humble, be gentle or meek. Not wanting to flaunt what you know or what you can do. Then there's a third set of qualities that Paul says we need to put on in this new ward robe. One of them is found in verse 12 and the other two found in verse 13. Three of them. They have to do with our reaction to ill treatment. Our reaction to being treated wrongly. Notice the first one at the end of verse 12 is patience. Patience is the opposite of revenge. Patience is being able to bear injury and insult and not retaliate. Patience enables us to put up with people who try our patience without putting them in their place. That's patience. Patience means that you count down before you blast off. Patience means you wait, but you don't respond quickly and harshly, but that you wait. You consider. You weigh things out before you jump back at that person. That's patience. And when you've been treated wrongly, that is so hard to do. So hard to remain silent, weigh things out, make sure that your response is going to be the response that Jesus would have and then do a carefully measured response to that situation. That's very difficult to do, but that's what patience really is. The second quality that has to do with ill treatment, verse 13, bear with each other, bear with each other. You know what that means? It means to tolerate people who irritate you. Now all of you have people that irritate you. You know that, don't you? You don't irritate anybody else, of course, but all of you have people who irritate you, right? And this quality of bearing with one another is to be able to tolerate that person who irritates you. To be able to engage them in conversation when you'd really rather walk the other way, that's bearing with one another. It has a little aspect of forgiveness to it, which we'll see in a moment, but it means when someone irritates me, when someone gets on my last nerve, I still go out of my way to be kind to them. John Erlichman and Chuck Colson were fellow conspirators in the Watergate crime back in the early 70s that, as you recall, led to the humiliating resignation of President Nixon. Erlichman was the chief domestic advisor whose office was just above the Oval Office in the White House, very important man in the government. Most of us know that Chuck Colson went to prison, came to no Christ as his savior there, began to grow as a believer in today, has a very, very wonderful prison ministry called prison fellowship. John Erlichman went the other direction, really. He got bitter, he got vengeful, and most of his bitterness and vengefulness after he got out of prison was taken out on Chuck Colson. He hated Colson. He felt like Colson had used his prison time to get religion and make a buck off of it, or get a name for himself. He just hated Colson. And he wrote all kinds of inflammatory articles and defamatory articles against Colson and about Colson. This went on for 20 years. And then one day Chuck Colson heard that Erlichman was near death, didn't have long to live. One of the most powerful men in the world back in the early 70s was now alone in a nursing home with Reno Failure. His third wife had left him, his children had abandoned him. He was all alone. Colson went to visit him, talked with him for an hour, just shared with him his heart, just talked with him as though he were a long lost friend. And that led to a conversation about Christ, and that led to another conversation about Christ. And Erlichman simply could not understand how one that he had treated so badly would really respond that way to him and would show that kind of love to him. About three months later Erlichman called Colson and said the doctors say I only have a few days to live. Colson was sick at the time and in bed and couldn't get out. And so he sent a friend over to talk to Erlichman and he led Erlichman to the Lord. A few days later he died. And if his testimony is genuine, which we have no reason to doubt, he's in heaven today, because someone was willing to bear with another person who irritated him, who heard him deeply. You have that kind of quality? Are you able to bear with people? To have the kind of grace to reach out to them even when they have treated you so miserably? Well that requires this third characteristic of responding to ill treatment that we find in our passage here and that's forgiveness. Verse 13, bear with each other and forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. Forgiveness is another one of those slippery qualities and it's kind of hard to get a grasp on. But I'm interested by a couple of things that Paul says here. He says forgive whatever grievances you may have against one another. This is talking about legitimate problems between people. And it implies that there are legitimate problems between people in church, right? He's writing to the Colossian church and he says even Christians can get bent out of shape with one another from time to time. And there are legitimate needs for forgiveness. You see, just because you're a Christian you're not perfect. Neither am I. You've seen the bumper sticker. I'm not perfect. I'm just forgiven. There's some truth to that. You're not perfect. Sometimes we do things wrong and others do things wrong to us and there's the need for forgiveness in the body of Christ. And what Jesus or what Paul says is that we should forgive as the Lord forgave you. That means that our forgiveness is to be full, free, no conditions attached. I told you the story before about the two men in nursing home, two old guys in a nursing home carried on a running controversy with each other all the time. Fightin' bicker and fussin' at each other all the time. And one of them is near death and he calls the other guy in and he says, I know I don't have long to live and I want to ask your forgiveness for the way I've treated you and the way I've talked about you. And I want you to know that I forgive you and it just seems like a really sweet time of forgiveness. And all of a sudden the guy stopped and he thought for a moment and he kind of raised up on one elbow and he said, but if I get better none of this counts. It's been said if you bury the hatchet don't leave the handle sticking up out of the ground so that you can go back to it easily. When we forgive someone it needs to be full, complete, no strings attached. We don't forgive someone when we say, well I won't hold this against you as long as, no that's not forgiveness. Forgive the Bible says, as the Lord forgave you. Well, I will forgive them someday if they come and ask my forgiveness. I'll forgive them if they repent, if they straighten up, if they do right. I'll wait a second. Think back, how did God forgive you? Do you know God's forgiveness is in two stages? The first is reconciliation and God took the first step on that. He didn't wait for you to do anything. He didn't wait for you to straighten up. He didn't wait for you to get rid of your lousy attitudes or your sins. He took the first step. He sent Jesus his son to die on the cross, to remove the barrier between God and man. That was God's doing. He took the initiative. He took the first step to forgive you before you could ever do a thing, before you could ever make one move toward him. God made the initiative, the initial move, to forgive. That's the first stage of forgiveness, reconciliation. The second stage of forgiveness in our salvation is justification. And that's when you do turn to him as a repentant sinner, confessing your sin and asking for his forgiveness and his grace and salvation. And it is at that point that the forgiveness really becomes personal and the both of you are brought back together and your sin is forgiven and harmony is restored. But the possibility for that began back in reconciliation when God made the first step before you made a step toward him at all. And so I believe if we're going to really follow what the Bible says here, forgive as the Lord forgave you, then we need to do the same thing. We need to have our attitudes changed so that there is no barrier between us and anyone else. We need to do everything we can to take the initiative to make the way clear for forgiveness to take place. So that means in my spirit and my attitude, I need to release that person and not hold anything against them anymore, not turn it over in my mind, not hold grudges. I need to release that, not expect anything, just release it. And really, in essence, forgiveness is releasing someone else to God to deal with anyway. Now when I've taken that first step, that's the first phase of forgiveness. The other person may never respond, but my conscience is clear and there's no bitterness or grudge in my heart that is contaminating my spirit, you see. Now if the second stage of forgiveness happens where that person realizes their need to come also and they reconcile with you and they ask your forgiveness and then harmony is able to be restored, that's wonderful. But even if that never happens, we always need to take the first step in the initiative to make it possible so that there's nothing standing in the way. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. Little boy was sitting on a park bench and he was kind of squirming around, in an obvious pain. Man walked up and said, son, what's wrong? He said, well, I'm sitting on a bee and the man said, well, why don't you get up? Little boy said, well, I think I'm hurting him more than he's hurting me. It's not true, is it? It isn't true. You never hurt that person more than they hurt you. Any kind of unforgiveness will contaminate your spirit and as long as you stay on the bee, thinking I'm going to hurt him worse, you will always feel the sting of pain in your soul because of an unforgiving spirit. So forgiveness, as God forgave us, means that I make the way possible. I don't hold a grudge. I'm not bitter against that person. I release whatever they've done to me. I release that to God for him to deal with and I leave the door open for them to come. In fact, I invite them to come. I take the initiative for them to come. Whether or not they respond is between them and God, but my conscience, my heart is clear. That's forgiving as God forgave us. There's one last quality. Let's just look at it quickly. This is a category all by itself. In fact, Paul puts it in a category all by itself. This has to do with our most important quality, our most important piece of clothing in this wardrobe, verse 14, and over all these virtues put on love, which binds them all together in perfect unity. This is like the belt that ties everything else together that holds everything in place. This is the one thing that we must have above all others. Paul says that above everything else put on love in another place in 1 Corinthians 13, Paul extolled this virtue of love. Look at the verses on the screen. He said, if I speak, this is in a context of all the wonderful spiritual gifts that people might have had in the 1st century. If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging symbol. If I have the gift of prophecy and confedemore mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains but have not love, I'm nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and surrender my body to the flames, but have not love, I gain nothing. Interesting, isn't it? You can do the most benevolent, most self-sacrificing thing in this world and do it for the wrong reason. If you have not love, it counts for nothing. That's what Paul says. That's why he says, over all these things put on love in 1 Corinthians 13, go ahead, very thanks. 1 Corinthians 13 says, now these three remain faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love. Of these wonderful Christian qualities, faith, hope, love, the greatest is love. That's the one we need more than anything else that binds all those other traits together. And unless we self-sacrificially love God and love others, we will never have any of these other qualities. Because love is something that is always others centered and never is concerned about me. And you're always concerned about me. When I'm always concerned about me, then I don't practice compassion. I don't practice forgiveness and kindness, humility, and all those other qualities. When my focus is on me, then none of those other qualities are real to me. Well, that's the wardrobe that we're to put on. We've seen the wardrobe, seen the need for it. We've seen the various pieces of the wardrobe. Now it's time to buy it. It's time to say, okay, I need that. I want that. And the great thing is, it's not for sale. It's a gift of God if we come before Him in the kind of spirit that says, Lord, I have nothing to offer, but I need you, I need you so much, to give me the strength and the power to develop and grow these qualities in my life. And then He says, okay. Just go into the dressing room here and fit you out for this wardrobe. Put on these new clothes. Let's pray together. Father, when we look at what Paul says here, we realize how short we often come in our daily lives to the standard that has given us here for our new life in Christ. Help us, Lord, to put on the right kind of clothing in our daily walk in the way we live. Give us grace and strength to really live this way, not just to talk about it, not just to think how nice it would be, but to really live this way. It is possible, I believe, Lord, through your grace and help us to do that. Help us not to live in the old life, but in the new life. We ask for your grace and your strength to do it in Jesus' name. Amen.