HOMILETICS
LECTURE 44
THE TRUTH IN LOVE II
Introductory truth
They don’t care to know until they know you care. You can tell them truth, ad nauseum; but if they don’t see that you are doing it because you love them, then it isn’t going to matter much to them. Let them know you care…then let them know the truth.
Speak the truth (that we like to hear) in love.
Speak the truth that sounds loving to us.
Speak the truth that makes us feel all lovey dovey.
Example of one speaking the truth in anger, irritation, condemnation, disdain:
A street preacher; A rebuking ministry; Hellfire & brimstone preacher…
How do you go about ‘nicely’ telling someone that they are condemned to eternal hellfire?
Speaking the truth in love necessitates the use of both the positive and negative. Modern man in his education has often come to believe that preaching must be positive.
Love is not some sensual feeling or some system of only saying things that will please the other.
We have a fixed faith to preach, my brethren, and we are sent forth with a definite message from God. We are not let to fabricate the message as we go along. We are not sent forth by our Master with a general commission arranged on this fashion: "As you shall think in your heart and invent in your head, so preach. Keep abreast of the times. Whatever the people want to hear, tell them that, and they shall be saved." Verily, we read not so. There is something definite in the Bible. It is not quite a lump of wax to be shaped at our will, or a roll or cloth to be cut according to the prevailing fashion. Your great thinkers evidently look upon the Scriptures as a box of letters for them to play with, and make what they like of, or a wizard's bottle, out of which they may pour anything they choose, from atheism up to spiritualism. (Spurgeon)
The truth often gets watered down by new evangelicals and charismatics who emphasize love. Fundamentalists sometimes are thought to be heavy on truth but light on love. Which is the worst? Heavy on truth, light on love vice light on truth and heavy on love? Hard to say; though, without truth, they are damned to Hell, no matter how much love you show them. But, without love, they may not care to listen to the truth.
To love to preach is one thing — to love those to whom we preach, quite another. Richard Cecil
Preacher, you need to speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth….so help your God!
Shake lots of salt on it
Col 4:6 Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man.
Preacher, spice your preaching with kindness, love, mercy, care, longsuffering…make it real salty! Let them really taste it.
Preach the truth
2 Tim 4:2-4 Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine. For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; And they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.
Preach the word (truth)….whether it is popular or despised. Whether the church folk are ready for it, or not. Whether they start grumbling or not…
But do so with longsuffering and lots of doctrinal explanations…show them that you understand and love them.
As things get worse with some in your church, all the more preach the truth, for they ‘are’ turning away their ears from the truth…en masse’! You could lose the whole church to ‘fable churches’…
Love will stammer rather than be dumb. Robert Leighton
Above all we must show our zeal for the truth by continually, in season and out of season endeavouring to maintain it in the tenderest and most loving manner, but still very earnestly and firmly. We must not talk to our congregations as if we were half asleep. Our preaching must not be articulate snoring. There must be power, life, energy, vigour. We must throw our whole selves into it, and show that the zeal of God's house has eaten us up. (Spurgeon)
The truth hurts
John 6:66-67 From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him. Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away?
The truth hurts… someone will yelp… stepped on toes…. conviction via the Holy Spirit…
If the truth you preach goes against somebody’s way of thinking and seems to show them that they are inferior, it will likely cause them to get offended, and they may just zip up their NIV’s and stomp out of the church hall and never to return again. A Pastor can be tempted to ‘tone things down a bit’ when a couple of these scenarios play out in his church…after all, he doesn’t want to lose people…it’s all about gaining people.
Gal 4:16 Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?
You are going to make enemies if you keep telling the truth. If you don’t do it in love, you will make a lot of enemies; but even if you show lots of love, you still will have some enemies. It doesn’t make sense to become someone’s enemy when they are just simply telling you the honest truth. Well, some will think that you are being unloving by saying such a thing and that if you truly loved them you wouldn’t say that. Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?
John 8:40 But now ye seek to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth, which I have heard of God: this did not Abraham.
Preaching strongly against sin and wickedness can make you a lot of enemies, some of which will want you silences, and sometimes the only way they figure that can be done is be physical threats…even death! Thus, if you preach strongly, but lovingly, against homosexuality, Bible perversions, non-Baptist church harlotry, the evils of CCM, the evils of ecumenism, etc., you may just find yourself with some folk set on killing you… This surely was the case in our Baptist history over the last 1500 years !!
It’s enough to make you cry
Acts 20:29-31 For I know this, that after my departing shall grievous wolves enter in among you, not sparing the flock. Also of your own selves shall men arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them. Therefore watch, and remember, that by the space of three years I ceased not to warn every one night and day with tears.
There are some that will come into your congregation and have perverse beliefs; some that will be totally against some key truth that you hold; they might even try to draw away some members into their own ‘camp’… ‘den’. Pastor, warn the sheep of these; call them out by name; howl at them; this will cause you great emotional upset; this is where your love for them and the truth becomes oh so important. Standing for the truth can make you shed tears…
God forbid that we should ever be satisfied either with heated ignorance or frozen truth. John Blanchard
They don’t want to hear the truth
John 8:43-47 Why do ye not understand my speech? even because ye cannot hear my word. Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it. And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not. Which of you convinceth me of sin? And if I say the truth, why do ye not believe me? He that is of God heareth God's words: ye therefore hear them not, because ye are not of God.
Tell the truth…always…even if they obviously don’t like it and don’t want to listen to it. They need to hear it. The children of Satan are ‘naturally’ not going to be attracted to the truth. Their father has absolutely no truth in him and that is what his offspring will ‘naturally’ have. If you truly do love these Satanic offspring then you will lovingly tell them the truth. You tell them the truth, but why won’t they believe it? They choose to follow their daddy, the Devil! So, don’t expect those that are not of God to want to hear the truth. But, do expect those that are of God to want to hear the truth.
Truth is true even if nobody believes it and falsehood is false even if everybody believes it. Os Guinness
“Love not the world”…. Don’t preach worldly truths that cause the listeners to smile and praise you. Love God…love the truth!
Don’t sell it short
Prov 23:23 Buy the truth, and sell it not; also wisdom, and instruction, and understanding.
When you have the unadulterated truth, don’t water it down! …don’t sell it short! …don’t hold some of it back!
It’s worth all the money that you might ever obtain…it’s priceless. Don’t sell it off cheaply!
The trouble with stretching the truth is that people are apt to see through it. Anon.
If we really believe a truth, we shall be decided about it. Certainly we are not to show our decision by that obstinate, furious, wolfish bigotry which cuts off every other body from the chance and hope of salvation and the possibility of being regenerate or even decently honest if they happen to differ from us about the colour of a scale of the great leviathan. Hold tightly to the truth, but be careful not to be overcome and obsessed with minutia. Don't go about the world with your fist doubled up for fighting, carrying a theological revolver in the leg of your trousers. There is no sense in being a sort of doctrinal game-cock, to be carried about to show your spirit, or a terrier of orthodoxy, ready to tackle heterodox rats by the score. (Spurgeon)
Don’t shun the truth
Acts 20:26-27 Wherefore I take you to record this day, that I am pure from the blood of all men. For I have not shunned to declare unto you all the counsel of God.
Don’t be intimidated, manipulated, pushed, to not fully declare all that God’s word has to say. Don’t worry if some, or most, will disagree and reject it. Be wise as serpents and harmless as doves: do your best to share the truth with lots of love; carefully present it to them; don’t shove it down their throats; use tact and wisdom. Because of your love for them, don’t shun the truth.
Truth is always the strongest argument. Sophocles
Twisting the truth
Rom 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;
Rom 1:25 Who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen.
It’s amazing; people pick and choose what they want to believe is truth or not. If it doesn’t sound ‘good’ to them then it isn’t truth. Or, they take what they don’t like and twist it so its sounds ‘good’. These humanists are not lovers of the truth. They are lovers of themselves; the truth they love is that which backs up what makes them happy. If you truly love the truth then you will hold to it even if it doesn’t necessarily ‘agree with you’. If the Bible says it, believe it.
To say that something can be ‘true for you, but not for me’ is virtually to reduce truth to a matter of personal opinion.
John Blanchard
Preacher, expect that a lot of those that hear your preaching will twist it and change it to conform to what they want to hear. Though, by doing this the wrath of God will be revealed on them. God is all love, and He is all wrath…His love demands that there be wrath for such things as this.
For the love of the truth
2 Thess 2:8-13 And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall consume with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. But we are bound to give thanks alway to God for you, brethren beloved of the Lord, because God hath from the beginning chosen you to salvation through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth:
Love is poured into truth…truth is full of love…truth is all about love…love is all about truth.
The truth of the Bible displays God’s unmeasurable love. His truths are all there to warn you of the dangers ahead in life and to guide you towards peace and happiness. Oh, John 3:16 is so true; what greater truth is there than this; what greater display of love is there than this truth?!