Daily Program

The Law of Kindness

Series: How's Your Love Life?

Leslie Basham: It's sad, but sometimes it's easier to show kindness to people we don't know very well than it is to show love to our own families.

It is Monday, September 20; and this is Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss.

Most of us show kindness to others, right? Today we'll look at the biblical standard of kindness and be challenged to make sure we're showing kindness to those closest to us. Let's join Nancy as she continues in a series called "How's Your Love Life?"

Nancy Leigh DeMoss: We've been looking at one of the most important subjects in all of God's Word, and that's the matter of our love life.

We've been taking a love test. We started into it last week and we're picking it up again this week and looking in 1 Corinthians 13 at some of the qualities, the characteristics of love and then seeking to evaluate our own lives in the light of this truth.

We've said that as a diamond is a symbol of enduring love that in order to find out if there are little flaws in that diamond (that would make it less valuable), the jeweler takes a magnifying glass and magnifies that diamond up to ten times so that he can see things that might escape detection.

And we're letting God's Word be that magnifying glass, putting our lives under that light so we can see, "Lord, are there cracks, are there flaws, are there defects in my love life, my love for God and my love for others?"

You may want to do in the morning and again in the evening so you can see how your day was in light of this test--but to read it out loud and to let God begin to work this passage into our hearts.

I've also suggested that we commit ourselves to memorize at least that middle paragraph, verses 4-7, where Paul describes 15 characteristics, the different facets of this diamond, this many splendored thing of God's love.

Let me read that passage and throughout the course of this series, I am going to read that paragraph several times.

And I'll read it from some different translations so that you can get a feel of some different meanings or ways of understanding these words.

Reading now from the New King James Version, beginning in verse 4 of 1 Corinthians 13: "Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails."

We looked in our last session at the fact that love is patient. Love is long-suffering. Love does not retaliate. Now we come to the second characteristic, that love is kind. One writer has said that patience, the first characteristic, will take anything from others; but kindness will give anything to others, even to its enemies.

Kindness is a giving love. It's being useful, serving and gracious--it's active goodwill toward others.

Remember as we take this test, if you're like me, and you hear these characteristics--and I've been mulling over these for a long time before teaching these sessions--I come away from those study periods feeling like such a failure. There is no way I will ever be able to love in this way. I'll never be as kind as I need to be, as patient and long-suffering as I need to be.

That's the first key to developing the love of God--to realize that I will never be able to love that way by myself. There is nothing loving in me. No matter how long I've walked with Him, I will never have any natural love inside of me.

How do I get that love? I have to continually acknowledge to God that I don't have it, confess it to Him, and then ask Him to fill me with Himself, with His Spirit, with His love.

Love acts kindly toward others. There are some wonderful illustrations of this in the Scripture, but one that comes to mind in particular is the story of Joseph.

Remember the last several chapters of Genesis how Joseph experienced one event after another at the hands of people who treated him wrongly. He was mistreated. He was misjudged. He was abused. He was misused.

And a lot of the abuse came at the hands of his brothers. And years after he had first suffered at the hands of his brothers, and they'd been separated for years, came a time when his brothers came to Egypt.

Joseph was now second in command in Egypt, and he was in a position where he could have taken vengeance on everyone who had ever wronged him, including his brothers.

His brothers came to Egypt. They didn't recognize Joseph at first, but finally Joseph identified himself to them. The brothers, as you can imagine, must have been terrified! "What is Joseph going to do to us? He was powerless when we wounded him, but now he's a very powerful man. What might he do?"

Genesis 45 tells us his response. He said to his brothers, "You will dwell in the land of Goshen--[Here there's a special place where I have set apart for you to live]--and you shall be near to me, you and your children. There I will provide for you, lest you and your household and all that you have come to poverty. For there are still five years of famine left" (v. 10).

Then the Scripture says, "He gave them provisions for the journey back to Israel. He gave them changes of garments (clothing), ten donkeys loaded with the good things of Egypt and ten donkeys loaded with grain, bread and food. "

That's kindness at work. Joseph owed his brothers nothing. But instead, filled with the love of God, he said, "I choose the pathway of kindness. " He gave provisions to them. He said, "I'll meet your needs. " He did it in practical ways--food and clothes and a place to live.

Think about the person who has most wronged you. Can you imagine yourself saying, "What can I do to meet your practical, physical, material needs?" That's kindness. I know some of us are looking a little shocked, like how could that ever be? It cannot be unless God loves others through us. The kindness of God is what motivates our kindness.

You know what the Book of Romans (Romans 2:4) tells us, and that is that the kindness of God leads us to repentance. God is kind to us in giving His Son for us and pouring out mercy on us and meeting our needs--our physical needs, our emotional needs, our spiritual needs--when we were rebels against Him. We were His enemies. We killed His Son!

And God says, "Draw near to Me. I've got a place for you to live in heaven forever. I'll give you spiritual food. I'll come into your life. I'll eat with you and let you eat with me. I want a relationship with you. I'll minister to your needs. "

Our hearts cry out, "O God! We don't deserve your kindness. How could You be so kind to us?" Then what happens? We're moved to repentance. The kindness of God provokes us to repent of our wrongdoing. Kindness--giving to others in useful service.

I think one of the places that kindness is most important and most neglected perhaps is--where? Inside the four walls of our own homes or with the people who know us the best. Why is it that we are more kind to guests and to strangers--to visitors--than we are to those whom we live with? Why do we take for granted those whom we know the best?

You know if someone comes into my home and spills something on the carpet--it has happened--or makes a mess or breaks something, I'm quick to say, as you would be if I were visiting in your home, "Oh, it's no problem. Here let me fix that! I'll pick it up. That vase, it wasn't worth anything. " It was an antique but--no problem.

And we're quick--I'm quick when guests come to my home to show kindness. I want to often take time to make sure there's a little note next to the bed in guest room on the night stand there.

We'll sometimes make sure that there are candles lit in that guest room part of the house. I want to show acts of kindness: "What can I get you for breakfast?'' I'm not a breakfast eater; I'm not into fixing breakfast. I'm really actually not into mornings! But if I have a guest, I'm going to show kindness.

What about the members of my own family? If there's a guest in my home and she wants to talk about something that is of interest to her, I'm going to take as long as she wants to sit there and listen. I'm going to be kind and attentive.

But what about when I'm with my mother, my brothers, my sisters--those whom I've known all my life--and they want to tell me a story or something that is happening in their lives, and I've got a book that I'm more interested in reading at the moment?

Are you kind in your own home? Are you kind to those you know the best,

There's such an importance in doing kind acts, and this is one of the things that has always marked women of God. Holy women of God do kind acts of service with hospitality, with cards, with notes, with being sensitive to the needs of others.

I have a friend whose neighbor was hit by a truck as she was crossing the street just outside her home.

My friend had never had much of a relationship with that neighbor who was not a warm person and wasn't really interested in spiritual matters.

My friend began, for months, to take meals to that woman and her family every single day.

Acts of kindness.

Now it wasn't as if she didn't have a family of her own to take care of, she did.

My friends have told me what an incredible transformation has taken place in that neighbor's life because she has seen the love of Christ demonstrated in acts of kindness and service.

It's not only important to have kind acts, it is also important to have a kind spirit and then to speak kind words. There's that little verse in the Proverbs, I kind of wish it wasn't there sometimes, Proverbs 31:26 says that the wise (or virtuous) woman, that on her tongue is the law of kindness. When she opens her mouth to speak, the words that come out are kind words. She is slow to condemn.

I was doing a radio interview, a live radio interview with call-ins some time ago. And one man called in to the program and said, "Can you help me? My marriage is in trouble and one of the reasons is that my wife seems to pick apart everything I say.

Now that's not the context for me to help that man put his marriage back together but I was saddened when I heard that.

I don't know any more about the situation than that. But I know that here is man whose spirit has been wounded because his wife does not have the law of kindness on her tongue.

Leslie Basham: Do you have the law of kindness on your tongue? We all need to grow in this area. It doesn't matter if we're young or old, single or married. In fact, here's what one young lady wrote in response to this series.

She said, "My boyfriend and I have been memorizing and reciting 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 together for the past couple of weeks.

It was exciting to hear your challenge for us all this month. We wanted to let you know that it has already been a great encouragement and help in our relationship.

Our desire is to save our first kiss for our wedding day. Thanks so much for your encouragement."

She's talking about the challenge Nancy's been giving us over the last few programs: Read 1 Corinthians 13 out loud every day for 30 days and memorize verses 4-7.

If you're up for the challenge, we hope you'll visit our Web site. We have some additional materials there to encourage you. And you can e-mail us and tell us what you're learning from this chapter.

Please remember. We're able to train young women--like this one who wrote--because people give generously to the ministry of Revive Our Hearts. We rely on your prayers and donations. You can call in a gift at 1-800-569-5959.  Or mail it to Revive Our Hearts.

One of the greatest enemies of love is envy. We'll hear more about that tomorrow.

Please join us for Revive Our Hearts.

Revive Our Hearts with Nancy Leigh DeMoss is a ministry partnership of Life Action Ministries.

"Many of the insights Nancy shares in this series have been drawn from The MacArthur New Testament Commentary: 1 Corinthians (Moody), and from the Insight for Living Bible study guide Koinonia: Authentic Fellowship (copyright 1972, 1985 Charles R. Swindoll)."

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