Bear With One Another
Ephesians 4:2 With all lowliness and meekness, with longsuffering,
forbearing one another in love;
Ephesians 4:32 And be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving
one another, even as God for Christ's sake hath forgiven you.
Colossians 3:13 Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another, if
any man have a quarrel against any: even as Christ forgave you, so also
do ye.
I have good news and bad news.
The good news is - all of us who have received Christ are going to heaven.
The bad news is - we are all traveling there together.
The bad news is further that - none of us is perfect, none of us is all
that easy to get along with, and most of us won�t get perfect of easy
to get along with during the journey.
Think about the people in the Mayflower. Don�t you imagine some of
those people lost their religion somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic?
One thing about Mayflower Assembly of God - you couldn�t quit the
church until you got to the end of the journey.
On the Mayflower, they didn�t have to struggle with certain temptations -
� like alcohol - there wasn�t any on board.
� adultery - there was no place to hide, and besides, after a few
days at sea with no showers, you couldn�t stand to be that close to
anybody anyway.
� theft - there wasn�t much to steal and no place to hide it.
The big sins were not a big problem. It was the little things -
� like brother so & so�s loud snoring
� sister so & so�s cackling laughter that made your skin crawl
� or the irritating way brother whathisname pick his teeth
� or sister whatshername�s constant chattering
� or that awful hairdo
� or just the way someone grates your nerves
Back in the 17th Century, the boat trips were long and slow, and there
were no helicopter rides back home in midstream.
What there was was commitment to go the long haul together. There was
a lot of �bearing with one another�.
To bear with means to tolerate. We don�t tolerate much today. We
sound off, or run off, or run somebody else off; we square off and
duke it out, but we seldom sit down and work it out. There is a great
lack of commitment in the church of Jesus Christ today. We don�t
commit to the family of Christ. When something displeases us, we move
to another family thinking the nest one will be better.
The same thing happens in many marriages. One or the other partner
decides they could do a lot better with another partner. But what is
really needed is to learn to �bear with one another.�
We don�t �put up with� much.
Bearing with one another requires:
1. Patience
You must learn to be patience with other people�s weaknesses,
limitations, and imperfections. They put up with yours! We all have
imperfections.
Do you expect more from others than you do from yourself?
1 Timothy 1:15-16 This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all
acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners;
of whom I am chief. Howbeit for this cause I obtained mercy, that in
me first Jesus Christ might shew forth all longsuffering, for a
pattern to them which should hereafter believe on him to life
everlasting.
We should do to others as Christ has done to us. He is very patient
with us.
Matthew 10:8 . . . freely ye have received, freely give.
Romans 15:7 Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received
us to the glory of God.
2. Forgiveness
Colossians 3:13 Forbearing one another, and forgiving one another . . .
Christians cannot hold grudges. Let me say that again for impact -
Christians can not hold grudges. You cannot be a true Christian and
hold a grudge; a true Christian will lose his grip on a grudge fairly
quickly. The spirit of God will not abide with such poison.
Neither can you hold a grudge and remain a Christian. The longer you
hold it, the more it gets a hold on you. The Spirit of God will be
grieved out by a grudge.
You will have to lose one or the other. Which would you rather lose?
Matthew 6:12 And forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.
Romans 14:13 Let us not therefore judge one another any more . . .
You will either forgive or you will judge. Which will it be?
Matthew 18:21-22 Then came Peter to him, and said, Lord, how oft shall
my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? till seven times? Jesus
saith unto him, I say not unto thee, Until seven times: but, Until
seventy times seven.
Forgiveness is an act of the will. It will not just happen all by
itself. What will happen by itself is that you will forget about the
problem - until it comes up again, and then you will relive it and it
will fester and poison your spirit. You must deal with unforgiveness
before unforgiveness deals with you.
If you take a good, hard look at yourself, it will not be hard to
forgive others. Look at how much God has forgiven you.
I would venture to say there are things in your own personality that
you would not tolerate in others.
Make a list of the people you don�t like or cannot get along with, and
you will probably find a common denominator there somewhere and that
will show you what your problem is.
It is time for Christians to stop being touchy, stop being petty, stop
being immature. It is time to grow up and get tough and bear with one
another.
Illus.
My kids are still young, if you call 19 and 21 young, and they haven�t
really been bitten by the �love bug� yet. So, one them said to me,
"Dad, I can�t imagine living with the same person all my life." I
said, "Why not?" And they said, "Well, I just don�t think I could put
up with the same habits and faults from one person that long." And I
said, "When you love someone, you can put up with almost anything.
Just look at mother ---- she has put up with me all these years."
I guess the problem with the church is that we just don�t love each
other like that.
Illus.
If a part of your body malfunctions, you will go to all extremes to
get it fixed - to make it right.
If it can�t be made right, then you learn to live with it. Joni
Erickson learned to live with paralysis. She had no choice - you
can�t just go out and find another body. Yet, that is what so many
Christians do - they go out looking for another body instead of
bearing with the one they have.
Brethren, these things ought not to be!
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