“Love keeps no record of wrongs.” Some Bible translations says, “Love thinks no evil.” The word literally “thinks no evil” is the Greek word logizomai. And that word is an accountant’s word; it literally means “to keep a mathematical calculation.” It is the word that is used in a ledger of a bookkeeper. And the reason you write things in a bookkeeper’s ledger is so that you won’t forget them. And what he is saying here is love never keeps books, (literal or mental accounts), on the wrongs or evil done to it.
Love never keeps a running record of somebody’s offense. The idea is holding somebody accountable for some wrong or evil or injury. Love just forgives and forgets.
Now, to illustrate the idea here, you simply need to look at the word logizomai. The word is the very verb that is used in the New Testament to speak of the pardoning act of God. So, as God has not kept any books on our sin, so are we not to keep any books or lists on the wrongs of others. In fact, the word logizomai is translated in the New Testament with this English word. “Imputed.” And it is used in many passages. Romans 4:8. “Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.” “Blessed is the man” – in 1 Corinthians 13 language – “of whom the Lord keeps no record of evil.”
God only keeps account of righteousness, never evil.
God has no resentment.
Have you ever offended God as a Christian? I have. But you know something? He doesn’t say, “Boy, I’m sick and tired of that, Lisa, and I’m going to start writing stuff down and keep a list of all her wrongs. I’m going to keep all this in My mind and heart against her and even bring it back up to her when necessary. She needs to shape up.”
No, He doesn’t say that. He keeps no account. Absolute forgiveness. That’s because He loves us. God so loves us that He doesn’t keep account of our sin, He just forgives it all and keeps on forgiving it and keeps on forgiving it and keeps on forgiving it. And we have an Advocate who is always praying for us to the Father – Jesus.
But resentment keeps on keeping books [mental accounts and lists] about it. And eventually resentment will present those accounts in the form of written or verbal hostility. Resentment, holding a grudge, and bitterness is why some people will keep mental accounts and brood over it, churning it over in the mind as though reading a book. Resentment is a form of hatred and it is what takes the molehill of somebody’s offense and turns it into a mountain of venomous malice.
“If someone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for the one who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen.” 1 John 4:20
But God is love, and God only writes one thing in His accounting book concerning a child of His and that is “righteous.”
Love never makes memories out of evils.
Love forgets and sees past a person’s sin to their potential, the fact that God loves them. Love hesitates to believe any rumor, much less be a part of spreading it. Love always forgives. Love never keeps lists of wrongs. It never is resentful. That’s love. Do you love like that? That’s the way Jesus loved, that’s the way we’re to love.
In His Love,
Lisa
For more go to:
**gracetoyou.org/library/sermons and biblegateway.org
