"Love does not behave rudely" (1 Corinthians 13:5).

IDEA: Love is aware of other people as people.

PURPOSE: To help listeners see people around them.

Do you think it’s possible to see people who are invisible?

In his 1952 novel about the Black experience in America, Ralph Ellison begins with these words:

I am an invisible man. No, I am not a spook like those who haunted Edgar Allan Poe; nor am I one of your Hollywood-movie ectoplasms. I am a man of substance, of flesh and bone, fiber and liquids -- and I might even be said to possess a mind. I am invisible, understand, simply because people refuse to see me. When they approach me, they see only my surroundings, themselves, or figments of their imagination -- indeed, everything and anything except me.

The Invisible Man later comments:

You often doubt if you really exist. You ache with the need to convince yourself that you do exist in the real world, that you’re part of all the sound and anguish.

Do you think it’s possible to look at people who are invisible?

Is it possible for us to love the people that we don’t see?

I. We often fail to see people who serve us.

II. We often fail to see the people who live with us.

Christians may be rude to members of their family when they may be unfailingly polite to people in the church. Why?