and not be present. We can be at work and not be
working. We could be having fun but being
miserable. And there are tons of things
that fall in that same vein. And beloved, you know, I say
this a lot. I say it probably more than I know that I say it.
When I stand here, I'm not standing here as an authority. And some of us look at the pastorate
like that. You're the authority, you're
the leader. No, no, no, no, no. We really have messed up understanding
the definition of terms, honestly. The authority is Christ. The authority is Christ. And
each one of you have the exact same authority to yield his message. to embrace it, to internalize
it, to interpret it, to apply it according to the scripture.
We've done a very, very poor job of making sure that while
everybody has numerous versions of the Bible on their shelves
and in their cars and in their hands and on their phones, where
it used to be a death sentence to be caught with it. We've done a very poor job as
a spiritual culture of ensuring that people are eating it and
reading it effectively. And there's still this us-them
mentality. I talk to pastors a lot through
the years and it's a my church and they and them and all this
other kind of stuff. And there's just this distance,
there's this lack of intimacy. Lack of interest, and the interest
is only in the role that I feel, fill, or the job that I have,
the obligation, and that's as far as it goes for so many people.
And then we meet those things with fake smiles and fake laughter,
and we wonder why life seems miserable, because we are miserable. And it has been said that misery
loves company, and oh my gosh, can they not throw a family reunion? Just open your eyes and ears
and listen and look and see the world that we live in and how
it is just so inundated with misery over and over again. Even that which is good and prudent
and profitable, they're putting the icing of misery upon the
cake of pleasure. Guilt has become the new glue
that holds the world intact. Fear is the compass through which
we walk and traverse this life. I am not the authority. I'm not
here to tell you what to do. I'm not here to hold you to a
standard that I myself am not able to keep. I am here to show
you what I am learning that you may learn also and apply it to
your lives. And if you think I'm ahead of
you anywhere spiritually, it's only by a few hours. Maybe by a few minutes. Because I've learned to speak
over the last quarter century. I've learned to present myself
and posture myself in a place of seemingly etiquette, somewhat
professional, but I'm not. I'm not. I'm just like you. And
I used to have a whole lot more time to study the scripture than
I do now. And everybody's like, well, I'm working. Yeah. But
it all boils down to one thing. And it boils down to one idea. And what is that? Living the
Christian life boils down to one idea. Being a Christian boils
down to one idea. I was like, I didn't tell you
what I was talking about. Who you are. It boils down to who you are.
And if I have to be the professional, if I have to be the expert, if
I have to be the academic, if I have to be this, then how can
I do that and be caring and loving and interested as a pastor? If I have to do all these and
be all these things, how can I be me? If I have to be and
do all these things as a husband, how can I be me? If I have to
be and do all these things as a father, how can I be me? Who am I? Who are you? It's not an easy answer there.
There's no easy answer there. Because when you say, if you
walk out onto the porch of the cosmos and say, who am I? Somebody's
gonna answer. You're gonna hear something back.
And you're gonna be drawn. Even if it's terrible, even if
it is coated in misery, even if it is held together by fear,
even if it is mapped out by guilt. These analogies might have been
different the first time around. But even if those things are
true, we run to it, we follow it, we go, okay, this is who
I am, and there's nothing I can do to change it, this is who
I am, this is who I wanna be, this is what's going on. The Bible gives us our identity.
The scripture as believers gives us our identity. But now here
comes the conundrum. The conundrum is that, oh yeah,
the Bible says is the precursor to about 99% of all false teaching. So how do you discern the difference?
You need to know the Word of God. Knowing the Word of God is knowing
God. Knowing God is intimacy. Intimacy
with God through Jesus Christ, the Son, the story, the narrative,
the overarching reality of what the Bible is and what it is intended
to communicate. is about God's revelation of
himself to his people whom he loves despite the fact they don't
love him. And that is the picture of the
good report we call the gospel. It means the good report. Hear ye, hear ye. Hear ye, hear
ye. There's a man named Jesus of
Nazareth who is God, who created the world in which he walks,
and the body in which he lives, and the womb from which he came. And he walked this earth and
he taught of peace and love and hope. And everybody who had all
the answers, who am I? They all told everyone who they
were. And the Bible does not teach us that we are worms. The
Bible does not teach us that we are wrong. The Bible does
not teach us that we are, as we would see the Puritans, maggots. That's the old comedian back
in the 80s that I heard in New Orleans one time. He talked about
the old King James Prayer and the pious preaching. He used
the tune to A Mighty Fortress. I know that I am but a worm,
so step on me God and watch me squirm. I mean, that's the sentiment,
right? That's the sentiment that many
of us have in this Christian walk that I'm just no good, good
for nothing. Listen, we're not going to talk
against the teaching of sinfulness and the sin nature, or what we
call in theological circles depravity. We're not doing that, but we
are going to show that the Bible does not tell us that that's
who we are once we are found by the Spirit. And the reality of it We are
the righteousness of God in spite of the fact that we sin because
he has declared us so. I read the full chapter eight
of Romans at the beginning of our service. We are his righteousness. Now, why is it that we live in
a world that causes so much stress and grief in the context of Christianity? because we have misunderstood
the application of this identity. The application of this identity
is boiled down to two things. And that is to love the Lord
our God with all that we are. Okay, let's stop there for a
moment. It's the great commandment, right? So I wanna explore the
great commandment from this perspective this morning. To love the Lord
your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all
your strength. And for some of you folks, with
all your soul. What's that mean? Everything that you are in all
parts of your person and being, your ontological essence, needs
to love God. Whether you're pooping or praising,
God's in the house. I mean, you know, we're supposed
to be loving God. That was for the adult men in
the room who are all laughing. But it doesn't stop there, does
it? To love the Lord your God with all that you are and to
love your neighbor as yourself, Jesus says, is on equal footing. So what I'm gonna do today is
I'm gonna talk about this. I'm gonna talk about when we
love others. When we do this, we are displaying the work of
God. And to display the work of God
is known as his glory, is to glorify him, to show him and
his work and his hands. The same is true in life. When
we understand the love of God for us and the giving of his
son and we realize our true identity, this changes us and this change
allows us in the mind to see the good in others, to forgive
them, to love them and to make intimacy a goal of life. by overcoming prejudices and
working toward reconciliation in mutual ways. I wanna further
express the reality that we need to be serious about our mental
and emotional intelligence as a people. I mean, there's such
a fad about fasting. I fast two days a week. It's
good for me. Got into that habit and I didn't
do it for a couple of weeks. I'm like, you know what, I need
to go back to that fasting. I feel good. Don't know why. Don't really care to understand
the science. Somebody said, hey, why don't you try this? Tried it,
worked. So there's this fad of fasting. There's this fad of
nutrition. There's always this fad of dieting. There's always something going
on with some kind of thing going on in our You know, social feeds. Have you tried this? You know,
have you licked the bottom of a toad? Have you, you know, stared
at the sun for 30 minutes without sunglasses? Ah, it'll do wonders
for your eyes. I mean, you know, all sorts of
silly things. And then there are some good things. There are
some good practical things about getting enough sleep and drinking
enough water. I mean, you know, is it too much? Eggs are good, eggs are bad.
Ah, you know, there's always something. And I see it more
in Christian circles than I do anywhere else. I see this emphasis
on physical health all the time. You know, 98 years old, feel
like I'm 40. No, you don't. You've forgotten
40. You feel like you're 80 because
you've forgotten 40, see? Man, I feel like I'm 30 today.
No, you don't. You feel like you're 45. You've forgotten 30.
I mean, you know, you just can't. This magic drug, this magic drink,
that's called caffeine. What's the point? There's always
something. Oh, we've got to learn how to
communicate. We've got to learn how to build relationships. We've got to learn
how to do this. We've got to learn how to do that. Let's do this for
the glory of God. Great. But where is our emotional
intelligence? Why are you talking about this?
Because the Bible speaks of it. I'm just now calling it what
we call it today. To love the Lord your God with
all your heart. and mind and strength and to love your neighbor
as you love yourself. Don't you think that takes some
brain work to figure out? Don't you think Romans 12 and
the renewal of our mind, don't you think how we learn Christ
is important? Don't you understand that this is far beyond academics,
that this is about our spiritual self? our hearts, our minds,
our souls, the way we think, the way we process things, the
way we hear, the way we allow our brains to write scripts. No, no, no. Sit down, close ears,
open mouth, shove word, regurgitate what I tell you to do. That's
where most pastors fail. Why? because they don't know any better
themselves. The importance of the great commandment
to love God and love others. And we find that first listed
in the scripture in Matthew 22. Let's go there and read it. Bunch
of scripture. Maybe I'll get through it today. Verse 34, 22, 34, Matthew. When the Pharisees heard that
he'd silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together. Oh, he's
tough, we gotta go get him. And one of them, a lawyer, asked
him a question to test him. Teacher, which is the greatest
commandment in the law? And he said to him, you shall
love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your
soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And the second is like it, you
shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend
all the law and the prophets. The great commandment. To love
God and display His glory. To love God and display His glory.
Love God with all your heart, your soul, and your mind. How
in the world do we do that? You see, this is where the error
pops in. This is where the purity culture, and that's a broad term
for a lot of little things. Some of us may be thinking different
things, but I say it all plays together in this. This purity,
puritan culture that we continue to live under the oppression
of as evangelicals as Christians, would say to us that what you
need to do is you need to test your affections. You need to
test your thoughts. You need to test your temptations.
You need to write out all the bad things you ever think and
think about, all the bad things you've done and think about them,
and all the things you wish you wouldn't have done and you need
to think about them. And so what we do when we do these things
is that we see how bad we are and then we get to the end of
ourselves where we really just want to jump off a short bridge
and say, I can't! And that's when we know we're
spiritual. Because on our way down, we reach
up and God's hand is right there, we just have to grab it. That
is ridiculous. And that's where we are. We have generations and generations
of young men and young women who believe that their very existence
is sinful. We have generations of young
boys who are taught that women are objects for them to Google
over. Google over, whatever it means. We're taught women that they're
bad for just being present. It's nonsense. Well, that's not loving God because
you have an intrusive thought. Shame on you. Nonsense. So we build. Decades of Christians. Who lie, who pretend, who posture. And who ponder what a life without
sin must be like instead of praising God for his glorious grace and
pressing into the promises of his purpose in Christ. and resting. To love the Lord your God with
all your heart and mind and soul and strength is effectually displayed in loving
others as yourself. And this is not new. We've talked
about it for 12 years. This September will be 12 years. A lot has happened over 12 years.
A lot has happened over two years. A lot has happened over 12 hours. A lot happens, right? It only takes a second. It only
takes one thought. It only takes one instance. It
only takes one conversation for things to be different. Well,
hear the conversation of mercy and grace and love and let it
be different in you. the displaying God's glory. We
glorify God by showing others who he is. You know, that's what
it means, right? To give God glory is not to say,
oh, we love you. No, that's to give God praise.
Oh, we thank you. That's to give God thanks. To
give God glory is to say, look, ta-da. Look. Jesus did it. I didn't come.
Oh, Jesus, you're awesome. Oh, well, look at you. Who do
you think? No, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'm just I'm just I'm
just a window. I'm showing you the father. Everything
I just did. This is the father working. Everything
I just said. This is the father speaking.
How can you be so kind? This is the father. This is the
father. This is the father's work. You
are created in Christ Jesus. You are God's workmanship. created
in Christ Jesus to do good works, which he created beforehand for
us to walk in. This is loving one another. Anybody
can be snarky. Anybody can be obligated. Anybody
can do their job. That doesn't give God glory to
be dependable. The Pharisees were dependable.
They dressed right. They spoke rightly. They ate
correctly. They prayed powerfully. But they didn't know how to love. Beloved, let us love one another.
This is John's first epistle, chapter four. Let us love one
another for love is from God and whoever loves has been born
of God and knows God. Anyone who does not love does
not know God. Now see, you know what we know,
right? This isn't a challenge for you
to test your faith to see if you're born again. We don't do
that. And I can take a pretext out
of the Bible and I can have us all riding Harleys by the end
of the service if I wanted to. Yeah, there we go, Tom. Let me
just crank them up, that'll be our praise music. We can twist
all this to make it say whatever we think we want it to say. And
we can be genuinely concerned about the well-being of others
when we do so, which is where most people who burden the church
over their unconvertedness are. They're not maniacal monsters.
They're misguided maniacs. And as a shepherd, the sheep
are going nuts. What's happening? I'm going to
jump with them. No, wait a minute. Wait a minute. OK. OK, I found
the right place. All right, y'all, come on. Because
most of the time when the church is scattering like crazy, the shepherd's
on the wrong side of the field anyway. Stupid shepherd. I mean, you
know, you could just, ah. If you want some coffee time
with me, I'm happy to talk for two hours. I love free therapy. Some of you got the joke. Anyone who does not love God,
does not love, does not know God, because God is love. So if we say we don't love, we
don't know him. It's like we're speaking into
ignorance. Well, God is this and God is that and God does
this and God does that. No, no, no. You're singing the
wrong song. You're looking at the wrong show.
You've got the wrong script. God is love. And if you don't
know love, you don't know him. You're talking about something
else. See, this is what John is trying
to help us see in 1 John 4. This is the second half of this
commandment, to love your neighbor. And in doing so, we actually
love God. We show God for who he is. In this, the love of God
was made manifest among us. This is how we know God, and
this is how we know God is love, and this is how we know who God
is, which is love. That God sent his only son into
the world so that we would live through him. In this is love,
not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his
son to be the propitiation for our sins. Rich, rich, rich. This is love. Beloved, if God
loved us this way, then we ought to love others this way. No one has ever seen God. And
here's the here's the kick. Here's how we know what I'm saying
is true. Not only does John chapter one
teach us this and all throughout John's gospel and other places
in Paul's writing and James and Peter, but we see also here in
this very context, no one has ever seen God. If we love one
another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.
And John will go on to say that perfect love casts away all fear.
See, fear and doubt and uncertainty and frustration and all of these
things, contemptuous, is all antithetical to Christ. These
are not the fruits of the spirit. This is not God's love manifesting
in the hearts of his people. So we display God's glory through
love for each other. And it starts at the microscopic
level. It starts at the internal level. And this is where people
get a rub, start rubbing and going, ah, Tiffins, you've really
slid a little sideways. Loving yourself. We'll talk about that as the
weeks progress. Because if I don't love myself,
how can I love my wife like myself? And if I can't love my wife,
how can I love my children? If I can't love my children, how
can I love my church? If I can't love my church, how can I love
my friends? If I can't love my friends, how can I love my neighbor? If
I can't love my neighbor, how in the heck am I ever going to love
my enemies? And if I can't do those things, then I can't love
God at all. Thankfully, He loves me anyway. Because He loved me
first. You see, the pressure is gone.
It's gone! So we just have to decide, do
we want to live in a joyful, free, authentic way? Or do we want
to live under a self-perceived burden? I choose the prior. Christ's example of love and
obedience to the Father displays the glory of God. Jesus would
say, but I do as the Fathers commanded me, so that the world
may know that I love the Father. Rise, let us go from here, Jesus
says. I'm going to show you how I love
the Father. I'm going to lay down my life
for you. What's that got to do with you?
Okay, I hear you pastor, I'm walking with you, I understand
it, absolutely, I'm in 100% agreement. What's that got to do with me
now, right? How's my identity tied up in this? Well, I'm glad
you asked. In John three, we see Jesus talking
to Nicodemus. And in that discussion, there
is a lot of cool stuff. And I might have even said this
last week, but you know God loved the world in this way that He
gave His only Son, the only one that He has, that those believing
ones have everlasting life. But those unbelieving ones do not have life. That's a paraphrase. For God came into the world,
sent His Son into the world, to what? That the world would
be saved through Him, not to condemn it. He's not going to
flood it. He's not going to burn it and
kill everything in it. I mean, this is the picture. This is seeing
God for who He is. Is God just? Yes. Is God vengeful? Absolutely. And He's just in
that vengeance. But His love is manifested. And that love is applied to a
people despite them, but also because of them, because they
are the objects of His affection. Otherwise, we are the trigger,
we are the catalyst to how God sees us, but we're not. God,
before the world began, loved us. And He demonstrated the love
through the giving of the Son, Jesus Christ, for us. So what does that say about us? We know ourselves. But how does
God know us? Read Song of Solomon. Read Genesis 1 and 2. See the picture, see the perfectness,
see the reality of this world that we live in, that we have
just riddled with shame and guilt and overbearingness. And in doing
so, we have hated each other for so long. Versus what the
little tiny shadows are showing us about Christ in the church. That we are the object of His
passion. And His passion is not for His
pleasure, but for ours. Oh, father, take this cup from
me. It's going to be too much fun. And I just don't feel like
I should be. I don't deserve so much good thing, so many good
things. That's not the prayer of Christ.
Oh, father, take this cup from me. Not because it's going to be
so splendid a drink, because it's going to be such horrid.
Wrath. But not my will, but yours be
done because of Christ's love for the Father, because of Christ's
love for you. We need to get a little intelligent
about our emotions on that issue, don't we? We need to understand the spiritual
side of things. The greatest spiritual warfare, I want you
to hear what I'm about to say, and if we don't do anything else
today, this is important. The greatest spiritual warfare
in our minds is the subtle, silent recording that continues to tell
us to not to see ourselves through the eyes of God. And in doing so, it's almost
like winding up the toys. Remember when we were kids, you
had to wind up the toys or pull the strings? And when they finally came out
with batteries, you know, after like four days, the batteries exploded.
And you're like, what is this pile of dust? That's how it works. The enemy
speaks this identity lie. And then it just does its thing.
It just moves on out. It just claps the cymbals like
the monkey, or it runs like the little car, or it goes in a circle
and barks like the little dog. You know those toys. It just
starts in an emotion and it just goes. And it's spiritual. You are who God says you are.
And the love of God is real and powerful. and purposeful. And we need to transform the
way we think about this. We need to understand that when
Paul writes to the Galatians who have really lost their identity
in Christ and found a new identity in the concept of obeying the
laws of Moses. And the concept of circumcision,
the mutilation of the flesh as a spiritual picture of their
personhood, of their place before the Father, of their perfection
before God. If I could just do this, then
I would be right. And you know what? It doesn't
stop there. When love dictates things that must be present for
love to be active, it is never going to stop. The can will be
kicked down the road to such a degree that it'll fall off
the cliff into the sea and continue to sink until it falls to the
bottom of a cavern and then finds a whole nother ocean underneath
to sink in. Love doesn't do that. God's love
doesn't do that. Our love cannot do that. If there's
any condition on whether or not we will create intimacy with
someone or if there's any condition through which God requires intimacy
with him that is up to us, then we're not loving. And thankfully, all the conditions
that God requires, he has met. Complete judgment for justice,
which is righteousness, and he poured it all out on Christ. And Paul tells these Galatians,
he says, for through the law, I died to the law so that I might
live to God. Galatians 2 20, you know, the
text for I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer
I who live, but Christ who lives in me and the life I now live
in the flesh. I live by faith in the son of
God who loved me and gave himself for me. This is who we are. Paul goes on to say, I do not
nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through
the law, if righteousness were through conditions, if righteousness
was through loving God through obedience, then Christ died for
nothing. But what does that do when that
identity is unfolded for us? It transforms our minds. Romans
12, one and two. We talked about that three weeks
ago, I believe. And then we are able, we are
freed. We are driven, we are empowered to love others and
to pursue intimacy. And in doing so, we glorify God. And in doing so, we love God. I mean, this is not rocket science.
It's not a very difficult argument. The greatest absorption of this
reality is found in children. They understand it. Because they
haven't spent a lot of time in their heads hiding from their
own attachment disorders. Hiding from their emotional compounding
heaps of garbage. Hiding. Because we either hide
or we just jump head first in and wallow. And those are the
two different types of people. We avoid it or we're an anxious
ball of fire. Oh, you're different? Then tell
me what it is so that I might inform all the world. There is a different. There is
another place. And it's at rest. It's at rest. And not at rest
as in distraction. Not at rest as in sleeping it
off. Not at rest as in being too drunk to think about it.
Not at rest and pretending. No, at rest, like literally at
rest. In other words, you can look at the circumstances that
you're in and you can say, this is terrible, nothing's going
to change, blah, blah, blah. People say, no, no, have a positive
attitude. I'm positive about it. I'm positively certain that
this is bad. I'm positively certain that no
one cares, you know. Listen to what I'm about to say,
I'm about to give you the punchline here. I'm positively certain, and you
probably are lying to yourself, but being okay with it and being
at rest changes our perception of it. How do we do that? Knowing the
love of God, finding our identity here. We now are able to pursue
intimacy, seeing the good in others. and overcoming our prejudices. I don't have time to get into
the book of James, but James chapter 2 starts out with that.
The first 7, 8, 9, 10 verses talks about having prejudices,
having biases. And at the end of that little
discussion, he says these words, if you really fulfill the royal
law according to scripture, which is you shall love your neighbor
as yourself, you're doing well. But if you show partiality, you're committing sin. I love how the scriptures tell
us about sin. Nobody tells us about sin that
way in real life, right? You know, you've got 700 words
that you've read and studied. You've got 60 minutes of teaching,
and you've got all this stuff, and pastors can get there and
beat the pulpit. Sinful! You know, it's like Yosemite
Sam. Tasmanian devil, whatever personification
of toxic masculinity that we could put before the children
in the 30s and 40s. And yet, James just says, you
sin, and he leaves it at that. That's wrong. Don't do that.
Paul does the same thing. Yeah, don't do that. It's just
sin. These are sins. You know what they are. Okay, moving right along. The righteousness
of God. You are a royal priesthood. You're a child. You're adopted.
You called God pops. What? But if you show partiality, you're
committing sin. And if you're committing sin, you're guilty
under the law as a transgressor of that. For whoever keeps the
whole law but fails in one point is guilty of all of it. See,
the law isn't a fixed thing. It's in a fixed one reality.
It's like, this is my righteousness. It's not like the laws we have
today. A speeding ticket is just not quite as bad as like murder. But you still have disobeyed
the law. Just got a bunch of subsections. There are no subsections
in God's righteousness. Partiality. We don't do that. God doesn't
do that with us. He's no respecter of persons. What does that look like? What
does that look like when I start seeing partiality? What does
that look like in my life? Well, we learn to forgive others as
Christ has forgiven us. Let no corrupt talk come out
of your mouths, Paul would say. This is good and prudent instruction,
Ephesians chapter four. Let no corrupt talk come out
of your mouths. Only say and speak that which
is good for building each other up. What? There goes my free
time. There goes my leisure activities.
There goes our Friday night family game times. I mean, isn't it
fun to trash talk? It's always been the case. I remember being trash talked
as a child by friends, and it was a little coarser than it
is now, more direct. Yeah, you're ugly. I hate you. I wish you were dead." You know,
now it's sort of like, oh, let's see who doesn't have the strength
to pick up a gallon of milk these days. It's just because the approach
is different. It doesn't mean it's not less
corrupting. But that's not the emphasis.
Paul's not putting the emphasis there. That's not the emphasis
of the love of God. Only talk about what's building up. That's
what love is. As fits the occasion, not obeying
a busybody and sticking our nose in other people's businesses.
If somebody doesn't ask, we don't intrude. that it may give grace to those
who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, Paul says,
by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. See, you're
sealed by the Spirit of God. By the love of God, his Spirit is in
you. So therefore, let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor
and slander be put away. Let it all be put away. Just
take all that stuff and put it away. Huh? I'm gonna put that
away. That very idea makes me angry.
That's because we've lost our identity. When I have anger, it's because
I've lost sight of my identity. When I have anger, it is almost,
I have been working on this for months, literally every time
I feel an emotion, to find out why I feel it and what the root
of it is. And you know what? I've yet to find one time where
it wasn't because something that I needed wasn't given to me.
Something emotional. something psychological, something
spiritual that I didn't have, a need that wasn't being met. And you know what I've always
found too in all of this? I mean, I'm a hundred, and it's anecdotal,
I understand it may be different for you, but for me, it all boils
down to looking at myself through the difference, in a different
lens, and not finding my pure identity and my soul identity
in Christ. Because when I see myself in
Christ, I'm sort of impressed with Him, with the Father's love
and with what He's doing. And I'm not impressed like, look
at the kind of guy I am, because that would ruin that, because
I know the kind of guy I am. I'm impressed that I'm counted. Righteous. I'm impressed that
I'm an object of passion. I'm impressed that I'm loved
by the Father. Wow, that's impressive God. To
the praise of your glory. It's not about me anymore. But
what that does is then it allows us to actually see ourselves
in the right light so that when I feel bitter, when I feel angry,
when I feel wrathful, when I clamor and slander and malicious, I
can go, gosh, just put this stuff away. It's like getting out them
28 jeans that you just kept for 10 years thinking, I'll get back
in them one day. No, you're not. You're not going to get in that.
That waste isn't going to be that smell again. No, you're not. It's like you're not going to
wear your baby shoes. Just pack that junk back away. You don't
need this as infantile stuff. This is stuff of the flesh. This
is not the spiritual thing. This is not the fruit. This is
the this is the old you. The new you is growing up and
it's just as good as the old you. So put it away. And then Paul
says in verse 32 of Ephesians four, he says, be kind to one
another. Here is I want to preach a whole sermon on this next word.
Tenderhearted. forgiving one another as God
in Christ forgave you. Therefore, he says in chapter
five, verse one, be imitators of God as beloved children. And
walk in love as Christ loved us and gave himself for us a
fragrant offering and sacrifice to God. What does that mean,
what do we do? I'll tell you what it means.
It means that we need to be purposeful about making intimacy a goal. If intimacy is not a goal, if
we're fighting against it in our lives, we're fighting against
it with the Lord and vice versa. Okay? And there are levels of that.
I believe the first foundation of that is reconciliation. From now on, therefore, Paul
would say to the Corinthians, 2 Corinthians 5, 16, we regard
no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded
Christ according to the flesh, we regard him thus no longer.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old
has passed, and look, see, the new has come. All this is from
God, who through Christ reconciled us to Himself and then gave us
the work of reconciliation. That is, in Christ God was reconciling
the world to Himself, not counting their sins against them, and
entrusting to us the message of grace, the message of reconciliation,
the message of love. Therefore, we are ambassadors
for Christ, God making His appeal through us. We implore you on
behalf of Christ to be reconciled to God. For our sake, He made
Him to be sin who knew no sin, that in Him we might become the
righteousness of God." We ought to become the righteousness
of God. In Matthew 11, Jesus prays these words. He says, Father,
Lord of heaven and earth, that you've hidden these things from
the wise and understanding and reveal them to little children.
Yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. All things have
been handed over to me by my father and no one knows the son
except the father and no one knows the father except the son
and anyone to whom the son chooses to reveal him. Verse 28, come
to me. All who labor and are heavy laden,
I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn
from me for I am gentle and I am lowly in heart. This is God Almighty
the Son speaking. And you will find rest for your
souls for my yoke is easy and my burden is light. You see,
we're an anxious pile of mess or we're an avoidant. We're anxious. We're trying to
escape. We're worried about it all the
time, or we're paying it no mind, or we're at rest, and we're secure,
and we know ourselves. We're not lying to ourselves.
We know ourselves, but we also know ourselves in Christ. So we can find peace and rest
in the love of God, and we can care then for our health, not
just our physical health like so many Christians are so excited
about, but our mental health. There you are again talking about
mental health. Listen, where is your faith? Is faith in your
left hand? Is it in always holding a particular
object and never letting it go? Is faith in the phylactery, putting
the Word of God in front of you so that you may always see it?
No, faith is in your heart. Faith is in your mind. The Bible
talks more about fear and anxiety than people want to give credit
for. We just sort of, we avoid it. I don't want to deal with
that. That's okay. But we can be at rest in the
gospel when everything else in life has fallen apart. We can
be emotionally intelligent about how we're feeling, even when
we can't deal with it right now, so we can rest in the context
of what God's love has done for us and is doing for us this very
second. The Bible commands us to not
be anxious. And we do that through prayer,
because if we don't ask, God will not give. Those needs that
we see so passionately not given to us and worry and worry and
worry, it's because we're not praying for God to give them
to us. How awful would it be in a 12-course
meal on a holiday if people just came up and began to take and
pile on two piles or two scoops of everything on the table onto
your plate without ceasing. And you're like, whoa, whoa,
whoa, I can't, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. No, stop, whoa, and just pile it
on, just pile it on, by now you're fed. Eat it. I didn't need nine different
types of potatoes. I can't get to the yams. But if you say, I'd like some
bread, somebody will give you the bread. We have to have the
security to ask God for what we need. We have to have the
security to ask each other for what we need, to tell one another. Many of you are good at reminding
me that. What do you need? Oh, it's all
good. What do you need? We can build this. We can build
this in ourselves. We can build this by the Spirit.
We can build emotional health through love and empathy and
community. Let love be genuine. Abort what
is evil. Hold fast to what is good. Love
one another with true brotherly affection. Outdo one another
in showing honor. Do not be slothful in zeal. Be
fervent in spirit. Serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope. Be patient in tribulation. Be
constant in prayer. Contribute to the needs of the
saints and seek to show hospitality. Bless those who persecute you.
Bless and do not curse them. Rejoice with those who rejoice.
Weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another.
Do not be haughty. Associate with low people. Never
be wise in your own sight. Repay no evil for evil, but give
thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all. If possible,
as far as it depends upon you, that means we can't help what
other people do, live peaceably with all. Now, the most important piece
of all this, I've already alluded to it. I've talked about it.
every single point, but the most important piece of all of this
is the fact that this points to the gospel. Jesus' passion, His love for
us, His love for the Father is our hope as believers. It's not
just the model and the example, it's the power of God for us. You see how easy this has been?
I want you to think about it for a second. This is an easy
sermon. It's an easy teaching. It's an easy reception. But yet
there's still turmoil here because some of us think, wow, we're
failing in this area. This is not the point. The point is God
has not failed you. His love has not failed you.
You love him. And you love others. But even when you aren't. His
love for you never fails. Jesus love for us. is a selfless
love displayed throughout His entire ministry. His death on
the cross, that while we were weak at the right time, Christ
died for the ungodly. God chose His love for us that
while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Christ reached
out to lowly people, to sinful people, according to the culture,
to those who were sick and hurting and hungry, and He served them.
It wasn't the ultimate end of his message or of his mission
because he had a greater mission to provide clothing of righteousness,
to provide clothing of bread that never ends, of himself. And he showed his love for the
Father in obeying the Father, submitting to the Father's will
for the sake of his people. And Jesus' resurrection is our
victory. Jesus' resurrection is truth that this love was not
in vain. And one day, beloved, we will
be transformed into His likeness, and we will dwell with Him forever.
Never, ever, ever to have to have these conversations again,
but to really sit in a place of true theology, of just adoration. and joy, enjoying one another
without pretense. What does that even look like? Beloved, love and identity and
hope and faith, all of these are interconnected. And I pray that as we take the
table today, as we remember the love of God, that we can pray
that he will help us meet the need of loving others. And that we will start by learning
who we are and loving ourselves. And that sounds counter to the
culture of Christianity. But I say, let it be. For the
word of God would test and prove us right or wrong. Let's pray. Father, as we close our time
today, there's much to be said, much to think about. Sometimes we think, well, we
need that. We're looking for that powerful moment where we're
trying to feel something here. But Lord, we just need to know
some things. It's like a grocery list. Sometimes
we just need to look at the truth and say, OK, this is what we
need and this is what we're going to get, that we might just rest
in it. knowing that your purposes and your promises will stand
and that nothing can take us away from you. So Father, help us to be content
until you work these things out in us. Help us to be unashamed. Lord, help us to encourage one
another to love and to good deeds. This is what we're to do. or
to teach each other and to encourage each other every day to love
as you've called us to love, not by shaming, by encouraging,
building up. You can do this. I know this
is difficult. I know you're hurting. Meeting
each other's needs, Lord, whatever it might be, Father, put the
words and the wisdom in us, not from the world, but from your
word. and remind us of this beautiful,
beautiful, beautiful, good report of Christ who has given himself
for us, that we might be called your righteousness. In his name,
and because of your love, we pray.