Forensic Faith and Scandalous Grace

John 4
David Stockton - July 26, 2020

Good morning, Living Streams. Another Sunday here, July 26. It’s good to be with you. It’s real important that we continue to do this. I’ve been thinking about this. It’s so different. I mean, I’m here talking to a camera—you’re looking at your phone or a TV, something like. It doesn’t necessarily feel the same, but I know that, at least in the spiritual realm, but I also believe in the natural, it is bringing us together when we take the time to do this: worshipping together, hearing from the word of God together, having this common experience together. I really think it’s important we continue to push into this. 

I know we’re going to be getting a new Executive Order or some new details from the governor as this last 30-day deal comes to a close. I want you to stay tuned to our website, and also on Sunday mornings we’ll be announcing what’s going on, what’s next for us at Living Streams. But please continue. I know summertime is going and school’s going to fire up, and all these changes, it’s easy to let this type of thing slide. But it’s really important we stay together as we go into whatever the Lord has for us, but also whatever the world’s going to throw at us. We need each other. Thanks for sticking with us.

Today we’re going to be in the book of John again. As we’re trekking through, as we’re trying to hear from the Apostle John about Jesus. John actually was writing his gospel, his book about Jesus long after the other three writers. Matthew, Mark, Luke and John are called gospels, written about Jesus. And the three of those, Matthew, Mark and Luke were written probably a little closer to about 60 A.D., thirty years or so after Jesus was gone. And yet John was more like 90 A.D. It was the end of his life. The Roman persecution of both Jews and Christians had just been rampant. John and many other Christians had been forced out of Jerusalem. He landed up in Ephesus where there was a church going on up there. 

As he was writing this book he had probably had that cultural context in mind. It was not necessarily Judaism he was writing into. He was probably more writing this gospel for the Greek mind as he was trying to translate to them who God is. We see that in John Chapter 1 when he says that Jesus is the “word.” The “word” in Greek is “logos” which is this powerful, intense Greek word that basically has to do with God’s logical argument used to convince the world that he is loving and just. That’s one of the definitions of it. It’s a logical argument.

The Greeks really valued philosophy and all those things. So he’s appealing to them saying, basically, the word, Jesus was God’s logical answer to all the questions humanity could ever have. In another place it says that the logos is the universal principle, the controlling principle of the world. Again, that’s a real ode to the Greeks that would be reading this later on.

We know from the book of John that his whole premise in writing this book, the thing that he wanted so badly—and he says this in John 20:31: “that you may believe. I have written every single word of this book, I’ve written all these stories, these signs and wonders that have taken place, these ‘I am’ statements of Jesus. All of this eyewitness accounts of what I experienced. I interacted with Jesus. I’m writing these things down so that you may believe in him.”

We’ve done some work to try to define what belief is. Obviously there are a lot of different things people say when it comes to belief. Is is more of a heady thing? Is it more of an experiential thing? And the way I really believe John and the New Testament writers try and define faith or believing in Jesus is to have a pledge of allegiance.

We do the pledge of allegiance to America. We know our country right now is experiencing a lot of division, a lot of unrest, a lot of challenge, a lot of stress, a lot of anger, even guilt. There are a lot of those things going on. And yet we pledge allegiance to this country that we will stand up for her, that we will fight for her. Though I don’t think that’s bad, the Scripture calls us to pledge our allegiance to Jesus and his kingdom. It calls us to no longer associate ourselves as Jew or Greek, male or female, slave or free is what Paul was writing in his day and age. And we could say we’re not supposed to be identifying ourselves and camping primarily in black or white, Democrat or Republican, rich or poor. None of those matter when we come to the cross of Jesus Christ. We are now a new creation. We are now people of God. We are now citizens of his kingdom and we have to remember that that is our call. We are pledging allegiance—not to some political party, not to some social justice organization. What we’re called to do is pledge our allegiance to Jesus and his Spirit and what he’s at work in this world.

I want to remind you, church, to make sure and be careful not to get all caught up in the vain jangling, in the convincing philosophies of our day. But remember to keep about the gospel. Keep about what the Bible teaches and make sure that we’re really citizens of his kingdom above all else. It’s not wrong to be Irish. It’s not wrong to be African or to celebrate those things. That’s great. But when we come into the house of God, what we are is One. We are all the same at the foot of the cross. We’ve got to remember that as we go forward into this divisive time.

Not just pledging allegiance to God, but in some ways we order our lives in accordance with his, with his word. That’s what faith means. We reorient our lives. We set up our lives in accordance with who he is and what he did.

Ultimately, I love how John has this idea of building trust over time. When he first met Jesus he was the Son of Thunder. He was this fiery guy. But towards the end of John, and as we go on, he’s the one laying against Jesus’ breast. He’s the one that Jesus loved. That’s how he was identifying himself. No longer this fiery kind of—maybe even arrogant or whatever he was—but now this person who is totally thankful to be part of the family of God, to have known Jesus. 

I hope that’s what stirs in us in this time. We’ve called ourselves to this. From the very beginning of this COVID season, that God is asking us to be humble and to be generous. I really want us to be good at that and known for that as we through this. Both in our individual lives and as a church as a whole as well.

John 3:31-36 kind of sums this up, this whole concept of faith. Once again John reiterates what he’s trying to do: 

The one who comes from above is above all; 

Again, philosophical. You can see him speaking to Greeks here. The Logos.

the one who is from the earth belongs to the earth, and speaks as one from the earth. The one who comes from heaven is above all. He testifies to what he has seen and heard, 

Only Jesus knows what is true because he has been with the Father. He has been outside of this corrupt world.

but no one [in this corrupt world] accepts his testimony. Whoever has accepted it has certified that God is truthful. 

Has basically pledged their allegiance. They’ve stamped their card in the truth. They’ve basically said, “I’m for the truth.” If we put our allegiance, if we put our faith in Christ.

For the one whom God has sent speaks the words of God, for God[ gives the Spirit without limit. The Father loves the Son and has placed everything in his hands. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever rejects the Son will not see life, for God’s wrath remains on them.

So that’s the heaviness of what happens. Our faith really does determine our standing with God. By faith we can enter into his love and grace and mercy because of what Jesus Christ did on the cross, the price that he paid. Or without faith in Jesus we find ourselves remaining under the wrath of God, where the punishment that was poured out on Christ is not taken on our behalf. So the wrath of God remains.

Faith is so important, so valuable. It really is what pivots us for all of eternity. So we need to continue to learn about faith, practice faith, teach our kids about faith. All of that.

That being said, let’s go to John 4 and we’re going to get another story from John about a person who came to faith in Jesus. He’s already given us John the Baptist, who came and put his faith in his cousin, that he was the Messiah. The reason he did that is because God spoke to him and said, “The one that you see the dove descending on, the Holy Spirit descending on, that is the Messiah. And John was out there one time and he baptized Jesus and, sure enough, the dove came down and descended. The Spirit like a dove descended on him. So John knew at that point, “This is the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”

The next story we have that John tells us about is he and his disciple friends were going with Jesus to a wedding at Cana. There, at the wedding at Cana, Jesus turned water into wine. It says right after that story, “This is when the disciples began to believe in Jesus.” Because of a sign that he had done. They had been following and hanging out with him and listening to him because of the things he was saying and teaching. But now they knew there was something more than this being a man who was doing something special. They knew that this was God in the flesh. They knew that this was the Logos as John would later call him.

Now many believed on him after the signs and wonders and cleansing of the temple that he did. Which is interesting because they’re not hearing Jesus speak about the things of God. They’re not seeing some miraculous sign that we get recorded. They’re just seeing the righteous indignation of Jesus as he’s cleansing the temple, as he’s standing against the oppressors. He’s fighting with them. It says many began to believe that he was more than just a man, more than just someone who was coming doing something good. That he was the Messiah. He was God’s answer. He was God’s one that was coming to save and redeem the world. 

So we have all of those and then today we get a story about a woman that Jesus meets at a well. So kids, before we jump into it, I want you to draw me a picture of the Samaritan woman at a well. I’m so thankful again for all the pictures that you’ve drawn. And adults, you could draw me pictures any time you want. One time I had adult draw me a picture. It was pretty cool. I liked it. 

Just so you know I’m taking this seriously, I drew one. And you’re going to have to beat this, okay? This is my drawing that I’m going to show you right now Bam. What are you going to do about this? I would like to say my kids drew this, but it was me. I’m not great at it. My wife, she’s really good at it. This is my woman at the well and it ain’t pretty. But that’s okay. You’ve got to beat that. If you do, if you give me the picture and it’s the best one for whatever reason, you’ll get a little something in your mailbox. Many of you have already. And thanks for telling me thanks for that, but I’m really thanking you for what you’ve done, so we’re good there.

All right. John Chapter 4. The woman at the well:

Now Jesus learned that the Pharisees had heard that he was gaining and baptizing more disciples than John— although in fact it was not Jesus who baptized, but his disciples. So he left Judea and went back once more to Galilee.

So after talking to Nicodemus, after cleansing the temple, Jesus had a lot of people following him. And he did exactly what his cousin John the Baptist was doing, he would baptize them. There’s something very significant about baptism. I’m not going to talk a lot about baptism, but I do want to say, if you are someone who wants to pledge allegiance to Jesus, you believe in Jesus, you want to associate your life with Jesus, you want to hide your life in Christ, baptism is something that is all over the New Testament. In the life of Jesus, Jesus himself was baptized. So please don’t hesitate. Don’t wait. Contact us. Let us know you’re ready to get baptized. Bam. We’re going to do this thing. I know guys are getting baptized this week. I know there’s a few people we’re going to do a baptism for in the next few weeks. I think I might be baptizing one of my daughters tomorrow, which is exciting. Baptism is real, it’s biblical, it’s Jesus and if you’re ready to follow Jesus, Jesus would say, “Come into the waters. Die to the old life and be born again to the new life.” That’s the death under the water and resurrection coming out of the water. We’re following Jesus. You gain something in the waters of baptism you cannot gain any other way. So get baptized.

Verse 4:

Now he had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.

So it’s hot. Not a great time of day to be hanging out. And yet, he’s thirsty. So he stops at this well. And then it says:

When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)

The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.)

So here we’ve got to really understand some context. Jerusalem is here. Galilee is here. Right in the middle is this place called Samaria. Samaria was a place that, basically, when the Assyrians came down and took all the northern ten tribes into exile, and later the Babylonians took the two southern tribes of Israel (twelve tribes of Israel) and took them into Babylonian captivity, the people that were left—they left the people that were impoverished, the people that were unable to make the journey, they left the people that basically, they rejected certain people and said, “You stay here. We’re not worried about you at all.” And those people ended up intermarrying with nations around that started to come into that time, as the Jews evacuated that place, people of other nations came in. So this is where the Samaritan group became part of Israel’s history.

So now, as the diasporas come back, as the exiles return, and Israel is filled with Jews who returned, now there’s this kind of separation. There are the Jews that would call themselves purebred Jews and then there’s the Samaritans that would be like halfbred Jews. And so there was this real separation, segregation. There was this real prejudice, racism, whatever you want to call it, that was taking place at this time, even to the extent where now, Jesus, who was a Jewish man, was sitting at a well and he’s thirsty. It’s noon. There’s a lady coming who’s a Samaritan, to the same well. She’s got a bucket and Jesus says, “Can I have a drink.

That seems very innocent. It seems innocuous. However, for this woman, it was startling. It was scandalous. And Jesus would have known that. His disciples had gone and so, now there’s one man, a single Jewish man, with a single Jewish woman, and you could only imagine what the tabloids would say that were following Jesus, how they would spin that. But this is a little bit scandalous all by itself, because of the way the traditions the culture of that day would have viewed the situation.

So Jesus actually extending this invitation to say, “Hey, can I have a drink? Can you and I join each other in this,” is actually a very, very provocative type thing. You can only imagine what started to spin in this Samaritan woman’s mind. She could have thought, Maybe this guy’s hitting on me. She could have thought all kinds of different things. But Jesus is asking her for a drink, obviously with pure intentions, and you will see all of that as it goes on. 

But she kind of says, “How could you do this?” And maybe she’s being a little coy. Maybe she’s really offended. We don’t know any of that. But we know it’s startling. She just basically says, “How could you do this?”

John Piper, as he was unpacking this a little bit, he has this quote that I think kind of helps us understand a little bit about how intense this was.

He is standing by the fountain marked “colored”…

He’s harkening back to that segregation time, before the civil rights movement. 

He is standing by a the fountain marked “colored” watching a black woman fill her water bottle and then, for all to see, says, “Can I have a drink from your water bottle?” She says, at the end of verse 9, “Jews have no dealings with Samaritans.” But more literally it says, Jews don’t “use together” with Samaritans…

 We’re trying to create a separation. We don’t want anything do with each other.

…You can’t be asking me to use the same bucket. That isn’t done. –John Piper

And so here, I’m just trying to give us a little context, but to ultimately say Jesus didn’t play by these rules. Jesus was someone who saw people for who they were. He knew that all people were created equal and he valued them. He loved them. He was not worried about maintaining culture or maintaining really stupid cultural ideals He saw through all of that. He saw people as people. We, as the church, in particular, we’ve got to be better than this. We’ve really got to watch out for the divisions that are in our society seeping their way into our church, our family. It is not to be for the people of God. We are to be united. We are to, like we said, be citizens of heaven. We are to be at the foot of the cross. And all men are equal, all woman are equal at the foot of the cross. There is no difference. No difference at all.

We’re trying to say, “We’re on the good side. They’re on the bad side.” But here’s a news flash for you. All of us are on the wrong side. God is on the right side. God is the only one who’s not corrupt. God is the only one who sees things clearly. All we can do is hope to land ourselves on his side by his grace and mercy. By the filling with the Spirit and the revelation that he gives us in the word of God. We might be able to be on his side here and there, off and on. That’s the goal. But we should never try to villify each other or start to speak ill of each other. We just need to realize that we all come to the foot of the cross the same. 

And here’s Jesus just shooting right through all these prejudices, all of this racism. He just shoots right through it and goes straight to the heart. And we’re going to see this unpacked a little more here. Verse 10:

Jesus answered her, “If you knew the gift of God and who it is that asks you for a drink, you would have asked him and he would have given you living water.”

“Sir,” the woman said, “you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep. Where can you get this living water? Are you greater than our father Jacob, who gave us the well and drank from it himself, as did also his sons and his livestock?”

Jesus answered, “Everyone who drinks this water will be thirsty again, but whoever drinks the water I give them will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give them will become in them a spring of water welling up to eternal life.”

The woman said to him, “Sir, give me this water so that I won’t get thirsty and have to keep coming here to draw water.”

So in this next section Jesus is basically saying to her, “Hey, I know what the world has told you. I know what maybe your own soul has told you. I know that you feel like I think I’m superior. You think you’re superior. There are all these arguments that go back and forth between Samaritans and Jews.” But he’s saying, “Look, if you had any idea of this moment that we’re in right now. If you had any idea who it is that is offering you living water, you wouldn’t be worried about buckets. You wouldn’t be worried about prejudices, stereotypes, you wouldn’t be worried about all of those things. You would be able to receive water. You would be able to receive refreshment that would last forever. Not just today. Not just a few hours.”

He’s obviously speaking to her of the spiritual water that comes when he brings salvation to a person. That, like we said, with faith, she could pivot into eternal life. That’s what Jesus is offering her. She doesn’t get it at all yet. She’s still caught up in theology, or the political stances of the day. But Jesus is saying, “No, no. It’s not about that.” 

He told her, “Go, call your husband and come back.”

“I have no husband,” she replied.

We don’t know the emotion that she says that with. We know because of what’s about to happen that it was a loaded statement.

Jesus said to her, “You are right when you say you have no husband. The fact is, you have had five husbands, and the man you now have is not your husband. What you have just said is quite true.

“Sir,” the woman said, “I can see that you are a prophet. Our ancestors worshiped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.”

You can see this moment where all of a sudden the air gets so thick and so tense, as Jesus says to her, “Hey, go call your husband.” 

Whether he knew because of something he’d observed, or she’s coming a strange time of day so he knows there’s something off there, whether it’s a revelation the Spirit has given him, but he speaks to her about this place in her life that is painful. And she has had five husbands that either she has left, but that’s probably not true in that society. It’s more likely that she has been rejected by them. And maybe she’s a very beautiful woman. We don’t know. Maybe she’s really given herself to these men physically. We don’t know exactly. But we know that five times she’s been rejected. And here she is in a new relationship. Thirsty as can be. Trying to find some satisfaction. Trying to find something in what a man, what a husband can give her. And the one that she has now is not legitimate. 

In this moment you can see her eyes probably were widening a little bit. She might have started sweating a little bit more. And she says to him, “I see you’re a prophet.” And instead of saying, “I would like to know more about living water. I do need help. I have a problem,” she says, “Well you Jews say this and that. And we say this and that.” So she goes to kind of this religious, theological division, and philosophies that have gone on. Again, totally missing the point. Totally deflecting. 

In the New Testament it says that we are supposed to watch out for “vain janglings” in the King James Version, which I think is such a funny phrase. But we’re also supposed to watch out for endless genealogies and cunning philosophies. And you guys, please know, what you’re seeing on your social media feed, what you’re seeing on the news, it really has to be taken with a lot of filtering. You can’t get caught up in what’s going on. It is exhausting. It is humanism. It is not of God. Jesus speaks of things of God that are not corrupt They’re not human. They’re not temporal. But right now we have just go so many “vain janglings” going on. 

So please remember to every once in a while get out of there. Take a deep breath. Read some scripture. Put on some worship music. Just cleanse your mind. And before you go into those worlds, before you turn on the news, before you do social media, pause, relax, say, “Am I ready for this?” Pray before you go in. I really think it’s an important practice that we’re doing because of how powerful these things are in our day and age right now.

She’s got Jesus in front of her and she’s still not able to connect because she’s so caught up with these things. Then they go on and Jesus begins to talk to her. He says:

“Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

The woman said, “I know that Messiah” (called Christ) “is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything to us.”

Then Jesus declared, “I, the one speaking to you—I am he.”

I am statement. Jesus is using this powerful Jewish language to say, “I am he.” That’s this moment of truth right there. Where Jesus kind of just drops the bomb and he says, “Look. We talked about living water and what I can offer. We talked about where you’re at truly in your life. Now I’m telling you you’ve got to get off these things. What God is interested in is you and your worshiping him in Spirit and in truth.”

In Spirit and truth, there’s a lot of ways to define it. It simply could be worshiping with your emotion, with your expression, all of that. And truth could be more your mind. I think that’s the safest way to unpack a little bit of Jesus’ teaching in the other gospels, that we should worship the Lord our God with all our heart and our soul and mind and strength. I think this is the way that God is saying to this woman, this is what God is after. He wants you to worship him. As you do, you will find in him all that you need to satisfy your soul.

Really an intense moment. It’s funny. Just then the disciples come back. We’re not going to get into that. But I want to pick up in verse 39. The disciples just got back. They were totally wigged out. Why is Jesus talking to this woman? What’s been going on? This is not going to look good in the press reports. All this stuff. Then the woman, she’s wigging out because of this moment. And she runs back into town. And then it says in verse 39:

Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers.

They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”

So many more began to believe. At first ,they believed on her word as she was wigging out. Again, this lady in that society was probably not known as someone who was very trustworthy as she’s gone from husband to husband. But here she comes. And there was something so compelling about what she was saying about her interaction with Jesus. And many more believed. But they did the right thing. They didn’t leave it at that. They actually went out to where Jesus was. They sought him out and said, “We want to know for ourselves. We don’t want to just live off the testimony of someone else. We want to know for ourselves.”

So they came and they got to spend two days with Jesus, the Logos. The guiding principle of the world. God’s logical argument. To show that he is loving and just. Jesus, God in the flesh. They got to spend two days with him. And according to his words, they heard his words and they really started to believe. They even declared that. “We no longer believe because of what she said. We believe because we’ve heard with own ears, seen with our own eyes who you are.”

This week, again to try to unpack this idea of faith, my wife was actually listening to a podcast. I’ve told you before she’s my teacher. She teaches me almost everything I’ve ever learned. As I was listening to it, there was this concept that this guy was putting forward. He was saying there’s reasonable faith, there’s blind faith, and then there’s forensic faith. This guy actually was a forensic scientist. He was a cold case detective. He sought to disprove Christianity but ended coming to Christianity because he said it’s the most logical, reasonable thing he’s ever experienced.

I think it’s important for us to unpack. Unreasonable faith is the kind of faith where, against the evidence you see, you continue to believe. Flat earth. Sorry some of you out there. I know you still love it. But it’s against all the evidence that we’ve seen. Now you can discredit the evidence or whatever. But the evidence shows that the earth is round. We’ve seen pictures and all of that. But if you continue to believe in that flat earth, you’re going against what evidence would say. So it’s an unreasonable faith. I would apply to that to people who believe that there isn’t a Designer, all those type of things. But again, that’s a whole other thing.

Blind faith is where you’re believing based on something you’ve heard from somebody else, or something you haven’t experienced or you haven’t known firsthand. Or something you believe without really caring about evidence. Maybe it’s just the way you were raised so you continue to go that way, believing in Jesus, or believing in whatever else you believe or you were raised to believe. Or, like these people, some them could have believed according to this woman’s testimony. Blind faith is not necessarily bad, because sometimes you end up in the right spot by blind faith. But it’s still not the faith that I think John is writing to help people experience It’s not the faith that I think the New Testament writers and Paul would really encourage.

Forensic faith is faith that is based on evidence. It’s, “I believe and yet I’m going to test this belief. I’m going to try these things out. I’m going to try and go get my own experience and understanding and revelation.” I think this is an important thing to remember as Christians in our day and age, that we need to spend time with Jesus.

Right now you can go online and you can hear the greatest bible teachers. You can hear worship songs that really are powerful and somebody you know, out of the secret place with the Lord they’ve brought these things out. You can feel like you’re having a secret place experience with the Lord based on a song. Nothing is wrong with these things. But if that’s all there is, it could be that our faith is a little blind. And my fear is that, as our faith gets tested, and I believe testing has come and will continue to come for a season, if our faith is not really forensic, if it’s not rooted and grounded and deep and strong, then it’s going to get blown away, washed away. Like Jesus said, “Those who build their house on the sand, when the storm comes, it’s over.” 

So I really want to call our church to really try and dive into a forensic faith. Really put our faith to the test. Really study the scriptures. Really search things out. When you hear somebody say something, don’t just take it because they’re cool looking or whatever. But actually process it through. Put it through the filter of the scriptures. The Wesleyan Quadrilateral. You can look that up later if you want. It’s really helpful to filter it and help us understand truth. 

That’s the call from John. He’s really trying to get us to grow in faith. My call as a pastor, and to myself and my own family, is to help us grow in faith, not just have easy answers or kind of, “This is the way it’s always been.” I’m always trying to tell my kids, when they say “Hey what do we believe about that?” I say, “Well, your mom and I have decided that we believe this because the scriptures say this, but you’re going to have to decide what you believe.” I’m trying to encourage that because the faith that we have, I think for a season might cover them, or sanctify them as the scripture teaches, but there’s going to come a day when they have to express their own. They have to have their own relationship with God. So we need to be helpful in that regard, as well.

We’re going to wrap things up. We’re going to have a response time. A slide will appear on your screen. You at home, if you’re in a group, you can interact with that. Someone step up and be bold and say, “I’ll take the lead and do this,” If you’re by yourself you can just interact with it as well. As always you can put comments down below. We love to hear from you in any way, shape or form, what the Lord’s been speaking to you, what you need a prayer request for. We love all of that. Go ahead and take a little time to let this word settle in and respond. 

Jesus is pursuing you just like the Samaritan woman. He has time for you and wants to give you living water.

Take amount and see if you feel pursued by Jesus. If not, ask Him to show you His love.

Take another moment and assess if your faith in Jesus is strong right now. If not, ask Jesus to help you believe.

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Cleansing and Zeal

God is Good, Evil is Real, and the Devil is a Liar

David Stockton
Series: John
Chapter 2

Well, here we are again. Welcome, Living Streams! It’s good to be with you. I want to say a prayer real quick as we jump into this. It’s kind of a wild world out there. Sometimes it dan be a wild world inside our own bodies. Let’s take a little moment and pray.

Lord Jesus, we do thank you for today. Lord, we want to hear from you. We need your word. We don’t need anymore words from mankind. We just need to hear from you—truth. We need heaven’s perspective. Lord, we’re hungry for your word. We don’t live by anything but the words that come from your mouth. We want to live, Lord. We don’t want to just exist. So please come speak to us.

Thank you for your Spirit that can speak to us. Thank you for the scriptures that have so clearly laid out for us your plan and how you work within humanity. Be with us, Lord, I pray. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Well, we’ve got 2020 still going on. In 2020 we’ve got the COVID-19, the death toll, the quarantine, the Donald Trump, the liberal, the conservative, the Black Lives Matter, the cisgender privilege. We’ve got riots, defunding police, it’s 115 degrees out there sometimes, and Disneyland is closed! 

So. Yeah. All of those words probably make you kind of catch your breath a little bit, or lose a breath, or your heart pace quickens a little bit. I understand that and I want to end that kind of wildness that we’re all experiencing day in and day out.

I want to say these words. This is 2 Corinthians 10:3-6 from the Message. Just let this wash over you:

The world is unprincipled… 

As my grandpa used to say, “God is good, evil is real, and the devil is a liar.” And that’s an absolute truth. 

The world is unprincipled. It’s dog-eat-dog out there! The world doesn’t fight fair. But we don’t live or fight our battles that way—never have and never will. The tools of our trade aren’t for marketing or manipulation, but they are for demolishing that entire massively corrupt culture. We use our powerful God-tools for smashing warped philosophies, tearing down barriers erected against the truth of God, fitting every loose thought and emotion and impulse into the structure of life shaped by Christ. Our tools are ready at hand for clearing the ground of every obstruction and building lives of obedience into maturity.

You remember that commercial that used to just go, “Ah, the power of cheese.” When it would talk about satisfying your hunger, I just feel like reading the scriptures these days has been just like, ‘Ah, the power of God’s word to just come in and satisfy a weary, thirsty or confused soul.” 

And I just love this verse. We’re going to get into a whole bunch more verses. But right now, as this message is going on, as you’re listening to this, in our Sanctuary, there is what we’re calling kind of a “worship attack” going on—a “prayer attack” going on. That sounds kind of weird. I understand that. But basically, the concept is we’ve been opening like we said in the announcements, our sanctuary for in-person, on-campus gatherings for a limited capacity of people that are coming. The whole point is they are coming to just pray. They’re coming to intercede. They’re coming to engage in spiritual warfare as the Bible teaches us. They’re coming to kind of see what we can do. Like Moses, Aaron and Hur, to lift our hands to turn the tide of the battle that’s going on in our society, and to make sure that all of the division and corruption that is in our society doesn’t find its way seeping into our church, let alone the Church of God as a whole.

So I’m so excited about what’s going on there. And with the homeless stuff that’s going on. I had some great conversations with some homeless brothers and sisters that have been coming. They’re very thankful for the relief. They’re very thankful for being able to kind of take a nap and then wake up without some startling thing where someone’s kind of hitting them, telling them they’ve got to get out of here. Or someone’s trying to steal their stuff. They can wake up in peace. They keep mentioning, “It’s just so quiet in here. So comfortable in here.”

It’s been a real blessing to be able to spend time with those men and women and to see maybe if there are some ways we can help them in a more longterm way.

We’re going to jump into John Chapter 2 here. We’re going to start in verse 13. 

When it was almost time for the Jewish Passover, Jesus went up to Jerusalem. In the temple courts he found people selling cattle, sheep and doves, and others sitting at tables exchanging money. So he made a whip out of cords, and drove all from the temple courts, both sheep and cattle; he scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables. To those who sold doves he said, “Get these out of here! Stop turning my Father’s house into a market!” His disciples remembered that it is written: “Zeal for your house will consume me.” 

The Jews then responded to him, “What sign can you show us to prove your authority to do all this?”

Jesus answered them, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days.”

They replied, “It has taken forty-six years to build this temple, and you are going to raise it in three days?” But the temple he had spoken of was his body. After he was raised from the dead, his disciples recalled what he had said. Then they believed the scripture and the words that Jesus had spoken.

Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Festival, many people saw the signs he was performing and believed in his name. But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all people. He did not need any testimony about mankind, for he knew what was in each person.

And so here we have again this concept that God is good and evil is real. Mankind has a problem. It’s got this depraved nature within us. And then we have the devil and the deceit that comes from that regard as well.

So Jesus is here in the temple courts and he does something fascinating. He does something wild. He’s watching this gathering take place. It’s the Passover time, so there are probably close to two million Jews that have gathered in Jerusalem. So the city is just bustling. And there at the temple, which is the central focus, people are coming to make sacrifices. According to Judaism that’s what was required. A sacrifice needed to be made to kind of show penance—to get forgiven of your sins. That was the deal that God had made with the people. 

So they would come to the temple courts with some sort of offering. That was to admit that they had been guilty, they had sinned. It was to admit that God is good and God is right, and they want to be right with God. And they were thankful that they could do something to actually make themselves right with God. So they would come and offer these sacrifices. And they would come with a dove. Or they would come with a cow. Or they would come with sheep, or whatever it might be. 

What they experienced as they got there, though, was the people who were running the temple, the priests, all those, had realized that they could make some money off of these people. So one of the things that was required is your animal would have to be perfect. It would basically have to be inspected by the priest. And if there was any fault found in it, they would not let them sacrifice that. So what the priests did was, they came up with their own kind of priest-inspected cattle, sheep and doves. So, if you wanted to come and purchase one of those, you wouldn’t have to carry an animal from wherever you came from. You wouldn’t have to worry about the unscrupulous priests who would come and find fault. You could just come and pay for an already-approved animal to sacrifice. The only problem was, it was a lot more expensive. There was quite a service fee added to it.

So Jesus was watching this take place. And not only that, but the money changers that Jesus was dealing with, they would also say, “We as the priests, we can’t receive that money that has Caesar’s image on it because it’s not holy money.” So they actually made up their own money. So not only did you have to purchase a priest-approved sacrifice, but you would also have to exchange your money into priest-approved money so that you could purchase your priest-approved sacrifice. Basically, people were just getting totally, totally ripped off.

So Jesus has come with his family. Jesus is thirty years old. Jesus has not gone public with his ministry. We talked about two weeks ago in John 2, at the beginning, really the first kind of revelation outside of his own family structure was to his disciples and to the people at the wedding at Cana when he changed the water into wine. That’s how John introduces us to Jesus. The first miraculous, first revealing of his glory wasn’t in some grand standing way. It was a very small town.

So now, here’s this other kind of revelation that’s happening, where Jesus is revealing a little bit more of who he is and the authority that he does have. So he’s just pulling out this whip as he’s watching person after person getting ripped off. Maybe he was getting to the front of the line. Maybe he was just thinking of his own mom and what she has done as she has come and been ripped off. We don’t know what it was that finally just kind of broke free in him. But he actually went over and found a cord and made a whip. And he just started making a scene. He was wild. He was whipping…I don’t know if he was whipping people or just kind of cracking the whip. We don’t know. 

We know he was throwing the tables over and he was just really attacking this whole enterprise that was going on. He was driving all the animals out, kind of causing all of that commotion. People running out watching for the stampede. He comes over to those with the doves. I guess he didn’t want to just let them go, so he just pushed them all out, got them all out. He threw the tables over, got the money changers out. He just basically went on a rampage. 

Then, when it all settled, or whatever happened as he was walking out, we don’t know exactly when security came. We don’t know exactly what happened, but they said, “What authority do you have to do this?” Like, “Who do you think you are coming in here and doing this?”

Obviously they didn’t know—no one knew at that point, but Jesus just says, “You have turned my Father’s house into a den of thieves. Get out of here. Stop turning my Father’s house into a market.”

So he’s saying, “My Father’s house.” He’s starting to allude to this connection that he had with God that was very offensive to the people. What John writes here is that, he remembered later on as he’s kind of remembering the scriptures, in Psalm 69, in talking about this Messiah, it’s a messianic Psalm. It says that the zeal for his house will consume him. So they’re kind of putting these pieces together, that something is happening, that something more than meets the eye is going on with this Jesus guy. And he’s fulfilling these messianic prophecies. Zeal for his house and what takes place there. Righteous indignation and this rising up to stand against oppression. And to stand for the people of God. 

I think about the times in my life where I’ve probably been most zealous, where I’ve been most enraged. As a grownup I don’t feel like I get enraged real easy. It takes me a while. But as a young boy, I had two older brothers and I don’t know if they loved picking on me, or if they loved seeing me lose it. I’m not sure which one they loved more. But they loved one of those very much. There were many times, as the smallest, and scrawniest of my clan, my brothers would pick on me and pick on me and pick on me. Ultimately, I would get to a point where I would just scream. I would just start throwing fists and they said it didn’t hurt bad, but my tiny little fists would hurt them, so they would go running as I was throwing my fists everywhere. I remember one time my brother locked himself in the bathroom. I was so mad that I got a butter knife and stabbed it through the bathroom door. I was so enraged. So enraged. 

Obviously Jesus was not losing it in that regard. He was still under control. We see where he kind of comes to the birds and those people and he’s able to say, “Hey, you need to go off this way.” So he was still in control. But he was so filled with this outrage. Zeal is the word used in the Bible. Actually, in the Greek the word is zelos. It really is kind of righteous indignation. It’s jealousy, but not in the sick way, but basically like a husband and someone is coming to take his wife, or maybe even to rape his wife, and the amount of angst, the amount of rage that would be built up in a husband in that situation. It’s protective. It’s standing against. It’s this zeal that Jesus shows in this moment.

For you kids, real quick, before we go on. This is the picture that I would love to see you draw. It sounds kind of interesting to draw a picture of Jesus with a whip. But I think it’s important because I want you to understand this aspect of God. That he will fight for what’s right. He will stand against evil.  So go ahead and try to draw a little temple, and maybe a picture of Jesus holding a whip. I think that would be a fun thing for me to see. So if you do that, go ahead and email it to me at david@livingstreams.org and I’d love to see that. Again, whoever kind of wins the day will get something in their mailbox. Some of you should be receiving some of those things if you haven’t already.

That’s what’s taking place. That’s the story. It’s so interesting to me because John introduces Jesus in John Chapter 2 as someone who turns water into wine, as someone who brings this conversion from water to wine. And then in the very next breath he shows Jesus as this one who cleanses. 

In the commentary I was reading, they were talking about how that’s the way of the Lord. We don’t get cleaned up before conversion. First we come to Jesus and we are converted. And then as we walk with him we start to find the temple of our own lives cleansed. It’s so important to remember that. 

And if you are someone that has not surrendered to Jesus, if you have not given your life to Jesus, if you have not said, “Jesus, I need you, I need you, please come and save me from myself. Wave me from my world. Save me from my family history. Save me from whatever it might be. Save me from my anger. Save me from my greed.” Whatever it might be. If you have not called out to Jesus and allowed him to come and convert you into one of his own children to transform your mind and heart, to help you be born again as Michael was talking about from John Chapter 3 last week, like Nicodemus.

It’s not enough to just try. It’s not enough to just fight, We actually need conversion. We actually need to be born again. We need the Spirit of God to come and dwell in us, to overcome our own sinful nature. It’s the only way we can go forward. As we do, as we make that pledge, as we make that pledge of allegiance to Jesus, as we put our trust in him, as we receive him into our life as Lord and surrender ourselves to him, then what happens is cleansing begins. That’s what happens in John 2, as well. 

I want to talk a lot about the cleansing today. The cleansing of the temple. There are a couple of quotes here that I think are really helpful in helping us understand Jesus, which is the whole goal of every time we preach. To understand who God is. And understand a little bit of how this message can apply to us today.

But first I want to put up a quote from G. K. Chesterton. He is just someone who is really good with words. Here’s what he says about Jesus in regards to what he has heard about Jesus and what he reads in the scriptures. He says:

Instead of looking at books and pictures about the New Testament, I looked at the New Testament. There I found an account, not of a person with parted hair in the middle, or hands clasped in appeal, but of an extraordinary being with lips of thunder and acts of lurid decision, flinging down tables, casting out devils, passing with the wild secrecy of the wind from mountain isolation to a sort of dreadful demagogy; a being who often acted like an angry God—and always like a God. The diction about Christ has been, and perhaps wisely, sweet and submissive. But the diction used by Christ is quite curiously gigantesque; It is full of camels leaping through needles and mountains hurled into the sea. Morally it is equally terrific; he called himself a sword of slaughter and told men to buy swords if they sold their coats for them. … Here we must remember the difficult definition of Christianity already given; Christianity is a superhuman paradox whereby two opposite passions may blaze beside each other.

I love the song that we were singing this morning, talking about there’s nothing stronger than the love of God. There’s nothing stronger than the love of God. And it is so true. God’s love for you is the most fierce, powerful thing the world has ever known. It is absolutely true. But at the same time, God’s desire for justice rages just as strong. In God we have this razor’s edge where he is perfectly loving and kind and good; but at the same time, totally, totally given to destruction of evil. And that’s in Exodus Chapter 34. We see the image of God. He is abounding in love and faithfulness to thousands of generations, but he will not leave the guilty unpunished,

Sometimes in our gospel message, sometimes in the reading of our scriptures, and sometimes in today’s preaching, we hear about the love of God. And it’s good and it’s right and it’s wonderful, but it almost becomes in exception to the justice of God, the zealous and jealousy of God for his nature, for his righteousness, for his people. And how angry and how wrathful he becomes when evil is allowed to prosper. Or when we play flippantly with sin. It’s very upsetting to him. Exactly what’s happening here. And the zeal of God… so it’s both together.

The words here, inside God, the dualistic nature, the opposite passions are love and justice. Or, as John Chapter 1 says, Jesus came with grace and truth. He came with eternal mercy and everlasting judgment. Both are valid. Both exist. Both are real.

It’s this razor’s edge that we find in the nature of God. So please don’t ever forget about Jesus with the whip. At the same time, don’t forget about Jesus turning water into wine. AT the same time, don’t look at the cross and forget about what wrath was being poured out. What suffering Jesus was going through. That the scriptures would actually say it pleased the Father to punish the Son. Those are hard, hard verses. But it’s the justice of God saying, “I need to deal with sin. I have to punish sin.”

And that’s what’s so amazing about Jesus. He stood there and said, “Then punish me, Father. Put it all on me so that David, and so that all those people at Living Streams Church would not have to feel the full vengeance of your wrath, your righteous indignation.”

So when you look at the cross, you’ve got to know it’s the love of Christ being poured out for us, absolutely. But it’s also the wrath of God being poured out and satisfied in the sacrifice of the Son. Some very important things to remember. So don’t forget about Jesus in this regard.

Another quote here comes from a guy named Alan Scot. He is saying about this cultural moment we’re in:

There is something about this national moment that is resetting the altars of our lives. It feels poignant. Everything is stripped back. It’s like a cleansing of the temple. God is resetting worship.

The reordering of worship overturns the current popular practices of worship. It delights those who value covenant above commerce. 

Which is so true of these Pharisees and these religious leaders here, these priests.

It throws off everything not aligned with the heart of the Father.

Jesus is trying to bring them back into alignment with the heart of the Father.

It moves worship from he focus upon the horizontal to the vertical.

And then he does on to talk about how:

Every platform to man removed. Every effort at popularity removed. Every idol of promotion removed. Using ministry to gain wealth removed. Using ministry to increase visibility removed. Every exploitation of people to fulfill our dreams removed. Every ignoring of the poor and seeking the friendship of the powerful removed. The cleansing of the temple has never been more necessary. The idea that Jesus would be impressed by what we have built to make him famous, or that he would  leave our models of worship intact is vain, We are too timid to tear down the temple ourselves, too afraid to confront the excesses, edifices for our own importance born from our ego rather than by his Spirit.

The cleansing of our modern temples has begun. It will continue with great acceleration.

That’s what has been so interesting about this COVID 2020, especially this summer. It’s not something that the church has to watch the world have to navigate. But it has drastically and dramatically affected the way that we go about our church services, our interactions with each other, our worship times, our prayer times. And that’s why we’ve spent the last two months trying to emphasize taking ownership for your own spiritual formation. If you’re whole religious activity, if your whole Christianity was based on that one hour a week of meeting at church, there is nothing left for you. 

I love it because I’m hearing story after story about Living Streams’ people and how there is a lot of meat on the bones, even though we’re not meeting that one hour a week on Sunday morning. The life groups are thriving and meeting still, and ministry is happening here and there from our interns and other people volunteering here and there. And the evangelism that’s going on. And the care. Some of our police officers are seeing so many opportunities down at the police force to share the hope that is in Jesus, because they’re feeling pretty hopeless these days. And the outreach toward the black community and the kind of pain that they’re navigating right now, and all the messages they are being filled with, and helping them and loving them and making room for them. It’s just been awesome to see. I’m so encouraged. I’m so proud of you, Living Streams Church. But we are not through this thing. We have got to ramp up even more and let the zeal of the Lord fill us for more and more, as we go forward.

I want to talk to you quickly as we’re coming to an end here. The biblical concept of zeal. If you read in the Old Testament about zeal, it and be troubling. One of the main stories is this guy Jehu in 2 Kings 10. What he does is, he uses the sword. He actually is filled with the zeal of the Lord and he goes and he attacks people with the sword and he kills people. And he tears down idols and he comes against Baal worshippers. Obviously it’s a completely cultural lens that we’re looking through versus what they were. It was a dog eat dog world, way more so in that regard. Yet, the zeal of the Lord was causing him to want to come and fight to the death against the things that were set up against God.

Then you think of David in that moment where this Philistine giant is speaking evil of the name of the God of the armies of Israel. David just can’t take it anymore so he runs after this giant. And he hurls this stone at him and takes him out. He says, “You will not be able to sit there and defy the name of my God.” 

He was filled with this zeal. Even to the point when Goliath falls, he goes over and he chops off his head and he carries it back to Jerusalem. This is gruesome, heavy stuff, especially from our cultural lens. In that day and age it probably would not seem that far-fetched. But the zeal of the Lord was causing people to rise up and stand up against the evil that was trying to pervade, trying to overcome. 

Realizing that what Jesus said is “The kingdom of heaven suffers violence.” The evil is not unwilling to be violent or aggressive, and those who are of God need to understand that “the violent take it by force”, that we advance by enthusiasm, by aggression. 

Again, now please hear me out. Please hear me out. Because this is Old Testament context and we’re talking about the life of Christ and he pulls out a whip. He didn’t kill anybody. He didn’t hurt anybody that we know of. But he was definitely causing a scene. He was definitely inflamed and he was making people really upset and challenging what they were doing and standing against them.

But we even times like when Hitler was on the rise. There was a guy named Bonhoffer. He’s definitely worth reading and studying about. He was a Christian. He was wrestling with this same thing. What is the church’s role in the face of this evil? Millions of Jews were being killed and others. It was so clear that it was evil. And yet most of the church just kind of stood aside and was passive in the face of it. Some of them were even complicit. 

And yet Bonhoffer knew this was not right. And he actually ended up putting together a plot to assassinate Hitler. It didn’t work, but he got found out and he ended up losing his life because of it. But as he wrote, it was a really hard thing to wrestle with. But he knew evil had come and he needed to stand up against it. So he did what he could. He did what he thought was right. Only history can tell whether it was right. Only heaven will reveal what was really right,

I think of Rosa Parks sitting on that bus. And she just was so filled with indignation about what was happening in the society around here. She says, “I will not give my seat up. I’m not going to just play along anymore. I’m going to stand against, no matter what it costs.” The zeal of the Lord consumed her. And something beautiful was brought about. A shift was made because of her courage. And she suffered for it. And many others did, as well.

So we have these times where God calls us to stand up. I just really feel like this is a moment where our church, we need to not be passive or complicit. When there is all of this swirling around us. Evil, I really do believe is trying to come in to America, to our society and to our church. It’s coming in the forms of deceitful divisions. It’s wanting us to vilify the other, no matter what we do, and to put ourselves in different camps that aren’t necessarily Christian. We’ve got to stand against it. We’ve got to know better.

Romans 10 talks about zeal. Paul was talking about these Pharisees, these people that he was with. He said they had so much zeal but without knowledge. They were just pledging allegiance to all kinds of things that were not of God. So we need the zeal, but we need it to be with knowledge.

Here’s what I think we need to be zealous for right now. Please hear me out. I don’t think we need to go around and kill anybody. I’m not saying anything like that. 

What we need to get zealous for is real simple. It’s always the same. We need to get zealous for prayer, We need to get zealous for God’s word. We need to get zealous for morality. We need to get zealous for evangelism. Church, it’s our time. This is what we need to apply all of our energy towards.

First of all, prayer. Prayer is listening to Jesus, worshiping Jesus, letting our attention, our affection be on Jesus, and interceding for others. Please schedule it into your week. Schedule it into your day—times for this. Don’t be caught with your hands down while the battle is going on. That’s that Moses, Aaron and Hur analogy. 

We need to get zealous for God’s word. This is study the Bible. Don’t have zeal without knowledge. Don’t listen to all the different things happening the media, and social media. Don’t let them tell you what the Bible says. Read the Bible for yourself. Get to know this thing. Get solid in it, because if you don’t, you will be washed away by the cunning and craftiness of the deceitful schemes that are being perpetrated in our world. You’ve got to know the Bible. It’s our anchor. It’s what’s going to keep us steady in the storm.

Recognize Jesus’ voice among all the other voices and revelation from God’s Spirit. Seek for him to speak to you. I’ve been hearing some cool visions. I shared about it in the weekly email, something that God was speaking to me.

We need to get zealous for morality. We need to uproot the compromises we’ve been making in our lives, and uphold the personal convictions God has given us. I had someone tell me, “Now, you know what? I love Jesus. I’ve been doing great. But I’ve been allowing alcohol to have too much of a place in my life. I just need to take it seriously.” 

We’re not going to get away with loose compromises and loose living, playing games with sin. It’s time for us to shore up. Like John the Baptist who had such intense morality and simplicity, but it caused his word and message to have such intense authority and clarity. 

We need to take ownership of our own spiritual formation, as well.

Lastly, evangelism. There is nothing that makes Jesus more proud of us than when we tell people about him. There’s nothing that fills his heart more. There’s nothing that puts a party on in heaven like when one sinner repents. 

We need to engage in society’s pain. Find out who’s hurting and go be with them. Try to find a way into their lives through hospitality and kindness and generosity. 

We need to defend the truth of our faith. Don’t let people come and tell us we have to prove we’re not a racist by compromising our biblical values. That’s ridiculous,

Lastly, we need to proclaim the good news of God every day. It doesn’t have to be complicated. It doesn’t have to be a message. But continue to just let people know that Jesus is the answer. Jesus has the answer. The gospel of Jesus is the power of God to actually bring about salvation. And everybody wants to be saved. 

We’re going to have a time like we’ve been trying to do for you at home to take some ownership of your own spiritual formation. To practice being the priesthood of believers. Whether you’re at home by yourself or if you’re in a group, we’re going to put up a slide and we want you to just take communion in your home. If you’re in a group, have someone who’s supposed to lead, you can all just look at that person right now. And be like, “I think he’s talking about you.” And that person, you can go ahead and lead everyone in this communion time. We’re going to put up the slide and take three or four minutes for you to do that at home. 

Slide:

Jesus, we pause to remember and thank you for the intensity of your love and justice towards the world.

Now we hold this bread and cup to remember the cross, when the fullness of your zeal for love and justice came together. 

As we eat this bread please fill us with your zeal for love and justice. (Take and eat Jesus’ body broken for you.)

As we drink this cup, please cleanse the temple of our lives from greed and pride and deceit. (Drink the cup. This is Jesus’ blood shed for the remission of your sins.)

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

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Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson

Jesus Teaches Nicodemus

Michael Johnson
Series: John
Chapter 3

Starts at 0:41

John Chapter 3. The title of my sermon today is Jesus Teaches Nicodemus. 

Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”

Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

Let’s stop here for just a moment. You know, let’s think. Why did Nicodemus come to Jesus? Was he attracted to his kindness? Possibly. The bible says in verse 2 he was attracted to the miracles. That Nicodemus saw miracles. Maybe he wanted some new wine. Maybe he was seeking God. You can come to Jesus at any time (Nicodemus came at nighttime), for any reason. Jesus says, “Come to me all of you who are weary or burdened.” If you’re burdened, come to Christ. If you are weary, or tired, come to Jesus. Whatever your situation or circumstances, at any time of day, at any part of your journey, come back, come to Christ.

Nicodemus was very significant. It says that he was a member of the Jewish ruling council. Nicodemus was a religious leader. He was a well-to-do man. He was probably pretty wealthy. He was intelligent. He was a professor of religion, mostly likely. Well, for sure he knew and he taught the law very well. He fasted regularly, probably. He most likely gave ten percent. 

But Jesus Christ says to Nicodemus, “That’s not enough.” He says, “You must be born again.”

It’s interesting that he says this. This is something that’s going to come through that I’ve found throughout this entire teaching and talk with Nicodemus. That God is trying to show Nicodemus that God has done for us what we cannot do for ourselves. Nicodemus had his religion but he needed to be born again into a relationship. Religion is one thing. Relationship is another.

Nicodemus really missed the mark, didn’t he? He called Jesus Christ Rabbi—a teacher. But Jesus Christ is the Son of God. As David previously preached, Jesus Christ is God. And Nicodemus, was missing that .That was a big problem. That’s why Jesus says, “You cannot see the kingdom of God.” Nicodemus wasn’t seeing Christ for who he really was. 

Who do you say Christ is? Is he a teacher to you? Is he a person of historical fact? Or is he your God? Is he your “abba”? Is he the Son of God? Who is he to you? Think about that.

Jesus talks about this “born again.” I looked it up and it means “to be born from above.” We’re all born from below. But have you been born from above? Being born again is described in other ways and other places in the Bible.

Ezekiel says an old heart to a new heart. I will give you a new heart and put a new Spirit in you.

The Apostle Paul says an old creation to a new creation. Those who are in Christ are a new creation. The old is gone and the new has come. Old to new.

Peter talks about darkness to light. But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation., God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who calls you out of darkness and into the wonderful light.

St. John, says from death to life. Okay.

Back to Nicodemus. He wasn’t seeing Christ for who he was. I’m going to give an illustration. I work in the seeing business. I help people to see better. One of the major reasons people don’t see well is because they have a cataract in their eye. A cataract is something that everyone gets. A cataract grows inside your eye. The Bible says everyone sins and sin is inside of our hearts. And Jesus knows your heart. 

I had a recent encounter with a man and he said to me, “I can’t drive legally.” 

I looked into his eyes and I said, “You’ve got a cataract in your eye. We’ve got to get that out.”

And he said to me, “I can see just fine. I don’t need to get it out. I can see cars. I can see street signs. I can see the road just fine.”

I had to remind him that, didn’t he just come from he Motor Vehicle Department? “Didn’t the DMV just tell you that you failed your test?”

He said, “Yeah. But…”

I said, “This is what the law says.” I put up the eye chart. I put up the law of the requirement for driving legally. I said, “Go ahead and read those letters.”

He said, “I can’t do it.”

I said, “Okay, that’s because you have a cataract inside your eye and you need to have it removed. Otherwise you’re not driving.”

The BIble says that the law of the Lord is perfect and it revives the soul. It converts the soul, the King James Version says. Sometimes people think that they’re good, that they’re okay. But they’re not until they look at God’s perfect way, which is to love God and to love one another. Until they look at God’s perfect law, they don’t have a realization that they have a sin problem. They don’t know.

How about you? Do you think that you’re a good person? I would say that you probably are pretty good. But are you absolutely perfect? Have you ever stolen or lied? Have you ever coveted your neighbor? The Bible says that all have sinned and have fallen short of the glory of God. That sin has infected all people. 

Let me tell you, this person, when they go get their cataract removed, they are happy. They say, “I can see the trees! I can see the leaves on the trees! I can see faces much better! I can see things completely different. There’s more light that comes in.” And they have a testimony, right? And they are singing and praising the surgeon.

The same is true when someone is born again. They are telling people. I was in a conversation at a lunch and we were just talking about our faith. And someone walked by, because he heard us talking, he said, “Guess what? I’ve been born again!” And he was all excited. This is what happens.

Jesus says back in John Chapter 2 that he didn’t need any testimony about mankind because he knew what was in each person. The lying, the stealing, the greed, the vulgarity, the prejudice, the pride, the anger, the fear. All of that is causing war with God and strife and war with each other.

It all started with Adam and Eve, right? Adam and Eve were in this garden and the sinned. Right? And then their sin was passed to the next generation. Cain and Abel, where Cain murdered his brother. And then the next generation received sin, the next generation, and so on and so forth—right to you and right to me. I’m a sinner. I admit it.

Do you admit it? That’s what God wants. He wants us to come into agreement with him. And then he wants us ultimately to thank him for what he’s done. Because, once again, God has done for us what we cannot do for ourselves. The Bible says that sin and death have entered the one man, Adam, but forgiveness for sin and life has come through the one person of Jesus Christ. Your body may be alive, but inside you’re dead. Your soul and your spirit are dead. And you’re searching in the wrong places. You may be searching in the wrong places, like sex, right? For fulfillment. Or money, or position, or power, or material things. All those things cannot fix you. You need Jesus Christ. You have to come to the cross. You must be born again.

Now, in verse 4, Nicodemus asks this question:

“How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

“How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.

“You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. 

He told Nicodemus who he was. But Nicodemus still is not seeing Jesus Christ for who he really is. He’s asking these questions. “How can this be? How can someone be born?

You don’t have to know everything about God to come to God. No one is going to know everything or know God completely, ever. You have to trust God. You have to come like a little child. The Bible says unless you change and become like a little child you won’t enter into the kingdom of God.

I have a three-year-old son. He is learning how to swim. He will come to the edge of the pool and he will jump to me. And guess what? If I don’t catch my son, he’ll die. He trusts fully in me. He comes. By faith, I say, “Come on, son.” And he just jumps right into the pool.

That’s how we have to come to Christ. You don’t think about it. You don’t have to have everything explained. You don’t have to figure everything out. You just come to Jesus and Christ and you trust him for what he’s done for us. You trust him that he died for your sins. You trust him that he came back back to life. Just like a little child. Come to Jesus Christ.

We don’t have any trouble using these cell phones, do we? I don’t understand how this thing works. I don’t understand how this camera works that I’m looking at right now. You can see me and you’re looking at your phone, or you’re looking through that computer. But I’m trusting right now that you’re looking right at me. We just trust. You put your faith completely all in Jesus Christ. Trust Christ and Christ alone.

Why couldn’t Nicodemus understand Jesus Christ? Jesus is talking about the Spirit. He says you have to have the Spirit to be born again. The Spirit does the work. Once again, Jesus is saying that God has done something for us that we cannot do for ourselves. He’s telling Nicodemus about the Holy Spirit. His Spirit. So I’m going to talk a little about the Spirit. 

The Spirit convicts people of their sin, the Bible says. When the Spirit comes he will prove to the world to be in the wrong about sin and righteousness and judgement. The Spirit empowers us to live the Christian life, to resist temptation we have to have the Spirit. The Spirit teaches us moment by moment. The Spirit lives inside every believer. If you’re not a believer, he wants to live inside of you. Do you not know that your bodies, you Christian believers, are a temple for the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit wants to fill you up. Do not be drunk on wine, the Bible says, which leads to debauchery. But instead be filled by the Holy Spirit. And the Holy Spirit wants to flow through you.

This verse is our church verse, right? Look at John 7:38 for just a moment:

Jesus says, “Anyone who believes on me, just as the Scripture said, streams of living water will flow from within.”

What flows from within is the fruit of the Spirit: the love, the joy, the peace, the patience, the kindness, the goodness, the faithfulness, the gentleness, self control. And I would even say sharing your faith, sharing Christ with others, having a desire to read your Bible, your prayers. You know what? The world around us needs those things. 

Jesus is teaching Nicodemus that you have to have the Spirit, that the Spirit does this for you, makes you born again. The Holy Spirit is responsible for the conversion.

I found here the condition of the natural man. The Bible says in 1 Corinthians that the person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God, but considers them foolishness. Jesus Christ, God, is having this conversation with Nicodemus, who does not have the Spirit. And Nicodemus is not getting it because Nicodemus does not have the Spirit. 

Have you ever had a conversation with someone, and you put out there on the table something spiritual and they just don’t get it. Or they even tell you, “That’s crazy.” Or, “That’s foolishness.”

I’ve had all those interactions. The Bible says that the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but for us who are being saved, it’s the power of God and that God delights in the preaching of the gospel. The preaching that is foolishness to the world, God delights in. So I’m here knowing that I’m a delight to the Lord preaching what the world would say is foolish. And you know what? I don’t care because Jesus Christ is my Lord. He’s the one that I live my life for. I don’t live my life to please man. I’ve been called many things. Foolish is one of them. Crazy. A crazy zealot for God. But I have had a powerful experience with the Lord many times and I know deep, deep down that Jesus Christ is alive, and that Jesus Christ is in me and he’s working through me, and the angels in heaven really do rejoice when people come to Christ. They will for you today when you come to Christ if you do.

We’re going to look at verse 14. Jesus continues to tell Nicodemus: 

Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”

Jesus is saying a story that Nicodemus knows about and that he’s read many times. Remember he was a teacher of the Law. He was a professor of religion. He knows this story. Nicodemus is listening to the story about when Moses leads the Israelites out of slavery and they are in the desert. The Israelites at this time are complaining about the food, about the water, and then God allows them to go through a patch of venomous snakes, snakes that, if they were bitten by one, they would die. And then they started dying. So Moses prays to God and God instructs Moses, “Make a snake out of bronze. Put it up on a pole. And anyone who looks up at that pole and believes will not die but will live.”

That is a foreshadowing of what happens with Jesus Christ. He was buried but he came back to life and anyone who looks to Jesus Christ and puts their trust on Christ and Christ alone will live, will have eternal life. Once again God has done for us something that we cannot do for ourselves. Could those Israelites put some mud on their wounds and live? No. Could they go to Urgent Care? There was no Urgent Care back there. Could they go to the doctor for their wounds. No. God only had one provision. He said, “Look to that bronze snake and believe. And if you do, you’ll live.” There was not other way.

Jesus Christ says, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one gets to the Father except through me.”

I think there’s only one way because he makes it simple for us. Simple, even a chid can understand. It’s simple but it’s so difficult. Christ is the stumbling block. He’s the cornerstone. 

Why would God do such a thing? Why would he make a provision for humanity? Because he loves you. It says it right here in John 3:16. This is pretty much the whole gospel in one verse. It says:

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 

Nicodemus is getting an earful, isn’t he? Jesus says: 

For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 

You don’t have to be afraid to come to Jesus Christ. He’s not going to condemn you. He wasn’t sent to punish you.

Sometimes I ride the light rail. It’s interesting because, when I’m on the train going down Central and the authority comes on the train, you see people scatter. They just jump off the train because they’re afraid. They know they didn’t buy a ticket. Then the authority walks around and says, “Show me the ticket.” So people that don’t have a ticket are gone! The people that do say, “Here’s my ticket.”

The point is that you can come to Jesus Christ. He’s not like the authority on earth. He’s not going to put you in jail. He’s not going to condemn you. The Bible says God didn’t send his son into the world to condemn the world. He came to save the world. You can come to Christ how you are. You don’t go and clean yourself up and then come to Christ. You can’t. Christ cleans you up. 

If you’re an addict to pornography, if you’re a drug addict, if you’re self-righteous or prideful, you can’t go and try to get all clean and then come to Jesus Christ. No. It doesn’t work that way. You have to come to Jesus Christ first, put your trust in him, believe on him that he’s alive. He comes into your heart and he starts cleaning you up from the inside out. He’s the Great Physician, by the way. 

When he called Levi he said, “It’s not the healthy who need a doctor. It’s the sick. I’ve not come to call the righteous, but the sinners to repentance.”

You come because you’re drawn by his kindness. And when you’re with him, you want to stay with him. You put your trust and believe on him, he cleans you up from the inside out. Let’s continue on in verse 18:

Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 

Remember Nicodemus came to Jesus at nighttime. He’s probably a little bit embarrassed of his homies, right? The other Pharisees in the Jewish ruling counsel. He probably didn’t want theme to see. But you know what? Jesus doesn’t condemn him for that. He doesn’t shame him. He sits with him. But in the same token, you can come to Christ. 

Whenever you come to Christ you come to the light because Jesus Christ is the light. He says, “I am the light of the world.” He says, “Anyone who walks after me will never walk in darkness but will have the light of life.”

You come to Christ, you’re in the light.

Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.

I just want to spend a couple of minutes in sharing the gospel. Nicodemus was a worker. He was a very hard worker. But we’re not saved by works. We’re saved by mercy and we’re saved by grace. Listen to this verse in Titus 3:5-6:

…he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. He saved us through the washing of rebirth and renewal by the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us generously through Jesus Christ our Savior, 

You Christians have heard this before. Ephesians 2:8-9

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.

Listen, I say it this way. If a generous person came to you and he said, “I’m going to forgive all of your debt, past, present and future.” Wouldn’t you be grateful? I know I would. I still have mortgage. I still have student loan debt. I’ve got a wife and five kids. I would be grateful. But I would say, “I’ll believe it when I see it.” I go down to the bank and I say, “Has my mortgage been paid?” And they'd say, “Yes, Mr. Johnson, your debt has been paid.” I wouldn’t go at that point and give the bank another thousand dollars. They would say, “What are you doing? Your mortgage has been paid!”

That’s what you’re doing if you’re not putting your trust in Christ alone. If you’re putting your trust in religion or being good, you need to repent from that. Or putting your trust in other gods, in addition to Christ, you need to repent from that as well. Trust in Christ—in Christ alone. He did it all. 

The Bible says it this way—Paul says, “I don’t set aside the grace of God. For if righteousness could be gained through the law, then Christ died for nothing.” He did it all, folks. He paid it all. 

I’m going to end with an illustration. Bear with me. Here we have three types of people. We’ve got the natural man like Nicodemus. On the outside he looks like he has it all together. But on the inside, he has sin. He has pride. Just like all of us. The Bible says that we’re born into iniquity. We have sin in us. So here he is. And he’s in our world. 

Then suppose that he put his trust in Christ and he became born again. Here we have a person who has been born again and so instead of being filled with sin now, they can be filled with the Holy Spirit. 

Both of these guys are in the world together. This guy, the natural person, we see it all the time, in our world, is kind of spewing off what comes out of his heart. The sin, the greed, the strife, the vulgarity, the anger, resulting in domestic violence, not taking care of your kids, family breakdown, the denial of who Jesus is. The disbelief. 

Then you have the guy who is filled with the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit is flowing through him. Love, joy, peace, all around the world, patience and kindness and goodness, so on and so forth. God continues to pour into this guy. God’s grace is endless. His mercies never end, the Bible says. More love and more joy and more peace. He gets filled up again and he overflows. This guy is a living streams Christian right here, okay? God just keeps on pouring his grace right into him and into our world.

But I want to talk to you guys, because I believe a lot of us are like this guy right here. This guy, the born again Christian who is led by his flesh. The Bible describes him as the carnal Christian. He’s got the Spirit in him. He’s been born again. But he’s also got sin in him and look at him. Sometimes he’ll be in church. And maybe after church someone will cut him off and he’s got the finger. 

Sometimes he really wrestles with his identity. He may have depression. He may at one moment be praising God and the next moment he may be having an idol. He’s pouring out also. 

And this guy over here, the natural person is looking at the carnal Christian saying, “We’re no different. You’re a hypocrite.”

So how does the carnal Christian get to the Spirit-filled Christian? How do we get from here to here? The Bible says that we come to Jesus Christ. We come to the cross just like Nicodemus did and we confess our sins. And God is faithful and just. He forgives us of our sins and he purifies us from all unrighteousness. And here we are again and God is pouring through us faithfulness, gentleness, self-control and so on and so forth. 

I’m going to be quite honest with myself and with you, that I go back and forth. I have my moments. I say, “Wow, that was the Lord in me.” And then I have my other moments, “That’s all Michael right there. Lord. Michael.” But as time goes on, God wants us to be more of the Spirit-led, Spirit-controlled, born again Christian. Because we have to, guys.

Listen. I was a product of the Arizona Child Foster system. I grew up in very dysfunction. My dad was an alcoholic. Long story short, he beat my mom. He beat us. I was adopted. The adopted dad was committing adultery against my mother . They got a divorce. My younger brother, alcoholic, died. Me, myself, I have a lot of sin to talk about as well. It’s not that we’re all black men and this is the product of the systemic racism, or this is a product of the white man putting their thumb on the black man. No! It’s a product of sin. We all have sin. 

It took me until after I was born again to realize that. I always wondered, “Why am I this way? Why did all these things happen to us?” And God gave me the answer. When Jesus looked down at our world and looked at our world, it’s pretty messy. And Jesus said, “Father, forgive them. They don’t know what they’re doing.” 

If you’re up to no good, if you’re led by your flesh, guess what? Expect bad things to happen to you. If you’re a Spirit-led Christian and you have yielded to Christ, fully surrendered to Christ 24/7, but you live in this world, guess what? Expect bad things to happen to you. If you’re a carnal Christian. It doesn’t matter who you are. If you live in this messy world, expect bad things to happen to you.

The gospel message is that Jesus Christ, once he comes inside of you, he never leaves you. He’s always with you. And you have eternal life that you won’t lose. If you could lose eternal life, it was never eternal in the first place. That’s very good news and that gives me peace today. If I die this afternoon, I know where I’m going. And I have peace inside. All around me it’s chaotic. But the peace of the Lord dwells richly inside of me and I’m able to overflow that peace into the hearts of others around me: my wife and my children, so on and so forth.

I’m going to end this message by asking you guys: which of these three best represent your life? Are you the natural person who’s never believed on Christ? Are you the Spirit-filled Christian soho is overflowing love and joy and peace, so on and so forth. Or right now are you this carnal Christian who’s got some sin in your life. You’ve got the Spirit, you’ve been born again, but you need to come to Jesus.

If you are the natural, come to Christ today. Believe on him. If this made sense to you, not like Nicodemus—not making sense—but if it does to you, guess what? You’ve been born again. You believe. Tell someone. Send an email to Pastor David. Tell someone in your house right now. “Hey, that makes sense. I believe on Jesus Christ.” Then begin to grow in your faith. Read your Bible and keep coming to church,

If this is you, the carnal Christian, again, come to Christ. Confess your sins and live, not bound by sin, but live in the victory of Jesus Christ.

That is the message for today. I just want to thank you and thank Pastor David. I’m going to end by just saying May the peace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you always.

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©️2020 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Pledge of Allegiance

David Stockton
Series: John
Chapter 2

(Starting at 1:50)

John Chapter 2. Let’s read this and let the word of God just wash over us to quiet everything else in our minds and hearts and see what John the Apostle is saying about Jesus in this chapter:

On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee. Jesus’ mother was there, and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding. When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him, “They have no more wine.”

“Woman, why do you involve me?” Jesus replied. “My hour has not yet come.”

His mother said to the servants, “Do whatever he tells you.”

Nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding from twenty to thirty gallons.

Jesus said to the servants, “Fill the jars with water”; so they filled them to the brim.

Then he told them, “Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.”

They did so, and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine. He did not realize where it had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew. Then he called the bridegroom aside and said, “Everyone brings out the choice wine first and then the cheaper wine after the guests have had too much to drink; but you have saved the best till now.”

What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory; and his disciples believed in him.

After this he went down to Capernaum with his mother and brothers and his disciples. There they stayed for a few days.

This is the word of the Lord. This is John writing as he’s thinking back, as he’s accounting the life of Jesus and the interactions he had with Jesus in the flesh, in the body, in Israel at that time. And John is at the end of his life. He’s been through a lot. He’s probably around 85-90 years old. He’s writing up close to the end of the first century. He’s recounting and writing to us, trying to give an account for why he believes in Jesus.

There is debate as to who he was writing to or who he had in mind. To me it seems that he might have had Hellenistic people in mind. Both the Greco Roman world that he was probably interacting with up in Ephesis and the way that he starts out calling Jesus the Logos, which is a Greek word. It’s more than a Greek word, it’s a Greek concept. It has a lot of depth and meaning in the Greco Roman world. So you can check last week’s message if you want to know more about that.

He introduces Jesus as the logos and he goes on to talk to us about this guy John the Baptist. John the Apostle, which we’ll call John A, then you’ve got John the Baptist, exhibit John B. John the Baptist  was this really neat individual who, in his day and age was able to exemplify walking in the world but not of the world. I mean, in some drastic ways. John was wearing camel skins. He was eating locusts and honey. He lived out in the wilderness as far as we know. He was baptizing people. He was calling people to come out of the religious system of the day. He was calling people to come out of the greed, out of their selfishness, out of all of the different things that are sinful. He was calling them out and saying, “Please come and return to God.” 

And amazingly, this wild haired, wild guy had a lot of people coming out to be baptized by him, to hear what he had to say. Jesus called him a prophet later on. His prophecy, the words that he spoke, were able to cut through the confusion of that day and really land in people’s hearts. It was drawing people out of the worldly systems, out of all of that into kind of a more fresh beginning with God. Even these people that were steeped in religious things in the Jewish world. 

I’ve been praying that we’re going to have a lot more John the Baptists rise up in our time, in our day, as we have so much noise, dissension and actual pain and confusion. We really need the prophetic voice to come on strong and cut through it all and speak to our hearts so we’ll know how to be in the world but not of the world—how to navigate this challenging dynamic that we’re in, with all of the political tensions, with all of the shouts and screams. Even with deciding how we’re going to navigate these racial issues and this racial pain. And other things as well.

I love the John Baptists. We talked about him last week as well. He was a fighter. He stood up in the face of injustice, oppression and immorality. His intense morality and simplicity gave his message intense credibility and clarity. I’m praying for some more of that in our day and age as well.So now we’re moving on to John Chapter 2. I want to spend a little time unpacking a few things here, but really focus on verse 11. 

I was a camp counselor one summer, actually a counselor in training. They gave us camp names. They called me Spelunk. Spelunk is obviously referring to cave exploration because I had done a little of that in my time. It’s always fun to go exploring in caves. You through maybe a little hole, crawling through and it’s not that good; but then it opens up into kind of a bigger cavern. And you can go and there are lots of different places to explore. There are lots of places that, as you go through it, it opens up into these broad things.

As you’re reading the book of John, he has so many phrases that you could spend the rest of your life just chewing on and diving into. So, as we read here in Chapter 2, it’s just like that. 

As we go on, I want to talk to the kids for a second, that are still awake, that haven’t left the room, that may be upside down on your couch by now—I totally understand that. No problem. But, kids, if you would draw me a picture of what it looks like to explore a cave, a spelunker. Someone who is going into a cave, exploring. That would be a fun drawing for me to see this week. Thanks for the ones that have been coming. Make sure you put your address with them so that I can make sure something shows up in your mailbox. There you go kids: Spelunking. That’s what you’re going for today.

So let’s dive in and do some exploration in John 2. Here are some phrases. He starts out chapter 2 with “On the third day.” Now, for those of us who know about the resurrection of Jesus, for John, who obviously did, that phrase “on the third day” is such a big deal. He uses this phrase and we don’t know if he’s talking about the third day that he had been with Jesus as one of his disciples. We don’t know if this is three days later from when he had that interaction with Nathaniel. Or we don’t know if he’s just kind of saying, “Hey, on the third day Jesus always does cool stuff.” We’re not sure. Again, loaded question. We don’t have time to unpack too much.

He talks about going to a wedding in Cana. A wedding in this day and age is a very big deal. A wedding for the Hebrew people is a very big deal. There’s a year-long lead to a wedding. There are all these traditions, all these things that happen, it’s a real communal thing, getting people together. When you are a people who are being oppressed, when you are a people who have no privileges, no rights as Roman citizens, it was a really big deal to have these moments where people could come together and have this special time of rejoicing and feeling human in the midst of all of this. So this was a wedding that Jesus was invited to and it was in Cana.

Now we don’t know where Cana was or anything like that. It’s a town that didn’t make the cut in a lot of ways for our maps. It was such a small village and very insignificant in a lot of ways. But here it is that John is mentioning Cana as a place where Jesus did something really cool. I just love that about Jesus. I love how different he is than our day and age. Anything we do cool we make sure and post it and make sure everyone knows how we cool we are and all these things. But when Jesus was doing the first miracle, the first time he was really revealing to humanity who he was, he was doing it in a way that very few people were going to know about it. In fact, really just his family, his village and his disciples.

That’s the emphasis we’re trying to make as we go through all of this. What are we going to do to heal the world, to bring real change into our world? I think the Jesus model is to just first take care of the ones that God has given you. I think that’s the most important thing. In addition to that, make sure you’re taking care of the ones he’s asking you to give yourself to. Not just the ones he’s given you, but the ones he’s asking you to give yourself to.

So that’s what Jesus was doing here. When the wine was gone, Jesus’ mother said to him… so there’s this other phrase. Jesus had this interaction with his mom. She said, “They have no more wine.” We don’t have time to dive into it. But I wonder what made her think Jesus could do something about this. What in the thirty years of her living with Jesus made her think Jesus could do something about this, that we don’t know about? The only thing we know Jesus did between zero and thirty was he spent the night at church one time and was asking some questions when he was twelve. So I just think it’s so interesting to think about their relationship there and what is being implied in this.

His answer to her is, “Woman, why do you involve me?” He’s basically saying, “Hey, you’re not really in line with what I feel like my Father is telling me to do here.” And he says, “My hour has not yet come.” He knew there was a timing to his life. He knew there was moment where he was supposed to step out. But at this point he knew it wasn’t time to do that. And yet still he does in a small way show his glory to those that were there.

And then a bunch of things go on. But I want to focus in on verse 11. Verse 11 says, “What Jesus did here in Cana of Galilee was the first of the signs through which he revealed his glory and his disciples believe in him.”

So again, John is writing, end of his life, probably trying to speak into the Greco Roman world that he was feeling like an evangelist towards, or feeling a mission to go and preach to. And he was sharing about what sign Jesus gave him in his process of believing, and the disciples as well. 

This is the first of seven signs. In the gospel of John there are seven signs. There are seven miraculous things that Jesus does that are sometimes included in the other three gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke. Sometimes they are not. But here they are: 

• The changing of water into wine. 

• The healing of the royal official’s son.

• The healing of a disabled man.

• The feeding of the five thousand.

• The walking on the water.

• The healing of the man born blind.

• The raising of Lazarus.

• And, obviously, the resurrection would be another sign as well. 

These are the signs that John gives us in his gospel. And I feel like John’s probably letting us know these are the most significant moments in his journey of faith as he was interacting with Jesus and coming to a full understanding of who this man, this small town man really was. And that, ultimately, he was the Son of God, or as we talked about, he was the logos. He was God’s who plan, agenda, politic. He was everything. He was there in the beginning.

So John went from a place of just interacting with this person who was kind of John the Baptist for all he knew, to ultimately seeing Jesus as God in the beginning. Forever. And writing about that.

So this was the first sign. This was a significant sign for John. And I like what he says here. He says that Jesus revealed his glory in this way and his disciples believed in him. John’s trying to do something significant there. We know that the whole theme of the book of John , again, we talked about it last week, John chapter 20 says that “Jesus performed many other signs [than the seven or eight that I’ve given you], in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written so that you may believe in him. So that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.” Life in his name.

Basically John is writing this whole book so that you and I will believe in him, will believe in Jesus. So that’s our whole goal. As we read this, we will continue to believe in Jesus. Those who don’t believe in Jesus, or don’t have any kind of connection with Jesus, that after reading this, they’ll take start to take Jesus seriously and they’ll begin a relationship with him. For those of us that have a relationship with Jesus, that this will foster and build and nourish our faith so that we’ll continue to believe in Jesus, even against all of the other shouts that come our way and all of the other things that are trying to demand our affections, our attention, and our belief.

I want to start to unpack what it means to believe. All of my life I was raised in a Christian home. My parents believed in God and believed in Jesus and they had their own reasons and they would share some of those testimonies with me from time to time. I remember one time actually it was interesting, but it was really significant because I know who my dad is. My dad was this big, strong guy. My dad did not like to rely on other people, did not like to make other people have to help him. He was very strong. He was very stout and he helped a lot of people all over. It was a very tough thing for him to allow someone to help him.

He told me a story about when he and my mom were first dating. They actually went to this Christian conference of some sort. There was someone there speaking and he had spent time growing up in a home where his mom and dad were very Pentecostal, like, “Hey, Jesus is the best.” And telling people about Jesus and really believing in miracles. But my dad had grown up and became maybe a little jaded in that direction. He had spent a lot of time living in the world. Then when he met my mom and my mom started actually came into full faith in Jesus, he started to think more about it again.

He said they went to this conference. At the end of it, they were going to pray that people could receive the Spirit of God. He was watching people being slain in the Spirit. Please don’t get caught up in “slain in the Spirit,” this is not the point of this message. I don’t see it in the scriptures and all of those things, so I’m not trying to make it a proponent of when the Spirit shows up. I’m just telling you a story that my dad told me of an experience in his life that helped him believe.

So he and my mom went forward. He, again, was this big, strong football player guy and there was this little lady that was praying for people. It wasn’t that everybody was falling over when she prayed for them. But he was just standing there, and when she prayed for him, he fell over. Again, this is not the important thing. Please don’t get caught up on this. But for my dad, it was the Lord showing up to my dad in a significant way saying, “Hey. I am here. I am real. And I do have a plan for you.” It was something that helped my dad believe. It helped my dad go, ‘Okay.” And my dad never talked about being slain in the Spirit and didn’t start thinking this important. But he did really start thinking it was important to believe in Jesus.

I think it’s interesting, however we come to this concept or this phrase “believing in him.” We all come with baggage. Some of us come with stories in our life of Jesus’ faithfulness that have been passed down for generations and maybe even shown up in our own life. Awesome. Wonderful. Hallelujah. That’s great. Some of us come to this message and this moment right now—you’ve never seen Jesus do anything. In fact, the times you’ve prayed, or the times you’ve tried to lean in and say, “Okay, God, I need you,” nothing has happened and nothing’s shown up.

So we all come to this phrase differently. I understand that. What I’m trying to do is just to show you the way John is sharing this is what’s helped him believe. And yet I need to unpack this word believe a little bit for us Faith is a hard word to conceptualize and make practical and embody. Belief is the same thing.

So believing in him. I want to start out to tell you what I think John the Apostle is trying to communicate when he says that “I began to believe in him.” A picture of that, I think, comes where, in the book of John, John never uses his name but he refers to himself as “the disciple that Jesus loved.” And he refers to himself as “the one who leaned against Jesus’ breast,” particularly on that night of communion he was kind of leaning on Jesus.

When I would try to encapsulate what John the Apostle would define faith as, I think he would define it as complete trust—or trust over time is another phrase that I have heard. It’s the idea of just kind of leaning on Jesus because you know he’s got you. And John, for whatever reason, it’s interesting because he was originally called one the of the Sons of Thunder. There was something about him and his brother James that was just passionate and wild, and maybe abrasive ,and maybe explosive. They were fighters. They wanted to call down fire on people at some point. But as we see John who has spent time with Jesus and been formed into the image of Christ, later in life we see John as this one who just wants us to love one another. He writes so much about how important it is that we care for one another, that really the law of God is fulfilled when we love each other. 

So here one of the Sons of Thunder has been totally formed into this trusting, caring, compassionate person. I just love what Jesus can do in our lives. That’s what John is saying. We need to trust him. He leaned on his breast. Totally at ease because of Jesus’ sovereignty. What I want to do is to bring to us that concept today. Where are we? Are totally at ease in the knowledge of Jesus’ sovereignty when our world is getting shaken, or our own souls are getting shaken, when our community is getting shaken, when our nation is getting shaken, when our health is getting shaken?

What Jesus wants to prove to you and demonstrate to you is that he really is sovereign. You can completely trust in him. It’s not a blind trust, but a trust over time and time and time again. Jesus showing up. It’s the substance that shows up for the things you’re hoping for, as Hebrews would say. 

So that’s John’s definition. It’s a complete trust. When John is referring to this miracle that happened at Cana in a small town, small village way, he’s saying that that was the beginning of my complete trust in Jesus. I think that’s where we need to start walking with Jesus and seeing where our complete trust is these days.

Secondly we have Paul. Paul the Apostle wrote most the New Testament. He’s actually called the Apostle of Faith like John would be called the Apostle of Love. When Paul defines faith, it’s more of a pledge of allegiance in a lot of ways. It’s Independence Day weekend, where we celebrate the freedoms that we have as Americans, and those who have brought us to this point, and the fight to continually maintain these freedoms for all people. It’s good and right. We have this pledge where we make our kids do, where they put their hand over their heart and they pledge allegiance to this country and all that.

For Paul, faith is really a pledge of allegiance. He refers in Romans 10 that we need to confess with our mouth that Jesus is Lord and we need to believe in our heart that he rose from the dead. In some ways, to sum that up, Paul is speaking about this confession of our mouths and this pledge, believing in our hearts that we confess that he is sovereign over creation. He is Lord. We believe in our hearts that he is the only one that can save us from death. Or the only one that can give us God-life. That is who we believe in for the resurrection.

So for Paul it really is this kind of allegiance. It’s not just a moral or intellectual ascent of like, “Oh, I say the right things, now I’ve got it.” But it’s this pledge of allegiance. “For the rest of my life, for the rest of my days, for the rest of my breaths, I’m going to do what is in the best interest of Jesus and his kingdom.” It’s basically coming out of one kingdom and pledging allegiance to another kingdom. 

It’s basically, “Denying the citizenships of all of my life, that I’ve always been, all the identities that I’ve ever had prior,” and now saying, “There’s one identity, one citizenship that I really am pledging allegiance to, and that is the kingdom of Jesus Christ, both now and forever.”

There is this author, Matthew Bates, that I’ve been reading a little bit about. I like what he says. He breaks it down into three different sections. He says faith, or believing, is a mental assent. There is a reality there. There is sworn fidelity. That’s this kind of allegiance concept of really kind of changing where we did have allegiance and making a new allegiance and being faithful to it consistently over time. And he also talks about embodied loyalty. I like that because now it’s the word becoming flesh. Now it’s faith and works. It kind of brings the whole thing together. Where our faith should cause our feet and hands to do different things. Our faith should cause us to go different places and be with different people that, maybe without faith in Jesus we wouldn’t have.

I like that. Mental assent, sworn fidelity, embodied loyalty. Mental assent. We need to take care of what we read and listen to and watch and fill our minds with. Absolutely. We live in the information age, not the truth age. Don’t forget that. Our saving faith comes by the hearing of the Word of God. That’s what Romans teaches. As we take in information, knowledge, understanding, it creates faith. It might create faith in Jesus, or it might create faith and allegiance to other things besides Jesus. Sometimes those allegiances can be a challenge where the Bible teaches we can’t really serve two masters. So we have to watch what comes in because it can produce faith and allegiance in a wrong direction.

Sworn fidelity. We need to take care what we pledge allegiance to. No one can serve two masters. There are powerful political forces clamoring for our attention and devotion. We need to make sure our allegiance to Jesus is not compromised or in competition with anything else. 

As I was praying this morning about this message, the image of Revelation 18 came to mind. In there, again, I don’t want to go real deep into it, but in there you have this call from the angels of God at the end of this kind of shaking that’s gone on in the world. And it says, “I want you to come out of her.” And it’s talking about the whore of Babylon. The world system. The world’s order or whatever it might be. It’s this call to the people of God at that time to come out of her. She is going to be ruined and exposed and destroyed. And you need to come out of her. Speaking to this challenge for Christians that we need to be in the world but not of the world. We need to serve this world and care for this world and try to bring healing to this world, but we’ve got to make sure we don’t get caught up in worldly ways in the process, or become worldly in the process.

Embodied loyalty. Your calendar, your phone usage app, your banks statements, your family—they are all proof to see where your loyalties lie. For most of us, it’s not that we are loyal to bad things, even though it’s tricky these days. You know, the devil shows up as an angel of light, we’re told. And marketers can make things look so good these days that we do have to watch out what we’re becoming loyal to.

The other thing I want to address is that, not only are we loyal to bad things, but sometimes we’re just so passive to God things. God’s callings on our life. God’s guidance. We need to make sure our faith actually is embodied in some way. It shows up on the ground. It shows up in practical life. It shows up in this world. It shows up in our relationships with those around us. It shows upon the way that we use the resources that we have. It shows up in those places.

So there you have mental assent, sworn fidelity and embodied loyalty. So just to wrap up how it’s working its way in my life right now. I was sitting in a direction team meeting. We’re obviously trying to figure out what to do as a Living Streams organization. I’m always trying to figure out what I’m supposed to do as just a follower of Jesus, as well. We just spent some time listening. I could picture Jesus there, like, in front of me, looking at me. And he was just kind of ready to say something. I was, like, “Jesus, just say it. Just say what you want me to do and—bam—we’re going to do it. We’re going to go all out. It doesn’t matter what anyone says. We’re just doing it.”

And I really had a sense—I wrote about it in my weekly email—this is what Jesus said, “I don’t want to tell you what to do. I want to see what you’re going to do. I’ve invested in your life. I’ve taught you my ways. I’ve given you my Spirit.” It was almost like he had this joyful anticipation. Like a father who in some ways knows his children are going to do something great, like he’s excited to see. He was just, “I just want to see what you’re going to do.”

I felt that message was helpful because it freed me up from feeling like I might make a mistake. It made me start wanting to do things that I know Jesus is going to think is beautiful. That’s really my challenge to each one of us. Twofold: 

1) we’ve got to figure out how to make sure we’re not getting caught up in the world, or secular humanism, or some sort of Marxist approach. We’re going to have to make sure and not get caught up in this world and the world systems. We’ve got to realize where we are already caught up in the world systems and we’ve got to figure out how to pull out, how to come out and be separate—being in the world but not of the world. 

2) At the same time, we’ve got to figure out then how we can serve this world, how we can walk in this world in a way that gives our Heavenly Father a lot of joy. I’ve shared some of those ideas. We’ll share some more of those ideas at the Congregational Meeting July 9 at 6:30. Don’t miss it.

That’s really what it’s all about. As we sit here as Americans. As we sit here as whatever ethnicity we might have, whatever political party we have. I think it’s really important to make sure that, above it all, first and foremost, every day our affection, our devotion and our allegiance is to the One who conquered death and showed us how to live. To really be there first and foremost. And then to go into this world and engage in society’s pain. Absolutely. Do the things that really do help bring changes in our world like John the Baptist did and like we need to today.

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©️2020 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

God's Politic

David Stockton
Series: John
Chapter 1

(Starting at 2:22)

I’d like to try to give some context to our cultural moment that we have here. I’d like to begin to show us what God’s politic, or God’s agenda or vision or what God wants to see happen in America. Then I also want to try to keep us from being puppets pulled by the strings of the devil, the world and the flesh. This is always a challenge for us, but it seems to be very challenging right now as we’re all disrupted and uncomfortable and kind of grasping in some ways what we’re supposed to do. We have these powerful internet trolls or powerful marketers and we have people that really are trying to put forth deceitful schemes right now. We need to be very aware as believers. Like Jesus taught us, “Be wise as serpents and harmless as doves.” So I wanted to keep us doing that.

With that being said, we’ll jump into these three different sections. First of all, our cultural moment. We humans, every single one of us, no matter what ethnicity, no matter what socio-economic part of the scale we’re on, we are all closet critical theorists. Basically, critical theory is this: It’s the reflective assessment and critique of society and cultural in order to reveal and challenge power structures. 

That’s the philosophical term for what a critical theorist is. And it’s true that we’re all doing that. In other words, we all have an opinion on what is wrong in society and whose fault it is.That’s basically what critical theorists do. And so we’ve all been closet critical theorists all this time. But as this disruption of COVID and the social unrest and racial unrest—all this stuff is stirring up so much in us. We’re not so much closet theorists anymore. We’re coming out and we’re shouting. We’re feeling these things and there’s emotion attached to all of them. We’re posting them and hearing other people’s posts and it’s really causing this major stirring within our soul. We know things are not right. We know things don’t feel right. And so we want to know what we can do or whose fault it is and all of that. Just be aware of that. That’s not a new reality. That’s something that we all kind of have all the time. It’s something that philosophers have been studying for a long, long time. It’s just our moment to manage this. Our moment to decide how we’re going to handle disruption, discomfort, the challenges that the world has faced all over the place for a lot of years.

Every week I’m on this call with pastors from around the Valley. Ever since COVID hit and we had to start to shut down our churches, we started getting together to really kind of encourage each other and talk with each other. It’s been a really beautiful thing to see the churches in Phoenix and some other parts rally together. It’s been very encouraging. This last week one of the guys was talking about critical theory and some of that. He was saying that what he has seen is that everyone in our churches seems to be falling into three different camps. 

The first camp is the people denying that COVID is a real thing or that it’s something that shouldn’t disrupt our lives at all. It’s not real. It’s not a big deal. There are some people in that camp saying that racism isn’t something new or something we should really alter or change. It’s just going to always be there. So there’s this kind of a denial camp. A lot of people aren[t really saying it, because it’s really unpopular. Some people are definitely in that camp.

Then you have the people who are admitting there are some things that are really wrong. There are systemic realities that are wrong, both that COVID has revealed and the horrors of racism that have popped up have revealed; but also our political unrest as we’re going toward another election. All those things have stirred all those things. So we admit there is a problem. And we’ve decided to pledge our allegiance to one specific solution. Whether it be political. Whether it be some sort of human rights solution. Whether it be some sort of medical thing. Depending on how you apply it. And we feel that we’ve found something of an agenda, something of a social movement that we can jump into, we can pledge allegiance to and we can run with it. So that’s another camp of some of those people.

And then there’s another camp. And this is where I think a lot of people in the church might be finding themselves in. We admit there’s a problem and we want to do something to help. We want to figure out what to say, what to do. And yet we really don’t feel like anything we’re hearing, anything we’re seeing really does solve the problem. Whether it be how Trump wants to do it, or Biden wants to do it, or Black Lives Matter wants to do it, or some other agency wants to do it. Nothing really seems to really encapsulate what we feel is a good solution. 

So we’re challenged in that regard. And I’m not saying good or bad on all of those entities. I’m sure there are a lot of people trying to do good things. But we’re just left feeling a little uncertainty. We’re left feeling a little unsure. We’re left feeling a little lacking in all of the different movements and things that we see. That’s where we’re at. 

That’s what brings us to the book of John. What I love about the book of John is John was writing this book toward the end of his life. He’d been there and he’d done that. He had tried a lot of things. He’d seen a lot of things. And now, he’s probably around 90 years old as he sits to pen this gospel account of the life of Jesus. The other three gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke had already been in circulation. The Church was not brand new. The Church was a few decades old at this point. It was established in Jerusalem and some other places and it was starting to get established in farther reaching places. John, who had walked with Jesus—literally in the flesh for three years—and had seen the Spirit of God come and fill the Church and begin to overcome obstacles and do miraculous things, and see people’s lives changed, and see it take root in the Roman Empire against all odds and against persecution and oppression in major ways.

John was both a Jew and a Christian, which, basically, there was nothing worse you could be in the Roman Empire during his time. And yet, John was continuing to go through his life and continuing to let the message, the gospel of Christ, filter into his life; continuing to develop and form into the image of Christ. He took seriously his own spiritual formation, even now that Jesus was gone. He took seriously the evangelism that Jesus was calling him to. And he was going around the world telling people how to love one another and sharing about the love of Christ.

And this was John. He had experienced very, very severe persecution. Church history tells us he was actually dipped in boiling oil as they tried to kill him. But he survived that. They didn’t know what else to do with him so they exiled him to Patmos, a prison island. And he survived that as well. Now he’s just old enough to where they thought he couldn’t do any damage. So he’s brought back and he’s able to sit down and pen these words to tell us what he would say Jesus’ life and message really were all about.

As he says in John 20:30 and 31:

Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book. But these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life in his name.

This is why he wrote these words. So that we would understand and see that Jesus is the answer. He’s God’s solution to anything we could ever go through. And that, if we find ourselves in him, if we follow in his way, if we receive what he has to give us, it will create life in us. The kind of life that death cannot overcome. The kind of life that doesn’t just feel like existence and going through the motions. The kind of life that gets us free from all the strings, all the puppet strings of this world that are trying to control us and tell us how we’re supposed to live, or what life really is.

So, for you kids, real quick, as we go forward. This idea of a puppet on the strings. This is the image I want you to draw and send to me. So draw a puppet and draw the strings trying to control he puppet and move the puppet. 

Because that’s a reality in our world. We are controlled by something. We think we’re Americans and nobody controls us. But we have marketers telling us what to do and what life really should look like. We have the social media and all the other media telling us what’s important, what’s valuable and what’s not. We have all these things, even in our own soul, dividing us and telling us which way to go and what to do. So what we really want to do is figure out how not to be a puppet attached to those strings, but people who are living the life that God has called us to live. Because that’s really what the world needs. It needs for each one of us to figure out what he’s designed us to do and then live into that fully.

So that’s what John’s going to teach us about here as we get into this. So let’s read, John 1:1:

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning.

Here’s some important words as he uses this word Word to describe Jesus. He could have used a lot of different words but this is what he says: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. And then he goes on:

He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

There was a man sent from God whose name was John. [John the Baptist] He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe. He himself was not the light; he came only as a witness to the light.

The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world. He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him. He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him. Yet to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God—children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband’s will, but born of God.

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

John is writing this. We have seen it. We have touched it. We watched it day in and day out. The glory of God made flesh in the person of Christ.

(John [the Baptist] testified concerning him. He cried out, saying, “This is the one I spoke about when I said, ‘He who comes after me has surpassed me because he was before me.’”) Out of his fullness we have all received grace in place of grace already given. For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.

Here it is. John is writing at the end of his life, after he’s seen it all, done it all, experienced all of the world, experienced all of the life of Christ inside of him. He sits down to write. And he says, “What am I going to call Jesus? What word can I use to describe who he is or what God did in his life?”

And he uses this word logos. And it is an extremely powerful word. It has so much depth and connotation both in the Greek world, the Roman world and we have the word word for it. Which is kind of a let down in a lot of ways. Basically, in the Greek world, as John was writing this, the divine reason implicit in the cosmos ordering it and giving it form and meaning. This is basically what all of the philosophers were trying to figure out. What is behind everything? What is really what causes everything? What is the motivation for everything? What is the purpose of everything? They kept trying to peel back the layers and all the noise in society. All of the guesses. All of the thoughts. All of the assumptions. They were continuing to try to peel everything back to get to the core. The true reality of the cosmos. And that was the word that they used.

So John is grabbing this word that is so intense and powerful and provocative and only really belongs to a certain segment of philosophical society. And he grabs it out of there and he says, “Hold on. This is who Jesus is. In the beginning was God’s appeal. God’s politic. God’s agenda. God’s plan. God’s design. It was there in the very beginning and it was with God. And it was God somehow.”

Then, at some point, he says, “And then that plan, that design, that theory, that vision, whatever it might be, it became flesh and walked among us.” And John is saying, “And I got to see what it looked like and felt like and sounded like as I walked with Jesus.”

God has an agenda. God has a politic. God has a plan. God is very, very intricately involved in every single thing that happens in our world. There is nothing he does not allow. There is nothing he does not control. And it’s very hard for us to process this. That’s why in the prophets it says, “Your thoughts are not my thoughts.” They’re too high for me. They’re too confusing for me. I don’t understand your purposes and intentions all the time. 

But what Jesus is, and why we’re going to spend this year maybe, or at least the next few months, in the book of John is because I want us to get a really clear picture of what God’s agenda is, what God’s message is. And there’s no better place to look than Jesus Christ. He is the whole thing. He’s God’s plan. He is God in the flesh. He is the glory of God, which is really what we long for. All of the discomfort we have, we’re longing for the reign of Christ ultimately. Because his reign is truly good. It’s truly glorious.

Everything that we do ends up being human. It ends up being temporal. It ends up being good for some and bad for others. That’s all we can come up with. And yet God has come in the flesh. God has dwelt among us. God has now left his Spirit to be among us so we can know the plan of God. That’s what he says at the end there:

No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God and is in closest relationship with the Father, has made him known.

We can know God’s plan, God’s politic. And it’s found in the logos. It’s found in Jesus Christ. 

We’ll skip down to this next part. What do we do? How can we keep from being this puppet on the strings of society or the gravity in this world that’s pulling us into superficial and artificial busyness to where we think we’re helping, but we’re not really helping. We think we’re doing something but the next thing we know we’re wanting to run over here. And then that person says “This is better.” And we’re kind of in between all these things. And we all know with the internet you can get any kind of substantial media or substantial video or information to support whatever side you might be on in any spectrum of any discussion. And you watch something one day and it really compels you to go this way. Then you watch something the next day and it compels you to go this way. It’s exhausting and frustrating.

So how can we be people that are not puppets on a string? That’s where I want to talk about John the Baptist. We’re going to talk a lot about Jesus and how he reveals to us God’s plan and what he did. It’s going to be fun. But John the Baptist is the next person that John the Apostle introduces here. I think there are some key things coming from the way John introduces us to him that will help us know how to move forward. Or how to apply or how to get involved in the agenda of God in our world. 

The first thing is that we need to realize that you nor no other human is the answer to the world’s problems. Now this is made clear in John 1:19, where it talks about John. It says: 

Now this was John’s testimony when the Jewish leaders in Jerusalem sent priests and Levites to ask him who he was. He did not fail to confess, but confessed freely, “I am not the Messiah.”

Here’s the deal. Here’s what we have to begin with. We have to start at this place where we realize humanity cannot accomplish the work of God in and of themselves. And I know this feels a little funny, because sometimes it’s confusing. And the second point I’ll make will make sense a bit. 

But I want you think of the tower of Babel. The tower of Babel. The flood had come and wiped out people. People were freaked out. They were unsure of what to do. They were nervous. Over time they began to have this idea that we could really come together and we could build this tower and maybe it would help us to ascend to know what God knows. Or maybe it would help us to have this thing that was high enough that, if the flood waters come then we’ll be above it and God can’t even wipe us out. In some ways there is something in humanity that, basically, we think we know better than God.

And really, it comes from a place where we’ve been let down by God because of pain in our life, or struggle. And eventually we begin to say, “Okay, God. Forget you. I’m going to figure this thing out on my own.” 

And we become self-reliant. And it’s a subtle way that it comes in. Even in the Garden of Eden, that’s where it began. The serpent came and said to Eve, “Do you really need God? Does God really know what’s best for you? Maybe you should decide for yourself what’s best.”

We’ve got to find a way to humble ourselves as a nation, as a city, as a people. To humble ourselves before God and say, “All right God. We’re not going to say another thing. We’re not going to make another move until you speak and you lead us.” 

This is the way that John the Baptist did it. John the Baptist went outside of society. John the Baptist was eating locusts and honey. John the Baptist was trying to find out what God wanted him to do. And then he was compelled by God to do the things that he did. And then when they asked him “It seems like you’re doing something good here, John. You’re drawing people back.” 

He said, “Look, Im not the answer. I’m just here to help people connect with God. Because God is the answer.”

And I think that’s really important for us as we go forward. 

Secular Humanism. Any humanistic effort is going to fail. It’s going to fail. It only is the work of God that’s going to produce the kind of goodness and beauty we want to see in our world.

So, first of all, realize it’s not us.

The second thing that we need to do is realize that God loves to share his glory with the world. He loves to share his glory with the world. He wants everyone to know him and his plan. And he loves to do it through you and me. So this is where it flips a little.

First, realize that it’s not you. It’s not in you. It’s not something you can come up with to solve the world’s problems. But God, who has a solution, who can actually solve the world’s problems has decided that his favorite tool is you. The favorite way that he wants to move in the world and express his glory and help people know his plan and actually experience the goodness of his plan is through. It’s through the Church.

The scripture that supports that comes from John 1:33. It says:

‘The man on whom you see the Spirit come down [this was John saying this] and remain is the one who will baptize with the Holy Spirit.’

John is saying, I could baptize you in some water and it could be this sign of you saying no to what society has you doing and kind of you getting freed of the puppet strings, so to speak. And it’s you now being governed by God. It’s you submitting to God. I can do that for you. But it’s not really going to empower you in any way. But he’s saying there’s one coming, the one who you see the Spirit come down on. He will baptize you with the power, with the Holy Spirit, with the presence of God that will help you actually overcome your own sinful nature. That will help you overcome the sinful nature of those around you. The sinful nature of your parents or those who have hurt you. He’s going to give you the power.

So that’s the second thing. We need to realize that, first of all, the power is not in us. It’s not something that we can achieve if we just work hard enough. It’s something that we have to find God’s power to do. So first of all, it’s not in us. And like John, we need to realize that Jesus has given us the power. And if we come to Jesus, he has the power. And he loves to use us. To fill us with his Spirit so we can go forward and speak the word of God that actually brings healing. And do the things of God that actually help people and lift people up, instead of just create by-products of other oppressions in some way. It’s so important for us to realize. And John was a master of this.

And the third thing that we have to remember is that the Word became flesh. I think this is so amazing. That our God, the God who made us, the God who knows everything about us, the God who was rejected by us, the God who has been betrayed by us—he came. And he became one of us. He became flesh. He didn’t just say what we should do. He didn’t just tell us from afar. But he came and entered into our pain and struggle—entered into our own sin. He took all of humanity’s sin upon him on that cross. He became flesh. He associated himself with us in order to really set us free and to show us how much God loves us. And God has a plan for us.

So, for us, we need to do just like what John the Baptist did. John 1:35-37:

The next day John was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, “Look, the Lamb of God!” 

When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus. 

I love this about John. First of all, John the Baptist is like, “Look, this is not in me. I don’t have the answers. I’m not the answer. Don’t look to me. We need to look for the one who has the power. The Holy Spirit.” And so he would say, “This is what we need to do.” 

But he knew that the Spirit was able to empower him to do some good. And so he did baptize. He did disciple people. He did speak the word of God. He did speak out against oppressive and abusive leaders. Absolutely he did those things. He let the word of God become fresh. And he didn’t try to bring people to himself. But here he says to his disciples, “That’s the one that you should follow.” 

And so they left him. They were following him and then they left him and followed Jesus. And this is Andrew and a guy named Peter. John was not holding on tightly to everything. He was doing the work of God. Speaking words out and meeting people where they were at and helping them find God. But he didn’t try and hold all that in together. But he continued to just point people to Jesus. Point people to Jesus. Point people to Jesus.

This is such an important factor. Some of the experience I’ve had—and this is one of the things we felt like God told us to do when we went to live in Belize. We needed to go and stir up the pot and try to help people find Jesus, and help disciple people. But then we needed to leave as well. Part of that strategy we felt the Lord was saying was we needed to make sure people connect with God and not with us.

It’s been so encouraging to see these guys like Orelle and Kenny and then the people they’re hanging out with—the work that they’re doing. It’s completely disconnected to us. Because they have now connected with God the Father. They don’t need what I can help them with. They need Jesus himself. They need his power in their life.

It’s so important that we connect people to God, we connect people to his strength and his life. And we need to make sure we’re not connecting them to us. 

So this is a little funny when you have a church. But we want to be a sending church at Living Streams. We’ve said this before. Living Streams, you have never needed us. You’ve never needed me. Not one day of your life have you needed me. You’ve got to connect your life to God. You’ve got to find a way to be in relationship with Jesus, follow him, hear his voice. Then walk in the power that he gives you in the direction that he leads you. This is so important. 

In some ways, God has kind of shut down the Church world in some ways in our city and in our nation. And I think this is one of the things he is wanting to teach all of us. That it is our time. Individually. In our own spheres and circles. We need to connect to God and we need to walk in his power. The priesthood of believers that we’ve been talking about. You have been sent, we’ve been talking about. That God really does want to share his glory with the world. And the way he wants to do  it is through you. In your own families. In your relationships. In your friendships. In your workplaces. In missionary endeavors. Whatever it might be. 

It’s funny because, at the beginning of the service I was thinking about saying, “Hey, we’ve postponed a couple of weeks. We’re looking at July 12. But if you’re really in a place where you want to be with God’s people and you really need that, I know Church for the Nations down the street is open, Bethany Bible is open, I know New City shut down for a couple of weeks. North Phoenix is postponing just like us. But go to places. We’re all in this together. No one needs to be connected to one individual or one church. We need to be connected to Jesus and go where he is sending us. 

For me, Living Streams is where God has called me to be and to care for people. I hope he’s called you to be that way too. But, ultimately, we need Jesus. We need to be led by him. And right now the world is shouting a thousand different things that we should do. We need to find a way to quiet ourselves, and get with Jesus, and make that connection stronger than any other connection. And there’s only one person that can do that for you. And that’s you. 

As a little bit of response time for you, whether you’re alone or you’re in a group, we’re going to put a little slide up and we’re going to pray these things. Take a moment to still our heart and then pray through these and write some of those things down and then share them with the group that you’re in, or maybe text somebody if you’re alone. 

But take some time and really allow God’s word to kind of wash over you, and then God’s Spirit to speak from within you and give you some guidance for this week. So in the quietness of your own space, take minute and pray through these things.

Take a moment and ask Jesus to quiet your mind and help your soul be still.

Then take a couple of minutes to ask Jesus these questions:

Where have I been prideful and relying on my strength or wisdom instead of God’s?

What things have I pledged time or allegiance to that may be limiting what God wants to do through me?

Now ask Jesus to tell you what action he wants you to focus on this week.

(Listen for his still, small voice, and don’t be suprised if it is something simple)

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©️2020 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Illumination: Guided by God

David Stockton
Series: 2020 Fasting Season

Good morning. Big time playoff game today. That’s why you came to early service. No, just kidding.

I feel like the Lord’s definitely wanting to give us what we need for the journey. I don’t know what 2020 holds, but I think there will be some battling going on. I think there will be some challenges. But I think there is going to be a lot of ground that the Lord is going to ask us to take for him in 2020. It’s really important that we get filled with what he wants to fill us, because you’re going to battle either way, right? So you might as well have what the Lord wants you to go into battle with.—otherwise, you’ve got to battle without it. He’ll be with you.

We’re trying to get filled up. The Spirit is important. This morning we’re going to continue to talk about our spiritual formation: forming habits that form us. We’re going to be talking about illumination and what that ultimately means. How we can be guided by God. It’s such a radical, strange thing.

But first, we have big news for you. It was about four years ago we made a transition and as we assessed what Living Streams was and where it was at, we had a good church family. Never, never not had a good church family. I’ve been here for almost twenty years now. See all that gray coming in? Watch out!

It’s been almost twenty years and this is a good church family. We also had a good staff and we had a good house, this house that we’re in right now. And yet, we had about 570 adults coming on a Sunday morning. And we just felt like there was more room for others. We felt like as we looked at the house, it’s like we’ve got two bedrooms full and there are four bedrooms sitting there empty. 

So we really prayed. We said, “Lord, we know that there are a lot of people out there who don’t know you and who don’t have a good church family.” And we really want to see this thing grow, this thing be maximized and used in that way. So we set a kind of vision statement for ourselves. We wanted to go from about 570 adults to 1,000 on a Sunday morning by 2020. And back then, we were like, “That sounds crazy. That’s almost doubling.” Last week we had over 1,000 adults on a Sunday morning. 

It was awesome. I didn’t even care if we got to 1,000. I just thought it was a good goal to shoot for. But that was really neat. Just so you know, I’ve said it a million times before. That number really isn’t important. It’s just a means to an end. The end is that the people who are joining us would actually knit their lives together with us. We know Sunday morning is good, but there’s so much more that can take place. There’s so much deeper, richer fellowship that can take place in groups where you can be known and you can know people.

I’m just asking. Obviously there are more of you coming than there used to be. And those of you who are newer to the church and are not plugged in in some other way, even if it’s at another church, I don’t care. Get into smaller communities because it’s so good. But we have some great opportunities here. We have Life Groups. We’re about to launch some new ones. We have mission trips that are coming up. We have an internship coming up. Next Sunday, for all the newer people who want to figure out what Living Streams is all about, we have a Starting Point Lunch after third service, which will then let you know about Explore Group—which is a nine-week track we want people to go through as they’re trying to get plugged into the church. All kinds of opportunities coming up. So please, if you enjoy what the Lord’s doing here enough to come on Sunday mornings, I would encourage you to take that next step and really get to know people in a deeper way.

And we have Wednesday night prayer night coming up. The next two Wednesdays we have Wednesday night fasting and prayer night. You can see information in the bulletin about that. Last Wednesday was awesome. The Lord always shows up. He spoke to me about a lot of things. Some of it’s even going to come out today.

All right. Christian Spiritual Formation. Let’s go through our slides to review, in case there are new people. also, it’s good for us to remember. Christian Spiritual Formation is defined simply as the process of moving from less Christi-like to more Christ-like. That is the goal of Christianity. God loves you the way you are. He died for you the way you were. He comes and wants to fill you with the Spirit the way you are, so that you will not stay the way you are. He wants to grow you, mature you, and make you more into the image of Christ. That’s the Spiritual Formation of which we are all a part.

Less Christ-like we described as the broken heart—the fallen, deceitful, restless, unwanted longing heart that needs to be refined. It needs to be healed and all of that. We talked about that a few weeks ago in a sermon. You can check that out.

The beautiful heart. We did a whole sermon series on it last November. Talking about the heart of Christ, the beautiful heart and what it looks like. You can check that out later.

We also have been talking in this series, the stages of the journey. We’re not the first ones to follow Christ. Did you know that? This is not the first generation. We’re not the only church that loves Jesus. It’s not an. American thing. (gasp) What? Yeah! This has been going on a long time. As we’ve gleaned from church fathers, church mothers that have come before us, obviously we have the scriptures. But people have been trying to apply the scriptures in all different aspects of culture, of society, for a lot of years. They’ve come up with some things that are helpful for us.

They say there are about five stages of the journey. These are our words. They’re stolen words, but we’ve put them together this way. So you’ll find different versions of this. But basically, all people at first are walking in darkness. They don’t have the light of Christ and they are walking in darkness. John 1 talks about that. At some point, God interrupts the darkness with light. That’s a moment of awakening. 

We go through seasons of darkness before we know Christ, but even after we walk with Christ we still kind of go through seasons where we feel like we’re in the dark again. Then a new form, a new aspect of the light of Christ begins to move on us. But it happens for those who are new to Christ, the first time around, Then what also happens is we keep going around in this formation cycle.

Darkness, awakening, and that moves us into seasons of purgation. Purgation is a horrible, fun word. Basically it’s just horrible and not fun at all when you’re living through it. It’s that process where God is now trying to refine your heart, refine your soul—to burn out the love of the world, to burn out the fleshly desires so that he can establish a heart for the things that are beautiful, the things that are right, the things that are good.

And we go through these seasons that are hard. But it’s all God trying to form us into his image.

Then, after that, there are seasons in our walk with the Lord that are illumination. That’s what we’re going to talk about today. You can pop up the illumination slide.

Here’s a scripture. We did a scripture with each one of these stages. This is the one we’re going to be talking about today.

Illumination - Jesus was teaching his disciples. This was right before he went to the cross in John 16:13

But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all the truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.

Jesus was teaching his disciples. The disciples were people that walked in darkness. They fished in darkness. They tax-collected in darkness. They did all those type of things. Then, at one point, Jesus, the light of the world, literally the exact replication of God Himself in flesh, walked up to their table or their boat and said, “Hey, come follow me.” He interrupted their darkness. And they, for whatever reason, were compelled to follow him.

As they followed him, they walked with him for three years, they had the actual light of God there, next to them. And then, Jesus was always saying certain things about how he was going to have to leave. That he was going to die and he was going to go away, and where he was going they could not come. And they kind of never really understood it. 

But this is where he’s unpacking all of this. He said, “Don’t worry. When I go there is One that will come.” And he calls him the Spirit of Truth. “And he will guide you into all the truth. And he won’t speak on his own. He will speak what he hears the Father telling him. And he will tell you about things that have not yet come. Or things that are coming to pass.”

And Jesus began to introduce, and you can read about it in John 14, 15, 16, a little bit in 17, Jesus was kind of teaching about this new relationship with God that his followers were going to have. It wasn’t a flesh to flesh relationship like they had with Jesus. But it was going to become a spirit to spirit relationship. That they who were flesh for sure also had a spirit. And that spirit inside of them was longing and restless until it could connect with God,who is spirit. And Jesus was actually saying that this Holy Spirit would come.

Then, sure enough, Jesus ascended into heaven. And the disciples were all sitting, not just the eleven, but also the community of people that had followed Jesus—his mother, the other Mary, and all of a sudden, as they’re waiting on God, it said that the room began to shake. There was a sound of rushing wind and in came—it’s got to be one of the strangest things of all time. Gonna watch the DVD in heaven, or YouTube it. But it says there were things like cloven tongues of fire that came and rested on their heads. Illumination.

They began to speak in tongues that they didn’t understand. But they were tongues that other people could understand—other languages. As there was this moment of confusion, excitement, whatever it was, some people started asking questions about it. And yet, the disciples who had not experienced this prior, but had the instructions of Christ and the scriptures, enough to say, “I think this is what was talked bout in the Old Testament in the book of Joel, where God is pouring out his Spirit upon us.”

So there it was! This new relationship. This new phase of Christianity. This new covenant promise, where the Spirit now came and illuminated things and then began to guide the disciples. They were actually living in very precarious times. One false move and they could be killed. And yet, the Spirit was guiding them and began to guide them in the way that they would walk and the way that they would lead the Church.

They were shocked because, all of a sudden, they would go to a different place where they weren’t people who knew Jesus. But then they would pray for them and the Spirit would come upon them. And then, what was crazy was they even went to people who weren’t Jews and the Spirit came upon them. They were like, “What is going on around here?”

From then on, people who were following Christ were trying to figure out what it means to receive the Spirit of God, to be baptized or filled with the Spirit of God and to be guided by the Spirit of God. Illumination.

Because I love stories so much, I want to go back to the life of Moses as we begin to unpack this. We’ve talked about how Moses is a good example of these stages. Moses was in darkness, for sure. He didn’t even know who he was or where he came from. He was raised in Egypt, but he was a Hebrew. Then an awakening began in him. The way it was expressed was he killed an Egyptian who was beating a Hebrew, when he began to realize who he was. He was going through an awakening. But that awakening wasn’t that one moment. It was lots of moments that ultimately led to a burning bush. 

This burning bush moment wasn’t the first time he had this uncertainty, or this tremor going on inside. But this is the first time he actually encountered the presence of God. God was speaking to him about what was already inside of him, and connecting the dots and making it make sense that God had put all of that in there, to lead him to this moment.

Then, the very first thing God does now that Moses is saying, “Okay. I believe you are God. What do you want me to do?”

God says, “I want you to go back to Egypt where it’s going to be hard for you.”

He leads him right back into the most difficult, challenging thing possible. Purgation. You guys tracking with me? That’s what we talked about last week. Now we’re going to talk about this stage of illumination. I want you to pick up in Exodus 4:18-3. This is right after the burning bush:

18 Then Moses went back to Jethro his father-in-law and said to him, “Let me return to my own people in Egypt to see if any of them are still alive.”

Jethro said, “Go, and I wish you well.”

19 Now the Lord had said to Moses in Midian, “Go back to Egypt, for all those who wanted to kill you are dead.” 20 So Moses took his wife and sons, put them on a donkey and started back to Egypt. And he took the staff of God in his hand.

21 The Lord said to Moses, “When you return to Egypt, see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders I have given you the power to do. But I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. 22 Then say to Pharaoh, ‘This is what the Lord says: Israel is my firstborn son, 23 and I told you, “Let my son go, so he may worship me.” But you refused to let him go; so I will kill your firstborn son.’”

So Moses is getting all these instructions. We who know the story know the way it all plays out. But this what the Lord is telling Moses, and it’s all vague for Moses at this point. But there’s a connection between the firstborn son. 

24 At a lodging place on the way, the Lord met Moses and was about to kill him.

What? 

25 But Zipporah took a flint knife, cut off her son’s foreskin and touched Moses’ feet with it. “Surely you are a bridegroom of blood to me,” she said. 26 So the Lord let him alone. (At that time she said “bridegroom of blood,” referring to circumcision.)

27 The Lord said to Aaron, “Go into the wilderness to meet Moses.” So he met Moses at the mountain of God and kissed him. 28 Then Moses told Aaron everything the Lord had sent him to say, and also about all the signs he had commanded him to perform.

29 Moses and Aaron brought together all the elders of the Israelites, 30 and Aaron told them everything the Lord had said to Moses. He also performed the signs before the people, 31 and they believed. And when they heard that the Lord was concerned about them and had seen their misery, they bowed down and worshiped.

The Lord is speaking to Moses. So he’s left the burning bush. Now, somehow the Lord is continuing to speak to Moses with the burning bush. I want you to catch the significance of that. As Moses is moving into this new mobile relationship with this burning bush God. In the process of doing that, God is telling Moses a little bit more detail. He’s talking about how he’s going to go and he’s supposed to say these things to Pharaoh. But Pharaoh is going to refuse to let the people go. But then God is basically going to convince Pharaoh. And Moses is supposed to say, “And if you don’t, God is going to kill your firstborn son.”

The very next thing that happens, Moses gathers up his family. He’s got his son Gershom, we talked about that last Sunday. He’s got his firstborn son and they are getting ready to go to Egypt. Then out of nowhere it says that the Lord was standing and was going to kill Moses. But Zipporah—not Moses—somehow figured out, “The Lord is going to kill Moses if I don’t circumcise our son.”

How? I have no idea. But maybe there had been talk. I mean, you can imagine Moses was probably circumcised. And Zipporah knew about it. And there was probably a debate in their household. Moses was probably saying, “You know, I wonder if I should. I don’t know.” 

There was a covenant established with Moses’ people. God said, “This is the covenant I’m establishing with you.” 

The covenant was established with Moses, but Moses’ son had not entered into that covenant. And yet, God was serious about it. In some way there is a connection to the firstborn son of Pharaoh. It’s almost as if God is saying to Moses, “If we’re going to go do this thing, we’ve got to get your house in order first.”

But the thing that is so amazing to me is that Zipporah figured it out. God helped. Zipporah figure it out. God spoke to Zipporah. How? Again, I don’t know exactly. But it’s an amazing thing. She doesn’t quite understand all of this, but she calls him a blood husband because she doesn’t understand who this God is—why he would require this. Moses might not fully understand all of this stuff. And yet, Moses was saved from God because God communicated to his wife about this thing. So God can speak to us. God can communicate to us. 

Let’s continue. They go into this time, and you guys know the story. They go into Egypt. Moses talks to Pharaoh. They go back and forth. Ten plagues. God is showing his power over all of the gods of Egypt. At the end of it, the last plague was death of the firstborn sons of Egypt. Yet all of the Israelites were saved, not only from that, but all of the other plagues, which is fascinating.

Finally, Pharaoh says, “Okay. Fine. Go.” And Moses leads all of the people out triumphantly. They go out there, but all of a sudden Pharaoh’s army is coming after them, because he’s having second thoughts. Red Sea parts. All of that. Red Sea falls on the Egyptians. And basically, the people are delivered forever.

Now they’re in the wilderness and they’re heading this way. God had guided Moses through all of that. Moses didn’t have to go find that same burning bush every time he wanted to hear from God. Somehow God has continued to communicate with Moses on the fly as he’s moving in and out, even in Egypt, now in the wilderness. So Moses is beginning to understand this relationship with God. 

In Exodus 33, I want to pick up. This is now when they’re in the wilderness. This is how it describes the relationship between Moses and God. 

7 Now Moses used to take a tent and pitch it outside the camp some distance away, calling it the “tent of meeting.” 

He doesn’t need a burning bush anymore. He just needs a tent.

Anyone inquiring of the Lord would go to the tent of meeting outside the camp. 8 And whenever Moses went out to the tent, all the people rose and stood at the entrances to their tents, watching Moses until he entered the tent. 9 As Moses went into the tent, the pillar of cloud would come down and stay at the entrance, while the Lord spoke with Moses. 

Kind of representing God’s presence. There was a cloud by day and fire by night. It would come and rest on the tent. 

10 Whenever the people saw the pillar of cloud standing at the entrance to the tent, they all stood and worshiped, each at the entrance to their tent. 11 The Lord would speak to Moses face to face, as one speaks to a friend. Then Moses would return to the camp, but his young aide Joshua son of Nun did not leave the tent.

Here’s this description. Whoever is writing this—it could be Moses, it could be somebody else—they’re describing what it was like when Moses would meet with God. 

I want to read a few other descriptions of this same thing. Numbers 12:8 (NASB):

With him I speak mouth to mouth,
Even openly, and not in dark sayings,
And he beholds the form of the Lord.

We’re talking about something very significant. Something very strange, especially in that day and age. The gods of Egypt were not gods that were kind and nice. They were gods who needed to be appeased, otherwise they would bring great judgment. That was basically the religions of all the nations around and tribes around there. It was basically, you did whatever you could to appease the gods so they’d send some rain. And anytime there was no rain, it means the gods were mad at you.

Here’s this new kind of different thing emerging in this part of the world, where God is speaking to this person, Moses, face to face, mouth to mouth. In Psalm 119:104 and 105, there’s another way that David describes this same kind of illumination stage:

I gain understanding from your precepts [words];
    therefore I hate every wrong path.
Your word is a lamp for my feet,
    a light on my path.

Talking about how God illuminates the directions that he’s supposed to go. Isaiah 30:

20 Although the Lord gives you the bread of adversity and the water of affliction, your teachers will be hidden no more; with your own eyes you will see them. 21 Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, “This is the way; walk in it.” 

Then in the New Testament—2 Corinthians 3:

13 We are not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face to prevent the Israelites from seeing the end of what was passing away. 14 But their minds were made dull, for to this day the same veil remains when the old covenant is read. It has not been removed, because only in Christ is it taken away. 15 Even to this day when Moses is read, a veil covers their hearts. … 18 And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

He’s alluding back to this—Moses had this relationship with God, and yet, there was still something lacking because Moses would have to go and meet in the tent and would have to do these type of things. But he’s saying that, now, in this new covenant, ever since Christ has come, there is no veil between us at all. There is no need for a holy of holies. We are always in the presence of God. We have constant access to the fullness of the Spirit to behold his face, to hear his voice. 

For some of you, you’re saying, “Yeah, that’s where I’m at.” Where you actually begin to have confidence that you can hear from the Lord. When you go to pray, you actually are praying and thinking, “I’m going to get something out of this.” 

And there’s definitely, even though I’ve walked with the Lord for a long time, and many people have walked with the Lord long enough, you’ll go through times where you don’t feel like the Lord is so accessible, or it’s harder to hear from him. Because you’re going through those other things. 

But there are those seasons of our lives where we finally arrive at this place where we really do feel known by God. We can feel like he hears our voice and knows our hearts.

It’s described this way in another place:

Illumination refers to a process of continually and increasingly becoming aware of the presence and care of God.

That’s illumination.

It’s the idea of perfect love casting out fear. Apart from God I’m driven by fear. 

As God comes in, I increasingly become driven by love.

Illumination.

When the love quotient in my life becomes greater than the fear quotient, purgation moves to illumination.

When you realize that God loves you so much whether you’re getting it right or wrong that day, and you can come boldly into his throne, instead of being so afraid that he’s going to condemn you or judge you in some way. 

When the love quotient increases and is greater than the fear quotient, it’s illumination.

t’s the place where my ego, my choices, my sin and my guilt no longer create distance between me and God.

There’s no distance anymore. And not only can you say that theologically, but you actually experience that, the closeness of God. And it is true that sometimes it comes and goes. But once you’ve been there enough, you realize it’s not because God is actually far. It’s because he’s taking me through another season of refinement. So that ultimately we can be even closer.

I want so badly to talk about union. But that’s next week. It’s going to be so good. I picked Moses, not for these other ones, but union, in Moses’ life—oh, it’s going to be so good. But illumination, that’s what he’s talking about. 

As we close, I was trying to think of how the Lord has spoken to me most in my life. Like Zipporah, somehow she knew this strange thing. Moses, it said, “And the Lord said to Moses.” Zipporah—it seemed like every chapter started with, “And the Lord God spoke to Moses,” and there you have a chapter. God’s just constantly talking to Moses. We know he goes to the tent of meeting. We know he talked with the burning bush. We know he stood still and saw the salvation of the Lord. We know he goes up on the mountain to talk to God. 

But it’s like God was communicating to Moses and we have the whole Torah, the first five books of the Bible—the Pentateuch. The Bible is story after story of God interrupting into a person’s life, speaking to someone and then them walking in obedience—or not. Right? But how is God speaking to me? That’s a vague thing to say to someone: “God wants to speak to you.”

I wrote these things down. I’m going to focus on one of them:

He guides us with the commandments and scripture. 

No doubt about it. If you want to hear from God, read the Bible. For two reasons: one is this really is God’s word spoken to you to guide you. But then, also, the more you get to know this, the easier it is to pick up when the voice of God is speaking to you outside of this. Because you learn about his nature. “Oh, that sounds like something God would say.” “That does not sound like something God would say.” That’s why this book is so important. Not only can it teach you God’s word, but it can make you familiar with God’s voice. So he guides us with his commandments and scripture.

He guides us with the community of saints. 

This whole thing that we’re unpacking is not in the scriptures, per se. It’s supported by the scriptures. But it’s language and stuff that’s helping us unpack our walk with God outside of just what the scriptures have. So church history is helpful. But also the community that we have. That’s why you’ve got to get into a small group. We have curriculum. Every one of these messages, we create a little curriculum that goes out to all the Life Group leaders. You go to a Life Group, then you’re going to be able to unpack this stuff a little further and deeper. Because some of this, hopefully, you question. You’ll say, “He didn’t say that quite right.” And you might be right. 

But you can start to unpack it in a smaller group of people who also want to know the word of God. And it can flower and get bolder and broader and it can get more precise. So the community of saints is so important how the Lord speaks to us. Other believers have spoken into my life and guided me so much. Sometimes they knew what they were doing. Sometimes they had no idea.

This last one is huge:

He guides us with the convictions of his Spirit. 

Conviction is a horrible sounding word. On Wednesday night, Ryan actually talked a little bit about it, how we should be praying for conviction. Because conviction is actually a beautiful thing. It means you have a Father who loves you and doesn’t want you to go off a cliff or end up in a ditch. So he comes with his conviction. But conviction does not feel nice. It feels horrible. 

I was thinking back towards the end of 2019, these times when I was at a crossroads and I didn’t know what to do. I was like, “Okay, Lord, I want to do this.” In particular, before I moved down here in 2001. I was in Oregon. I loved Oregon. I really started following the Lord in Oregon. It’s Jesus’ country. They’ve got rivers. They’ve got big fish. Not these little tiny fish. All my friends were there. All my Christian friends, literally, were there. 

And yet, Mark Buckley, the founding pastor of Living Streams, he’s kind of been our family pastor forever. He knew that I had done some ministry. He said, “Why don’t you come work with our high schoolers at Living Streams.” And I was like, “Oh, that’s funny.” I didn’t want to do it. And yet, in Oregon, it was like everything was drying up. You know, like the picture of the cloud would every once a while lift up and go and that meant the people were supposed to go. Slowly but surely, it felt like the glory was departing. And yet, I didn’t know that. I just thought, “Oh, I just haven’t got the job I want yet.” 

But Mark kept saying, “Why don’t you come down here?” And so he said, “Well, we’ll just fly you out. You could just come check it out.”  Which was not a good decision, because I flew in and checked it out. Then I said, “Now I will never go down there!” Literally. That’s what I thought. I thought, “No! No! No!” 

But I remember my soul had no peace in Oregon. I was at my mom’s house. There was just no explanation. I couldn’t sleep at night. I started to feel depression start to settle in. No peace. No peace. No peace. I remember waking up one day and I said, “Maybe I should go to Arizona.”

It was so amazing. It was like a flood of joy and peace kind of just hit me all of a sudden. I thought, “No. I still don’t want to do it.” I wrestled with it. I kept fighting it. Sorry. I’m not great at a this. But it was a wrestling match of conviction. It was like God was guiding me. Even though he wasn’t speaking to me, inside I just knew. No peace—stay here. Twinge of peace and excitement there. So, ultimately, I went for it. 

I can’t tell you the depth of layers of the goodness of the Lord that’s been revealed to me in this place. And he was the one that guided me. And I have lots of other stories like that.

I hate it when the peace goes away. It’s miserable. But I’m so grateful that the Lord leads us in that way. 

Illumination.

Let’s pray:

Jesus, I ask that you would guide us. Lord, we’re so desperate for your guidance. We’ve got politicians that don’t know what’s up or down. We’ve got media shouting and screaming at us what we need, what we don’t need, who’s cool, what’s not. We’ve got our own hearts that are so confusing and restless, and they want this thing today and they don’t tomorrow. They want that thing that’s not good for us. Oh, we’re so lost. But I thank you so much that you know the way. 

And, Lord, I do pray that you would convict America. I pray for a great wave of conviction to wash over us—rich, poor, Democrat, Republican, Christian, non-Christian. Just let a great wave of conviction wash over us. Take away all of our peace in all the places that we’re headed in the wrong way. And give us peace in the right direction.

Your word says we should go out with joy and be led with peace. I pray that we would be a people like that. That we would trust you, trust that still, small voice, trust your fatherly guidance. 

Right now, Lord, if there are some people in this room who are saying, “Aw, man, why did he have to say that?” Because they know you have been convicting them about a relationship, or a job, or something they are doing in their life, whether it’s sin or not. Lord, I pray that you would give them the courage to trust you. And that, as they step toward where you are leading them, your peace would flood them, and they would sleep so good, and they would have joy fill their hearts.

Thank you, Lord.

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©️2020 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture marked NASB are taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE®, Copyright © 1960,1962,1963,1968,1971,1972,1973,1975,1977,1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission

Purgation: Seasons of Testing

David Stockton
Series: 2020 Fasting Season

Darkness:

John 1:4 - In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.

We’ve been talking about spiritual formation, which is the process of moving from being less Christ-like to more Christ-like. We’ve talked about more Christ-like is expressed in the beautiful heart. We did a whole sermon series on it. You can go back and check it out. We described the beautiful heart—what it means to be formed into the image of Christ, which is the goal of Christianity.

Last week we talked about what our starting point is. Being less Christ-like is having the broken heart: the heart that is fallen. The heart that is restless. The heart that is deceitful. The heart that has all these unwanted longings that we battle with. That’s our starting point.

Jesus has taken it upon himself to take our hearts and form them, if we’ll allow him to, to form them into the beautiful heart. To form them into the heart that’s just like his. Primarily we are made more like Christ by being with Christ. Spending time with him is the best way.

We also talked about how, over church history, there have been people who have basically tried to help us have a roadmap for the journey of spiritual formation. The process. What are some of the things that are consistent for all people, all places, all time in this process of spiritual formation. 

And so they describe these times of darkness. Now, obviously, before you know Christ you are someone who is walking in darkness. So that’s the first phase that people, before you know Christ, you are in darkness. But there are also other times in our Christian walk where we find ourself all of a sudden back in this place where we say, “I kind of feel like I’m in darkness again.” But this is part of the refining process, part of the journey, that God has you on. 

There are certain things you can practice in each of these stages that will be helpful. Some you can practice and they will be helpful in all the stages, some are specific for those stages. But in darkness, something that is required is a lot of honesty about where you’re at. The Lord can handle your honesty. He’s okay with that. 

Then there’s the next phase you can move into: Awakening. Ephesians 5 describes this:

For you were once darkness…

Not that you were in darkness, hey, buddy, you are the darkness.

…but now you are light…

Which is cool. Because now you’re not just in the light, but you have become the light in Christ.

…in the Lord. Live as children of light (for the fruit of the light consists in all goodness, righteousness and truth) and find out what pleases the Lord.

What’s so beautiful—Alec and Colleen are not just people who are in the light who are going into the darkness. They are people who are the light. Wherever they show up there is going to be light, even if the go to darkness.

Have nothing to do with the fruitless deeds of darkness, but rather expose them. It is shameful even to mention what the disobedient do in secret. But everything exposed by the light becomes visible—and everything that is illuminated becomes a light. This is why it is said: “Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”

As we walk in darkness, as we experience these times of darkness, whether it be our life before Christ or whether it even be part of our walk with Christ, God can interrupt that darkness at any moment with his light and cause an awakening to happen. An awakening in our soul. An awakening in our spirit. An awakening in our mind. Whatever it might be. And we move into a stage, not so much a stage, but an awakening season. 

And an awakening season gives way to a next season called purgation. Uh-oh. That’s a horrible word. Yeah. It describes a season that is not a lot of fun. It’s not purgatory. We’re not Catholic. We’re not talking about afterlife. We’re talking about while you’re still breathing. 

Purgation. There are these seasons that Jesus described in Luke 9, where he said:

Then he told all of them, “If anyone wants to come with me, he must deny himself, pick up his cross every day, and follow me continuously, because whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it.”

Hebrews describes a similar thing in chapter 12. He says

My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines the one he loves, and he chastens everyone he accepts as his son.

Here you have a description of seasons of our lives, of purgation. It’s hard. In those seasons you are trying to figure out, “Did I do something wrong?” “Is God not everything I thought he was?” “I feel lost.” “I feel confused.” “I feel tested.” “I feel refined.” “I feel a burning.” “I feel pain.”

And sometimes this is the Lord saying, “Hey, I need you to go through a season that’s going to test your faith. That’s gong to test your strength. That’s gong to refine your faith.” 

And if you can make it through, if you can continue to go through, you’ll come out on the other side better. It’s hard to believe that when you’re in it. But you’ll come out on the other side and your faith will be more pure. Your roots will be deeper. You’ll even see that, maybe you’re stronger than you thought you were. Or you’ll have more strength for the next time you go through a time of testing or challenge. Because you can look back and see God was faithful.

I love that song we sang today about the faithfulness of God. How he carries us through. Your promise still stands. Great is your faithfulness. You can’t say that if you haven’t been through purgation. I mean, you can say it, but it means nothing to you. But t hose of you in this room who have been purgation, and many, many times of purgation, and some of them a lot longer seasons than you thought, you can now stand and say, “Your promise still stands. Great is your faithfulness. Because I’ve tried it. I’ve tested it. It’s shown up when I’ve needed it.” Times of purgation. Seasons of testing. 

The next stages that we’re going to get to in the next couple of weeks are illumination and union. We described them a little bit last week. We’ll get into those in more depth. But I want to stop here and I want to go to a story. Stories are great.

Turn with me to Exodus 2. We’ll start in verse 11. We’re going to look at the life of Moses over the next three weeks. We’re going to get a story form of this same spiritual journey that we’re all on. In Exodus 2, we have the birth of a guy named Moses. Many of you are familiar with this story and what he was born into. Let’s jump in and take a look at what’s going on here:

One day, after Moses had grown up, he went out to where his own people were and watched them at their hard labor. He saw an Egyptian beating a Hebrew, one of his own people. Looking this way and that and seeing no one, he killed the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. The next day he went out and saw two Hebrews fighting. He asked the one in the wrong, “Why are you hitting your fellow Hebrew?”

The man said, “Who made you ruler and judge over us? Are you thinking of killing me as you killed the Egyptian?” Then Moses was afraid and thought, “What I did must have become known.”

When Pharaoh heard of this, he tried to kill Moses, but Moses fled from Pharaoh and went to live in Midian, where he sat down by a well. Now a priest of Midian had seven daughters, and they came to draw water and fill the troughs to water their father’s flock. Some shepherds came along and drove them away, but Moses got up and came to their rescue and watered their flock.

When the girls returned to Reuel their father, he asked them, “Why have you returned so early today?”

They answered, “An Egyptian rescued us from the shepherds. 

Interesting, right? He’s called an Egyptian.

He even drew water for us and watered the flock.”

“And where is he?” Reuel asked his daughters. “Why did you leave him? Invite him to have something to eat.”

Moses agreed to stay with the man, who gave his daughter Zipporah to Moses in marriage. Zipporah gave birth to a son, and Moses named him Gershom, saying, “I have become a foreigner in a foreign land.”

So, a very familiar story. Moses as born in Egypt to a Hebrew mother and father. The Hebrews at that time were slaves in Egypt. They were oppressed. There had been a command from Pharaoh to kill all of the Hebrew boys that were born, because he was starting to be afraid of their numbers, that they could revolt. So Moses’ mom, experiencing a major time of challenge, decides instead of allowing the Egyptians to kill her baby, she hides him. She puts him in a basket and sends him down a river. And, by the grace of God, he’s found by one of Pharaoh’s daughters or something (I can’t remember - someone in Pharaoh’s family). And she takes him and raises him.

He’s raised an Egyptian boy; but, at some point as he grows up, maybe because of genetics, maybe because his mother told him, but at some point he comes to the understanding that he’s not Egyptian, he’s not one of Pharaoh’s family, but he’s actually a Hebrew. It’s this moment of awakening to his own reality.

He goes to look—in this part of the story—at what’s happening with his people, with the people that he’s come from. We don’t know anything about the details of what’s transpiring inside of his own soul, but we know he’s interested in what’s going on there. But he sees an Egyptian abuses a man and he kills the Egyptian. So he has this moment of passion and rage, and he does this horrible thing. 

The next day he comes out again and sees two Hebrews fighting, and you know the story goes on. And all of a sudden, Pharaoh’s after him, and he realizes he’s done a horrible thing. So he flees. He runs to Midian, which is out in the desert, outside of everything he’s known, away from everyone he’s known.

And he’s there by a well and sees some ladies and he helps them out, and ends up staying now with this Midian priest. And he’s got this uncertainty of who he is. They think he’s an Egyptian, probably because of the way he was dressed, more than anything—maybe the way he spoke.

And this is his situation. And he names his own son “I’m a foreigner living in a foreign land.” He’s lost. “I don’t know who I am. I don’t know where I am.” This is Moses’ situation.

Then, in Exodus 3:

Now Moses was tending the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the wilderness and came to Horeb, the mountain of God. There the angel of the Lord appeared to him in flames of fire from within a bush. Moses saw that though the bush was on fire it did not burn up. So Moses thought, “I will go over and see this strange sight—why the bush does not burn up.”

The burning bush story is very familiar. In this situation, Moses was totally distraught within his own soul. We know he’s somewhere between 40 and 80. And he’s out caring for his father-in-law’s sheep, and he’s taken them to a far part of the wilderness. All of a sudden he notices there’s a bush that’s burning. It’s not just that it’s burning—it’s burning and it doesn’t burn up. So there’s a time lapse. It could be an hour, it could be a couple of hours, it could be a couple of days. But it’s long enough to where he actually sees, “This bush has been on fire for way too long. This makes no sense that this bush could still be burning.”

So he decides to go check out what’s happening with this bush. You guys know the story. The bush speaks to him and says, “Take your shoes off for this is holy ground.” And the bush starts talking to him about the Hebrew people—the very thing that Moses was interested in before. And he starts talking about the oppression of the Hebrew people—the very thing that Moses experienced, and saw, and killed a man because of it. 

He just starts speaking about this. And somehow in this conversation Moses becomes totally intrigued by this bush, this bush God. That’s all he knew at that point. He knew the gods of Egypt, but this was a bush God. And the bush God and he were having a conversation. 

I want to pick up what’s happening in Chapter 4 Verse 10: 

Moses said to the Lord, “Pardon your servant, Lord. I have never been eloquent, neither in the past nor since you have spoken to your servant. I am slow of speech and tongue.”

The Lord said to him, “Who gave human beings their mouths? Who makes them deaf or mute? Who gives them sight or makes them blind? Is it not I, the Lord? Now go; I will help you speak and will teach you what to say.”

But Moses said, “Pardon your servant, Lord. Please send someone else.”

Then the Lord’s anger burned against Moses…

I didn’t read the whole conversation to you, but basically, Moses is saying, “I don’t want to go back to Egypt. I don’t want to deal with what I’ve done. I’ve been kind of putting all of that aside, putting all of that behind me. I haven’t been dealing with that. I’ve got a new life here in Midian. I’ve got a wife. I’ve got a Gersham. I’ve got sheep. I’ve got a flock. Just leave me alone.”

And God keeps kind of breaking in. Because what God is trying to do is awakening, right? God enters into the darkness in order to bring his light. He’s disrupting. He’s coming. It’s very annoying. It’s very disruptive. 

God doesn’t come into our lives and just say, “Oh, let me just put a blessing on everything you’ve been doing.” God comes into our lives and he starts to do work—the work that will ultimately make us more into the image of Christ. 

As Jude says,

To him who is able to… to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy…

The minute we start encountering Jesus Christ, his goal is to take us and make us beautiful so that when we stand before God forevermore, there is great joy. This is what Jesus wants. 

And God is now breaking into the life of Moses to say, “Moses, I want to talk to you about all that stuff that’s deep in your soul, that kind of burst out at one point long ago, but it’s all still there. I want to talk to you about that. I want to teach you about that.” And, what’s beautiful is God’s work in Moses’ individual life actually brought the freedom of a whole nation. 

So don’t ever discount what God can do in your life. And if you’re saying, “No, I don’t want God to come and disrupt my life. I don’t want God to awaken me. I don’t want God to have to deal with all of that stuff that I’ve been a part of before.”

Really, what you’re doing is limiting what God can do with everybody else, as well. Right now there are some of you who would, if you were honest, say that you are in darkness. And you feel God interrupting, and knocking, and being annoying a little bit. And you keep trying to keep him at bay. You keep trying to push him off. Because you are afraid. 

And I will tell you that your fear is not unfounded, because, once you awaken to who God is, he really does take you into seasons of purgation. So I’m not telling you, “Don’t be afraid.” I’m telling you to trust him. 

And that’s what God was trying to cultivate in Moses. So we get to the end. The Lord’s anger is burning at Moses. He’s given him signs of, like, staffs turning into snakes and then turning back into a staff. He put his hand in his coat, took it out there was leprosy. Put it back in, took it out it was better. God’s doing all these things. He said, “I”ll help you. I’ll send your brother Aaron. He can be your mouthpiece because you don’t like the way you talk. Whatever.” He’s working with him and working with him, and now his anger burns at him.  I don’t know what that meant. The bush got a little brighter or whatever. 

But in this conversation, Moses eventually says, “Okay. Fine. I’ll go.” And we know the rest of the story. We know all the good that’s happened. But I just want to stop in this moment and h help us see that, when Moses awakened to what God was doing, when he finally surrendered to God, God led him straight back into the thing he was most afraid of: Pharaoh. Egypt. The Hebrew oppression. Slavery. His past. 

God said, “Come and follow me.” And Moses was like, “Well, this is interesting. You’re a burning bush…”
God said, “Follow me.”

Moses said, “I’m not going over there! No way! Let’s just keep burning out here.” Or whatever.
But God took him back there. And do you know why God took him back there? God took him back there so he could overcome every single one of those things. So God could put his fingerprints on all of the pain of his past, all of the confusion of his past, and now, all of those things were no longer ruling over him or causing any kind of disturbance in his soul.

That’s why God wants to lead you back into those things. That’s why God wants to take you through seasons of purgation and testing. So that he can prove to you his strength and faithfulness and the love. But you’ve got to trust him.

All of the stages require humility and surrender. But in the darkness stage you need honesty. In the awakening stage you need repentance and surrender. In the purgation stage you need courage. 

It’s funny. Jay asked me, “How are we going to conclude the message this time so we know what song to pick and how to go about the end of the service.”

I started writing, “We’re going to be talking about seasons of testing, so we’re probably going to want to minister a lot comfort.” And I was just about to send it and I thought, “Hold on. That’s just not right.” When we’re talking about times of testing, talking about seasons of purgation, what God wants to minister to you is not comfort. What you need is courage.  

The hope is that this message will help you have courage when you go into these times of testing. You see, it’s true that, when we surrender to Jesus and take his hand, he leads us into scary things. He knows what is best for us in the world. He knows we need seasons of purgation, seasons of testing, trying and challenge.

As the Psalmist says, “He leads me through the valley of the shadow of death.” He does not do this to be cruel. He does this so you will know how close he is and how powerful he is, and that we can trust him more. As we go through this, the fear that we have will give way to the freedom that comes from faith in God. 

Once you’ve been through a few valleys of the shadow of death, you’re just not afraid like you used to be. I love that Alec and Colleen are going to step out into something unknown and scary because God is leading them. And the truth is, they are going to go through times of testing. There are going to be some hard things, but they are not afraid of that because they know God is with them. 

Jesus said to Peter one time, “Satan desires to sift you like wheat.” What that means is, basically, you take a little filter and you take all of the stuff you’ve gathered, and you put it on there and shake it and only the good stuff remains. All the bad stuff falls through the filter. And Jesus looked at Peter and said, “Satan is wanting to shake you.” And God says, “I’m going to allow it. Because Satan’s purpose is to shake you and try to break you. But I’m allowing it because I know that when he shakes you, you’re going to lose all of that impure faith. And what will be left is something pure.”

The way Peter describes it is that your faith can be refined like pure gold, better than pure gold.  What Jesus says to him is, “Satan desires to sift you like wheat. But take courage because I’m praying for you. After you have come through, strengthen the brethren.”

Jesus isn’t going to keep you from purgation. He’s going to pray for you, and he promises you can make it through, because he has plans for you after you’ve made it through to go and help those who are about to go into a season of purgation.

So my message is, if you feel like you’re in a season of purgation, it’s a time to face your fears, to take God’s hand and say, “Okay, let’s do this.” 

To go through the refiner’s fire. You’ll come out better on the other side. As the pope says (Pap Francesco), he says, “We need to ask Jesus what he wants us to do and then we need to be brave.”

Let’s pray:

Jesus, we do thank you so much that you are praying for us. It’s kind of a strange thing to think about, but you’re interceding for us. And that means a couple of things. First, it means that you are paying attention to us. But it also means that you are allowing what we’re going through to be there because you know it’s doing a good work in us. Lord, I pray for everyone in this room, that you’d give them courage this morning. That they would really be able to trust you and your promises, and that, after they go through these seasons of testing, Lord, that their fears would melt away, and they would experience more freedom and a stronger faith in you.

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©️2020 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Spiritual Formation

David Stockton
Series: 2020 Fasting Season

(Sermon starts at 11:00 minutes)

As we face this new year, this has been a scripture that has kind of got me stirred up a little bit, particularly the last part. It says this:

But dear friends, remember what the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ foretold. They said to you in the last times there will be scoffers who will follow their own ungodly desires. There are the people who divide you, who follow mere natural instincts and do not have the Spirit. But you, dear friends [Living Streams] by building yourself up in your most holy faith and praying in the Holy Spirit, keep yourselves in God’s love as you wait for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ to bring you to eternal life. Be merciful to those who doubt. Save others by snatching them from the fire. And to others show mercy mixed with fear, hating even the clothing stained by corrupted flesh. Now to him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy to the only God, our Savior, be glory, majesty, power and authority through Jesus Christ our Lord before all ages, now and forever. Amen.

What we’re going to do this year is we’re going to introduce this concept of Christian spiritual formation, discipleship. We’re introducing it—not that we’ve created it. But we’re introducing it as a kind of guidance for our church this year and what we feel the Lord wants to do. Last year we focused on the family as far as our household and the work that needs to be done there, as well as our church as a family and the work that the Lord’s doing there. And this year we’re going to talk about how we can be formed into the image of Christ. The state of our soul. The state of our being. Where it is and where it could be, or where God wants to lead it to be. 

I love this verse. It is so important for us to remember as we start to try to move forward in our relationship with Christ is that God is able to present us spotless and with great joy before his glorious presence. It’s not that we just grit it out and summon all of our strength and we just try and try. Resolutions are fine. That’s great. But anything that we are trying to do in our own effort alone falls short. Many of you are trying to diet or get in better shape. Many of you are trying to do this or that, read more books or… How’s that working for you? Is it working good. You’re getting everything you want done. No. We struggle with following through.

But I love what the scriptures say. The promise we’re given here is that God is able. We should rejoice and be glad and worship and praise and rest—that God is able. Listen to what he says:

To present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy…

How fun will it be to stand before the throne of God and your name is called. “Come before the throne, David. Job. Bartholomew.” Whatever your name is. And you walk up there and you’re going before the very presence of God. And in this moment you feel spotless. You feel great joy. That’s God’s plan for your life. That’s the work that Jesus Christ in the power of His Spirit wants to do in you, no matter where your starting point is.

First of all, let’s know that it’s God who wants to do it. It’s God who makes is possible. It’s God who fuels it, funds it and gives us all the energy to do it. It’s all him. But what we’re going to learn is what we can do in this dance with the Lord as he’s trying to get us to this point.

Spiritual Formation. We’re going to define some things.

Christian spiritual formation is the process of moving from less Christ-like to more Christ-like. It’s not complicated. It’s pretty simple. I mean, the process is not simple, but the idea of what God’s trying to do. When we give our life to Christ, what he’s trying to do is to take us from being less Christ-like and causing us to become more Christ-like.

We define being Christ-like as the beautiful heart. We did a whole sermon series on it. You can go back and listen to it on podcast, watch it on video, whatever you want to do. We define the beautiful heart, the heart of Christ, as the humble heart, the helpful heart, the grateful heart and the generous heart. That’s a good vision for 2020. To grow in those things. To help our kids understand the beauty of this versus all the other things they think are beautiful. A humble heart. A helpful heart. A grateful heart. A generous heart.

So we’re going to talk a little bit more about the broken heart. That’s our starting point. That’s what it means to be less like Christ — to have a heart that’s broken, that God can form into a beautiful heart.

The stages of the journey. We’re talking about spiritual formation. It’s a journey. It takes days and decades for us to follow Christ and to experience the formation of Christ. And, hopefully, many of you today are saying, “Well, I’m not where I should be, but I’m not where I was.” And that’s a wonderful thing to be able to say at the end of the year, or the end of a season of your life. That’s what God is trying to do. He’s working it out. He’s working it out. He’s working it out.

There are stages of the journey. This is not something we have come up with. This is over two thousand years of church history in addition to thousands of years before that of a Judaistic approach to the One God. This is unpacking a lot of that. People have put different terms to it. But they understand that there seem to be phases. It’s not necessarily linear phases, even though sometimes it goes that way. But sometimes it’s like cyclical phases of refining what we go through. 

But these are some of the phases: We are walking in darkness. That’s where we usually begin. We’re aware that we are in the dark, but that usually is because we’re starting to understand and we have an awakening to the light of God, to the presence of God, to something that God is bringing into our life, which, if we surrender to that, it brings us into a stage of purgation. Now, that’s a fun word, right? No. It’s horrible. But I love it because it describes that process where God is starting to unpack the world in us. In unpacking the world, the flesh and the brokenness, he’s starting to pull those things out and put in something of his nature, something of his love, something of his kingdom. It’s a process. It’s a refining process. It’s challenging. It’s purification.

Then there’s a season of illumination, where, all of a sudden, now, I feel like I’m now able to hear the Lord and know the Lord; and I’m able to see the difference between what is me and flesh, and what is the Lord and his Spirit. it’s this process of illumination that we get to.

Ultimately, the end result, the goal of it all is this super-intimidating word for me: union. When I first heard this, it shocked me. Because I think it’s such a better word than all the words I’d ever come up with. Union with Christ. United with Christ. It’s the goal of all Christian spiritual formation. 

Jesus prayed in John 17:

Father, I pray that they would be one with me even as I am one with you.

Which seems like an audacious, ridiculous prayer But that is God’s goal for you and you and you, individually. He wants to be united with you. Now, some of the super-holy people that wrote about all this stuff, talked about it as spiritual marriage. I’m not going to talk about that. It throws me off. But being united with Christ is the goal.

Here’s the beauty of it. I keep thinking that, if we’re really following Christ, we’ll be producing, we’ll be serving, we’ll be sacrificing. We’ll be doing all these things. But no, the goal of God in your life is that you’ll be united with Christ. Jesus says stuff like this in John 15:

If you abide in me and my words abide in you, you will bear much fruit.

So the goal is not bearing much fruit. The bearing much fruit is the by-product of our union with Christ. This is so un-American. It’s so much more Eastern or something. It’s so hard for us because we are constantly trying to measure up with our accomplishments and achievements. In the kingdom of heaven, God says, “Phhh. Whatever.” Union with Christ—being united with Christ. 

We’re gong to spend the next three weeks looking at the book of Exodus and the life of Moses to try to give pictures of this. This type of philosophical terminology doesn’t do much for me. I need pictures, like a little kid. So we’re going to do that.

This is a diagram that we’ve come up with to help us understand the cyclical formation of this process. Spiritual deformation. Spiritual formation. Right now you are being formed in one direction or another by what you take in through your ears, through your eyes, through your experiences. You are being formed one way or another. You are either leading to Christian spiritual formation or deformation. 

All of us, before we came to Christ, were in this cycle of indulgence, which leads to idolatry, which leads to disintegration. Disintegration being our heart loves many other things, other than what it was created to love. So it doesn’t work quite right. It’s confused, restless, broken. This is the process of disintegration. 

You can see this in America. Indulgence. Idolatry. Disintegration. We’re on this constant cycle. And I’m praying for election year revival. I really think we’re at this point where it’s going to turn one way or another in some ways. But there is no way that America can’t turn back. We can have our own spiritual awakening as a nation. You don’t believe it. I’m struggling too. But let’s keep praying for it.

Somewhere in that process, many of us here have been interrupted, disrupted by something outside of ourselves, even outside of creation. Something of God has broken in to our scene. The light, the love of Christ has come in. The voice of God has spoken. For some of us, there are lots of little moments of awakening that lead to this big surrender. 

Remember Saul on the road to Damascus, there was this big, abrupt smack in the face. Bam. The light of God showed up and he surrendered to Christ to go into the process of spiritual formation.

For Joel, it’s funny. I know Joel. I don’t think he’s in here anymore. He’s my cousin, so I grew up with him. He describes his conversion to Christ, or his moment of awakening as a moment of surrender. He had lots of moments of awakening, where God was coming and calling to him, drawing him and calling to him. But he was like, “That’s not fun. That’s not cool. I want to go this way.” And he just kept going fake id to fake id to fake id. That’s kind of what he was doing. But his big moment of truth was when he took his fake id and tore it up. He was like, “Okay, God. I’m going to go your way.” And he started following Christ and going through the process.

Surrender is a big part of that awakening. But that moment of awakening leads to this formation of purgation and illumination, which ultimately leads to union. We’ll describe more of that as we go on. You tracking with me? You want to sign this contract? I’m trying to sell you something right now.

Spiritual practices. So people who have been paying attention to all these years of church history, paying attention to what the Bible teaches, paying attention their own lives and have written and discovered there are certain things: spiritual disciplines, spiritual practices. There are certain things that we can do as believers that will helps us progress down the road of spiritual formation.

These are not “rub the genie get what you want.” There is no guarantee you are going to do one of these things and—aha!—you get what you want. God doesn’t work like that. But there are practices that have been proven to be helpful. What’s interesting is that you might find some of these things are helpful for you and some are not. Whereas for your spouse, maybe some of them are helpful for her and some are not. So you’ve got to try to find what are the spiritual practices in your own life with your personality, with your job, with your family, with your illness or whatever it might be—what are some spiritual practices that will help you.

What we’re going to do as a church is to dive into this and begin to discover these things. In the month of January, we’re going to practice some of these things specifically. Our hope is that maybe you’ll grab a couple of these and find out, “Wow. When I do these things, I seem to progress. I seem to strengthen. I seem to hear God’s voice a little better, a little clearer.”

So then, when you go through the seasons of your life, where maybe your marriage is struggling, or one of your kids is totally crazy, or you’re having a hard time or dark night of the soul, or something happens—you’ll have a couple of these practices that you can run to and say, “God I’m going do this. Meet me here again.” It’s helpful in those times to have those. Journaling is a huge part of my walk with Christ. It’s so embarrassing because I sound like a girl. I’m writing in my diary all the time. But it’s true. I’m not a girl, but I journal all the time.

Spiritual practices that can help. We’re going to visit some quick examples. We’ll fill these lists out. The last life or slow life. We need to cultivate this. This is abstaining from food, from television, from social media, from music in your car, whatever it might be for seasons of your life so you can draw closer to the Lord. 

The grounded life or grow. Start a Bible reading program. Memorize scripture. Read a Christian book about spiritual formation. Schedule appointments with a spiritual mentor or Christian therapist, something like that so that you can grow.

The giving, generous life. Serve someone in need. Give gifts to people in need. Share your faith. Or just take your family and move to Manfredonia for a year. Ways to say, “I’m going to just give out, and in doing that, I’m going to hope the Lord will respond with drawing us closer, filling our tank.” That’s what Joel’s been able to share, even though they’re going through tough times.

So those are practices for January specifically. I’m a pastor. I might be your pastor. You can call me whatever you want. You can call me “That guy up there.” But I’m asking you, summoning all the authority I can in saying, “Please participate with us on this:” 

In January, we want you to join us on Sundays. You’re already doing great. Great job everybody. And in your Life Groups. If you don’t have a Life Group, we’ll be launching some more in February, so hold up for that. 

Then, on Wednesdays, we want you to fast from food: breakfast and lunch and snacks. Then join us at 7:00 pm for a full on prayer meeting, where you’re going to pray out loud in front of other people. We’re going to pray. It’s not going to be church like this. It’s going to be a prayer service. We are going to provide soup at 6:00 for anyone who needs to eat before they pray, because they’re too angry to pray. And for families and all of that. It just work out conveniently so we could have a little fellowship, too. But the main thing is, no food on Wednesdays. Three Wednesdays, that’s all we’re asking for. Then at 7:00 we’re all going to pray together in here, super hungry or soupy, whatever it might be. We’re going to pray and seek the Lord for 2020 and for each other and all of that. You ready? Are you with that?

The last thing is we want everyone to commit to one thing in each of those categories for twenty-one days. It’s just twenty-one days starting next Sunday. We gave you a little handout. So you can choose one of these, or you can write something in if you have better ideas than us. We’re totally comfortable with that..

Serve (choose one)

• Spend time with someone in need

• Serve someone in need

• Give gifts to people in need

• Share your faith

• ______________________

But for twenty-one days we want to try to set ourselves differently, as we’re going into this year with the hope that God will speak, God will guide, God will fill our tanks so that we can go through 2020 in all of that. We’re probably going to need to reset a couple of times throughout the year. But we want to start out that way, as well.

So, can you please join us, even though you’re like, “Well, you know, I’m really busy.” That’s fine. But just maybe for three Wednesdays, can you join us? I mean, our house is supposed to be a house of prayer. That’s what Jesus taught us. To some extent, I think, we’re going to be measured more on our prayer time attendance than we are in anything else, of whether we’re doing a good job. It’s important for us to gather together and pray together as a family.

If you were here Christmas Eve at the first service, there were a thousand people, and about a hundred of you, I’m so sorry, I know it was miserable for you. But this is fasting and prayer time, so if there’s a thousand people in here and we’re all miserable, it’s better. We’ll do whatever we’ve got to do Wednesday, January 15. That’s the first one. It’s going to be great. It’s going to be good.

Now I want to focus in really quick as we bring this message a little more to us. I want to focus on the broken heart. That’s our starting point. That’s where we’re beginning. For those of us who are honest, even if we had a great 2019, we’re still starting this year with a broken heart, a heart that we can’t quite understand, a heart that goes places we don’t want it to go, a heart that isn’t there when we need it to be there in love and strength.

We define the broken heart with a few words. It’s a fallen heart. What I mean by that is what the Bible teaches. Psalm 51:5 (NASB)

Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity,
And in sin my mother conceived me.

Before you ever did anything, the Bible teaches that your heart was fallen. It was broken. It was bent toward sin. You didn’t teach your kids how to sin, did you? If you did, that’s horrible. You didn’t teach your kids to say the word,  “Mine,” did you? But they all figured it out. Mine. Mine. Mine! “Where did that come from, man? I’m going to change my bedtime stories.” You didn’t teach them. You didn’t teach them, but it’s there. They were born that way, with a broken heart. 

Ecclesiastes 7:20 (NASB)

Indeed, there is not a righteous man on earth who continually does good and who never sins.

So, if you thought that was you, sorry to burst your bubble this morning. And women, you are included in there, okay? It says men, but women are in there too.

Isaiah 64:6 (NASB)

For all of us have become like one who is unclean,
And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment;

Even if we try really hard to get our act cleaned up, even if we’re trying to do good things, even for God, potentially, the truth is, they are all filthy garments. That was one of the things that God had so much trouble with the people of Israel. They were doing so many good things, but out of dirty hearts, which made it all dirty.

Then in 1 John 1:8 (NASB)

If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us.

A little bit of honesty time as we begin 2020. The truth is we have a fallen heart. We have a heart that is bent toward things away from God. All of us do. Not only do we have a fallen heart, but we have a deceitful heart. Just like 1 John says, our heart likes to deceive us and trick us.

Jeremiah 17:9-10 (MSG) goes a little bit heavier. He says:

The heart is hopelessly dark and deceitful,
a puzzle that no one can figure out.
But I, God, search the heart
and examine the mind.
I get to the heart of the human.
I get to the root of things.
I treat them as they really are,
not as they pretend to be.

Because we have this awareness of our deceitful heart, of our fallen heart, we spend all of our lives trying to dress it up. We come up with all kinds of facades, all kinds of disguises, all kinds of fronts that we project because we don’t want anyone to really know the true state of our heart. That’s true for all of us. It’s true for me. 

If you guys knew the stuff that goes through my heart and my mind, you would go to another church. And I would join you somehow. But then you’d have to go to different church again. But then I would too. Maybe we would end up at the same one and then we’d have to go. But maybe you’d get lucky and you’d go somewhere where I wasn’t there. But then, if I knew stuff in your heart, then it would… See what I’m saying? Honest. Honest. Honest. This deceiful, fallen heart.

Augustine, this guy who wrote in about the 300th, 400th century after Christ, was a great Christian thinker.  He’s been really formative, even today, for a lot of Christian philosophy and theology. He wrote something called the Confessions. In it, he describes the restless heart. He described his heart. At one point his heart was so restless because he didn’t know who he was, where he came from, or what he was supposed to do. You might be coming into 2020 feeling that. “I don’t really know who I am or what I’m supposed to do.” It’s an anxiety, a restlessness that stirs up within you.

He talks about another aspect of the restless heart. Once you say, “Okay, I feel like I know who I am. I know what I want. I know what I’m hoping for.” And then you get that. And it’s like, “Yes!” You know? It’s like a week of “Yes!” And then there’s like another four days of “Yes!” And there’s like, “Oh, no. The restlessness is coming again!” That ache. That restlessness begins to surface again. And you’re like, “No! The very thing I thought would answer this.” The job. The new house. The girl. Whatever it might be. It hasn’t actually hasn’t done anything. It’s kind of scratched the itch, but now it’s even stronger. 

And that’s a real challenge. That’s America right there. Keep scratching the itch. Never stop scratching the itch. Instead of seeing that, maybe there’s an itch that can’t be scratched by the things in this life and in this world.

The last restlessness he talks about is the the restlessness of the Christian, in the process of spiritual formation. This restlessness comes from the fact that you know who you are. You know where you are going. But you know there are a lot of miles between here and there. And you are okay with that, and you understand that, but it’s still a restlessness because you long to be at that point where you’re with Christ, united with Christ. When our faith becomes sight and our union becomes easy. There isn’t a gravity of this world pulling us out of that union all the time, that we’re resisting. We are just united with Christ.

That’s our longing. Yet we know that we are not there. We are in this process, on the way there. But we know we can’t control when we get there. That lies in the hands of God the Father, who will send his Son at the time appointed to bring times of refreshing. So there’s this restlessness that comes from that. But that’s a restlessness that the peace of Christ satisfies. A restlessness that’s also filled with hope. And a restlessness that makes us do like the Fritzes and say, “Hey, I want to find the people who restless in those other categories and share with them the love and hope of Christ so they can move out of that into a restlessness that actually has peace mingled with it.” That’s our hope.

Lastly, the heart that is broken, fallen, deceitful and restless, it has these unwanted longings. Unwanted desires. Where we know there is infiltration coming from outside, but what is so bizarre is that, every once in a while, your own heart within you will start to want something that you know is out of line. Yet, for some reason, you can’t just stop it from wanting it. It’s because we have broken hearts.

What awakening does is it brings us to a point where we can be awake in Christ. We can receive the life of Christ. What the Bible teaches is that, when that happens, when we surrender our broken heart to God, he fixes it. And the way that he fixes it is interesting. He puts a new heart within. And this is where it’s tricky. The way the Bible describes it is it’s almost like we have both hearts now.

I heard someone say it’s like a kidney transplant. In a kidney transplant, they leave the old kidney in there and they put a new one in there. They wire it all up, but they don’t bother to take the old kidney out. It’s crazy. And that’s a little bit like what goes on with us. The Lord puts this new heart in us, but we still have the old heart. So there’s this battle going on within us. And the Bible talks about the spirit vs. the flesh. You know, when I’m talking with the kids,I’m usually like, “the good dog and the bad dog.” If you feed the good dog it gets stronger. If you feed the bad dog it gets stronger. You don’t feed the bad dog it gets weaker. You feed the good dog and it gets stronger and—hey—you’re doing better. 

It’s a little bit of what spiritual formation is and spiritual practices. It’s trying to form and grow and strengthen the spirit within us—that new heart that God has given us, so that you can become strong, healthy and vibrant. That’s what spiritual formation is all about. That’s what we’re going to be participating in. That’s what you have to figure out on your own, but we’re collectively going to try to figure it out together, so that you can figure out on your own. But we all start with this broken heart.

I love this. I just want to wrap up with this. This is so comforting to me, when I think through the challenge of all of these things. There are two things I want to read to you as we wrap up. The first is something from a lady named Celia Corey, who’s writing about St. John of the Cross and Theresa of Avila. Some of you are going to love this and some of you are going to be like, “I never want to hear that again.” Because it’s very wordy.

A major conceptual dynamic in all religious traditions is the need for purification and transformation of an individual in order to affect integration and maturation of the personality in the divine. 

It’s just fancy ways of saying what we just said.

Although the means by which this purification takes place differs according to cultural and religious configurations of any given tradition, nevertheless a reoccurring image of that of an inner and outer odyssey is necessary. A major example is the threefold path of John of the cross…

Which is what we have: purgation, illumination and union.

…which represents a psycho spiritual journey by which divine osmosis can be realized, passing through the dark night of the soul and culminating in spiritual marriage. Although not accepted by many theoreticians or practitioners of mysticism, nevertheless the value of the San Juan schemata still holds sway in contemporary society.

Do you guys feel better? Let me say a lot of that in a scripture way. This is 2 Corinthians 3:16-18 :

But whenever anyone turns to the Lord, the veil is taken away. [between them and God] Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. And we all, who with unveiled faces contemplate the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his image with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.

The way Paul was writing, that someone later tried to sum up in a kind of psychological way, is the process of how we are formed, it isn’t about human effort. It’s not about all these challenges. It’s not about getting things right here and there. It’s simply about contemplating the face of Jesus. It’s trying to find a way to quiet the noise around us. To quiet our minds within us. You know, the world is full of noise, with our phones dinging, with the tv on, with the stuff on the radio, with other people. There is constant noise. It’s neither good nor bad. I’m not making a judgment on that. It’s just so full of noise. We’ve got to find times of quiet to hear the still, small voice of God. 

Not only that, but our own minds. We in America have really started to believe that we can work as hard as we want for as long as we want and then just shut it off and sleep any time we want. And when that doesn’t work for us, we still work just as hard and just as long and then we take a little medicine or a little wine to try to quiet our minds to sleep. And that might work for a little while, but once that stops working, we never go back to the amount of work and the way that we’re using our minds in a way that is beyond what it was supposed to be meant for. Trying to ever scratch the itch and gain more wealth and position and whatever.  We run right through Sabbath—whatever it might be. And we can’t figure out why our mind won’t shut off when we need it to shut off. Because we’ve spun it out of control. 

So we not only have to quiet the world around us, but we need to figure out how to quiet our own minds, to find a rhythm and a pace of life that changes depending on how old or young you might be, so that our minds can actually be healthy enough to once again rest and hear the still, small voice of the Lord.

And then our hearts are crazy, too. But we have to find a way to kind of get into a place where we can actually sit and contemplate the face of Jesus. Jesus did the work to remove the veil. He died on a cross. He paid the price for our sins so that the veil between us and God could be torn forevermore. So now there is nothing that separates us from the very presence and freedom and light and beauty of Christ’s presence. Yet, for some reason, when we get there our minds are so spun out, our worlds are so busy that we still can’t really receive what he has for us.

So the first step is to acknowledge our broken heart and to acknowledge the busyness around us, and to realize that the whole goal of Christian formation is to be more like Christ. The only way we’re going to be more like Christ is if we can spend time contemplating the face of Christ. 

So that’s what we’re going for. That’s a good starting point. And then, as always, as Jude taught us, remember that it’s the work of God to make us spotless and full of joy before his presence. So don’t feel some sort of legalistic burden laid on you right now. Feel the hope that, if you’ll find time to carve out time to contemplate the face of Jesus—he’s torn the veil through his blood and sacrifice on the cross. He’s the one that’s taken on the responsibility to make sure when you show up he’s got guidance for you. All you’ve got to do is figure out how to show up, and not show up so burned out, fried, busy and loud, but you can actually receive his still, small voice. That’s what we’re going for.

Let’s pray right now. This is a good place. The space between heaven and earth feels a little thin in here most of the time. I hope you feel that. Let’s just bow our heads and quiet our hearts.

God, I ask that you would help quiet our minds—even us that our minds spin and run and have a hard time being still. I pray that, by your Spirit, by the power of your Spirit, Lord, you would bring a holy silence, a holy stillness in this place. We just want you, Jesus. 

And in this place, really, I just want you to think about your heart and if any of those descriptions of the broken heart really resonated, if you’re being honest. If you’re able, if you’re willing, just in a whisper you can say, “God, I want to give you my heart. As we start this year of 2020, and you’ve still got breath in my lungs, I just want to give you my broken heart, that you might begin to form it in a way that you see fit.”

I think about my kids. When something they care about breaks, they don’t try to fix it. They run to me and they put it in my hands. I think this is a good moment to run to your Father in heaven and put your heart in his hand, because he’ll take it and he really knows how to fix it. He’s the one who made it in the first place. 

Lord, we do give you our hearts this morning. We pray that you would take and form them. Transform them, Lord. Help us learn how to quiet ourselves before you in a very loud world. I pray all this in Jesus’ name. Amen.

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©️2020 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture marked NASB is taken from New American Standard Bible  Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation.

Scripture marked MSG is from The Message Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson

The Servant Heart

David Stockton
Series: A Beautiful Heart

Good morning. It’s good to be with you guys. Thanks for coming. 

We have a special announcement today. We’ve been praying for a while that the Lord would give us vision and direction for Living Streams. And something that’s come up time and time again and has really landed deep in our hearts—and it’s broader than just me, it’s our whole team—we really feel like the Lord is calling us to be a “sending” church. 

We’ve been trying to figure out what that means. We’ve been trying to discuss it, pray for it, prepare for it, lean in to it. We finally arrived last year, at some point, at a goal that we want to send out fifty long-term missionaries by 2025. Long term meaning about a year or so, a year or more. We believe in short-term mission trips and all the experiences that can happen, but we really felt the Lord was wanting us to be a place where we cultivate missionaries—to be a sending church in that regard. 

We’ve been able to do that. On the organizational side we’ve been planning, preparing, trying to set aside budget and all of that for that. At the same time, it’s been for me to get to know people, to sit with people and for them to say, “We just have this calling or stirring in our hearts about missions.” Or, “We’ve really been thinking about this place int he world a lot. Do you know anything about that?” And I would be like, “Ha ha. I know all about that.”

No, I don’t creep people out too much. But this is Brandon and Kari Gurney. Brandon and Kari have been around Living Streams for a while, been in the internship and on staff for a while, and have served us really well. And both of them, before they were Brandon and Kari, they were just Brandon…and Kari. They both had a little stirring for missions, and it’s sort of what brought them together in some ways as well. 

But they’re feeling like it’s time. So we are going to be sending them out as missionaries. Why don’t you tell us a little bit about what’s going on?

Brandon: 

Like David said (I’m a little sick so forgive my voice), Kari and I are going to be launching in 2020 into Cuenca, Ecuador. That’s a place that we’ve had some connections as a church from the last few years We’re going to specifically be working with their worship department and communications, helping them develop some online ministry to reach out to the surrounding areas that are sort of inaccessible to the gospel but there’s internet still there.

We’ll also be working with some Venezuelan refugees, and a brand new college ministry that a church down in Cuenca is going to be launching. So if you want to learn a little bit more about what we’re doing, how you can support us, how you can partner with us and pray for us, check out the address that’s on the screen right now: gurneysglobal.org. And we’ll also be hanging out in the courtyard afterwards so you can learn a little more about what we’re doing and how you can pray for us too.

David:

It’s a beautiful thing and it’s a little difficult thing too; because these two are a real treasure. They’ve served us really well. I’ve gotten really close to Brandon, in particular. We’ve been able to see him do some really neat things. Kari’s been growing in that as well and been able to bring a real sweetness. So, it’s funny because I’v been praying to the Lord that we’d get to send all the junkers out, but instead we’ve been having to send out the cream of the crop. You know we’ve got the Fritz family over in Italy, serving away. And I’ve been meeting with other families. This one’s hard for me, for sure. But let’s pray for them and bless them, as they’ve served us well. We’re happy to let them go and bless them as they go serve the body of Christ in another place.

Lord Jesus, we come to you and we trust you and we know that you are sovereign over all things. We know that you have plans in this world. We know that you are preparing and building and purifying a bride for yourself, that’s called your Church. And we pray that, as these two go, that they really would be able to strengthen the church in Ecuador. Lord, that they would be able to get underneath and lift it. That they’d be able to get behind it and push what you’re already doing in those places. We pray that they would be able to spread your word, your word that restores our souls. Your word that brings life and guidance and wisdom. I pray that they would be able to do all of that, not just with their words, but also with their lives, their example, their hands and their feet and their hearts, Lord. I pray that they would be really good at giving body and blood, just like you gave to us, Jesus. That they would go there and they would wash people’s feet—both figuratively and literally. And you would just help good testimonies to come, good fruit to come, and we’d all get to rejoice together. We do pray that you’ll care for them well and bless them as they go. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Thank you, guys. Thank you, church for all the support. Thank you for giving your tithes and offerings and gifts so that we can continue to forcefully advance the kingdom, as Jesus said, and be proactive in that way. It’s really a wonderful thing.

Who’s next? Who wants to go next? Some of you sitting in here, you’re going to be going. And I’m excited bout it. And we don’t know each other but we should. I’m looking around. I don’t know who you are. But you know. You and the Lord talk it out and then let me know.

We also have baptism coming up. If you have not been baptized, as Nacho Libre would say. Jesus himself was baptized, and he’s called those who follow him to follow him through the waters of baptism. It’s not just a cute little ritual, but it’s actually a real step of faith and solidifying in your walk with the Lord. If you’re ready to follow Jesus, if you’re ready to say, “Hey, I just want to go Jesus’ way and I want to let everything else go,” that’s all you really need to know. I mean, the rest you’ll learn more about as you go. If you’re interested, sign up for that.

We’ve got a Mexico mission trip coming up.

So, we’re in a sermon series called The Beautiful Heart. It was kicked off last week. The beautiful heart is the humble heart, the servant heart, the grateful heart and the generous heart. It’s so interesting to me. We’re going to be focusing on the servant heart today. As I came in today, I got the bulletin and I knew I was teaching on the servant heart, not a lot of other people did. I think we actually advertised the wrong heart online or something, but it’s okay. We’ll live. But as I walked in, I saw that we are spotlighting one of our staff members, Arthur Le. I just thought the Lord was smiling a little bit, saying, “ha ha,” because, as I was studying all week about the servant heart, you know, looking at the heart of Christ and looking in the Scriptures, I kept thinking about, “Oh, that sounds like Arthur.” On the good side of things. It was like, “Oh, I got a story from Arthur’s life that illustrates exactly what that is.” And then I come in and it was like, servant heart, here, we’re spotlighting Arthur. So if this message doesn’t work today, to help us understand the servant heart, just go find this guy and hang out with him a little while. Bam. Done. You’re going to get it. No problem. Arthur is a total joy and he’s teaching all of us what it means to serve around here.

To get us off on the right foot, the end goal of every Christian is to become Christlike. That’s it. If you what to follow Christ, yes, you get baptized. Yes, you invite him into your life. You make confession and then you follow him. And the whole goal from that point forward is for you to become Christlike. If you ever wonder what’s supposed to be happening, what it means to have good fruit coming out of your life, it’s Christlike. That’s the goal. Whether you’re Kanye or anybody else, the goal is to be Christlike. 

It doesn’t matter where you start. It doesn’t matter how un-Christlike you might be, when you follow Jesus, he leads you into a place where you are becoming more like him, more into the image of Christ, more Christlike. That’s the goal.

The name “Christian” actually means little Christ. So what does it mean to be Christlike? This sermon series is all about that. We’re calling it the Beautiful Heart. Jesus had the beautiful heart. And it’s our attempt to answer that question. 

We look at the heart of Christ, which is so beautiful. Some would say the heart of Christ is so beautiful it’s irresistible. Oh, how amazing and perplexing it would have been to spend a day with Jesus as he walked among us. To see. To hear. To feel the heart of Jesus expressed in humanity. I mean, you probably would have been, like, “Wow. This is incredible.” And, “Whoa, this is so weird.” Because it was probably so foreign to experience a heart like that.

But I believe Jesus’ heart is summed up well by something I picked up by familymatters.net. It’s actually grace based parenting. It’s this organization that’s trying to help parents parent better. One of the things they do is they say that you should teach your kids what true greatness is. The world is teaching them that to be wealthy, to be powerful, to be popular, those are the things that are really going to be great in life. But we should teach our kids what true greatness is. True greatness is a humble heart, a servant heart, a grateful heart, a generous heart. That’s what’s truly beautiful. I agree with that.

I’m just furthering it to say that I think this is what sums up the heart of Christ and what it means to be Christlike. So we’re unpacking that together.

They said:

A humble heart is a reverence for God and a respect for others.

A servant heart is a willingness to take action in order to help someone else. [Whether they like you or not, or are like you or not.]

A grateful heart is an appreciation for what you have and an acknowledgement of Who has given it.

A generous heart is a great delight in sharing with others what God has entrusted to you.  

—familymatters.net

I like how Nathan Bentley highlighted the word “meekness” in his kickoff of the Humble Heart. I think that is a really great word. Strength under control. Powerful and gentle. Jesus himself described his heart this way. It’s always a real positive thing when you can build a sermon series and you can actually have Jesus saying, “Hey, if you want to know what my heart is like, I’ll tell you what my heart is like.” 

We have a verse where Jesus actually describes his heart. He says, “To all who are weary and carrying a heavy load…” Anybody? Weary? Carrying a heavy load? Whether it’s your own or somebody else’s? No one? That’s amazing! Liars!

He said, “If you’re in that spot, come to me and I’ll give you pep talk.” Nope. 

“Come to me and I’ll give you some construction criticism and help you with your problem solving.” Nope.

He says, “Come to me and I will give you rest.”

What an awesome song that came out of our worship team’s heart as they wrote that. Just resting in him. Resting in him. That’s really what we’re supposed to do. We’re supposed to abide, remain in Christ. And that alone will cause us to bear much fruit. 

He says to link arms with him and learn from him, for he is gentle and humble in heart. Our God, when he described his own heart, he says it’s gentle and humble. And that’s just not what we celebrate. I mean, every song out there is talking about, “Look how cool I am. I’m so bad. I’m so awesome.”  You watch these football players. They make about fourteen bad plays in a row, but they block one pass and they’re dancing all over the guy like they’re something so special. We’re like, “Whoa, that’s so cool. Look at their celebration.”

Yet, Jesus describes his heart as gentle and humble. He was not harsh or severe. He was not condescending or provoking. He was not disappointed or crotchety. He wasn’t in a hurry and he was not easily offended. Just like Americans. Just like me as a parent. No. The humble heart of God.

What’s so amazing about the humble heart of God is the humble heart of God is also in connection with the omnipotence of God. So powerful. Creator of all. And yet humble in heart. 

When I first started worshiping Jesus with singing—it might sound weird, I mean, I went to church for a long time and never song—but at one point I was awakening to a relationship with Jesus, and I wanted to bless his heart and do things that I thought would please him—and one of the things I read in the Scriptures and I saw other people doing was singing. So I thought, “Eh, what the heck. Let’s give that a shot.” Usually, luckily at our church, it’s loud enough that nobody can hear you. But I just started singing a little bit. There was one song in particular that the lyrics were simple. It said, “O God, awesome in power, O God, gentle in love.” Those two lyrics together of awesome in power and gentle in love, it just endeared my heart to this God that I was beginning to learn about and know. How could someone be so awesome in power and yet gentle in love. Because every person I’ve known that gets power, their heart doesn’t go that way. It goes the other way, with power corrupting. 

Yet God, who had all power, was expressing his power in gentleness and love and humility. And the more I got to know Christ, both studying his life, and then experiencing a relationship with him, it just got further and further in that same way. The humble heart of God is so beautiful. 

Isaiah 40. I love the way a prophet who was kind of getting a picture, a word from God about this Messiah that was to come later on—the way he describes this God is: 

10

See, the Sovereign Lord comes with power,

    and he rules with a mighty arm.

See, his reward is with him,

    and his recompense accompanies him.

And with all that power, and that mighty arm that he has…

11 

He tends his flock like a shepherd:

    He gathers the lambs in his arms

and carries them close to his heart;

    he gently leads those that have young.

I love the way they describe the Messiah. So different from any other Savior that you could imagine. 

In another place it describes Jesus as one who “a bruised reed he will never break and a smoldering wick he will never put out,”

Jesus, as he walked full of all that omnipotence that created the cosmos, he walked among us like a lamb with gentleness and humility. He didn’t break anybody. He didn’t hurt anyone. His humble heart was so beautiful.

So what does it look like to have a servant heart. I think the humble heart, once you cultivate the humble heart, it is expressed in the servant heart. Just like when you cultivate a grateful heart it is expressed easier in generosity. So the humble heart leads to the servant heart.

I came up with three points because it’s a good teaching tool, and I forget to do it all the time. But I remembered it this time. 

• A servant heart is selfless in its motives.

• A servant heart is secure in its service.

• A servant heart is sincere in love.

We’re going to unpack each one of those as we go. But before we do, I don’t want you to miss this. And I’m going to come back to this at the end because it’s that important. We are upholding these virtues. We’re trying to get a picture of the heart of Christ. As we look at it, we see it as beautiful. We see it as amazing. We see it as what the world needs today. We see it as so different from everything we see. Ultimately, if we’re honest, we see it as something different than our own heart. And we can start to feel a little bummed. Or challenged.

And the question comes, “Well, how can my heart, that is so worldly, that is so selfish, that is so unlike Christ, how can this old heart, this young heart, this hurt heart, whatever it might be, how can it form and change into a heart that is more Christlike?” 

And the Bible is very clear on this. And I want to be very clear on this. The only way to become more Christlike is to be with Christ. You’ve got to spend time with Jesus. There are a lot of gurus out there that will tell you a lot of different things. Do some weird stretching. Climb mountains. Stare at your belly button. Whatever it is. You’ll get more in tune with yourself. No doubt about it. And it is good to get in tune with your own soul. But it is not going to form you into the image of Christ. There is only One who knows the image of Christ, and that is the Spirit of Christ. And when we are in the presence of Christ by his Spirit, we are formed. He rubs off on us. We are changed into his image when we are in the glory of the Lord. 

And the trick is, you have to do it daily and you’ve got to do it for decades. Being a Christian is not just, “Hey, say a prayer and we’re good. We’ll check in every year or so, Christmas and Easter.” You’re going to have a very un-Christlike heart if that’s what you’re doing. You might be great at church, but you’re not going to be like Christ. It’s a scary thing to be good at church and not like Christ. It’s a daily spending of time in the presence of God, of Christ. And it takes decades. So that’s the challenge to us.

A servant heart is selfless in its motives. Let’s turn to 2 Samuel 17. We’re going Old Testament. We’re going to get another Old Testament character because so often these Old Testament pictures give us such a clear vision of what Christ is trying to teach us in the New Testament In 2 Samuel 17, we’re introduced to a few guys, and I want to highlight on in particular: Barzillai

27 When David [the king] came to Mahanaim, Shobi son of Nahash from Rabbah of the Ammonites, and Makir son of Ammiel from Lo Debar… 

Anybody? Lo Debar ringing a bell? Anybody? Yeah? A couple of weeks ago. Mephibosheth. Lo Debar? Yeah. This is the same guy that took care of Mephiboseth before David called him to his courts.

…and Barzillai the Gileadite from Rogelim 28 brought bedding and bowls and articles of pottery. They also brought wheat and barley, flour and roasted grain, beans and lentils, 29 honey and curds, sheep, and cheese from cows’ milk for David and his people to eat. For they said, “The people have become exhausted and hungry and thirsty in the wilderness.”

So we have this picture. An introduction. One of these four characters in particular, Barzillai, because the Bible highlights him in the next couple of chapters. All we know is that David is in a place where, for whatever reason, he and all the people that are with him are exhausted, tired and weary. And these guys, including Barzillai,  get together some supplies and they give to the refreshment of David and his men.

What is happening is David and the people are outside of Israel, across the Jordan river in Lo Debar area, which is without pasture. It’s the wilderness. It’s the desolate place. It’s like Arizona. Just kidding. It’s the desert. It’s way out there. And they were fleeing because David’s son Absalom, who all we really know about was that he was bitter because his father didn’t really deal with his family well. He had some daddy wounds. And he had really long hair. That’s all we know. And yet, he had basically cultivated a coup to overthrow David. He wanted to kill David. He wanted to overthrow David. He did some horrific things to David’s family. 

David had to flee. And the people he could gather had to flee for their lives. Because Absalom had gathered all these men, and David, at the time, wasn’t willing to fight his own son whom he loved. So David had fled and had been run out of town. And people had been mocking him. People had been laughing at him. People had been saying, “See, this is what you get for the horrors that you’ve done.”

And so David is out there, feeling shame, feeling betrayed, feeling hurt. And literally had no time to get supplies for the journey. They had been running for their lives so they’re exhausted. And there were these men that came around, men that David had probably interacted with when he was younger and was running for his life from Saul. But they come around. They hear the king is in need and they come around and give aid to him and the people. And Barzillai in particular is mentioned because what happens is, they care for David and then, at some point, however long that period was, there was a war between David’s men and Absalom, as Absalom is pursuing David. And Absalom’s hair gets caught in a tree and he’s kind of hanging there. He gets killed and his men get overthrown. So David is now able to come back to Jerusalem and set up as king again.

As he’s coming back, it says in 2 Samuel 19:

31 Barzillai the Gileadite also came down from Rogelim to cross the Jordan with the king and to send him on his way from there. 

So, for whatever reason, those other ones aren’t there anymore. And this is what I love about the servant heart. The servant heart is a thorough heart. All these guys came and basically said, “Here, we’ll help you out in this moment.” But it seems like the other guys went home. I don’t know that, but I do know that Barzillai stayed with David. He didn’t just give him a handout and then leave. He stuck with him. He cared for him. He made sure things were okay. 

And even when David was going back, he said, “All right. Well, I’m going to go on part of the journey with you, across the Jordan. And then I’m going to send you on your way.” It’s like, “You came to my house and I’m going to walk you out to your car.” He was thorough in his service, this Barzillai. 

32 Now Barzillai was very old, eighty years of age. He had provided for the king during his stay in Mahanaim, for he was a very wealthy man. 33 The king said to Barzillai, “Cross over with me and stay with me in Jerusalem, and I will provide for you.”

34 But Barzillai answered the king, 

And this is pretty funny. First service was laughing a lot. See what kind of age we’re dealing with here.

“How many more years will I live, that I should go up to Jerusalem with the king? 35 I am now eighty years old. Can I tell the difference between what is enjoyable and what is not? Can your servant taste what he eats and drinks? Can I still hear the voices of male and female singers? Why should your servant be an added burden to my lord the king? 36 Your servant will cross over the Jordan with the king for a short distance, but why should the king reward me in this way? 37 Let your servant return, that I may die in my own town near the tomb of my father and mother. 

So, here’s Barzillai, who’s basically like, taking care. He’s got a willing heart. He’s got a thorough heart. He’s selfless in his motives, because, here the king is basically saying, “Hey, I need people like you with me. You can sit at my table. You can live in the palace. We’ll take good care of you. You can be someone of esteem instead of being a person that lives out here in Lo Debar, that we all make fun of because it’s like Gila Bend.” (Sorry if you’re born in Gila Bend. )

And Barzillai looks at the king and says, “King, look, I’m good. I’m grateful. I didn’t do this to try and get in good with you. I didn’t do this to try and climb some sort of ladder. I know where I’m supposed to serve, king. I know what God has called me to do and it’s beautiful, even if you can’t see that, king. And he tells the king, “This is what I’m going to do. I’m going to take care of you, and I’m going to get you across that Jordan River. And I’m going to send you on your way with you need to get home, and I’m going to get back to the serving that I know I’m supposed to do. And if it’s small in your eyes, so be it.” 

I just love the way Barzillai reacts here. On the other hand, he also says, “Why in the world would you try and reward me for something like this? This is what I do. This is who I am. It gives me pleasure to serve you. And ultimately, king, I’m not serving you to serve you. I’m serving you because I serve God. So why would you try and reward me for something that is a joy for me to do?”

That is a servant heart right there, you guys. We found it. That’s the servant heart. That is so un-American. We’re trying to climb every ladder. All of our giving has strings attached. And here’s this Barzillai, who knows what it means to serve. And he has to put the king back in his place and say, “King, what I’m doing is beautiful. What I’m doing is service. And it’s meaningful. And besides, you city boys, I don’t understand all that singing and dancing that you do.”

I love his attitude in all of this. It reminds me, honestly, my grandfather was a Colonel in the air force, my wife’s grandpa was in the army, career. Those guys just got it. They understood service. You would thank them for their service and they would just try and stop you. Because they didn’t do it so that someday they could tell the stories and be praised. They did it because they had a servant heart. This is what I see in Barzillai. He was someone who served with selfless motives. 

The second thing: A servant is someone who is secure in their service. John 13 is another passage. It teaches us about how to serve out of security:

 13 It was just before the Passover Festival. Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

Thorough in his service, as well.

2 The evening meal was in progress, and the devil had already prompted Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. 3 Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; 4 so he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist….and began to wash his disciples’ feet…

In John 13, John is basically recounting this story that is not in the other three gospels. Matthew, Mark and Luke were all written between 60 and 70 a.d. by those guys. John didn’t write until about another twenty or thirty years later. John was one of the people that was actually there, that got his feet washed. John is writing at the end, saying, “Hey, there are a few more stories that need to be told. And there’s a little bit of a spin I want to put on the stories of what I remember of Jesus.” 

He really emphasizes the deity of Christ. So he has these basic elements of the story, and he inserts things like, “Jesus knew that it was time for him to leave the world and go to the Father. Jesus knew that he had come from God and was going to God. So whatever John is writing here, he’s recounting that moment where he’s sitting at the Last Supper with Jesus. He can feel the intensity of whatever is going on in Jesus’ heart. It doesn’t sound like they were too clued in on what was going on with Judas, but it was all happening.

John is writing the story about this moment where Jesus got up from the table, —and whether all of them kind of looked at Jesus when he did that, or if just John noticed that Jesus was doing something different—he’s remembering the look in Jesus’ eyes. He’s remembering the emotion that seemed to be expressed in Jesus’ heart and the pace at which Jesus moved through these steps. And John recounts everyone. It’s almost as if slow-motion was happening.

And John says, “Jesus, knowing that it was time for him to leave the world, knowing that the cross, the betrayal, the pain, the agony, the real test was coming, and knowing that he had come from God and was going to God, knowing that the Father had put all power in his hands to do whatever he wanted, he chose to get up, to grab a towel, and to wash these guys’ feet.” 

That’s what he did with his power. That’s what he did in his most important moment. And there was something about what John was saying. Jesus had this understanding, this perspective. He knew he had come from God, he knew he was going. There was a security that Jesus had which enabled him to serve in a way that was so meaningful that John wrote about it years later, after living a life of service. And still today, all over the world, people are washing each others’ feet to show love and service to one another.

Down in Belize, just a few weeks ago, when we were with all the men at the retreat. There were over 60 guys, I felt like the Lord was saying, “Hey, let’s do some foot washing.”

And I was like, “Oh, this is going to be weird. They’re going to be like, ‘What? I’m not toughing that guy’s feet. Ugh.’”

But I said, “All right, guys. We’re going to do a foot washing.”

They were kind of like, “What?!” 

Some of them knew, they had heard stories. Some of them hadn’t. So I tried to lighten the mood a little bit by saying, “Okay, now, we’re going to wash each other’s feet. And just because it’s going to feel a little weird, it’s not supposed to. When you hold a guy’s foot and you’re washing it, just don’t look them in the eyes, okay?”

They liked that a lot. 

“And then there’s like a twenty second limit per foot. So, as you’re washing it, just don’t look them in the eyes and then make sure you don’t go over 20 seconds. Then switch to the other foot. Twenty seconds and it’s done.”

I was trying to ease it up a bit. It was a beautiful thing to see all of these guys that have a lot of father wounds, that have been hurt by a lot of their male relationships. It’s a tough, dog-eat-dog society and culture. And here they were, washing each other’s feet. 

It’s all coming back to this moment where Jesus, out of his security, was able to debase himself, was able to say, “I don’t care what everybody thinks about me. I’m going to serve, because I’m so locked in with the way my Father in heaven feels about me.”

And how do you get that security? Well, same thing. You’ve got to be with Jesus. Jesus knowing where he had come from, knowing he was returning to God, and that’s what we need to do. We need to root ourselves in that security if we want to serve well.

And then last: A servant heart is sincere in its love. Really, there’s no better description of the servant heart, I think, than what happens in 1 Corinthians 13, when it is describing what love is. 

Dallas Willard—we’re going to get a bunch of Dallas Willard next year as we try and grow in our understanding of who God is and what he wants—he says that love is to will the good of another. That’s the way he describes it. Basically that’s what love is. It’s not a feeling. It’s not something you can get. True love is when you are willing the good of another. That is what love is all about. 

1 Corinthians, you guys know it:

I’m going to say it. Love is patient. Love is kind..I’m going to go through this thing, but a servant heart is these very same things. 

4 [A servant heart] is patient, [a servant heart] is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs.

I really think that’s a key. You know you have a servant heart when someone is treating you like a servant and it doesn’t bother you. It’s never happened in my life. No! When someone treats you like a servant, like, “Go get that for me!” And you’re like, “What did you say?” Again, it’s coming from a place of security. It’s not that you should just allow jerks to run over you and take advantage of you all the time. No, it’s when God’s calling you to love and serve someone, if they treat you like that, you say, “Okay. No problem. I’ll continue to serve you until you start to understand. Until you start to feel what patience and kindness really feels like. Until your heart can be softened by the love and service that I’m offering you. Just like my heart was softened by the love and service of Jesus to me.” So that’s what a servant heart looks like. 

So how do we become more selfless? We spend time with the One who gave it all, who called himself the servant of all. How do we become more secure? We spend time with the One who is eternal, immoveable, unchanging, who is called the Rock of Ages. 

How do we become more sincere in our love? We spend time with the One who is described as love and the Author of love. 

How do we become more humble, helpful, grateful, and generous like Jesus? We spend time with Jesus. Daily and for decades. Daily and for decades. There is no quick and easy fix. It’s every day and it’s every day. 

Let’s prepare our hearts for communion as we close—spend a little time with Jesus, allowing him to maybe highlight some things in your life where you’re doing well with this. Just allow him to search your heart and commend you for the things you’re doing well. But then, also, to bring to mind the things that maybe you’re not doing well in. You can spend that time confessing both your sin and mistakes, as well as confessing your forgiveness and wholeness. 

We’ll all take this together in the end, but just hold on to the body and blood of Christ and spend a little time talking to Jesus. 

Paul writes this to the Philippian church (Philippians 2):

5  In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:

6  Who, being in very nature[a] God,

    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;

7  rather, he made himself nothing

    by taking the very nature[b] of a servant,

    being made in human likeness.

8  And being found in appearance as a man,

    he humbled himself

    by becoming obedient to death—

        even death on a cross!

And Jesus, we do pause right here, as the world is spinning, as our to-do list is clamoring for our attention, we choose to pause everything, Lord, and to look into your face, and to see into your eyes and into your heart, and to say, “Thank you” for your body that was broken so that we could be made whole. Please fill us with your humility.

Let’s take the bread. 

And Jesus, we thank you for your blood that flowed to wash away all of our selfishness. Please do that once again.

Let’s take the cup.

Will you guys stand with me as we close in a chorus and have a little time of prayer up front? If you need prayer for anything, we’d love to partner with you and go before the Lord. This is a lot of information. I’m excited that we have a little curriculum that’s going to be going out to all the Life Groups. You can unpack it a little bit more.

If you don’t belong to a Life Group, we’re going to be launching some new ones in February so you can plugged in. This is more important than enneagram, or Myers Briggs or your PDP report. Whatever you are will be expressed in the most beautiful way if you can get this stuff right. You won’t even have to worry about it.

Let’s just spend time putting the Lord on the highest place in our hearts. 

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©️2019 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

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©️2019 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Mephibosheth Around the Table

David Stockton
Series: Church Around the Table

Living Streams! I was just in Belize for a week and had a great time down there. I’m pretty much fully recovered. We had about six fifteen-hours days in a row, which was long. But it was good. And we also had a basketball tournament one night, where we had to represent America against the Belizeans. And the basketball tournament started about midnight. We won every game, but my ankle lost one game real bad at the end. But other than, doing good.

It’s good to be with you guys. We have a lot of good things going on around here, I keep reading all of these articles and getting all these emails and hearing all these stories about how the church is in decline, and how millennials aren’t coming to church anymore, and whatever the after-millennials call themselves (not quite sure yet), and I just go, “Oh? Interesting.” I’m not saying it’s not true, but it’s just not what we’re experiencing here. We’re experiencing people being added to the church like every week and more every year for sure, getting discipled and plugged in. Were seeing a lot of millennials and those after-millennial people joining up all the time. It’s a really neat season. I’m thankful for what’s going on. 

We have a lot of things that, if you are still on the periphery a little bit, I would encourage you to jump in. We have this Explore Express class. If you’re newer to Living Streams, it’s a great place to get to know people, and get to know what’s “behind the curtain” at Living Streams; and we also have Life Groups going on, Polemeo. The Life Group thing, we keep hearing great reports about people getting together, sharing a meal together, sharing some time together outside of this context, getting to know each other. We’ve got that raw authenticity, relentless encouragement. We need relentless encouragement. It’s tough sledding in this life. We’ve got biblical counsel and genuine friendship happening in a lot of ways.

If you’re not plugged into one of those, there are a few slots available even now. But in January, we’ll get some more going. I’m excited because the end goal for Life Groups is not just to get everybody in our church into a group, but everyone in the world into a group. I really mean that because right now we’re trying to establish these communities where the love of God is manifest, it’s just there, it’s easy, it flows. And then those Life Groups would hopefully eventually start inviting people who don’t know the love of Christ, or don’t have a table to go to where they feel the love of Christ, and they can come into our homes and our tables and it’s already there, it’s already present. So next year we’re going to really be trying to make sure that’s a part of Life Groups as well. You guys are doing well. Thank you so much. I know it’s hard. I know it’s so hard following Jesus in this world. But you’re here! You made it. 

2 Samuel Chapter 9 is where we’re going to be today. We’re finishing up our Church Around the Table series. That’s the concept where we’ve been spending a lot of time looking at the table that Jesus set up for his disciples, the Last Supper, and really what he was trying to impart. I’ve been teaching the Bible for—how old am I now?—for twenty-five years. Literally, Sundays and Wednesdays, I’ve been teaching the Bible for twenty-five years. I’ve been going to church for a long time, been following Jesus for a long time, and I have felt like God has taught me so much in this last little series. I feel like it’s reshaping my heart. I feel like my heart is being reshaped in a brand new way after all these years, and I’m so thankful.

If you haven’t been tracking with us, everything we have is online. You can go to livingstreams.org. You can watch services live. You can watch them not live. We also have some supplemental material as well that can further your study and hopefully deepen your walk with Jesus.

That said, we’re going to do Church Around the Table today. We’re going to look at another table, an Old Testament table, a table of King David. Let’s read in Chapter 9, Verse 1:

David [who was king of Israel] asked, “Is there anyone still left of the house of Saul to whom I can show kindness for Jonathan’s sake?”

Now I know most of you are Old Testament scholars and all of this brings so much context to you, just this one verse and these names. But just in case you’re not sure, we’ll go ahead and recap a little bit of this.

David is a very famous figure in the Bible, in the Old Testment, he’s very famous in the New Testament, as well. He is an Israelite. He was king at this point. He was the guy who killed Goliath when he was young. Right after he killed Goliath, he began to be a part of Saul’s household in a way. Saul was the first king of Israel.

Now God had chosen this people, Israel, to demonstrate how he feels about everybody by having this one example. He took these people out of slavery in Egypt and he led them across the Red Sea. Moses, prince of Egypt, we’re all there. And he’s going across the wilderness, and he’s forming them into a nation. He’s giving them laws. He’s giving them judges for those laws. He’s giving them the way that he wants to go. He’s delivering them from the oppression of those around them. And then he leads them into the Promised Land to establish them as a nation with land.

So they’re in this place, and God has done so much for them. And they say, “God, it’s a little weird for us, having you be our king. Can you give us a man to be king? We want to be like all the other nations around us that have a man as king.”

And God said, “If I give you a man to be king, he’ll steal everything good from you.”

And they demanded it. They said, “God, we want a king.”

So he did. He gave them a king. And his name was Saul, the first king of Israel. And there it is, Saul’s family. Saul became a king and it seemed like everything was going good at first. He did seem to follow in God’s way and lead in God’s way. But as power came to him, he started to change a little bit. Ever seen that in human history before? Power began to corrupt. Power began to change the way he viewed things. He now was so afraid of losing power that he started to do things that were very unlike what God would want him to do. He became someone that, for the people of Israel, was rejected. He even at one point became demon- possessed, that we know of. He was visiting witches to try to figure out what was supposed to happen instead of listening to the prophets of God. He became a very wicked king in a lot of ways. Very confusing. Very harmful for the people of Israel. And he really became someone that, when we look back, we think Saul represents shame, represents the flesh, represents sinfulness, represents defeat. The people began to see Saul that way toward the end of his kingship.

Saul had a son named Jonathan. Jonathan was awesome. He’s probably my favorite Old Testament character. I really think that Jonathan was the person that gave David the courage to fight Goliath, because Jonathan had done something just as cool a few chapters before. Jonathan was King Saul’s son, so Jonathan lived with this not being king, his family being not known at all, then his dad becomes king and, all of a sudden, they’re thrust to the front of Israel’s vision. And now they are the royal family and treated as such, and known as such. Yet, Jonathan maybe experienced all this and thought “This is great.” Jonathan had some great exploits. People knew Jonathan and loved Jonathan. But then Jonathan also got to watch as the whole tide of the nation began to shift from loving and honoring them to really being embarrassed and ashamed of the family of Saul, of the kingship of Saul. You see this difference that’s taking place? That’s what Jonathan grew up with.

But along the way, as David killed Goliath and Saul brought him in, hoping that the fame of David would kind of rekindle the love for Saul, Jonathan and David became best friends. Like serious best friends. And they loved each other. And one day David said to Jonathan, “I think your dad has turned on me. I feel like your dad hates me. In fact, I think your dad is trying to kill me.”

And Jonathan was like, “Well, how do you know he’s trying to kill you? You’re crazy.”

“Well, he was throwing spears at me the other day.”

And still, they weren’t sure. “Well, I don’t know.” And they came up with this plan to find out, Is Saul really trying to kill David? Has Saul’s jealousy and shame so gripped him that he would try and kill David, Jonathan’s best friend?

So they came up with a plan. Jonathan found out that Saul was trying to kill him and they had to part. They had to break up their friendship, and David basically went and lived as an outcast, outside the nation of Israel, living in caves, trying to just stay alive as Saul hunted to try to kill him.

This is what’s taking place in the context of this one verse. And now David has become king because Saul and Jonathan went to war and they died on the same day. Then for the next six years or so there was this battle over who would be the next king. A couple of Saul’s sons stood forward and said, “I’ll be king.” And there was some battling between them. All of the people’s hearts went with David, and they wanted David to be king. But instead of making David king of all of Israel, David became king of a place called Gibea on the outskirts of Israel. 

He was king there for six years while all of this fighting and turmoil was going on. Then, finally, after all that time, David was thirty-seven years old and he becomes king of all of Israel, unites all twelve tribes under his leadership. And he followed God as one who seeks God’s own heart, loves God’s heart, wants to do what’s in God’s heart. He became a great king in Israel.

One of the things he did after he was established after all this craziness, he sat one day and he said, “Is there no one left of the house of Saul that I can bless for Jonathan’s sake?” 

This is what was in his heart. This is what stirred in his heart as king. It says:

2 Now there was a servant of Saul’s household named Ziba. They summoned him to appear before David, and the king said to him, “Are you Ziba?”

“At your service,” he replied.

3 The king asked, “Is there no one still alive from the house of Saul to whom I can show God’s kindness?”

Ziba answered the king, “There is still a son of Jonathan; he is lame in both feet.”

4 “Where is he?” the king asked.

Ziba answered, “He is at the house of Makir son of Ammiel in Lo Debar.”

So Lo Debar is an important name, as well. Lo Debar basically means “without pasture; desolate.” Lo Debar is also a place outside of Israel, across the Jordan river, on the wrong side. A place that we find out was where all of Saul’s family that was alive after all of that in-fighting, they fled for their lives in fear of the other sons of Saul coming to kill them because they weren’t part of that lineage—fear of David coming to kill them, because that was common that a conquering king would come and destroy everybody that was a threat to the throne. 

And in 2 Samuel Chapter 4, we actually find out what happened to this son of Jonathan. As the people were fleeing, one of the servants of Saul picked up this young boy named Mephibosheth, who was five years old, and as he was fleeing, he was dropped and it broke his legs and he became crippled for the rest of his life. Not only was this boy crippled, but he was taken to go live in a desolate place, hiding for fear, totally overshadowed by the shame of Saul’s name, in a place that was desolate and without pasture. 

So David says to Ziba, who tells him where he is:

5 So King David had him brought from Lo Debar, from the house of Makir son of Ammiel.

6 When Mephibosheth son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, came to David, he bowed down to pay him honor.

David said, “Mephibosheth!”

“At your service,” he replied.

7 “Don’t be afraid,” David said to him, “for I will surely show you kindness for the sake of your father Jonathan”

And the reason David says this, all of this is so pertinent and powerful. The fact that he says, “Mephibosheth” and they put an exclamation point there, and there’s a reason. And the fact that he says, “Don’t be afraid,” it’s important because, for all Mephibosheth knows, David could have summoned him to Jerusalem to kill him, to get rid of him. Because the power could have now corrupted David like it corrupted Saul and he wants to eliminate any threat at all. 

But when Mephibosheth comes in the room and bows himself down to David, David cries out, “Mephibosheth!” And there’s so much meaning behind that name. Mephibosheth means, “the end of shame.” 

Track with me here. The end of shame is what his name means. That name first came to him from Jonathan and his wife. And Jonathan and his wife had Mephibosheth toward the latter years of their life and Saul’s kingship. So here, Jonathan has watched the tide of favor, the tide of grace and glory and strength, completely shift to one of total shame, as his father has done these horrible things as king. So what was once an honor to be the son of Saul has now become a total shame. The people have rejected them. 

And Jonathan, when he has a son, with his heart broken at what his dad has done to the nation, heart broken at what his dad has done to his best friend, David—he and his wife agree to name their son Mephibosheth, the end of shame. 

I don’t know if God spoke to them and inspired them. We don’t get all of that. But we know that it meant something for these two people to name their son Mephibosheth; because they were wrestling with the shame. They felt it every day. And their hope in this child was that he might be born and grow up and, they might have thought, become a great king that will turn the nation of Israel back toward God and end and remove the shame of the name of Saul. 

But right after he was born, just a few years in, Jonathan is killed. Saul is killed. And in the hurry and stress of all of that, Mephibosheth, the one who will end all shame, is broken as he’s fleeing for his life. The one who was to be king and end all shame is now crippled in both feet and can’t walk. And shame remains and another layer is piled on.

Then he’s taken as a young boy to a place where there is no pasture. And there he is living basically disabled, unable to do much, unable to be fruitful, unable to produce anything of value, and every day people say, “Hey, Mephibosheth.” “Come here, Mephibosheth.” And the irony just tortures him. As he is called to be the one who ends all shame, and all he’s ever known is layer upon layer of shame. 

Then one day he gets called to go to be with King David, and he walks in and he bows himself to the ground. David, the king that maybe took his place, I don’t know what he’s thinking, but the king is looking at him and what does he say to him? “The One Who Will End All Shame, welcome! Do not be afraid.” And then he goes on to say this:

… I will restore to you all the land that belonged to your grandfather Saul, and you will always eat at my table.”

8 Mephibosheth bowed down and said, “What is your servant, that you should notice a dead dog like me?”

Now, please. We know people all the time who fake humility to try to procure more favor. They say things like, “Oh I could never do that.” And they know they’re better than everybody. And you’re just like, “Blah, blah, blah.” In your mind. You don’t say it out loud. But that’s not what’s taking place here. Mephibosheth is really shocked and confused. He can’t even see the potential goodness because the shame is so thick on the lenses of his life. 

When he says to David, “Why are you taking notice of me, a dead dog?”—in a lot of ways he’s saying, “David, please don’t call me Mephibosheth anymore. I’ve changed my name to Dead Dog.”

Out of the heart, the mouth speaks. And shame had won the day. The one who was named To End All Shame has become one who is just gripped by shame. He sees no good thing in him at all. And yet David restores to him all of the land that Saul had owned. That might be even more land than David had. And not only was it land, but Saul who had been king did just like God said. He took all of the best of the land. So now, the one who had only known no pasture, Lo Debar, now has the most fruitful parts of Israel as his. And one more thing. David said, “And you will sit and eat at my table.”

Let’s go on:

9 Then the king summoned Ziba, Saul’s steward, and said to him, “I have given your master’s grandson everything that belonged to Saul and his family. 10 You and your sons and your servants are to farm the land for him and bring in the crops, so that your master’s grandson may be provided for. And Mephibosheth, grandson of your master, will always eat at my table.” (Now Ziba had fifteen sons and twenty servants.)

That plays into something later.

11 Then Ziba said to the king, “Your servant will do whatever my lord the king commands his servant to do.” So Mephibosheth ate at David’s table like one of the king’s sons.

12 Mephibosheth had a young son named Mika, and all the members of Ziba’s household were servants of Mephibosheth. 13 And Mephibosheth lived in Jerusalem, because he always ate at the king’s table; he was lame in both feet.

So there’s this recounting in the library of Scripture, of this guy Mephibosheth. Sure enough, just like most of his life he thought was just wasting away, shame had won the day, now in this moment’s notice, he’s called by the king to come into his presence. There, in his presence, he is restored. All of his inheritance and destiny is restored in a moment. He now has the ability to do exactly what his name and calling is for him to do. He has all of Saul’s resources and he can use them differently than Saul did. He’s given all of Saul’s resources and it’s the most fruitful land.

The guy who grew up in Lo Debar, no pasture, is now having to have servants care for all of the produce that his lands produce. And then it says that he is invited to David’s table. Mephibosheth Around the Table. And when he comes up to that table, so many things take place, you guys. The crippled “Dead Dog” comes to the table. I’m sure on the first day it felt really weird for him. But as he’s sitting there at the table, the only thing people see is who he really is. They don’t see his crippled feet.

 I talked to my daughter about that last night. I was like, “You like sitting at the table?” (She’s in a wheelchair.)

She said, “I love it because we’re all the same here.”

She knows what it feels like. 

And here, Mephibosheth, however he gets to the table, he’s sitting there. And he really is just like one of the king’s sons. And there, at that first day, I’m sure he felt very unsure and like, “Uh, this is weird. Everybody knows I don’t belong.”

But think about as the years go by, year after year after year, he becomes so familiar there, maybe even tells some great jokes from time to time. Maybe even gives a little counsel. Maybe welcomes another one of David’s sons to the table because he’s been there a lot longer. All of a sudden he’s just there. And the shame, his past, they don’t know him like that. All they know is this person who sits at the king’s table, this person who has fruitful fields. 

And day after day, as he comes to that table, year after year, as he comes to that table, his shame dissipates. His shame fades. His shame no longer has authority in his life, no longer grips his heart, no longer is the most powerful voice in his life. But now he’s known as Mephibosheth, the one who ends the shame for himself and for his family.

And this is the call of God to you and me. We are called to be like David. This whole Church Around the Table is trying to inspire us to be more like David. So sit before our kingdoms, whatever they might be; whatever resource you have, whether it’s a car or a house or a table or a good park bench; whatever you have to assess the vastness of your kingdom and say, “What can I do today to show kindness, to show the love of God to someone who might not know it?” And invite them in. That’s what this whole thing is about. We’re trying to inspire that and be that. 

And some of you guys are doing a great job of that. You’re having people come across the threshold of your house that you never would have before. People that are so shameful you were afraid of them before. And now you’re inviting them all the way to sit at your table. And you’re not even afraid of their shame getting on you because you know Jesus’ love is too powerful. You’re having people come sit at your table that have done shameful things. And they’re feeling so free at your table to even confess some of those things so that they can be washed and cleansed. And there is so much more to come.

But the really important thing that we’ve got to notice here is that we’re aspiring to be David, but the truth is that David is a picture of Jesus and we’re a picture of Mephibosheth—people who have a destiny to end shame, to remove shame, to set ourselves and our family and others free of the shame of this sinful world, and our sinful mistakes. 

Yet, we find ourselves crippled in Lo Debar most days. But can you hear Jesus calling? Can you hear the King summoning you to come? All Jesus wants you to do is to come and sit at his table. He doesn’t care what you bring. That’ll take care of itself. He’s saying, “Come. Come to my table. I have died on a cross. I had my body broken, my blood spilled to provide for this.”

And if you will come to his table every day, year after year, you will find yourself being someone who can’t really remember how shameful you used to feel. You will come to his table, and all of a sudden you will find your destiny, your true name. And it might feel so weird at first. Some of you are here for the first time at church and you’re like, “Whaaaa. This is so weird!” 

But as you continue to come into the presence of Jesus, what happens is your shame gets washed away. And it sometimes happens in big, heaping, cleansing waves. Sometimes it’s just a little scrub. Sometimes it takes a few scrubs because that shame is sticky. But if we will keep coming to the table, if we will keep coming into his house, coming into his presence, pretty soon we won’t be known for all of our crippled-ness, all of our past. We’ll be known by our true name. 

When we went to Belize, I got to spend some time fasting the day before. All the guys that went, we fasted on the day we were headed to Belize. We knew we were going to go there and we want to tune in. “Okay, God. I don’t want to think about anything worldly. I want to think about spiritually what you’re doing.”

So I was journaling on the plane from Houston to Belize. I was just writing my prayers down and then, I’ve learned over time that praying should be more listening than talking. It’s really hard to remember that. But I was remembering and I was like, “Okay, Lord. Speak to me. What do you want to tell me? What am I looking for? What do you want to do in this time?”

So I started to write some things down. I ended up writing down about four different scenarios that I felt God was speaking to me about. It was interesting because, then it was like I was kind of on a treasure hunt. 

One of the scenarios I wrote was that there was a guy that I would meet down in Belize. We were going to do men’s ministry. There was a guy that I was going to meet. And he was a guy that really felt like his soul was dark, that the things he had done in life had broken his soul or had brought so much shame to his soul that it could never be lifted. And he just walked around with this heavy darkness in his soul. And that darkness came because he had really hurt a lot of people, actually physically hurt people. And I was like, “I don’t know if I want to meet this guy.” Then I felt the Lord told me that this was someone that has even murdered someone. Now it got real. And I thought, “Okay. That sounds too specific.” And how do you do that in a conversation? “Hey, have you killed someone?” “Okay, cool. Sorry.”

I didn’t know how this worked. But the very first night we were there, we created these moments of church around hot dogs and taekwondo. And we had all these guys there. And there were a couple of guys I didn’t know. Toward the end of the night I walked over to them and I said, “Hey, you guys. I’m looking for a couple of people. Can you help me out?”

And they were like, “Yeah. For sure.” 

So I read the first scenario. I said, “Do you guys know anybody like this?”

And one of the guys said, “I think that’s me.”

I didn’t read the part about killing anybody. I was too scared to do that. And he was like, “That sounds like me.”

And I said, “What does that mean? Do you feel that darkness?”

He said, “All the time.”

And I said, “Have you had a rough past where you’ve hurt people?”

He said, “I used to be in gangs, so I hurt people all the time.”

Then I was like, “Well, I also wrote down here that this person had murdered somebody.” I said, “Is that true?”

He said, “Well, I had a lot of past in gangs. And there is one thing that is really heavy on my soul right now. That’s me and my girlfriend just kind of broke up sort of. It’s complicated.”

I said, “Yeah, it always is.”

He said, “But she was pregnant with our son and she just had him aborted. And it’s been killing me. It’s been torturing me.”

This is where I had a little turmoil in my own heart as I was thinking, can I just say, “Hey, you’re forgiven.” That seems like, “No, you need to say these prayers. You need to show up at church a hundred times.” There’s got to be something to it. But then I remembered that when Jesus walked around here he would walk up to people and say, “Hey, I don’t condemn you. Go your way and sin no more.”

He said to a guy that got dropped through the ceiling, “Your sins are forgiven.” He didn’t know this guy. 

And then, in Hebrews 12, we talked about it two weeks ago, that the blood of Jesus Christ, one word and one word only, and that word is forgiveness.  And I thought, “I don’t know how else to process this moment; but instead to say to you, ‘I think Jesus has sent me here to pronounce you can be forgiven, and because of the confession you’ve made right now, you are forgiven. You are washed. You are clean. Jesus is going to put brightness and light in your soul. And he’s going to take those sinful desires and he’s going to give you new desires.’” 

I was like, “Can we pray for you?”

And the guy was like, “Yeah. For sure.”

And we all gathered around him and we had this holy moment. 

This was just a week ago, so I can’t tell you, “And now he’s the president…” I’m going to follow up on him as best I can. But I can tell you it was a really big deal because, that was a Tuesday night, and then we were gone the rest of the time and then we came back Sunday. I was really hoping he would show up. He came to church on Sunday morning in Belize City for the first time as an adult. I think he really believed that maybe, just maybe, there was a spot for him at the table. And he came and we had another time together and prayed. I hope he showed again today because, Jesus does a work the first time. But it takes a lot of showing up at the table before shame can not be the loudest voice in your life. But that’s what the table of Jesus is all about. For you to go and get your shame removed, but also for you to invite others who are full of shame to come and hear about the forgiveness and cleansing that Jesus can bring.

Let’s pray:

Jesus, we do thank you so much for your table that you invite us to; that we can come and sit at your table and we can be sons and daughters of God, full inheritance, free from shame both now and forevermore. And, Lord, it’s a marvel, it’s wild, it’s scandalous, but our hearts resonate with the truth of it. And, Lord, I just want to pray for those right now that are full of shame, that know their soul is dark and their feet are crippled, that they would just be so stirred by your Spirit and that they would come to your table, come into your presence, even right now in this moment. They would say to you, “Jesus, I need you. Jesus, I’m here, wanting to be with you.”

Let’s just take a moment in silence and allow the Spirit of the Lord to speak. If you need to confess, just whisper it. If you need to just rejoice and praise him for his grace, whisper it. 

Thank you, Lord.

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©️2019 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Radical Hospitality

Marty Caldwell
Series: Church Around the Table

Ryan Romeo: 

Good morning, Living Streams Church. David is out. He is in his second home, if you know David. He is in Belize right now, a place he loves. We always joke on staff. We feel like we’re one of two kids he has, and Belize is like that second kid. He’s over there, which is awesome. We’re so excited for him. He’s going to be back here next week.

Right now it’s my pleasure to introduce our guest speaker, Marty Caldwell. Marty’s with Young Life. He’s been to over eighty countries. He travels the world talking to young people. If you know anything about Young Life, for us it’s such a big deal. We love Young Life. I was a big part of Young Life growing up. So please join me in warmly welcoming Marty Caldwell.

Marty Caldwell:

Thanks, Ryan. By the way, David was part of the seeds planted that helped us get Young Life started in Belize. And they had their first weekend camp just a few weeks ago. There’s an inner connectivity in all of this. 

Good morning. This is the day that the Lord has made. Let us rejoice and be glad in it. I do want to say this: If you’re going, “I am not thinking that’s going to come out of my mouth, it’s not in my spirit. There’s a sadness, or there’s a loss, or maybe there’s a sickness in me.” — I want you to know, in the kingdom of God and in a family like Living Streams, when you’re on this side, this is the day that the Lord has made, “Let us lament and have peace in it” is equally important.

It’s not a smiley face on the lament. If you read the Bible, there’s a lot of lament in the Bible—sadness and sorrow. And we’re not afraid to enter into that. And we’re not afraid to welcome you into that. If you’re in here and, “This is the day the Lord has made and let me lament,” you get to lament. Because this is part of God creating larger hearts, a more compassionate people. And even the ability to have  both of these things: joy, celebration, worship and victory—absolutely. Equally: compassion, gentleness and lament. 

We are a people that God is making to have bigger hearts. We can do both of these things at the same time. But usually, it’s a little more one or the other. I just want to say one thing: If you’re here with a spirit of lament: welcome, welcome, welcome. Holy moly. You got out of bed this morning and you went to church in sorrow. That’s courage. That is courage. And I just want to say I’m impressed. Welcome. You don’t have to raise your hand. You just sit with this. 

But if you’re here on this side, I mean, same thing. There’s no greater welcome over here or over there. The Lord has made this day and we are gong to rejoice and be glad in it. But we are not afraid to enter into the lament and show compassion to those who are in that spirit today. That’s the reality of the kingdom of God and Living Streams is a place to express that. Welcome into it.

This morning, what I want to do is to talk about the radical hospitality of Jesus. I don’t know. Hospitality is one of those words that needs a better marketing group. Because, for the most part, hospitality is one of those boring, ordinary words. Well, yeah, like some flowers or candles, you know, maybe some cookies, baking, sort of ordinary. By the way, I think actually there are lots of elements of hospitality that are ordinary; but in today’s world, which is so divided, so polarized, so “us/them,” that the radical nature of the hospitality of Jesus, and the radical nature of the hospitality of the body of Christ, is absolutely, stunningly subversive and radical. 

So it may have some ordinary actions to it, but it is always a response of our hearts realizing that the God of the universe welcomes us. So if you would, pray with me: 

Lord, we’re so glad we get to be here this morning—together. You welcome us. You want us. You love us. You like us. You want to be with us. Well, this is just stunning, because you are God! You made all time, all geography, all universes, and you want to be with us and you welcome us into your presence. Wow! Help us to capture that but also to be captured by that, so that we may express radical hospitality in our own lives and our homes, our places of work, school, restaurants, neighborhood. Because we want to do your work your way as an expression of knowing how much we are loved. We pray in Christ’s name. Amen.

A simple definition of hospitality—I looked it up in the dictionary. I didn’t like it, so I made one up: 

Any action or set of actions, or words, or experiences, or touch, or smell, that says to another person or group of people, “I am so glad you are here. Come on in. Let’s be together.” 

And really, for this morning, if you’ll allow me, I’m going to use hospitality and belonging and welcome almost interchangeably. I think hospitality is kind of the inner core—the dynamic—but the expression of hospitality is welcome and belonging, belonging and welcome. 

The first one, of course, to express that is the God of the universe. He says that to you and me whether we’re broken, whether we’re falling away, whether we’re joyful or lamenting, or absolutely in prodigal country. He says to us, before we behave and before we believe, that we belong. This is the radical nature of the gospel. It is not like any other religion. It’s not like the rules and regulations that we would set up, that we would expect: Well, you have to have the belief test and then the behavior test and then you get to belong because you’ve learned the secret code. You’ve learned the secret belief. You’ve learned the secret behaviors, and then God says, “Ok, now you belong with me.”

Christ most expressly says, “You belong with me.” 

“Well, wait a minute. I don’t know the belief system.”

“You belong with me.”

“I certainly don’t behave.”

“You belong with me.”

This is the hospitality of God. If you don’t think that’s radical, just read the newspaper. Actually, just look at your own family. This is not how things work. This is how the gospel works. The gospel is this radical person, Jesus Christ, who expresses to a broken and hurting world, “You belong with the God of the universe.”

Stunning. Really. That God is radically hospitable to us. And if you believe this, if you have this at your core, you are most free then to express radical hospitality to others; which is most simply expressed in the second greatest commandment: Love your neighbor as yourself. Ultimately, hospitality, welcome, belonging are of the same kind. They are “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

This is it. Sounds so ordinary. Sounds so every day. It is. It is ordinary. It is every day. But if you think it’s easy, your life is not like mine. This is hard work. This is costly work. This has to be a practice.

Here’s what Paul says in Romans 12. He’s kind of riffing.

9 Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. 10 Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. 

This is getting harder as we go.

11 Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. 12 Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. 13 Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. 

And this just stands out there, screaming at me:

…Practice hospitality.

And this is what I would like to inspire you to. Practice hospitality. I really like the language of that because it’s a little bit better for me than “be hospitable.” Because what if I can’t be hospitable? Well, okay, good. You can’t. But what if you practice? Okay, I could try that. Practice. I’m not good. I have this muscle of hospitality right here. Here we go. Try to lift it. “I can’t lift it.”

“Okay, get something lighter. Practice.”

So this morning, what I’d like to encourage you in, is practice hospitality. Young Life is really kind of a laboratory for this with disinterested, lost teenagers here and around the world. I have a picture of a greeting. This is Tanzania, so this is probably mostly muslim kids. These are kids with no background in Christ. We set up a welcome for them. The little three wheeler coming down, and these are flags of all of these nations, back behind here is a wedding band and about a hundred people that are saying to teenagers that don’t feel welcome in their neighborhood, don’t feel welcome outside of their neighborhood, often not in their own family, maybe nowhere, not in their school, this is a hundred people or so, singing, dancing, screaming, flag-waving, “We are glad you are here!” It’s beautiful chaos. This would be like any Young Life camp anywhere around the world. This just happens to be Tanzania. 

A really iconic moment for me of hospitality, and the importance of welcome happened a few years ago, kind of our first camp in Tanzania. All of the kids had come. They’re already here. This is kind of the start and this is the finish. One kid had missed the bus. So he missed out on the greeting. 

And I kind of go, “Well, you know, we’ve got to get dinner going. It’s a little bit late. I’ve got to button things up. But just have him come and he’ll walk into dinner and somebody give him a high five and it’ll be great.”

The Africans go, “Oh, no, no. We do the same greeting.”

I go, “Wait a minute. For the one kid?”

“Yeah.”

So he gets on the bus by himself. We’ve got to all wait out there for about thirty minutes. He comes down that road. It’s hilarious. It is a bus driver and one kid. But by that time, all the kids that had been welcomed had joined us. So now it’s about 350 people and they have set up a gauntlet for him. And he is being greeted like he is a rock and roll star. High five and he’s disoriented. I think what he had felt was the shame of missing the bus, the “maybe I shouldn’t have come,” the “maybe I don’t belong.” And he is overwhelmed. 

And what’s interesting to me is, not just the believers who had done the first welcome, but now everyone’s in on the welcome. There is something fundamental that God has wired to us in Genesis 1 and 2, that is to be welcoming. And then there is something fundamentally broken from Genesis 3 on that says, “Play small, play safe, guard, don’t share, be in the background, be with people like you.”

There’s you know, 150 muslim kids and then 50 atheist kids and 50 nominal Christian kids. And they’re all welcoming this one kid. No duh. Did that kid meet Christ? Okay. Yeah. Absolutely. He met Christ. He hears the gospel. He’s experienced the gospel because he’s had a whole world welcome. “You belong. You belong. You belong.”

“Well, wait a minute! I’m late. I missed the bus. I probably shouldn’t be here.”

And this expression—and believe me, this is loud as any proclamation could be—it’s as fine-tuned and powerful as any sermon could ever be. So when you think about the radical hospitality of God, the radical hospitality of, “You belong with me,” also think about your own chance to express that gospel message to others who feel like they don’t belong. To say to them, with your words, with your actions, “You belong. You are welcome. We are so glad you are here.”

Luke 15:

15 Now the tax collectors and sinners were all gathering around to hear Jesus. 2 But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law muttered, “This man welcomes sinners and eats with them.”

Which of course, in the Middle East a couple thousand years ago, and still today, if you come into someone’s home and you share a meal, often hospitality has to do with food. Good. Something fundamental going on here together. Always has to do with conversation. Also has to do with eye contact, learning names, to say with our body, with our words, with our actions, with our very spirit, “I am so glad you are here.”

And really, when you think about that, I think this is generally true with Living Streams, as David and I talked about this a few months ago, the idea of radical hospitality and that being one of the dynamics of Living Streams, we really did think we’re going to hire a high school band for the parking lot. And then we’re going to get a bunch of people to come in early to create a gauntlet so that everyone coming in got a high five, or a hug, or a “We’re glad you’re here.” 

We were defeated by the logistics, but the heart and the idea were good. But just imagine you coming in this morning and there is a band in the parking lot, and they’re wailing out some John Philip Souza tune, and they’re kind of marching, and you’re all, “What’s going on?”

And then somebody says, “Oh! They’re here for you.” 

“Huh?” 

“Well, yeah. That’s the welcome band. They’re here playing so that you know how welcome you are.”

“Wow.”

Then you walk into the foyer and bunch of people are high-fiving. They’re here for you. This is the kind of place this campus desires to be.

But here’s the cool thing. What if we brought the marching band to your neighborhood, or your house, or your back yard. And really, the marching band is probably some great barbecue, probably some great drinks, probably some fun and games in the back yard. And you’ve got some neighbors coming over and they feel this welcome. They are treated with “We are glad you are here. You belong.”

“You’re one of those weird-o religious people.”

No response needed. “I’m just glad you’re here.”

Okay, did they make the direct connection of, “Oh, I bet God’s glad I’m here”? Of course not. But hospitality is an experience of the good news that we belong with God in relationship. It’s an experience. It’s the beginning of what I call the non-verbal proclamation of the gospel. 

Think about your own life. There were things that happened around it that told you you belong, that brought you in. You just didn’t know what they were. What you said was, “I want what they have.” Because hospitable people create a curiosity—especially in today’s divided world. This is a very subversive activity.

Luke 19:

19 Jesus entered Jericho and was passing through. 2 A man was there by the name of Zacchaeus; he was a chief tax collector and was wealthy. 3 He wanted to see who Jesus was, but because he was short he could not see over the crowd. 

Think about this. We’ve got Zacchaeus. He’s a turncoat, he’s a tax collector, he’s stealing from people, he’s a liar and a cheat, he may live in a big, empty house on a hill and—ha ha!—he’s also short. And I think what you must imagine is a powerful, wealthy, but isolated, alone individual. And he wants to see what sort of person Jesus was. He didn’t really want to meet him. He doesn’t want to go hear a lesson, he wants to see what sort of person he is.

4 So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore-fig tree to see him, since Jesus was coming that way.

5 When Jesus reached the spot, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down immediately. 

I mean, Zacchaeus knows his internal life. He knows what he’s done. He’s going to spiritual prison and here’s the religious guy, the country rabbi that’s calling him out. He didn’t have that in mind. He climbed the tree because he wanted to see what sort of person Jesus was. Not to meet him. Not to talk to him. Not to get a lesson from him. But just to see him. Kind of a curious guy. Remarkable to me. Jesus knows his name.

By the way—become good at names. Know the names of your neighbors, the names of the people you sit next to in school. Go to one Starbucks. Learn people’s names. Go to one grocery store. Learn people’s names. Got to go shopping with my wife sometimes to get one gallon of milk. It’ll take an hour because she’s got to talk to everybody in Safeway. The guy that cuts the meat, the guy stocking the shelves, she knows all of the people that are checking the groceries. She walks in. They stop her. “Susan! How’s your mom?”

I’m going, “Give me the milk. Let me out of here.”

She’s one of my teachers in hospitality, welcoming and belonging. But just think about how crazy that is. It’s a subversive act. Go into the Safeway and learn people’s names and honor them for their work and ask them questions about their life. I promise. Experiment. Practice on this. Just try this for a couple of weeks. Same grocery store. Learn people’s names. Validate their work. Ask them questions about their life. 

It’ll be a little weird at first. They’ll go, “Oh man. There’s a weird-o here. Better call security.” But they’ll get over that pretty quickly because that’s one human being validating another. And the human being that knows Jesus saying to the other one—regardless of where they are—“You belong. You are loved. You matter. Your work matters. I see you.”

A lot of hospitality is seeing, noticing, watching, sometimes the sad one, sometimes the isolated one, sometimes the one celebrating, but no matter what, an outward expression of the love of Christ is to notice. This means we have to slow down a bit. You know, you’re really not noticing people when you’re doing this (on phone), you’re doing that. It’s not happening. The idea that hospitality is cheap and free is incorrect. It’s actually pretty expensive. It costs time. It costs money. It costs some comfort. There’s a little bit of discomfort related to hospitality. But this is the whole subversion of the kingdom of God. It starts with Christ in the middle.

Matthew 25:

34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 

This is Jesus speaking.

35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in,

I’ll stop there. 

Luke 19:

5 …“Zacchaeus, come down immediately. I must stay at your house today.” 6 So he came down at once and welcomed him gladly.

7 All the people saw this and began to mutter, “He has gone to be the guest of a sinner.”

That Jesus. Doesn’t he know? The religious. Powerful. “We have a reputation to guard here and now you’re going with Zacchaeus? He’s the enemy. He’s been trying to destroy our town.”

8 But Zacchaeus stood up and said to the Lord, “Look, Lord! Here and now I give half of my possessions to the poor, and if I have cheated anybody out of anything, I will pay back four times the amount.”

Like, even just being welcomed, your name is used, “Come down, I’ll be with you.” His life goes upside down from everything he’s ever known. I have to think that comes from a vacuum of not belonging. But this belonging and the special nature of Jesus to notice, to “I see you, Zacchaeus,” is the thing that flips his life upside down.

9 Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, because this man, too, is a son of Abraham. 10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”

The very purpose of God: seek and save the lost. And this is why broken people are so quick to be sought and to find Jesus. In self-sufficiency, “Everything is going my way,” it’s a heck of a lot harder to find Jesus. You find him most often in desperate moments, in lonely moments, in broken moments, in recognition of, “I don’t have it.” Yeah. You don’t. Me neither. 

So what do we do? We’ve got a Savior. Died for our sins and rose to offer us life now, in hope and freedom, enjoying everything good. 

Back to Matthew 25:

36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

Wow. So when serving and giving our lives away to those who are lost or broken and lonely, and maybe different from us, maybe we have to enter into a little of our own discomfort to express the love and the knowing and the “I see you” and “you belong” and all of those things, what happens is, Jesus says, “Yeah. You did that to me.”

“But no, I thought I was doing it to them.”

“Yeah, anytime you’re doing it to them that way with your hospitable heart, this is what you’ve done to me.”

The Son of Man came to seek and save the lost.

The practice of hospitality begins in the human heart. We realize that God has been hospitable to us, so 1) we are grateful. If you realize how hospitable, how “You belong, Marty, with all of your stuff,” the natural response is gratitude. We can express that in worship. We can express that in prayer. We can express that in generosity. We can express that in service. But a heart that is grateful is a heart that is true; because it recognizes what God has done and what he has said to us and how he activates that within us.

Then it causes us to begin to practice more hospitality. It frees us up. Hospitality is a subversive and courageous action in a divided culture. Actions, words, memories, smells, even touch. You’ve got to be careful in the climate today. But read the signals. You can tell if someone’s a hugger. Hug them. You can tell if they’re not a hugger. Shake their hand. But just pay attention. See, look. A handshake can be very welcoming to a person that needs a handshake. Maybe you shake the hand in a different way. Maybe you put the other hand on there. 

In Ethiopia—this is so cool, so humbling—any older person, a younger person comes and shakes hands and they always put their left hand and they lift it up, because the young person does not want to be a burden on the older person. For once to lift their burden. Is that cool? Like a cultural hospitality. A sign of respect. A sign of eldership. A sign of “I want to be last. I want to be a light to you.” And you see this all over Ethiopia. It’s intentional. It’s thoughtful. We think about what will help them feel welcome most often in the home, but it really can be everywhere, noticing, affirming blessing.

I want to tell you about one of my hospitality heroes, Holman Mendoza. I brought a picture of him. It’s a picture of my job with Young Life. Rapha Allejo, the Director of Young Life in the Dominican Republic, Carlina Poe, Director of Young Life in South America, and Holman Mendoza, Director of Young Life in Nicaragua. If you know anything about the politics in the eighties, the Sandinistas were being fueled by the Russian government; whereas the United States was funding the Samosa government. I’m not going to get into the politics, because there are two stories worth telling on both of those sides. 

But Holman was born in the eighties. He was raised as a revolutionary. I’ve seen his textbook. He showed me his second grade math textbook. One AK47 plus two AK47’s is how many AK47’s? This is how he’s learning math. Two hand grenades plus two hand grenades is how many hand grenades? The Sandinistas realized, “If we don’t start raising up revolutionaries, that will want to join our army and kill the enemy, then we’re going to lose this war.” 

So Holman was raised to be a Sandinista revolutionary and his weapons were really going to be hand grenades, AK47’s and whatever he could make available to do violence to the enemy—until a guy named Emerson who played basketball, didn’t speak Spanish very well, walked into his neighborhood and said, “Do you want to play basketball?” Holman and his friends started playing basketball again and again and again. His Spanish wasn’t very good and neither was his basketball. But he had one and they didn’t have a basketball and they loved to play. They played everyday until Emerson said, “Holman, I want you to come to this Young Life camp with me.” 

Remember, he’s consorting with the enemy. “I’m supposed to hate you. You’re supposed to hate me. But we’re playing basketball together. I’m really not sure about this.” But he just caught him on a whim and he doesn’t have something better to do, to go to this Young Life camp. He meets Jesus. He eventually becomes a volunteer leader, he gets a college degree, eventually goes on the Young Life staff. This is about fifteen years ago.

But he told me a couple of years ago a thing that really flipped me upside down. He goes, “Marty, I was raised to be a revolutionary. My weapons were going to be those of destruction.” But he said, “I’m still a revolutionary at heart. So I have new weapons, because I want to change my nation. I want to change Central America. I want to change North America. I want to be part of God’s changing the world. My new weapons of revolution are love and service and prayer and hospitality. But I want to fight with the same passion. I want to love my enemy. I want to welcome those who feel like they don’t belong into the welcoming arms of the family of God.”

This is the subversive nature of the simple but radical, ordinary hospitality. And really, my admonition to everyone here today: practice. Just do something. “Okay, I’m going to practice that. I’m going to learn a name. I’m going to take a little more time at Starbucks. I’m going to have my neighbors over—my actual, real neighbors, the ones that live next to me. I’m going to invite them over for a barbecue.”

Well, yeah, should you have a Bible study right away? Yeah, I kind of don’t think so. Have a barbecue. Make good barbecue. Find out the beverage of their choice. Serve that beverage. It might not be your beverage. But this is the idea of hospitality, that this tribe, Living Streams, would be those who are most hospitable. And there really isn’t something that’s more hospitable or expresses hospitality better than breaking bread. That this is our symbol in the body of Christ. It’s actually a revolutionary act to break bread together. 

You can pass out the elements. When you think about this, this is God welcoming you to his table. Why? “I don’t know the theologies or I don’t know the doctrines, or maybe I do but I forgot them." Or maybe, “I’m not living them.” “I know them but I don’t live them.” No matter what, the welcoming nature of God is expressed most regularly and most simply in the act of communion. That God says, “You belong with me. You are mine.” We are brothers and sisters.

I would propose to you that not only is taking communion together an act of hospitality, it’s also an act of revolution. We are not going to live by the world’s values. We’re not going to think it’s about stuff or achievement. We are going to think about the love God, experience his love, and love people. 

This is the place within the church, the tribe of the church, that we come together and God expresses that belonging. I actually think the most stunning thing about communion was the first one, when Jesus offered communion to Judas. I can’t believe this. He knew the betrayal. He knew what was going to happen, and he still says to Judas, “You belong with me.” So what this says to me is, no matter how far you have drifted, no matter how far you are, if this is your first time in church in twenty-two years, God says, “Glad you’re here.”

I mean, it’s nice that we say, “Glad you’re here.” But it’s a little bit nicer and lot more powerful that God says, “Glad you’re here. Welcome home, welcome home. Let’s share a meal together.”

And so communion expresses this idea of hospitality so beautifully. Theologically commanded in Scripture, and also it is an action, seemingly ordinary, but, like hospitality, subversive, powerful and a lot more than the sum of the parts. 

On the night in which he was betrayed, Jesus took the bread. He gave thanks and he broke it. He said to his friends, “This is my body broken for you.” So let’s take and eat the bread, the body of Christ.

And likewise, he took the cup, pretty ordinary in its day, always an expression of hospitality, always an expression of, “We are friends in this together.” And in particular, that this is all new to you, this is the blood shed on a cross for your sin and mine and an offer of sweet forgiveness forever. Not just the past stuff, but the today stuff and that tomorrow stuff which will come. Forgiven once and for all and again and again and again. And it’s why he has commended communion to us—so that we would remember that well. The blood of Christ for the forgiveness of sin, the new covenant. The old is passed away, behold, the new has come.

If you feel like you don’t belong, I have failed. Please don’t let my failure become yours. You belong. The whole Bible, all of God’s history, every one of his expressions is to say to you and to me and to call us by name, not some generic somebody, “Hey, Dude,” but to say to us, “You belong. You’re with me. We are together in this thing called life and I want you to have it in abundance.” 

And for that very reason, you belong. We belong. Why? Because that’s what God wants. And he has a way of getting what he wants. Let’s pray:

Lord, thank you for your hospitality toward us. We’re a little bit nervous about being revolutionaries, but we can certainly invite our neighbor over. We can love them and we can pay attention. We can get to know the guy at Starbucks and remember his name, the gal at the bank that cashes the check, the guy at Safeway that’s mopping the floor, our neighbor, the one that’s next door and behind us. We ask for the gift of names and we ask for the practice of hospitality, that we would always be known as “those weird-o’s that welcome everybody. They’ve got something different.”

Indeed. The Holy Spirit indwells and expresses itself most beautifully in receiving God’s love and expressing his love by loving other people. We just admit, Lord, we need help on this. Probably going to fumble a few times. But that’s not news to you. We ask for help. We ask for your fruitfulness and your thriving in our lives. I pray in Christ’s name, amen.

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©️2019 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

The Practice of Hospitality

David Stockton
Series: Church Around the Table

We’ve been trying to unpack this concept of Church Around the Table. We’ve been spending a lot of time talking about Jesus, which is a good thing. We talked about Jesus’ Last Supper and what was really going on in that moment. We are trying to get into us as Jesus’ followers 2,000 years later what Jesus was trying to get into his disciples in that last culmination meal with them, those last few hours he had with them.

We’ve been taking it really seriously and diving in. And we are going to continue doing that a little bit today. But today will be a little different. I’m trying to just make sure we don’t get all this stuff in our heads, but we’re going to have some pauses in our time together. I’m hoping that stuff will get distilled down into our hearts a little more today. So this might be a little bit slower. If you fall asleep, that’s okay, we’ll just go straight to your heart. We don’t need your brain anyway.

We’ve shared some concepts in this regard. We’ve shared some inspiring stories. But what I’ve been praying is that God will help you understand how this applies to you in your daily routine. There’s this phrase: What would Jesus do? It’s a good phrase; but one of my friends says it’s totally insufficient and actually a really heavy burden if we just leave the question like that. He says the true questions is: What would Jesus do if he were me, and he lived in the context that I live in today? It’s a little longer thought process, but it’s more valid. Because you are you and you are facing the things you face. You have the job you have and the calendar you have. 

I want us to figure out what it could mean for you. At the end of this thing, I’m going to pray that Jesus would just show us what the next step is, because we are following him. He is leading us from being one thing to something much greater. It’s just one step at a time. So we’re going to try to do a little bit of that in our message today.

Luke 4 is where Jesus comes on the scene and he sits in the synagogue with all the other believers at that time. At one point he is called to the front and he’s given a passage from Isaiah and he reads it:

18 
“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
19 
    to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
And then he sits down and says, 

21 …“Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

He’s basically saying, “From now on you can judge everything in my life based on this criteria. This is what the Spirit of the Lord is upon me to do. Proclaim good news to the poor. Set the oppressed free, to heal people, to help people, and to let them know how much God loves them, that his favor rests on them.”

That’s what he said. And then, a little later on, John the Baptist—who was Jesus’ cousin—was trying to figure out, “Jesus, are you really the whole thing? Or are you just part of it?” 

And Jesus said to him, “The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and good news is proclaimed to the poor. Blessed is anyone who doesn’t stumble on account of me.”

Jesus said, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me to proclaim good news to the poor and to heal people.” And then, later on, John the Baptist was saying, “Jesus, is it really you?”

And Jesus said—same test—“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me to proclaim good news to the poor and to help and heal people. And if you’re seeing these happen you know the Spirit of the Lord is upon me.”

Then, as we get to that Last Supper, Jesus is basically saying to his disciples—in John 13; he washes their feet, John 14, 15, 16, is the discussion they had in that time, recorded for us. Jesus is saying, “The same Spirit that is on me is going to be on you. Therefore, the same measurements are going to be applied to you.” 

The Spirit that is upon Jesus caused Jesus to walk in the way that he did. And the same Spirit now rests on us, thanks to the resurrection. And so the Spirit of the Lord is upon you and me to do what? To proclaim good news to the poor, and to help and heal people. That’s the transfer that was taking place in that moment. We’ve talked about that, leading up to this.

As we’ve gone through, we’ve talked a lot about the life of Jesus showing up. We’ve talked about a lot of giving body and blood and washing people. But this one phrase is constantly jumping out at me, saying, “Don’t forget me.” And I go on to the next one and, “Don’t forget me.” Because when we talk about Jesus, we have to remember that, one of the main things that he was about was proclaiming good news to the poor. Proclaiming good news to the poor. So, if you want to follow Jesus, then one of the things that should show up in your life, on a daily, weekly, monthly basis—however you measure your life: proclaiming good news to the poor. That’s what it means to have Church Around a Table. To proclaim good news to the poor.

So we’re going to unpack that a little bit; because, obviously, good news is kind of a funny word, and poor can be defined in a lot of different ways. First of all, let’s define the word poor. Matthew 25:31-40 in the Message translation (MSG):

31-33 “When he finally arrives, blazing in beauty and all his angels with him, the Son of Man will take his place on his glorious throne. Then all the nations will be arranged before him and he will sort the people out, much as a shepherd sorts out sheep and goats, putting sheep to his right and goats to his left.

34-36 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Enter, you who are blessed by my Father! Take what’s coming to you in this kingdom. It’s been ready for you since the world’s foundation. And here’s why:

I was hungry and you fed me,
I was thirsty and you gave me a drink,
I was homeless and you gave me a room,
I was shivering and you gave me clothes,
I was sick and you stopped to visit,
I was in prison and you came to me.’

37-40 “Then those ‘sheep’ are going to say, ‘Master, what are you talking about? When did we ever see you hungry and feed you, thirsty and give you a drink? And when did we ever see you sick or in prison and come to you?’ Then the King… 

The Lord, as Allan Meyer talked about last week. The Lord of all.

…will say, ‘I’m telling the solemn truth: Whenever you did one of these things to someone overlooked or ignored, that was me—you did it to me.’”

So, in this definition, the poor would be those who are overlooked and ignored. I married a lady fifteen years ago, in Brittany, she’s my wife. I live with her still today after fifteen years, which I guess is progress, something to celebrate in our world. But I live with her and I link my life with her. Prior to marrying her, I was not married to her for twenty-seven years. Seventeen of those years, I really, really loved myself. I thought a lot about myself and I considered myself more highly than I ought. I was just absorbed with myself. I really was. I thought I was great and if everything was going my way then everyone should be happy. And if they weren’t, I didn’t even know, because I didn’t think about them at all. It’s true. Just very arrogant, prideful, selfish, self-absorbed. 

Then, at seventeen, Jesus started messing with my life. He started to say that he wanted to do a work in my life. I thought, Cool. You want to care about me? Well, I care about me, you care about me, this is going to be great. I’ve got God now thinking about me, and what I want, and how important it is. 

But it didn’t happen that way. He actually saved me. When I talk about the salvation that Jesus brought into my life, yes, it’s true, he saved me forevermore. Yes, it’s true, he saved me from living a life not knowing my Maker, knowing my Father. He saved me from so many things that I didn’t know about; but, in that moment, he saved me from my selfishness and pride. And he started to all of a sudden make me care about other people. It was a radical thing for me. I really did, I started to care more about other people and the stuff they were going through than even the stuff I was going through. 

I don’t get it right all of the time. But that was really important because then I got married. And I married someone who also cared about herself and not me. We kind of had this tug-o-war, where all of a sudden I had to care about her all of the time. She had feelings about everything all of the time. I didn’t have much space in my life for all of her feelings about what she was going through; because I had all my feelings about what I was going through. 

So that was a big trip, and in some ways I would say she saved me again. God was saying, “Okay, David, it’s not working just me and you. I’m going to bring Brittany.”  And Brittany is strong and powerful and she won’t put up with crap. I remember her just sticking up to it, and me having to adjust. It’s been an awesome thing.

All of that is to say that Brittany is someone who cares for the overlooked and ignored. She has taught me this in such amazing ways. And it’s funny because, sometimes it comes out where she doesn’t really care that much for people who aren’t overlooked and ignored. If you’re someone who’s not overlooked and ignored, sometimes you’ll be like, “I don’t know how she feels about me.” Just keep it there. Who knows? She doesn’t hate you or anything. Her life is just so driven towards the overlooked and ignored. She loves them and cares for them. I always describe my wife as, she’s like the real Peter Pan. She’s just looking for lost boys so she can teach them how to fly. It is absolutely true. I’ve seen it over and over and over again. 

I feel like God has been constantly trying to teach me these lessons. What I’m sharing with you today is just from the deepest parts of me. I’m wrestling with this all of the time because I’m so prone against it, but I’m so in love with what Jesus is trying to teach me. And Jesus has been teaching me for years. He’s a great teacher, and I’m going to try to jam it all in and I’m not that great. So just bear with me on this. I’m going to try to give us some pictures, trying to distill this for how this can be expressed in your life.

I married Brittany, and we ended up building this house together. We moved in about 30 months ago, so we were building it before then. I remember her praying that this house would not just be used for us, but that it would also be used for others. I didn’t really know what she was talking about and didn’t care that much about it at that time. I just thought, “Whatever, as long as we get to live there it will be better than living in this master bedroom with all five of us.” 

Just last week I woke up to lots of barking dogs, because we have a lot of them. And I was thinking about our situation. I remembered her prayer. Because, right now we live in this house with our three daughters, which is a lot of her fault, some of my fault but a lot of her fault. So there’s all of us living in the house now. We also live with two foster boys, which was a dream and a prayer of hers all of her life (and it became one for me, too). We also live with her mom. Her mom’s cool, so there’s no problem there. And then we also live with her sister, and she has a husband and they have five kids. Okay. You know? They have two dogs, the mom has two dogs, and we have two dogs. That’s not that abnormal, but that’s six dogs when you bring them all together.

And this guy, he’s working with the kids upstairs. I could understand if you don’t feel comfortable with this, but this kid is nineteen years old. He lived in California. And for some reason, he wanted to move in with us. He’s been with us a few months now. I’m trying to find something wrong with his brain. But he wanted to move in with us. So he lives in this little garage side room thing at the kibbutz that we call home. He’s loving it.

We have a chicken. We used to have eight, but we have coyotes that come around, so we’re down to one. It’s not funny. We also had a goat at one point. And to describe my wife even more—somewhere in Phoenix there was a goat that was born to a mama goat and the mama goat rejected the baby goat. Which is sad, right? And the person who was there to witness that, for some reason in her mind thought, “I should call Brittany.” I still have no idea how that happened; but all I know is this goat was overlooked and ignored, literally, and this person said, “I’m going to call Brittany.” 

And I came home one time and there’s a little baby pigmy goat. For the next two weeks, every two hours, the goat needed to be fed. So all throughout the night, “Here you go, baby goat.” So God is just laughing at how self-centered, self-absorbed and prideful I am, and here I am, years later, at 3:00 a.m, feeding a baby goat a bottle inside my house. And loving every minute of it. Not true. Loving when I’m in the right mind, ever minute of it.

I’m not saying that this is what the Lord’s calling us to. Please. Do you hear me? Do not do this! Do not do this. But God has led me step by step on a journey to where now I can check off some these. Somehow I’m learning and I have to rely on the grace of the Lord. We have to take breaks from time to time.

We were sitting with our daughters last Sunday night and they’re saying, “Hey, you know. Whenever this works out this way, can we just take a break for a little bit?” I was telling them, in thirty months of living in this house, twenty-six months we’ve had someone living with us. That’s only four months of building this house and getting to enjoy it just ourselves. And then I told my wife to stop praying. No, I didn’t. I didn’t say that. Thought it. But didn’t say it. 

Caring for the overlooked and ignored, even baby goats sometimes. 

Isaiah 58 (MSG) is the Old Testament perspective, but it’s kind of saying the same thing:

6-9 
“This is the kind of fast day I’m after:

So the people were fasting with no food and thinking that God was so pleased with them because they weren’t eating. And God was saying, “Look, if you want to know what really is important to me, it’s not that you don’t eat food, it’s this:

    …to break the chains of injustice,
    get rid of exploitation in the workplace,
    free the oppressed,
    cancel debts.
What I’m interested in seeing you do is:
    sharing your food with the hungry,
    inviting the homeless poor into your homes,
   putting clothes on the shivering ill-clad,
    being available to your own families.
Do this and the lights will turn on,
    and your lives will turn around at once.
Your righteousness will pave your way.
    The God of glory will secure your passage.
Then when you pray, God will answer.
    You’ll call out for help and I’ll say, ‘Here I am.’

So in this passage, “care for the poor,” is care for the exploited, the oppressed, the hungry, the homeless, the cold, the in-debt, and also those maybe in your household that are overlooked or ignored or neglected, whether you’re willing to admit it or not. 

So what we’re going to do right now is to be quiet for about forty seconds. And I just want to see if God might be able to bring to mind someone in your life that could be described as overlooked, neglected, or any of these other things; and for you to take a mental note of what God might be speaking to you. Maybe someone’s already come to mind. That’s fine. Just begin to pray for the person and begin to ask God, “What can I do?”

I pray Lord, that we really would hear from you. Amen.

So now that we’ve described who the poor might be, I want to talk about how do we present good news to those people? Is there some way we can learn what might be a first step or a simple step—or start the creative process between the Spirit of God and you, and maybe your wife, or your roommates, or whatever, how we can begin to walk this out. 

Hebrews 12:18-24 (TPT) is going to be the beginning of diving into this. We’re going to take some more distilling moments as we go through this, as well. This is good stuff right here. You should read this every day, or at least every time you’re sad. 

18 For we are not coming, as Moses did, to a physical mountain with its burning fire, thick clouds of darkness and gloom, and with a raging whirlwind. 19 We are not those who are being warned by the jarring blast of a trumpet and the thundering voice; the fearful voice that they begged to be silenced… 

This is the writer of Hebrews in the New Testament harkening back to the library of Scripture where we learn that Moses was out at this mountain called Sinai one time, and God came near to the people of Israel. He came as this big fiery cloud that sat on the mountain, and he spoke in this powerful, thunderous voice out of the cloud and spoke to the people. And all the people were like, “Ahhhh! This is freaky!” 

And God was saying, “Come up to me. Come up here.” And the people were like, “No! Moses, why don’t you go up there, because it’s scary up there.” And then Moses went up there, and we learn in Exodus 33 and 34 that Moses had this deep, intimate, powerful moment with God. For forty days he was with God experiencing the love, compassion and kindness of God, in the midst of all the power and wonder that was taking place.

So he’s saying “We’re not this, where we need to be afraid. What we have come to is this:

22 …we have already come near to God in a totally different realm, the Zion-realm, for we have entered the city of the Living God, which is the New Jerusalem in heaven! We have joined the festal gathering of myriads of angels in their joyous celebration!

This is what heaven is like. God is not super concerned about the election cycle that is happening. Heaven is not going, “Oh, yi yi yi.” I know we are. But right now, in heaven, the holiness of God is being celebrated because nothing on earth could never change that.

23 And as members of the church of the Firstborn [Jesus] all our names have been legally registered as citizens of heaven! And we have come before God who judges all, and who lives among the spirits of the righteous who have been made perfect in his eyes!

We are being made perfect in his eyes. Yes! And then this:

24 And we have come to Jesus… 

Not to that scary mountain. We’ve come to Jesus.

…who established a new covenant with his blood sprinkled upon the mercy seat; blood that continues to speak from heaven, “forgiveness,” a better message than Abel’s blood that cries from the earth, “justice.”

So how do we preach good news to the poor? We’re able to come to them and speak out a message of forgiveness. Forgiveness instead of justice. Contrasting that Mount Sinai mountain with all that power, we have the babe of Bethlehem, that was born into this world soft and kind. And then he walked among us, not with heaviness. Full power though, but the power was not to condemn. The power was not to provoke. The power was not to hurt or punish. The power was to heal and to forgive. 

In Isaiah, it speaks of Jesus. It says “as a smoldering wick he would never put out and a bruised reed he would never break. He came with a softness and lightness and a kindness to the poor—whether they were poor in their relationship with God, poor financially, poor physically, poor in their righteousness. Whatever they were poor in, he would come around them with kindness and a message of forgiveness. It wasn’t a forgiveness that forsook justice. It was a forgiveness that was born out of him laying down his life to produce justice.

In that moment when he took on all the sins of all humanity—the most disgusting, horrific, murderous, raping sins—he took them on his body. Out of that came a message of “Father, forgive them for they don’t know what they’re doing.”

Preaching good news to the poor is coming around the poor. They already know that they’ve failed. They are already wallowing in their own shame and guilt. They don’t need us to point it out. They need us to come and show them a path of forgiveness. 

There are these two books that have taught me a lot along these lines. One is called Tattoos on the Heart. It’s a Jesuit priest. If you want to check it out later, the story is amazing, the writing is beautiful. In it, he says, 

“Here is what we seek: A compassion that can stand in awe at what the poor have to carry rather than stand in judgment at how they carry it.”

I would add just one little phrase:

And then we should lend our own shoulder to carry the burden for a while.

Because, as we go to approach the poor, which we know Jesus wants us to do, the Spirit of God is upon us to that end. We shouldn’t look at the poor and see them in their sinfulness, see them in their poverty, see the bad decisions they made, the way that they’re carrying themselves, the way that they are speaking out. We have to come to them and not judge them. God’s the judge.

We come to them and we provide forgiveness. We come to them and we stand with them in their poverty. Instead of saying, “Wow. Look at all that heaviness all over you. You’re not carrying it right, you should carry it like this;” we just say, “Hey. Do you want me to carry a little of that on my shoulder for a while? Let’s walk together.” This is what it means to preach good news to the poor.

There’s this phrase I’ve been chewing on: “Empathy must be stronger than condescension.” 

I’m a master at condescension. I am. I’m awesome at it. Always have been. I have to fight it all the time. I’m so good at it. I can just see it coming. It’s something the Lord is constantly having to work on in my life. It’s something that I basically have a limp that I’ve had to learn to limp with, and make sure I don’t live into it. The opposite of condescension is empathy. Empathy is foreign to me. Empathy in the sense of being able to put yourself in another person’s shoes to feel what they feel from their point of view. 

Just last night one of my kids was having a real pathetic moment. And I was just like, “I don’t want to feel what you’re feeling, because you’re crying and moaning and groaning and whining. I want you to feel what I’m feeling.” But that wasn’t true because I was actually starting to get stressed because I was like, “I’ve got to preach tomorrow and I’ve got to get my message together and you’re over here moaning and groaning.”

And I just felt like the Lord was saying, “Go there!” I was like, “Argh!” And I did a horrible job of it. But I tried. I just sat on the bed and said, “All right. Tell me what’s going on.”

“You don’t care.”

Already? I haven’t even started! “I want to hear what’s going on.” It’s crazy. 

Here’s a few more things to finish. This comes from a different book called The Gospel Comes With a House Key. That’s pretty good. In this book, this former lesbian, now follower of Christ, Rosaria Butterfield, is describing some of her experiences with something she calls radically ordinary hospitality. This is good stuff. These are meaty, so you’ve got to buck up. Everybody sit up straighter a little bit—if you need to stretch a little bit. We’ve got some long phrases here, but it’s the distilling process.

“Living out radically ordinary Christian hospitality means knowing that your relationship with others must be as strong as your words. The balance cannot tip here. Having strong words and a weak relationship with your neighbor is violent. It captures the violent carelessness of our social media-infused age. That is not how neighbors talk with each other. That is not how image bearers of the same God relate to one another. Radically ordinary hospitality values the time it takes to invest in relationships, build bridges, repent of sins of the past, to reconcile. Bridge building and remaking friendships cannot be rushed.”

“Just get better.” “Stop feeling what you’re feeling.” No! But taking the time. Here’s another one:

She’s describing the first moment she encountered what she called radically ordinary Christian hospitality: 

“I breathed hard and hoisted myself out of my truck, nursing a tender hamstring from my morning run. I waded through the unusually thick July humidity to the front door of these Christians and I knocked. The threshold to their life was like none other. The threshold to their life brought me to the foot of the cross.”

Hallelujah, right?

“Nothing about that night unfolded according to my confident script. Nothing happened in the way I expected. Not that night or the years after, or the hundreds of meals we had together, or the long nights of Psalm singing and prayer, as other believers from he church and university walked through the doors of this house as if there was no door. Nothing prepared me for this openness and truth. Nothing prepared me for the unstoppable gospel and for the love of Jesus made manifest by the daily practices of hospitality undertaken in this one simple Christian home. Long before I ever walked to the doors of the church, the Smith home was the place where I wrestled with the Bible, with the reality that Jesus is who he says he is and eventually came face-to-face with him on the glittering knife’s edge of my choice sexual sin.”

Way to go, Smiths! Way to go, Smiths! Way to go, Smiths! And the last one:

Radically ordinary hospitality describes those who see strangers as family and neighbors as the family of God. They recoil at reducing a person to a category or label. They see God’s image reflected in the eyes of every human being on earth. They know that they are like meth addicts and sex trade workers, they take their own sins seriously, especially the sins of selfishness and pride.

They take God’s holiness and goodness seriously. They use the Bible as a lifeline with no exceptions. They practice radically ordinary hospitality. Those who practice radically ordinary hospitality do not see their homes as their own, but as God’s gift for the furtherance of God’s kingdom. They open doors. They seek out the underpriveleged. They know that the Gospel comes with a house key.

And one last thing from Acts 28 (MSG) as we close:

30-31 Paul lived for two years in his rented house. He welcomed everyone who came to visit. He urgently presented all matters of the kingdom of God. He explained everything about Jesus Christ. His door was always open.

Again, I’m not telling you to do something specific here. I’m just saying that we’ve got to begin to understand what this means to live out radically ordinary hospitality. To live out the love of Christ in this world. To proclaim good news to the poor.

Let’s pray:

Jesus, I do pray in this moment that you would continue to distill some of this. Not only would you bring to mind the people that you have given to us, that you are putting on our radar, that you are assigning to us, just like you assign people to Jesus. But Lord, I pray that you would also stir in us some creativity of how we could begin to be hospitable, be empathetic, be compassionate—not just concerned, but compassionate. And you’d help us know that it’s going to take time. There’s no quick, easy way to do this. 

I wrote this during the music time during first service. I just want to share it, in case it applies to some of you. Not only are we called to do this, but the beauty is that Jesus has done this for us. He left glory to come and enter into our pathetic state, and to feel our pain.

“The blood of Abel and all the others cut off by the knife of sin or burned by the fires of injustice cries out because the guilty are left unpunished and wrongs are not made right. But in Christ crucified, forgiveness and justice happen. All the wrongs are made right by the forgiveness and healing released by Jesus’ sacrificial love. You might think today that no one cares about you or loves you or whatever sacrifice for you, but the scars in Jesus’ hands and feet speak a different word. 

There will come a day when you and I will see those scars. The Bible teaches we will see Jesus as a Lamb who has been slain. But you can feel his love today and forgiveness and healing can start right now.”

Jesus, please come close to those who don’t know you. Lord, please, for those who are willing to admit that they are poor in their relationship with you, they are poor in righteousness, they are poor in so many ways, I pray that right now they would cry out to you and you would answer with the full weight of your love and salvation would come. And they would become new creations, robed in your righteousness, and they would really know what forgiveness is. I pray this in your name. Amen.

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©️2019 Living Streams Church
7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture marked MSG is taken from The Message (MSG) Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson

Scripture marked TPT is taken from The Passion Translation®. Copyright © 2017 by BroadStreet Publishing® Group, LLC. Used by permission. All rights reserved. thePassionTranslation.com

The Lordship of Jesus

 The Lordship of Jesus

Allan Meyer
Series: Church Around the Table

Mark Buckley:

We’ve got a special guest today: Allan Meyer. You’re going to enjoy this. The Life Groups will be discussing this. If you’re not in a Life Group, I hope you’ll sign up for one real soon. Allan’s got a world-class gift from God. When John the Baptist came, he prepared people for Jesus. When Allan comes, he prepares us for what God wants to do in our lives. Let’s open our hearts and welcome Allan Meyer to Living Streams.

Allan Meyer:

Thank you. What a privilege to be here with you. Thank you for the opportunity. It’s lovely having been an occasional visitor over many years. There’s a wonderful buzz in the house over this past few days. It’s a privilege to be able to share it with you. I brought two resources with me. One is my book From Good Man to Valiant Man. It’s about male sexuality. Women need to read it because you’ve got to relate to men everywhere you go. And men need help. I’ve got a DVD called Becoming a Valiant Man, that explains why men need so much help. Women have known that for a long time, but men do. In a highly sexualized world, men need a lot of help. The book is the kind of help they need. And if that’s helpful to you, I’ll be glad to sign one for you later. 

Today I want to share with you the conversation I had in university that changed my life. I wouldn’t be here this morning if it hadn’t been that I had one of those divine moments where you sit down next to another student, a conversation unfolds, and it just happens that God had the right person to sit next to just at that moment in your life. And everything changes.

That conversation was triggered by the call of God on my life. I grew up going to church. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t go to church because Mom and Dad were both believers. As a result, I was there from the time I was a child. I can’t remember a time when I didn’t believe the Bible was true. I enjoyed church. I enjoyed worship and I would have called myself a believer.

All I ever wanted to be in church was a school teacher. My dad was the principle of a primary school. I had aunts and uncles who were teachers. That’s all I ever dreamt of. I wanted to be a normal Australian that had nice house, a pretty wife, a football team that could win lots of games, and be a school teacher, have barbecues and have a really nice life, and then die and go straight to heaven (if such a place ever existed). That was my plan. 

I was a strange kind of believer because I had a kind of a breakthrough in my final year of high school. I won a scholarship to university. The education department put me through university. I had signed an agreement that at the end I would teach for three years. I was really happy with the arrangement. During those first years of university, I was as happy as I could be. I had a car. I had money in my pocket from my studentship. I had golf clubs, a rifle, a pretty girlfriend. I was just having a whale of a time and having tremendous fun, and attending church. 

The weird thing about my life is that, while I attended church, I was a weird kind of Christian. I had a can and a hose in the trunk of my car. I used to syphon petrol out of other people’s tanks. At least I used it to get to choir practice on Friday night. I would steal my lunch from the university cafeteria every day so I would have a dollar to put in the offering on Sunday. While that might not sound like a really Christian life to you, it was working for me. 

My pretty girlfriend was an Anglican girl. She was going to an Anglican church. Her minister used to bring people in to share testimonies. I was a Lutheran. We didn’t have any testimonies. I had never heard one. But in the Anglican Church, apparently, there were a few testimonies.

One night, listening to one of these testimonies, I got really disturbed because the kind of relationship with Jesus he was talking about was totally unfamiliar to me. Then her minister quietly came up beside me and asked me a question. He said, “Tell me, young man, where are you with the Lord?”

I didn’t have a clue what he was talking about. I didn’t know how to answer the question. I had been going to church all my life and no one had ever asked me that question. I bumbled out some nonsense about, “Well, I used to have my doubts but now I’m right in there.”

I went home from that meeting that night aware that I had no idea where I stood with the Lord. In fact, I thought, Well, how would you ever know? I mean, I guess you have to die to find out where you stand with the Lord.

A good Lutheran boy should have known better than that, but that’s where I was. And that question upset me. It set me up for the next thing, which was three weeks later. I went to my Lutheran church and we had a visiting speaker. He spoke on hell. I have to tell you, halfway through that sermon, I got the feeling I was going to get to see this place someday. Even though he didn’t have 8x10 glossies to prove that hell existed, I had a bad feeling that all this stuff is true.

He said something that day that shook me up. He said, “The worst two words that will ever be uttered in hell are the words ‘if only.’ If only I’d followed Jesus. If only I had listened. If only I had taken it seriously. If only I’d been a real believer.” That so disturbed me that, at the end of the service I could hardly get up and walk out of the chair.

Now, if you came to Living Streams and someone shared a message like that, at least at the end someone would stand up and say, “Now if there is any young man here today that has a can and a hose in the trunk of his car, who feels the need for repentance…” I would have said, “Yeah! That’s me! That’s me!” But I went to a Lutheran church. They scare the hell out of you and send you home for lunch. I left there that day thinking, I have got to get this figured out—where I stand with Jesus.

Well, I started asking myself the question: “How Christian do you have to be to get to heaven? And how would you know when you crossed the line?” Because here was my challenge: I didn’t want to be a fanatic. I really did want to die and go straight to heaven and have my sins forgiven; but I didn’t want anyone else to know I was on the way. I hoped that I would die, walk through the gates of heaven, everyone would turn with shocked surprise and say, “Oh, we never thought we’d see you here, pal!”

And I would say, “Oh, me and Jesus were like that, because I was a secret agent for God. It was my business to get into heaven under the radar so no one else knew I was on the way.”

I was trying to figure out: How Christian do you have to be to really be right with God? I started trying to do the sums on that. The first thing I thought of was money. Now, God’s nearly always broke. They tell you that in church. If I was to give God money, that would be very helpful. That’s got to count for something. So I put that on my list. I don’t mind giving some more. 

Then I had the brilliant idea. Sunday School. Brilliant. It happens in church on Sunday. I was going to be there anyway. So I could be normal through the week, come to church on Sunday and teach the little children about Jesus. If Sunday school teachers don’t get to heaven, you tell me who does! How much suffering does it take to get into heaven?

I was getting my list of what I was prepared to do, and I was starting to feel pretty good about this list. “Well, I’m giving money. I’m teaching Sunday School.” I came home from work on a Thursday, four days later. I was going to take my girlfriend out (she’s now my wife). I got right near the front door and God spoke to me as clear as I’m speaking to you. He didn’t speak in my ears. He spoke in my chest. I heard it in here. He simply said to me, “I want you to be a minister.”

I’ve got to tell you, that wasn’t on my list. A minister. I’m trying to be a secret agent for God. I’m trying to fly under the radar. I’ve got to figure out something pretty quick. I saw myself dressed as a Lutheran minister with the black stuff on and the colors around my neck. I burst into tears. “Oh, no! Nineteen years old and I’m dead already!”

I felt like my entire life came to a halt. I jumped in my car. I drove around to see my girlfriend. I said, “I think God wants me to be a minister.”  She cried. She didn’t want to marry a minister.

I have a reverse testimony. You’ve heard those testimonies, “I was low and down and broken and filled with sin. And Jesus came and lifted me up.”

Well, I was doing great. I had a lovely life. I had a car and some money and a pretty girlfriend and life was going great. Then Jesus came along and wrecked the entire thing. As a result of that moment, the call of God, now I’ve got a crisis on my hands. I want to be absolutely sure I’m going to heaven. I’m a university student. I can figure out that, if I keep telling God I’m not doing what he says, that’s not going to go well. 

As a result, I found myself in an emotional crisis. I was so upset I couldn’t think straight. Here I am, trying to study for my final exams, and I’m so overwhelmed with this sense of the call of God on my life and not wanting to do it, that I can’t think.

I was in the university library, studying for a history of educational thought exam, and I was so overwhelmed. I’m trying to study. Nothing will go in. I can’t even read stuff. It was just overwhelming my emotions. I don’t know why—again, God is so wonderful—I just saw that the university diary for the day said that there was a Lutheran service in the religious center at lunch time. I thought, Well, I’ll go and do something religious. Maybe God will leave me alone if I do something religious. 

So I went down to the religious center and I sat down on one of the seats. Another student just happened to come in and sit down alongside me. Away they went with the Lutheran service. By the way, my Lutheran church was a wonderful experience for me. That Lutheran service that day didn’t mean a thing. At the end of it, as they packed up and were beginning to leave, I was overwhelmed with distress; because I had hoped to find a bit of peace here so that I could study. I was just as messed up after the service as I had been before it began.

The young guy sitting beside me opened his lunchbox and started eating his sandwiches. Now let me tell you a secret about sharing your faith: Sometimes we worry, How can I share my faith? How can I break into the conversation some spiritual thought? Listen, just don’t leave too soon. You’re having coffee with someone, having a conversation with someone, just don’t leave too soon. Because the Bible says “Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.” 

I was so overwhelmed, I just couldn’t help myself. I start telling this kid next to me all of my woes. “I think God wants me to be a minister.”

Well, he says to me, “That’s wonderful!”

I said, “No! No! It’s terrible!”

He said, “Why?”

I said, “Because I don’t want to be one.”

He said, “Well, are you a believer?”

I said, ‘Yeah.”

He said, “Well, what do you believe?”

Oh, well you ask a Lutheran that, I can tell you. I went right through Luther’s small catechism. “So what do I believe? Well…

I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth
   and in Jesus Christ, His only Son, our Lord, 
   who was conceived by the Holy Spirit, 
  born of the Virgin Mary, 
   suffered under Pontius Pilate, 
   was crucified, dead and buried. 
   He descended into hell.
   The third day he rose again from the dead. 
   He ascended into heaven. 
   He sits at the right hand of God the Father Almighty 
  from whence He shall judge the heavens and the earth.
I believe in the Holy Spirit, 
   the holy Christian church
   the communion of saints,
   the forgiveness of sins,
   the resurrection of the body
   and the life everlasting.

Do you think I’m saved?”

He said, “Ah, it’s possible. That’s a lot of believing you’ve got going on there, man. But you don’t want to be a minister?”

“No!”

“Well, let me ask you something about all that confession you made. I just wonder if you haven’t overlooked one of those words that was in there.”

“Well, which one?”

“Well, go back to the beginning. ‘I believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth and in Jesus Christ His only Son, our Lord. That’s an interesting word in there, Allan. Lord. Do you know what the word means?”

“Well, I guess it’s kind of like it’s part of his title. Like there’s Professor Gordon Brown, and I’m Mister Allan Meyer and he’s Lord Jesus Christ. It’s kind of like part of his name. You’d only have two names if you didn’t put Lord on the front.”

“No, no. That’s an interesting point of view. But no, you see, the issue with lordship is that Lord actually means something, Al. The interesting thing is you’ve got a lot of believing going on there, but if you went right back to the beginning when Christianity was just beginning, it was an awful lot simpler than that. Everything you just said, that’s good stuff to believe. But it took a hundred and fifty years to get that locked together. Right at the beginning when people were first beginning to embrace Jesus, all you really had to know was four words: Jesus Christ is Lord. The earliest Christian confession. You knew if people were disciples or not. Jesus Christ is Lord. I wonder if, in all your believing, you’ve overlooked that one, simple thought. What do you think Lord means, Al?”

“Well, I don't know. I guess He’s in charge or something?”

“Yeah. That’s exactly right. You see, the word Lord means that he is the master. He is the owner. He’s the one with supreme power and authority. He’s the one who rules. He’s the one who has dominion. He’s the one who has power. He’s the one with all authority in heaven and in earth. Put in simple language, mate, he’s the boss. Do you believe that Jesus Christ is your boss?”

“Well, I don’t know that I’ve ever thought about it quite like that. Now, I guess when I was syphoning petrol out of tanks I really hadn’t given that a lot of thought.”

He said, “Al, what you need to understand is this is the critical issue. Who rules? It’s the struggle of the ages. It’s the spiritual war that will separate life and death. And it’s the war that’s been going on from the very beginning. If you go back to the Garden of Eden, that’s where the war began. And it was all over one question: Hath God said? Who’s in charge around here? Who is the one with supreme authority? Who are you following? Who are you yielded to?

“You see, God created that garden and said to Adam and Eve, ‘The whole thing is yours. Fantastic. Enjoy the lot. But that one tree, the Knowledge of Good and Evil, leave that up to me. Because, you see, as human beings, you don’t know enough to proclaim with authority what’s good and what’s evil. You’ve got to leave that to me because I see the end from the beginning. Something you think is really good, if you just knew where it leads, you’d discover one day that was evil. And something you think is really bad, if you just new where it would lead, you’d say, ‘‘‘That was good.’”

He said, “You need to know that God said to them, ‘The tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, that’s all mine. You leave that alone. You honor my leadership.’ And into that garden came a creep, dragging with him the silent chains of our future bondage, and he starts with this thought: ‘Hath God said you shall not eat of anything in this garden?’ 

“No, he didn’t say that, you miserable coot. 'He said we could eat of everything, just leave that tree, the Knowledge of Good and Evil. Let him be the boss.’

“‘Oh, I hate to tell you this, but you see, that’s the problem. You’ll never have a real life ’til you’re the one who sits upon the throne.’

“It’s the war of the ages.

“Listen to what Psalm 2 has to say:

1 Why do the nations conspire
    and the peoples plot in vain?

2  The kings of the earth rise up
    and the rulers band together
    against the Lord and against his anointed, saying,

3  “Let us break their chains
   and throw off their shackles.”

“There is a spirit that sees obedience to God as a prison house. And yet, the Father of life, obedience to him is a fountain of life, not chains and shackles. The Bible says:

4 The One enthroned in heaven laughs…
“He says:

6  “I have installed my king
  on Zion, my holy mountain.”
7  I will proclaim the Lord’s decree:
     …“You are my son;
    today I have become your father.

8  Ask me,
   and I will make the nations your inheritance,
the ends of the earth your possession.

“Who rules, Al? Who rules? See, what you need to understand is that when Jesus was sent into the world, he was sent as Lord. It’s in the Bible from one end to the other. You might have overlooked it, but let me just remind you just how frequently the Bible refers to Christ as Lord. The angels said it when they were announcing Jesus’ birth.”

Luke 2 (NASB):

1 for today in the city of David there has been born for you a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. 

Acts 2 (NASB):

36 Therefore let all the house of Israel know for certain that God has made Him both Lord and Christ—this Jesus whom you crucified.

Romans 10 (NASB):

9 … if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; 

Philippians 2 (NASB)

9 For this reason also, God highly exalted Him, and bestowed on Him the name which is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow, of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and that every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

1 Peter 3 (NASB):

15 but sanctify Christ as Lord in your hearts,

1 Corinthians 8 (NASB):

6 yet for us there is but one God, the Father,…and one Lord, Jesus Christ,

2 Corinthians 4 (NASB):

5 For we do not preach ourselves but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bond-servants for Jesus’ sake.

Revelation 17 (NASB):

14 These will wage war against the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, because He is Lord of lords and King of kings, and those who are with Him are the called and chosen and faithful.”

He said, “Al, do you understand what the word covenant means?”

“Yeah, well, I guess that means it’s an agreement.”

“Yeah, that’s right.”

“Like, you know, when I sold my bicycle. We haggled over the price and then we came to an agreement.”

“Ah,” he said, “But that’s not the kind of covenant that you can have with Jesus. The kind of covenant you just spoke about—in the Bible there’s a word for that. It’s (Greek word). It’s an agreement between equals. You can haggle about that. You can negotiate those agreements. But Jesus Christ is not the subject of a (Greek word). He’s the subject of a (Greek word)—a covenant from a superior to an inferior. You can accept him as Lord. You can reject him as Lord But you can’t negotiate. You either embrace him or reject him as Lord.” 

He said, “Al, I think I understand why you’re struggling so much. The problem you face is that you’re trying to marry a dishwasher.”

I said, “Um, you’d better run that one by me one more time. What do you mean I’m trying to marry a dishwasher?”

He said, “Just imagine this. That pretty girlfriend of yours—imagine when the time comes to marry the girl, you step up to the altar and the pastor says, ‘Allan, repeat your vows.’ And out you come, ‘I, Allan, take you Helen to be my lawfully wedded dishwasher.’

“You’ve got to know at that point that ceremony isn’t going to go one step further. Then she’s going to say, ‘Excuse me? Lawfully wedded dishwasher?’”

“‘Oh, yes! No, excuse me—far too narrow. I embrace you as my lawfully wedded cook, ironer of shirts, occasional romantic companion, and my dishwasher.’

“‘No, no, no! That’s not marriage, Al. Whatever you’ve got in your mind there has nothing to do with marriage. You see, when I came down that aisle, I was prepared to marry you as a wife. Now if you embrace me as a wife, an occasional dish might get washed. But you can’t marry me as a dishwasher.’

“You see, Al, that’s what you’re trying to do. You would love to have Jesus for your Savior, but you don’t want him as your Lord. And here’s the problem. You can’t have him on those terms. You either embrace him as Lord, or you do not embrace him at all. That is not a covenant that’s available to you. You need to appreciate that, if you embrace him, you embrace him as Lord, and because of who he is, he will wash you. He’ll wash your feet. He’ll wash your heart. He’ll wash your life. But you can’t marry a dishwasher.”

I cannot tell you how important that moment was for me. The recognition that I was trying to engage with Jesus in a way he was not available to me. No wonder I was in distress and I couldn’t find any peace. It was a horrible time.

Listen to it in the words of Jesus:

Jesus said, “Not everyone that says to me, ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter into the kingdom of heaven. But only those who do the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophecy and drive out demons and perform miracles?’ And he’ll say, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evil doers.’”

In Luke 6 (NASB), Jesus put it this way:

46 “Why do you call Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I say?”

Well, that was me. I’ve got to tell you, it nailed me to the wall. That conversation changed my life. Listen to this last parable: (Matthew 21 TPT):

28 Jesus said to his critics, “Tell me what you think of this parable:

“There once was a man with two sons. The father came to the first and said, ‘Son, I want you to go and work in the vineyard today.’ 29 The son replied, ‘I’d rather not.’ But afterward, he deeply regretted what he said to his father, changed his mind, and decided to go to the vineyard.” 

I am that son. I had been living for nineteen years attending church and believing everything but I had never embraced the Lordship of Jesus. When he called me in a way that I did not want to follow, it was exposed for what it was. I was a rebel to the core of my being. 

30 The father approached the second son and said the same thing to him. The son replied, ‘Father, I will go and do as you said.’ But he never did—he didn’t go to the vineyard. 31 Tell me now, which of these two sons did the will of his father?”

They answered him, “The first one.” Jesus said, “You’re right.”

I thank God for that young man who sat beside me. We had a conversation and, at the end of that conversation, I knew that if I did not embrace him as my Lord, I couldn’t have him as my Savior. I decided, “I’ll take Jesus, lock, stock and barrel.” I am so glad I did. What I thought was going to be a horrifying life has turned out to be the most thrilling journey you could imagine. 

What I thought was going to be evil actually turned out to be really good. And what I was trying to hold on to, what I thought was good, would have destroyed my life and left me in dust and ashes. I am so grateful that a young man explained to me one day that Jesus Christ was Lord.

Let me ask you a question as we close. Is Jesus your Lord? In reality, Is Jesus the ultimate authority in your life? Is that who he is? If Jesus Christ was really to be your Lord, would you have to handle your money differently? If Jesus Christ was really your Lord, would you have to handle other people’s money differently? If Jesus Christ was your Lord, would you have to handle your sex life differently? Or is your sex life sitting on the throne? If Jesus Christ was really your Lord, would you love better? Would you love your husband, your wife? Would you love your father or your mother? Would you love your brothers or your sisters? Would you love your church or your nation differently if Christ was Lord? 

If Jesus Christ was Lord, would you get up tomorrow morning and go to work and do a fundamentally different kind of work? Would you go to work knowing that you serve the King? Would you give it your best if Christ was Lord? Would you have to change? Would people see a difference in the way you work if Jesus Christ was Lord? 

If Jesus Christ was Lord, would you handle your worst enemy differently? Would you forgive more quickly? More completely? 

If Jesus Christ was the Lord of your life, would you stop driving and texting at the same time? If Jesus Christ was your Lord, would you clean up your room when your mother asks you? If Jesus Christ was your Lord, would you resolve conflict? Would you serve better?

Let me sing you an old chorus. When I sing a chorus, it’s like going to an Eagles concert. Just old songs. It’s an old song I heard years ago. It became part of my life. 

For he is Lord
He is Lord
He is risen from the dead 
And he is Lord
Every knee shall bow
Every tongue confess
That Jesus Christ is Lord

One day there was a man who bought himself an apartment. He thought he’d put in a tenant. Figured he’d come back at the end of the first month and collect the rent. He knocked on the door. A man came out and said, “Are you the owner?”

He said, “Yes, I am.”

“Wonderful, I’ve got something for you.” He took a backward step and began to sing:

You are the owner
You are the owner
You have bought this apartment
You are the owner
Every knee shall bow
Every tongue confess
That you are the owner

He shut the door and went back inside. The owner said, “That’s incredible. I’ve never seen that before. Maybe he’s going to give me two months’ rent when I come back next month.”

He came back and knocked on the door. The man comes to the door and says, “Sweetheart! It’s the owner! Bring the kids!”

All the family comes out and begins to sing:

You are the owner
You are the owner
You have bought this apartment
You are the owner…

They give him the whole song, shut the door and go back inside. He says, “That is absolutely incredible. Maybe they’re going to give me three months’ rent at that end of next month.”

He comes back at the end of the third month, knocks on the door. The man comes out. “It’s the owner!” The entire neighborhood comes together. They’ve got a sixty-piece orchestra. They’ve got a fifty-person choir and they begin to sing:

You are the owner
You are…

There will come a moment when he will say, “Shut up! And show me the money!”

If Jesus Christ is Lord, he deserves more than a song. I went to church for nineteen years and sang my heart out. Jesus said, “That’s really good. Show me the money, Al. Show me your obedience. I want to see it in every part of your life.”

And by the grace of God, that conversation changed my life. And it’s why I’m here today. My life has unfolded differently because of that moment. And may God help you, that perhaps your life might unfold differently from this moment because you were here today.

Would you bow your heads with me this morning?

Father, in the name of Jesus, I want to thank you for the moment that was so precious in my memory and in my life. I pray for my friends who are here today. I pray for those who perhaps through this story it has awakened them that they need to adjust where you sit in their life. 

If you’re here today and hearing this story awakened you to the thought that you really do need to make an adjustment to the submission you have and the obedience you have to the words of Jesus, I want you to wave at me a little bit and I’m going to pray for you right where you are. It’s helpful to do it. You say, “I heard that and I know that I need that.”

Father, I pray for every hand. Let the Spirit of the Lord remind them, ‘Show me the money.  Show me the life. Show me the obedience. Follow me, not just in words, but in reality.’ Let your kingdom come in these lives, I pray. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

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Scripture marked TPT is from The Passion Translation®. Copyright © 2017 by BroadStreet Publishing® Group, LLC. Used by permission. All rights reserved. thePassionTranslation.com

When Jesus Shows Up

David Stockton
Series: Church Around the Table

We’ve been going through Church Around the Table. We’ve been trying to define what the Church is. There are a lot of different thoughts — whether the Church is good or bad—that the Church is is based on people’s definition of the word. 

In the book of Ephesians, Paul is laying out what he thinks the Church is. He was saying it at a time when the Church looked nothing like it looks today. It was a fledgling movement that was basically about to be snuffed out by Roman persecution. There was not much to it. But he was talking about it as being this Body, this Bride, and this family that is going to fill to world in every place with the fullness of who God is. And everyone would laugh at him, for the most part. But, sure enough, here we are a couple thousand years later, and the Church is a powerful entity.

We also define the Church both as an organization and as an organism. The organization of the church is like Living Streams—or whatever church you grew up in. It’s an organization that is supposed to be a good house, a fruitful environment for the organism, which is the Church, which is you and I—the people that Jesus died for, the people who are following Jesus, the people filled with his Spirit. Living Streams is just an organization that will come and go as the sands and winds of time change. But the organism will continue to go on. My job is to be a leader of an organization. What I try to do is make sure that this place is a really good house for the organism of the Church. 

So we’ve spent some time defining that. You can go back and look at some of those things. The organization has had good seasons and bad seasons, no doubt about it. But the organism has continued to grow into this beautiful thing that is the fullness of God in every part of this world. It is the single, most dominant force for good the world has ever seen. Any true historian would say that it is just amazing what these people have done in this world. We’re going to talk a little more about that.

We’re trying to get this concept Around the Table to help us understand that Church is not something that happens for an hour on Sunday mornings. Church can happen there, but what Christians are supposed to do happens outside of these walls and outside of this Sunday morning context, for the most part. This is just supposed to help us, encourage us, teach us, equip us, so that we can go be the Church outside. So that’s where we’re trying to get people’s minds to think about your own home. Or when you’re having a little lunch break at work. Church can happen around the table. 

For me, one of my first real, powerful church experiences was around food stamps, with a friend of mine who was loving on me and caring for me, but he was living on food stamps. We talked about Church happening in a 15-passenger van. For Jesus and Peter, Church first happened when Peter had a boat, and Jesus came and hung out in his boat for a day. Peter left feeling really dirty. And Jesus said, “Don’t worry about it, I’ll take care of that.”

We’ve been spending the last two weeks talking about the Church that was happening around the table at the Last Supper. Are you with me there? We looked at Matthew, Mark and Luke’s account. Those are three of the four gospel accounts. They really focused on that moment when Jesus was having his last meal with his disciples. When he was trying to give them that final message, that final teaching that would stick in their minds. What he says to them is, “I’m giving you my body and blood.” And he hadn’t gone to the cross yet, so they were thinking in that moment about all the times that Jesus had cared for them, served them, saved them, and healed them the last three years of walking with him. That Jesus, who they now realized is a lot more than just a man. He’s their teacher, he’s their rabbi, he’s their Lord and Savior. He’s actually served them and given of himself for three years. 

He’s saying, “You guys know, this is my body. This is my blood. I am giving it for you. have given it for you.” He was also alluding to the moment on the next day when he would physically offer his body and blood as a sacrifice for their sin and the rest of the world. 

So when they finally remembered that moment of Jesus’ teaching around the table, and then they knew of the crucifixion, the message was so powerful in their lives that they completely devoted the rest of their lives to that, even to the point of being martyrs for that cause. What Jesus was trying to teach them was, “Just as I have given body and blood for you, I want you to now go and give body and blood for others.” It’s a heavy thing. 

So Church is not a picnic. Church is not a little club. Church is not easy. It’s the hardest thing you will ever do, if you you really want to follow Christ. The covenant he made with those disciples was, “Just as I have given body and blood for you, I want you to now go and give your body and blood for others.” It’s intense. It’s heavy. Another way to put it is, “Just as I have loved you, I want you to go love others.” It’s a very, very high, hard calling. And last week we talked about how he empowers with his Spirit to do that.

The next week we looked at John and saw how he also talks about the Last Supper, that Church Around and Table moment, but he never mentions the body and blood. Not to contradict them, but he wants to focus on a different thing. He said when they first walked into that room, Jesus shocked them by taking off his outer clothes, wrapping a towel around him, getting the basin that was there by the door, and he started to wash his disciples’ feet—which was something that a lowly servant was supposed to do. 

He washes their feet and he does this very cleansing, very kind, very humble way of caring for them; and it was so important that John, 60 years after Jesus rose from the dead, writes that as his account of the final message of Jesus Christ. And Jesus said, after he did that, said, “Now I want you guys to go and do as I have one unto you.”

We talked about another way that Church is supposed to be going on. When we go into this world, to seek to cleanse the world. To seek to wash the world—refresh the world—instead of condemn the world. That’s the call of what Church Around the Table is supposed to be. Giving body and blood and seeking to wash and cleanse and renew people around us. 

That’s what Church is. Church happens when we do those things. No matter where you are in this world. No matter what frame of mind you’re in. Whatever. 

I want to illustrate how this happened after Jesus left. Jesus sends this message. He establishes these things, and then we have the book of Acts. Now Jesus is gone. The followers of Jesus, who have made this covenant with Jesus, are now practicing this. We see in Acts 2:42 (MSG):

41-42 That day about three thousand took him at his word, were baptized and were signed up. They committed themselves to the teaching of the apostles, the life together, the common meal, and the prayers.

43-45 Everyone around was in awe—all those wonders and signs done through the apostles! And all the believers lived in a wonderful harmony, holding everything in common. They sold whatever they owned and pooled their resources so that each person’s need was met.

46-47 They followed a daily discipline of worship in the Temple followed by meals at home, every meal a celebration, exuberant and joyful, as they praised God. People in general liked what they saw. Every day their number grew as God added those who were saved.

This is now Jesus’ teaching imparted to his people. Jesus is now gone and this is an account of what took place just a few months later. They were now practicing the way of Jesus. Those who learned this lesson, those who were imparted this lesson, those who got to watch Jesus do it for three years, and then it all culminated on the cross—they now started to walk it. I love these people. I love Jesus for sure. But I love these people because they were doing it without Jesus there in person. How he was there with the Holy Spirit. But these people were like you and me. They didn’t have a clue what they were supposed to do, but they had some teachings from Jesus and then they had the power of the Holy Spirit.

I love looking at the book of Acts. It’s like, “Okay. Okay. I can get into this.” It’s also challenging because they got to see some really cool things happen. But their practice was in the temple and then house to house. That’s what we’re trying to get into our minds. It’s good for us to gather together, encourage one another, and celebrate what the Lord has done. But it’s also important for us to think about Jesus showing up outside of this place: in our homes, our workplaces, Life Groups, and things like that.

Acts 5:41-42 (NIV)

41 The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name. ‘

They had just received a rebuke and a flogging from the Sanhedrin.

42 Day after day, in the temple courts and from house to house, they never stopped teaching and proclaiming the good news that Jesus is the Messiah.

Here are some accounts from the early book of Acts and what was taking place. The time frame was probably about 60 a.d. when this was going on. But I want to borrow some Roman historians’ words about the Church. We’re going to go extra-biblical here. This is not in the library of Scripture. But these are some Roman historians that were writing around 100 a.d. and around 350 a.d. They were describing these followers of Christ and what they were like. They obviously don’t think that they are right. They don’t like them, necessarily. And there is persecution, so there are some heavy things. But I want you to just understand that these people were practicing this way in such a profound way, that the Roman historians were taking note of it, as well.

Here’s a Roman official named Pliney writing to another Roman official named Trajan around 100 a.d. He says,

Meanwhile, in the case of those who were denounced to me as Christians, I have observed the following procedure: I interrogated these as to whether they were Christians; those who confessed I interrogated a second and a third time, threatening them with punishment; those who persisted I ordered executed. For I had no doubt that, whatever the nature of their creed, the stubbornness and inflexible obstinacy surely deserved to be punished. There were others possessed of the same folly, but because they were Roman citizens, I signed an order for them to be transferred Rome.

And here’s what they were guilty of, according to Pliny:

They asserted, however, that the sum and substance of their fault or error had been that they were accustomed to meet on a fixed day before dawn and sing responsively a hymn to Christ as to a god, and to bind themselves by oath, not to some crime, not to commit fraud, theft, or adultery, not falsify their trust, nor to refuse to return a trust when called upon to do so. When this was over, it was their custom to depart and to assemble again to partake of food—but ordinary and innocent food. Even this, they affirmed, they had ceased to do after my edict by which, in accordance with your instructions, I had forbidden public associations. Accordingly, I judged it all the more necessary to find out what the truth was by torturing two female slaves who were called deaconesses. But I discovered nothing else but depraved, excessive superstition.

There’s a lot to take in right there. But around 100 a.d. this Roman official was talking about these Christians, and how they kept getting together before dawn. They would get up before dawn and they would sing some sort of hymn to this Jesus, as if he was a God. And they would have this time together and then they would continue it on from house to house. They would have this fellowship. They would care for one another. They would do all these things.

Then you go further on and there’s this Emperor Julian around 360 a.d. He says this:

Atheism…

The Christians were considered atheists because they didn’t believe in the polytheistic gods of the Romans and Greeks. It’s kind of weird, right? Because they only worshiped one God they were atheists—because they didn’t believe in all the gods.

Atheism has been specially advanced through the loving service rendered to strangers and through their care for the burial of the dead. It is a scandal that there is not a single Jew who is a beggar, and that the godless Galileans care not only for their own poor, but for ours as well; while those who belong to us look in vain for the help that we should render them.

So three hundred years later, after Jesus was gone, this is the testimony of a Roman emperor, writing about these Christians who had become a huge problem for them; because they were doing things like rendering service to strangers and caring for the burial of the dead. They were caring for their own poor and also for the Romans’ poor. They were giving body and blood. They were washing people’s feet—not just their own—but those around them.

What history teaches us is around 316 a.d. is when Constantine became emperor, and he basically took away the ban from being a Christian. It wasn’t illegal to be Christian anymore. It was a big move. What was illegal, and what Paul talked about as being this beautiful thing, but it was just this fledgling, persecuted movement in the Roman Empire had now become something that the Roman Empire said, “Ok, what you’re doing is actually so good, we can’t deny the beauty of it, so it’s no longer illegal.

And this was in 360, so there was a lot of debate about what to do about it. So in 390, Christianity became the religion of the Roman empire. And Rome has a very different story from that point on.

The power of this movement. The power of the people of God, filled with the Spirit of God, giving body and blood, washing one another—actually caused the Roman Empire to be completely turned upside down. That’s the Roman Empire. We’re just dealing with America. There is just so much beauty and power if we can get this right. If we can be who Jesus has called us to be and wants to empower us to be.

The second thing that I think we need to notice, as we read these same Scriptures, and we think about Church Around the Table, is that true church happens when we give body and blood; and we wash one another and wash the people in this world; but Church also happens when the life of Jesus shows up. So that Acts 2:42, remember that whole phrase that talked about how they devoted themselves to the apostles’ doctrine, the breaking of bread, fellowship and prayer—it says that they were caring for one another in a really beautiful way. And it says that all of these signs and wonders started showing up all over. It was just as if, when Jesus was alive and Jesus would show up, healings would happen, miracles would happen, wonders would happen. They just followed everywhere Jesus went; because the life of Jesus was being manifest into the world. 

Now, what was a shock, and something that the book of Acts writers were marveling about— that Jesus is not here in body, but the life of Jesus kept showing cup in the same way. The manifest presence of God kept popping up. They’re having a little time together, all of a sudden somebody comes in that is sick, or can’t see or whatever. The next thing you know they’re leaving and they feel better or they can see. The life of Jesus. Those things kept popping up. 

The disciples were harkening back, thinking about when Jesus first came on the scene. He had just been baptized by John the Baptist. He had just spent time in the wilderness. And now he’s coming back full of the Spirit and ready to do his ministry. He starts out going to synagogues and reading a verse from Isaiah that says (Luke 4:18, 19):

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
        to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

And then he sits down and everyone’s looking at him. Jesus says, “Today, this Scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.” It was a big moment, where Jesus is like, “Watch out. It’s on.” And, sure enough, as he goes out from that place, some would reject him, some would come to him. And those who came to him with any kind of illness would be healed. The life of Jesus was showing up. The promise of Jesus, followed by the life of Jesus.

And we talked about John the Baptist in Luke 7. He believes Jesus is the Messiah. But now he’s in prison and he’s about to lose his head. And, like any of us, he’s like, “Hey, Jesus. I think one of those things you mentioned was ‘setting the captives free.’ But I’m still here.” So he sends some of his friends to say, “Hey, Jesus, are you the one? Or is there another one who might set me free. Because I’m not free. I’m sitting right here.”

And Jesus responded to him and said (Luke 7:22):

“Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor.”

Jesus said, “John, look at the fruit that’s on the tree and then tell me whether the tree is real or not.” What he was saying was, “Yes, this is it.” And it’s a hard thing for John to hear and process when it doesn’t happen—to trust God in those moments. Jesus is saying you can judge the tree by the fruit. The life is showing up everywhere. The kingdom of heaven is breaking into our world, and we’re seeing the evidence of it all around.

What was so amazing was, again, he was there with the same guys that he had the Last Supper with. In Mark 16, he says to them:

15 He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation. 16 Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. 

Now plug your ears if you don’t want to have Jesus mess with your life. 

17 And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; 18 they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

Jesus is saying, “Look, I told you it would happen. It happened. John was wondering, I reminded him it’s happening. And now I’m going to go away and, guess what? It’s going to keep happening.”

And the disciples were like, “Well, how’s it going to happen if you’re not here?”

And Jesus was like, “Those who believe in me, those who are following my way, those who continue to do the things that I taught you to do—as you do them…”

…the life of Christ will show up. The manifest presence of Jesus will show up. And when it does, things like this will happen. Sick people will get healed. You’ll speak in new tongues. You’ll cast demons out of people so they can be free. Something about snakes and poison and whatever.

So here we are. We got to see Jesus promise that. We got to see it show up in the book of Acts. But this is 2019 in Phoenix, Arizona. Where’s the life of Jesus? And you in your relationship with God and your journey, maybe you’re saying, “Jesus and all this is crazy stuff!”

I totally understand how you can think that. So you have a decision to make. Are you going to step into this family? Are you going to start following the way of Jesus, hoping and believing that the life of Christ will show up? And you’re sitting around a bunch of people who are saying, “Yeah, he shows up.”

Some of you are saying, “I’ve been following Jesus for a while but I haven’t seen a lot in my life. Maybe I’ve seen it in others, or I’ve heard other people talk about it. But they’re kind of crazy, so I don’t know if they’re telling the truth. Is it for me too?” And the message is, “Yes. It is.”

And then there are a lot of people in this room who, if you really sat them down and asked them, “Has the life of Christ shown up?” They would look you in the eyes and say, “Yes.” And some would say lots of stories and some would maybe just tell you a couple. But Church happens when the life of Jesus shows up. It follows the believers.

In Mark 16, Jesus said, “Now it’s your turn to go and do these things.” The apostles experienced it. For us at Living Streams, here in this one small representation of the family, we’ve been able to see the life of Jesus show up. I actually asked Pastor Kurt, who loves to pray for people to be healed, to start cataloguing, you know, like they did in the book of Acts—start listing them. This date, this time, this is what happened and this is how we followed up to make sure they weren’t just having a moment. But like, a week later, a month later, we checked in and, sure enough, there it is.

We had a guy, I just heard, that had a problem with his shoulder. He had surgery and then he had done something and re-hurt it. He was so bummed out. Then in one of our church services, just a few weeks ago, he was singing and thinking about how much his shoulder hurt. He felt like the Lord told him to lift his hands in worship. And as he did, he said his arm kind of got warm, and got healed up. Then he was like, “No, that can’t be right.” But the pain has been gone for over three weeks now. I don’t know what that does for you or what that doesn’t for you. 

Kurt started pulling out all these stories. I was like, “Holy Moly, there are a lot of stories.” But some of them are hard to verify. And then some of them, a month later, are like, "I don’t know why, but the pain is back.” I don’t know what to do with all of those things. 

What I can do—I can offer to you as one person, just like the gospel writers did, my account of what Jesus has done and how his life has shown up to me. 

First of all, when I was about fourteen years old, I didn’t know any of this stuff. I didn’t really care about this stuff. I just wanted to play basketball. I was at a retreat with friends. Kurt was actually one of the guys that was leading the retreat. I was there because there were some friends and there was a gym and you could play basketball. At one point they were having a time—and I didn’t understand what was going on—at one point one of my friends was saying “yes” to one of the things the pastor was saying about being baptized in the Spirit of God.

Again, I was not paying attention. I didn’t know what was going on. I just knew that at one point there was a circle of everybody and they were all putting their hands on him in the middle and praying for him. Because I was his friend, I thought I should probably do something. I was putting my hand on them and all I could think about was my hand. I was like, “This is weird. Does that person think I’m weird? Is this weird? I don’t know this person that well, but I can’t reach the guy.” All I was thinking about was my hand. That was the full extent of what was happening for me and my fourteen-year-old brain. 

But I could hear people start to speak in tongues. I didn’t know they were speaking in tongues. They weren’t speaking English and I thought, “Okay. People do that—maybe.” I’m not joking. I have no reason to make this up. But, as this fourteen-year-old, in this very weak moment of trying to love on my friend and say, “Hey, yeah, I care about him,” I started to speak in tongues just a little bit. I started to speak in a language that wasn’t familiar and it was short. It wasn’t long. 

I went right back to being just as self-centered and crappy of a teenager as I could be. Again, I had no framework for it all. I just thought, “Well, that was weird. Was I just mimicking them?” That was it. I literally did not think about it again until I was eighteen years old and I was in a little Bible study school and they were teaching on baptism of the Holy Spirit, they were teaching on the gifts of the Spirit and they were talking from the Scriptures about this thing called “tongues.” And I was like, “Whoa. Wait a sec.” 

And it was funny, because at that point—you’re going to crack up—but at that point I was trying to figure out if tongues was right or wrong. I was trying to figure out if it was a good thing or a bad thing. But I had a problem, because I didn’t know anything and it happened. And the only thing I could think was just that God, in his mercy, was basically just kind of pouring out his Spirit and there was this little splash that came over to this dumb little kid. 

God knew the story. God knew what was going to happen and, in his mercy, he was like, “Watch this.” And he let a little splash over on this kid. So now I’m having to learn about something that had already happened in this moment of Church that was taking place where we were trying to care for this guy and love him. The life of Jesus showed up. And I didn’t even know it until years later.

And then you continue on and he talks about speaking in new tongues. I was with my wife and my one-year-old daughter and we were totally diving into all that the Lord had for us. We felt that he wanted us to go to Belize, to this village that we knew about, and just love on these people. Go give body and blood and to wash their feet. We were there, doing it as best we can, not really sure what we were supposed to do. 

One morning, early, I heard this guy yelling from the little dirt road that was next to our house. “Hey, Pastor David!” I looked up and it was just getting light. He said, “You’re needed in the other part of the village.”

So I got dressed and went down there. He had a bike for me. We rode bikes to the other side of the village. I walked upstairs, still trying to get my eyes to stay open. There was an older guy who was reading Scriptures about demon possession and those type of verses. There was a lady and her daughter sitting on a couch, crying. They looked like they had been through a lot. I just sat there and watched this happen. And then he prayed for them. Then we walked down the stairs. 

He looked at me and said, “Do you have any experience in this type of thing?”

And I was like, “Like getting up early? No, I don’t. Honestly. I don’t. You can see on my face, no, I don’t have a lot of experience in it.” But I knew what he was referring to. I just kind of smiled and was like, “I don’t know.”

We walked over and there was a young man, probably about twenty-one, and he was with two friends who were sitting on the ground. He was sitting on a chair and was writhing up and down and making some moans. We walked over there. Obviously, he was looking to me to do something. I didn’t know exactly what to do. I mean, I knew some Bible verses and so I actually grabbed his hand. I knew his name, so I said, “I’m here. I want to try to help.” 

I grabbed his hand. I was nervous, because in the Bible sometimes, you know, demon-possessed people are strong. Then he started squeezing, but it didn’t end up being that strong. It was strong, but it was just normal strong.

I got right next to his ear. All I could think to do was to say, “You’ve got to call on the name of Jesus. Jesus is the only one who has authority. Jesus is the only one that can save. You’ve got to call on the name of Jesus.”

At first, he was just kind of writhing, so I was just going up and down with him a little bit. At one point, it seemed like he was trying to speak, but he was choking up. We just kept trying. It was about eight or ten minutes of repeating this. At some point, he started saying, “Jesus, help me. Jesus, help me. Jesus, save me. Jesus, save me.”

Then he just went limp. Again, I don’t know what to do at this moment, but he’s limp and his eyes are closed. I had this thought, “Ask him what he sees.” 

So I said, “What do you see?” 

He said, “One of them left.”

I was like, Oh, no. What do you mean one of them left? And at this point, I just said, “Well, how many are there?”

And he said, “There’s one more.”

And I was like, “Okay, that’s not too bad.”

I don’t know! I don’t know what to think. So, I said, “All right. Let’s call on the name of Jesus.”

As soon as he tried to call on the name of Jesus, he started writhing again. We went through the whole process again and he went limp again. I said, “What do you see?” (It worked last time!) “What do you see?”

And I’m not joking. I’m not trying to make this sound better. He said, “A man in white told me to go to the church.”

I don’t know anything about the man in white. But I was like, “We’re going with him. We’re going with him. He’s talking about church. He’s in white. Sounds all right. Let’s do this.”

So we got him up and we walked him down to the church. Right as we were about to get him into the church, we were like, “This is cool.” In some ways, I’m like, “This is amazing.”

We got him to the church and we were trying to get him into the church. He started screaming and kind of pulling back. I don’t know if this is spiritual or not, but both of us lowered our shoulders and just smashed him into the church. But he was in the church now and he was okay. So I don’t know if that’s part of what the Bible teaches, but it just felt right at the moment. So he was in there. And there’s more story to tell about things that the Lord spoke to him. 

We actually went to town. We came back and he was in a different place. He left the church and it was all happening again. They had garlic and crosses all over him. We had to get the toff of him. There’s more to it.

But I’n offering to you that, for this guy this was a significant moment where he experienced some freedom from something that was freaking him out. But for this guy, it was also significant. It was like the life of Jesus was showing up. And here, in another moment, where either Jesus was or wasn’t—Jesus was. 

I could tell you more stories about healings and about how the Lord has shown up and those things. We are kind of out of time. But we’re going to keep sharing these things. If you want to hear more stories, talk to Kurt or talk to me if that is something you’d like to hear more about. If you have stories to tell, share those stories in your Life Groups or in other moments, if you can.

The life of Jesus is the fuel that we run on. If Jesus stopped showing up, we really don’t have anything. We just have a social club. But Jesus is showing up. He’s showing up Sundays. He’s showing up outside of this place. That’s the call. That’s the hope. That’s the prayer that we have.

Let’s close in prayer. Bow your heads and take a moment to allow Jesus’ Spirit to speak to your heart, to quiet your heart.

Jesus, we’re hungry for your life to show up. We know you rose from the dead. I pray for those who haven’t ever experienced your life connecting with their life.  I pray that today, Lord, they would ask and you would answer, and they would become part of your family and experience your great salvation. Thank you that you pour out your Spirit, Lord. Fill us anew. In this week, as we’re going through our lives, I pray that you would awaken us to moments when you’re wanting to impart some special gift; and we would be obedient, courageous and faithful, and leave the rest in your hands. 

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©️2019 Living Streams Church

7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Scripture is taken from Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Scripture marked MSG is from The Message, Copyright © 1993, 2002, 2018 by Eugene H. Peterson

Jesus' Table

David Stockton
Series: Church Around the Table

Last week we introduced the idea of Church Around the Table. I’m supposed to get to the book of Acts. I’m supposed to start talking to you about the table and all these things, but I just can’t. Last week I just started looking at Jesus’ life and I was like, “Man, we’ve to go back and really get this Church thing figured out.” 

We spent the last couple of months in the book of Ephesians, trying to get Paul’s inspired vision of the Church, as it was in the first century when it was really just an underground, persecuted, not-going-to-make-it type thing. Yet he had a grand vision. And if he could see the Church today around the world, I’m sure Paul would just be dancing some sort of jig, or whatever they did back then.

It’s really been amazing what the Church is. We talked about how the Church is not the organizations that call themselves church. Living Streams Church is not the Church. Living Streams is an organization that, hopefully, is a good house for the organism of the Church. Jesus is the head of the organism—which is the people who are actually following and practicing the way of Christ; people who are living in the light of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection; people who have seen that Jesus’ life, death and resurrection actually left a way for us through this confusing, consequential maze we call life. And they’re doing their best to walk in this thing. That is what the Church is. That’s all it is. 

Living Streams is hopefully just like—okay, you’re following the way—we’re one of those tables that has orange slices and a little bit of Gatorade, and we’re just here. And you’re following the way, and we’re like, “All right. Come on, man! Go man, go man!” That’s all that Living Streams is, just a little table by the side of the way, trying to help people get a little further down. And maybe if you need to rest a while, that’s fine. But then, eventually we’re going to be like, “You’ve got to stop resting, man. Get back on the way, get down the road!” That’s all this is. It’s just supposed to be a help. 

The organization has been helpful at times, and at times it’s been absolutely horrible to the organism of the Church. But Jesus died for the organism. He died for the people. He calls that his Bride. Living Streams is not his Bride. It’s just an organization. Are we getting that? I’ve said that a lot, so if you’re not getting it, it’s just not going to work at this point.

Church is not what Christians do, as far as the Sunday morning Living Streams context. Church is just supposed to help Christians do what they’re supposed to do. And it can happen in here. And it does happen in here. The reason you’re here is not because Living Streams does something to you. But when you’re here, the house of Living Streams is a good place to find the Spirit of God. And heaven and earth does feel a little bit closer together here, hopefully. And Church can happen here.

But then Church is supposed to happen outside of these walls—very importantly. Jesus said he would rather us leave the ninety-nine and go after the one. That’s a priority. So really, Church should happen outside these walls more so than inside these walls. That’s what we’re trying to get to. 

Jesus lived that way perfectly. Last week we talked about how Jesus had Church in a dirty man’s boat. He was there, sharing with the crowd in Peter’s boat—it was just Simon at that point. And Simon, at the end of Jesus’ talk with the people, said, “You’ve got to get away from me because I’m a dirty man.” 

And Jesus looked at him and said, “Hey, if you will follow my path, I will take you from being a dirty fisherman and make you into something beautiful that will actually catch men.”

And, sure enough, we got to watch that story unfold. Three years later, Peter was sitting in a room around a table with Jesus. And Jesus was basically saying the same thing to him. He’s telling him what Church is really about. And he hands out to all of the disciples there, and he says, “This is the new covenant. This is all it’s ever been about. This is the economy of heaven. This is the only thing that really matters. This is what you were made for. And he breaks some bread and he passes it around and he says, “This is my body given for you.”

The disciples could probably understand what that meant, even without the cross. They had been with Jesus for three years and watched him break off parts of his life for their own sake, and for the sake of so many others. So that actually could have worked even without what happened the next day. 

And then he took the cup and he said, “This wine is a sign of the new covenant. This is forgiveness for you.”

And he hands it out to them and, basically says, “I’m being poured for you. I’m being broken and given to you. I’m being poured out for you.”

The message in that moment was definitely what we have done with it, it’s a picture of what Jesus did on the cross. But that was just the final example. That was the most important example. But Jesus had been breaking off his body and handing it to them and others. Jesus had been pouring out his blood in forgiveness all through his ministry already. Are you with me there?

So when Jesus is doing this to his disciples, he’s once again teaching them a lesson. And they’re going to get that lesson once they see him die and rise from the dead. All of a sudden, these dense disciples will be like, “Oh!” So they still didn’t quite get it. But the lesson Jesus was giving was, “I want you to go now and do for the world what I have done for you.” 

Which means, “I want you to give them your body and your blood, just as I have given body and blood to you. This covenant that I’m making with you. This Church that I am birthing for you.”

Every time you go into this world and break off a piece of your life sacrificially, and you pour out a part of your life sacrificially, that’s when Church happens. That’s what Church is. 

Last week I told you guys about the guy with food stamps, who was just caring for me, loving on me, so interested in my life. And then one time I watched him pay for groceries with food stamps. He thought it was kind of an embarrassing thing, but, honestly, for me it showed a deep love. Because he had bought me stuff. He had taken me places. He had done things, and yet he was providing for his family on food stamps. What I felt was, “Man. He really loves me.” And he opened for me the love of Christ. He loved me in the way that Christ had loved him—sacrificially. He was breaking off body and blood for me. It compelled me to want to follow Jesus. 

Then I talked to you about the guy in the fifteen-passenger van, “stealing” the boat and all of that. And we went on and we both basically said, “You know, Jesus did this.”

We talked about Jan Tyranowski, how Pope John Paul remembers this apartment of this tailor named Jan Tyranowski that he used to go to. And he said that he “opened up his life to us and showed us the love of Christ.” And it compelled this guy to become pope. It’s a big deal.

That’s what we’re talking about—defining Church. I was like, “Okay. Good, we got Church defined, now let’s go to the table.” But we can’t go there yet. We’ve got to talk about Jesus some more.

Matthew, Mark, Luke, John are these four preserved accounts of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. We call them the gospels. There are four of them. Matthew, Mark and Luke all have this Last Supper story. They all four have the Last Supper story, but Matthew, Mark and Luke focus on the “body and blood” moment.

But John, who also talks about the Last Supper in John in John 13, never once mentions the body and blood. It could be that John wrote later, so he’s like, “Well, it’s already in the other three accounts, so I don’t need to reiterate it.” But John focuses on a different element of what took place in that Last Supper—that first real moment of Church Around a Table—that so compelled there. So I want to go there and look at what John’s perspective is.

We all know that John is a little “out there.” John would have been an awesome hippy. John is a little more spiritually inclined. John is laying on Jesus’ bosom and he actually tells people about it. He feels. He’s emotional. He’s driven that way. When you read his gospel and then his other writings, he’s just kind of wired that way. It’s beautiful and wonderful. He adds so much to it. This is who he is. 

John 13:

1 It was just before the Passover Festival. Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to leave this world and go to the Father. Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

2 The evening meal was in progress, and the devil had already prompted Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus. 3 Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, and that he had come from God and was returning to God; 4 so he got up from the meal…

Having all the power and authority in heaven and in earth. Just think about it. Let’s say you have all the power. Last night at the ASU game they showed on the JumboTron there was a sun shot with a solar flare hitting down on the desert. And—poof—out comes Sparky, this little devil guy. And he’s walking over Phoenix, and there’s a big haboob behind him. He’s got all this power and his pitchfork. And I don’t know what happened after that. They just lost.

But picture yourself being endowed with all the power. You’ve seen it in the movies. The bad guy is like, “Arghhhhhh!” getting all the power, and then he does something stupid and dies. 

But he’s got all the power. This is no joke. This is real God, real power, and all authority. All power has been put in his hands. And look what he does with it. Who knows John 13? Who knows what’s going to happen? Okay. For just a second, stop knowing what’s going to happen. Let this be the first time you’ve ever heard this. I know it’s hard, but try.

He’s got all the power.

…he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothing, and wrapped a towel around his waist. 5 After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples’ feet, drying them with the towel that was wrapped around him.

This is what he did with all the power in all the universe. He got down on his hands and knees and he washed the disciples’ feet. This is Jesus. This is God. This is why the Jews can’t believe it and the Greeks think it’s foolishness. Do you get that? What kind of God is this? 

6 He came to Simon Peter, who said to him, “Lord, are you going to wash my feet?”

7 Jesus replied, “You do not realize now what I am doing… 

“Just shut your mouth,” is basically what he’s saying.

…but later you will understand.”

8 “No,” said Peter, “you shall never wash my feet.”

Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”

9 “Then, Lord,” Simon Peter replied, “not just my feet but my hands and my head as well!”

10 Jesus answered, “Those who have had a bath need only to wash their feet; their whole body is clean. And you are clean, [Peter]

Uh-oh. What was the first interaction between Jesus and Simon? “I’m a dirty man!” And now, Jesus is saying, “You’re a clean man, Peter. You’re a clean man. You’ve been washed. Yeah, your feet stink a little bit, but your whole body is clean, Peter. You know that now. You know that.” Oh, what an amazing day that would be if we could actually believe we are clean!

…And you are clean, though not every one of you.” 11 For he knew who was going to betray him, and that was why he said not every one was clean.

12 When he had finished washing their feet, he put on his clothes and returned to his place. “Do you understand what I have done for you?” he asked them. 

That’s basically the question he’s been asking since the very beginning. And he’s never once gotten a very good answer. And now this is his last chance, his last night with them. He says, “Do you understand what I’ve done for you?”

13 “You call me ‘Teacher’ and ‘Lord,’ and rightly so, for that is what I am. 14 Now that I, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another’s feet. 15 I have set you an example that you should do as I have done for you. 16 Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him. 17 Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.

This is Church. This is new covenant. This is the same story as the giving of body and blood, but the way John says it is, you need to go and wash people. You need to wash people’s feet. That’s what the Church really is supposed to do. We’re supposed to go into this world and find all these people who are filthy and dirty from walking in this world, and we’re supposed to wash their feet with the love and forgiveness of Christ. We’re supposed to invite people into our homes so they can sit at our tables and so we can wash their feet. 

We just had Life Groups launch this week. Thirty-something groups, over three hundred and sixty people all getting together in homes outside this context. Hallelujah! How many of you washed their feet? I’m just kidding. I’m not trying to put a guilt trip on you. Like, “If you knew Jesus, the first thing, as soon as they walk in your door —bam—whip off the clothes, get down on the knee, ‘May I see your feet, ma’am? Sir?’ Wash them. Wipe them with a towel." Don’t do that! That’s weird.

Jesus knew these guys really well. It’s all guys in the room and he spent three years, so… maybe someday…but don’t be like, “Oh, the message. Let’s just do it.” No. Don’t do it. Okay? Don’t do it. Don’t do it.

But you can wash them in other ways. Right? And I think you guys probably did. You loved on each other. You leaned into each other. You listened to their stories and you pronounced blessing and encouragement. You allowed raw authenticity, relentless encouragement, and biblical counsel, in the hopes of genuine friendship forming. 

That’s what we’re going for. We’re teaching on Church Around the Table and we’re practicing Church Around the Table, all at the same time. When we practice the way of Jesus, it changes us. We’ll talk more about that in a minute.

But do you see how beautiful this is? Do you see how amazing this is? To sum it up, Jesus says, “Give body and blood for the sake of others.” That’s what you’re supposed to do as the Church. Give love to others the same way that Christ loved you. 

Yes! It’s so beautiful! Have you ever done that? Loved somebody to the same degree that Christ has loved you? I don’t know. 

Seek to wash and cleanse others instead of condemning others because that’s what Jesus did.  Those who are willing to admit they were unclean. The way Mother Theresa says it is, “Spread love everywhere you go. Let no one ever come to you without leaving happier.” Or, what I would say is, “Washed, rinsed, cleansed by the words that come out of your mouth and the love that comes out of your heart.” 

This is why it’s so beautiful. This is why the Christian Church is what it is today. Because the movement is legit. Because they are the most “woke” people walking around this world. Now, we get it wrong from time to time. We add to it. We get a little squirrly. We start throwing in all kinds of other stuff, no doubt. But this beauty is undeniable—that the God of the universe, the One who created it all and we jacked it all up—he comes and lives a perfect, clean life, sinless in every way—tempted in every way, but sinless in every way. 

And then he is—at this moment when he is endowed with all of the power—he is fully God, but he has never cheated by using any of those powers. Yet in this moment he is so aware of exactly what this moment is. And what he chooses to do with all the power, all the righteousness—self-righteousness that is actually true for him—he gets down underneath his disciples and he washes their dirty feet. Hallelujah!

In so doing, John said that after that he said, “Now blessed are you if you go and do the same thing.”

So my question to us is, when is the last time you washed someone’s feet? And I’m not just talking about shoes and socks and stuff. That’s what Church Around the Table is. It’s just these moments where we wash people’s feet. 

Last Sunday, I was talking about body and blood. It sounds weird, but I learned a lot from that message. I don’t know any of this stuff. I’m learning it the same time as you guys. Maybe just a little ahead. But I was just so convicted and compelled by Jesus’ message and all of that, and I was thinking, "Body and blood. Body and blood. Giving body and blood.” 

I knew that John 13 was going this other direction with it and I was stirring on all of that. I went home and was studying more. I was thinking, “I just did the message. I don’t have to study anymore.” And I was like, “Yes, I do!” So I was chewing on it and studying and going, “Lord, what are you saying? I need to get a little further in.”

It was my birthday. I just really felt like I wanted to wash my family’s feet. I wanted to. And don’t think we’re like a spiritual household. We’re not that great at Bible studies. We’re just now trying to get in this routine on Sunday night where we sing a couple of songs and pray a little bit. My kids hate it most of the time. And we hate them most of the time because of it. So don’t get this picture.

But this was a good moment, where, for my birthday I told them I wanted to wash their feet. And my wife was like, “Okay. We’ll see how this goes.” Because she’s right. And my girls were like, “Whaaa?” You know? (Our boys were actually with their siblings at this time.) 

I sat them down. I didn’t take my clothes off. I got a bowl of warm water and I got a towel. And I sat them down and washed their feet. They were a little bit giggly, but they held it together pretty well. I was trying to tell them about what Jesus did and how I just want to love them in the same way. I think they were able to receive some of that. 

Then my wife was like, “It’s your birthday. We want to wash your feet.” So they all decided that they wanted to wash my feet. I felt washed and cared for and appreciated. It was a moment where I was just trying to practice something, not really having much expectation. But there was a bit of a moment, and I think we kind of had Church Around the Table. Church around a bowl of warm water in this moment. It was precious and I was so thankful for it.

Then this morning, we were downstairs and I had three kids with me. I live in a weird situation. A couple of nephews and a foster boy were with me. We were downstairs and the whole team was praying and worshiping, getting ready for this. And my mind was on a thousand things. We’ve got a Belize Men’s Retreat barbecue afterwards. So I was stressing about that, my message, just everything in mind. And I felt like the Lord was like, “Right now.”

So I got up and I walked behind the boys that were just sitting there. They were being good, but they were like, “These people are always singing all the time.” I don’t know what they were thinking. That’s what I’m thinking they were thinking. 

I go behind them and I put my hands on the shoulders of the first one. He tensed up like, “What’s happening?” And I just prayed a prayer of blessing in his ear. Then I went to the next one and prayed. I don’t know what it meant to them at all. But I felt like I was being filled with the love of God for them as I was trying to love them. Does that make sense?

It was like I was practicing the way of Jesus and I was being filled with the Spirit of Jesus. That might sound really weird to you, but those of you who know what I’m talking about—it’s not weird. It’s very natural. It’s actually beautiful.

There’s this love that God is wanting us to do. We’re supposed to love our spouse the same way that Christ loved us. Husbands are to love your wives the same way Christ love you and laid his life down for you. There’s the same imagery. This is what cultivated and motivated the First Church experience. 

Paul was like, “You should forgive one another. Why? Because God in Christ Jesus has forgiven you.” This was the crux of their operation. It was their mission and vision statement. We’re supposed to love the way Christ loved us.

All I can think is, “That’s impossible.” Not because my wife is hard She’s awesome. But because I’m bad at stuff. So at the same time, I’ve been compelled by the beauty of this vision and so overwhelmed, going, “How am I going to live into this thing?”

I could think of a thousand times I got it wrong and I had to work really hard to give you two really good examples. And then there’s the rest of today, you know? And tomorrow, and all of that.

I want us to just know that Jesus understands that. He taught them and pointed them in this direction. But then, if you go into John 14, 15, 16 and 17, you find how. We don’t have time to go through all of it. But in John 14, I just want to read one verse to you. This is Jesus’ plan for how. For how you could love others in the way that he loved you, including, if you notice, Jesus washed all of his disciples’ feet. All twelve of them. 

You get what I’m saying? He washed Judas’ feet, knowing that the devil was already in him to betray him. He got down on his knees, with all the power, and he picked up Judas’ feet and he rubbed those feet, he cleansed those feet, and he probably prayed, “Father, if there’s any other way, let him know your love.” And he washed his feet. 

Loving your kids, loving your wife, loving your friends, loving your coworkers, loving your enemies—loving those who have absolutely betrayed you—is this heavy, awesome, beautiful call. How is it possible? John 14:15

In your Life Groups, if you want to unpack the main points of 14, 15, 16 and 17, of how Jesus said, “This is how it’s going to work out.” You can do that. But to sum it up:

15 “If you love me, keep my commands.

And what are his commands? That you will love others in the same way that he has loved you. Bam. Done. Too heavy. Too beautiful. If you will do this…

 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate [or helper] to help you and be with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you …

Helping you to see the vision

…and will be in you… 

Helping you walk in the way of that vision. That’s it. There are no other tricks. You don’t have to climb a mountain, stare at your belly button, or anything else. You just have to take your step in the way, in the direction of the commands of God in your life—and Jesus will ask the Father and he will give you a helper—the Spirit of truth. The world cannot receive  him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him for he lives with you. He’s the one giving you the compelling. He’s the one giving you the conviction. He’s the one who’s opening your mind to see this way. Then he will be in you to empower you to walk in it.

In Acts 1, Jesus rises from the dead. He’s sitting with the disciples. John was the only one that was at the cross. The rest of them were out of there. Forget it. Jesus’ thing didn’t work. He’s dead. And now, they’re all out fishing again—fishing for fish. And Jesus comes up on the shore and he has a little time with them.

In Acts 1, he’s with them and he says, “I’m going to leave like I told you I would. But this time I’m not coming back. But I want you to go to Jerusalem and wait for the promise of the Father. For when the Holy Spirit comes upon you, you will be empowered to be my witnesses. You will be empowered to walk in the way and everyone else will watch you walk in the way and think, ‘Huh. I need to learn Jesus’ way. I need to know about Jesus.’”

It’s the Spirit that empowers us toward this beautiful end. And like I just explained to you—How practical is it? I was not feeling it. I’m a little tired. My mind’s all a blur of things. I feel like the Lord’s saying, “Right now. Wash someone’s feet. Give some body and blood.”

I’m like, “Man, these are all church people. Well, those three dudes right behind me. I don’t know what’s going on with this.” So I just walked back, and like I said, I stepped into the commands of the Lord. I said, “Okay, I’ll try. And I’m going to fail.” But then, as I was doing it, I was being filled with love that didn’t come from my own tank. It came from somewhere else. And I was able to pray these genuine prayers. I really was praying these prayers. I wanted to see these things happen for these three boys. And I got filled with Jesus in that little moment, and maybe they got a little splash. I don’t know. I’ll ask them later. They’ll probably say, “I don't know what you’re talking about.” But it’s just a little way it works out. When you lean in, the Spirit empowers you. 

We’ve got a lot more to come in the next few weeks, at 8:30, 10:00 and 11:30. But right now we’re going to spend a little time waiting on the Father to give the Holy Spirit—waiting on the promise of the Father. We’re going to have the ushers come forward to pass out the bread and the cup. We’ll once again have this time of teaching ourselves in the way that Jesus taught his disciples—once again remembering and being compelled by the love of Christ, who gave body and blood for us, who just spit in his face, who so often have chosen sin instead of his way. 

As you get this piece of bread and this cup, just hold on to it. We’ll all take it together in the end. This is definitely that time when we’re going to try and get filled with the Spirit of God for the task that we have in front of us. Be thinking, have you received the Spirit of God or not? If you have received the Spirit of God, how full is your tank? How full is your tank? Would you like him to fill you again? Fill you afresh? Are you willing to make room? To surrender things that are blocking the filling of the Spirit? Communion is a good time to confess those things and do that transaction with the Lord. Give up your sin and your junk for his Spirit and his power.

I have a couple more things to mention. I really want to talk to people in the room that maybe don’t know where they are at with Christ. I had a friend come to church recently. He is someone that has a real critical mind. He’s sharp. He’s actually super smart and still kind. He came to church and, I knew that he’s not a follower of Jesus. He has, at times, been against things like that. So I asked him afterwards. I said, “How was it?”

This is what he said. And this is for you that are at Living Streams, and loving people well, to encourage you. But this is also where maybe some of you are at. 

He said:

“I found myself wondering about how I could replicate, develop or steal what seems like super powers that you believers have. There is an obvious depth and value that I’m missing out on, so it made me want to figure out how to hack that in myself.” 

I loved the honesty. This guy’s mind is brilliant. He’s not pretending. He’s saying, “I see something.” And what he sees is the Spirit of God empower us and compelling us toward each other. He’s saying, “Yeah. I’m missing that.”

I don’t know if he’s willing to surrender to Christ and make that move, but I thought it was pretty beautiful that he could recognize that. But some of you are in this room and you can say the same thing, if you’re honest. And this is your moment. It’s never going to be easier than right now to receive Jesus in this room, in this moment. It will only get harder. I just want to encourage you to receive Jesus. 

We’re all going to take communion now. We’re all going to partake together. Those of us who know Jesus, we’re just once again saying, “Jesus, more of you in our lives.” But if you’re someone who has never made that decision, this is a great place to start. If you’re someone who doesn’t want anything to do with Jesus, please don’t take this. There’s some verses about that. It doesn’t go well. But if you’re someone who is saying, “Yes, I’m ready to receive Jesus for the first time,” then you are more than welcome to partake with us. 

Let’s pray:

Jesus, we thank you for your body that you gave so freely to us. We receive it now and ask for more of you in our lives.

Let’s take the bread.

And Jesus, we thank you that you wash us and cleanse us by your blood—that perfect blood that was sacrificed for us. We ask that you would cleanse us once again, Lord.

Let’s take the cup.

Amen.

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©️2019 Living Streams Church

7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Scripture is taken from Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Church Around the Table

David Stockton
Series: Church Around the Table

Good morning, everybody. Thanks for talking to each other. Thanks to all the introverts for not leaving right away. I know it feels. 

We’re kicking off a new sermon series. Life Groups are kicking off this week. We’ve got over 300 people that are going to be hanging out a whole bunch in smaller group situations, in homes, around tables with snacks, and the word of God—partaking in raw authenticity, relentless encouragement, biblical counsel, and, hopefully, some genuine friendship—in a very crazy, disconnected, more connected than ever online world that we’re living in. I’m really excited about it. 

So, thanks to everyone who said, “Ok, we’ll give it a shot.” And thanks to all the people who are leading and inviting people into your home or wherever you’re going to meet. And more to come on that. It’s going to be great.

Yes, we are going to be going to three services, starting September 29. Your fault, not my fault, just so you know. I was doing just fine with two services. This is no problem. But then you guys just kept coming and doing all this stuff and bringing friends. It’s wonderful. We’re so excited. The Lord’s definitely leading us. It’s been our hope for years now. We really do believe that there is more room in the family here. We’ve got enough food in the cupboards and goodness coming out on the table. 

There are some more people that need to be here with us. Hopefully not necessarily people that are already going to other churches. There’s room for them there. But people who aren’t going to church. We’re really going to start diving into that a little bit. We spent time in Ephesians figuring out the vision for the Church. And now we’re going to figure out a little more of how we can practically walk this out in our Twenty-First Century world. 

Some of you are just killing it. Some of you are so awesome at this. Some of you are a little newer to the game. And some of you need to get back in the game, because you’ve been taking a break and it’s been like twelve years now. Breaks over, my friend. Get back in the game.

We did establish that this Sunday morning church concept is not what Christians do. This is just supposed to be a help for Christians to do what they’re supposed to do. Living Streams is an organization that does not have Jesus at the head of it. It’s true. We do our best to make sure the head of Living Streams, which is our elder board, is in line with the head of Jesus Christ. But, at the end of the day, it’s still kind of filtering through a board of elders and some pastors. We don’t get it right all the time. We’re an organization. We’re trying to create a house in our city. The organism of the Church, which is the real Church, is what Jesus died for. Jesus didn’t die for Living Streams. He died for the people who are his Church, that just so happen in this season of their life to be going to the organization of Living Streams.

Are we clear on this? We have to get this straight. We have taught people for too long the wrong way. Not on purpose, I don’t think. But we’re focused on a building. We’re focused on an organization. We’re focused on this church or that. The Church is the people of God who are trying to follow in the way of Jesus and he’s the head of them.

The Church, in that regard, the organism is the single most dominant force for good the world has ever seen—any time, any age, any place. No doubt about it. No on in their right mind can contest that.

We, as the leaders of the organization of Living Streams, we say, “Lord, what can we do? What are we lacking? How can we steer? How can we get better at housing this beautiful Bride, Body, Temple that you formed. That you died on the cross for, rose again for, gave your Spirit to? What can we do?” And that’s when we came up with this concept that we’re lacking in the church what’s supposed to happen outside of the church. That’s a very confusing phrase—especially when we’re dividing that word up. 

Basically, we’re lacking in the church what’s supposed to happen outside of our Sunday morning context. The Lord is wanting to raise a standard. He’s wanting to challenge us. He’s wanting to spur us on.  As he looks as assesses our church family, as it is, he’s saying, “You’re doing great in a lot of ways. But there’s one thing you lack.” Kind of like in the letters to the churches in Revelation. “I see all these good things, but there’s one thing you lack. You lack in the church that which is supposed to happen outside of the church.”

And so that’s our big push. Let’s go open our homes. Let’s do Life Groups. That’s a program, but it’s more than that. We’ve got to take a step back from that. When we see the book of Acts—and we’re going to dive into that the next two months—we’re going to try to get a picture of what this looked like in the book of Acts, and what this looked like in Church history. But I want us to take a step back, because I want us to get to the real core of what’s behind all of this. 

We’ve got to back to Jesus, right? We’ve got to go back to the life of Jesus. So we’re going to go to Luke 4 and we’re going to learn the way of Jesus once again. Many of you are familiar with this, you know all about it. But it’s always good for us to go back and remember the way that Jesus lived.

Before I do that, I just want to set a little tone. I wrote a poem this week. I’m not reading this poem because I think it’s so good, or whatever. I’m reading this poem that I wrote (which is a little embarrassing) because I just want you to get a little bit of a feel as to where this message is coming out of, as the Lord took me through a process of trying to teach me something that I could share with you. And so, here it is:

Is there a way through this consequential maze
So full of dangers, toils and snares
Physically drained and dying
Spiritual asleep and unaware

Is there a way through this relentless desert
So dry and cracked and parched
Physically wasting away
Emotionally dry and desensitized
Mentally weary in well doing
Spiritually hopeful but helpless

Is there a way through this oppressive society
So polluted and popular and poisonous
My body is to be worshipped
My desires are worthy of indulgence
My ideas are more valuable than yours
God loves me more than truth and justice

Is there a way? I don’t know.
Some days I am sure
Some days I can’t tell
Some days I just lie down, hopeless for a while

But today? Today I see Jesus
I see the trail His life, death and resurrection left behind

Today I choose to follow His way
So hard and rewarding and hard
Physically touching others’ wounds with tenderness
Emotionally pouring out sacrificial praise
Mentally being transformed by His words
Spiritually fighting to stay awake with anticipation

And that was the question that came to my heart as I wrestled with my own “stuff.” As I wrestled with stuff in my family. As I sat in a hospital room next to a drug addict that’s a good friend of mine and has been for a while. This is about his sixth or seventh time he’s been in the hospital with his life on the line. And I asked him, “Hey. Do you have any hope?” And he said, “Well, I don’t really know if now is the time to talk about that.” I was like, “I don’t know if you’ll have another chance to talk about it. I don’t know if there’s any better time in your entire life to talk about whether you have hope or not.” And then I just left it because he wanted to talk about something else. And he knows exactly what I would say.

Is there a way through this consequential maze that we call life and living? Jesus is someone who says there is. And Jesus is someone who says, “Actually, there’s only one way.” And Jesus is someone who says that he is the only way. 

In Luke 4, we’ll pick up there and we’ll get the start of this, where Jesus is coming on the scene. He’s just been baptized by John the Baptist. He’s living in a Roman-dominated, oppressive world, with an impoverished people, confused and beating each other up with religiosity. He’s been out in the wilderness for forty days, being tempted by the devil, which I’m sure was intense. And then he goes back home. He shows up to church in the synagogue on the Sabbath. He’s sitting there in church, and this is where we pick up in Luke 4:14

14 Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about him spread through the whole countryside. 15 He was teaching in their synagogues, and everyone praised him.

16 He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. 

Jesus went to church, by the way.

He stood up to read, 17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:

18 

“The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
    because he has anointed me
    to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
    and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,

19 

     to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”

20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. 21 He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”

Basically, Jesus is saying, “If any of you are asking if there’s a way  through the consequential maze of life, is there any chance that we can find freedom, good news, healing, favor, is there any chance at all that we might find that?”—Jesus said, “Well, I’m here to pave a way for that. The Scripture that you just heard today is fulfilled. I am now going to set a path before you. I’m going to chop through the jungle. I’m going to show you the way to all of those things.”

And immediately the people in his own home town said, “Pshh. Jesus. This guy’s crazy. I remember when he was a little kid. He fell over there and hurt his knee. I remember when he was over there and he got sick.” Whatever. They remember him growing up. And now he’s standing there saying he is the way. He’s going to pave the way to freedom, healing and life, goodness. And then he said to those people right after that, “And just like many prophets were not received in their own home town, I know you guys will not receive me. So I will go to other places and I will show them the way. Because you will not receive it.”

They got so mad they pushed him to the edge of the cliff and they were going to push him off to kill him. And then he walked right through them, the Bible says. He paved a way even through them. 

And then in Chapter 5, at that point he goes out to this place called Capernaum and he preaches to them and he says, “Bring to me anyone that is in those situations.” They bring them to him and he heals them and sets them free. He gives them hope. He tells them about God’s favor for them. It’s a wonderful thing.

Then, just after that, he calls some disciples to him. He goes out to the sea one day near Capernaum. There are these fishermen there. He says, “Hey, can I borrow your boat?” And they were like, “Whatever.” So he gets in the boat and they go out a little bit and he starts teaching the people. He’s giving them words of life. He’s teaching them what the Scriptures are really trying to say—who God is and what God requires. And the people are stirred and then, all of a sudden, the guy who is the boat, this guy named Simon Peter is there. He looks up after Jesus says what he has to say. Simon says, “Depart from me for I’m wicked. You don’t want to be around me, Jesus. You’ve got to go find someone else’s boat. This is a dirty boat.”

 And Jesus says, “If you follow me, if you get on this path that I’m carving, if you stick close with me, you’re going to be saying some real different things.”

And then we have the story of Peter beginning, and the other disciples as they followed in that path, they found all those things that Jesus had promised. And even more importantly, they began to be people who can pass those things on. 

Then, later on, it’s interesting, turn to Luke 7. There’s this moment where John the Baptist, the guy who was Jesus’ cousin, the guy who baptized Jesus, the guy who was kind of a forerunner for Jesus—he actually said that he was the guy who was supposed to prepare the way for the One who was coming that actually show us the way, that can make a way where there is no way. 

In verse 18:

18 John’s disciples told him about all these things. Calling two of them, 19 he sent them to the Lord to ask, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”

20 When the men came to Jesus, they said, “John the Baptist sent us to you to ask, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?’”

“Are you the one that’s going to show us the way that can make a way where there is no way? Because at one point I kind of thought that, but now…” If you know John’s situation, he’s in prison and he’s about to lose his head because he was talking to the political leaders at that time, saying, “What you’re doing is not pleasing to God.” 

So John’s been in prison for a while and he’s wondering if Jesus cares. And it’s starting to make him wonder if Jesus really is the way. 

21 At that very time Jesus cured many who had diseases, sicknesses and evil spirits, and gave sight to many who were blind. 22 So he replied to the messengers, “Go back and report to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor. 23 Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me.”

He basically says to him, “All of the things that were promised in the beginning are still showing up today as I’m carving this path and people are following this path, they’re receiving these things—this path of life, the path of the just that shines ever brighter to the perfect day.” And he’s saying, “John, I know you’re on this path and I want to say ‘blessed is anyone who does not falter or stumble or get off the path because I didn’t do what they thought I should do.’ I’m the one paving the way. You’re the one following, John. Follow me and you will see all of these things come to pass.”

And then he continues to pave that way. We read at the Scriptures. We have the stories. We have four different accounts in this Bible of all that Jesus did, all that he stirred up with his words and his power, with his love, and with his death and resurrection.

Many of us in this room have said, “Okay. All right Jesus. There are lots of people telling me they know the way, but they’re all dead and they stayed dead. But Jesus, you’re the one that said you knew the way, died and then conquered death. I think I’m going your way.”

And we’ve been following this way, for whatever reason. We’ve been going down this path and we’ve been able to experience some freedom, some healing, some favor, some grace, some of the things that Jesus has promised. 

I’ve asked Pastor Kurt to start categorizing and cataloging all of the signs that we’re seeing in our midst right here in our church. He just sent me an email. There are so many wondrous things happening. People actually getting physically healed at the Men’s Retreat, in our Sunday morning services, other places. If you’re like me and you’re like, “Oh, you’re just saying these things. I need to talk to the person it happened to.” Feel free. I’m sure they would be happy to tell you. Come talk to me. Come talk to Kurt. Kurt - stand up and do a little circle.

I’m not joking. I’m as skeptical as anybody. Come talk to us. We’ll take you to the people that have actually experienced healing and you can determine whether you think they’re true or not. We’re not trying to make something up or trying to exaggerate. I mean it’s true. We are experiencing this stuff. Two Sundays ago, you guys saw. We had a bunch of people get baptized up here. And right before that we had all these people raise their hands to say, “I need to follow Jesus.” And they are experiencing life. 

Again, that’s why somehow we’ve got to get together so we can hear each other’s stories. The reason most of the people are in this room is because they can say, “Absolutely, without a doubt. Jesus in my life—different.” No doubt about it. Whether it’s some supernatural, miraculous thing, or it’s more deep, spiritual work—or both. That’s what this is all about. This is not built on some sort of idea or some guru. This is built on tangible, practical, signs and wonders of the Spirit of God showing up. That Jesus is not dead in a grave somewhere. He is alive and on the move. Maybe, just maybe, we’re getting to see true revival happening right here. We’re going to talk more about that. 

But John the Baptist—“Stick with the program, don’t fall on account of me.” Jesus is telling him he is the way. Jesus is basically trying to teach him that, “I am paving the way. I know the way. I’m going to go the full distance. If you can follow my way, though it’s hard—rewarding and hard—you will get to see the life of God. The life God intended. You will get to taste the kingdom of heaven even in this life, prior to the next.”

This is the word and promise of Jesus Christ that has been spreading throughout the world. And then there’s this culmination which brings us to Church Around the Table. There was this culmination at the end of Jesus’ life. As he had gathered his followers.—and there were about 120 at one point and now there were only twelve that had committed their lives to following the way of Jesus. Because it’s hard. 

And there were only twelve left in this upper room, as Jesus calls them to have a little time of church around table, a little time of fellowship around a table, a little time of raw authenticity, relentless encouragement, biblical counsel, and genuine friendship around a table. Jesus, when he is spending his last night on earth, decides to make a powerful statement for all of us. The most valuable thing you can do is church around the table.

Jesus gathers his people together. There are twelve of them there plus Jesus. One of them is not going to work out so well. And he’s there having a meal with them. He said, “I have so longed to share this meal with you. This has been the day, the moment that I have been planning and hoping for this entire ministry life that I’ve had, these last three years. This really is the culmination. This is a precious, important moment. I don’t want you to miss this. 

And he broke bread, and he said, “This is my body which I am giving to you.” And they didn’t understand the full ramification of what that meant in that moment. They just thought, “Yeah. Jesus is for us. He’s with us. He loves us. He’s given so much to us.” 

But Jesus was speaking of more than that. He’s actually saying his body was going to be pierced and broken on a cross so that they could be set free from the wrath of God. And they received this. And Jesus said, “Do this often, in remembrance of me. Whenever you eat, remember me. Remember that your fellowship is not just with each other, but I am there as well. And just as I gave myself to you, I want you to give yourself to one another. I want you to find people that you will give yourself to in a sacrificial way—just as I found you and gave myself to you.”

And then he said, “This is my blood which is going to be poured out to cover you.” And we understand that it’s his blood, that sacrifice that actually covers our sins because he was sinless and we aren’t. But, still, the impartation is there. He gathers these people together and says, “I will give all of me to you—my body and my blood, poured out for you. And I want you to go and do the same. To gather some people around your table and love them so much so that you could say with all honesty, ‘This body is for you. Anything you need, I will give you. This blood that flows through my veins—I will pour it out for you so that you could know the love of the Father.’” 

This is discipleship. This is the call of the Church. This is the call of you. That’s why you can’t have hundreds of them. That’s why it’s a joke for me to think I’m pastoring all of you guys. Here is my body. It’s like three people would get it and the rest of you would be starving to death. Here is my blood. I want to give you everything. Most of you would just be broke and miserable. Because I don’t have that much. But I have enough for a few. And guess what? You have enough for a few, as well. You have enough for a few.

What I love about Jesus’ life is that, Jesus, when he came to world, knowing all of the problems in the world, all of the poor, all of the injustice, all of the rape, murder, all of the lying, stealing…Jesus knew about all of that. And you know what he did to solve all of those problems? He gathered some people around him and loved them with everything in him, and then asked them to go do the same thing.

What kind of strategy is that? It’s Jesus’. It’s God’s strategy. I will not give my body and blood for Living Streams Church, this organization. Sometimes it feels like it. But there are some people in my life that I’ll give everything for, and I’m supposed to. The more I give to them, the more the Lord pours right back into me. 

I want us to understand. It’s not just Church around the table, Church around the communion table, Church around whatever table. For me, in my life, it’s been a little different from that. It’s been Church around food stamps. It’s been Church in a 15-passenger van. It’s been Church in different ways like that. Church in my own home with foster boys or a friend of mine that needed a year to get stable. 

For Jesus it was Church in a boat. Remember? He was with Peter and he was doing his sermon, but Jesus was like, “Bam. Ha ha. Got you. You just heard the message. Now you’re saying you’re dirty. You’re getting the message. Come on. Let’s do this thing.” 

And that guy that was so dirty, that wanted nothing to do with Jesus, but just had a little Church time in the boat with him, was at the table with him on his last night. And that guy right there got the message so well that, after Jesus died on the cross, he went and lived as Jesus. When you read the stories about Peter after Jesus’ death and resurrection, it’s really hard to tell the difference sometimes. Is this a story about Jesus—or a story about Peter?

And then, in the end, Peter decided that Jesus is so worthy, I don’t want to die the same way he did. Because he was crucified as well, but he decided that he wanted to do it upside down, as he gave his body and his blood for Jesus and the ones that he was called to love.

I’m sorry if you came to church this morning for a little “pick up.” I really am. It’s my birthday, though, so you have to deal with it. You get away with so much more on your birthday. You’re like, birthday card. Oh, I’m sorry I was a jerk to you. BIrthday card! You know? You’ve got one day to do it all. 

But Church in a boat. You know, Jesus had Church in all kinds of places. Church on the side of a hill. Church in a garden. Church here, Church there. Jesus had Church everywhere. For me, when I said Church around the food stamps, I remember this guy, Jason Biel. I was seventeen years old, my senior year of high school, and he was twenty years old and had a wife and a kid.  Seemed a little quick to me. I just thought he was fun. And he cared so much about me. I don’t know why. He just really wanted to make sure I knew he Jesus was, knew that I knew the love of Jesus, felt the love of Jesus, knew that God had a plan for my life, knew that there was this path that, if I would walk on it, it would be hard and rewarding and hard, and knew that, if I walked on these other paths it would be like, meh, and then death—vanity.

I remember one time we were in line. He would just hang out with me. He’d pick me up and take me around. He’d set up all these adventures we’d go on. Then one time we were in a grocery store. I remember he had his kid, and he was buying some weird stuff like baby stuff. I had never seen it before. I was seventeen years old. Then, all of a sudden, he started to act a little strange as he’s in the little ticket line. I was standing behind him and then, he kind of pulled some stuff out and he handed it across, and he was kind of looking down.

My dad was a doctor. I had never seen food stamps. But when he did it, I wouldn’t have known what it was, except for the kind of feeling he was having. I thought, “Oh, those are food stamps. Oh, he must feel like I think less of him because he’s on food stamps.” But it was the exact opposite. I thought, “Here’s a guy that’s doing everything he can to take care of his family, but yet he still has time for me, to care about my life, to teach me guitar, to take me on all these weekend adventures with some Christian deal, to just pray for me and care for me and ask me all these questions about my life and what I’m going to do.” He showed me a path and made me want to know Jesus.

Later on, I remember I had just graduated high school and I had some plans for my life. I thought I was pretty cool. And this guy said, “Hey, you’ve got nothing to do this week (because I talked to your parents). I have to go to Mexico with this group of high schoolers and make sure they’re doing okay. But ultimately, I have to go steal a boat that my brother left at a gas station down there, because this guy won’t give him the boat back.”

And I was like, “I’m in. I don’t know what you said before ‘steal a boat’ but I’m in.”

This guy was a pastor and this was his job as a pastor that week, I guess. I didn’t know you could do that as a pastor. We’re driving down and he’s telling me all about Jesus, telling me all this good stuff, teaching me all of these things. We stayed the night probably a mile away from this gas station where they had to leave the boat because the trailer broke. And he’s like, “Okay, well someone needs to stay awake the whole night. I’ll take the first the shift, then my brother.”

I was eighteen and they were older. They were going to cover it. I woke up one time and everyone was asleep. And there were cars driving by and we’re deep in Mexico. I’m just like, “We’re going to die!”

And then the next morning, right before the sun came up, we went over and got this whole boat and trailer onto a flatbed trailer. We would jack it and then push it until the jack fell over. Jack it, push it. It was the most ridiculous, dumb thing in the world. But I remember, as soon as we got that on the thing, he was like, “Get in!”

Boom. We took off running. Then, as we were driving out, the owner of the station was driving in and he was like, “Whoa!” And we were out of there. And he was telling me a little more about Jesus and he was praying for me. And I thought, “Okay. Church in a 15-passenger van down in Mexico. This is legit.”

I thought, “You know what? I’m interested in who Jesus is and what he does with a person’s life.” And it was shortly after that when Jesus came to me himself and said, “Do you want to do  what you have in mind for your life or do you want to see what I have planned?” And it was over. I’ve been very interested in his plans ever since. And so much has shown up in my life, there’s no other way to explain it, except Jesus.

Then there’s this other story about a guy named Jan Tyranowski. We’ll finish with this. Pope John Paul II. He was Pope, by the way. He tells a story about a moment in his life when he had Church in the apartment of a shoemaker, of a tailor. I just love this quote so much. This is the call. We’re supposed to have Church around our table, no doubt, but we’re supposed to have Church everywhere we go. This is just supposed to be a little pep talk, you know? A little encouragement. And even this, you know? Create a little space here. Some people in this room are barely hanging on right now. And you could just come and wrap your arms around them. 

This is what John Paul II said about his Church in the tailor’s apartment. This guy, Jan Tyranowski. And I’m praying that every single person at Living Streams will change their name to Jan at some point. I want this so badly for us because this is Jesus.

He was one of those unknown saints, hidden among the others like a marvelous light at the bottom of life, at a depth where night usually reigns…In his words, in his spirituality and in the example of a life given to God alone, he represented a new world that I did not yet know. I saw the beauty of a soul opened up by grace.

This is Jesus’ dream for your life, that there would be people, maybe just ten or eleven, that would say these words. They’d say, “I know who that is. That’s George. That’s Sarah. When I hear that quote my mind immediately goes to…this person.” Because that’s what Jesus has been for us. 

What I wrote down is:

I think we all need to find a Christian luminary and learn. Then we need to become a Christian luminary and share our lives and, ultimately, focus on someone who is not a Christian, until they become a Christian luminary. That was the way of Jesus. That’s the way Jesus taught us to do Church.

Let’s pray. We’ll take a moment now and be quiet before the Lord. We really do believe that Jesus is alive and that his Spirit moves among his people—that, if two or more are gathered in his name, his presence is there. We believe the Bible teaches that God loves to speak to people, whether they know him or not, whether they got it right this morning or not. So we just want to stop for a moment and see what God might say to us. It can be something about the message, or it could be something totally different.

Jesus, I don’t know exactly how you did it, but you were able to take those fishermen and make them into fishers of men. Lord, they were able to follow in your path and bring healing—true healing, and freedom—true freedom and love to people. Lord, I just ask that, first, everyone in this room would know that this is something that you want to do with them. That you are faithful. You are the Author and Perfecter of our faith. That you’ve taken it upon yourself to be that for every person that would follow you. And you’ve given us your Spirit, that, if we choose to follow you, we actually can receive your Spirit as a guide, as a strength, as a comfort. Jesus, I pray that anyone in this room that does not have your Spirit living inside of them, that today they would ask and you would give. And they would know that this is not something you want them to do in their own strength and wisdom, but something you want to partner with them for. 

If you haven’t received the Spirit of God, if you haven’t said, “Jesus, I want you to be the Lord of my life,” I just encourage you, in this moment, to say those words out loud. God is listening and he is ready if you’re ready.

Jesus, I do pray that you would teach us your ways, that you would keep us from getting distracted or side-tracked by the stuff in our own hearts and minds, let alone in our world, that your voice would always come through loud and clear. We thank you that you are our teacher, you are our guide, Jesus. I pray that we would fix our eyes on you and we would follow your path. We pray it in Jesus’ name. Amen.

---

©️2019 Living Streams Church

7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Scripture is taken from Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Don't Get Distracted

Rob Capaldi (www.capaldi.life)
Series: Ephesians

David Stockton: 

He is apostolic. He has traveled the continents sharing the word of God, trying to spread God’s word and strengthen churches. He’s here to share his gift and his calling with us—his story. He’s been in Ecuador. He’s been in Canada. He’s been in the U.S. and now he’s currently living in Italy, trying to build the church there. I’m so excited to tell his stories. I told him he can’t speak in Spanish, he can’t speak in Italian. He has to speak in English. He could do any of those. He could probably speak Canadian, too, but nobody wants to hear that. What’s up, Roy? Here you go, Rob. Let ‘em have it.

Rob Capaldi:

Thank you, David, for that amazing introduction. I feel like I could just do a mic drop after that and just walk away. See, now, that’s why I wanted a handheld. You can’t mic drop an earpiece. That’s not right.

Thank you so much. I will do like Paul has done in some of the books of the Bible:

Italy brings its greetings to you.

That is definitely true for us today.

Now, for those who do not know me, which is most of you, I am a second-generation missionary. When I was six years old, my parents decided to sell everything, put some of their stuff in a container and move to Ecuador. I obviously didn’t have much say in this because I was six years old. We lived there for a while, church was growing and everything was going great. 

But a little less than three years ago, with my family—I’ve been married fourteen years now, to my beautiful wife that is with me this morning, Karina. My oldest son is Robby, he’s twelve, and Angelina, she’s going to be seven, and my last daughter, Alia, she is four years old—we decided to move as missionaries, as David said, to Italy. I’ll be telling you a little about that story as we advance.

Something interesting happened to me when we were leaving Ecuador to go to Italy. There is this really popular Bible verse that people use when they are going to go somewhere else. You’ve probably heard it before. This verse is Acts 1:8. It’s one you know: 

You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you will be my witnesses, telling people about me everywhere: in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and to the ends of the earth.

Have you heard that before? Yeah. You’ve heard that, right? So, obviously, we were using that verse when we were leaving Ecuador. “We’ve got to go to the ends of the earth. This is our Jerusalem. We’ve got to go to the ends of the earth. So that’s where we’re going. We’re going to the other side of the world to the ends of the earth.” For us that is Italy.

We get to Italy and the church that received us there, were actually on this missions topic as well. And guess what? They put that verse up and they’re talking about that. And they’re saying, “We need to have a vision to send people to the ends of the earth.” 

And I’m thinking, “Wait a minute. The ends of the … this is the ends of the earth! I just came from Jerusalem. This is the ends of the earth!”

And then it dawned on me. I just realized something. Now, I’m assuming none of you are flat earth believers. But I realized, “Oh my gosh. There is no ‘ends of the earth.’ The earth is round! So, if there is no ‘ends of the earth’—I’m coming to the ends of the earth—you’re gong to the ends of the earth and we’re crossing. Wouldn’t it just be cheaper and easier if everyone just stayed put?”

It’s funny though, because, you see, we all know when Jesus finished his ministry he left. He left the earth. And at that moment, I think that’s one of the coolest moments in the Bible, the disciples are there and they are watching Jesus leave. He’s gone on a cloud. He’s leaving and they’re just watching him. After a little while, he’s actually gone. But you know what the disciples are doing? They’re still just looking up into the sky. Then, all of a sudden, this angel appears among them and he says, “Uh, guys. What are you doing? Why are you looking up in the clouds? It’s time to pick up shop. Let’s go. It’s up to you now.”

If this angel was Italian, he would have said, “Hey, guys, salt in the salt shaker does nothing to the pasta. You’ve got to spread out that salt. You’ve got to get out there. You’ve got to go all around.”

That is God’s heart for us. No, we do not have to stay put. Yes, we have to go all around the world telling everybody about God’s love and everything that he has for us. That has to sound in every tongue, in every ethnicity, in every kind of person. It’s amazing when you hear it from different people around the world in the same place. We’ve really got to grasp that God is not just our God, here let’s say in Phoenix, but he is God of the whole world. So when we have people together speaking in Italian, in Portuguese, in Spanish, and they’re all talking about the same God. That is really power.

[A few sentences in Italian and then Spanish]

Okay, I’ll talk English. I’m sorry, David. Plus, I’m starting to sound a little like the candidates in the Presidential debates. We won’t get into politics this morning.

The point is, Jesus’ Body, he left, right? But his Body is still here. The Church, we are the living, breathing Body of Christ, amen? And Jesus still is serving everyone. He wants to do that through us. And now it is up to us to go all around the world. I am a witness, as David said. I’ve been around. Thank God. That is such a blessing. I’ve been to Spain. I’ve been to Switzerland. I’ve been to Italy. I’ve been to Canada. I’ve been all around. And you know what? God is everywhere! 

Don’t believe the news. Don’t believe whatever you hear about Christianity. Let me tell you something. And I can tell you because I’ve been there. God is doing things all around the world. 

If you could leave here this morning with just one thing, please let it be this: Do not get distracted. Do not get distracted from Christ’s love. Bear in mind, English is my first language, but it is actually the language that I use the least. It is a little rusty. So if I say anything stupid, please do not get distracted. 

I would like to bring our attention to Ephesians now. Ephesians 3. Paul, in Ephesians, is giving us this amazing vision of what the church looks like in the future. He’s teaching the Church how it needs to act, and also the individual, how it needs to act in this broken world. But in Ephesians are also these amazing golden nuggets that Paul does. And he does something amazing. He pauses for a second from his teachings, and he says he gets on his knees and he prays for the church in Ephesians. This is what he says in Ephesians 3:14. I’m reading from the New Living Translation. Listen to this. You might be able to receive this as a prayer, because this was Paul’s prayer for the Church, and we are part of this.

14 When I think of all this, I fall to my knees and pray to the Father, 15 the Creator of everything in heaven and on earth. 16 I pray that from his glorious, unlimited resources he will empower you with inner strength through his Spirit. 17 Then Christ will make his home in your hearts as you trust in him. Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. 

Let me repeat that:

Your roots will grow down into God’s love and keep you strong. 

18 And may you have the power to understand, as all God’s people should, how wide, how long, how high, and how deep his love is. 19 May you experience the love of Christ, though it is too great to understand fully. Then you will be made complete with all the fullness of life and power that comes from God.

Amen. What makes us complete? What makes us complete in him? It’s experiencing God’s love. And may we never, ever get distracted from that one thing: God’s love through Christ. Christ’s love in us. That’s what makes our roots grow deep and keeps us strong.

Before I got married, when we were about to get married, we went with my mother and father in-law to do some errands. Karina and I were in the back seat. My future mother in-law was driving, my father in-law was in the passenger seat. We were downtown and there was a lot of traffic. We were running some errands. So he jumps out to run some errands and my mother in-law was going to drive around the block to pick him up after he could do something quick.

So we’re in the back and she’s driving. Then, all of a sudden, as she was driving, somebody screams out, “Hey, be careful! Fire! Fire!” Like underneath the car. So she stops the car and jumps out. I also jump out because, you know, I have to show that I’m a responsible person, right? I hope that’s what she thought and that I wasn’t jumping out to save my life. So I jump out and I’m looking under the car and I don’t see anything. I’m like, “There’s nothing here.”

Then this guy comes around and taps me on the shoulder and says, “No, no. It’s in the back. Come and see!” And he touches my shoulder, he pushes me down a little and he says, “Look, look, look!”

So I’m looking at the exhaust pipe. I’m looking around. I don’t see anything. My mother in-law and I were both in the back of the car just looking like that and the guy says, “No, No. Look down. See? See? See?”

And after we’re looking a while, this girl comes up to us and says, “Hey, guys.” And I’m still looking, you know. “They just stole your purse.”

And I’m thinking, “What an idiot!” And so I get up and I’m like, “This can’t be. They just stole my future mother in-law’s purse. I’ve got to do something!”

So I start running. Right? I’m running and running and running. And then, as I’m running, I’m thinking, “What an idiot! Who are you running after? I don’t know what this person looks like. I don’t know where they went. I don’t even know what the purse looks like. I didn’t pay attention.”

And so I stopped and I turned around. I’m bummed out and walking back. And as I’m walking back, because I ran about a block and this is the longest block to walk back. As I’m walking back, I’m thinking to myself, “Wait a second. I saw the thief. I didn’t just see the thief, at least one of them, he touched me! The guy that was tapping on my shoulder, showing me where to look, pushing me down, he wasn’t trying to help me. He was distracting me. He was distracting me, making me look down so that I wouldn’t realize what was actually going on. That guy was in on it. That guy was the thief.”

That sometimes happens to us. We get distracted from what is really going on. We get distracted from what God really wants for our lives and for what God really wants for your life. Let’s not get distracted. You know what? Sometimes we think those distractions are going to be bad things, evil things. No, no, no. This guy was trying to help me, right? That’s why I was listening to him. He was trying to help me. Right? That’s why I was listening to him, because he was trying to help me. But it wasn’t true. So sometimes it can be apparently good things in our lives, but if they distract us from the love Christ has for us, then it’s not necessarily a good thing.

This reminded me of something in Matthew 13. I’m just going to mention it, you don’t have to go there. There’s a parable that Jesus was teaching. You’ve definitely heard it before. The parable about the farmer planting seeds. The farmer casts out all these seeds everywhere. All these seeds fall on all these different types of soil. 

That’s a teaching in itself. That really shows us the Father’s heart. He’s going to throw seed everywhere. That sounds like a terrible farmer, actually. A good farmer would just throw seed where it’s going to grow. This farmer just throws it everywhere. It doesn’t matter if it lands on stone, if it lands on wherever it lands. But that’s God’s heart. He gives everyone an opportunity. And you might think, “Man, I’m not really good soil. But you know what? He’s throwing seeds at you because he wants you to grow.”

So these seeds fall on different kinds of soil. The first soil wasn’t soil at all. It was just stone. The sun came out and the seed didn’t have anywhere to grow. It burns right up. The second one has a little bit of soil. It starts to grow, but can’t put its roots anywhere. Dries right up, as well.

And then there’s the third soil. This is the one I want to talk about. This third soil terrifies me. At the same time that I’ve traveled everywhere, I’ve seen this third soil around the world, as well, and it terrifies me. There’s a reason why it terrifies me. I’m going to read directly from Matthew 13:22 (NLT): 

22 The seed that fell among the thorns represents those who hear God’s word, but all too quickly the message is crowded out by the worries of this life and the lure of wealth, so no fruit is produced.

Why does this terrify me so much? Because this seed that grows, it doesn’t die. No. The soil is good. It starts growing, but it does not die. It grows among thorns and the thorns let it grow, but it kind of grows bad. It’s not growing properly, so no fruit is produced. You may think, “Thorns, those are like bad people in my life. That’s what those thorns must represent.”

But that’s not the truth. Thorns are just distractions. Thorns are things you worry about. Or thorns are things you really want, like wealth and riches or to be prosperous or whatever. Just distractions. 

You know what happens when you have too many distractions in your life? You forget about the essential thing, which is Christ’s love for you and being in that love. When we lose that, our roots cannot grow deep to where they should be, and we will not produce fruit. We do not want that in our lives. We want to be good soil without these distractions.

What happens then? We can produce thirty, sixty, a hundred times that. It doesn’t matter if you’re thirty, sixty or a hundred. The important thing is that everything that is growing and is healthy will keep on growing and will produce fruit.

I thought I wasn’t a person that would get distracted from these kind of things. In 2016, my life was actually going pretty well. It was going really well, actually. I was super happy with my life. I had my own business. It took a long time to get that thing running, like years. But it was finally up and running. My family was growing. I had a beautiful family. The church—I was ordained pastor a few years prior. The ministry was growing. My ministry was growing. Man, I was loving it. It was going great.

So we decided to purchase a piece of property. So we bought this piece of property and we paid it off. It’s easy to buy things. It’s the paying off part that’s hard to do. So we paid off the property. So we decided to build. Oh yeah. This is like our all-time dream. We’re going to build our own house. That’s like a thing in Ecuador to buy land and build your home. That was our vision. That’s what we want to do. We were living temporarily—which was actually like ten years—in my father in-law’s house. They did not live there, so that was a good thing. That’s when a blessing starts to become a curse, right? When you’re overdoing it. So we were building our own house. This was going to be amazing.

So we start this amazing project. We were on Pinterest, checking out what the rooms were going to be like. We were putting this project together to give to the architect. So the week we had to do all that, it was a Monday morning, I was having breakfast with my wife. We were going over the last details so I could hand this over to the architect. And as we’re going over the details, having breakfast, talking, this idea just flashes through my mind. It gives me goosebumps. The idea was, “Is this the will of God?”

I’m thinking, “Well, come on. I mean, it’s the logical thing to do. We’re advancing in life. We’re supposed to be doing this.” And I’m thinking, and I ask my wife, “Honey, did we pray about this? Because this is a long term project.”

And she’s like, “No, I don’t think we have.”

I’m like, “Man, I don’t feel good right now. Let’s just pray about this.”

So I say a real simple prayer. I say, “Lord, I’m really sorry we haven’t put this into your plans first, but if this is what you want us to do, bless this. If it’s not, just let us know so we can do something else. Just let us know kind of soon, okay? Amen.”
It was as simple as that. Five minutes later—I am not joking—five minutes later I receive a phone call. It was my dad on the phone. And he says, “Son, I was just praying and meditating right now and this thought came to my mind. I’m just going to land it on you. Do whatever you think—but this might be a great time for you to go somewhere else as a missionary.”

“Thanks, Dad. I appreciate it.”

So I hang up and I look at my wife. She’s like, “What’s going on?”

And I’m like, “How about instead of building our dream house, we sell everything and go somewhere else as missionaries?”

See, I warned her before we got married that I was going to do that someday. So she had to say, “Yes.” But she was surprised because she thought it was after we’d retire, or something like that. 

That is exactly what we did. We sold everything. We took six months to really get the confirmation. It wasn’t just from that phone call. So don’t go do anything crazy if you receive one phone call. It took us six months to decide where we were going and all that, and then six months to sell everything and prepare everything. So exactly that same date that we received that phone call and prayed about it, we arrived in Italy one year later.

You know, the thing is that I realize in my life that sometimes we just go into autopilot, you know? It was obvious. I was supposed to advance in life. I was supposed to build a house. That’s true. They are all good things. But they are also distractions. You never know what the Lord wants to put in your path. You’ve got to just give it a second and let him talk to you. Maybe the life he has for you is slightly different than the one you are imagining for yourself.

You might be saying, “Rob, I hear you, but come on. Where do I start this kind of a life that just really trusts in God, that really loves Christ, that understands…? I just don’t know where to start so I just keep going back into autopilot.” If you don’t know what to do, don’t let that distract you from Christ’s love, either. 

When we went to Italy, we actually didn’t know what we were supposed to do. We had no idea. I knew I was supposed to leave and that was about it. It was not like I had this five year plan of where am I going to be in five years? We didn’t not know what we were going to do. But the Lord put this verse in my heart that really got me through hard times. Genesis 12:1

The Lord had said to Abram, “Leave your native country, your relatives, and your father’s family, and go to the land that I will show you.

All right. That sounds pretty basic, right? But wait a minute. Listen to that verse. There’s something kind of secret there. This is when you realize Abraham truly was the father of the faith. He had to leave his father’s home to a land that God was going to show him. So, he actually had to leave to somewhere and he did not know where he was supposed to go. You know what that is? Those are steps of faith?

In your life, take steps of faith. They don’t have to start with huge steps of faith. Take small steps of faith. But start putting your faith in action. Because when you need to put your faith in action, you start churching Christ’s love for your life. When your faith is not in action, you don’t really need God’s love. You can do church life. You can do Christian life without Christ’s love. That’s the crazy thing. But you know what that is? That’s a plant growing with thorns around him. That isn’t producing fruit. You’re doing the thing. You’re living the life, but it’s not to its fullest. God does not want that life for you. He wants you to grow to that full plant, tree, whatever, that has tons of fruit. And we need Christ to do that.

You can start with small things, basic things. Ephesians tells us all about it. Start with your own life. Start living good. Get your act together. Start being a testimony for different people, just by the way you live. You don’t have to be a mega evangelist to do that. Just get your act together. Start with that. It takes faith. And it takes love in Christ to really be able to do that. Or serve in any way possible. There’s always something to do at church. Believe me, there’s always something to do in God’s kingdom. It doesn’t matter if it’s sweeping the floor. One door opens the next. You’ve got to start somewhere. Sometimes we only want to start if it’s something big. No, no, no. Start with something small. One thing will lead to the next.  

This wise person told me something that really helped me throughout my life. He said, “If you only want to go in one direction, follow your vision. That’s it. There’s only one direction for your vision. But if you’re willing to serve someone else’s vision, the whole world will open up to you.”

That’s a profound statement. But you know what? That is true. Sometimes in periods, seasons of our lives, we need to be open to follow someone else’s vision. But one door will open up to the next and the Lord will use us. 

Support God’s kingdom. Support a missionary, how about that? I can give you a few names, if you want. At the end of the service, my email and website will be there. Snap a picture, send me an email, say I want to be on your newsletter. We’ll be happy to do that. That’s not the purpose why I’m here. I want to talk about Christ’s love and don’t get distracted from that.

Don’t get distracted even when you’re in a desert. That’s going to come around one time or another. The Israelites were really surprised when that desert came around. They thought, “Promised Land,” but there was a dessert first. Things are going to happen in your life, but don’t let that distract you from Christ’s life. 

Our time in Italy was rough at the beginning. I have never been at the hospital so many times. It wasn’t even for myself. It was for my children, for all these different things, so many things I can’t get into it. But it’s amazing how many problems you can get into when you’re loving Christ. It’s a strange thing. But you know what? He warned us about it. And in that desert, that’s not the time to complain, That’s the time to trust in God.

I woke up the other day with something in my heart that I just wanted to say: You are not your desert. Do not make that your identity. The identity of the Israelites was the “People of  God.” It was not “Desert People.” And that’s the same for us. You are not your financial problems. You are not your confusions. You are not your troubles and your problems. That is not you. You are God’s son and daughter. That is your identity. Always go back to that identity. Because we are not our deserts.

Don’t get distracted from Christ’s love even when the Promised Land, that life that God has for you, looks a little bit different from what you imagined it to be. Those Israelites were surprised when they saw the Promised Land. You know why? Because they thought it was going to be flowing with milk and honey. And that’s true. It was. But there was also another surprise there. A little problem. Spies came back and they said, “Guess what? In this Promised Land, there’s giants!” 

There are going to be giants in our Promised Land. It might look a little bit different. When we went to Italy, oh man, I thought this red rug was going to come out from the airplane when we walked down and everybody would coming running up, “Tell me about Jesus!” And when we got there, it was like, “What are you doing here?”

It looks a little different sometimes than what we imagine. And that’s okay. 

Christ’s love. We should never get distracted from it. And that’s one of the reasons we do communion. And we and start passing that through. The reason we do communion is to remember the most important things in our lives. That is Christ’s sacrifice for us. Remember the love that he has because it is that love, Christ’s love for us, that is what is going to make our roots grow deep and keep us strong. That’s what it is. 

As we pass out the elements, just let God start to talk to your heart for a second. What thorns do you have in your life? What thorns do you need to remove? What distractions do you need to remove? Are you on autopilot, my friend? I think God has a more adventurous life for you than just to worry about bills at the end of the month. Those are all part of our life. That’s okay. But I believe God has so much more for each and every one of us. 

As we pass the bread and wine, we remember about what Christ has done for us. I want to say one last thing about these distractions. Don’t get distracted from Christ’s love, even when you mess up. You know, sometimes a relationship with God seems like this mountain. It’s a huge mountain. We’re building up, climbing up this mountain and, sometimes we feel great. “I’m on top of the mountain. This is awesome!” And then we mess up. 

And we go and do it again. It takes us a while. We’re like, “Great! I’m back in this relationship. Yes!” And then we mess up. 

And then next time, we kind of look at the mountain and say, “Meh. Maybe in a few years.”

Can I tell you something? That mountain doesn’t exist. Ephesians 3:12:

12 Because of Christ and our faith in him, we can now come boldly and confidently into God’s presence.

You know, God’s mercy is new every day. You’ve heard about that? You know what that means in our lives? It’s like when we mess up and we say, “God, I’m sorry I messed up.” And then the next day we mess up again. And we go back and say, “God, I’m sorry I messed up again.” And God says, “Again? What do you mean again?”

You see, God’s mercy is new every day. It’s like the first time every time. That’s too big of a love to comprehend. That’s what Paul’s trying to explain. It’s just too big of a love to comprehend. And you are righteous people. You know what righteous people do? Proverbs 24:16:

The godly may trip seven times, but they will get up again.

If you’ve fell, you’ve messed up in your life in any way, get back up. The ground is not a  place for you. It’s also just a distraction. It’s the thief trying to get you to look at the ground instead of looking up to see what’s really happening. And you know what’s always happening? Christ’s love for you. And that is why we get back up.

And speaking about getting back up, let us all stand, please. 

Father, we want to remember right now, Lord, all the goodness that you have for us. Most importantly, the love that you have for us, Father. 

For I pass onto you what I have received from the Lord himself, on the night when he was betrayed, the Lord Jesus took some bread and gave thanks to God for it. Then he broke it in pieces and said, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” I thank you, Father. I thank you, Jesus, for your body. You were the last sacrifice. Thank you for that love that you’ve had for us. In the name of Jesus. Let us eat the bread.

In the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper, saying, “This cup is a new covenant between God and his people, in agreement confirmed with my blood. Do this in remembrance of me as oft as you drink it. For every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are announcing the Lord’s death until he comes again.

We thank you, Lord, for this new covenant. A better covenant, m Father. Not by law, but by your grace, filled with your  love. May we remember this every time we drink this cup. That it is your love that we seek. It is your love that keeps us strong, and may we remember that in the darkest times of our life, and also in the happiest, Lord. May we never be distracted and always come back to your feet, Father, and receive that love. Let’s drink the wine.

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©️2019 Living Streams Church

7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Scripture is taken from Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Church as the Bride

David Stockton
Series: Ephesians

Good morning. College football has started! But I’m an Oregon fan. It was a rough night for me. 

But it’s good to be with you guys this morning. We’ve got baptism this morning—both services. About ten people getting baptized today, which is super exciting and fun. And we’re going to be working through Ephesians again. Ephesians 5. 

Life Groups. Life Groups. Life Groups. Maybe it’s weird phrase: Life Groups. But it is small groups of people trying to get together outside of the Sunday morning context to check in on each other, pray for each other. The four things we’re dreaming and praying for you is that you’ll get raw authenticity and the healing that comes with that. You’ll get relentless encouragement from each other because we definitely need that. You’ll get Biblical counsel in those small groups. And you’ll get some genuine friendship. Not the online kind but the face-to-face kind. Online is cool. You can do that, too. But face-to-face is important, as well. 

We actually have over 200 people that have signed up since last Sunday. Yeah. There’s a lot of “whoo-ing” going on around here. We think it’s really important. We are not trying to build a Sunday morning show. That’s the last thing we’re trying to build around here—where people come for an hour, watch a show and then go. We are not in that business. We’re trying to build a church. And it is so important that the church has more than Sunday morning to stand on. 

I don’t care if you find life groups in another church. You’ve got to find ways to get together with people in smaller settings, where you can be known and you can impart the wisdom God is speaking to you and you can be supported. 

Did I mention Life Groups? It’s very easy. You go online, livingstreams.org and we’ve got a whole list of them. They’ve got times, locations, what’s happening there. We’re asking everyone in our church—everyone—if this is your first Sunday—hey—you’re in. You came. It’s your fault.—to at least sign up for six weeks, starting September 15. We have leaders, we have groups, we have everything ready. We even gave the leaders their first snacks for the first night. We’re serious about this thing. And we’re serious about snacks, too.

Just give it at least six weeks. The leaders are going to be there and they’re ready to run past six weeks, but we just really want you guys to give it a shot and see what the Lord can do. We don’t want to miss anything that God has in store for us.

All right. We’re going to be in Ephesians. We’re looking at Paul’s vision of the church. He didn’t have a vision for Living Streams Church. Living Streams is just an organization that has men and women who are leading it. And the Church that Jesus Christ gave birth to by his blood and the vision that Paul had is the Church organism. It is the thing that lives on beyond Living Streams. It is the thing that was there before Living Streams or whatever other church you might be a part of. 

And we’ve built these organizations, these churches that are hopefully going to help that organism prosper and thrive within it. But YOU are the Church if you are called by Jesus’ name. You are the Church. And the Church is the single most dominant force for good that the world has ever seen. Any era. Any age. Any place. No one can deny the power of what the Church, the true Church has done.

At the same time, no one can deny that there have been real good seasons and real bad seasons for the organization aspect of the Church. There have been horrible seasons when we look at the organization of the Church. But Jesus is not the head of the organizations. We do our best to make sure he is in control of this place, but at the end of the day, it’s got to go through people like me. And it’s going to come out a little squirrly. But he is and always will be the head of the Church, which is his Body here on earth. And everyone of you has a part to play. 

So Paul is trying to impart to us this vision, this grand vision, this vision that, when he got it, he did not want it. But when he got it, he changed every single thing in his life. He threw away everything he had ever known and become—position, power, money, self-righteousness, pride. He threw it all away and said, “I just want to live into this vision.” And he spent the rest of his life traveling the world to tell Gentiles (people who are not Jews) about this vision that God has for them.

In Ephesians he tries to piece it all together in this letter that he was writing. And it’s so ridiculous. If you were to get this letter back in Paul’s day, you would think the guy is insane. You would think he’s absolutely crazy. Because, what he is putting forth in this vision, and what was in reality at that time of the Church are so far apart. If you get nothing else in our time in the book of Ephesians, I just want you to get this. That Paul was declaring something that had no chance of becoming a reality. The Church at that time was scattered, was living in caves and dens, was persecuted and dominated. It was a laughing stock. It was pitiful. And yet Paul could see something that Marty Caldwell gets to see all the time as he travels around. That other people—we have someone speaking next week who’s been around the world seeing the Church in action in all different continents. He’s going to share a little bit of the strength and beauty these days.

If Paul could see the Church today, he would do an old man backflip. Which is kind of like rolling over, I think, or falling down, maybe. What the Church has become, there is no way Paul could actually have believed that it would be what it is today. She is so beautiful. But Paul could see a vision. We talk about Martin Luther King, Jr., as he speaks to that crowd right before he was killed and he said, “I have no worries. For I have been to the mountaintop and I’ve seen the other side. I’ve seen the Promised Land. I know we’re going to get there.”

And that’s basically what Paul is saying in his day and age. He’s saying, “I’ve seen the vision. Jesus has given me the vision. And now I’m living into the vision. And I’m going to see us grow from this tiny, little, infant baby that is not even having a chance to live, forsaken in every way—it’s going to become the most powerful thing the world has ever seen.

It’s awesome what we are reading right now. And I’m hoping it will get in us. I’ve had a couple of visions in my life. When I first gave my life to Jesus, I was about eighteen years old. When I first gave my life to Jesus. I had received Jesus prior to that, but there was a big difference when I turned seventeen and eighteen, right in there, where I think Jesus was saying, “Okay. Now I’m going to ask something from you.” 

And I went for it. Immediately (Mike, you can attest to this) I just, for some reason starting thinking about Ireland all the time. I had actually gotten to go to Ireland with my family right after I graduated, so I just thought that’s all that it was. And yet, this idea of going to Ireland and starting a camp, like a summer camp, and then also starting a church and having a school there kind of all on the same property. This vision just started coming. 

Again, I had been to Ireland. My grandmother was Irish. I do have Irish citizenship—I have dual citizenship through her. So, I started thinking, “Maybe there’s something here.” And I just had a compelling vision of going to Ireland and getting rid of all the snakes. Not really. That was somebody else’s vision. But going to Ireland, trying to see the Lord do something. So I graduated college and I talked to some friends who were crazy enough to say, “Let’s do it.”

We came up with a plan. We were all going to go for three months. We bought a three month ticket. That was the entirety of the plan. And we were going to just see what the Lord would do.  And I’m here in Arizona now. Right? Working here, you know. 

But we did go there. We got to see the Lord do really great things. It was very strengthening for our faith. Within three days we had jobs and a place to live. And our names were being sent to all these different ministry clubs in Northern Ireland. We got to go two or three times a week. We’d get on a bus and say, “Can you take us to this place and do ministry?” And at the end of it, though, we were like, “Well, we should go home.” It was a great time. It was building my faith, but then we came back. 

Then I had another vision. I was sitting right down here one time by Mark Buckley as he was about to preach. And we were singing the song, “For the sake of the world, burn like a fire in me.” And I can’t tell you how clear it was. I saw a vision of a bunch of Belizeans. My wife and I had lived in Belize a little before, so it wasn’t that far off. But I saw a room full of Belizeans and they were singing, “For the sake of Belize, burn like a fire in me.” And it was real clear. And it was a vision.

I remember talking to Mark about it and the elders, and saying, “You know, my wife and I are thinking maybe we should go to Belize again.” And Mark said, “Okay. Okay. Let’s figure this out.” And, sure enough, we ended up going to Belize for a little more than a year with our family. And step by step, we started a Friday Night Fire, is what they wanted to call it. Except, in Belize, it’s called “Friday Night Fi-yah.”

We started a little worship night. And my wife and I were doing music, which is not that impressive. We started using that song to close every one of the Friday nights that we had. We changed the word, I don’t know if we’re allowed to, but it was in Belize where you can get away with anything. We changed the words and I thought, “Wow, this amazing.” Little by little, the room started to fill up. And people were singing that song. And the Lord, just to make it so clear that I didn’t miss it, there was one night when it was totally jam-packed. This was probably about one hundred or so Belizeans. It was a small room so it was jam-packed. 

We were singing that song and it was a great night. We were really leaning in to the Lord. And, all of a sudden the power went out completely. When the power goes out in Belize, it was dark. It was so dark you couldn’t see anything inside this room. And it was very hot. Yet, the power goes out, our mics, everything is gone, and everyone just kept singing. And we’re just at the part where we sing, “For the sake of Belize, burn like a fire in me.” And I just stepped back from the mic for just a second and just went, “Oh, my goodness!” It was like the Lord was saying, “No, no, no. We’re making a point of this.  Exclamation point. Boom!”

There are these visions that the Lord gives us. Paul was so compelled by this vision of what he was going to see. I don’t know if he ever got to a point where he felt that he got to see it. I think he probably saw little pieces of it. But again, Ephesians is this grand vision that he’s trying to lay out for all of us.

He starts out giving a vision of the Church as a family—that we’ve been adopted into God’s heart. So the Church is one of the ways we can see this vision. One of the ways Paul saw it as it’s like the family of God. We’ve got the name of God on our jerseys, on the back. We walk around and are learning how to live according to his family rules and culture.

And then he goes on to talk about how the Church is the dwelling place of God. That somehow his Spirit is in all of us and, as we go about the world, God’s presence goes into all the world, and it’s a picture of what God can do.  When people come and get to know us, it’s like coming over to God’s house and hanging out for a while. 

Then we talked last week about how the Church is a body. That we’re this body. We’re trying to grow into this full stature, this amazing, powerful force that God has in mind for us to be. And we start at one point and try to grow into it so that we can be strong enough to withstand the winds of every deceitful scheme that comes our way. That we won’t be tossed to and fro by the waves. And that’s the dream that we have. 

Today we’re going to talk about the Church as a bride. So all the girls are like, “Oh, yeah, that’s cool.” And all the guys are like, “College football, man. College football.”

So Ephesians Chapter 5. You’ve got to deal with it. It’s in the Bible so get ready. Get your wedding dresses out.  

5:1 Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children 2 and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

So there you have fragrance, right? We’re already getting girly. But Jesus loved us and he gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering. And then he says:

3 But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity, or of greed, because these are improper for God’s holy people. 

Or, for God’s bride. Right? Skip down to verse 21: 

21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her 26 to make her holy, cleansing her by the washing with water through the word, 27 and to present her to himself as a radiant church, without stain or wrinkle or any other blemish, but holy and blameless. 28 In this same way, husbands ought to love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 After all, no one ever hated their own body, but they feed and care for their body, just as Christ does the church— 30 for we are members of his body. 31 “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.”

And then Paul says this as a little bit of a hesitation caveat:

 32 This is a profound mystery—but I am talking about Christ and the church.

So all this stuff about submission, all this stuff about two becoming one, he’s saying, “Now, I need you to pay attention here. I’m not trying to be weird. But somehow this is a mystery. All of this stuff that I’m talking about is actually about Christ and his Church—his bride—the people who follow him

 33 However, each one of you also must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband.

Paul opens up this whole can of worms. He’s basically saying, “Now another way I want you to picture the Church is as the Bride of Christ.”

It is the people he has chosen. The people he has give his life for and will forevermore. The people that he is actually trying to love so well that they actually form into all the beauty that they can form into. He’s talking about how Christ and His Body are to become one in lovingkindness and mutual respect.

Again, John 17 is a prayer that, if Jesus didn’t pray it, I would never really teach it. is prayer is that those who believe in him would become one with him, just like he and the Father are one. It’s not saying that we’re going to become gods. But somehow we’re going to be included into the trinitarian love and oneness as we follow him.

It’s a profound mystery. And I’m not going to talk about it anymore because I no idea what else to say about it. One day I’m just going to die and—bam—in it. I can just call it a profound mystery,

We’re talking about this love. We’re talking about the romance. We’re talking about how God in Christ romanced us. Reckless love. However you want to talk about it. He wooed us. Romeo and Juliet. All of the stuff you want to say here. 

It’s fun for me to talk to guys when we go on men’s retreats or Belize retreat. To get to know them, I love to just ask the question, “Do you have a girlfriend?” (if they’re not married.) And it’s so funny because, immediately, I feel like—bam—you are in. Unless they’re like, “No. Don’t talk to me about that. I don’t know you.” 

But if they start to answer that question at all, they can’t help it. Their heart is coming right out of their mouth. You get to see their heart right away, whether it’s good, bad or whatever. Because that’s a big part of where their life is flowing out of. It’s that part of their heart that longs for that companionship.

And then I love to ask guys on our men’s retreat—we were in Belize and last time I asked the guys, “All right. What we’re going to do tonight as a kind of debrief, I want everyone to tell us how you got engaged.” 

You could see all the guys were like, “What do you mean?” And then they’d start telling it. And they would be struggling, trying to make it not a big deal. But then as they would start telling the story they would start gushing a bit. It’s like, “Oh, you’re sappy! Yeah, you are a romantic guy! Look at you! Ha ha! We got you! Busted.”

But as they would tell the story, it comes out. And it’s so precious and beautiful. Even the guys who are like so tough, when they start telling about getting engaged, it’s just an awesome, awesome thing.

For me, I fell in love with this girl named Brit. And she and I were dating and hanging out. (This is my wife, by the way.) Yet, at the same time, I knew she also loved another. It was the kids in South Africa. She loved them a lot. She knew that she needed to go to them. So we started dating and we were hanging out and I was like, “Yeah, we love each other. But I know you love these little kids in Africa.”

So, we knew she had to go. And so she went. A big thing was, she was going to see. She loved the Lord above it all and she wanted to go where God was leading her. So she went for a few months to Africa. I didn’t know what was going to happen. Would she love me more than Africa? Would God put our paths back together at some point? It was a real moment of truth. 

I remember talking to her while she was there. At one point it was pretty clear that what she was saying was that she loved me more than Africa. That was a big deal for my life. I was like, “I’ve got all of Africa beat! Yeah!” I was thrilled.

So knowing that, I ended up getting on a plane and flying to London where she was going to be flying back. I surprised her by being in London. She didn’t know I was going to be there. And I surprised her by looking like this (photo of David with long hair and beard). She was going and I said, “I’m not going to cut my hair while you’re gone.” I didn’t think about this part. So she was like, “Oh, hey! Oh, heyyyy!”

And I surprised her one more. I got on one knee and asked her to marry me. She said, “Yes.” It’s been almost fifteen years. It’s been a pretty cool deal.

I’m saying all of this because Jesus loves you in this way, if you can receive it. He loves you and wants so badly for you to love him. Not only for his own good. Somehow, mystery of mysteries, if you love Jesus, his heart is full. If you don’t, his heart is broken. God of the universe, Creator of everything, has somehow made his heart dependent on your love. 

If you choose to love him, you will be loved well. There are some verses in Ephesians that bring this out. I want to go through these and I want you to maybe grab a couple of things out of these. Maybe write them down. Maybe just hide them in your heart.

There are some phrases that are key as we go through. Ephesians 2: I’m going to read this out of the Message translation. I like the way the Message says it: 

1-6 It wasn’t so long ago that you were mired in that old stagnant life of sin. 

You weren’t anything that special.

You let the world, which doesn’t know the first thing about living, tell you how to live. You filled your lungs with polluted unbelief, and then exhaled disobedience. 

That’s powerful imagery.

We all did it, all of us doing what we felt like doing, when we felt like doing it, all of us in the same boat. We loved a lot of other things. It’s a wonder God didn’t lose his temper and do away with the whole lot of us. Instead, immense in mercy and with an incredible love, he embraced us. 

He walked right up to our filthiness, our rebellion, and our anger, and he hugged us. He pulled us close to him and stole it all away.

He took our sin-dead lives and made us alive in Christ. He did all this on his own, with no help from us! Then he picked us up and set us down in highest heaven in company with Jesus, our Messiah.

7-10 Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. 

That is what Jesus is longing to do. To bring you closer to him. To shower you with lovingkindness both in this world and in the next. And just so you know, there won’t be pain in the next. Here you get both.  

Next is Ephesians 2:11-13 in the NIV. 

11 Therefore, remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth and called “uncircumcised” by those who call themselves “the circumcision” 

(Those who are feeling like the upper class and you were called the lower class by them.)

(which is done in the body by human hands)— 12 remember that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

All the way into his arms. Pressed against his own chest. Covered by his love. Never needing to fear or worry again. Perfect redeeming love is wrapped around you in Christ Jesus. 

I defined it a little bit like this, the way that God treats us as his bride: Lovingly, romantically, faithfully, kindly. What happens is our vulnerability is met with his passionate, wholehearted, generous covering. He finds us naked and ashamed, and he covers us with his righteousness and love. His love really does redeem. 

Ephesians 5:1-3.

1 Follow God’s example, therefore, as dearly loved children 2 and walk in the way of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God.

3 But among you there must not be even a hint of sexual immorality, or of any kind of impurity…

 Why is the Bible so serious about sexuality? Why is the world disparaging and rebelling against the Scriptures right now because it’s too harsh or hard? Well, because the writers of the Bible are trying to help us understand that there are really two images that God has given us outside of Christ incarnate that teach us about him better than anything else. 

Genesis 1 makes it very clear that God created male and female in his image. So if we get male and female right, then the world gets to see God. If we screw up or twist up male and female, we lose one of our most powerful demonstrations of who God is in full. God is not male. Never has been. Never will be. God is not female. He is somehow the fullness of both of those when we get it right. That’s why there’s a big attack right now. But it’s not the first time. We got through this attack generation after generation, where the devil tries to destroy our image of God found in maleness and femaleness.

We do need to sit back and weather the storm with love and kindness. But we also need to make sure people understand God put the fence there for a reason. If you move the fence, you’re going to find the lions, the tigers, the bears ready to devour you. Which we see over and over again. That’s why the world and society has never really been able to move on to this total free love thing. Because, ultimately, the consequences show up and we go back. This isn’t a new thing. This is just the latest wrong version of “woke,” that we’re going to have to wake up from with consequences all around us. The Bible is the only thing woke. 

Not only that, but he also says that the second thing that is the best image of God is marriage. Marriage is the second best image of God. I’m talking about Christ and the Church. You want to learn about Christ and the Church, go look at someone’s marriage. That’s how you’re going to learn about the love of God. The faithfulness, the stick-to-it-ativeness, the patience, the kindness. That’s the way God loves you, except that he’s perfect and totally trustworthy. 

So why would the enemy want to destroy marriage? Why would he want to get rid of that or call it crazy or too hard? Because he doesn’t want people to see the image of Christ and his Church. Because they might fall in love with him and experience his love. 

The last thing I want to read as we close is Ephesians 5:21-33. The same passage, but I want to read it in the Message translation. I want to highlight a couple of things. I ask again that you try to grasp a couple of things for your own heart right now. 

21 Out of respect for Christ, be courteously reverent to one another.

22-24 Wives, understand and support your husbands in ways that show your support for Christ. The husband provides leadership to his wife the way Christ does to his church, not by domineering but by cherishing. So just as the church submits to Christ as he exercises such leadership, wives should likewise submit to their husbands.

25-28 Husbands, go all out in your love for your wives, 

Be extravagant like Jesus was. 

…exactly as Christ did for the church—a love marked by giving, not getting. Christ’s love makes the church whole. His words evoke her beauty. Everything he does and says is designed to bring the best out of her, dressing her in dazzling white silk, radiant with holiness. And that is how husbands ought to love their wives. They’re really doing themselves a favor—since they’re already “one” in marriage.

And we’ll just finish with that. I love some of those phrases. That this is the love that Christ has for us. It’s the love that we’re supposed to show toward our spouses, toward our kids, toward our friends, toward our enemies, toward our neighbors. This kind of love that is marked by giving, not getting. The kind of love that makes the person that we’re loving more whole. It doesn’t point out their deficiencies, but it actually begins to fill those things, cover those things until they have a chance to grow in those things. And their words evoke their beauty. 

I want to love my wife like that. And I’m so bad at it. I want to love my kids like that. And I know I fall short. I want to love you guys like that. It’s a beautiful love that Jesus has for us. It’s a life-changing, redeeming love. It’s a love that feels like vulnerability met with passionate, wholehearted, generous covering. 

As I was worshiping downstairs with the team, there was a moment where I saw this picture of some people who are feeling pretty vulnerable, pretty gross, pretty bad themselves, pretty unsure, pretty weak—whatever it might be. And Jesus comes and actually covers you with his robes of righteousness, of love. He wraps this covering around you. And then, when you look in the mirror, you’re like, “Wow. I didn’t know I could like this.” But the story wasn’t over, because, at one point, that robe was removed, and no longer was there something disgusting underneath. Now it was like you had your own form of beauty. You had your own form of strength. It was Christ in you, that hope of glory. So the covering doesn’t just cover up your sickness and make you feel better for a moment. That covering actually redeems everything underneath the covering, stirs up, evokes the beauty that he made for you to be. His innocent love causes that kind of change.

It’s hard to abide in Christ. It’s hard to keep absorbing that love from time to time. But that’s the only way that we’re going to be able to love like him. We can’t do it in our strength. Never can. Never will. But Jesus knows that. So if we will set aside time to go sit in his presence and allow him to robe us once again—if we can put on Jesus Christ, be robed in his righteousness, we will absorb that love. It will reform us and fill us so that we can then go and clothe others in this world. That’s a beautiful vision of Christ and his Church. Christ and his Bride. You are the Bride of Christ.

Let’s pray:

Jesus, we do thank you so much that you love us, that you gave yourself for us in ways beyond what we can imagine. I pray, Lord, that once again we would allow you to cover us so that you can cleanse us and transform us and fill us, so that we can go into this world and we can cover others with that same love. Thank you. 

______________________________

©️2019 Living Streams Church

7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture noted as taken from The Message: Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group

Stick it Out

David Stockton
Series: Ephesians

Good morning. [Life Groups Announcement - 8:15]

Sermon:
Ephesians 4

We’ve been talking about the vision of the Church that we find in the book of Ephesians, which was written by a guy named Paul. He was so compelled by this vision that he was no longer an angry person, that he gave up everything he had, as a Pharisee, as a person of status and position, and he traveled the world to try and let other people know about this vision that God had for his people. Both Jew and Gentile.

Obviously Jesus was the founder of the Church, but he imparted to Paul to take the vision to the Gentile world, which is the non-Jew world. So, basically every church that is non-Jew that follows Christ is somehow a product of the Apostle Paul. And there are a few of them out there—and they’ve lasted for some time. They really have become the single most dominant force for good the world has ever seen. Any age, any place, any time. Because the vision is real and the vision is empowered by the Spirit of God. It’s the greatest vision there. We talked about that last week. 

Ephesians basically says the Church—when it gets it right—will bring unity to all things. The Church is what carries God’s full presence into all places and all ages. The Church is what shows off God’s manifold wisdom. The Church is what builds people up so they are strong and courageous, instead of tossed to and fro by the deceitful, cunning schemes that we face in this world. That’s God’s vision for the Church. That’s God’s vision for you and me. Not Living Streams. Living Streams is just an organization. It’s not the real Church. It’s just a box that the Church lives in. And if it’s getting in the way of the real Church, let it die a thousand deaths. What we’re wanting to build is the Church of Jesus Christ. That’s the only thing that matters. And she is beautiful and she is everywhere in this world.

In Ephesians 1, Paul gave us more specifics of what the Church is supposed to be. This is a little review for you:

The Church was God’s purpose from the beginning of time. When God made Adam and Eve, he had the Church in mind. It’s what we learn in Ephesians 1. 

God’s Church is supposed to be a family. God has adopted everyone into his family. We have sonship, daughter-ship, because of what Jesus Christ has done for us. We’re supposed to operate like we’re a family. That means you’re supposed to drive your cousin crazy sometimes. You’re supposed to get so mad at your brothers and sisters, but you’re not supposed to leave. You’re supposed to stick it out, because we’re family.

He also says that the Church is what is glorious in God’s eyes. It’s what gives him the most joy in all the world—the Church.

And last, Church is what brings praise to his glorious grace. That flawed, imperfect people like us can make up this Church are a testimony to God’s grace. The fact that we get anything right at any time shows the world that God can do a lot with not-so-good people. Amen to that. It’s a beautiful thing, this Church. 

Ephesians 2, which Mark preached on last week, tells us a little bit about how the Church is God’s artistic masterpiece. He says that we were dead in our trespasses ad sins, but God brought us into his family and he’s forming us. He’s shaping us, almost like a tool that he can use to create good in this world. Or forming and shaping us like a work of art being cultivated out of a lump of clay. We are his workmanship. We’re his project. We’re his masterpiece that he’s forming and creating.

He goes on a little later in Chapter 2, talking about how the Church is being formed as God’s dwelling place. Each of us is like a brick and God sticks us in the building where we fit. When we all come together, we actually become this dwelling place where the glory, beauty and power of God fills it. Again, if you look over the history of the world, ever since this Church took form and shape, it really has been powerful and beautiful. You can’t go anywhere in this world and not find some little, old lady who love Jesus feeding hungry people. It’s unbelievable what this thing is—this Church.

When Paul was writing the book of Ephesians, it was maybe thirty or forty years after Jesus died. The Church was small, puny, insignificant. Persecuted. It didn’t have a chance to survive another ten years. And Paul was saying, “But, wait a second. I can see it.” You can almost think of Martin Luther King Jr on that night before he was shot, when he said, “I have no worries. I have no fear, because I’ve seen the other side. I’ve been to the mountaintop and I’ve seen the Promised Land.”

Paul is saying, “I know when I look around, and I go into this town and say, ‘Jesus,’ and they put me in prison. And I see the floundering, frail leaders that are trying to stand up and become this Church.” That’s all he saw was weakness and impotence. And yet this vision was so real and captivating, that he wrote it to the Ephesians and said, “Hold on, my friends. Stick with the program. It’s going to be beautiful.” 

If only he could see it now. Maybe he can, I don’t know. It’s hard to know what’s going on up there.

Now we come to Ephesians 4. He gives us a new description of the Church that we are, that we have, that we’re trying to grow into becoming all the time. It’s in the form of a body. Chapter 4:

1 As a prisoner for the Lord, then, I urge you to live a life worthy of the calling you have received. 

Catch the vision. Live into the vision. Stay focused on the vision.

2 Be completely humble and gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. 3 Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit,

The way he describes the church is as one body—many people all forming one body filled with one Spirit. One body. One Spirit. That’s what we’re to be.

just as you were called to one hope when you were called; 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism; 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.

7 But to each one of us grace has been given as Christ apportioned it. 8 This is why it says:

“When he ascended on high,
    he took many captives
    and gave gifts to his people.”

9 (What does “he ascended” mean except that he also descended to the lower, earthly regions? 10 He who descended is the very one who ascended higher than all the heavens, in order to fill the whole universe.) 

Now catch this. This is a vision that is worth living for or dying for.

11 So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, 12 to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up 13 until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

14 Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of people in their deceitful scheming. 15 Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ. 16 From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.

That’s a beautiful vision. I have five kids that I’m raising right now. Year after year, I watch them grow. They get a little stronger, a little bigger, a little fine-tuned. Their skills get a little better. They still trip and fall all the time. Last night while we were on the golf course, watching the sunset, they say, “You want to race?” And every time they say that, I start to get a little nervous because I’ve never lost. But then, their feet are bigger and their strides are a little longer. And they look a little stronger. And they run a lot more than me. They’re running all the time. So I look at them, and I go, “Yes. I will race you.”

There’s a part of me that thinks it’s going to be neat one day when they beat me. But most of me says, “Never let that day come.” And so they still want a head start and all of that. 

I was sitting on the ground when she said, “All right, on your mark, get set, go!” She took off running and I got up off the ground and I took off running. I smoked her. Smoked her bad. I made it somewhat close, because I didn’t want her to never try again. But it was awesome. And she didn’t know that in my mind I was thinking, “This might be the day.” But it wasn’t the day and so I smiled at her like, “I never thought anything else.”

And then, another one said, “What about me?” I thought, “Two in one day?” I smoked him too, so I’m feeling pretty good today. No hamstring pulls or anything. It was a good day for me.

But they’re growing, they’re developing, they’re maturing. And they’re still not there. They’re still not full strength. They’re still not full coordination. And then, this morning I woke up and there was all out war going on in my backyard, because they are all immature, and angry and upset, throwing things at each other. I just think, “Man, when are you going to grow up? Because I never fight anybody anymore.” When am I going to grow up?

But we’re still growing. And Paul is speaking to the Church in an amazing, fatherly way. He sees it as clumsy. It’s not put together. It’s not even whole. There are no arms, no legs. When he looks at the Church in his day, he couldn’t have seen anything that impressive. But the Lord was moving enough to keep him going.

Now when we look at the Church worldwide we see a body. We see it healthy and strong. Our Belizean friends, when they came up here for ten days and interact with the Living Streams family, they were so amazed and inspired about how much strength, love, kindness and generosity you guys portrayed. And you’re just one small part of the family here in Phoenix. And they went back so inspired, longing for God to build a family like that in Belize. 

But when I look at the Church as a whole, I don’t know how coordinated we are. We have some parts going this way, some parts going this way. Some parts are still undeveloped and immature. Some parts are really strong. We’ve got work to do. As a  Church family, we’ve got to figure out and grow into what God has called us to be. That’s why we’re doing things like Life Groups every year. We want to grow. We want to mature. We want to attain the full measure of what Christ has for us. 

The reason it’s so important for us to catch this vision is not just because it’s beautiful and life-giving, but there are also other visions in our world that are clamoring for our attention, our cultural moment, our zeitgeist. The spirit of our time. 

We live in a time where the external guides of science, government and religion are not trusted at all anymore. They’ve failed us. But, really, we put them in a place where only God can be. And so we’ve created this world where we want to deconstruct everything. We want to move all the boundary stones. Any time there’s a fence we think the fence is bad and evil and mean. 

Today, the ones that rule are the deconstructionists. What they’ve left us is reverting back to our internal guides of individualistic thoughts, emotions and desires. It’s a new form of renaissance and it feels really cool. And maybe we get better coffee because of it, but we’re still left with the plague of loneliness, all the deep questions are not getting any answers.

We have more information at our fingertips than any generation ever before. And we don’t have any better answers. Families breaking up like crazy, leaving people with all kinds of emotional debt and baggage, to sort out in all kinds of unhealthy ways. The way Coldplay puts it, Christ Martin of Coldplay—I just think this is so interesting. He said: 

I was just guessing at numbers and figures, 
Pulling your puzzles apart
Questions of science, science and progress
Do not speak as loud as may heart

It’s an honest frustration. It’s honest saying, “Ugh. I’m sick of all of that.” And that’s not a bad thing. But to look to your own, individualistic heart, you’re not going to find any healthy answers, either. The heart is deceitful and desperately wicked, selfish and prideful. The only real answers come from One wholes outside our external things—or our internal things—and that’s Jesus Christ. He knows the way. He’s the Shepherd. He’s the Way, the Truth, and the Life. And he’s not just up there saying, “Ha, ha. You don’t know the way.” But he came and laid down his life to show us the way ad lead us out of this. And it cost him a very big price. He’s the only teacher, the only leader, the only one to ever claim to be the way to life and then conquer death. He is worthy to be followed. He is worthy to be praised. 

I want to read this to you. This is another guy describing the spirit of our time.

Post-Christianity is ultimately the project of the West to move beyond Christianity, whilst feasting upon its fruit. Thus it constantly offers us options and off ramps, in which we seemingly have what we enjoy about faith, but without the sacrifices and commitments. It does not demand that we become apostates rather that we reshape our faith to suit the contours of the day, and in the process offers us the promise of tangible freedoms and pleasures for doing so. 

It does not challenge our faith head on in a kind of apologetics debate. Rather it uses soft power, offering a continual background hum of options and incentives which eat away at our commitments. We are offered the mirage that we can have community without commitment, faith without discipleship, and the kingdom without the King. To steal and misquote Eliot’s line, our faith doesn’t disappear with a bang but with a whimper. —Mark Sayers

We need to watch out or that is going to describe all of us. It’s subtle. It’s deceitful. It’s cunning. And if we don’t grow into full strength with each other and individually, we’re just going to be blown to and fro by every wind of doctrine that presents itself. And so we have a call to build up, to take up our position in the Body. To be what God has called us to be. 

And here he says there are some apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, evangelists that are called to equip us. And I think what Paul is recognizing in the church that he’s talking about, as he’s gone around, every person falls into one of these categories, probably. That you’re supposed to be apostolic in your church family. You’re supposed to be evangelistic in your church family. You’re supposed to be pastoral. You’re supposed to be a teacher. You’re supposed to be a prophet. You’re supposed to take up your position. 

Like in a building, you have wood, you have brick, you have whatever. If you’re that, you should step up and say, “Hey, I’ll be that in my local expression of the Church.” Or if God sends you out, wherever he sends you. We’ve got to take up our position. We each need to do our part. 

That’s what it says at the end here: 

16 From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work.

You have a part to play. God did not save you so you could just sit there and soak up his salvation. He saved you because he has got a job for you. And when you do the job, all of a sudden stuff starts lighting up inside of you that you never thought could.

To close, I want to give us this charge. As we’re seeking to grow into this vision, I think it’s really important to remember that this is going to be hard.  The more people you invite into your life, or the people you invite closer into your life, they are going to annoy you. Because they are nowhere near as cool as you. They’re nowhere near as smart as you. They like gross things. They don’t like the things that are good to you. 

What Paul says here in the beginning, before he says “here’s the vision,” he says, “Remember these things. Be patient with one another. Be completely humble and gentle. Bear with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.”

We’ve got to learn to fight for each other. We can’t quit. We can’t step out. We can’t say, “Oh, it’s hard.” Or, “Maybe there’s a better place.” If we keep doing that, we’re never going to land and we’re never going to grow.

If a tree keeps deciding, “Oh, it’s a little windy over here. I’m going to uproot and take myself over here,” the tree would never grow, Because its roots would never get deep. It would never go through the seasons it’s supposed to go through to bear the most fruit. 

I’ve had a lot of friends do that. They bounce from church to church. They get hurt by one thing and they move on to the next. They just bounce around, and they end relationships. I’m not saying you need to stick around and take abuse. There is a time to move on, but the relationships that God has called you to foster and keep are for your good, even if they’re hard.

I love the way Joseph Helman puts it in a book. He says:

Spiritual formation occurs primarily in the context of community. People who remain connected with their brothers and sisters in the local church almost invariably grow in self-understanding, and they mature in their ability to relate in healthy ways to God and their fellow human beings. This is especially the case for those courageous Christians who stick it out through the often messy process of interpersonal discord and conflict resolution. Long-term interpersonal relationships are the crucible of genuine progress in the Christian life. People who stay also grow. 

The real crux of the message today is to just lean into some of those relationships that you know God has for you but are really hard for you. You might say today, “That’s my marriage.” There you go, Start there. “That’s my kids.” Start there. “That’s my church family.” 

Some of you might be sitting here and you’re not supposed to be here. You quit on the church family that you are supposed to be a part of, and you came here because you didn’t want to deal with that. Though we like you here, you should go back and at least finish what the Lord has for you—if you left early. And talk to someone before you make that decision. Process it out a little bit. 

Some of you are here saying, “This is hard. This is miserable. I’m not finding what I want. I’m going to leave.” And God would say to you, “Stick it out. Keep leaning in.”

Growing up is hard work. Maturing. Ugh. It’s miserable. But the fruits of it are so beautiful. It’s what this desperate world needs more than anything. If we can get this right, the world has a chance. If we can get this right, the world can live, grow, build, taste of the kingdom of heaven right here and now. We’ve got to get this right. We’ve got to fight for this—fight for each other.

Let’s pray:

Jesus, we thank you for this day. We thank you for your word that doesn’t let us be us, but continues to prod us and push us to be what you have in mind in for us. Lord, though it is hard work, it takes time, there are no quick fixes—we do say ‘yes’ to you today. We pray that you would speak to us and we would have the courage to obey.

We’re going to take a moment right now and, with our heads bowed in an attitude of prayer, let the Lord speak to you about some of those things. Maybe you offer up to the Lord some questions and see what comes to mind. The Lord loves to speak to his children. He knows the way to life, no matter what kind of death you’ve got yourself in right now. 

Jesus, I pray that we would step forward with you, step into where you’re leading us. I pray that Life Groups would be a rich thing that happens in our church, whether they are already happening or not, whether people here find them in another community, whatever it might be, Lord, we just pray that would find what you have for us. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

______________________________

©️2019 Living Streams Church

7000 N Central Avenue ∙ Phoenix AZ 85020 ∙ 602-957-7500 ∙ https://www.livingstreams.org

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture is taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.

The Mysteries and Majesty of God

Mark Buckley
Series: Ephesians

Good morning, Living Streams. Good to see you today. David is up at Lost Canyon with over 100 of our men with 450 other guys from around the Valley. They’re having a great time. He’ll be back preaching next week. We’re doing a sermon series on Ephesians. If you want to open your Bible to Ephesians, that would be great.

I want to say thank you to those of you who have been praying for Kristina and myself. My wife, Kristina, is a candidate for a heart transplant. She’s twelve sessions into a thirty-six session cardio rehab prep, so that the surgery itself is something she will survive, Lord willing. It is a big battle. But at the same time, with so many people praying for us, we’re experiencing a lot of grace. We’re enjoying life. So it’s one of those mixtures. It’s the best of times and also dark clouds on the horizon. So, thank you again for praying for her.

The title of this message is The Mysteries of God in Ephesians. When I was a kid, I went to church every week. I went to confession and communion and catechism classes. When I was a teenager, I asked in a catechism class one time something about God. It was a profound question on my heart. The teacher said, “Well, that’s a mystery.” Sort of like, if it’s a mystery then you’re out of it. You don’t have an answer. We’ll never know.

I began to think in my mind, “Well, if it’s a mystery to you and it’s a mystery to me, what am I doing here? I’m going to go somewhere where I can get some answers.” And I began a search that took me through all kinds of Eastern religions and occult practices and, ultimately back to Jesus. Ultimately, I saw in people who really loved Jesus, who believed that he’s alive, a life of vitality, something in the Spirit that drew me. I was drawn to him because of healing and miracles and a need that I felt in my own life to really connect to God—even thought the message itself seemed too simple. And the people seemed pretty simple. They didn’t seem like my people. For a while, that was a big struggle for me. 

So, today we’re going to talk about mysteries of God from the book of Ephesians. We’re going to talk about three things: The Mystery of God’s Will. The Mystery of Christ uniting Jews and Gentiles, and The Mystery of Christ and the Church.

First: The Mystery of God’s Will. Ephesians 1:9

9 he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, 

Let’s pray together.

Father God, I ask that you, who are the revealer of mysteries, that you would speak to our hearts this morning; that you would touch us where we need to be touched; that you would show us life is not an accident. It’s not chance. We’re here for a divine purpose. And that you would reveal those divine purposes to each one of us. In Jesus’ name. 

So, Paul says, hitting the big mystery on the head, he’s like, “God has revealed to us the master of his will.” The first spiritual truth anybody understands is life is not an accident. It’s not just luck. It’s not just chance. 

I listen to a podcast that I love called How I Built This, by Guy Raz. He interviews the founders of Instagram, Airbnb, SnapChat and all these different companies. And he’s talking to them about how they got from zero—when they first started, when they first had an idea—to the fulfillment of this vision, in many cases which is far beyond what they had originally anticipated. And, at the end of the interview, he always asks them the same question, every person he interviews. He says, “How much of your success do you attribute to luck, and how much is just hard work?” And they all have various answers.

If, per chance, I ever was interviewed by somebody like that, I would not say it was luck. I would say there is a lot of hard work to get from where we are to the fulfillment of the dreams and visions in our heart. But there’s a lot of something else called the grace of God. And the grace of God is an impartation that allows us to fulfill a destiny far beyond our capacity, if it was just up to us and our hard work or chance. 

So Paul says the mystery of his will has been revealed to us. And here’s what it is in verse 10:

10 to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment—to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.

This is the will of God. To bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ. Now, if Genghis Khan had known that, he might have killed far fewer people in his attempt to conquer the world. If Alexander the Great had known that, he might not have died as a young man. If Hitler had known that, he would never have invaded Poland, Russia, Austria, Czechoslovakia. Because the destiny of the Germans wasn’t to rule the world and to bring a better order according to their understanding of how life should function. 

If the ruler of Isis had known that, he wouldn’t have had to flee Syria and Iraq and leave devastation in his wake. The destiny of the world is not to be united under an Islamic caliphate. 

America needs to know that. Our destiny is not to be all Republicans or all Democrats. Even though some of us push. I had dinner with a friend the other night. We got in a big political fight because, every now and then friends like to do that. Get rid of what’s in their heart—a little frustration. Nevertheless, we’re not destined to all be Catholics, or all be Baptists, or all be at Living Streams. We are destined to all bow our knee to the name of the Lord Jesus Christ who was sent by the Father to not only bring salvation, but to rule and to reign and to establish a kingdom that will last forever. 

The second mystery: The Mystery of Christ uniting Jews and Gentiles. Ephesians 3:

2 Surely you have heard about the administration of God’s grace that was given to me for you, 3 that is, the mystery made known to me by revelation, as I have already written briefly.

He says, “I wrote about this mystery that came through revelation.” And it’s in chapter 2 and we’ll go back there in a minute.  

4 In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, 5 which was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s holy apostles and prophets. 6 This mystery is that through the gospel the Gentiles are heirs together with Israel, members together of one body, and sharers together in the promise in Christ Jesus.

Now, somebody might ask the question, when we talk about the mystery of Jews and Gentiles being united, the mystery of Christ and the Church and Israel. Somebody might say, “What’s the big deal? Why is that important? Who even cares?”

Well, let me say this. You will care a lot if you take the time to read the Old Testament and you see the covenant promises that God made to his people to bless them. Not just them as individuals, but to bless them for generations and generations, when they keep his promises. They have promises. They have prophecies. They have the law and the patriarchs. Everything that was first given to Abraham and then to his son Isaac, and then to Jacob and the twelve sons of Jacob who became the nation Israel. All those promises become our through Christ. We become inheritors of something through a mysterious union that allows Jews and Gentiles to become one. We’ll talk about that in just a minute.

The other day I was looking at Kristina. She was sitting at the kitchen table and there was a big, thousand-piece puzzle that she was putting together. And I walked by. It looked a little strange to me. I said, “How’s it going with the puzzle?” And she said, “Well, I like to do it upside down without looking at the picture on the box.” And I thought, “Yeah, that’s my wife. It’s really strange.” She said, “It’s good for my brain.” It would drive my brain crazy trying to do a thousand-piece puzzle, but to do it upside down without looking at the picture, that’s tough.

I’m trying to give you a picture today of what God wants to do. As much as anything, if you have a picture of his will and his purpose, then even though different events don’t always make sense, you can save the understanding of how that fits into your life for a time when there’s another piece that produces clarity, if you know what I mean. Are you following me? Because we all have certain events that don’t seem to fit. And some of those are very painful events. Some of those seem like scars. By faith we have to resist the temptation to be angry and to say, “That person has messed up my life.” Because nobody has the power to mess up your life. The only thing that will mess up your life is if you will let that pain fester through unforgiveness, resentment and bitterness. That will cause you some trouble. 

Now we’re going to go back into Ephesians and see how we become united with the Jews to fulfill God’s purpose. Ephesians 2 (RSV):

1 And you he made alive, when you were dead through the trespasses and sins 2 in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience. 

He’s talking about the demonic realm, and how, at one time we cooperated with the demonic realm. We were just going for whatever felt good, whatever was going to make us happy and gratify us at the time. 

3 Among these we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of body and mind, and so we were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. 4 But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us, 5 even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 

The secret sauce that transforms us is called grace. It’s a divine energy that we didn’t earn, we don’t deserve, but we get to receive. Jesus received it from the Father. He lived a sinless life, and in his sinless life there was a grace that he was able to transmute—or to impart—to his disciples. And when he imparted that grace to them, they were able to heal sick people, cast out demons, and do amazing things that they were never able to do before. And he said, “After I’m gone, you guys are going to be even better off. Because I’m going to the Father and the Holy Spirit is going to come upon you.” 

This grace saves us. It makes us whole. I know that I’m not worthy in terms of being a good person for God to answer my prayers. I’m just sort of an average guy. Most people, if you do an intelligence test, they’re all just a little bit above average. Right? Nobody says, “I’m actually a little big below average, a little bit meaner, a little nastier than the norm.” But I know that I don’t drive real nice. I know there’s no impulse in me that says, when I’m at the grocery store, “Oh, let somebody else go ahead of me in line because they only have a few things.” No. I’m in a hurry. I’ve got people to see and things to do. You know what I mean? I need grace. 

And it says: We’ve been….

6 …raised us up with him, and made us sit with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. 8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God— 

We have received this impartation of grace that lifts us up. Instead of being people that are bombarded because of the participation we’ve had in the demonic realm that leaves us vulnerable to all kinds of thoughts and impulses that leave people empty and defiled—now we have this grace. And grace, for the first time in my life when I was twenty years old, when I said, “God, I want to give my life to Jesus. I’m a little afraid to say the prayer, because I was afraid all my life that you’d make me wear a black suit and stay celibate and liven Iowa or something like that.” Every time I say that, somebody comes forward from Iowa, deeply offended. Nothing personal. It was my own fear. I’m sure it’s a lovely place. 

However, we have one sense of what our destiny is and then God gives us grace. We discover when we have grace, that we can overcome. That we can actually be the person that we really would like to be in our hearts. Now, do we do it all the time? No, not all the time and in every situation. But we have the power to do what’s right because we’ve been lifted up out of the mire—the Slough of Despondency that David was talking about last week. And we are seated now in the heavenly realms with Christ. That is a realm that has actually come to the earth. That’s another whole mystery. But Jesus brought the kingdom to earth. We live in a fallen world, but we live in the kingdom of God in the midst of a fallen world. 

That’s why my wife and I, in the midst of the fact that her heart is failing—she’s going to need a new heart—we can actually still enjoy life because we would be dishonest if we said we weren’t experiencing blessing right now. We are being blessed right now. If you’re living your life like you are waiting until the weekend to have fun, you are waiting until your vacation to relax, you are waiting until you retire to travel, if you are waiting and waiting and waiting, you’ll be waiting until it’s too late. You’re either going to experience God’s kingdom now, or you’re missing out. 

So, the second part, in terms of being united with the Jews, he deals with Ephesians 2:11

11 Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision, 

The Jews were the circumcision. The Gentiles were the uncircumcision.

which is made in the flesh by hands— 12 remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near in the blood of Christ. 14 For he is our peace, who has made us both one, and has broken down the dividing wall of hostility, 

The dividing wall of hostility. Why was there hostility between the Jews and at the Gentiles. It’s because God told the Jews to stay away from their corrupt practices. He didn’t mean for them to judge and despise the Gentiles. But you know, if you’re like me, that if you quit eating meat, or tried it for a while, you have a tendency to despise meat eaters. If you sit in first class, then you sort of look down on people in coach, you know? If you live in a nice house, then you’re not as impressed with somebody who lives in a lesser house, or whatever. That’s human nature. 

So the Jews who were very religious in keeping all of the law of God sort of despised the people who were eating anything, partying all the time. They despised the unhealthy lifestyle of the Gentiles. And when somebody despises you, you despise them back. When somebody judges you, you judge them back. It’s a natural self-defense mechanism. 

So there was a hostility. And now, Jesus comes. The Son of God is manifest. And before him, all men are sinners. All of us have a big need. And he sheds his blood. He dies on the cross for the Jew and the Gentile. We all need forgiveness of sins. The religious people couldn’t really connect with God, and the irreligious people couldn’t really connect with God. We’re all equal before God as sinners. We all can receive forgiveness. And when we do, the hostility goes away. We become brothers. 

17 And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near; 18 for through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; 22 in whom you also are built into it for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit.

That’s a lot of words. Here’s what he’s saying. He’s saying you have a place in the family of God. You are a member of the family. You are now a chosen person. And when you believe that, there’s something that changes in your life. 

My daughter Kelly, has a foster child. This little girl has been bounced from her dad to her mom. There’s drug addictions. There’s irresponsible behavior. She has appointments with family members who never bother to show up and take her. She has been a heart-broken person. But when my daughter invited her into her family, this little girl hit the jackpot, when it comes to foster care. Because she is loved and she is prayed for. Before she goes to bed, she wants me to pray for her when she’s at our house. And she gets all kinds of good food. And when we go to a restaurant, we don’t say, “The family eats one thing and you eat something else.” It’s like, “Go ahead and order whatever you want. When you are in this family, you are welcome. You are welcome here. Whatever blessing God puts on us extends to you, too.” 

That’s how we do life. That’s how God does life with his children. When he says you are a member of the family of God, he says, “I’m not holding anything back from my kids. I am giving them everything they need for life, everything they need to overcome. All the grace that will transform them and make them fruitful, and allow them to fulfill their destiny. That is the gift that I have for all my children.”

It’s not just for the Jews. The Gentiles are not excluded. They become one in Christ. Through the blood that was shed, we can all draw near. It says we can all approach the Father with freedom and confidence. The Church is a family. That’s what our theme is.

Our last mystery, I just want to touch on. We’re going to skip all the way to the third point. The Mystery of Christ in the Church. Ephesians 5. In Ephesians 5 he’s talking a lot about husbands and wives. And how husbands relate to their wives, how they should love their wives as they love their own body. When your body aches, you stop. You don’t just power through the pain. You make sure you get a massage or physical therapy or you rest, or whatever. Husbands love your wife like your own body. 

And wives, submit to your husbands. That’s a fearful command unless you realize that your submission to your husband is similar to our submission to Christ. Christ is the one who covers us. When you’re doing what he wants you to do, there’s a special blessing that is imparted to you.

He goes into this whole teaching on marriage. Then he says something that seems really strange at the end of verse 31. 

For this reason, a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh. 

The two become one flesh through the sexual union and the union of marriage. 

This is a great mystery. And I mean in reference to Christ and the church. 

He talks about mysteries. Now he says this is a great mystery. In some translations, this is a profound mystery. What’s the mystery? The mystery is that, just as a husband and wife become one, Christ and the Church become one. So, let’s back it up. What does it mean for a husband and a wife to become one? 

Kristina and I have been married forty-six years as of a week ago Monday. We’re one. But I’m not Kristina and she’s not Mark. We’re distinct in that. We have distinct personalities. We have different tastes when it comes to certain things. But when it comes to our standing before God, when it comes to our equality before God, when it comes to God’s love for us, we’re one. When we pray together in unity, we have power. When we have disagreements, if I’m too harsh, if she’s too whatever, and we’re battling each other, it hinders our prayers. That’s why Peter said in 1 Peter 3, “Husbands live with your wives in an understanding way so your prayers aren’t hindered.”

What he’s saying is there’s something really powerful that God wants to do when you’re in unity that doesn’t happen when you’re in disunity. So you’ve got to figure each other out. And husbands, it’s especially incumbent on you to figure out your wife. And I’ll give you a little clue that God gave you a gift and that gift is in the package of a female version of yourself, that you’re often out of touch with. She sees life different. She wants to drive through the city different. She wants to spend money a little bit different. But in all those ways, if you can understand where she’s coming from, you’re going to be enriched. You’re going to have a better chance of being in unity. And when you’re enjoying your unity, then things are good. Things are as good as it’s going to get in a lot of ways.

So now he’s saying, “I’m not just talking about husbands and wives.” That’s what he says at the end of this. “I’m not just talking about learning to figure out how you do life in a unique way; and the way you do life”—who manages the money, who does the cooking, who does the shopping, who cleans this and who fixes that. The way you do it should be unique to the gifts and skill set of your family, of your husband and your wife. He says, “I’m not just talking about that. I’m talking about Christ and the Church are one.”

I’ve had the privilege over this last year of preaching in California, Nevada, Hawaii, Arizona, in this Valley from Sun City to the San Tan Valley. I’ve had the opportunity to worship with congregations of people who were in retirement communities and also worship at ASU with Hope Church, where they have rap worship. I’m not a big rap fan, but their rap worship is awesome. I’m not a big old hymns fan. But you go to Glencroft Retirement Community and we’re enjoying one of their worship services. And I’m telling you the Holy Spirit moves in the midst of some really old, beautiful hymns. You know why? Because those people worship with all of their hearts.

What am I getting at? What I’m getting at is this. Whether you’re in a retirement community or a college campus, when you’re whole heartedly committed to Christ, then the church becomes one with Christ. The presence of God is there. And when the presence of God is there, the blessing of God is there. And when the blessing of God is there, people’s lives are transformed. It’s pretty cool.

Now, if you know me, you know I believe in speaking in tongues and prophecy and healing. I believe it’s all for today. But every now and then I’ll preach in a church where they don’t necessarily believe in some of those things. Or they definitely, even if they were to accept it, they don’t emphasize it any way, shape or form. But here’s what I’ve discovered. The people that are really committed to Christ, the people that are really involved in the church, have become one with Christ and over the years, they reach a place of maturity that makes them indistinguishable from anybody in this congregation. You know why? Because the life that transforms us, the grace that transforms us comes from Jesus himself.

In the midst of the Church, when the Church is one with Christ, is Christ himself. Not just at Living Streams or at Life Point or at Streams in the West Valley, but at New City, and Church for the Nations, and the Catholic parishes around. In spite of the fact that we actually have a few things and a few people that do life a little weird and don’t always believe the same way. And they have a few people that believe some things, and sometimes even leaders that do things they should have never done and they pay a price for that. And so do we. Because there aren’t any perfect congregations. It’s all a mixture of people that start in spiritual infancy and, hopefully, grow into a place of spiritual maturity as we are connected together.

Because it says here in Ephesians that, if we are built together, that he makes us into a dwelling in which he inhabits by his Spirit. We become stones—Peter says it—stones that form a building that Christ fills. So the real life-giving element in every church is Christ himself. And when we gather in his name, we’re together in his presence. 

So when somebody says, “Oh, I just can’t find a church.” That’s a little bit like when I hear somebody say (which you never hear), “I can’t find a restaurant that I like to eat at in this city. I can’t find one.” Really? It’s just food, you know. It’s just food in a restaurant. Church is just people. But a church is people gathered to meet Jesus.

As we close this service this morning, we want to meet with Jesus, right? We want to have some of the mysteries of our lives solved. We want to have the puzzle pieces of life fit together. Daniel, who interpreted the dreams of King Nebuchadnezzar, when he did so, he said, “God is the revealer of mysteries. God himself.” 

Let’s pray together.

Father God, you are the one who reveals mysteries. You are the one who unites us with your people. You have brought us into your family. You have called us to love one another. We want to bear fruit together, to make known your marvelous grace on the earth, to reveal your plans and purposes. In Jesus’ name.

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Unless otherwise noted, Scripture taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION® NIV®,
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