Life in the Father's House #1 - "A Culture of Christian Love" (Romans 12:9-10)

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So if you have a
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Bible, and I hope you do, take it and turn with me to Romans chapter 12. Romans chapter 12 as we begin a new sermon series for the month of October.
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If you're visiting, our regular habit is to work through books of the Bible. We've been actually working our way through Genesis for quite some time, but for the month of October I'm taking a break from our regular study in the book of Genesis to devote some time to a series that I've entitled
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Life in the Father's House. Life in the Father's House.
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I'm going to say more about this series in just a moment, but Romans chapter 12,
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I'll join you there in just a minute. If I can introduce what we're going to be doing in this series for just a moment,
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I think it might be helpful for giving some context for what I'm hoping the Lord will do through this series and what
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I'm hoping you'll get out of it as we work through it. How many of you have heard the term deconstruction before?
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Okay, quite a few of you in the room. It's quite a popular term of late in Christian circles.
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For those of you who maybe are unfamiliar, in the last five to ten years a lot of professing
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Christians have been, as they put it, leaving or walking out of the church, as it were, and for various reasons.
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For some it was theological, it was belief -based. For others they thought the church overemphasized some things to the neglect of others.
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For others it was the fact that, oh this Christianity thing, they're so exclusive and that can't possibly be true.
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The reasons are varied but the end results have remained pretty much the same. All of these folks, as the name suggests, went on a project of deconstructing their faith.
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Hence the term deconstructing. They wanted to tear it all down and then get back to the real essence of what they said was
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Christianity. And as they saw it, they were replacing the
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Christianity they knew with what they said was a more purer form of it. Now if you know anything about this whole movement of deconstruction, what ended up happening really is, it just became classic theological liberalism.
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Classic theological liberalism said the Bible isn't God's word, it might contain God's word, but there's a lot of man's word in there too, so we don't really view it as God's word.
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Jesus isn't the only way to be saved, yes he is a way, probably the best way, as some of them put it, but that whole
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Jesus is the only way to be saved thing, not so much. Well sin, oh please that's an outmoded concept, people are innately good.
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The church overemphasizes this sin thing too much. Let's get away from all that and let's get back to recognizing the innate goodness of people.
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Funny, the movement called deconstruction pretty much ends up every time in the same place. Now you may think, well if he's starting with this, he must not, if he's starting with this, he must not think that deconstruction is all that good of a thing.
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But, and this might surprise you, I actually sympathize with those who've gone down this road.
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I don't necessarily like their conclusions, but I don't blame them for asking questions.
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Because if I'm truly honest, and my conviction about this has only grown in the last month as I've had time away to read and pray and reflect and chat to other brother pastors,
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I genuinely believe that there is a sanctified deconstruction, a good kind, not the kind that leads you into error, but a good kind of deconstruction that needs to take place in the church.
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I've come to the conclusion that lots of people have ideas about church, and usually their ideas are some mixture of what they grew up with, what they, you know, would think or should think happens, stuff that they expect when they come to church, and as someone who's been teaching the
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Bible for quite some time, I've come to the conclusion that quite frankly many of us, myself included, have views about church life, about what happens when the church gathers together, that has more to do with personal preference and tradition than it does what this book has to say.
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And I want to argue that if our ideas about church life have more to do with what we expect and what we want out of the church instead of what
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God has said, then beloved, we're gonna find ourselves severely impoverished, we're gonna find ourselves severely unhelped when it comes to God's plan for us as his people.
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And so for the rest of this month I want to engage with you in an act of what I've described as sacred deconstruction.
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What I want to do in this series is essentially, I want to do both something positive and negative.
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I want to do two things really in this series that we're calling Life in the Father's House. On the positive side,
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I want us to develop a vision for body life that is radically centered on and organically formed by the
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Scriptures. Since we believe, at least here at Redeemer we do, that this book is
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God's holy and divine word, anybody agree with me on that much? We believe that this book is
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God's word. I happen to think that in whatever conversations we have about the church, what it is, what it should or shouldn't do, what it should or shouldn't be, this is the only conversation partner that really matters.
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We may have opinions about things and that's fine, but we have to recognize that our opinions must bow at the foot of King Jesus as he has spoken in his word.
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And so my hope over the next five weeks as we look at Romans chapter 12 verses 9 through 21, the next three weeks and then the final two weeks we look at Ephesians 4 11 to 16, as we look at this
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I'm trusting that God's word is going to paint for us a beautiful and a glorious picture of life together as the people of God.
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So that's the positive thing I want to do. I want us to come away from this series saying, really, let me put it like this, if at the end of this series you come away from this saying,
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I love the church and not this, not necessarily this local church, but the church, the thing that God has brought together in Jesus Christ, that Christ shed his blood for.
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If you come away from this saying, I love the church more now than when this series has started, I would have achieved my aim.
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So that's the positive thing I want to do. But there is a negative and I don't want to spend too much on this, but I don't know,
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I do want to acknowledge it. Negatively, I want to collide head -on and hopefully,
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I put destroy in my notes, but I'm gonna say bring to an end. Destroy sounds kind of harsh.
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Hopefully bring to an end what I think is a problem and just when I was thinking I was alone in this, this past couple of days
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I was up in Roseburg at a event and I got to hear some pastors speaking about life in the gathered church and it was three speakers and all three speakers said the same thing.
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That somewhere along the way, the church, with a big C, started to buy into this idea that the church exists primarily for the, the word that one person used was the self -actualization, big fancy word for saying, the church is basically to make you the best version of yourself.
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And so people come to church expecting that the church is here to meet their needs and to make them be the best version of themselves they can be.
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Here's the problem, as we're gonna see over the next few weeks, the Bible's view of the church is not that you come to church to be served, is that you come to church to serve one another and here's the thing, as you serve one another, people will serve you.
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Thankfully, God knows us better than we know ourselves. All of us are played with a little bit of what my dad used to call the big
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I and the small you. We, all of us, myself included, we all have a little bit of a sense of I'm really important and you need to serve me.
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Big I, small you. But my hope in this series is that we will gain a vision of the church where we don't come just to be served, but we come to serve one another.
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Now I'm not naive enough to think that this series is going to bring about an instant transformation and we're all gonna just get this first time.
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No, this is the beginning of what I hope will be a ongoing conversation in the life of our body as we think about how we can better serve one another and, as the series says, engage in life in the
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Father's house. So, kind of a long introduction.
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I hope you're in Romans chapter 12 already. Romans chapter 12 and verses 9 through 21.
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That's what we're gonna read. Romans chapter 12 verses 9 through 21. If you grabbed one of the red Bibles that we give away, that's on page 1006.
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Romans chapter 12, reading from verse 9 through to verse 21.
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Romans chapter 12 from verse 9 through 21. It's our custom usually that when we gather for the preaching of God's Word and we're about to read the
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Word, we stand. So if you're able to do so, can I invite you to stand with me as I read this portion of God's Word.
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Romans chapter 12, beginning in verse 9 and reading through to verse 21.
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Brothers and sisters, let love be without hypocrisy.
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Detest evil. Cling to what is good. Love one another deeply as brothers and sisters.
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Outdo one another in showing honor. Do not lack diligence in zeal.
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Be fervent in the spirit. Serve the Lord. Rejoice in hope.
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Be patient in affliction. Be persistent in prayer. Share with the saints in their needs.
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Pursue hospitality. Bless those who curse you. Bless and do not curse.
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Rejoice with those who rejoice. Weep with those who weep. Live in harmony with one another.
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Do not be proud. Instead, associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own estimation.
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Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Give careful thought to do what is honorable in everyone's eyes.
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If possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.
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Friends, do not avenge yourselves. Instead, leave room for God's wrath because it is written, vengeance belongs to me.
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I will repay, says the Lord. But if your enemy is hungry, feed him.
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And if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. For in so doing, you will be heaping fiery coals on his head.
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Do not be conquered by evil, but conquer evil with good.
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Pray that God will bless that reading of his Word and give us understanding of it. Join with me as I pray, ask for God's help, and then we launch into our message for this afternoon.
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Heavenly Father, we are thankful to you because first of all, you are good. You give us all that we need for life and godliness through the knowledge of your
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Son. And every time that we open up your Word, we receive just a little bit more of that knowledge we need. Father, I take a moment to thank you for your goodness in the time that I was away.
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Thank you for those who filled this pulpit while I was gone. Pray for Pastor Tommy and Pastor Lucas and Fred and Doug who opened up your
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Word and proclaimed your good news from this pulpit. I pray that you would bless each and every one of them, that you would strengthen them, that they would continue to be always abounding in the work of the
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Lord. Father, thank you for the local churches I got to spend time with during my time away.
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Thank you for Veritas Church in Roseville, Trinity Presbyterian Church here in Medford, Creekside Bible Church up in Rogue River, and Faith Bible Church out in Sharpsburg, Georgia.
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Thank you for those local churches. Thank you that in every place you have people who you are bringing together and they are calling upon your name and bringing you glory.
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And I pray for all of those churches, that you would strengthen them, that their witness would be vibrant, that they would, as we even just read, not lack diligence and zeal, but they would be fervent in the
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Spirit. And so Father, I pray for us even now as we come to this time in your
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Word. Father, I pray that as we talk about a subject that at times can be a little bit cliche and one that we think we know.
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Father, we pray that you would do unfamiliar work through a familiar subject. I ask all these things in Jesus name and for his sake.
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Amen. Well please be seated. I want to speak to you for a few moments from a subject that I've given the title,
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A Culture of Christian Love. A culture of Christian love. As we think about life in the
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Father's house, I want to look at various cultural markers that should mark life in the
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Father's house. And the first, and I think the most foundational, is a culture of Christian love.
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As we come to Romans chapter 12, we need to do a little bit of background as to where we are in this letter since we're kind of jumping very much into the middle of it.
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As we come to Romans chapter 12, Paul has been expounding the glories of the gospel in all of their fullness.
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He's dealt with our need for the gospel, he's dealt with God's provision, he's dealt with the fact that God is transforming us through that gospel, he's dealt with the reality that there are some people who will believe and some who will not, and God is sovereign over that.
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He's dealt with the faithfulness of God to his promises in the gospel. As it were, Paul has climbed the mountaintop of spiritual truth and he has seen vast and glorious land for 11 straight chapters.
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As I heard one pastor this weekend put it, as Paul comes to the end of chapter 11 he starts to theologically hyperventilate, which
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I thought was a great picture for what happens at the end of chapter 11. That great benediction where he says,
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Oh the depths of the riches, both of the wisdom and the knowledge of God, how unsearchable are his judgments and untraceable his ways, and he ends it verse 36, for from him and through him and to him are all things, to him be the glory forever.
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For 11 straight chapters he has, and I think sometimes we miss this, Paul himself is having to think about these truths as he's being inspired to write them, and as he thinks on these truths and he's reminded of these truths, he himself is caught up in worship.
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The only way that he can respond is with a heart of worship. But then in chapter 12, after kind of surveying the land and seeing these vast and glorious plains of gospel truth, is as it were,
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Paul comes down from the mountain in chapter 12, and now he starts to explore how all of this actually works itself out in the life of God's people.
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He starts to survey these rich lands of application as he applies the gospel message to every area of life, and when you come to chapter 12, the real focus in chapter 12 is on how the gospel affects the gathering of God's people.
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How it is that redeemed people, the people who have experienced all of the great truths in chapters 1 through 11, how all of those people live together like redeemed people.
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And so in verses 1 & 2 he starts off with this great imperative that we ought to give ourselves to the
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Lord entirely as living sacrifices, and that this happens as a result of the renewing of our mind.
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In verses 3 to 8 he then kind of explains the power of the Spirit in this, that he both enables us as God's people and he empowers us as God's people.
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And then he comes to chapter 12 and verse 9, where he really starts to think about, okay, now that we've dealt with all that is true, all the indicatives, that's a fancy way of saying, all the things that are statements of reality, this is what's true of you, how does this then become imperative?
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Another fancy way of saying, how do we actually start to live this out? Really there are three things we're going to consider in our three weeks in Romans 12, 9 through 21.
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So look at your own Bible for a moment. In verses 9 & 10, the theme we're going to consider today is love. So you kind of have a heading statement there in verse 9, let love be without hypocrisy.
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We'll talk about that in just a moment. But he starts off with love in verses 9 and 10. Verse 11 is its own unit where he discusses the idea of zeal, the idea of zeal.
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So again, heading statement in verse 11, do not lack diligence in zeal.
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We'll talk about that next week. And then in two weeks we're gonna see verses 12 to 21, service.
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So really that theme begins end of verse 11 where he says, serve the Lord. Well what does that look like? Verses 12 through 21.
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And so we're going to look at those three themes over the next three weeks, love, zeal, and service. And each of those is going to build on the other as we think about this idea of life in the
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Father's house. Well if we're going to truly partake of life in the Father's house, at the foundation of that life, at the foundation of our shared life together, brothers and sisters, is the virtue of love.
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Love for God first and foremost, which of course means love for Christ, and flowing out of that love for God and love for Christ, love for one another.
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Now instinctively we know this as Christians, we know that love is central. The Bible tells us that God is
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Himself love, and over and over and over again in the Bible we are commanded to love one another.
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But here's where this gets tricky, because though the Bible makes it clear that God is love, and the
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Bible makes it clear that we are all to love one another, we can all come to those commands and those realities with very different definitions of what it means to love one another.
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And so the question we really want to be asking this afternoon is, what kind of love should mark the shared life of the people of God?
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If we truly say we love one another, what does that actually look like? Not according to us, but according to God's Word.
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If we truly say we love one another, what does that actually mean day to day?
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Well that kind of leads to my big idea for this message. Simply put, God's people should be marked by a love that is honest, discerning, familial, and selfless.
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Let me say that again. The idea for this message is that God's people should be marked by a love that is honest, discerning, familial, and selfless.
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A love that is honest, a love that is discerning, a love that is familial, and a love that is selfless.
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For the rest of our time I want to briefly look at five features of Christian love that Paul teaches us, and how these five features can transform our lives as God's people.
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Five features that I think rise out from this text. Four explicit, one is implicit. Four of them are stated by Paul, one is in the background and he's assuming it.
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So five features of Christian love that I want us to consider. Five points,
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I want to try and be as quick as I can. So consider me first of all, point number one, Christian love is honest.
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Christian love is honest. So look at the beginning of verse 9 with me, Romans 12 verse 9 in your
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Bibles, that first line there, let love be without hypocrisy.
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Let love be without hypocrisy. What's interesting is that the phrase that's translated at least in the
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Christian standard Bible as without hypocrisy, it's a phrase in English but it's actually just one word. It's one word.
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Without hypocrisy is actually a pretty literal translation because it's just a negative prefix and then the word we actually get hypocrite from.
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But there's more to it than just being without hypocrisy. You see, hypocrisy has kind of morphed in meaning over the years.
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In the ancient world, to Paul's audience, when Paul said that love should be without hypocrisy, all of his audience would have heard the same thing.
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You see, in the ancient world, a hypocrite wasn't always a bad person. Do you know who hypocrites were in the ancient world?
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Who said actors? Actors. Actors were hypocrites.
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Why? Because they, in the ancient world, would put on a mask for the purpose of playing a role.
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That's what that word means. Hupo over Kratos was the word for an actor's mask.
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It was what play actors wore. So if you went to see a play on from London, we have a little part
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London that's called the West End, where all the theatres are. So in the, if this were the ancient world, you'd go to the equivalent of the
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West End and you'd go see a play and all the actors didn't show their faces. They wore masks to show which character they were.
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But over time, the meaning of this word began to change. It started with, funny enough, politicians being called hypocrites, which really doesn't surprise anyone if you know the world of politics.
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But politicians were called hypocrites because what they would often do is not tell the truth, but they would pander to their base.
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They would play a role to get votes. Remember, this is the
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Greco -Roman world, the beginnings of what we know as democracy. And over time, this word morphed from just the word for an actor putting on a mask, to a politician kind of pandering, to pretty much anybody who played a role instead of being honest and sincere.
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And that's the definition of hypocrisy that you all, and I know, that a hypocrite is somebody who says they're one thing, but they're actually something else.
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So when Paul says here that let love be without hypocrisy, he is calling you and me and all of us to be honest in our love for others.
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Paul essentially is saying that love is meant to be the real deal, as one writer put it, that love is to be genuine and not counterfeit.
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But what's fascinating is that our English translations all have the verb be in there, so let love be without hypocrisy, or let love be sincere.
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The thing is, Paul didn't actually use a verb. It literally just says, it's three words in the
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Greek, love without hypocrisy. And love is a noun, not a verb. That tells me something.
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It says here that Paul, at least for Paul, Paul is telling us that this isn't a suggestion.
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Neither is this even a command about how things should be.
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No, no, no. Paul is saying that this is what love actually is.
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The kind of love that Christians have by its very nature is honest.
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And there are some massive implications that flow from that very simple fact that Christian love is honest. You could substitute the word genuine, it gets you to the same point.
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So massive implications, but I want to focus on just two as we think about life in the
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Father's house. Two implications that flow from this. First of all, if love is supposed to be honest or genuine, then first of all, honest love, genuine love will look different from person to person because people are different.
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Love will look different from person to person because people are different. In preparing this message,
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I looked up online what the world population is. Did you know we're at 7 .9 billion people already? We're almost at 8.
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Growing up the number was always 6, now we're almost at 8. 7 .9
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billion people live on this planet after 2022. Think about that for a moment. That's 7 .9 million individual image bearers, people who bear
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God's very image. That unites humanity.
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But does that make humanity uniform? No, it doesn't.
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No two people. My wife and I were talking about this the other day. We were talking about my brother.
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My brother and I grew up in the same home, with the same parents, in the same area, and yet me and my brother couldn't be more different.
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Different emphases, different things we prefer, different ways of carrying ourselves. We couldn't be more different. But people could look at us and say, wait a minute, but you grew up in the same home, how could you be so different?
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Well, that's just part of how God has made us all. We are all incredibly different. No two people are the same. And that means no two
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Christians are the same. And if no two Christians are the same, the reality is that even though all
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Christians are commanded to love one another, for it to be genuine, for it to be honest, means that sometimes
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Christian love will look different in its manifestation from person to person. Kofi, why are you laboring this point?
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No, simply put, I'm laboring it because sometimes people assume that love is uniform.
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If you love me, you will do this. And I want to pause and say, who told you that?
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Now, let's be clear, that doesn't mean you get to do things that are hurtful to people and say you're loving them. No, no, we'll talk about that in just a moment.
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There is such a thing as an objective standard for what love is. But the reality is, if love is going to be honest, if Christian love is going to be genuine, then that love is going to manifest itself in different ways.
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Why? Because every single one of you in this room are different people. You have things that are demonstrations of love that maybe don't match with other people.
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I'll give you an example. How many of you have I had over at my house at some point? Okay, a number of you.
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If you haven't, you are welcome. Our house is always open to everyone. If you come to our house, one of the things you will notice very quickly is,
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I like food. Food is great. In fact, we're having a potluck after the service.
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Please stay, join us, because food is good. I like food and I like cooking. I really enjoy it, actually.
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Well, let me put it this way. I mostly enjoy it. Some days I don't, but most of the time I genuinely enjoy cooking, which means if you come to my house, one of the things that I put the most priority on is the food you're going to eat when you come to my house.
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Lord will tell you, I'm constantly researching recipes, constantly looking at stuff. I can get...
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I'm not very OCD about a lot of things, but I am when it comes to cooking. Why? Because cooking is one of the primary ways
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I show people I love them. Now, somebody could say, no, he's not very loving.
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All he does is cook for people, but hold on, that's my way of showing that. You may have a very different way. So as I think about my wife, one of Laura's big ways is,
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Laura likes to say kind things. That's one way that she shows love.
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She also gives great hugs, I can say that because she's my wife. Her way of showing love looks very different to mine, but that doesn't mean
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I don't love her because I don't show her love in ways that she prefers. Okay, Kofi, why are you laboring this point?
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Well, because the reality is, in the life of God's people, love is going to look very different. For some people, love looks like a thousand conversations.
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For others, it's acts of service and meeting needs. For others, it's just the gift of their presence. For others, it's, if it's usually me, some sort of grilled meat, regardless of what love looks like.
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Love is going to look different from person to person, and if we don't have a category for that, here's what ends up happening in church life.
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Some of you have probably seen this. You don't love me, or this church isn't loving. Okay, well, why isn't this church loving?
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Because you don't do this. Okay, but what about this, this, this, this, and this? No, no, no, this isn't happening, so you don't love me.
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What's happened in that moment? We've basically, think about this with me for a moment, we've basically said that Christian love doesn't need to be honest, it just needs to be what
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I want. And we won't call it hypocrisy, but basically what you're asking for is a sort of self -serving hypocrisy.
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Be something you're not, so I can be happy. Hear me, Redeemer, before we ever accuse any believer, whether part of our church or outside of it, of being unloving, here's maybe a positive thing to do.
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Maybe we should start by looking for and thanking God for ways love is being shown genuinely, even if it isn't our preferred way.
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Because maybe people are being honest, sincere, and genuine in their show of love, and we just aren't recognizing it.
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And that should make sense because I'm gonna say this a lot over the next few weeks, it really isn't about you, ultimately.
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Christian love is ultimately about the other person. And so love will look different since people are different, and since people show love differently, that means also, here's my second big implication, honest, genuine love will,
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I hate to say it, it will make mistakes sometimes. Some of you maybe have heard the name
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Owen Strand. Owen Strand's Provost and Professor of Theology at Grace Bible Theological Seminary out in Conway, Arkansas.
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Count Owen as a personal friend, great guy. And recently Owen posted on his
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Facebook page about an idea that he gave the label functional perfectionism.
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Functional perfectionism. He described it as the belief that says that though in theory we believe in Christians making mistakes and even sinning, in practice we don't expect them to, and when they do we must punish them.
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You all know me, if you forgot I'm because I was away for a month, you know me, I tend to be pretty brutally honest.
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Have we not seen this in the life of the church too often? Where in theory we say we are all sinners being saved by grace, we're all good, but in practice we don't actually treat people that way.
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We're not theologically perfectionist but we're functionally perfectionist.
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We functionally act as though people should be perfect all the time. My friend
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Owen explains the dangers of this quite simply when he says in a functionally perfectionistic context everyone's terrified of acknowledging what ironically we all know to be true.
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We are all light years away from being perfect. So you shouldn't really surprise anybody when people in church make mistakes, they say the wrong thing, they do the wrong thing, they mean well but you know what, communications gets crossed, we all mean that, we're not hearing things, in my house we always say there's a difference between you know what was said and what you heard, all of these things happen and that can be done with actions.
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There's so many reasons why believers can get it wrong, it happens, but unfortunately you see this sort of functional perfectionism when folks hold grudges and they harbour internal unhappiness and they hold people to what
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I frankly think is a devilish lie of unspoken expectations, only voicing them when they've had enough and I call it devilish because my
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Bible says that the devil is the accuser of the brethren. I'm not saying the people who do this are devilish but they're acting in devilish ways when they would rather accuse the brethren than actually hear the brethren out.
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That sounds really negative so let me put it in a more positive way. If Christians make mistakes and if honest genuine love will at times make mistakes because we are all learning, we are all figuring this thing out, then positively we want to be a people who are marked by letting people get it wrong when they're trying.
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So somebody said something to you in a way you maybe didn't like, okay I'm gonna, wasn't it 1
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Corinthians 13? It says love believes all things, you know what if people get it wrong, alright let's be thankful for when they got it right and hey let's give him another chance.
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I mean isn't that how our God deals with us? Doesn't he show us mercy every time that we mess up?
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Doesn't he not just cast us away every time we mess up but he gives us another chance? Oh faith family, let's not hold people hostage to what we think love should look like, instead let's cultivate an environment together where people can love honestly and they can love genuinely.
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So much more I'd like to say but I'm really behind the clock so I need to get moving. Christian love is first and foremost honest but there's a second feature of Christian love in this passage.
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Point number two, Christian love is discerning. Christian love is discerning.
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Christian love is discerning. So look at the end of verse 12, Paul says let love be without hypocrisy.
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Detest evil, cling to what is good. Those two phrases are actually one clause in the original language and this builds right on the reality that Christian love is honest.
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Because you see if Christian love is honest then Christian love will be honest in, catch this, discerning the difference between relational good and relational evil.
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I don't want to be here too long but in a culture where we are essentially told that, I mean you've all heard these phrases
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I'm sure, you know love is love, you can't put limits on love. This point needs to be made that yes while Christian love is honest,
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Christian love is objective and not subjective. So the psalmist can say, if you're taking notes,
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Psalm 97 verse 10, the psalmist can say in Psalm 97 verse 10, you who love the
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Lord hate evil. It is quite possible for you to both love something and hate its opposite.
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It's not, oh if I love then I can't hate anything ever. Well no, pause. Bible says that if you love the
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Lord you're gonna hate what is evil. If we love God we'll hate the things that God hates.
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And thankfully God has not left it to us to determine the things that God hates.
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We don't have to sit there and kind of wander in the dark and think, I wonder what it is that God doesn't like. Keep something in Romans 12.
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Turn with me to Proverbs chapter 6. Proverbs chapter 6, if you've ever wondered,
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I wonder what God really doesn't like. Well praise God, God doesn't leave us in the dark about that.
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Proverbs chapter 6 and verses 6 to, verses 16 excuse me, to 19.
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Proverbs chapter 6 verses 16 to 19. Right so Proverbs says,
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Yahweh the Lord hates six things. Oh okay this is nice and easy. He tells us up front how many there are.
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In fact seven are detestable to him. Alright, so God hates seven things. I wonder what the seven things are.
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Well again he tells us. Verse 17. Number one, arrogant eyes.
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Number two, a lying tongue. Number three, hands that shed innocent blood.
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And before anyone says wait a minute, well I've never killed anyone. I refer you to the words of Jesus, Matthew chapter 5. If you're angry with your brother, angry with your brother without a cause, the
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Bible says that's tantamount to murder. Number four, verse 18, a heart that plots wicked schemes.
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Number five, feet eager to run to evil. Number six, a lying witness who gives false testimony.
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Now that would include gossip, slander, incomplete storytelling. Here's one that always gets me whenever I read this passage.
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Right at the end of verse 19. Number seven, one who stirs up trouble among brothers.
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God does not take it kindly when those who say they know him act in ways that are relationally evil.
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You see, love doesn't let relational evil slide. Yes it's genuine and it's honest and that means at times people are going to love in ways that are different and they're going to make mistakes when they love, but there's a difference between a mistake and something that the
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Bible describes as evil. Love is not going to ignore evil in the name of keeping the peace.
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I mean how many of you have heard this phrase you know, you've got to play the social game. I've been told that a lot. Play the social game, wait a minute.
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So there's a difference between, okay there are certain cultural mores and things that we all observe, that's one thing.
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But if playing the social game means, well so -and -so is doing something that's not right, but I'm not gonna say anything because that would be unloving.
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That's not really my business. Hold on, that's not the Bible's understanding. The Bible's understanding is like when you go to an airport.
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I don't know if you travel often but when I travel I hear the same thing over and over again. If you see something say something.
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Commenting on Paul's words, go back to Romans chapter 12 with me. Commenting on Paul's words in Romans chapter 12,
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Calvin said, it is indeed difficult to express how ingenious almost all men are to pretend a love which they really do not have.
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Paul says no no no no no no. Christian love detests what is evil. But it also, did you catch the way that Paul renders this?
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It clings to what is good the CSB says. Cling is actually a good translation.
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It carries this idea of literally being glued to. In the Greek translation of the Old Testament this word is used in Genesis 2 24 when a husband leaves his father and his mother and clings to his wife.
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Same word. And actually when you read the New Testament the concept of us holding on to what is good comes up over and over and over again.
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So this past summer we were in Philippians. Remember Philippians 4 8? Whatever is true, honorable, just, pure, lovely, commendable, if there's any moral excellence, if there's anything praiseworthy.
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Remember what Paul said? Dwell on these things. 1st
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Thessalonians 5 21 after Paul says that we are to test all things, he says you're to hold on to, same word actually, hold on to what is good.
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Christian love doesn't just spend all of its time discerning what is evil and saying I don't want what is evil, but it also looks for the good.
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It looks for that which is good, that which is right in people, right in relationships.
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Christian love doesn't focus on all the things that one does wrong to the exclusion of anything they do good.
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No, it's discerning. It knows when something is wrong and needs to be addressed and when something is good and should be praised.
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And I said in this point it's going to require discernment.
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Discernment is the art of judgment as to what is best. My historical hero Spurgeon, he said like this that discernment is the difference not between right and wrong but the difference between what is right and almost right.
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In a very real sense our definition of love cannot just be mindless and sentimental. One commentator put it like this, it has to have a strong objectivity, hatred against evil and faithful adherence to what is good.
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Christian love is honest, Christian love is discerning. There's a third feature of love in our text here in Romans. Christian love is familial, point number three.
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Christian love is familial. So look at how
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Paul says it verse 10. He says love one another deeply as brothers and sisters.
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I feel like this gets lost on us sometimes because we use the term brother and sister so often and that's not the fault of the words or our usage necessarily but I think at times we say it so often and sometimes so glibly that the reality that we
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God's people are family that sometimes that reality gets lost in translation.
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For some of you family is the tightest bond that there is. You will move heaven and earth for your families and you should and you care about your families, you do anything for family and rightfully so.
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For others of you maybe you didn't have a great relationship with your family and the idea of family is a painful one. The beautiful thing is this for those of us who have come to know the
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Lord Jesus Christ even if we have had terrible examples of earthly family, God unites us to a spiritual family.
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It's like the psalmist says that God puts the, I think it's Psalm 68 verse 6, that God puts the solitary in families.
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The CSB says love one another deeply, translating the verb there. I actually like the
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NIV on this one. The NIV says we are to be devoted to one another. You see, beloved, if Christian love is familial, if it's family love, the
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Christian love is the kind of love that doesn't quit on people. It's persevering love.
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It's the kind of love that says no way are we giving up on this even when things get difficult. Why? Because as Paul says, love one another deeply, be devoted to one another as brothers and sisters.
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Over the years as someone who's been teaching the Bible I've heard people say varying versions of stuff like, my loyalties to my family first, not to my church.
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Or another version I've heard, if I have to choose between my church and my family, I pick my family.
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And I understand the sentiment and I don't want to be too critical about it because I understand it, but I want to say
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I think you might want to take the foot of the gas a little bit with that expression.
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And thankfully I don't have to be the one to answer that because there's a story I recall. I believe it's in Matthew chapter 12.
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Jesus was ministering and the text says that his mother and brothers came looking for him.
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Let me read it to you, Matthew chapter 12 verse 46. It says, while he was still speaking with the crowds, his mother and brothers were standing outside wanting to speak to him.
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Someone told him, look, your mother and your brothers are standing outside wanting to speak to you. Before I read on, what do you think
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Jesus' response was in that moment? Did Jesus stop and say, okay guys, guys, guys, I know
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I'm preaching to you this word of salvation and what -have -you, but mumsy's here.
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Guys, I'll be right back, I've got to go deal with that. Verse 48,
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Jesus replied to the one who was speaking to him, who is my mother and who are my brothers? Stretching out his hand toward his disciples, he said, here is my mother, here are my mother and my brothers.
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For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.
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Unless you think that that was an isolated incident in the life of Jesus, it's picked up again in Mark's Gospel, Mark chapter 3. Now, I can understand,
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I'll tell you why, when I usually say that to people, here's what I get. So Kofi, are you saying I should love the church more than my family? Absolutely not.
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I'm not saying that at all. What I'm saying is that you should love, and I know some of you are visiting, you're part of other local churches, whichever local church you're a part of, you should love your local church, not more than your family, but as much as your family.
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Why? Because, Paul says, we're brothers and sisters. This reality of the church as a spiritual family wasn't lost on the early church.
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So you read Paul's letters 74 times, 74 times, almost an average of six times per letter,
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Paul refers to believers as brothers and sisters. Another 22 times, the remaining
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New Testament authors refer to other believers as brothers and sisters.
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Pulling on those images of what we think of as family, that it's the closest relationship there is, it's lifelong.
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Yes, it's not always easy, but it's worth it to persevere through trials and difficulties, because that's who we are, we're a family.
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And I have to be honest, I'm deeply saddened when folks will fight and bicker and split from their brothers and sisters without even thinking about the fact that we are family.
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Yes, family goes through hard times, but like any other earthly family, think about this in your own experience with families,
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I'm sure you've had moments where your family members go on your nerves. We're in church, you shouldn't tell lies. I come from a family, we were six, and I lost a brother at the age of 13, age of 15, excuse me.
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But when we were all together, yeah, I grew up in a family with five other people. I would love to tell you that I love my family all the time, and they never tried, that was, that would be a lie, they trapped my patients.
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But they're your family, so what do you do? You find a way to work through it. May not be immediate, it may mean sometimes compromise, but guess what, you find a way.
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Why? Because they're your family. And think about this with me for a moment, just by way of application.
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How much relational tension could be resolved in the church if we started off with the idea that we are family?
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What a witness to a watching world it would be if the world could look at Christians and see Christians act like they're family.
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Paul says that if you're gonna talk about Christian love, Christian love is familial, it views other believers as family.
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Not like family, no, we are family. Christian love is honest,
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Christian love is discerning, Christian love is familial. Point number four, Christian love is selfless. Christian love is selfless.
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So verse 10, verse 10 says, outdo one another in showing honor.
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Now some of you might have the updated version of the Christian Standard Bible in front of you, they changed the translation when they made some updates in 2020, so the newer version of the
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CSB doesn't say outdo one another, it says take the lead in showing honor. Not crazy about the new version if I'm honest,
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I think the older one gets the point of the Greek term much better. It's this idea of that Christian love blazes a trail and shows the way, that Christian love goes above and beyond to show honor to other believers.
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Now I guess I need to pause and explain what honor is for just a second. The word for honor here is kind of an interesting word, it's used a variety of ways in the
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New Testament. Sometimes it's used for kings and the sort of honor and respect that are shown to kings or those in authority.
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First Peter 3 .7, husbands are told to show wives this word, honor.
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At times the word simply just means respect, but in the context here of Romans chapter 12, it carries much more than just respect or reverence, it also carries the idea of deference to someone else.
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As one dictionary put it, it's submitting to and acknowledging the merits of something. You see, believers are to go above and beyond in seeking how they can submit to and acknowledge one another as more important than themselves.
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How many of you were here back in February when Pastor John Benzinger was here with us? Okay, a number of you were here back in February.
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For those of you who are visiting, we are a church plant from Redeemer Bible Church in Gilbert, Arizona. They came out in February to come visit us and when
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Pastor John, who is their lead pastor, preached here, he preached from Hebrews 10 24 and 25. Excellent message called spiritual growth in a world of resistance.
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You can find it on our YouTube channel and I highly recommend you watch it. Anyone remember what his last point in his sermon was?
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If you don't, I remembered it. I literally printed it and put it on my top of my computer screen so I never forgot it.
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His last point in the end of that sermon was point number three, come to church asking how
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I can serve others. See, picture this with me for a moment.
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Imagine if we came to our gatherings, be they Sunday or midweek or our men's and women's
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Bible studies or even just getting together one -on -one with each other. But imagine if we only came expecting our needs to be met.
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What does the church miss out on when everyone is just focused on their needs being met?
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Let's put that aside to a moment. Imagine with me if everyone who came to one of the gatherings of Redeemer Bible Fellowship came thinking
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I'm gonna purposely look for somebody that I can serve today. I'm gonna purposely look for somebody that I can pour into.
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I'm gonna look for somebody that I can ask how's your week going? How can I be praying for you? During the week you know what?
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We all have these wonderful things called phones. I'm gonna pick up the phone and call a couple of people and just see how they are.
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Imagine if we all did that selflessly, not expecting anything in return other than how can
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I be a blessing to somebody else? Imagine we were all doing that for everybody in our church.
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What kind of glorious thing would we see happen in the life of this body?
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Kofi, I think you're missing the point though. If what you're saying is accurate then who's going to meet my needs if I'm busy meeting everyone else's?
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Hold on, didn't we just say everybody's serving everybody? Which means your needs actually get met.
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Think about this. If people come to church only focused on how their needs are going to be met then guess what? Nobody's needs get met.
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But if everyone comes to church asking how can I meet somebody else's needs, everybody's needs get met. Christian love is honest, it's discerning, it's familial, it's selfless.
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But remember at the beginning I said that there were four features that are explicit in this text and one that's implicit? You see there's one more feature of Christian love.
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Paul doesn't say it but he doesn't really have to say it because he's assuming you've heard everything he said already in this letter.
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There's one feature that gives life to all the others. And so real briefly, point number five,
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Christian love is Christ -centered. Christian love is Christ -centered. Here's the danger of everything
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I've just told you. With everything I've just told you the danger can become that this gets turned into a law.
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In fact some of you who've been around Redeemer Bible Fellowship long enough will remember that we heard teachings from a previous sending church about the law of love.
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Anyone remember that? I've come to really dislike that phrase for a number of reasons.
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Here's the biggest. If you turn love into a law, if essentially love becomes, listen you will love one another and like it.
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If that's what happens with love then here's what ends up happening. Sure you can fake it for a little bit.
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We have all been around people who pretend to like you but they really don't. You can fake it for a little bit but here's what ends up happening.
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You either become really bored. It's like you know I can't be bothered with this anymore. Or you become really big -chested.
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Well look at me and how loving I am. I love everybody. But here's the beautiful reality about Christian love.
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Christian love isn't powered by you. Oh and Christian love not only is it not powered by you, it's not even about the other person that you're loving.
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As I was preparing this week, as you all know I'm kind of a nerd which means I like to read really nerdy things when
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I study. Anybody who studies Romans knows that arguably one of the most technical commentaries is considered like the gold tier is by a
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British Methodist pastor called C .E .B. Cranfield. It's in a green series called the International Critical Commentary.
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It's pretty dry and boring. It mostly just deals with grammar but every now and again because he was a preacher and he couldn't help it, you get a few gems scattered throughout his commentary.
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And as I was studying this week I saw this one. It was so good I put it on screen so everyone can see it. C .E
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.B. Cranfield said, the gospel has disclosed a fact of transcendent importance in connection with love of the neighbor.
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Namely that the Son of Man himself is mysteriously present in the other person in his human need.
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It is because the other person, Paul is speaking here specifically of the other Christian though it's true of all men, the other person is the representative of Christ to me or rather the one in whom
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Christ is mysteriously present for me. That is why I must honor him not as not just as myself but above myself.
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Really fancy way of saying this. The reality is if the gospel has saved your brother and your sister and as a result
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Christ has made his home by his spirit in the heart of that other Christian. Oh by the way he did that on the basis of his perfect life.
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A life in which he always spoke the truth in love even when it cost him. A life in which he rejoiced in the truth and stood against evil.
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A life in which he called his own, his friends, his brothers and his sisters. He did that on the basis of his own shed blood as he went to Calvary and went to the cross and he shed his blood for us.
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That's the good news of the gospel by the way. That's the good news that all Christians unite around. That's the reality that we celebrate every time we come to this table.
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Which we will in just a moment. The reality is the reason why we can live in this kind of way, brothers and sisters, is precisely because Christ models it and not only does
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Christ model it, he is the one who empowers it. If our definition of love is sentimental and self -centered it will not last.
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But if our definition of Christian love is Christ -centered, if it's as one of my friends calls his ministry cruciform in the shape of the cross, that love will be genuine.
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It will be for real and it will transform the way we live together as God's people. And so I pray that as we have thought about the love of God shown to us in Christ that we will indeed be a people who are marked by this kind of love.
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An honest, genuine, a selfless, a familial, a discerning and ultimately a
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Christ -centered kind of love. Let's pray together.
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Our Father and our God we thank you because we are not left to our own to discover what true love is. We are not left to our own devices to figure out what genuine
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Christian love is. Ultimately we know what love is because we know what the cross is.
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We know what love is because we know who Jesus is. And so Father my simple prayer for this faith family and those who are visiting with us, my simple prayer is that you do a work in all of our hearts where we would love like you have loved us.
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Where love doesn't just become a law that we obey because we have to, but it becomes the desire of our hearts because your spirit has written your law upon our hearts.
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Father be with us as we come before your table, this token of your love for us. I ask you in Jesus' name and for his sake.