Check Your Assumptions

Kongsvinger Lutheran Church

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Welcome to the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church. Kungsvinger is a beacon for the Gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of northwestern

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Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins and salvation by grace through faith alone.

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And now, here's a message from Pastor Chris Roseberg. In the name of Jesus. Amen. Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?

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That's what James said. Friendship with the world is enmity with God. Now, before you strike out on your quest to unfriend the world, you had better first check your assumptions about what is being said here when we are told that friendship with the world is enmity with God.

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Now, many people's false, and I would even say presumptuous assumptions about this have sent far too many people off on the broad road that leads to destruction rather than the narrow path that leads to life.

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Now, false assumptions, you may be asked. What do you mean by false assumptions?

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Well, let me kind of circle around the concept a little bit. Consider the story of the man who bought a parrot from a pet store and the next day returned the parrot quite angrily to the store.

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And when he got there, he told the owner, you sold me this parrot and you told me it could repeat every word that it heard.

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And the owner said, well, that's right. He says, well, I've been talking to it all day and all night and it hasn't said a single word yet.

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That's false advertising. And the store owner said, no, it isn't. The parrot is deaf. You see, check your assumptions.

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Check your assumptions. Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?

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So, how hard can this be? Let me set off in the wrong direction to kind of make the point. Well, how hard can this be?

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The world loves movies, so all I have to do is hate movies. That seems a little oversimplistic.

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The world loves to drink beer and watch football, so I'm going to keep watching football but drink iced tea.

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Something's wrong here. The world loves designer clothes, expensive cars, jewelry, watches, so I'm going to wear a burlap sack and refuse to style my hair or engage in any kind of cosmetic grooming.

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See, this is really easy. Friendship with the world is, you see what I'm saying? You've got to check your assumptions.

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Now, Luther gets at this actually quite poignantly in his discussion regarding the fourth commandment in the large catechism.

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And we must remember this, that Luther was a monk prior to his great discovery of the gospel.

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This is a guy who literally, if somebody could be saved by monkery, then

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Luther would have been saved by it. And this is a fellow who locked himself up in a monastery and beat his body to the point where the rest of his life he actually had, you know, physical problems as it related to his digestive tract that's actually quite legendary in the history of Luther.

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But I want you to consider what was going on here, that Luther's father was very unhappy with Luther's decision to go into the monastery.

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And the reason being is that the question that was put before Luther, who's going to care for us in our old age?

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That's the job of children. And so Luther, in discussing the fourth commandment, the fourth commandment says, honor your father and your mother.

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This, by the way, is a good work. But people who lock themselves up in monasteries oftentimes lock themselves in monasteries in order to escape the world.

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I mean, after all, friendship with the world is enmity with God. And in so doing, not only do they escape the world, they escape their biblical duty to care for their parents.

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Is this what we're supposed to do? Luther in the large catechism writes, how great a price all the

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Carthusian monks and nuns would pay if in the exercise of their religion they can bring before God a single work done in accordance with the fourth commandment and can say with a joyful heart in his presence, now

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I know that this work is well -pleasing to thee. What will become of these poor, wretched people when standing before God and the whole world?

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They shall blush with shame before a little child that has lived according to the fourth commandment and confess that the merits of their whole lives, that they are not worthy to offer even that child a cup of water.

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So it serves them right for their devilish perversity and trampling down God's commandment underfoot that they must torture themselves in vain with their self -devised works and meanwhile have only scorn and trouble for their reward.

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Should not the heart leap and melt with joy when it can go to work and do what is commanded?

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Say, lo, this is better than the holiness of all the Carthusians, even though they kill themselves with fasting and pray on their knees without ceasing.

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Kind of a poignant point. But you'll note that much of the motivation for monasteries and convents is to despise the world, to leave the world, to be out of it and dedicate yourself to holiness, which kind of then begs the question, when

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Scripture talks about holiness, what is it talking about? Check your assumptions. It has a lot more to do, and I mean this, in loving your neighbors and loving each other than it does with abstaining from certain things that are offered in the world.

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A lot more. And this is what James is getting at in his epistle. If you want to return back to James 3 .13,

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we're going to note what James is admonishing us as Christians when it comes to our good works.

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It says this. Who is wise in understanding among you? By his good conduct, let him show his works in, and note the modifier, in meekness of wisdom.

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Hmm. But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth.

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This is not the wisdom that comes down from above. This is earthly, unspiritual, and demonic.

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Now, one that we can always identify when it comes to this selfish ambition is the proverbial fellow in the corporate world who is climbing the corporate ladder so that he can have that corner office, and in climbing the corporate ladder, there are a bunch of dead bodies of his fellow co -workers that he's climbing up their backs in order to claw his way to the top.

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But understand this, that selfish ambition, as crude as that example is, is something that we each struggle with, and jealousy is something that we each struggle with.

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I find it fascinating that when you translate passages from the Greek into the English as it relates to jealousy and envy, that there is an idiom that is over and again used in the

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Greek, and the person who is jealous and envious is the one who has the evil eye.

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They are coveting what other people have, and that coveting could take the form of coveting their, well, their mind, their intellect, their power, their influence, their stuff, their friends, the number of likes they get on social media.

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The evil eye and jealousy take on all kinds of forms, but selfish ambition is a fascinating thing as well.

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Selfish ambition can be driven by narcissism, that desire and need that everybody recognizes how great, how brilliant, how amazing you are.

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And being then in the presence of others who are receiving praise or who legitimately have good gifts given to them by God, their solution when it comes to selfish ambition is to tear that person down and to destroy them, because by destroying them, they make themselves look good.

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Selfish ambition is a terrible thing that lives inside of each and every one of us, if you think about it.

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So, James says, this is not the wisdom that comes down from above. This is earthly, unspiritual, and demonic.

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In fact, the way the whole world system works, it's all about selfish ambition.

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It's all about... In fact, watch the commercials. Commercials are designed to create in you a coveting, jealous desire to have what somebody else has, to have the latest and the greatest, to be praised and honored by people for making such astute, glorious purchases.

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I mean, the last thing you would want to be seen in public with, right, is like the oldest

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Android phone. You need to be seen with the latest and greatest technological endeavors.

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And to pull an old phone with a cracked screen out of your pocket is to basically say that you're just a mess.

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This is not biblical or godly wisdom. This is demonic. This is the world's system.

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This is the world's values. And James continues, where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.

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Just walk through the second table of the law, and you'll say, yeah, that's exactly right.

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There will be sexual immorality. There will be theft. There will be murder. There will be slander and gossip.

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There will be coveting and all of the things that flow from that. Selfish ambition is exactly the same sin that the devil engaged in that led to his fall and the fall of a third of the angels.

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It's all about me. Or as Dr. Matt Richard says, the sinful nature wants what it wants, and it wants it now.

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It's in this context, then, that we consider our gospel text, and I'll work in just a few pieces of it.

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In Mark 9, 33, it says this, that the disciples and Jesus came to Capernaum, and when

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He was in the house, Jesus asked them, what were you discussing on the way? But they kept silent.

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Yeah, that means that the question itself kind of nailed them to the wall. For on the way, they had, listen to this, argued with one another about who was the greatest.

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So Jesus sat down and called the twelve, and He said to them, if anyone would be first, he must be last of all and the servant of all.

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I mean, consider the utter irony of the context of this story. Jesus is the Alpha and the

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Omega. He's the first and the last. He's the son of David, the son of God, the king of Israel, the king of kings.

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Jesus is the image of the invisible God. He's the firstborn of all creation, and by Him, all things were created in heaven on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities.

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All things were created through Jesus and for Jesus, and He's before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

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He's the head of the body, the church. He's the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that in everything,

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Jesus might be preeminent. For in Him, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. Now, correct me if I'm wrong here, but when it comes to who's the greatest,

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I'm pretty sure Jesus has that locked down and that there isn't anyone who even comes in as a close second.

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So the disciples were arguing with one another about who was the greatest in the presence of the greatest.

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How blind do you need to be? That shows you just how turned around the devil has us all, thinking about me, constantly thinking about me, my passions, my needs, my desires, what

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I want. It's kind of like Veruca's salt from Charlie and the

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Chocolate Factory. So they were arguing with one another about who's the greatest.

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Luke's account says this, in Luke 22, starting at verse 24, a dispute also arose among them as to which of them was regarded as the greatest.

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And Jesus said, the kings and the Gentiles, they exercise, and listen to the word, lordship over them.

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Isn't that what it's all about? Lordship, control. I'm going to make you do my will, right?

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And those in authority over them, they're called benefactors, but not so with you. You see, don't you know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?

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And now we're starting to see what that really means. So Jesus says, rather let the greatest among you become as the youngest, like a child who only can be given to, and the leader as one who serves, or who is a slave.

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For who is the greater, the one who reclines at the table, or the one who serves? Now the obvious answer to that is the one who reclines at the table is the one who's the greatest.

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But then Jesus says this, but I am among you as the one who serves.

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Pay attention. That's kind of important when it comes to holiness. So James continues, the wisdom that is from above, then, the wisdom that comes from God, it is first, and listen to these words, and tell me if they don't just have a rather calming effect.

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The wisdom from above is pure. It's peaceable. Gentle. It's open to reason.

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It can be reasoned with. Have you ever noticed that those who are following their own sinful passions cannot be reasoned with?

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They cannot be spoken to. Speaking to them sets them off.

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That's a sure sign that your sinful nature is in the driver's seat. It's open to reason.

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Full of mercy and good fruits. It's impartial.

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Sincere. What a great list. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.

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So James continues. So what causes quarrels? What causes fights among you? What causes discord, disunity, all of the ugliness that is part of our world?

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Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?

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These passions burble up from your sinful nature, from your old Adam. So you desire, you lust, you covet, and you don't have simple solutions, so you murder.

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And if you're too afraid to actually go and get a gun and kill the person that you are jealous of, you can always just destroy their reputation via gossip.

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You covet and you can't obtain, so you fight and you quarrel, and you don't have because you don't ask.

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And then when you do ask, you don't receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions.

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Me, me, me, I, I, I, I've got to be in charge. I've got to be the one who gets all the glory, just like the devil.

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You adulterous people, do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God?

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And there's the context. Therefore, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world, and being a friend of the world in this context is talking about pursuing your sinful, self -centered, bent -in -on -yourself passions.

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Whoever wishes to be a friend of the world, and by the way, this is what the world is all about, whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

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Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says that God yearns jealously over the spirit that He has made to dwell in us, which is

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His Holy Spirit, but He gives even more grace. Therefore, it says God opposes the proud, but He gives grace to the humble.

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And now James is doing what so many pastors need to do, calling

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Christians to repent, because this repentance thing is not a flu shot.

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Oh, I repented back in 1978. Why would I need to do that again?

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Yeah, this repentance is a daily thing. Sometimes hourly.

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Sometimes minute -by -minute thing. See, God opposes the proud, but He gives grace to the humble.

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The one who recognizes that he is a poor, miserable sinner in need of a Savior is the one whom

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God gives grace to. So submit yourselves to God. Resist the devil.

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And the way you resist the devil is to say, I'm a sinner, and He will flee from you. Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.

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Now, one of the things I find fascinating is that so many people on a cursory look at James' epistle somehow think that James and Paul are teaching the exact opposite thing when it comes to holiness and sanctification.

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I beg to differ. They are teaching the exact same thing. Consider what Paul writes in Philippians 2, starting at verse 3.

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Paul writes, Do nothing from selfish ambition or vain conceit.

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You see, that's the nubbins of the problem. But in, listen to the word, humility, count others as more significant than yourselves.

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What does Jesus say? Deny yourself. Take up your cross.

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Follow me. And this is what Paul's saying. So then let each one of you look not only to his own interests, but you need to look also to the interests of others.

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And have this mind among yourselves which is yours in Christ Jesus. And here comes what is called the

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Christ hymn, an actual hymn plugged into the book of Philippians. And here's what it says.

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Who though he was by nature God, he did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped.

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Instead, he emptied himself by taking the form of a slave. And being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

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And see, in our gospel text, the beginning of it, Jesus is explaining to his disciples, boys,

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I'm going to Jerusalem. When I get there, they're going to arrest me, they're going to put me on trial, they're going to crucify me,

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I'm going to die. And then I'm going to rise again. And you'll note that none of this even registered with them.

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Jesus might as well have been saying wah -wah, wah -wah, wah -wah, wah -wah, wah -wah, wah -wah. They didn't get it at all.

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Why? Because they were buying into the world's system, the world's moral values, which aren't even moral.

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They were arguing already, kind of thinking, Jesus is going to Jerusalem. Oh, he's going to set up his kingdom.

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I need to make sure that I've got the right position in his cabinet and can exercise authority and all this kind of stuff.

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This is why they're arguing about who's the greatest. They're jockeying for cabinet positions in the administration that Jesus is going to set up.

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And they didn't hear a word that he said about him going to the cross and dying. And it's important that he did, because he had to go to the cross to bleed and die for all of that sinful, selfish ambition of theirs on that same road.

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And the good news, this is that Christ has bled and died for all of your selfish ambitions, all of your vain conceit, all of my jealousies, all of your coveting, all of your murdering and your slander.

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He's died and bled for all of this. And he sets you free.

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And this mercy and grace is not for the proud. It is only for the humble. It is only for those who recognize that they are sin sick and in need of this mercy and grace.

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And for those who recognize this, there is unlimited grace from Christ.

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So he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

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Therefore God has highly exalted him, bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that the name of Jesus, every knee will bow in heaven on earth and under the earth.

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And every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the

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Father. So James says this. Cleanse your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you double -minded.

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Be wretched and mourn and weep. Recognize your sinful passions for what they are.

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Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the

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Lord and he will lift you up. Come to him naked, poor, pitiable, sinful, wretched and say,

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I have really messed up here. I have not checked my assumptions. I thought it was all about me and that's the problem.

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Have mercy on me, a sinner, and he will forgive you and he will exalt you.

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He will raise your body on the last day and you will spend eternity with him.

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I love the confession of sins that is in the Lutheran service book when people come to me for private confession and absolution.

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It really gets at the heart of this. In that liturgy, in that little rite, people spend time with me when they confess their sins privately because they're struggling.

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Here's what it says. The person who is there to receive forgiveness says, Pastor, please hear my confession and pronounce forgiveness in order to fulfill

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God's word. I get one word here. Proceed. And now comes the best confession ever.

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The person says, I, a poor, miserable sinner, plead guilty before God of all sins.

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I have lived as if God did not matter and as if I mattered the most.

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My Lord's name I have not honored as I should. My worship and prayers have faltered and I have not let his love have its way with me and so my love for others has failed.

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And there it is. I have not let God's love have its way for me and so my love for others has failed.

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Friendship with the world is enmity with God. When God's love has its way with you, you will love others.

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We forgive because we are forgiven. We love because we are loved. So I have not let

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God's love have its way with me. My love for others has failed. There are those whom I have hurt, those whom

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I have failed to help, and my thoughts and desires have been soiled with sin.

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This is what it means and this is what it sounds like to humble yourself in the sight of the

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Lord, to recognize your participation in the satanic system of this world and buying into the assumption that it's all about me.

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But Jesus is very clear that all of the commandments of God are boiled down to two and all of the commandments hang on these two, to love the

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Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.

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So if you think holiness is all about listing off the things that you have abstained from, you are far from a proper understanding of holiness.

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Holiness is not about what you have abstained from. Holiness is about whom you have loved and have you loved them well?

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Have you, as James said, been peaceable? Have you, as James said, been full of mercy?

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Have you been gentle, kind, impartial, sincere? If not, then you have been satanic, demonic, and worldly.

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And remember this. Love covers a multitude of sins. And so we must again repent.

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We must again say that we have fallen short. We must again say that we have not properly grasped what holiness really is.

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And look to the crucified Savior, who, though He was God, came to earth, born of the

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Virgin Mary, lived in abject poverty in the backwaters of Judea 2 ,000 years ago, and humbled

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Himself and went all the way to the most ignominious and painful death ever, death on a cross.

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And He did this for you. And He did it for me. And this then informs us how our love should be for each other.

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And it gives a whole new dimension to this idea of deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me.

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I think the words of Peter from 1 Peter are very fitting then in this context to kind of wrap up this thought.

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Peter writes in 1 Peter 1 .13, Therefore, preparing your minds for action.

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Action. We Christians are people of action. Faith without works is dead.

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You say you have faith, but there's no works. I'm going to show you my faith by what I do, James says, and he's right.

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Just as the body that is not breathing is dead, faith without works is dead. Peter says, prepare your minds for action, you

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Christians. Be sober -minded. Set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Christ Jesus.

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So first and foremost, set before you the cross and the mercy and grace that is there and will be revealed when

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Jesus comes. So as obedient children then, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, your old sinful flesh.

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But as He who called you is holy, you also be holy in all of your conduct.

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Since it is written, you shall be holy for I am holy. And if you call on Him as Father who judges impartially according to each one's deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile, knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, but with the very precious blood of Christ like a lamb without blemish or spot.

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He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in these last times for the sake of you who through Him are believers in God, who raised

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Him from the dead and gave Him glory so that your faith and hope are in God. So then having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth, which is another way of saying purified your souls by belief and trust in Christ for the forgiveness of all of your sins.

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So having purified yourselves by your obedience to the truth for a sincere and brotherly love, now love one another earnestly from a pure heart.

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And the reason for this is because you have already been born again not of perishable seed but of imperishable through the living and abiding

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Word of God. Grant us repentance, Lord, for our false assumptions.

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Grant us repentance, Lord, to recognize our selfish ambitions, our vain conceits, our envying and our coveting and all the different ways that we have mistreated people because of our love for self that we've inherited from our parents and given to us by the devil himself.

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May you, Lord, increase in us love, unity, peace and joy in your spirit.

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And give us, Lord, according to your great mercy and grace, a pure love for each other, a brotherly love for each other so that peace may reign in our hearts and reign among us.

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The peace that has been given to us by Jesus who has bled and died for our sins.

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In the name of Jesus, Amen. We thank you for your support.

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