mondayschoolblog

Luke 15    (click on the pic to listen to it)

11 To illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story: “A man had two sons. 12 The younger son told his father, ‘I want my share of your estate now before you die.’ So his father agreed to divide his wealth between his sons.

13 “A few days later this younger son packed all his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all his money in wild living. 14 About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land, and he began to starve. 15 He persuaded a local farmer to hire him, and the man sent him into his fields to feed the pigs. 16 The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him. But no one gave him anything.

17 “When he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, ‘At home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and here I am dying of hunger! 18 I will go home to my father and say, “Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, 19 and I am no longer worthy of being called your son. Please take me on as a hired servant.”’

20 “So he returned home to his father. And while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, and kissed him. 21 His son said to him, ‘Father, I have sinned against both heaven and you, and I am no longer worthy of being called your son.’

In his book, The Ragamuffin Gospel, Brennan Manning shared this true story:

“A story is told about Fiorello LaGuardia, who, when he was mayor of New York City during the worst days of the Great Depression and all of WWII, was called by adoring New Yorkers ‘the Little Flower’ because he was only five foot four and always wore a carnation in his lapel. He was a colorful character who used to ride the New York City fire trucks, raid speakeasies with the police department, take entire orphanages to baseball games, and whenever the New York newspapers were on strike, he would go on the radio and read the Sunday funnies to the kids. One bitterly cold night in January of 1935, the mayor turned up at a night court that served the poorest ward of the city. LaGuardia dismissed the judge for the evening and took over the bench himself. 

Within a few minutes, a tattered old woman was brought before him, charged with stealing a loaf of bread. She told LaGuardia that her daughter’s husband had deserted her, her daughter was sick, and her two grandchildren were starving. But the shopkeeper, from whom the bread was stolen, refused to drop the charges. “It’s a real bad neighborhood, your Honor.” the man told the mayor. “She’s got to be punished to teach other people around here a lesson.” LaGuardia sighed. He turned to the woman and said “I’ve got to punish you. The law makes no exceptions–ten dollars or ten days in jail.” But even as he pronounced sentence, the mayor was already reaching into his pocket. He extracted a bill and tossed it into his famous sombrero saying: “Here is the ten-dollar fine which I now remit; and furthermore I am going to fine everyone in this courtroom fifty cents for living in a town where a person has to steal bread so that her grandchildren can eat. Mr. Baliff, collect the fines and give them to the defendant.” So the following day the New York City newspapers reported that $47.50 was turned over to a bewildered old lady who had stolen a loaf of bread to feed her starving grandchildren, fifty cents of that amount being contributed by the red-faced grocery store owner, while some seventy petty criminals, people with traffic violations, and New York City policemen, each of whom had just paid fifty cents for the privilege of doing so, gave the mayor a standing ovation.”

When we read the story of the prodigal son we compare ourselves to the son in regard to our sinfulness, our rebellion, and our desperation. We tend to focus on our waywardness and our need for God.  Romans 3:23 reminds us that all of us has fallen short of the glory of God.  It is true that we are lost without a relationship with God but that’s not the main message of the story. There is another similarity between the prodigal son and each of us that is harder to spot, and is much more dangerous. It’s the way he related to his father. It’s the tendency he had to measure his worth and his identity by his own good or bad deeds.

The prodigal son deserved to be punished. Disowned. Banished from his father presences forever.  He knew it and so did the crowd listening to the story. The people listening to Jesus’ story have been under the tyranny of legalism and law their whole life. The boy deserved to be punished! Instead, before he could reach his father,  his father runs to him! Filled with love and compassion, he ran to him! He ignores the constraints and constructs of society says is the right thing to do and hugs and kisses him …. A lot!! As you look at the passage, while the son is buried in his father’s arms, he remembers something.  He doesn’t deserve this. This is isn’t right. This is isn’t fair. This is what logic says, anyway. He tries to wiggle his way out of the embrace so he can give his speech. The son gets his speech out and the people listening are thinking, “Oh, I’ll take notes on that speech. That speech is going to work. You watch, he’s going to win his dad over with that one.”  But the speech is interrupted.  He ignores its logic. It’s flawed any way. Instead he honors his son with a party.

What did the son do to get the party? Nothing. He didn’t deserve it all! He didn’t do anything. It wasn’t about Him. It wasn’t about what he did or didn’t do.  It was about the grace of the father.  The wayward son simply had to accept the forgiveness the father offered him. He simply had to show up at the celebration. The father never stopped loving Him. They father never gave up on the relationship. The father patiently waited for the son’s return.

The story of the prodigal son serves as a beautiful picture of what grace looks like. He didn’t deserve the party, the sandals, the robe, and a new start. The people listening to the story for the first time would had been in shock that the father took him back. They knew what he deserved.  The prodigal son received grace!

What is grace?

Grace is not a get out of jail free card.

Grace is not a cover up of sin.

Grace is not a rug to sweep the nasty stuff under.

Grace is not a license to keep on sinning.

Romans 6 tells us: Well then, should we keep on sinning so that God can show us more and more of his wonderful grace? 2 Of course not! Since we have died to sin, how can we continue to live in it?

There are people who abuse grace.

My dad owned a Christmas business. We (his workers)  each got paid by the number of wreathes we could produce. The more wreathes you made the more money you would get paid. Each day we (on the honor system) had to record the number of Christmas wreathes we made. My dad hired a guy who just got out of jail. He wanted to help and give him some money. After a couple of weeks, the man wrote down that he made a  100 wreathes on one particular day. The amazing thing is, he did it in 5 hours. Another amazing thing is, there has only been one guy who made a hundreds wreathes in a day and it took him over 14 hours. This guy had worked for my dad for over 10 years. When the man came in to get his pay my dad asked if he could come in the next day and show him how he made 100 wreathes in 5 hours. My dad told him that he wanted to train the other workers to do the same thing. My dad gave him the money but they guy never showed up again. My dad didn’t belittle him. My dad encouraged him and wanted to give him a chance to be truthful. My dad showed him grace, the man didn’t know what to do with it.

There are some people who abuse grace. They live like the devil and some still call themselves Christians. That is MIND-BOGGLING impossible.

There are people who do use grace as a “get out of jail free” card. There are people who use grace as a cover up for sin. There are people who use grace as a license to keep on sinning. People who do this don’t know what grace is. They don’t know what to do with the gift they have been given so they make it into something it isn’t. People who abuse grace make it tempting for us to qualify grace and hem it in with restrictions and rules so that people won’t abuse it.   If we put restrictions and rules on grace to keep people from abusing it we will invalidate the very truths that would set people free.

If you remember the story about LaGuardia,  the grandmother who stole the bread. She was guilty.  It was a crime and there was a fine to be paid. The woman accepted the 47.50 and let him pay the fine.  How do you think that woman felt when she left the court room?

What grace is:

Grace is more than a principle that can be taught.

Grace is more than a good idea.

Grace is more than a doctrine or dogma.

Grace is more than a cover up for sin.

Grace is a person.   Jesus is grace!

Look at John 1:14-17

¹⁴ And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth. ¹⁵ (John bore witness about him, and cried out, “This was he of whom I said, ‘He who comes after me ranks before me, because he was before me.’”) ¹⁶ For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace.¹⁷ For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.

These verses say that Jesus was “full of grace and truth,” and that from that fullness we have received “grace upon grace.” In other words, he embodied grace. He oozed grace. He was grace. After people met Jesus, they probably said things like, “this man is different. That man has grace all over him.” Jesus gave people a picture of grace. They watched him and listened to him, and for the rest of their lives, they didn’t have to wonder what grace looked like. Anyone who met Jesus  knew what grace looks like.

Watch this clip. It will give you a beautiful picture of grace. (click here)

Isn’t that a beautiful picture of grace?

Judah Smith, who wrote the book, Jesus is ____________,  says this, “When you realize that grace is a person and not a principal to be lived out and possibly abused, abusing grace is no longer an option.  It is easy to abuse a principle, to manipulate system, or to excuse away a doctrine but is it much harder to abuse a person or violate a relationship.”

Let’s think about this for a moment. If you have a best friend, or you are married, or you have a significant other in your life right now, would you abuse the relationship? Of course not.  Why not? Because you don’t have a relationship with a principle or an idea – you have a relationship with a person.

You don’t commit to loving the idea of marriage – you commit to loving the person.

You don’t commit to the idea of a friendship – you commit to being that person’s friend.

You don’t commit to the idea of having a significant other – you commit to being their significant other.  

If you are committed to him or her – there is no way you would abuse the relationship.

Grace is a person and Jesus is grace! When you meet him – you meet grace.

Grace was nailed to a tree. Grace was abused, ridiculed, mocked, beaten, and suffered because he believes having a relationship with you is the most important thing in the world. He didn’t die to solve the issues of the world. He didn’t die to make the world perfect. He didn’t die to condemn the world. He died to save the through world.

It is only because of grace that we can be in a relationship with God

Look at these scriptures:

Ephesians 2:8-9 (NLT)

⁸ God saved you by his grace when you believed. And you can’t take credit for this; it is a gift from God. ⁹ Salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so none of us can boast about it.

Acts 15:11 (NLT)

¹¹ We believe that we are all saved the same way, by the undeserved grace of the Lord Jesus.”

Romans 11:6 (NLT)

⁶ And since it is through God’s kindness, then it is not by their good works. For in that case, God’s grace would not be what it really is—free and undeserved.

When you understand and feel his relentless love for you (like the prodigal son did) it will not motivate you to sin, it will motivate you to righteousness. It will motivate you to do the right thing.

Do you know him? Not do you know about Him. There are a lot of people who know about Him. Do you know Him?

Like the father, He is waiting for you to come home and experience his grace and throw a party on your behalf.

Scripture – Romans 12:17-21

¹⁷ Never pay back evil with more evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honorable. ¹⁸ Do all that you can to live in peace with everyone.

¹⁹ Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say,

“I will take revenge;
I will pay them back,”
says the Lord.

²⁰ Instead,

“If your enemies are hungry, feed them.
If they are thirsty, give them something to drink.
In doing this, you will heap
burning coals of shame on their heads.”

²¹ Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.

The Message

^17-19 Don’t hit back; discover beauty in everyone. If you’ve got it in you, get along with everybody. Don’t insist on getting even; that’s not for you to do. “I’ll do the judging,” says God. “I’ll take care of it.”

^20-21 Our Scriptures tell us that if you see your enemy hungry, go buy that person lunch, or if he’s thirsty, get him a drink. Your generosity will surprise him with goodness. Don’t let evil get the best of you; get the best of evil by doing good.

Leonardo Da Vinci, just before he commenced work on his “last supper” painting had a violent argument with a fellow painter.  Leonardo was so bitter that he determined to paint the face of his enemy, the other artist, into the face of Judas, and thus take revenge by handing the man down in infamy and scorn to succeeding generations. The face of Judas was, therefore, one of the first he finished.  And everyone could easily recognize it as the face of the painter with whom he had quarreled.

But when it came to paint the face of Christ, he could make no progress. Something seemed to be baffling him, holding him back, frustrating his best efforts. Finally he came to the conclusion that the thing that was frustrating him was that he had painted the face of his enemy onto the face of Judas.  He painted out the face of Judas and was then able to resume his work on the face of Jesus and this time he did it with success that the ages have acclaimed. When Davinci moved past his right to take revenge and made the right response instead, he broke the power of hatred and allowed the love of Christ to have the last word.

We like revenge taking revenge or seeing revenge taking place makes us feel good. Revenge only leads to more hurt. But we love revenge. We call it justification for what they did wrong. Like when the guy goes speeding past you and a few miles down the road you see that a state trooper has pulled them over. There is this feeling of “justice served” that wells up inside of us.

Or we like the story  of the trucker who was in a restaurant  was minding his own business and a motorcycle gang began to harass him. On in particular got in his face and said “Big man in the 18 wheeler, out of your truck you’re a wimp.” And he continued to shout at him then pouring his coffee all over his food. The trucker pays his bill and walks out. The biker says to the waitress, “he’s not much of a man out of his truck” the waitress shoots back, “not much of a truck driver either he just ran over 6 motorcycles on the way out.”

Justice served! They got what they deserved. We like that kind of story. It appeals to our human nature. When we get cut down, betrayed, or hurt we like some clever way to get back.  When we do get them back. Or when something happens to them that gets them – we rejoice in that they got what they deserved.

When it comes to revenge a Christ follower has no rights. We have no entitlement to take revenge on anyone.

Look at what Romans 12:19 says, ¹⁹ Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say,

“I will take revenge;
I will pay them back,”
says the Lord.

As in the Davinci story we are to let the love of Christ have the last word.

Are you saying to me pastor that if someone hurts me, betrays me, stabs me in the back, and does all kind of evil things against me – I can’t do anything back? If you are a follower of Christ …. No …. You can’t.

Do you just have to sit and take it? No …. You don’t!

Look at what God is asking us to do?

• “if your enemies are hungry feed them.”
• “if your enemies are thirsty give them something to drink.”
• In doing this, you will heap
  burning coals of shame on their heads.”
• Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good.

As a follower of Christ – this is what you are entitled to do. That is impossible! You are absolutely right.  God is asking us to allow the supernatural to happen but we must be willing to give up the need for revenge. Revenge just makes us feel good about ourselves but it accomplishes absolutely nothing.

A few months ago I introduced you to Saeed Abidini.  He has been imprisoned by the Iranian government for believing in Jesus Christ.  Several months ago he wrote this letter to his wife.

Dear Naghmeh,

I have been stung so many times that I have become full of poison. This is an Iranian saying. A lot of people say that they have been stung by so many people who their whole being is full of poison like a poisonous snake. It means that we have been bitten by the snakes of this world so many times that, that all of the poison has collected in us and that we are like the poisonous snake. But if we sting anyone, we will die. This Iranian saying is full of spirit of revenge and unforgiveness and every time I would hear this in Iran, I would get very sick hearing it.

A few days ago they brought a young war veteran who was disabled in 80% of his body in my cell. He had been put in solitary confinement with his horrific condition. And this had made him very mad and he kept saying “why did they do this to me? I gave my whole life for their sake. See what they have done to me!!!” And when he would get very mad he would say “I will take my revenge!”

I spoke to this young man until 4 in the morning. I spent time with him and spoke to him to forgive. When we don’t forgive, we drink the poison ourselves and then wait for the other person to die. And we take the knife that has hurt us and we stab ourselves with it again! And this is the will of the evil one who wants to destroy us.

But when we forgive, we pour out the poison of the enemy and of the devil and we don’t let the poison stay in us and we don’t let the poison make us into poisonous snakes! So that we don’t become like the person we despised and who persecuted and tortured us.

If we don’t forgive we take revenge. We might not run over motorcycles or physically hurt someone. We can also be silent or give someone the cold shoulder. We can talk about them behind their back. We can throw knives at them in our dreams. We can wish they would have justice serve to them.

We can’t change what people have done to us. We can’t change their attitude toward us. We can’t change what our enemies think of us. What we can do when people do evil against us is love them sacrificially.

It would be much easier to give them the cold shoulder, hurt them physically or emotionally, or just talk about how awful they are behind their back. As Christ followers – we are called to love them sacrificially.

Look at the evil things they did Jesus. Did Jesus just sit around and do nothing?  NO! He loved them sacrificially. He said, “Father forgive them because they don’t  know what they are doing.”

Look at Joseph in the OT. They threw him a sewage pit. They sold him as a slave. He was framed for rape. He was thrown into prison and forgotten about.  He had every reason to grow bitter. He had every reason to retaliate. When he was put into power he could have easily destroyed his brothers.  What he decided to do was love them sacrificially.

Look at what he says to his brothers in Genesis 50:19

¹⁹ But Joseph replied, “Don’t be afraid of me. Am I God, that I can punish you? ²⁰ You intended to harm me, but God intended it all for good. He brought me to this position so I could save the lives of many people.

Did  you see what Joseph did? He repaid good for evil!

What is the major stumbling block that keeps us from being able repay good for evil? Not being able to forgive!

Forgiving others opens the door for God to do a work in them. Forgiving others soften their heart toward God. We want Christ NOT US to have the last word!

When you forgive you are giving Christ the last word.

Look at what these scriptures say;

Matthew 5

⁴³ “You have heard the law that says, ‘Love your neighbor’ and hate your enemy. ⁴⁴ But I say, love your enemies! Pray for those who persecute you! ⁴⁵ In that way, you will be acting as true children of your Father in heaven.

Matthew 6:12-13

¹² and forgive us our sins,
    as we have forgiven those who sin against us.
¹³ And don’t let us yield to temptation,
    but rescue us from the evil one.

The scriptures continue to remind us in Ephesians 4:32

³² Instead, be kind to each other, tender-hearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.

How do you heap burning coals on someone’s head. Forgive them!

Jesus makes forgiveness a pretty big deal.

How do you forgive those who have betrayed you, abused you, or done you wrong in some way!

To forgive is a willful choice. It is a point in time decision.

• To forgive isn’t a feeling. It is a willful decision you have to make in your mind. Forgiveness is not going to happen just because you say “I forgive you.” It is a decision you make.

Forgiveness is a process. It is a journey of aligning  our will and emotions.

• We might have made the conscious decision to forgive but our emotions don’t always go with our decision. Past memories  still hurt. When  you see them or have to deal with them or the issue – emotions are going to come.
• How do you align your emotions up with what you have decided to do?
  • Pray for them
  • Pray for yourself
  • Then Bless them (do good to them for the evil they have done to you.)

There comes a point when you will be able to rejoice with them when something good happens to them and mourn with them when something bad happens to them. When
your emotions have caught up with your decision the process is over.

You have forgiven them.  You have given up your need for revenge. As followers of Christ we want Christ – not us – to have the last word in someone’ s life. When we forgive,  (like Saeed said earlier) we pour out the poison of the enemy and of the devil and we don’t let the poison stay in us and we don’t let the poison make us into poisonous snakes! So that we don’t become like the person we despised and who persecuted and tortured us.

Forgiveness releases the poison in us that is destroying us. Forgiveness conquerors evil with good. Forgiveness allows Christ to have the last word.

Make a willful choice to forgive  (write down their name, what they did, you’re feeling towards them)

Begin praying for them/yourself  (father forgive them for they don’ t know what they are doing or did.

Bless them  – genuinely do something that allows Christ to have the last word.  

Romans 12: 9-12  (NLT)

(click on the pic to listen to it to)

⁹ Don’t just pretend to love others. Really love them. Hate what is wrong. Hold tightly to what is good. ¹⁰ Love each other with genuine affection, and take delight in honoring each other. ¹¹ Never be lazy, but work hard and serve the Lord enthusiastically. ¹² Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying.

From The Message:

^9-10 Love from the center of who you are; don’t fake it. Run for dear life from evil; hold on for dear life to good. Be good friends who love deeply; practice playing second fiddle.

^11-13 Don’t burn out; keep yourselves fueled and aflame. Be alert servants of the Master, cheerfully expectant. Don’t quit in hard times; pray all the harder. Help needy Christians; be inventive in hospitality.

His name was Bud. He was a factory worker with more than a slight resemblance to Archie Bunker. Every single day he’d come home sweaty and dirty. He’d go in the back door, grab an alcoholic beverage of choice from the frig, and plop himself down in front of the TV until his wife brought him supper.

One day as he was driving to work he happened to come across a Christian psychologist on the radio – kinda’ of a local version of James Dobson. And something the commentator said  stuck in his mind that love and marriage are about sacrifice. And it hit him – no, convicted him – that he’d been expecting his wife to sacrifice for him but he’d never really sacrificed for her. It was though a relational light bulb came on and he knew that he had to do something about it. So he decided that he was going to surprise her the next day. Before coming home he showered and shaved. He went to the florist and bought flowers and instead of going in the back door he went to the front door he went to the front and rang the bell.

When he answered the door he held out the flowers and said – “Honey, they’re for you. I love you!”

She looked at him, her mouth dropped open. Tears filled her eyes.

And she said, “I’ve had a terrible day. Billy broke his leg and I had to take him to the hospital. No sooner had I got home then the phone rang. It was your mother and she’s coming  to visit for two weeks. I tried to do the wash but the machine broke and there’s water all over the basement floor. And now, you come home drunk!”

Poor Bud. He somehow  knew the concept of love was wonderful. However, he soon discovered that love relationships are difficult and messy and we are not very good at it by nature. There’s a lot of pain and disillusionment involved in opening your heart to another person and all the baggage from our past is many times pulled into our present relationships.

But, let’s give Bud credit; he’d finally got the right idea! Love manifests itself in sacrificial action. Love and sacrifice go hand in hand with husband’s and wives, brother’s and sisters, with team mates, with business partners, with God and humanity. Bud had the right idea – loving someone cost you something.

When you love someone you change the way you think about them. You also change how you relate to them. When loving others you change!

God is challenging us through Romans 12:9-12 to love without pretending.

We can figure out when others are pretending to love us. It usually incases them wanting something from you. Salespeople pretend to love you in the moment they are trying to sell you something. Once you buy or don’t buy you are forgotten all about.  It is fairly easy to recognize when someone is pretending to love you.

We also can figure out when we are pretending to love others. We become salespeople trying to sell something or prove something to somebody. We know when we are pretending and we know when others are pretending. Don’t we? All of us have had moments when we have pretended to love something or someone.  We are all guilty.

How do you love without pretending?

First of all we need to look at why we pretend.  The reason we pretend is because we have an inaccurate view of ourselves. We either think too highly of ourselves which affects how we love others. Or with think too lowly of ourselves which affects how we love others. So we pretend. If we think too highly of ourselves we become  spiritual snobs. So we try to prove to others that we can be humble. If we think to lowly of ourselves we become a spiritual doormat and become people with no spiritual back bone. So we try to prove to others that we have some spiritual backbone.

When we try to prove to others anything – we just become pretenders.

Those who are being transformed (like Bud) don’t pretend. Bud wasn’t pretending. He had a God moment. A Damascus road experience.  He was humbled by God. Bud began to think in a different way. Bud began to think of his wife more than himself. His motives were genuine.

We don’t have to prove anything to anybody. We are already God’s greatest joy and greatest asset.

My wife has never asked me to prove to her that I love her. My kids have never asked me to prove to them  I love them.  But because of the relationship we have  – I get to love her, I get to love them. I don’t have to pretend and I can’t pretend because they are going to call me out when I do pretend. Loving them hasn’t always been easy and loving me hasn’t been easy for them. Loving someone else has never been easy.  We all need to work hard at it.

How do you love without pretending? Stop trying to prove yourself to others.

I love the moments when my kids got so angry at me  that they would say, “Dad, I hate you!” I would walk out of the room and go “YES!” (with arm pump). They didn’t pretend. They were honest.

Once we stop pretending we can get about the business that of genuinely loving others.

We need to learn how to love others. To love them genuinely you need to take an interest in them. Not just lip service interest,  but actually showing up at their house, or an event they are in, or at the hospital. The thing is . . . . all you have to do is show up and take an interest.

How do you love without pretending? Learn how to play second fiddle.

We need to love others. Because when we love others, it allows God to work in their heart and soften it. When you are loving others  genuinely, you are not expecting them to love you back.

Genuine love is sacrificial.

John 15:13  “There is no greater love than to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.”

You can’t fake sacrifice. When you do sacrifice it affects someone else’s life and it make an impact. They are forever changed.

Listen and watch the impact that one’s father sacrifice had on is Son.  (just click here to watch).

I believe this is kind of sacrifice we are called to  make as followers of Christ.

Why are we so afraid to sacrifice? We see stories like this (The Hoyts) and our heart is overwhelmed with emotion because we know that it is the right thing to do. And the Holy Spirit stirs in us saying “that should be me –  sacrificing for others whether they can love me back or not.” There is only one answer I could up with. It is because we are afraid we might have to do it again and again and again. And are life – the way we planned is totally ruined. Yep …. That is what happens. Your life is changed forever. And when  you love sacrificially,  it becomes addicting. You get to do it again and again and again. Team Hoyt has run together for over 35 years and has ran in over 1,000 races (30+ races have been marathons). Their last race will be the next Boston Marathon in 2014.

God is somewhat dependent (not codependent) on us to love others sacrificially. To love others sacrificially  softens their heart toward God. We are not called to necessarily to do something great; we are called to do small things with great love. It is the small things we do with great love that have the greatest impact on someone’s life.

Genuine love is action

We can say we love each other and we can say we love others but if it is not followed up with action it is not love.

I can say I love my kids all I want but if is not following up with action – it is not love

I can say I love my wife all I want but if it is not followed up with action – it is not love.

I can say I love  my church all I want but it if it not followed up with action – it is not love.

I can say I love my neighbor all I want but if it is not followed up with action – it is not love.

I can say I love Jesus all I want but if is not followed up with action – it is not love.

Love is not a feeling. No one can fall in love with anyone. One can only commit to loving someone. Love is action word. It is not a noun, pronoun, or predicate. You don’t fall in love with someone. That is a myth. You commit to loving them. You commit to sacrificing for them. You commit to being there for them.

I Corinthians 13 reminds us what love look likes (from The Message)

Love never gives up.
Love cares more for others than for self.
Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have.
Love doesn’t strut,
Doesn’t have a swelled head,
Doesn’t force itself on others,
Isn’t always “me first,”
Doesn’t fly off the handle,
Doesn’t keep score of the sins of others,
Doesn’t revel when others grovel,
Takes pleasure in the flowering of truth,
Puts up with anything,
Trusts God always,
Always looks for the best,
Never looks back,
But keeps going to the end.

Romans 12:3    (in the context of Romans 12: 3-8)

³ Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us.                                                NLT

³ I’m speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you. Living then, as every one of you does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him.                                                                     The Message

“Many years ago a man conned his way into the orchestra of the emperor of China although he could not play a note. Whenever the group practiced or performed, he would hold his flute against his lips, pretending to play but not making a sound. He received a modest salary and enjoyed a comfortable living Then one day the emperor requested a solo from each musician. The flutist got nervous. There wasn’t enough time to learn the instrument. He pretended to be sick, but the royal physician wasn’t fooled. On the day of his performance, the impostor took poison and killed himself. The explanation of his suicide led to a phrase that found its way into the English language: “He refused to face the   music”.                     -Max Lucado –  Just like Jesus

A life that is being transformed isn’t afraid to face the music about themselves:

• We have all fallen short of the glory of God.
• We have all sinned against God.
• All of us have a checkered past.
• All of us have pride issues.
• All of us have insecurities.

We don’t have to respond like Adam and Eve did in the garden and go and run and hide. Not a one of us is exempt. God knows our insecurities. God knows our checkered past. God knows we have pride issues.  He needs us to be honest about them. Because that is when he can begin the transformation process.

We spend a lot of time being an impostor trying to cover up our pride and/or our insecurities. We either think to highly of ourselves and allow our pride to rule our life or we think to lowly of ourselves and allow our insecurities to rule our life. We need to face the music about ourselves and be honest in your evaluation of yourself, we are to measure ourselves by the faith God has given you.

Some translations of Romans 12:3  say we are to think soberly of ourselves. In other words don’t get drunk on yourself.

• A life that is being transformed doesn’t think they are better than they really are.
• A life that is being transformed doesn’t  think they are worse than they really are.
• A life that has been transformed doesn’t think of themselves at all.

Luke 14:11 puts this in perspective (NLT): ¹¹ For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

In other words, if you think to highly of yourself –  you will be humbled. If you think to lowly of yourself – you will be humbled.

A transformed life doesn’t think of themselves at all.  If you can remember the story of from a couple of weeks ago about the grasshopper and the ant,  according to little Marky (the little boy in the story), the ant didn’t think of himself at all. He simply gave it all to the grasshopper. The ant died so that the grasshopper could live. We need to allow the impostor in us to die. In order to really live. This high view of yourself or this low view of yourself needs to die!  They only view of yourself that matters is God thinks of you.

Those that have died, look at themselves honestly and realize that their value only comes from God and putting their faith in what God says about them. This allows them not to think about how really good they are or how really bad they are.  It doesn’t allow them to think of themselves at all.

A transformed life doesn’t think of themselves at all. A transformed life only cares about what God thinks of them.

His view of you is the only right one.

We have a culture that will define your view. We have friends that will define your view. You have a media culture that will define your view. We have people of influence that will define your view. Their view of you is only going to puff you up or tear you down. No one can give you and accurate view of yourself but God alone.

Look at how God views his own son in Matthew 3:16-17:

¹⁶ After his baptism, as Jesus came up out of the water, the heavens were opened^[a] and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and settling on him. ¹⁷ And a voice from heaven said, “This is my dearly loved Son, who brings me great joy.”

Not only does this apply to Jesus – but this is God’s view of you. You are His dearly beloved son or daughter – who brings him great joy!

YOU BRING HIM GREAT JOY! How can I bring God great joy? I have messed my life up. I have made too many mistakes. I have sinned against him. We have this inaccurate view that there is no way I can bring God great joy. You don’t have to do anything to bring him joy because you are His joy! Your mistakes and all. When he knit you together in your mothers’ womb you became his joy. He has already accepted you – will you step out in faith and accept His view of you?

Think about it.  Those of you who have kids or love kids and have been around kids at any time. We watch them mess up. We watch them disobey. And if you didn’t get angry at them when they did, you obviously didn’t care about them at all in the first place. We don’t throw them out of our house if they are disobedient or mess up.  Why? Because they are our joy! Despite all the disobedience and the mess ups – they still bring you joy. Don’t they?

God, who is much bigger than us and whose love for us is perfect, finds great joy in you.

My dad gave me a really good picture of this when I was a teenager.

I had just got my license. I got permission to take the car  and experience that freedom you get when you are behind the wheel of a car. The whole trip went well until I was just a few miles from home. I rammed into a ladies back left quarter panel – which she just got fixed. I was scared to death – The lady cussed me out in the cop car. I was in tears. I was messed up. After that I had to go home and tell my dad. I was scared to death once again. I told my dad what had happened. I was expected to be grounded, banned from the car for a few months. He simply said to me, “are you OK? Then he laughed at me and said, “The car can be fixed.”

My father gave me a beautiful picture of what was really important to him – His relationship with me.  I didn’t do anything to deserve my dad’s kindness. In reality I deserved his wrath. He showed me mercy and compassion.

God’s relationship with you is the most important thing to Him.  You are his joy!

• You are more important to Him than the Nation Debt.
• You are more important to Him than the government shutdown.
• You are more important to Him than a catastrophic event.

We deserve wrath – but we get to worship.

We deserve punishment – but we get to pray and ask forgiveness.

The scriptures go on to say:

John 15:15 – I no longer call you slaves, because a master doesn’t confide in his slaves. Now you are my friends, since I have told you everything the Father told me.

You are his friend! God has confidence in you! Despite your hang-ups, despite our shortcomings, despite our insecurities, YOU ARE HIS CONFIDANT! He trusts you. He has given you one or more spiritual gifts, he has given you talents and abilities. He has entrusted you with these things.

So whatever He  has put in you – you are to go and invest it in others.

If you have the gift of prophesy – then prophesy.

If you have the gift to serve others – then serve.

If you have the gift to teach – then teach.

If you have the gift to encourage – then encourage.

If you have the gift of giving  then give well

If you have the gift of leadership – then lead.

If you have the gift of showing kindness  to others – then show kindness.

I Peter 4:10  – ¹⁰ God has given each of you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another.

A lot of followers of Christ have a totally inaccurate view of themselves. They see themselves as God’s greatest disappointment instead of God’s greatest asset. They focus on their inadequacies and not their abilities They focus on their sinfulness and not forgiveness. They focus on their shortcomings instead of God’s short memory.

You are his greatest asset

A lot of us feel like J.E.

J.E. was a very angry man. In fact, at age 54 he’d been angry person for many years. In a Bible study one night, many questions had been raised in his mind. Talking with the leader afterward, J.E. said, “I asked Jesus to be my Savior when I was 9 years old. But nobody ever taught me about who I am in Christ, that I am accepted  by God or that Christ lives in me.”

“What were you taught?”, the Bible study leader asked. “Where I grew up, we heard all the time about how perfect Christ was and about how we should learn to live like Him – if we didn’t , God would judge us.” JE went on, “It didn’t take me very long, I’d say in my teen years, to figure out that I was never going to cut it. So I gave up trying. I guess I’ve been living in guilt and running from God ever since. Off and on through the years I tried to get back to church, but I just got more guilt piled up on top of me. I’ve sat under so many teachers who made me fearful that I was afraid to turn in any direction because God was going to get me. This is the first Bible study I’ve ever attended that gave me hope.”

No one ever told JE that he was God’s friend. No one ever told JE that he was God’s confidant. No one ever told JE that God trusted him. No one ever told JE that he was God’s greatest asset. He lived with an unhealthy fear of God. He was afraid that God was out to get him. He spent 45 years  running away from God.

Why is an accurate view of yourself so important? Because if you don’t understand how important you are to God – then he will never become important to you.

Look at what God says in Luke 12:48b:

When someone has been given much, much will be required in return; and when someone has been entrusted with much, even more will be required.

God has put a lot in you! You are the most important part of his story. He wants to be the most important part of your story.

Romans 12:2 (NLT)

² Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.

(click on the pic to hear it too)

From The Message:

Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.

Back in the late 90’s , Steve Jobs (Apple Computers Founder), challenged his employees to think different.

• If his employees said it was impossible – he said make it possible
• If his board members said it was impossible – he said I can make it possible.

They ended up doing what was deemed impossible – possible.

Back in 1994 he did an interview with PBS and was asked about his success.

This is what he said,

When you grow up you tend to get told the world is the way it is and your life is just to your life inside the world. Try not to bash into the walls too much. Try to have a nice family, have fun, save a little money.

That’s a very limited life. Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is – everything around you that you call life, was made up by people who were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it,  you can build your own things that other people can use.

The minute you understand that  you can poke life and actually something will, you know if you push in, something will pop out on the other side, that you can change it, mold it. That’s maybe the most important thing. It’s to shake off the erroneous notion that life is there and you’re just gonna live it, verses embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it.

I think that’s very important and however you learn that, once you learn it, you’ll want to change life and make it better, cause it’s kind of messed up, in a lot of ways. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.

What I hear Mr. Jobs saying is “don’t allow the things of this world to form you into it’s image.”  Be transformed by changing the way you think! We need to shake off the erroneous notion that life is not there just to live it  – embrace it, change it, improve it, and make your mark on it.

Jobs idea of changing the world  was creating gadgets that we didn’t know we needed.

Jesus idea of changing the world begins with you and me – by changing the way we think.

Steve Jobs is right when he says, ‘everything around you that you call life was made up by people no smarter than you.’ Everything you see around you, all the customs and behavior of this world are made up by people and they are designed to drag you down to its level of immaturity.

As a follower of Christ, We are not called to reflect the immaturity of the world. We are called to spiritually grow up and not give into the patterns for this world.

I read this true story this past week that reflected maturity.

Last week after continued reports of character issues such as bullying, academic trouble and rudeness toward their teachers, a high school coach in Utah suspended his 80-player team to help them begin thinking differently.

He got tired of the immaturity that his team was displaying off the field. He collected equipment from the players and explained that the team would not be permitted to play until they “proved themselves as human beings.”

“We felt like everything was going in a direction that we didn’t want our young men going,” said Labrum, an alumnus of the program he’s coached for the past two years. “We felt like we needed to make a stand.” 

The “suspension” only lasted one day; the team performed community service this past weekend instead of practicing for their upcoming game against another local high school. 

“We looked at it as a chance to say, ‘Hey, we need to focus on some other things that are more important than winning a football game,” Labrum said. “We got an emotional response from the boys. I think it really meant something to them, which was nice to see that it does mean something. There was none of them that fought us on it.”

Do you think his team began thinking differently? At least for a football season it did and maybe the rest of their life.

Jesus, too, is challenging us to think differently.

We are not here on this earth to become successful, financially secure, comfortable, self-centered, have a nice family, have fun, and save a little money.  This is a limited life.

All of these things reflect the patterns of this world. There is nothing wrong with any of those things. But if that is all you are living for, you are just reflecting the patterns of this world.

Throughout Biblical history (OT/NT) God has been changing the way people think.

God changed Abraham’s way of thinking. His dad, Terah, made and sold idols to worship for a living. Abraham worshipped only one God. God changed the way he thought.

God changed Moses way of thinking. Moses outburst of anger and bitterness lead to him to killing an Egyptian. Moses came back to Egypt and peacefully lead 2 million plus people out of Egypt. God changed the way he thought.

Jonah ran away from God. Got swallowed up by a big fish. Jonah had some time to think inside the fish. He was spit out and  he preached to the city of Nineveh – a nation was saved. God changed the way he thought.

Gideon a farmer became Gideon the army leader. God changed the way he thought

Mary, the virgin, became Mary the mother of the Son of God. God changed the way he thought.

Disciples who were fisherman became fishers of men. God changed the way they thought.

Disciples who were tax collectors began collecting people. God changed the way they thought

Nicodemus was a Pharisee. Nicodemus became a follower. God changed the way he thought.

Paul who persecuted the church became a pastor of many churches. God changed the way he thought.

Peter who denied Jesus 3 times declared Jesus to the world. God changed the way he thought.

And the list goes on. Zacheus, the woman at the well, the woman caught in adultery, the Roman centurion. You and I.

In order to live a transformed life – one must willingly surrender their thinking process to God. This is where the real battle is. We give Jesus our hearts but not many people give them their mind.

I met a young man at McD’s this past week. He struck up a conversation with me. I asked him if he was a believer. He said yes. He went on to say that he had done some really bad things growing up but he believed now that he has done more good things than bad and he was good enough now to get into heaven and that God wasn’t mad at Him anymore.

God had his heart – he was a really great guy.  But God didn’t have his mind.

Not only are we to give him our heart, soul, and strength – we are to give Him our mind. God wants us to stop and think and listen! God wants us to use the brain he has given us.

He wants to renew our mind but we must willingly surrender our mind to God.

How do you willingly surrender your mind to God?

1. This comes through the disciplines of the faith like fasting, reading, studying and meditating on his Word. When you do those things it allows the Holy Spirit to work in you.

2. Do what Philippians 4:8 tells us to do:

Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.

3. Do what 2 Corinthians 4:18  tells us to do “don’t look at the troubles we can see now; rather, we fix our gaze on things that cannot be seen. For the things we see now will soon be gone, but the things we cannot see will last forever.

Our culture will drag you down. We get mesmerized by it. We get caught up in it. We get influenced by it. We need to shake this erroneous notion that “life is there” and you’re just gonna live it. In other words we must not allow the culture to dictate life to us.

God is calling us to embrace our culture , change our culture, improve our culture, and make your mark on it. We can’t avoid our culture.  The disciples didn’t avoid their culture. They embraced their culture and took the message and the hope of Christ into it.

This is how you transform a culture.

By introducing others to the one who has transformed your life  and taking it (your life)  into a culture that is immature and longing for something much greater.

The transformation starts with you renewing your mind by surrendering your thinking process to God.

Think different! click on the pic to watch the bird-cage video. Pretty powerful!!

Scripture Romans 12 (NLT)

12 And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him.

12 ^1-2 So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. (The  Message)

The mother of a 9-year-old boy named Mark received a phone call in the middle of the afternoon.

It was the teacher from her son’s school.

“Mrs. Smith, something unusual happened today in your son’s third grade class. Your son did something that surprised me so much that I thought you should know about it immediately.”

The mother began to grow worried.

The teacher continued, “nothing like this has happened in all my ears of teaching. This morning I was teaching a lesson on creative writing. And as I always to, I tell the story of the ant and the grasshopper;

“The ant works hard all summer and stores up plenty of food. But the grasshopper plays all summer and does no work.

Then winter comes. The grasshopper begins to starve because he has no food. So he begins to beg, “Please Mr. Ant, you have so much food. Please let me eat, too?” then I said, “Boys and girls, your job is to write the ending of the story.”

Your son, Mark, raised his hand. “Teacher, may I draw a picture?”

“Well yes, Mark, if you like, you may draw a picture. But first you must write the ending to the story.”

“As in all the  years past, most of the students said the ant shared his food through the winter, and both the ant and the grasshopper lived.

A few children wrote, “No, Mr. Grasshopper, you should have worked in the summer. Now, I have just enough food for myself.” So the ant lived and the grasshopper died.”

But your son ended the story in a different way from any other child, ever.

He wrote, “So the ant gave all of his food to the grasshopper; the grasshopper lived through the winter. But the ant died.”

“And the picture? At the bottom of the page, Mark had drawn three crosses.”

All of us in here have a default setting. Look how most of the children responded, “The grasshopper deserved to die.” The other popular answer was “the ant shared with the grasshopper and they both lived.” Most of us in here would agree that there is nothing wrong with either of their answers.

But little Marky in this story  reveals the evidence of a transformed life.

The evidence of a  transformed life is a willingness to be a living sacrifice so that
others may live.

What does it mean to be a living a sacrifice? It basically means we sacrifice something or ourselves to give someone else life.

One of our default settings is getting what we think we deserve and giving what we think others deserve.

Being a living sacrifice is about loving others who you think don’t  deserve to be loved.

I John 4:11 says, “Beloved, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.”

John 3:16 says, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his one and only son.” Not because we deserved it but he willfully gave his life.

Romans 5:8 says But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.

The evidence of a transformed life is the fact that you believe everyone deserves to be loved. You believe that, “if God can love me, He can love anybody!”

• Think of the most annoying person you know – They deserved to be loved
• Think of the person who has hurt you the most – They deserved to be loved.

We don’t have to be their best friend. But when you love them it gives God the opportunity to transform their life.

There is a true story about a man named Jim Elliot.  Back in 1950 He was one of the missionaries that went to the Auca Indians to evangelize the Huaorani people  in Ecuador. People who had never heard the gospel before. It was such a profound story that they made a movie out of it called the End of the Spear.

Let me set up this scene you are about to watch. They had been dropping packages from the sky to the people for a while to show them that they were a friendly people and meant no harm. They finally decide to go and meet them.

Here is what happened next. Watch the clip here.

This is not the end of the story. Jim’s wife, Elizabeth, went back to the area where her husband was killed. She met the man who killed her husband – and eventually he became a Christ follower. Despite them killing her husband, these people deserved to be loved. Elizabeth Elliot and a team of other ladies went and loved them and eventually a whole tribe was born again.

Everyone deserves to know they are loved by God. Whether they love Him back is up to them Everyone deserves to know that Christ loved them so much that he died for them. Everyone deserves to be loved by another human being.

The evidence of a person whose life has been transformed is the willingness to love those who don’t deserve to be loved. There is a little song that reminds us that they will know we are Christians by the way we love.

When you love others who you don’t think deserve it   – something changes inside of you. Your love might not affect them at all but it will affect you. You will be changed.

I Peter 4:10 tells us “God has given each of you the  you a gift from his great variety of spiritual gifts. Use them well to serve one another

Philippians 2:3-4  tells us, “Don’t be selfish; don’t try to impress others. Be humble , thinking of others as better than yourselves. Don’t look out only for your own interests, but take an interest in others, too.

A couple of Thursdays ago, someone wronged me. I called them up and let this
person know they had wronged me. They didn’t show up on time. They caused me to be late to an important meeting. While waiting here at the church for him to show up, I called them and asked where they were at. I rudely told him
that his incompetence cost me a ½ hour.  I was hot. I was angry and I let him know that he was the cause of me being late and I hung up on him.

That was real Christian love,  wasn’t it? I was right! He had caused me to be late for an important meeting! I had every right to let him have it! But I was rude. Looking out for my own interest. There wasn’t an ounce of humility in my body.

I went to my default setting which is to verbally crucify someone who has wronged me. I shared this with two wonderful people. They both told me I need to call him back and ask for forgiveness.

I did!

Who do you think was changed in that moment? Both of us.

Being a living sacrifice is about allowing your default settings (the way you were programmed)  to die in you and allowing Christ to live in you and becoming a living sacrifice.

This starts the transformation!

Paul pleads with us to give our everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering.

Stop your complaining and start your confessing where you fall short.

Stop your taking from God and give yourself as a living sacrifice.

Why? Because of all he has done for you! Jesus gave his everyday, ordinary life and willingly placed it before God as an offering.

He is pleading with us to let our default settings die and begin to give life to those around us who don’t deserve it.

He is asking us to being a living sacrifice!

click on the pic to hear the sermon

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall.

Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.

All the king’s horses and all the king’s men

Couldn’t put Humpty Dumpty together again.

There are a couple of events in history that are tied to this nursery rhyme. Today it is a reminder that all of us have had a great fall.  Romans 3:23 says, ” ²³ For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.”                                                           

We all (100%) have fallen short. We all are broken.  We all have sinned. Not a one of us can measure up to God’s standard.

None of us can put ourselves together again. Nothing can put us back together again

Our friends can’t put us back together. Our parents can’t put us back together. Our church attendance can’t put us back together. Our Bible reading can’t put us back together. Your pastor can’t put you back together. You can’t put yourself back together.

Have you ever tried to put an egg back together? No one can do it. It is something that is impossible. Go home. Drop an egg on the floor and try to get everything back in. It is never the same once you crack it. It is forever imperfect.

We are forever imperfect. We are the Humpty Dumpty that sat on the wall. We are the Humpty Dumpty that had a great fall. And nothing and no one can put us together again.

But we all of us have a longing to put be put back together again. We all have this longing in our heart for something much greater than ourselves. We are looking for something or someone who will help put us back together. We get disappointed in them when they don’t. We try to ourselves back together again – but we fail miserably.

All of us in here will (or already have) come to a point in our life where we realize something/someone  is missing. We are all longing for something new to happen in our  lives.

The only one who can put us back together again is Jesus Christ. He is the one we are longing for. He is the only one that can meet you at your deepest need. Our deepest need is a relationship with God. Everything and everyone else falls short.

He is the only who can unscramble scrambled eggs. He is the only who take the mess of your life and put it back together. But we must be willing to be born again. We need to enter a relationship with Him.

Todays scripture comes from John 3:

John 3  There was a man named Nicodemus, a Jewish religious leader who was a Pharisee. ² After dark one evening, he came to speak with Jesus. “Rabbi,” he said, “we all know that God has sent you to teach us. Your miraculous signs are evidence that God is with you.”

³ Jesus replied, “I tell you the truth, unless you are born again, you cannot see the Kingdom of God.”

⁴ “What do you mean?” exclaimed Nicodemus. “How can an old man go back into his mother’s womb and be born again?”

⁵ Jesus replied, “I assure you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit.^{[b] 6} Humans can reproduce only human life, but the Holy Spirit gives birth to spiritual life.^{[c] 7} So don’t be surprised when I say, ‘You must be born again.’ ⁸ The wind blows wherever it wants. Just as you can hear the wind but can’t tell where it comes from or where it is going, so you can’t explain how people are born of the Spirit.”

⁹ “How are these things possible?” Nicodemus asked.

¹⁰ Jesus replied, “You are a respected Jewish teacher, and yet you don’t understand these things?

Nicodemus

Nicodemus was a religious scholar. He had followed all the rules of the church. He was a well-respected religious man. Nicodemus was the Billy Graham of his day. Respected by everyone.  But he didn’t understand what it meant to be born again.

The term “born again” was used when a Jewish boy was circumcised. He was born again into the house of Israel. A gentile who was baptized into Judaism was said to be born again. When a man was married to his wife – he was born again. All of these became new phases or new seasons of life. The term “born again” was used the Jewish culture whenever anyone enter into a new season of life.

In Judaism – there were 8 born again experiences you could have as a man. The last experience to be born again happened after he was 40. If he was selected to be a Rabbi, a teacher of Israel, that was the greatest born again experience he could have.

Nicodemus as a ruler of the Jews had that experience. He was at the highest phase of life. Nicodemus has had all the born again experiences that he could have. Why Nicodemus was baffled was because Jesus looked at this super religious man and still says to him – YOU MUST BE BORN AGAIN!

Jesus was telling Nicodemus – “yes you have had all the born again experiences that you can have – but you haven’t had the most important one. The one that is called born of the Spirit.”

Nicodemus  was thee religious person. The one who has grown up in church. Sang the songs. Went to vbs. Went to church camp. And was dutiful and regular in church attendance but had never been changed from within.

This past summer we baptized a young man who for a while only gave lip service to God.  Matt’s story helps us to realize that we can grow up in church and never be born again.

watch video here

If you watched the video you learned that Mat was changed from within. He was born again. He was born of the Spirit.  He had gone to church all his life. He was a good child, good student, and a good role model. But if confessed that he was not born again.

Being born again is about willfully surrendering your life to the one who can put you back to together again. No matter how good or bad you think you are God can take the mess of your life and turn it into a message of hope.

Being born again is not a one – time event. It is a daily surrender.

If you were to go to Alaska (or anywhere where true Eskimos live) and ask a true Eskimo how old they are – they will tell you they are almost a day old.  You see …. Every day they get up they believe they are born again. Let’s apply this same principle to those who follow Christ. Each time you wake up you are born again. His mercies are new. His compassion is new. You have new opportunities. You just  have to be willing to surrender your life on that day. And at the end of the day when someone asked you how old you tell them – almost a day.

Jesus makes it pretty clear in verse 5  that  “no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and the Spirit”. You must be born twice. No you can’t go back into your mother’s womb.  Your mother doesn’t want  you back in their womb.

That second birth comes when you say, ‘’God I need you.”  Not, “mom I need you” or “dad I need  you” or “spouse I need you” or “boy/girlfriend I need  you.”  God I need you. Your mom can’t put you back together again.  Your dad can’t put you back together again. Your spouse can’t put you back together again. Your boy/girlfriend can’t put  you back together again. Your pastor can’t put you back together again.  You can’t put yourself back together again.

Most of us in here have  tried to put our life back together again. But we have failed or are failing. All the kings horses and all the kings men can’t put your life back together again.

A lot of us have tried or are trying to put our life back together again. As Dr. Phil says, “how is that going for you?”

Only God can put your life back together again.  He is the only one that can unscramble the scrambled mess  you have made of your  life.

As we learned the past couple of weeks, God doesn’t want control of your life. He doesn’t want to change your personality. He doesn’t want to take away the free will he has given

He wants you and I to willfully surrender.  He wants us to be born from within. (or born again).

I am  not just talking to those  who don’t know Christ yet. I am talking to all of us. There are some of us in here who are like Matt and myself. We have grown up in the church. We had great Christian parents. We have sung Christian songs all our life. We have done all the religious rituals but have never prayed the prayer – “God I need you.”  We have never been desperate for God.

If God is speaking to your heart and you want to recommit your life to Christ then come and put your name on the cross. Or maybe  you have prayed that prayer and today you just want to reaffirm your commitment to following Christ by putting your name tag on the cross.

if you don’t know Christ and you want to be “born again” come and put your  name on the Cross.

Note: Since we can’t relive the full experience of this Sunday morning, I suggest you pray this simple with all your heart. “GOD I NEED YOU.”  He will come. Your life will be changed forever.

to you.

Galatians 5:18-23 (click on fruit to hear it)

 But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not subject to the law. Now the works of the flesh are obvious: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions, envy, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these. I am warning you, as I warned you before: those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. By contrast, the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against such things.

There is a story  of a little boy who used to escape his bedroom after being punished. He would crawl out of his bedroom window down an old fruit tree to the ground. One day, his father told him that he was going to chop down the fruit tree, because it hadn’t borne any fruit for a number of years.

That evening, the boy and his friend bought a bushel of apples, and during the night, tied those apples on the barren branches. The next morning, the man could not believe his eyes. He said to his wife, “Honey, I just can’t believe it! That old tree hasn’t yielded any fruit for years, and now it’s covered with apples. And, the most amazing thing is that it’s a pear tree!”

There are many who think that  the gospel, that Christ died for my sin in my place according the Scriptures and rose from the dead on the third day, was for people who did not know God.  Many think that once I become a Christian, the gospel ceases to be relevant to my life and what matters is understanding how I am supposed to behave and then obeying.

Then you read  Galatians 5:19-24

We can either be crushed by our  failure to exhibit the fruit of the Spirit or incredibly prideful at what we thought to be successful compliance. In reality, most of us produce counterfeit fruit. The fruits of the flesh are not so much a list of things not to do (although it is at least that) but rather a pattern of living that indicates we are worshiping idols and attempting to justify ourselves (still living under the law as slaves). When we trust in Christ because of his work on the cross for us, we are given peace with God and emotional peace and security knowing that nothing can shake that acceptance.

We have the righteousness of God through faith.  Our slavish obedience to the law out of fear of God’s punishment is over, and true fruit can now be born because we seek to obey God out of gratitude and joy in his ways.

He wants us to seek Him out of gratitude and joy.

We make following Jesus a chore. We make the Fruit of the Spirit a chore. Nobody wants to do chores. Not you. Not me. Not your kids. Not anybody. Chores mean work. The Fruit of the Spirit are not a chore! We try to be kind, we try to be gentle, we try to be joyful, we try to love the less attractive.  We try, we try, we try.

Stop making it a chore!! It is not a chore.

God is not telling us to produce these fruit – we can’t produce them. It is impossible.  God wants to set us free from trying.  Because we if think we are trying hard – then God will love us more. He actually tells us to stop trying and start seeking.

Look at Matthew 6:33 and Jeremiah 29:12-13

Matt. 6:33 Seek the Kingdom of God  above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.

Jeremiah 29:12-13   12 In those days when you pray, I will listen. 13 If you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me.

He doesn’t want to take away your free will. He is the one who gave you free will.

He doesn’t want to take over your heart and mind. He is the one who gave you your heart and mind.

He doesn’t want to change your personality. He is the one who gave you your personality.

He wants us to willfully surrender and let His thoughts become our thoughts, his ways become our ways.

My daughter Lyndsay has taught me a great lesson these past few weeks about surrender. In our conversation together before she made the decision to move to the Dominican Republic, I told her, “you know what to do. You decided within the first couple of hours of hearing of the opportunity. The question is are you willing to surrender? Are you willing to start over?”

When you willingly surrender you also must be willing to start over.

When we surrender we can love the less attractive people. When we surrender we can serve those who don’t deserve it. When we surrender we can love those who won’t love us back.

We experienced that at the block party and at St. Martins yesterday (a Saturday).

• If  you went to St. Martins – wasn’t there a joy that rose up inside of you?
• If you were at the block party – wasn’t it amazing how God brought us all together.
• Did you not sense the presence of God there.  We didn’t preach a sermon, or sing songs, or read scriptures and I saw some of you conversing with people you never met before.
• There was joy that rose up inside of you.
• There was a peace that rose up inside of you because you were doing the right thing by serving those who will never ever be able to serve you back.
• Do you realize  that maybe only one person (if any) will come to this church.

We willfully surrendered our Saturday for people we don’t know but hope to connect with. When you do that something supernatural happens in you.

The key phrase in this whole passage today is “if you are led by the Spirit”.

What does it mean to be led by the Spirit? Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. Jonah was led to the city of Nineveh.

When you are led by the Spirit something inside of you dies.

• Your fears become faith
• Your obstacles become opportunities
• You  go from doing nothing for others – to do something for others. And you do it because you know it is the right thing to do.

You realize you don’t HAVE to love God – You love God and you really can’t explain why. You don’t have to go to church – you just go because.

When you are led by the Spirit the Fruit of the Spirit begins to live.

If you are led by the Spirit you will experience real joy.

Real joy is delighting in the beauty of God and the salvation he gives in Christ even in times of loss, disappointed and pain.

If you are led by the Spirit you will experience real peace.

Real peace is that Confident assurance that God is for us, that he is wise, and that he is in control rather than trust in ourselves

If you are led by the Spirit you will experience real patience

Real patience is Suffering joyfully and not becoming angry at God when his timing doesn’t match our own.

If you are led by the spirit you will experience real kindness

Real kindness is a Sincere vulnerability that involves empathy, compassion, and help.

If you are led by the Spirit you will experience real goodness

Real goodness  is honesty, openness, and consistency in all contexts of life.

If you are led by the Spirit you will experience true faithfulness

Real faithfulness is loyalty, reliability, and courage based on convictions and not on practical benefit leading to loving confrontation when it is right.

If you are led by the Spirit you will experience real gentleness

Real gentleness is not  thinking of yourself highly so that you are sensitive to the needs of others.

If you are led by the Spirit you will experience self-control.

Real self-control  is staying focused on the important things rather than what is urgent.

If you are led by the Spirit you will experience real love.

Real love is joyfully serving another for their good, not to get something in return.

When all of these things are happening inside of you –  you know you are being led by the Spirit. Because they all affect one another. You don’t experience joy one day and  another and, oh by the way, I think I will love the less attractive person today.  I think I will show patience at work on Thursday. I think Wednesday is a good day to demonstrate goodness. They all happen simultaneously.

You are not being led by the Spirit if all the fruit are not happening at once. You
are being led by your human spirit and you produce counterfeit fruit.

The Human spirit leads to moralism.

The Human spirit leads to socialism.

The Human spirit leads to denominationalism.

Human spirit leads to alcoholism.

The Human spirit leads to whatever  “ ISM” controls your life.

An ism is system of belief that controls your life.

An “ISM” needs to die in order the Holy Spirit to live. For the Fruit of the Spirit to come alive in you an ISM (or ISM’s)  needs to die.  What ISM needs to die in you in order for the Fruit of the Spirit to come a live in you?

(Click on the pic to the left to listen to audio too)

There’s a  story about the actor who was playing the part of Christ in the Passion Play in the Ozarks.  As he carried the cross up the hill a tourist began heckling, making fun of him, & shouting insults at him. Finally, the actor had taken all of it he could take. So he threw down his cross, walked over to the tourist, & punched him out.

After the play was over, the director told him, “I know he was a pest, but I can’t condone what you did. Besides, you’re playing the part of Jesus, & Jesus never retaliated. So don’t do anything like that again.” Well, the man promised he wouldn’t. But the next day the heckler was back worse than before, & finally the actor exploded & punched him out again.

The director said, “That’s it. I have to fire you. We just can’t have you behaving this way while playing the part of Jesus.” The actor begged, “Please give me one more chance. I really need this job, & I can handle it if it happens again.” So the director decided to give him another chance.

The next day he was carrying his cross up the street. Sure enough, the heckler was there again. You could tell that the actor was really trying to control himself, but it was about to get the best of him. He was clinching his fists & grinding his teeth. Finally, he looked at the heckler & said, “I’ll meet you after the resurrection!”

None of us in here will ever be able to love like Jesus. But we can commit ourselves to love like Jesus. We commit ourselves to figuring our ways to love. When you commit yourself to loving anybody you begin to change the way you think, change the way you feel, change the way you do life.

We don’t love naturally. Loving God and loving others is supernatural.

When I met my wife something happened in me that goes beyond reason. I really can’t describe what happened in me. It just happened. This little video clip will give you an understanding of what happened (its only 1 min and 50 seconds long). Click here to see it.

It also happens in friendships. There is just certain people who you connect with more than others. You can’t explain it – it just happens. Like Jonathan and David. You can’t explain it. When I met Jesus for the first time at age 18 – the same thing happened in me. I could explain it – but it was something that is really unexplainable. I just know when I met him I began to think differently. I began to live differently.

To commit ourselves to love like Jesus is to make ourselves vulnerable to hurt, pain, and suffering.

CS Lewis said, To love at all is to be venerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin or your selfishness. But in that casket–safe, dark, motionless, airless–it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable…The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers…of love is …. Hell. 

Hurt, pain, and suffering are a part of loving. These are the very same things (hurt, pain, and suffering) that  could cause you to stop loving God and others. We need to accept the reality that people are going to hurt us – sometimes intentionally and sometimes unintentionally.  Why does it hurt? Because we love them.

If it doesn’t hurt then you are not loving them. Sometimes we can get so hurt that are heart grows hard to the point where we can’t love them any more.

Why didn’t Jesus heart grow hard towards God, His father? He was hurt (wounded) more than we will ever be hurt. He went through more pain than we will ever go through. He suffered more than we will ever suffer. He was abandoned by the Father at a point of need.

Why didn’t Jesus heart grow hard towards God? Because He loved his Father and not what His Father could do for Him.

It is important to note that God loves us  not for what we can do for Him. There is nothing we can do to make Him love us. He already does. There are no prerequisites. There are no conditions. He already has a relationship with you because he was there when you were knit together in your mother’s womb.

The question is …. Do you love Him? Will you open up your heart to Him?

It is also important at this point to know that you really don’t love God if you expect Him to do something for you. He is not a genie in a bottle that will meet your top three needs.  Actually, He never promised to meet any of our needs – he only promised to be there.

If we are honest we really don’t need God. We need Him to do stuff for us.

• We need God to get us that job we want.
• We need God to provide us that significant other in our life
• We need God to make the changes we need to make in our life.
• We need God to take our pain and heart ache away
• .We need God to make our life better.
• We need God to take control of our life and make it right.

He says  “ I don’t want control of your life – I want you to surrender it!”

When you say, “I need God” PERIOD. That is when the supernatural begins to happen. He will meet you at your deepest need – the need for a relationship with Him. Nothing else. No one else. God alone.

We need a relationship with God. It is what we are all yearning for. Whether you are agnostic, atheist, or just a religious person (believe God is a control freak) – we are yearning for the same thing – to be loved. Only God can love you the way you need to be loved. We think we need more money. We think we need a better job. We think we need a new spouse. We think we need new kids. We think we need this and we think we need that. We think we need a boyfriend. We think we need a girlfriend. And we wear ourselves out chasing after them.

The only thing you need is to understand is that you are loved by God. Nothing else and no one else matters.

Jesus had confidence that His father loved Him. Even when they did mean and cruel things to Him – He never stopped loving Him. And God never stopped loving Him when mean and cruel things were happening to His only son.

You can put your confidence in the fact that God will not stop loving you even when others do mean and cruel things to you. Understanding how much God loves me gives one confidence to love others.

Because you understand that if God loves ME …. He can love anybody.

Loving others is the most important thing you and I can be doing. Last week we learned that the most important thing we can do is to love God with all our heart, mind, and soul and to love our neighbor as ourselves.

When you love others – you make yourself vulnerable. You give them your heart. That is a very dangerous thing to do. Because when you love someone one you begin to care about them. When you care about them you serve them. When you serve them you give them opportunity to break your heart.

Look at Jesus …

Jesus healed people.

Jesus fed people.

Jesus did miracles for people.

And what did they do to him? They nailed him on the cross.

Jesus served people for their good and intrinsic value, not for what people could bring to him.

Dr. Tim Keller gives us this definition of love:

Love means to serve a person for their good and
intrinsic value, not for what the person brings you.

We are to love people who won’t love us back.

We are to serve people who will never serve us.

We are to help people who will never help us.

In the life of Jesus Christ, we see a living example of the fruit of the Spirit. Jesus modeled love, but He did so in a way that challenges our culture’s understanding of love. In this Corinthian passage Jesus shows that love is more than romance or a feeling. Fundamentally, love is an action.

1 John 3:18 New Living Translation says this:

18 Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.

If you love someone one you are going to serve them. There is no way around it.

In John 13  Jesus demonstrates His love for the disciples by moving straight to where they are least attractive—their feet. We tend to avoid loving less attractive people. We like to love beautiful people so that we can feel better about ourselves.

Those who we tend to avoid are the ones we need to serve. You can pray for them all you want but until you serve them you are not really loving them. If all you do is hang around beautiful people you will never really learn how to love.

Again look at the life of Jesus. He didn’t hang around beautiful people. Look at this list:

• Prostitutes
• Tax Collectors
• Really difficult religious people
• Demon possessed
• Judas his betrayer
• You and I

To Jesus, people are people. Everyone deserves to be loved for their intrinsic value and not for what they can bring to you. Romans 5:8 reminds us that while we were yet sinners, he died for us.

He is committed to loving us to the end. He is patient, kind, doesn’t keep a record of wrongs, He is not rude, and so on.

He tells us to go and love others who can’t love you back.

To serve people who will never serve you.

Help people who will never help you.

He is asking for a  commitment  to love Him by committing ourselves to loving others.

(please note: If you listen to the service, at the very beginning I say something like, “today we will look at selfishness” – well I should have said, “today we will look at self-control.” Only my 3rd mistake this year 🙂 .  (CLICK ON THE PIC TO THE RIGHT TO HEAR THE AUDIO)

Scripture– I Peter 3:8-10(NCV)

⁸ Control yourselves and be careful! The devil, your enemy, goes around like a roaring lion looking for someone to eat. ⁹ Refuse to give in to him, by standing strong in your faith. You know that your Christian family all over the world is having the same kinds of suffering.

¹⁰ And after you suffer for a short time, God, who gives all grace, will make everything right. He will make you strong and support you and keep you from falling. He called you to share in his glory in Christ, a glory that will continue forever. ¹¹ All power is his forever and ever. Amen.

The ancient Greeks prized self-control over all virtues.  Of all the schools of Greek philosophy, the one that elevated self-control to the highest level of importance were the Stoics.

Stoics are people who are seemingly unaffected by pleasure of pain.

Stoics taught that if a man could become master of himself— if by sheer will-power he could gain control over his emotions and responses, then he would be perfectly free—no one, no circumstance could control him. He would be unmoved by anything that happened to him. 

There is a famous legend about a young Greek man who embraced Stoic philosophy. In order to prove his commitment to Stoicism, he put a fox under his tunic.  As this fox began to bite him, he did not move,  and  he did not grimace. The people around him had no idea that anything was wrong. They had no idea he had a fox under his tunic, until he dropped dead, because the fox had torn into his stomach and eaten his insides.

I a pretty sure this is a legend, but it does illustrate the Greek understanding of self-control, which was simply will-power.

Probably a legend, but it does illustrate the Greek understanding of self-control,  which was simply will-power.

Many think self-control is reaching inside yourself and grabbing some inner strength – and hanging on. Will power turns your heart into stone.

Self Control is not will power!  It’s not about reaching down into yourself and grabbing some inner strength. Self control is not the ability to suck it up,  to get over it, or just say no.

That is the common  and popular understanding of self-control. This common understanding of self-control  only leads to  hardening yourself to everything.

Peter tells in this passage to “Be self-controlled and alert”.  This is not a command to simply exercise your will-power.  Our will power is weak. We are all flawed.

Your will power is no match for the lust of the flesh. Your will power is no match for bad habits, thoughts, and attitudes. Your will power is no match for your tongue, your eyes, your credit cards, your stomach—and I could go on and on. 

How many of us can go to buffet and not over eat? (We gotta get our $10 worth)

How many of us have started some kind of discipline – only to stop a few months down  the road?

How many of have said, “boy, I need to read my Bible more” only to never get started.

I am pretty sure all of us can identify with one of those. Our will power is simply not enough. Your will power will fail you every  time. Self – control is not will power. Even the maker of Lay’s potato chips knows you can’t eat just one.

So what is self-control?

Tim Keller gives a great definition of the fruit of self-control:

Self-control is the ability the Holy Spirit gives you

   to choose the important thing over the urgent thing. 

If you are a Christ follower – meaning you have a made a commitment to follow Christ and you allow his teachings to change the way think, act, and do life  – You have the Holy Spirit living inside of you.

What is the important thing? Jesus told us the two greatest commandments – The greatest thing you can do  is to love the Lord your God with all your mind, heart, and strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.

What is the urgent thing?   Following the urgent cravings of our sinful nature.

In other words, if it feels good … do it!

I don’t know if you remember this story from a few weeks ago but 3 bored teens in Oklahoma  killed an Australian baseball player running by their house because they were bored and they needed something fun to do.  It felt good so they did it.

We do the same thing. We might get so bored that we decided to shoot and kill someone running in front of our house. We give into our cravings when we are bored. Think about when you are bored at night, what do we do? WE EAT.

And If it taste good we eat more of it.

Money is good so we need more of it – so we work more hours. Compromise time with our families. Strive for the almighty dollar. Sex is good – so we need more of it – instead of making a commitment to someone and putting our name on the dotted line – we just find a sexual partner and call it co-habitation and call it right. Power is good – so we need more of it – so we do anything to get it.

Without the fruit of the spirit called self – control we will always choose the urgent thing over the important thing.

All of us in here craved (yearning) to be loved. All of us in here desire (yearning) to worship something or someone. All of us in here have something or someone at the center of our life.

A gross example of this is animals in heat. They simply can’t control themselves. Poodles don’t look for poodles during this season. German Shepherds don’t look for German Shepherds. They look for whatever they can get. Instead of choosing the best thing, we become like animals in heat. We take whatever satisfies us in the moment.  We take whatever satisfies our craving. We will worship anything or anyone that makes us feel better about selves. That’s how people and things become idols in our lives. We become satisfied with whatever makes us feel good in the moment.

The bottom line is when you choose the urgent thing over the important thing – your life will always be out of control.

So, how do get self-control?

The self-control which Christians are to cultivate is supernatural.

You don’t get self-control by giving God control of your life.

I’ve heard people say, “Give God control of your life,” God doesn’t want control of your life. God isn’t a dictator who pushes a magic button to take over our free will.  We voluntarily bring our lives and purposes into agreement with what he wants to accomplish. God gives us the power we need to master our flesh, our appetites, our passions, and even our tongues!

God didn’t control Jesus – Jesus voluntarily gave his life. God doesn’t control us – he allows us to live out of control.

The supernatural happens in you when you voluntarily refuse to give into that urgent thing.  The supernatural happens in you when you voluntarily stand strong in your faith. The supernatural happens in you when you voluntarily do the important thing.

You get self-control by voluntarily loving God with your life.

I don’t have to love my wife. I don’t have to love my kids. I don’t have to love them. I love them voluntarily.  I don’t have to be with them. I need to be with them.  I don’t control them and they don’t control me – we all voluntarily give ourselves to each other.

Voluntarily loving God with your life allows God to do something supernatural in you.  I don’t have to love Him and He still loves me. I don’t control Him nor does He control me. I voluntarily love Him.

If you look at the scriptures you will learn that God didn’t control any of those people we read about. They didn’t have to do what they did. ALL of them volunteered to do what they did. They volunteered because they knew God loved them. They knew God would not leave them or forsake them. They knew God was them.

When you love someone else – I mean truly love someone – you willingly give them control of your life. Why? Because they are important.

You don’t get self-control by praying for it.

I have tried this …. But it doesn’t work.  I have prayed for self-control at my kids games.  When you are passionate about your kids and about the team they are on – this is a powerful combination that constantly causes me to lose. Like patience – I can pray for all it I want – but it is not going to happen. I could not go to my kids games but that not would not solve anything. I could stop caring about the things I am passionate about but that wouldn’t solve anything either.

You get self-control by praying for yourself. Not praying ABOUT yourself. Not praying TO yourself (“Oh God, help me right now).

Look at Luke 18

To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: ¹⁰ “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. ¹² I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

¹³ “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

Do you see it? The Pharisee is praying ABOUT himself. The tax collector is praying FOR himself. “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

We want God to change our situation. We want God to change the people around us. We want God to change our family members. We want God to make it fair for us. We want God to change our spouse. We want God to take control of our life.

God doesn’t want control of our life – he wants you to voluntarily surrender it!

Pray this prayer:

“God have mercy on me, I am out of control!”

When your anger is out of control – “God have mercy on me, I am out of control.”

When your spending habits are out of control – “God have mercy on me, I am out of control.”

When your eating habits are out of control – “God have mercy on me, I am out of control.”

When your sex life is out of control – “God have mercy on me, I am out of control.”

When power goes to your head – “God have mercy on me, I am out of control.”

When that prayer is sincere – uncontrollable sobbing (no matter how stoic you are) usually occurs afterwards.

Then something supernatural begins to happen in you.