A Life Characterized By Love - Pastor Jim Cymbala - First Baptist Orlando

anybody here from New York City or that area lift up your hand if you're from the New York City area how many are he are you from Florida born and raised in Florida how many so there are Floridians yes there are well I was born and raised in Brooklyn and I'm a long way from downtown Brooklyn right now in many ways but I'm with God's people and that's my family one of the most intimidating little verses in the Bible is at the very last part of Matthew 5 and it says this Jesus is preaching what it was we call the Sermon on the Mount be perfect therefore as your heavenly Father is perfect I mean just on the face of that all the years I read that it was like come on now be perfect not just be perfect be perfect even as your heavenly Father who is God is perfect what does that mean what's the context it can't mean perfectionism it can't mean be perfect as in quality with God because the Bible says all have sinned and come short of the glory of God and even as Christians the Bible says if anyone says he has no sin he's a liar the truth is not in them and Jesus taught us when he told us to pray how many know that part that says forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trust so right in the Lord's Prayer we're asking for mercy so if we're perfect how could we be saying forgive us our trespasses and then we love that verse don't we in 1st John if if we confess our sins confess our what our sins he is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness so what does that mean well here's how it begins that paragraph you have heard that it was said love your neighbor and hate your enemy that's in the Old Testament time right you love your fellow Jew but the amorite s-- the Philistines the Jebusites and all those other i'ts that are found in the Old Testament they're the enemy sometimes you knock down their their their wall that in Jericho and you wipe out those Canaanites that is nothing to do with the way we live today we live in a different time than the Old Testament and we live in a different covenant and we live with better promises and you have to be careful to rightly divide the word of God so Jesus said this is what you heard in the Old Testament law love your neighbor hate your enemy but I tell you love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you that you may be sons and daughters of your father in heaven listen to this he God the Father causes his Sun to rise on the evil and the good and he sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous if you love those who love you what reward will you get are not even the tax collectors the publicans doing that and if you greet only your brothers the people that are like you your color your background your cousin's your whatever from your Island from your culture if you love those only what are you doing more than others don't even the pagans do that now be perfect therefore as your heavenly Father is perfect so this verse is stunning isn't it but it assures us into something that we need to understand more than maybe more today than in the history of our country our country but we're part of the world we're part of the body of Christ and that is Jesus is say if you want to be true sons and daughters of in your heavenly Father remember he is love he doesn't have love he is loved his essence is loved he has power he has wisdom he has qualities like omnipresent everywhere at once omniscient he knows everything he's omnipotent he has all power those are attributes of God as the theologians call it but he is his essence is love so to be a true son and daughter of God and to reflect his heart your life has to be characterized by love or you become a contradiction to the name you're carrying which is Christian you call yourself a Christian a follower of Christ now in the family of God because you've been born again but your life contradicts that because you don't reflect the father's heart which is love I'm the bye I'm the product of a Ukrainian father my late dad and my mother who's polish on November 21st she's gonna be a hundred and three years old my mom 103 a couple years ago she was in my office and she was getting up from the chair and she said Oh Jim I'm getting old I said mom you're not getting old you are old you are old not getting anything at a hundred year old so I'm I have a genetic makeup that reflects you the Ukraine Poland whatever and Jesus is saying now you spiritually are children of a heavenly Father so you're supposed to reflect what he looks like what is he he's loved he's loved so a Christian Church I'm not going by doctor now I'm not going by how nice the building is you're building my building little storefront building what when you walk in a Christian Church the first thing that should hit you is love the love of God so thank you I'm watching my clock and my time so when I go like that it means holy applause to Leah and then we'll go we'll tear the building apart okay so we're supposed to reflect love that's very strange because a lot of churches I've experienced growing up and traveling around the country in the world and will reflect love they reflect a doctrinal edge where Calvinist where our minions were evangelicals where our minions were charismatic but that is not these words don't exist the course to God you know those words don't exist a god you know there's no Baptist to God you know how many say amen to that there's only one Baptist John the Baptist he's already there so let him be that's the only Baptist but these are words humans have made up and they're usually divisive usually divisive so instead of just calling ourselves Christians just be Christian so outside in inside the church there's a whole lack of a lot of lack of love denominationally racially and just think racially still racially still Civil War was 1865 it ended racially still among Christians my late my friend Mariano Rivera the great pitcher for the Yankees we Carolyn I just say this house to Monday's ago and they they catered some good Puerto Rican food tostones yeah yeah yeah all of that I started to get an accent I ate so much food I was starting to speak a little Spanish and Mariana the first time I met him he was pitching for the Yankees at the height of his career and he said to me casually what after service we gave he gave his testimony and he said so past Jim can I ask you a question we spent hours together talking baseball and and and and the work of the Lord he said how come the Yankees are more integrated than the Christians I don't know where he just said that to me I said what do you mean he said because you know I watch in America the churches and the whites are there and the blacks are there and the Latinos are there and the Asians are over there and but he said on the Yankees nobody cares what you are nobody cares I'm from Panama no one cares what Derek Jeter is no one cares who a what a rod comes so because you're wearing a pinstripes the only question is can you play you're my man you're on my team but he said why aren't Christians like that they died together in the World Trade Center you think when those EMS people we lost more people in a church in New York for people on 9/11 you think when the EMS people the cops were going up they were going up thinking I wonder how many blacks are up here or how many whites or how many Latinos I wonder who makes 400,000 who makes 40,000 you think anyone was thinking that no mayor Giuliani did want a funeral at our at our church for one of the officers who was slain and and he said I don't live this way but I want to tell you something it's an example to me when they were going up there they only had one thought they were walking up to die they didn't know that smoke-filled corridors and stairwells and he said when they were going up there they were just thinking every life is precious I can pull one person out of here I don't care what background they are when you're saving lives every life is precious amen but but unfortunately we live where we were selective about the whole thing and now churches are generally generationally selective they only want people of a certain age group or some churches want a certain group economically unless I want to declare something to you if you think the Christian Church is a nice place for the family you totally have misread the Bible the Christian Church is supposed to be a Holy Ghost Hospital where anybody can come in broken Ashtyn life every color air homeless smelly whatever they come in and they are loved because we know that Jesus died for them that deserves our applause come on let's say amen to that you might say well no I didn't grow up that way how you grew up or how I grew up is totally irrelevant to anything why shape your theology to how you grew up and what you saw I grew up in a very legalistic Church in bed-stuy my mom and dad drug me there as a little kid and they pounded the Bible and legalistic and all these rules and meanwhile they they wouldn't want a black person within 50 yards of that church that's what I grew up around so should I repeat the tradition of my elders no you think my wife and I would be in downtown Brooklyn if that was our mentality but that's the way Christians can be and the world forget the world in fact we have to make a contrast between Jesus and his church and the world we got to show people no it's not like it is in the world we're not conforming to that mentality we're not gonna live like that because there's there no love out there I just did a wedding in Chicago they're slaughtering people left and right there especially on the south side no one seems to care and in New York City you know and you you just had two officers slain but there's hate there's animosity racial animosity political animal within the church if someone disagrees with our political position we're up in that guy's grill or that girl's grill and we're all up enough you know in a huff and getting angry and then saying things back and all of that and then we come together in church and we go Oh God we worship You God so loved the world we love him because he first loved us but our lives reflect something so different that the let's do real talk the world looks at and says that's a joke would you stop would you stop would you stop with this love stuff oh you whites hang together a bunch of rednecks you blacks full of anger you're hanging together and Latinos are having rice and beans over in the corner here and they don't want anybody to bother them and so on and so forth and that's the way it is and guess what if we live that way the world should laugh at us that doesn't reflect Jesus Christ when did Jesus Christ favor one person over another did he no he did not he did not he never turned one person away not one so we have to decide or we can live by the way we grew up or what the culture is around us or are we going to be New Testament Christians and here's what Jesus says the only way to test maturity and growth in God is only one test if you want to know how tall you are in God if you want to know how strong you are in God there's only one test and that's love the best Christian in this building God knows who that person is and I know who that person is but not by name but God knows the person's name the best Christian in our church in Brooklyn at the Brooklyn Tabernacle God knows their name probably not me for sure but I know who it is the person who loves the most oh you memorized a lot of the Bible that's great but if you don't have love what good is that have you had revelations of the Lord and all kinds of great things and you were in great meetings and you've got a whole war story about things you've been through that God brought you through that's great I praise God for it I've had the same faithfulness of God but the question is if you speak with the tongue of men and angels and have not love you are zero if you understand all mysteries if you have faith to move mountains and don't have love look at me what's the sense what's the sense of talking about Jesus if we don't reflect more and more his love he prayed for people who were killing him Father forgive them they don't know what they're doing so the acid test of all spirituality is how much are you controlled by the love of how much does that love exude out of us so that people can say look at this this person is so different than everyone else that's the test for all of us you can preach a sermon and be eloquent and and and and stun people and dazzle people you could be in a choir and get people jumping and praising God but if you don't have love the Bible's telling us you you really don't know God and the greatest spiritual deception of all is this that you think you know God and love him you just have no use for people I once had a minister write me an email could you call me pastor Jim I read some of your books I need counseling I need help I have a problem I called him I said brother what's your problem he was in another state he said here's what I love to be alone with God I love to study the word I love to read commentaries I love to meditate on God's goodness I just can't stand being around people and I said you're a pastor he said yeah I said I don't know you better check your calling because how could you be a shepherd if you don't want to be with the Sheep oh they just aggravating me listen he's not the only pastor there's a lot of them who feel that way that's why they're leaving 1,700 a month leave the ministry in America 1,700 a month not a year a month because sometimes people get so ornery and or so hard to love come on don't you know people that are hard to love if you don't come to New York ride the subway you'll just be there for about 20 minutes and you'll run into somebody very hard to love unlovable obnoxious whatever but here's the clincher and I closed Jesus said the test of love is not that you love people who love you he said sinners do that mafia leaders in New York and elsewhere they order somebody to be whacked and the next week the same guy who whacks somebody is gathering their children around them and saying I love you I would do anything for you and they mean it so God is Jesus is saying to us if you love people who love you what is that if you stroke people who stroke you what is that sinners do that if you love your family or you love people of the same race because they're your race or you love everyone from your country because my goodness they come from my country like your country is special but like my country is special it's not there's no special country there's just a special Savior Jesus Christ he's the one yeah let's say amen to that so if you love people who love you and who are like you Jesus is telling us what do you prove by that the publicans do that but if you really want to be like your heavenly Father listen love your enemies bless those that curse you love people who are different love people who are unloving love people who who just they just turn you off love them because he says listen have you noticed this your heavenly Father when he sends the rain on the farms in America the rain just doesn't come on the Christian farm it comes on the atheist farm or the Muslim farm or the Hindu farm or the degenerates farm the rains coming down on all of it am i correct or wrong and when the Sun shines what does he do put a block over the people who don't love him or does he let the Sun Shine on everybody so he says if your heavenly father loves and blesses all people regardless of where they're coming from now show the world that you belong to that family and love in love unconditionally love and I'm telling you that love is not in us I want to declare to you that I want to tell you the truth about Christianity unfortunately a lot of Christianity and preaching has become old testament ish we're giving people commands and then they get all revved up and they got it psyched up and they make a vow oh that's right pastor symbol or spoke about love I want to go out there and love I'm gonna try and that's that's what a lot of services come to just making a new vow but you're gonna break that vow aren't you I broken so many vows I mean I've turned over more new Leafs than Central Park but they did nothing changes because that's not Christianity Christianity isn't trying to do stuff in your own strength didn't you hear what Jesus said in John without me you can do nothing not something nothing you can't love anyone the way I want you to love without me that's why when you come into my family my father's family I'm gonna put my spirit spirit of love in you and you'll be able to love because it won't be you it'll be me loving them it'll be my spirit loving them yes the sermon can inspire the pastor can encourage but all we can be as an arrow for you to get to God if you don't make contact with God today if you don't open your heart to God if you don't let his word and his spirit yea express itself through you express himself through you what good is going to church you just get revved up like itll Mormons do and you're over witnesses all they can do is teach and then people try to live better that's not Christianity you got to give up on yourself I'll never have that love in me I will never love people who hate me that's not in Jim similar that's not my DNA if you're nice to me I'd be nice to you you're not so nice to me come on let's let's deal with this thing right now you know that's the way we are in Brooklyn so but yet the command is no excusing of sin the commander's be perfect the way your heavenly Father is perfect so just because God makes a command doesn't mean he wants you to try to obey it he wants us to obey it but it has to be him doing it through us as one great spiritual writer said for every command there's a promise for every command there's a promise that God will help you to do it otherwise this you become a hypocrite oh I'm gonna turn over a new leaf I'm gonna really love then you don't know I'm sorry God I'm now I'm really gonna love you try harder to love but it's not in us to love some of us are filled with anger some of us grew up in prejudice homes some of us grew up just so selfish that when we rewarded we resent it but Jesus is the answer to all of that living through us through the Holy Spirit why do you think Paul said I can do all things through Christ - what how strengthens me by the Holy Spirit living inside of me without the Holy Spirit Christianity is hopeless churches that deny and pant tamp down the Holy Spirit they're hopeless it's hopeless why because he's the only strength that I have Jesus is my strength through the Holy Spirit the fruit of the Spirit is what love joy God doesn't say get love get joy get peace how would I get peace in myself no let that spirit I put inside of you let him express himself yield to him walk controlled by him and you'll you'll show people what I'm like so I thought I had learned this many times in my life and I'm still learning it I haven't arrived but God gives you situations where he just reminds you Jim symbol you are so helpless you're so hopeless you need be so honest Easter Sunday a long time ago we did an outreach I was preaching the gospel on that end of the fourth service I was tired and I leaned over sat on the edge of the platform like as if I jumped up here and with my feet dangling and I was sitting there and Carol was playing the keyboard and I had made the invitation present the gospel a lot of folks came forward to receive Christ taking their names we're gonna baptize him man we're doing the work of the Lord but it gets tiring sometimes because people have a lot of baggage they bring and you're praying and there's demonic battles going on and everything so I'm just sitting there I pull my tie down it's when I used to look like a minister no longer but whatever so I see a guy about 5th row middle aisle just looking at me hat in his hand silty cap he looks filthy sweaty african-american guy I thought he was 50 he was turned out early 30s and he's just looking up there at me like I want to get to you want to talk to you and I was thinking because this happens all the time at our church people are panhandling looking for money so I thought oh man we got a whole process that we do when people come in looking for money we don't want to help them get more drugs or alcohol we don't want to do that so there's a whole process but I was tired I'm gonna go through that process let me just get him up and give him some money because you know it's late and I'm tired so I call him forward he walks up to me and everything I'm gonna tell you now if God is listening to me everything is absolutely true he walks up to me he gets within five six feet of me and brothers and sisters the dude smells so bad I couldn't take it okay the nastiest smell to this day that I have ever smelled feces urine sweat Street some alcohol just nasty so nasty that it overwhelmed me I'm not talking about little body odor I'm talking about hydrogen bomb kind of so I look away from him to take an inhale inhale my breath so I could talk to him and I go so what's your name David where'd you sleep last night abandoned truck where somewhere in the city how come you're not in a shelter too dangerous I ain't going there Krum how long you been out there a couple years industry okay what I didn't know was that he had been laying outside on Park Place side of the of our building on these doors on the side of the auditorium he had been laying out there on the steps in his own urine and he heard the music and he came in and stood in the back but he was ashamed because of the way he was looking and smelling so I reached in my pocket where my money clip was then and I took a couple bills and I began like let me help him and just let me get home you know yo I'm tired and he took his hand and he pushed my hand down and he said I don't want your money I want this Jesus you were just talking about wait wait wait and when he said that like everything went off in my head as God is my witness I became so ashamed I'll use the right word I became ashamed like what's what am I sick what am I just one of these phony preachers who has sermons and smiles and glads hands all the people but then has no love no compassion on the people that Jesus is sending in that's like my ultimate nightmare to be like a preacher you know what I'm saying I'm gonna get what I'm talking about you know like a professional put money in and you get a sermon I forgot about David my feet were dangling I lifted my hands and I said God forgive me please forgive me change me please God you know forget him he needs you but I need you was that funny I just said I didn't get it so God just helped me and you know what God baptized me in love listen you can discount me you can say you're just an emotional fanatic or whatever listen I've been doing this for a while God came and filled me to overflowing with love with love and I began to weep for myself my brokenness my wrongness and he sensed God was doing something in me and he started to weep and then he came close to me and he fell on my my suit and shirt he fell his head and he put his arms around me and I put my arms around him and we just started rocking back and forth just rocking him crying me crying he needed Jesus I needed Jesus at that moment and while we were doing that I felt the Lord speak to me and said you see this smell if you don't want to love that smell I can't use you I'll put you on the Shelf if you can't love that smell because the whole world smells like that to me the whole world and it's sin and it's degradation that world smells to me but I loved that world I love that smell and I started to love that smell and the smell as God knows it turned like into a cologne or perfume and I'm hugging him at weight and we're just lost we just were just lost I let him to Christ put him in hospital I think he was there for days detox full alcohol messed up got to be careful of his liver they told him been out there cleaned him up handsome guy handsome 32 years old handsome he had no teeth here we got his teeth fix quick we we got him hired at the church and in the housekeeping to start with the guy started learning versus sister you can believe how he learned verse he learned versus better than I could ever memorize verses he was memorizing verses left and right every time I like met him I'd say hi David you know God is good he said yes remember past simple Isaiah 42 verse 8 and I'm gonna I don't even know Isaiah 42 verse 8 what's that about no but that's the way he was just learning verses he joined the prayer band we have 400 people now in the church who pray around the clock in the church in the church in small groups larger groups from the morning till the night seven days a week and he joined that and he started praying and he started growing in the Lord I'm a little bit over but I just want to finish the story you don't mind so he's just amazing spent Thanksgiving the first Thanksgiving got saved he spent it at my house Carol made a big meal and he was there nervous he knocked over his apple cider that she made he got so nervous my kids said no don't worry about it David forget it he came at Christmas the next month and he had no money hardly so all he did was he gave me a handkerchief a white handkerchief just wrapped in wrapping paper no box and that handkerchief I kept fried how many years because it meant more to me than anybody you could have bought me a Mercedes and that that that handkerchief meant more to me than that he made a girl in the church from Africa Ghana I believe pharmacist they fell in love they got married then the doctors told them they want to have children and you went by no no pregnancy and they told them dude you wasted your body you were you just wiped out your own body you're not going to ever have children you could think of adopting they came to me after a Sunday services with the doctors we believe everything's possible God look what he did in my life and she's saying yesterday is her name we're believing God for that and would you pray that we could have children so I pray laid hands on them about six months later she got pregnant they had a baby listen then after that baby she got pregnant again they had another baby then they came back to me and said could you reverse that prayer and No Mas No Mas Nino's No Mas no more children he later moved to New Jersey he got ordained in the ministry became an assistant pastor of a church he's my buddy I give anything if I could just have him walk out here and you could see what a man of God but the point is I was this close hey dude have some money get out of here look at me and closing do you think I grew up the way he grew up you think I grew up around that smell you think I slept in shelters and in abandoned buildings look at me you think that ever happened no he's everything I was not growing up but God put a love I don't know what I would have done for him he was so precious but it wasn't me because I don't have that love and you don't have that love but if we're going to show the world who Jesus is we got to love them are you with me on that you say amen to that because otherwise it's that old American Church concept Christ died on the cross so I could go to a building once a week for an hour oh that really makes a lot of sense no no he bought us with his precious blood so we could show the world how awesome he is one last time let's put our hands together [Applause] because you know let's close our eyes close your eyes join hands with the person next to you Lord forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who have trespassed against us especially forgive us for our lack of love we don't have to live human we can live supernatural Christianity is not a human religion it's a divine religion even not just to dying and putting away of sins on the cross but the power of the ability to love and do exploits I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me give us that love break us us that are hard and proud here in stodgy because we've been in church wherever for so long we think we know humble us make us like children so that we can come broken and say Phyllis Lord with your love there's any ministers here visiting today Lord who have run out of love and they're getting hassled by people losing their patience baptize us afresh in love all of us Lord by this shall all men know we're your disciples now because we carry Bibles or conservative-liberal know by this they'll know because we love one another then help that love go to the world and the people who are contrary even the way we were contrary to you have we not been contrary to you have we not failed you have we not disappointed you and you haven't thrown one of us away you keep reaching and loving and we love you today because you first loved us fill us with your love not my love your love let the world see it before we ask it in Jesus name and everyone said aloud okay so here's how we're gonna dismiss we done been doing it all today we're gonna do Brooklyn Tabernacle style they let me do the benediction and here's how we often close no handshaking I want every lady to hug six ladies and look when you hug him say I love you with the love of the Lord hug someone you don't never seen before and love him with the love of the Lord every brother hug come on brothers hug some brothers no exceptions come on everybody [Music] [Music]

Channel: First Baptist Orlando

Views: 21,553

Rating: 4.891892 out of 5

Keywords: church, faith, God, Jesus, First Orlando, First Baptist Orlando, Orlando, orlando florida, pastor jim cymbala, brooklyn tabernacle singers, God is love, a life characterized by love, living a life of love

Id: BWnF5CZXrqA

Length: 37min 31sec (2251 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 07 2017