James #4 - How does faith work with people you don’t like?

[Music] [Music] so [Music] oh howdy we are in a great new testament book of the bible called james if you've got a bible go to james chapter 2 and i like to say he's the blue-collar scholar of the new testament we tend to think of bible teachers spiritual leaders those who are more professorial or writers and authors as coming from big cities and academic institutions and and massive pedigrees that's not james story he grew up in a small rural town his parents were married as teenagers they were peasants he never made it to a big city he never went to a great university but mary and joseph were his mom and dad and jesus christ was his big brother and so he did learn a few things along the way and when he goes to write this book it's after his brother jesus died rose returned to heaven and what he's looking at is how faith works how do you not just have arguments about god but how do you live a life with god and what he's talking about is how to take the faith in his brother jesus and put it to work in the practical day-to-day stuff of your life thank you for letting me help you learn god's word and if you didn't get one on the way in there's a free study guide and if you're online you can get a free ebook copy at realfaith.com and it just lays out the sermons we'll be going through there are questions to help you study god's word and help you get connected to here at the church what we call a life group doing life together giving life to one another this week we deal with this subject and it is uh how does faith work with people you don't like any of you have someone that annoys you frustrates you troubles you you brought them to church good well now you guys could talk about this on the way home work this out uh if you're married you know exactly what i'm talking about all right so what happens in life there's always a person or a group of people or a kind of person that just drives us crazy kind of annoys us and gets under our skin and agitates us and the question is if we are christians what do we do in those kinds of relationships so first let me ask think of a time when you've been the outsider there was a group of people and they were sort of a group and you didn't fit in that group you were the outcast from the outsider of that group this happens let's say for example you transfer into school mid-year and everybody's got their friend group and you don't you join a sports team and these kids all get along and you're out you join a maybe a band or some sort of uh extracurricular activity and these kids are a click and you're out you go to work and these people all get along and and you're not really included we all know what it feels like to be sort of the outsider the dejected the rejected one the one who for some reason is out and it seems like there's really nothing you can do to get in think of it conversely who feels that way about you who is the person or what is the group of people that would say yeah i just don't feel like you really understand me you give me a fair shake and i'm not sure you even want to get to know me or have a relationship with me maybe because you have a prejudice or a partiality or a bias towards me that's the heart of what james is talking about and so what has always happened because of sinful fallen human nature we tend to feel more comfortable with people who are more like us this can be cultural racial gender generational and lately let me just throw it out there potentially politically you just kind of hang with your own kind and and you and so you tend to think well i feel comfortable with these people i feel uncomfortable with those people i don't really know those people but i'm going to judge those people so that i have a case by which i can reject those people and we do this all the time and i would say in our polarized pressurized political environment maybe now so more than ever there are whole groups of people just don't like each other aren't talking to one another but are very happy to yell at one another i was reading a study this week that coming up for christmas one in eight americans is saying they will not buy presents for relatives that voted for the other presidential candidate merry christmas mom you voted bad here's your call i mean it's kind of it's kind of harsh and so that's the issue that he is dealing with now what happened in the early church was it was the same the teams were different but the attitude and heart was the same the jews didn't like the gentiles and vice versa the rich and the poor they didn't get along and get together the slave and the free they never really came together as the same team and what happens is uh then all of a sudden jesus returns to heaven the holy spirit comes down and guess who shows up at church a bunch of people that didn't ever hang out together actually didn't know each other or like each other now there's the jew and the gentile the rich and the poor the slave and the free and they're like well what are you doing here well god's my father oh he's my father too i guess now we're brothers and sisters we're in one big crazy adopted family called the church and we've got to figure out how to get along with one another and so there's this new team this third way i call it team jesus paul calls it the new man and so we're going to look at how do we deal with as a church family with a lot of division and judgment out there how do we have unity and mercy in here and so he starts in james chapter two verses one through four and the big idea is don't look down on them look up to him that's where it all starts my brother so we're family it's kind of like kids getting adopted into a family you didn't know each other maybe you didn't get along but now you've got to figure it out because you're family my brothers show no partiality that's prejudice and prejudgment as you hold to the faith in our lord jesus christ how does faith work with people you don't like the lord of glory for if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in just think of what you would consider really high fashion apparel you're younger you're like retro jordans and the guy in skechers if you're older it's name brand on your underwear versus you bought them at walmart a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and says sit here in a good place will you say to the poor man stand over there in the broom closet or sit at my feet i do need a coffee table have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts and so what he's talking about here is one of the ways that we have social pedigree and pecking order is by your seating by your seating so uh if you go to a sporting event uh the people that are closer to the field those are the people that are on a different plane economically we went to the sun's playoff game and i bought tickets and we were literally the last row paul talks about the third heaven the only worse we were there we were there i was like oh my gosh the the court is in another zip code like we are we are not close and then you look down and there's people on the floor and then the team is high-fiving them you're like yeah that's a different level this happens as well when you go to a concert how many of you go to a concert and you're way in the back and then you see the people that are the vips you're like oh my gosh they get food they get to sit up front they get to go backstage they get to take a selfie and make me covet that's amazing this happens all the time right this happens as well uh how many of you hate going to movies because they run an hour and 27 minutes of commercials before the movie so you like to pre-buy your seats pick your seat have a nice recliner so you can sit there like a king or a queen and just sort of show up late while all the peasants who sat up front had to show up early and watch the commercials and so what happens is he's talking about a case study in a church or a synagogue and in that day if you were in a synagogue which was their version of kind of church for hebrew jewish people you would literally buy your seat to this day some synagogues still sell your seat imagine if imagine if to come to church today you had to go on to ticketmaster and pay for your seat i'm praying about it so i just uh i'm just kidding and all of a sudden you're like well i don't know let's let's let's get the good seats so that we could show up late oh and it comes with a vip parking stall and they're going to meet you with a glass of water or they've got valet parking and they won't stick us on the naughty dirt lot that's good okay and then you show up and all of a sudden your seats are pre-arranged and pre-signed to this day some synagogues still do that so on the high holy days when everybody comes you've got the seat that you paid for so you can show up late vip parking come right to the front meanwhile the people that can't afford it they're in the back standing up that's the way that it works so you know who the rich and the poor are imagine if you came into church today and like uh hey i'm new where do i see i don't know how much do you make we have tiered seating based upon income it's fine if that's the way in the world you get what you pay for but when you come to church and we're family it should be different how many of you at thanksgiving your parents around the dinner table don't organize you by income right if they do have them call me they're horrible parents right you know oh you make this okay you sit next to me okay you make the next amount okay you sit next to me okay you don't make that much you're at the kid's table that in the family of god we love one another and it's so much so that it's like brothers and sisters and it's not the way the world operates according to economics it's just we're family and so if somebody comes in we don't treat them differently based upon their income level now what was really weird to me in god's timing this week i was in dallas texas amazing country uh texas and uh it's still in america which is nice um it's nice to fly to america from america you don't get to do that a lot anymore so i got to do that this week i went to texas and i went to a conference for leaders it was good got to see some friends and i got to teach a bunch of pastors at cowboys stadium got to go down to the 50-yard line and let me just tell you this after being in that stadium i don't want to hear anyone complain about mega churches ever again i'm like the dallas cousin boys are the biggest cult i've ever seen and their screen is bigger than our buildings like no one should ever complain about church technology this is crazy so i got done teaching and i wanted to get home to teach real men on wednesday night and my flight was going to cut it close so we went to the airport and thought okay maybe we can get an earlier flight so i jumped up to the line they said well we have standby this the flight is sold out but you might make it if you just sit standby you might get home early i was like that's great so they called my name and i go up and uh they're like hey we have a seat you can leave early i think that's great i was like so so if you're gonna ask for a seat what would be the first one you should ask for if you're not a seasoned traveler this is the helpful part of this sermon isle aisle because those two crazy people at some point you may need to get away okay you may need to get away and if you can't get the aisle the next is hit the window so you can look out the window and ignore those two crazy people or at least take a nap the worst seat is the middle seat oh yeah if you're stand by middle seat it's where catholics got the doctrine of purgatory it's not hell but it's a painful place that feels like hell for a little while until you get out that's where catholics got the concept of purgatory was from the middle seat it's a terrible place you need to be for a while to just pay your price so i was like oh they're like we have a middle seat it's like okay so i jump i get in there grace said i need to be careful how i say this she's my wife um and my conscience lives in grace and so if she's not here we're in trouble so i ran this buyer and there were two people that didn't fit in their seat let's just say that okay so what just moving right along okay so so i i i look at them and they look at me and they're like and i'm like oh we all know this isn't going to work but we don't say anything and so they're like would you like to come in no actually i wouldn't i'd like to get in the overhead bin that's what i'd like to do that's i'm going to go with the overhead pin so i finally get in there and i made a strategic air i took my bag with my laptop and i put it under my feet not thinking i have no upper movement room now i have no lower movement room now i'm houdini man now i'm in a situation i got to get myself out of and i can't i'm feeling claustrophobic so the flight's like half an hour late i'm like okay i gotta go to sleep i gotta ignore this and let me tell you this when you turn 50 god gives you a super power to nap it's just he doesn't give it to young people it's too powerful they can't wield this superpower so what god does when you turn 50 and you're mature enough he gives you the superpower to nap i was like oh yes lord i will nap so i i kind of got i kind of got you know i kind of got in the position a little bit and i'm i actually went to the chiropractor after this flight true story so i'm in my position and i fall asleep and i think you know what i'll just ignore and then i get awake and two traumatic things happen i hear the loud sound of what sounds like a wild animal and it smells like a diaper change these are happening so i wake up this person over here their head is on my shoulder and they are [Music] snoring in my ear they're like ah so i go over this way and it smells like satan's breath and this dude has a massive bucket of chili that he snuck on the flight like you really got to be committed to your chili like i might go to jail but i might have chili i'm fine either way i mean he smuggled the chili the bucket of homemade chili on the flight and he's just eating it with a spoon i look over he's like i mean chili is like oh i know i know i know it smells like a diaper over there dude is pounding a bucket of homemade chili and i'm like okay this is terrible so i hadn't even started the sermon i hadn't even touched it i'd been busy i thought you know what lord i'll just sit here and study your word here's your faithful servant mark so i'm trying to get my laptop and it's it's now full-on t-rex because this is all i got i'm full-on t-rex i get my laptop i open it i open it do my t-rex bible study between the snoring and the chile and up comes james chapter two cheap people get bad seats i kid you not that's my bible study and in that moment i thought you know i mean i do like better seats i'm not gonna lie to you better seats are good but how many of you in life it just feels like you're always in the middle seat how many your whole life just feels like middle seat snoring in chile that's just your whole life and what he's talking about when people come into church we need to consider them in a way that is different in the world in the world you get what you pay for you get the seat you pay for you get your position on the org chart but what he's saying is when somebody walks into god's house there's a reason why we don't sell tickets it's free our god does grace heaven you don't pay anything jesus paid for everything that's how you're saved and that's how you enter into the kingdom of god and so what he's saying is i want to say thank you to those of you who are generous there's lots of people they get free bibles they get free bible say they have free church they get all kinds of free stuff and it's because those who have pay for it and those who don't know jesus or can't afford it can't that's how a family works that's not how a business works in a family i pick up the tab for you in the business you get what you pay for so what he's saying is when you come to church we need to we get so conditioned when we're out in the world that we judge people just simply by some externals and we look at the outward we don't look at the n word we don't really get to know who they are we just judge by what we see and this is the counterfeit of discernment it's just looking at people and prejudging them which leads to partiality discernment is i get to know you in your heart and your character and your motives the counterfeit of that is partiality where i just make generalizations okay so let me ask you this let's just talk about it for a minute we got nothing else to do so what are some things where we tend to look outwardly and rush to judgment to determine whether or not this is someone that we would like to know or have some sort of relationship what are the things we look for yeah bling what are you wearing you know did you get your watch at walmart or is it a rolex so we there are certain clues and indicators of income and status level one is jewelry watches accessories what else do we look for car what car do you drive oh my gosh would you look at that i mean we have the barrett-jackson auto auction just if you don't know what this looks like drop by this winter it's pretty fun but it is you know it is it is quite an undertaking it's not jus you you start on the outside of the bear jackson audience you're like their car is amazing and then you get inside you're like that car is not amazing i mean it just gets better and better in addition to car in addition to jewelry or furnishings what else do we look for where do you vacation put it on social media so we can cover it you know where do you live what is your zip code or do you live in scottsdale okay but are you in south scottsdale or north scottsdale because the north is closer to the lord jesus you know that's where north is right what else do we look at or look for for external clues and cues who do you hang out with what is your social circle what do you do for a job uh where are you at on the org chart are you cfo are you ceo are you j-a-n-i-t-o-r like where are you on the org chart how beautiful are you how beautiful is your spouse how amazing are your kids all of these externals let me just tell you this in scottsdale a lot of the people who appear to be doing well have a lot of debt they're lying by financing they're projecting a lifestyle that they don't provide for and so in our world we tend to prefer people and the preference works both ways sometimes the rich people don't like the poor people the poor people don't like the rich people sometimes the young people don't like the old people the old people don't like the young people so the prejudice and the partiality it runs in both directions what he's saying is as we come together and as we look we tend to look down on people that we think are lesser than us and then we get a little arrogant and proud like you know i'm smarter than you i'm prettier than you i'm better than you i'm more successful than you or you know well you're a crook that's why you're rich and and you rip this all off and you're corrupt and we're doing social justice to reorient your wealth you're welcome so what happens either way we tend to look down on people and the key to stop looking down on people he says is to look up to jesus christ the lord of glory rather than looking down on them look up to him and here he calls his brother jesus the lord of glory now lord means that jesus christ right now is ruling and reigning he's the highest authority in all of the universe it says repeatedly in the bible that right now jesus in the unseen realm after risen from the dead is high and exalted and seated on a throne it appears in 17 to the 22 chapters of revelation 45 times the new testament talks about jesus on his throne ruling and reigning as king of kings and lord of lords ruling over heaven and earth having all authority and all dominion when the throne appears in the bible all worship all glory all honor all obedience goes to jesus on the throne all authority all dominion all rule comes from jesus on the throne and what sometimes happens is we look down on those people rather than looking up to him and we're so worried about where we sit on the org chart in the family in the ministry wherever the case may be we tend to forget that all our seats are under his throne and his throne is ultimately the one that we should be paying the most attention to and he uses this language that jesus christ is the lord of glory glory and what that means is that if you are impressed with yourself the quickest way to solve that is to look up to him and to realize i'm not a big deal he is my group is not that impressive he is and when it talks about glory in the bible it mentions this word about 275 times in the english language and it uh uses words like splendor beauty magnificence radiance heaviness weightiness prominence preeminence luminescence splendor majesty holiness purity and worthiness you know that you've seen glory when here's your response wow right so what happens when a sun sets in arizona how many of you love the sunsets you just pull over and you just stop and you're like wow there's something in us that was made to feel small in the presence of something beautiful and bigger than us this is why we drive all the way up to the grand canyon just think about it it's a big hole in the dirt i've seen holes in the dirt and i didn't make long drives to just be there but what happens when you go to the grand canyon there's a sense of glory this is big i am small something in me feels really good about being small it's because you were made to be in the presence of god and understand your place in all of creation this is the kind of feeling that you get when your sports team does something amazing and everybody jumps out of the stands like this is what a husband feels when the door opens on his wedding day and she's actually there wearing a white dress with a smile glory glory yay glory is when you see someone or something that is beautiful majestic awe-inspiring overwhelming gives you a right sense of being loved but also not being the center and that is jesus christ the lord of glory and the problem is when we think of jesus we tend to think of him in humility not in glory right now jesus is not poor he is rich he is not in humility he is in glory right now he is not working as a carpenter he is ruling as a lord right now he is not being used and abused right now he is being worshiped and adored that you and i need to continually think of jesus not just as he was but as he is because as he is is as we will be not only is jesus in glory he has gone before us and he has prepared a place for us in glory it doesn't so much matter what you make today it doesn't matter so much where you live today it doesn't matter what you drive or what you wear today or how you look today or what you wear today today is a brief moment it is as the bible says a little while and then when you go before the throne of jesus he is going to reward you for all that you endure in this life and you're going to get a new seat it says this jesus does in matthew 19 in the new world when the son of man talking of himself will sit on his glorious throne that's the lord of glory enthroned you who have followed me will also sit on thrones so maybe you drive a nice car you don't drive a nice car maybe you're way up the org chart or way down the org chart maybe in your family you're the one that everybody loves or you're the one that nobody understands it doesn't matter where you sit today it matters to some degree i don't want to besmirch suffering in life but at the end of time jesus will say everything you've been through i faithfully reward and i have a throne for you not only is all of eternity going before jesus throne god's people are going to get assigned by jesus their own throne he says everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children for my name's sake will receive a hundredfold and inherit eternal life and many who are first will be last and the last will be first what happens in this life is everybody's just trying to climb their way up the ladder and what jesus says and when all is said and done i will reward everyone according to their obedience and faithfulness and some of you have lost some position you've lost some income you've lost some influence because of your faithfulness and love for jesus and as a result you may not be in the seat to use that metaphor that you want to be in well just be faithful in that seat and then when all is said and done he's going to reseat you have you ever been somewhere where you had a seat and somebody came up and said uh actually i've got another seat for you and you got reseeded when all is said and done jesus is going to resee you the seat you're in is just a temporary seat it's just sitting in the waiting room of eternity and when all is said and done he has the throne for you so what he's saying is stop looking down on them look up to him don't worry about how you're interacting or related to them worry about how you're interacting with and related to him and just be content with the seat that god has given you and when eternity comes that seat will be changed in addition the next point that the lord jesus makes is don't look only at the outward look also at the n word this is why we have facebook and we don't have soul book all right everybody looks at the outward nobody looks at the n word the bible says old and new testament man looks at the outward god looks at the heart god looks in we look out are they beautiful are they young are they rich where do they drive what do they wear where do they live what does their family look like you know let me peer into their life listen my beloved brothers again we're family we've got to think in the church as a church like a family has not god chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith there's two economies your finances and your faith we tend to pay far more attention to the economics of finances than we do faith those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which he has promised to those who love him but you have dishonored the poor men are not the rich the ones who oppress you and the ones who drag you into court are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable name by which you were called if you were really to fulfill the royal law according to scripture is going to quote his big brother jesus you shall love your neighbor as yourself you are doing well but if you show partiality we're the good people they're the bad people i prefer people like me and i judge people like them you are committing sin and convicted by the law as transgressors and what he's talking about here is outward versus inward it is fine to have outward okay if you have money great if god's provided a great lifestyle for you awesome if god's giving you a nice car enjoy it not against any of that but in addition to what's out there we need to pay careful attention to what's in here do you love god do you have character do you have integrity this is the fruit of the spirit love joy peace patience goodness kindness gentleness faithfulness and self-control manifest itself through you and what he's talking about is in the world it's pretty much just about money and we have judgment and evil thoughts james told us and what that is we're looking for people who can benefit us oh you're beautiful maybe we could date or marry or live together sleep together oh you make a lot of money well you could be good connections for networking oh you're a high net worth person that could really benefit me and what he says is what we can do is we can just look at everybody as a bank statement not a human being and as a result we can overlook some of the best human beings because some of the best human beings they don't have a great bank statement but the ledger in heaven they are rich in faith i don't mind if you're rich in finance doesn't bother me at all it doesn't bother god at all but the question is are you rich in faith this is the economy that god cares about not just the external but the internal here's the big idea who you are is more important than what you have and the truth is life is not necessarily improved by just generating more wealth it's having better relationships and so as you're looking for a spouse you better be looking inward if you're looking for a friend you better be looking inward if you're looking for people to do life together you better be looking inward not just outward and what he's talking about here is rich and poor and again historically and categorically we're rich if you're in america right they keep sending checks to your house with air conditioning and not making you pay your rent you're rich you're doing good right if you flush the toilet in your house winner winner chicken dinner you're right you're doing great and so what we tend to do is americans we tend to go onto social media and look at the most affluent people and then consider ourselves the poor instead we need to look globally and historically and say we're the rich because they're looking at us the rich and the poor tend to be two categories as i've said previously in james that are dominated by sort of this socialistic marxist thinking and it's brainwashed most to go to university universities where you go to get an education but not wisdom and what happens is then you're told that the rich or the oppressors and the poor or the oppressed in the name of social justice the poor attack the rich to redistribute the wealth through government which is stealing and so we tend to think in terms of rich or poor and as i've told you previously the bible has four categories and here's what they are there are godly poor that's james's family his mom and dad jesus family is poor there's the godly rich james is not opposed to them in chapter two in chapter five of his book james you're going to meet abraham and job two very godly people who are very very wealthy so he's not opposed or against it got to read everything in context then there are the ungodly poor people who are lazy people who are bad stewards and then the ungodly rich what he's talking about here in james 2 is category 1 versus category 4. he's talking about godly poor people who are being oppressed by ungodly rich people who are taking advantage of them and lowering lawyering up and the poor people can't afford to defend themselves in court and what he's saying is this if all you do is look at the outward you're like i just i want to get close to the pretty people i want to get close to the power people powerful people i want to get close to the rich people you're going to miss some of the best people now what you find in the church sometimes somebody who's very rich and somebody's very poor they have a very loving healthy relationship because they're both rich in faith they are both rich in integrity and character when it comes to the people you're gonna do life with and to trust your heart with and to invest your days with don't just look external look internal if they're rich great if they're poor great the question is not are you rich or poor the question is are you godly or ungodly how do you know you're godly with your wealth well first is how do you get it do you work an honest job do you invest smart do you tied to the lord are you a good steward that's godly if you don't do that that's ungodly and then and so it's how do you obtain and how do you dispense steward your wealth your possessions your affluence and you can be rich or poor doesn't really matter the question is are you godly now some people that i know that are the most godly i know some people that are incredibly godly and very rich and god has enriched them because they're good stewards i know some people that are very godly and very poor and they've chosen a difficult path of life often in missions or ministry because they love the lord and they're storing up their treasures in heaven so their 401k doesn't look great but their eternal case sure does that god is going to richly reward them and give them a throne and what i would ask you is this are there certain preferences that you've allowed to become your prejudices it's not a problem to have your preferences like i like this kind of music this kind of food this kind of neighborhood you know this kind of school for my kids that's your preference but does it become your prejudice and those people i'm not sure about them because think about this if we just looked at the externals jesus christ in his early 30s before he's died on the cross and returned to heaven how would we evaluate him just looking at the externals okay uh so jesus where'd you go to college answer yeah i i didn't well have you traveled much not never gone more than 200 miles from my house and i walk everywhere i can't even afford a ride so what do you do for a living well i i street preach occasionally i cast out demons but those people tend not to have a lot of income so it doesn't pay really well um also how famous are you well yeah they're usually trying to kill me i'm not super popular well how about how about the religious people i mean surely they love you no actually they're the worst i told them their mom shagged the devil they've been really frustrated with me ever since it's in john 8 by the way wow so well tell me about your family kennedy's rothschild nope small rural town teenage peasants got married in middle school had me my dad's a carpenter where do you live i'm homeless where do you sleep on couchsurf how about your wife yeah i've never been married never had a serious romantic relationship you got any kids nope we would look at jesus in his 30s and say loser you're unemployed homeless no income stream no wife no kid no plan and he's god don't pursue your potential pursue your calling jesus could have made a lot more money but that wasn't his calling jesus i'm i'm guessing he would have been a good husband but that wasn't his calling i'm sure he would have been a good dad but that wasn't his calling he could have run a company a really good he could have run a government in fact he does right now it's called the kingdom and he's really good i mean it's going well it says that the streets are paved with gold that's a guy who's made it right he's looking at paradise valley going dump right hey like but if you were to walk around and just judge the outward not the n word and only be attracted to those with beauty wealth power and you know platform you wouldn't have been really interested in jesus because outwardly there wasn't a lot to show but inwardly he's god and he's perfect and he's rich in faith i just want to unburden some of you right your your net worth does not determine your self-worth that ultimately at the end of the day i don't care if you're rich or poor and i don't think god much does either i think the question is are you godly now there is and so some of us are rich some of us are poor but what he says is if for god's children there's one thing we can all be rich in love love and we live in a world that has a lot of judgment not a lot of love so he quotes the lord jesus he quotes his big brother they came to jesus and the religious leaders are okay we're reading the old testament we knocked out the first five books it's called the pentateuch which means book in five parts it's called the law or the law of moses and of course the studious types you know they they wrote down and numbered all the laws we got we got a number of these somebody's got to organize this they actually fought because there's one that they debated if it was one or two so some said 613 some said 614 either way there's a lot of laws they go to put them on the fridge like wow it doesn't even fit on the fridge that's a lot that's a big you know gold star list so they go to jesus hey jesus yeah it's pretty long could you tweet that for us just sort of break that down summarize that simplify it and here's what jesus says here's a big idea love the lord your god with all your heart soul mind and strength love your neighbor as yourself that's it jesus says it's actually if you'll love god and love people the rest will figure itself out james chapter 1 is about loving god james chapter 2 is about loving people his whole book is following this quote and summation from his big brother jesus and so what happens is we tend to look at people and ask what do you have and what god says he wants us to ask is who are you you may not be a wealthy person but you can be lavishly generous in love you may not be able to give very significant gifts and some of you can and you should but we can all give love this is the one thing that the world doesn't understand because god is love and god god gives us his love god pours out his love through us by the holy spirit he has given us what that means is we have a limited resource for finance but we have an unlimited resource for love in faith and he's saying that when we come together as god's people when we do life together as god's people it shouldn't be judging one another it should be loving one other it shouldn't be partiality it should instead be seeking to outdo one another in love and so what he's talking about here is love and what love means is you're my priority see what he's talking about previously is we have partiality and we're selfish how can you benefit me you're pretty you're successful you're powerful that benefits me love says how do i benefit you jesus came down to the earth not to be served but to serve not to be loved but to love not to take but to give the essence of christian life is just love and that is what is best for you even if it is not best for me when it came time to go to the cross in the garden of gethsemane the lord jesus was stuck between what was best for him and what was best for us what is best for him is not to endure the wrath of the father and be crucified what is best for us is that he would go to our place and take our penalty for our sins that he would endure the wrath of god and he would forgive sin and conquer death and in that moment he had to choose between what's best for me what's best for you what did he choose what's best for us for god so loved the world that god demonstrates his love for us in this world yet sinners christ died for us that no one has any greater love than this than they lay down their life for their friends jesus life and death were for you and he loved you and he did what was best for you and so if you want to grow as a loving person one of the most important things is to figure out the people in your life what does love look like for them and jesus says to love your neighbor so who's your nearest neighbor your spouse and your kids oftentimes religious people look over their spouse and kids who can we love it's like no no love and ministry start at home love your spouse love your kids from there your family go love some other people but it starts at home and there's a guy named gary thomas he's written a good marriage book most of you are probably familiar with he calls it the five love languages he's got this thesis that's really helpful and that is that oftentimes we're loving people but their love language is different it's almost like two people that don't speak the same language they can't communicate and connect so you need to learn to become bilingual say there's a hispanic person and a an english-speaking person they get married they got to learn a little spanish they got to learn a little english so that they can communicate so what oftentimes happens is with our spouse with our kids with our friends we think that we're loving them but they don't feel loved by us any of you married and had this experience i just don't feel like you love me like what do you mean i don't love you i go to work every day i come home and i do my ba and here comes the little attorney rises up in us to give the defense and if you've not had this experience you're single okay and you will i'm just prophesying your future and his five categories for love languages are quite helpful one is uh words of affirmation this can be encouragement i believe in you this can be praying over someone it's it's encouraging them this can be a text uh this can be an email this can be the handwriting of a card or a letter but it's words of affirmation the other is acts of service how can i help what burden can i live what do you need me to do i'm super practical just tell me how i can help and then there are gifts sometimes it's a big gift i got you a new car sometimes it's a small gift a friend of mine he gets up before his wife and she loves a certain kind of tea with a little bit of honey so every day he gets up before her spends time with the lord he makes her tea puts the honey in it and brings it to her so that she starts her day with her husband giving her a little gift it's a little thing but it's a big thing because it's it's an honest thing sometimes it's not just gifts sometimes it's quality time hey let's hang out let's go for a walk let's sit down turn your phone off you know turn the tv off let's let's have a date let's go for a walk let's let's get some time away let's get quality time we need to do face to face we're always doing shoulder to shoulder getting stuff done we need to do face to face and make sure that we're connected and close and then touch like i like to hold hands i like snuggle like to hang out and what happens he says is we've all got at least one some of us are high maintenance and have more than one i know a guy and when grace and i first got married i know that she loved me and i loved her but she didn't feel loved and i didn't feel loved it's because we had different love languages her love language was service so she is laundry dishes groceries gas up the car washed the car vacuumed the car i mean wow and correct me that's not me i am touch i have multiple times faked an injury to get a backup multiple times how are you doing oh my gosh i i pulled a thing uh it's a terrible thing would you like a back rub i hadn't even thought of that that's such a great idea oh my gosh the pain is to my neck i need a neck rub too so this is what we and so when we're driving i like i always hold grace's hand i like to snuggle i like having a rock called ministry of presence i just like how i like her let's get a little secret i like my wife okay i like having her around and uh but hers is gift of service so she's always like doing stuff and i'm sitting on the couch like hey come on over come on over hey you came from my rip you need to come back like you need to you need a bit you can eat a little come back home here baby girl right she's like no no i gotta dust the light bulbs and i gotta go clean the gutters and like no you don't no you don't i'm good at hiring people like i don't i don't have the gift of service i have the gift of hiring i got there i saw him yelp yeah we'll fix this here sit down and so she'll be like i can't sit down because i'm loving you i'm like no no you need to sit down because that's how i feel loved and then we had kids and she's like you better get up and do some stuff i was like honey but my law language is oh okay okay okay you know so now if like the other day i couldn't believe i bought her gifts i've incur the other day i gassed up her car and washed it she got teary she's like thank you so much i'm like what the heck you didn't get a new car you got gas in the old car but for her it was just serving so i did i mean i'm way off my i'll tell you yesterday okay i messed up okay so not just yesterday it's not like was jesus until yesterday but like i woke up before grace first time in our whole marriage i i i i i believe you know hey the lord's on the throne i'll see you at noon that's just kind of me you know i no nothing to worry about i don't i don't get up early so i i got up here i don't know why maybe because i'm 51 soon and i'm old and we get up early so i got up early and i was like okay i'm going to serve my wife i'm not going to make any noise so i'm doing my ninja thing trying to get out of the bedroom quietly close the door and i'm like i'm gonna let her sleep in and i'm thinking how can i serve grace how can i serve grace because hers is acts of service so i'm like okay so i cleaned up downstairs and i have to be very like this i gotta like lord jesus help i don't think about doing things he's like take out the garbage i was like oh okay so i'm trying so i got the garbage and i'm gonna let the dog out and i opened the door but i forgot to turn the alarm off so i'm trying to serve my wife by not making any noise and oh the good news is i was quiet with my feet and i didn't i didn't shut the bedroom door loudly but i did turn off the alarm in the whole house wake up my wife the whole thing i'm trying not to do she comes downstairs i kid you not this is my wife she gives me a big hug she says thanks for trying which it was very loving but now that i think about it it's like you tried you know so but the point is like love is who are you because let me ask you this to really love someone do you get to do you have to get to know him you do to judge someone do you have to get to know him no so judging someone is easy loving someone is hard judging someone you don't even need to get to know them loving someone you really need to get to know them and what he's saying here is don't judge people love people don't just look at the outward get to know the n word and the truth is not only should we look at their outward we should look at our n word because god looks at our inward and that's where he transitions the world runs on judgment the church runs on mercy james 2 10-13 whoever keeps the whole law like i read the whole bible and i did it all and i only missed one thing it's a fail but fails in one point has become guilty of it all for he who said i love how he says this he's like i know a guy who once said who's that guy his brother jesus i would have said it this way my brother jesus christ who is king of kings and lord of lords and shared a bunk bed with me and from eternity pass chose a brother named james do not commit adultery also said do not murder if you do not commit adultery but you do murder you have become a transgressor of the law so speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty for liberty excuse me i just for some reason liberty like i don't know why i've got that commercial gone um for judgment is without mercy to the one who has shown no mercy here's the big idea that's why i underlined it mercy triumphs over judgment here's what we tend to do we tend to show up on the earth and we tend to think um there are good people and bad people of course i'm one of the good people and if those people are different than me they are the bad people i don't really know them but i judge them and i'm partial against them and i compare myself to them so that i look good here he talks about murderers and adulterers he's like at least i'm not a murderer or an adulterer and today you know that you're a really bad person when you pull hitler in anybody who's like i'm not hitler like well yay yay thank you so much for not being a genocidal demon-possessed terrorist yeah you're you're a really good person like and so what we tend to do is we tend to we tend to have some moral outrage for them and we feel that we're better than them this is what drives social media by the way every day is who's worse than me that i can draw attention to so that no one asks me who i am it's a diversionary tactic and we tend to think that there are good people and bad people we tend to judge the outward not the inward and what he says is jesus works totally differently the god of the bible works totally differently that god rules and reigns through perfect unchangeable and fixed laws and that you and i are judged by jesus the judge according to the laws and what he's saying is we tend to think of people who live their life as on sort of a continuum or a scale you know from a f student to an a student and you're like well mother teresa is an a student and billy graham's an a student and you know genghis khan's an f i'm probably a b and we ten and what god looks down and he doesn't see that what he sees is pass fail if you're perfect you pass if you're not you fail if you do everything the bible says except for one thing you're a failure and it says this line it's haunting from jesus in matthew 5 be perfect is your heavenly father is perfect god is not a past fail it's a perfect imperfect category and in addition to god judging our outside he also judges our inside he judges your inside so here he's talking about murder and adultery jesus took it a step further and he said murder and adultery is not just what we do with our hands that's what we do with our heart he said i never murdered anyone really did you murder them in your heart you're like yeah i've had a lot of heart murder have you murdered their reputation have you murdered their relationships have you murdered their emotional mental well-being because sometimes you're like i don't want them to die i just want them to hurt every day which is just heart murder and jesus says in addition to adultery of the hands there's adultery of the heart you lust after someone you're into pornography you have impure thoughts now in hearing this what we've done is we've gone from judging them to allowing him to judge us as soon as we do that we realize we are sinners we have fallen short of god's word and god's ways god's standard in god's scripture and so what he talks about then is we deserve judgment guilty people deserve some sort of consequence for their behavior and we're guilty see we tend to be very aware of their sin but not our own but those other people tend to be very aware of our sin and the truth is we're all judging one another because we sense you know there needs to be some judgment here and god's like i've got this i'll judge all of you and his conclusion is that we're all sinful now some of you are here and you're not a christian let me speak to you for a moment or maybe you're a prodigal or you've been away from the faith for a while and you would say well i'm not a bad person nobody's perfect that's the non-theological way of saying i am a sinner there is one person who is perfect and we murdered him that's how imperfect we are his name is jesus christ and so when it comes to god's law judging us and us being imperfect and sinful having broken god's law externally with our hands and internally with our heart he says it really comes down to only two options so if you're here this is the most important thing you'll ever hear this is the most important decision you will ever make are you going to proceed forward toward judgment or will you go up to god for mercy see the good news is this either god judges you which is hell or god comes to give you mercy and be judged in your place that is jesus the story of jesus is that he didn't stay up there and judge us he came down to serve us he came down to love us he came down to substitute himself for us the story of jesus is this he is god become a man he lived the perfect life the only life without sin and he went to the cross and he died in your place for your sin to satisfy the judgment of god which is right and good and on the cross all of my sin was placed on jesus and he took all of the judgment and then he gave me all of the mercy so the idea is this you're all guilty we're all guilty the question is will it end in judgment or mercy this is where you need to make a decision whether you will give jesus your sin and receive from him mercy so that you can be forgiven and become a brother to him and a child of our heavenly father or whether you will continue in your path that ends in judgment now if you will just even in the quietness of your heart because god knows the outward not just the n word if just even the quietness of your heart or mind you go you know what i am a sinner jesus is my savior i'm asking you jesus to forgive me so that i get the mercy and i'm grateful that you took the judgment there is never a person who will turn to jesus that jesus will turn away from them and this begins your eternal life as you become a person who is no longer headed toward judgment but living under mercy and let me let me say this as well i'll close with a rant and i'll bring the band up i'm not sure where this is going to go but what happens here in james is james makes an incredible promise what he says is he told us in james chapter 1 that those who don't only listen to the word but do what it says are blessed by god here he tells us that god will pour out mercy for those who recognize their personal sin and live under christ the lord and the lordship of jesus christ and he says if we will be doers of the word and live under christ as our lord not only does the mercy of god come down but it unleashes something that he calls the law of liberty the people are set free the destinies are changed the cultures are altered that lives are rewritten and this was written two thousand years ago and james makes this incredible prophetic proclamation about the future that if we will be under the word of god and live by the mercy of god and live for the glory of god that ultimately god will pour out liberty on people wherever the church and gospel of jesus christ spread now we find ourselves in this historically unique position 2 000 years later here we are and the question is did it happen did the freedom did the liberty did the mercy that the blessing that god promises to those who are under his son and under the authority of his word has it happened and it has we live in this day when there is this great grand cultural longing and desire for we need to have tolerance and diversity and equality an issue is why apart from jesus christ why would we have any notion that those things were conceivably possible until we have cosmic justice with god how could we possibly have social justice between one another until our relationship with god is right how could we possibly make right our relationships with one another now if you're here and you're not yet convinced of the gospel of jesus christ or maybe you are but you have been in your closet not public with your faith let me just say that there are only a few what i would call world views or meta-narratives or grand ways to see life and god and your place in it i'm going to eradicate the options i'm going to tell you about jesus and then we're going to sing some songs i'm going to summarize chapter 7 from the most recent book critical theory versus christian theology it's free at realfaith.com you'll get what you pay for i haven't been in trouble for a while that should fix it here's the big idea when it comes to life if you reject what james is teaching and what the bible is modeling here are your options and and the big idea is james is talking about part not having partiality but equality and justice and liberty and human flourishing your first option is something called karma prominent in eastern religions and hinduism and it is this you live your life there is some sort of cosmic scorecard your good deeds and bad deeds are measured if your bad deeds outweigh your good deeds you reincarnate and you suffer to pay off your karmic debt with your eternal goal being nirvana which is nothing the result is that you and i would not be compassionate people because if someone is suffering it must be a consequence it's not that jesus pays they must pay it's not that jesus is the one who makes it right they need to come back and get it right this is why if you go to a place that believes in karma there is no grace there is no mercy there is no justice there is no generosity because there is no concept of a benevolent god this is where you get partiality in the caste system and the untouchables you're looking for equality and impartiality and liberty you won't find it in karma some then choose islam which is the fastest growing religion on planet earth you won't find impartiality men and women are treated differently those who are muslim are considered superior and those of us who are christian and jews are called monkeys and fakes and we're inferior sharia law has no place for freedom it's converter die in addition the way women are treated is not without partiality and liberty and equality and wherever it spreads it's a demonic counterfeit to the kingdom of god and it doesn't bring the law of liberty it brings the law of death that's exactly what happens in radical jihadism your third option is atheism and what people will say who are atheists like well religion is the cause of all the conflicts and the wars i believe in jesus and math and the truth is atheism kills people in the 20th century alone we see that 170 million people were killed by other human beings 130 of those by atheists stalin killed 40 million hitler killed 15 to 16 million mao killed 70 million chinese and we look at that we're like i can't believe they did that we have murdered over a billion people in the womb through abortion we have a holocaust on our hands we have partiality toward the unborn we believe in justice and equality and liberty once you make it out of the womb but the most dangerous place to be is still the womb the leading cause of death is not coveted it's abortion and i just call out the hypocrisy where it's like well let's follow the science hey we're at it let's follow the science that says that life begins at conception hey when did we all become when did we well we need to take the vaccine we need to shut down the economy we need to put on a mask why because we believe in the preservation of human life oh great now we're all pro-life welcome and waiting for all of you to join us because what we have now is we're willing to do anything for the lives of the born and nothing for the lives of the unborn because we have no partial we have total partiality and we have no liberty now if you are one who has had an abortion god loves you and can forgive you but in this day of we just need to love people and preserve life what about the most frail the most fragile what about the most vulnerable the unborn life our god was in the two he was in the womb rather before he was in the tomb he was in the womb of a teenage unmarried rural peasant girl praise god there wasn't a clinic in nazareth he would have never made it to the resurrection in addition out the outgrowth of atheism is they cannot live without some concept of equality and justice and liberty so they steal it from jesus frederick nietzsche the great atheist he credits christianity for the concept of equality in the will to power he says quote another christian concept is passed even more deeply into the tissue of modernity the concept of souls equal before god he went crazy and his christian mother tended to him at the end of his life what he says is we don't actually have any reason to believe in equality impartiality mercy and liberty but just something in us it's kind of like maybe we were created with a conscience something in us really wants that so we'll steal that from jesus richard rorty the more modern philosopher just comes out and says it clearly he says the idea of universal human rights was a completely novel concept in history resting on the biblical teaching that all human beings are creating the image of god he calls himself a freeloading atheist i just stole it out of this atheism comes out of what we would call evolutionary thinking if you want equality if you want mercy if you want liberty and you believe in evolutionary theory it absolutely is incontrovertibly contradictory and the concept is that we started as animals and then some of us evolved there is some sort of continuum therefore some of us are more human and some of us are more animalistic in our own tragic nations history there was about 100 years where people who were non-white were only counted as 60 human for reason of voting and census and we all know that it's based on the teaching of charles darwin this is where evolutionary thinking comes from and you've been told in school because you were lied to he wrote a book called the evolution of the species that's not the whole title he says it is cold rather on the origin of species by means of natural selection or the preservation of favored races in the struggle for life evolutionary theory is inherently partial not impartial it leads to slavery for some not liberty for all it is the belief that we were not made in the image and likeness of god and it leads to all kinds of classism and racism and nationalism here's a big idea according to the bible there's one god he made us all if you trace our family tree back there is only one family the human family there is only one race the human race adam and eve are the mother and father of the saul were made in the image and likeness of god we did not evolve from lower form animals now what happens within this evolutionary thinking the fit people need to get rid of the less fit people so there's a guy named thomas malthus comes out with a philosophy saying we need to have social justice and reorientation it leads to something called nazi germany the historic pursuit of social justice led to jewish people be putting in furnaces because the thought was well they make money we need to reallocate it they have education we need reorientation they're in a privileged position we need to take down our oppressors this led to world wars we've been here before humanity is driving around the same stupid cul-de-sac declaring progress when james says if you want liberty and mercy and impartiality you need to repent of your sin and receive jesus christ there was a gal who took the thoughts of malthus and applied it to birth control sterilization her name was margaret sanger she realized that big camps were not good concentration camps so she instead architected small clinics and she opened something called planned parenthood as a result even though those who are hispanic black african-american would account for 29 of the population they account for 55 of the abortions because we need to go into the poor clinics and we need to get rid of certain people and we call it liberty and it's demonic misery and here's the big idea if you want equality you have to believe in the word of god that there is one god who made us in his image and likeness there is one race the human race if you want justice you need to come under the authority of god's word we are all sinners by nature and choice god sees what we do externally god knows how we feel internally and he says that we have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of god and he comes down to fix our problem and he lives the perfect life and his name is jesus christ and he comes to love us and to be judged for us and he goes to the cross to substitute himself and die for us if you want justice you need jesus if you want equality you need jesus if you want mercy you need jesus if you want liberty you need jesus because when the son sets you free you are free indeed everything that james promised two thousand years has come true i am not ashamed we are not ashamed of the gospel of jesus christ it is the power of god it changes lives it reconciles relationships it transforms nations it's the only hope for planet earth and i don't know what they're doing out there but we're going to worship in here

Channel: Real Faith by Mark Driscoll

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Id: zEaS4hIlHNA

Length: 65min 34sec (3934 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 03 2021