Mean People and What to Do About Them | Part Two

you will never forget [Music] good morning good morning how are we feeling this morning why don't we stand on up we're gonna sing together guys look so wonderful come on let's try [Music] this [Music] oh then you can't belong [Music] is now satisfied sing i'm not afraid [Music] cause the god of the mountain is the god of the valley [Music] but there's not a place in grace they won't find me again [Music] [Music] [Music] is [Music] you turn shame into glory you're the only one who cares [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] nothing is better [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] well that was awesome hey good morning welcome to north point hey you guys can go ahead and take a seat um if it is your first time here we are especially glad that you're with us this morning we certainly hope it will not be your last time and in fact some of our staff would love to say hello to you today they're going to be in the connections area which is right outside the east auditorium after today's service we've got a gift for you so stop by and say hello because we would love to meet you uh whether it's your first time here or you've been around here for a long time we've come up with a way to keep you in the loop of everything happening here at north point all you have to do is visit our website at northpoint.org forward slash top three and there you're going to see a list of the top three things either in person or digitally that we have for you and one i'd love to highlight this is pretty new around here something we're doing digitally that we call leadership labs this month our special guest is elizabeth dixon she is an exceptional leader she actually leads chick-fil-a corporate for service and hospitality and she's going to be unpacking five essential ingredients for creating an exceptional customer service experience so whether you're leading in the boardroom or at your business or maybe even the pta any of those places we have created this content really to help you lead well and we've made it really easy for you to share with your friends and co-workers even we're going to provide a handout and a discussion guide that you can take into your teams so that you can unpack this content with them so you're going to want to visit top three today and register for leadership labs that is happening on july 22nd well whether you're connecting with us digitally or you've been connected in a small group around here everything we do we do it for one purpose and that is to inspire people to follow jesus that is our mission it is our heartbeat because we believe that following jesus will make your life better and make you better at life and today we're going to take a chance and celebrate a story of life change leah is with us this morning and yeah we got a couple leah fans in the audience yeah leah is gonna share a bit of her faith journey and follow it up with baptism so before we hear leah's story i would love for y'all to stand we're gonna sing together and tan is gonna lead us in our first song [Music] is [Music] there's [Music] is [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] wipes away all tears [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] is [Music] for your mercy never fails me in all my days [Music] oh [Music] [Music] you have been so [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] is [Applause] [Music] is [Music] is [Music] i'm leah machetta before i knew jesus i was a very angry person i was angry with my circumstances unhappy with myself and dissatisfied with my life i kind of just resented my own existence like what's the point of even being here when i finally understood what jesus had done for me on the cross i felt the weight that i had been carrying for so many years began to lift jesus had shouldered my grief and allowed me to see life through a renewed lens his sacrifice was so selfless so moving so indescribable that it compelled me to want to be more like him at first i thought i needed to clean up my life master my sin and then i could come to christ i later realized that i just needed to come to him right in the middle of my storm and he would transform my life blot out my sins and make me a new creation in him one of my favorite verses is found in mark 2 17. jesus said to them it is not the healthy that need a doctor but the sick i have not come to call the righteous but sinners my hope was made complete in this one simple statement now that my confidence is rooted in christ i no longer resent my life i can stand firm in my faith and know that no matter what hardships i face and no matter what tragedies i may endure i can rest easy be still and know that he is god my faith in jesus changed everything leah that was beautiful and you didn't just share your story you shared jesus story that he came to do for us what we cannot do for ourselves to carry a weight we were never meant to carry and to give us a new life that is only found in him jesus changes everything and it's based on your decision to follow jesus that is my honor to baptize you my sister in the name of the father the son and the holy spirit [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] is [Applause] is [Applause] [Applause] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] is [Music] [Applause] [Music] god thank you so much for the truth in that song thank you god that it's not just a melody it's not just a song but it's a holy reminder of who you are and who you've always been if we take a step back and look at from the beginning of time how you are the keeper how you are the giver of good things that through your love and through your kindness through your grace through your compassion through your justice [Music] we have a right to be called children of god [Music] we thank you for that and god we thank you that today we can even take a look at our own lives and see that through it all we're here and it's because of your grace god you're so faithful even in those moments when it's hard to find the goodness and maybe even some of us are walking through that right now god you see and you know you know the valleys you know the mountains you know all of it and god i thank you that your promises are true that you will never leave us and you will never forsake us and you never have and you won't start thank you for being good thank you for never changing would you make us aware of that would you open up our hearts and our minds to see all of the goodness there is that is surrounding us even in the darkest moments i love you jesus and i thank you for being with us even right now it's in your name that we pray amen amen thank you so much for singing y'all can have a seat [Music] [Music] hmm [Music] so um before we get started today i want to tell you something about something very important um and if you have if you've only been visiting or part of one of our atlanta area churches for a few months you really need to know about this in august which i know sounds like a long ways away in august we launch our community groups our small groups all over the city and we have community groups or small groups for singles for marrieds for newlyweds all kinds of folks and it's the best way to make that church where you're sitting in church today begin to feel like your church or if you're watching online we would love to invite you to be a part of this as well now if you've only been attending one of our churches for the last few months this is your first opportunity to get in a small group and we don't want you to miss it so here's what we'd love for you to do we'd love for you today or sometime this week to go to life is betterconnected.com lifeisbetterconnected.com you'll just choose the campus that you attend and then you'll have an opportunity to sign up for a reminder so when we open registration when we open registration for our small groups in the fall you will be the first to know so you're not signing up for anything you're not committing to anything you're just saying to us hey i'm interested and when registration opens up please let me know so just go to lifeisbetterconnected.com and sign up for a reminder and when we open registration you will be the first to know now as some of you know today we are in part two of the series entitled mean people and specifically what to do about them mean people and what to do about them and just so you know i realized that um you have been mean perhaps somebody is going to hear or watch this this message i hope not and you'll come to mind i hope that's not the case we've all had seasons in our lives when we've been to mean people and mostly when we get together and and open the scripture together and and worship together we're talking about how to live a life in such a way that we're not the mean people so we usually focus on how to become better people but in this series we're talking specifically about how to respond to or what to do about the mean people in our lives not not just the folks who bug us we all have people who bug us specifically these are the mean people these are the people who are deceptive um they're controlling um they're just unkind they're unpredictable they're manipulative to be specific i'm not talking about somebody who's physically or sexually abusive that's different that's illegal this is just the mean people and it's important to talk about this and it's important to think through how we're going to respond because if we're if we don't have a plan if we're not prepared if we're not proactive well you know what happens what happens to the mean people in our lives the mean people in our lives they actually gain a measure of control over our lives and before we know it we are being mean right back even if we don't mean to in fact it's almost as if we have no choice because and you know this mean can make you mean because mean people keep us off balance and if somebody walks up to you and pushes you and you're off balance what do you do well you have no choice but to compensate when we're off balance we're forced to compensate so when you're around these people you always feel a little bit off balance in fact when you're around these people other people who know you might even say to you you know when you're around him when you're with her i notice when you're together you're not you're you're not the same person you are everywhere else you seem to become a different person it's because that person has kind of thrown you off balance and obviously or it seems intuitively our only choice is to respond in like kind i told you uh the first part of a story last week we have an 80 year old friend sandra and i do name alice and um alice um sandra became her legal power financial power of attorney because we needed to move alice out of her home into assisted living and sandra went to jump through all the hoops to become legal power of attorney and we eventually got alice moved but during that process alice had invited a friend to move in with her who had fallen on hard times this guy's in his late 60s living out of his car and out of the goodness of her heart she said well you can stay with me a few months until you you know kind of get yourself together and we were warned that if he moved in we would have a hard time getting him out but when i met this guy his name is roger he seemed like such a nice guy and he was actually helpful with alice and helpful with the garage sale so we eventually get her house cleaned out some of you heard this story last time get her house cleaned out we put the house on the market but he won't move out we gave him a deadline he won't move out we're we're showing the house a real estate agent showing the house there's nothing in the house now except roger's air mattress some clothes and his computer it's like it's a lovely home just don't look in there the guy camping out in the house he'll be gone so we're we're trying to show the house sell the house so she can get her money she was living off of pension social security and there was a little bit of a gap in terms of her monthly expenses with the assisted living so we really really wanted to sell her house put her equity in the bank and you know she'd be good to go but roger wouldn't move out and what was our response well our response was pretty much what probably your response would be we sat around coming up with mean manipulative ways to get roger out of alice's house because that's just what you do and after a while we realized we're becoming like roger we're thinking like mean people in fact he was so in our heads and he was like he was living with us in our home it was all we talked about he became the focus of our attention i come home every day what's the latest with roger as we got closer and closer and closer this closing and we were so worried he was going to undermine the closing in fact as i shared last time he actually tried to do it the point being it's difficult not to be mean to mean people it's difficult not to be unkind to people who've been unkind as it's difficult to be sensitive to insensitive people and again the golden rule is like right out the window isn't it when it comes to mean people now it's the iron rule it's the do unto others as they have done unto you or as they are doing unto you or even worse right but of course we talked about this the problem with getting back at the beam people or the problem with trying to get even with mean people is that it actually makes things worse because the problem with getting even makes us even with someone we don't really even like it makes us like someone that we actually dislike so the question we're asking in this series and we began you know unpacking to answer last time is what do we do i mean you can't just ignore these people that actually empowers them and eventually you're going to break right eventually you're going to break you're going to act like them or worse which actually gives them more power over you in fact we have all been there some of our greatest regrets perhaps or how we responded or how we reacted to the people who threw us off balance the mean people in our lives so there's actually a third option you don't have to ignore them you don't have to become like them there's a third option that actually takes away some of their power i mean it actually positions us to keep our frustration from overflowing into other relationships around us maybe you grew up in a family where your mom was angry your father was angry and as you got older you realize they're not really angry with me they're angry with their father their mother they're angry with somebody else they're angry with life but their anger just overflowed and how they parented and this third option protects us from falling into that trap as well jesus taught it of course and jesus modeled it in fact he was the ultimate model but abigail modeled it as well and abigail is a character in the old testament that many people don't know about and she's part of sort of the backstory of the story of david most of us are familiar with king david if you grew up in church maybe you know the story of shepherd boy david but this story takes place in the season of his life where he is fugitive david when he was a teenager as most of us know he marched down into the valley of elah he killed goliath with a slingshot in that moment he became a national hero so king saul the king of israel brought him in close actually made him part of his family because he was a national hero and he was a leader and he had influence and king saul was smart enough to know you keep your enemies you keep your friends close and you keep your enemies close as well and david he realized was a bit of a threat to his power and his influence in israel and then he gets word that a rogue prophet had actually gone to david's house when he was a little boy and anointed him as the next king of israel and if you are the current king of course that's a problem because you want your son to become the next king so now david is a threat to saul's dynasty so um he tries to kill david he eventually banishes him david becomes a fugitive he gathers other fugitives around him before long he's got about 600 men their wives their girlfriends their you know their kids kind of traipsing along behind him he's got a small army but he's a fugitive from the law and he's angry he's angry with king saul and he's angry with the circumstances but he can't get to saul so he just kind of carries the seething anger everywhere he goes and that's what brings us to the story and this is where we meet abigail so i'm going to catch you up a little bit with the story and then we'll continue from there here's how the story begins first samuel chapter 25 samuel was essentially david's biographer a certain man in moan who had property there in carmel was very wealthy he had a thousand goats and three thousand sheep which he was shearing in carmel and his name was nabal now during sheep shearing season um men and families who had a lot of sheep discovered just how much wealthier they had become this was like payday this is a an annual financial report his name was nabal and his wife's name was abigail and she was an intelligent and beautiful woman but her husband was harsh and mean there's our word in his dealings so david and his men hear about um the fact that nabal is having sheep shearing and caramel and realizes vaal is about to become even wealthier so david sends 10 of his men to carmel to meet with dabal to say hey would you be willing to share some of your wealth and some of your extra wealth some of your extra with me and my men and why would david feel like he could make that request well that's what the message to nabal that's the message from david's men to nabal explains that here's what they said they said never when your shepherds were with us out in the fields for months and months and months when your shepherds were with us we did not mistreat them and the whole time they were at carmel nothing of theirs was missing in other words our men could have taken whatever they wanted to take we could have taken women we could have taken sheep we could have mistreated your shepherds but instead you can talk to them nothing went missing in other words your profit is due in part to our protection so this seemed kind of reasonable hey would you share with us your profits because you know your profits are due in part to our protection nabal's response he was rude he said this who to david's messengers who is this david now he knew who he was who is this david who is who is this son of jesse who's broken away from the king he's just abandoned he's a fugitive he's a nobody he's an outlaw i did not ask for his help i didn't need his help and i don't owe him anything and you can go back and tell him that so david's men they turned around and they went back and when they arrived they reported every word and if you were with us last time you'll remember david's response david said to his men each of you strap on your sword so they did and david strapped his on as well and about 400 men about 400 men went up with david they were headed out of the mountains to carmel now this 400 men this was an overreaction as we said of epic proportion this was going to be a massacre and as he rides along he does what many of us have done many many times as he rides along he kind of builds up a head of steam he begins justifying to himself what he wasn't 100 sure he should be doing it's been useless he mutters to himself it's been useless all my watching over this fellow's property in the wilderness so that nothing of his was missing and what has he done how has he responded to me he has paid me back evil for good and then god you know david evokes god's name and invites god into the equation may god deal with me he says may god deal with me may god deal with david be it ever so severely if by morning i leave alive one male of all who belong to him i'm going to kill his servants his friends his sons and then i'm gonna kill him now again you read this story and you're like okay so david he didn't share with you is this is this is this what you do well if we know anything or if you know anything about david's history this is this is what he did so he's riding along he's hurt he's angry he's powering up it's going to be evil for evil he's really channeling i think his frustration with king saul but king saul is untouchable but he's found somebody he can take his anger out on and that's pretty much where we left off last time with the story so we'll continue from there meanwhile meanwhile back in carmel here's what happened one of the servants one of the servants nabal servants told abigail naval's wife david sent messengers you weren't here we find out later you weren't here but let me tell you what happened david sent messengers from the wilderness to give our master his greetings but our master hurled insults at them yet yet abigail these men david's men these men were so good to us they did not mistreat us the whole time we were out in the fields near them nothing went missing night and day night and day they were like a wall around us they protected us the whole time we were hurting our sheep near them and then she says abigail think it over i want you to think it over and see what you can do because disaster is hanging over our master and his whole household he and then i think she leans in she doesn't say this very loud she whispers in abigail's ear he is such a wicked man he's such a wicked man that nobody nobody can talk to him so abigail acted quickly and here's what she does it's kind of interesting she assembles um a caravan of food donkeys okay you're familiar with food trucks okay food donkeys caravan of food donkeys she gets all these donkeys ties them together and then she loads them up with food food donkeys there were hundreds of loaves of bread figs um cakes wine she just loads them up she knows she has about 400 male mouth to feed and she then she told her servant this was so smart she said to her servants you go on ahead you head out toward the plane i'll follow you but she did not tell her husband nabal what she was up to meanwhile coming down out of the mountains here comes david and his 400 men armed for battle and he's just mumbling to himself building up this head of state steam justifying building up justification for what he's about to do and as he comes out of this ravine that text tells us he comes out of this ravine onto this big wide open plane and what does he see a caravan of food donkeys and in the front is this beautiful woman and it totally messes up his mood have you ever had that happen like you've got your speech perfectly planned and you've kind of built up a head of steam and you're going to go home or you're going to walk down the office to the other office you got it all worked out and then somebody apologizes or somebody does something so nice for you it's like it's like how you know i i was so mad i was perfectly mad i was perfectly mad to deliver this message so here comes david i mean he's spent all this time he's got these guys and here's here's the you know the food caravan ruins his mood i mean you just can't stay mad with that going on so here's what the text says when when abigail saw david she quickly got off her donkey and she bowed down before david with her face to the ground and this is so powerful she begins to speak to david she begins to speak to david as if he is already the man that she hopes he will become now ladies you should take note of this this will work on us even when we know what you're up to it just works you know honey you are so patient with the kids i am yes you are so it's like a jedi mind trick you are so patient with our son and with our daughter honey you are such a good planner i can't wait to see what you've planned for my birthday you're such such a good planner it's like i am you know anyway here's what she does it's so powerful she fell at his feet and she said pardon your servant my lord and let me speak to you in other words just give me a minute and please hear what your servant has to say please she says pay no attention to my husband my lord that wicked man the ball he is just like his name his name means fool and folly goes with him so you're not wrong about my husband okay and as for me your servant i wasn't there when your ten men showed up and made the request if i'd been there this that i i may have been able to influence my husband i wasn't there this wasn't my fault referring to the ten men that david had sent ahead of time then she then here she goes this is so powerful here's what she says and now and now my lord as surely as the lord your god lives and as you live since the lord since the lord has kept you from bloodshed since the lord has kept you from avenging yourself with your own hands and david's like he did she's like yes he did he did in other words david you're not come on you're not the type of person that would avenge yourself on a defenseless person are you well i guess i'm not and then she gives him credit again for being even better than he was about to be she continues and let this gift which your servant has brought to my lord be given to the men who follow you again this just completely ruins his plans i mean how do you justify slaughter and pillage when somebody is bringing you what you were going to steal the lord is your god the lord your god will certainly make a lasting dynasty for my lord because you fight the lord's battles he's like i do yes you do you fight the lord's battles you don't have to fight your own battles david and no wrong doing and no wrong doing will be found in you as long as you live it won't no it won't even though and then she refers to king saul because everybody knew the story everybody knew the background of why david was a fugitive even though someone is pursuing you to take your life the life of my lord will be this is this uses some interesting hebrew imagery the life of my lord will be bound securely in the bundle of the living by the lord your god which is like what here's here's basically what she's saying even though someone is trying to steal your life your life your life is tucked away securely and safely in god's wallet your life is hidden in the bottom of a lady's large purse it's safe no one will be ever be able to find it then this is my favorite part then she takes him back to 15 year old david his 15 year old self when he faced goliath in fact in fact perhaps as we talked about last time david's sword was goliath's sword he had actually taken it from a priest earlier just a few chapters earlier perhaps she saw goliath sword strapped to his back or strapped across the back of his mule maybe that's what gave her this idea here's what she says but the lives this is so great but the lives of your enemies he god will hurl away is from the pocket of a sling david remember remember god's past faithfulness remember when you marched down into walk down into the valley of elah to face goliath you weren't a warrior you weren't equipped for battle you didn't have a sword you you just did did what you felt like god wanted you to do and do you remember how god came to your rescue do you remember how god defended you remember those days david you don't need to get even you have no need to return evil for evil for the lord your god is with you and then she speaks to his future and essentially she asked the question that we ask all the time around here she asked the question without asking it directly essentially this next part she says david what story do you want to tell when this is nothing but a story that you tell years from now when you're looking back on this season of your life as a fugitive because one day you're going to be the king god's going to keep his promise to you but when you look back on the season what story do you want to tell here's her version when the lord has fulfilled for my lord every good thing he promised concerning him and has appointed him ruler or king over israel my lord this is so great my lord will not have on his conscience the staggering burden of needless bloodshed or of having avenged himself david isn't this the better story don't you want to look back on this season and realize that you stepped back instead of taking matters into your own hand and of course david comes to his senses he's about to act like somebody he doesn't even like and david said to abigail praise be to the lord the god of israel who has sent you today to meet me may you be blessed for your good judgment in other words you had good judgment i didn't i'm thanking god for your good good judgment and i'm so grateful and intersected with the decision i was about to make for keeping me from bloodshed this day and from avenging myself with my own hands i have heard your words and i'm granting you your request now some point we all need an abigail in our lives don't we we all need somebody who can talk us down we all need somebody who has access to us we all need somebody who feels permission to delve into those areas of our lives that we oftentimes just keep people away from we all need an abigail and when she shows up or when he shows up in our lives we should be wise enough to listen in fact some of us if we're honest one of our greatest regrets could have been avoided if we listened to the abigail in our life somebody did say something maybe a parent maybe a friend maybe somebody you work with somebody you date they did say something but you just wouldn't listen we need to listen to those people who speak to our preferred future that who remind us that that what we want immediately sometimes isn't going to get in the way of what we want ultimately that will feel what feels right right now may haunt us later and then and i was tempted to skip the rest of the story because it's you know it's a little bit storybook but hey this is how the story ends and this is how things went down back then when abigail went to nebal he was in the house holding a banquet like that of a king because he's just made oh he's got all this extra wealth all this extra he was in high spirits he's so happy and very drunk and so she told him nothing at all until day breaks and she doesn't go back and say you really owe me big time because she just waits then in the morning when the ball was sober his wife told him everything that had happened and his heart failed him when he realized how close he came to being executed and losing everything he had and he became like a stone and then about 10 days later the lord struck nebal and he died and then the storybook ending then david sent word to abigail asking her to become his wife like really yeah this is just how things happened back then what do you think she did abigail quickly got on a donkey and attended by her five female servants went with david's messengers and became his wife and of course they lived happily ever after the end so yeah i made that part up okay so here's what we have and this is where this begins to interface with all of our lives either now or in the future um three characters three different responses but only one hero nabal david and abigail evil for good evil for evil this is where we're tempted to live and then good for evil as we said last time as you get to know nabal he's pretty much maniacal david is predictable in this circumstance and abigail is remarkable and these are our choices really and if you're not a jesus follower you get to choose and hopefully you will lean in more in one direction than the other but it's up to you you're the captain of your own ship but if you're a jesus follower for those of us who not just christians not those of us who just say we believe stuff for those of us who wake up every day and say to our heavenly father i want to surrender my eyes my ears my will my life you know my resources i to the best of my ability i want to follow you we're really only left with one option and that's remarkable and the reason it's our only option is twofold number one we've been on the receiving end of remarkable and we have been called to model it we don't call you know our remarkable abigail amazing abigail we call ours amazing what amazing grace that while we were still sinners christ died for our sins and then jesus who died for our sins says now i want you to not just believe in me or believe things about me i want you to get up every single day and follow me to which you may be tempted to say well what does that look like and jesus would smile and say well you should know by now if you're going to follow me it means you emulate me which means i want you to love your enemies to which we say you mean tolerate and ignore he says no i mean love love as in and here's here's his words his words i want you to do good not just ignore and not just not be unkind i want you to do good to those who hate you that's what you say i thought i was doing good just not to you know hurt him hurt her or let the air out of her his tires or you know slit the air mattress and put all of his clothes out on the street and change the locks i mean i thought i was already doing good because of what i hadn't done jesus says no that's not what i'm talking about and i want you to bless those i want you to bless those who curse you and i want you to pray for those who mistreat you does anybody do this to pray for them if we're honest we would say i don't even spend a lot of time praying for the people who treat me well and jesus says i want you to pray for those who mistreat you i want you to pray for the mean people i don't want you to do something to them i want you to do something for them because that's how you keep from becoming like them but there's a bonus jesus says when you do to them and for them what they don't deserve for you to do and when you pray for them and when you do good to them you actually become like your father in heaven because he is also kind to the ungrateful and the wicked so got some mean people in your life parents do your children have some mean people in their lives and because your children have mean people in their lives you know if anybody mistreats my kids it's like they're mistreating me and how have you responded and what would it look like you don't have to do it and what would it look like for your children they don't have to do it either but what would it look like in your circumstances to actually do good to those who hate you what would it look like to return good for evil as things uh continued to escalate um with roger he threatened to sue our real estate agent i mean it just it just got completely out of control about six days before um closing the closing that we weren't sure was going to happen because he wasn't about to move out and of course you're not going to close on a house with somebody living in it i mean it was just so weird i walked into the kitchen and sandra had been baking and she had cookie sheets out with muffins out that were cooling and then there was a paper plate with six muffins with some cellophane over it and clearly she was going to take these muffins to somebody which she does all the time and i said who are these for and she looked at me and smiled she said they're for roger and i'm like what she said there for roger little backstory during the garage sale that roger actually helped us with he actually bought things you know from sweet alice and and then said he we were throwing her out of her house it's just crazy anyway during the garage sale um sandra took two different kinds of muffins and he loved one particular kind so she got up that morning and made his favorite muffins and was gonna go over there and take i'm just like darling really and here's what she said she said i have to do this for me i have to do this for me i have to do something for him i have to do something for him and this is the best thing i could come up with so she went out in the garage got on her donkey and rode to lawrenceville now her plan was to get there and leave the muffins on his car and then text him and say hey roger you know he was outside they had a very awkward conversation she left the muffins didn't make a dent sandra she would tell you she was free and then four days before the closing was to take place after again all kinds of just crazy stuff he finally took his stuff and he left but here's the point for all of us let's let's not write a predictable story let's let's let's not write a predict let's not write an evil for evil story it's so predictable it's what everybody expects you to do it's what you're justified your friends would say well of course that's what you did this is our moment this is our opportunity the meaner they are the meaner they are the brighter our light has an opportunity to shine and i know because i don't know your circumstances i know that's so easy for me to stand up here and say but i'm not asking you to follow me i'm just trying to inspire you and encourage you to follow our savior and to write a remarkable story to do for others precisely what they don't deserve for you to do and it may not in fact it probably won't change anything in them but it will do something for you and in doing so you will be like your father in heaven now last time i uh left you with four questions and i'd like to leave you with the same four questions again as you kind of wrestle with this through the filter of your current circumstances do you want to be even with someone you don't even like i think most of us would say no wouldn't you rather be a head yes we'd rather be ahead and it's not intuitive but the way you don't get ahead by becoming even or getting even what story do you want to tell it's a powerful question to ask and then this is this is where the rubber meets the road this is this is where the change happens this is the tension point what would it look like to return in your circumstances what would it look like to return good for evil whether or not you follow through you at least owe it to yourself to explore and answer to this question even if you don't follow through at least ask the question because your willingness to say yes and your willingness to step into that crazy space that so few people are have the courage to step into that moment will do something in you that you may talk about for the rest of your life because in that moment again you will be like your father in heaven i'd love to pray for us heavenly father it is so much easier to stand up here and talk about it than it is to walk off the stage take off my mic and go live this out in the world but this is what you've called us to do to let our light shine in such a way that people would see not our belief system or our church attendance to let our light shine and our life shine in such a way that they would see our good works and realize there's a connection between what we do and what we believe and who we worship so give us the wisdom to know what to do give us the courage to do it in jesus name [Music] amen [Music] so take this life and breathe this heart that is [Music] so take this this heart that is [Music] oh take this there is no greater love sing that again come on hold on [Music] take it yes [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Applause] so take this amen may that be true for all of us that we lay our hearts down at the feet of jesus thank you guys for being here today we'll see you next week have a great one [Music] you

Channel: North Point Community Church

Views: 7,720

Rating: 4.969697 out of 5

Keywords: North Point Community Church, North Point, NorthPoint, North Point Atlanta, Andy Stanley, AndyStanley, Andy Stanley church, Andy Stanley message, Andy Stanley sermons, North Point church, NPCC, North Point youtube, Andy Stanley YouTube

Id: MSESVxh2rwE

Length: 57min 26sec (3446 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 18 2021