FRIENDS OF REDEEMER | Guest Speaker Jim Anderson

Well, good morning, everyone, and welcome to Redeemer.

If we haven't had a chance to meet yet, my name is Ben Anderson and I'm one of the pastors here.

I just want to welcome you to church this morning.

Also, a special welcome to you.

If you are checking us out for the first time, we hope that you have an absolutely great experience.

And if you are in that place where you're visiting and you are ready to be known, you want to dig in deeper.

One of the best things you can do is swing by our welcome desk, which is right there in the commons area.

There's gonna be somebody there who would love to get to know you, your name, and your story, and point you in the right direction for that deeper connection.

Well, today, whether you are a first-time guest or you have been here your whole life, uh, this is a really fun Sunday because we start our latest series, Friends of Redeemer.

And this is a season of the summer where we invite in guest speakers, people that we know really, really well, um, some new faces as well, pastors from the past.

And today I get to introduce to you Jim Anderson.

So I'm gonna tell you a little bit about Jim.

Now, first of all, what you're thinking is, are you relatives?

The answer is no.

I mean, honestly, we'd love to be a relative of Jim, but I'm not.

So uh, nor is anyone else on our staff.

Uh, we you know that we have a pastor, Terry Anderson.

We're not related, they're not related.

Uh, you guys might not know this, but the person who is leading worship today, his name is Logan Anderson.

Not related, not related, not related.

Okay, just um just piles of Andersons in Minnesota, you kind of know the drill.

But let me tell you a little bit about Jim.

Jim has been in ministry for over fifty years, which is longer than many of us have been alive.

I mean, that is impressive in and of itself.

But as you can imagine, when you're in ministry for 50 years, there's a lot of stuff that you do.

And so Jim has been a church planter, a church consultant, and a senior pastor along the way.

Most recently, he was the lead pastor at a church called the Harbor Church in St.

Paul, Minnesota.

Before that, in 1985, he helped start a ministry called the Harvest Network International, which serves ministers, ministries, and congregations all around the United States and 23 other nations.

I mean, so impressive.

And currently, Jim is the director of Harvest Impact Ministries, which consults and also offers resources to congregations around the world.

But here's the part that I love the best.

And I think that, Jim, uh, you would say this is the most important thing about you is he has been married for 50 years to his wife, Dun.

Obviously, inspirational to us all.

And as a result, they have four kids and six grandkids.

I get them all in that correct.

So that's reminding me.

And to be clear, once again, I'm not any of those categories.

But today, um, you're gonna hear from the wisdom of Jim.

It's gonna be a great experience for every single person here.

But let's give um a warm welcome to Jim.

Well, the f the first thing we should ask is how many of you are named Anderson?

It's great to be here.

We were here about two years ago, my wife Dawn and myself, and uh we just loved it.

Um Redeemer is a very, very friendly place.

I go to a lot of different churches, and you guys are kind of special that way.

Just the welcome we received, and it's just it's fun to be back.

Thank you for having us.

Um I'm gonna talk today.

Uh the message title is A Lexicon of Grace.

If you're not familiar with kind of the definition of a lexicon, it's like a dictionary that's special to a field or a unique practice.

Like, for example, if you're in um the computer sciences, you guys speak a different language.

You do it to confuse the rest of us, I'm convinced.

Um we have a son who's in the Army.

He's over, in fact, in the Middle East right now, deployed.

And uh we also have a son-in-law who's in the North Dakota National Guard.

And they get together and they start talking about weapons and strategy and different things.

We can't understand a word they're saying.

The Army's famous for its confusing lexicon to civilian.

Um, but that's true of every area.

Medical people have a lexicon, um, drug companies have a lexicon, and all their words are this long.

So I want to talk about the lexicon of grace because we, as believers and followers of Jesus Christ, um, there are some very important words that we use and aren't used by a lot of other people.

And I'm gonna talk about three words in our lexicon today.

Um, the first one is I'm gonna talk about the fact that I think it's misapplied, or there are two of applications, and we only use one usually, and the other one is very important.

So I'm gonna talk about that.

I'm gonna talk about the second word, which is falls into the category of something too good to be believed.

It's just so great, and yet I will bet not one of you used this word in the past decade.

All right, it's just not used very much.

And then finally, the third word is uh one of those words that gets distorted in its common usage.

In other words, we hear it and we think of something it doesn't mean.

And uh it's a very, very important word.

If we're gonna grow as a Christian, it's one of those words we really have to practice.

All right, so let me pray.

Lord God, we've come here to worship you, but we've also come here because we need each other.

We want to grow, we want the world to see your marvelous love in our lives, and also see your nature growing in our lives so that they can glimpse what you've done for us.

Come, Holy Spirit, and just bless us, help us grow this day.

We want to just ask you to help us think about these words that are so important and foundational in the lexicon of grace.

In Jesus' name we ask it, and everybody said.

Amen.

All right.

The first word is repentance.

Very important word.

And we um we tend to not be unfamiliar with it.

Christians understand what repentance is, and I think probably if you've been around at all in the kingdom, you know that you know repentance basically has the idea of turning around and going in a different direction.

Um, in fact, if you look up the dictionary meaning, it says to turn from sin and dedicate oneself to the amendment of one's life.

And normally, where we use this is we're talking about areas where we've strayed from God's moral law.

In other words, we're talking about particular practices, behaviors, where we know, and you know, the Holy Spirit's job, one of his jobs, is to uh bring to our conscience a conviction that I'm not walking in the ways of the Lord and I'm breaking the commandments.

And uh then we are saying Lord God, to give us grace to repent, to turn.

But I'm suggesting today that there's another uh more foundational, a more basic need to understand repentance.

And let me go to two scriptures that kind of will illustrate what I'm trying to say.

The first one is in Mark, uh beginning of the Gospel of Mark.

Uh after his baptism, you know, Jesus really launches when he's about 30 years old into his primary ministry here on earth, of being the Savior.

Mark 1, 14 says, After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee proclaiming the good news of God.

The time has come, he said.

The kingdom of God's near.

Repent and believe the good news.

Now let me go to another uh place, and this is on the day of Pentecost.

Peter preaches that great first sermon that really launches the church.

About 3,000 people get converted that day.

And uh he's preaching, and he says, uh it's a bold message he preached.

Therefore, let all Israel be assured of this, he says.

God has made this Jesus whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.

When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart.

And they said to Peter and the other apostles, brothers, what shall we do?

That's a great preacher moment when people are yelling at you, what do you want us to do in response to this?

What's Peter's response?

Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ, for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

We believe that you don't get into the kingdom by cleaning up your own life.

So I want to suggest to you that in this these two instances, the beginning, in a sense, of introducing the kingdom, it's sort of like, you know, a lot of you have a welcome mat at the front door that says welcome.

I hope most of you don't have a go-away welcome mat, but uh it says, Welcome.

In a way, what I'm suggesting that the the mat at the front door of the kingdom says, repent.

But what is he asking us to repent of?

I don't think though Jesus says, repent of all your moral failings, repent of all the bad things you've ever done, repent of your bad attitudes, your bad thoughts.

In one sense, that would become works righteousness, wouldn't it?

Clean yourself up before you come in and experience the grace of the kingdom.

That's not what he's talking about.

You know what he is talking about in this regard?

Is he talking about repenting of that thing we call original sin.

And you know what?

Original sin, it's kind of a theological word in our lexicon, isn't it?

What I really believe that is, is self-ownership.

It's a declaration of independence from God.

It's saying, uh, no, thank you.

You won't lead me, guide me, own me.

I won't be your servant.

I'm gonna serve me and my agenda.

That's what Adam and Eve did, deceived in the Garden of Eden.

They basically said, Well, I'm gonna be the God of my own life, right?

That's true in all of our lives.

Whether we are aware of it or not, whether we admit it or not, there is this deep drive towards self-ownership and independence from God.

I believe that that is what Jesus and in this case Peter was referring to.

He's saying, You want to enter the kingdom of God?

You got a new master then.

And he's a good master.

He's smarter than you, he loves you more than you even love yourself.

He loves you at a level you don't even understand what love is.

He said, repent of your desire to lead your own life.

I have found over the years that the difference between believers who are growing continually and manifesting continually the kingdom of God in their life is that they have understood the kingdom at this level.

And they have repented of their independence at this level.

And then, guess what?

The Holy Spirit's faithful, he moves on and talks about specific moral issues and cleans this up even more.

Now, um this, I don't know if this is new to anybody, this uh application of the world repent, but I want to go to a scripture that I think really makes this clear.

Um, well, first of all, it puts into context the amazing and I would even say severe teaching of Jesus on discipleship.

He says uh to us in uh Matthew 16, he says uh about being a disciple of his.

Jesus said to his disciples, if anybody wishes to come after me, he must deny himself.

You see the word there?

This is that deep repentance.

And take up his cross.

What's this cross a symbol of?

This is where you talk back.

What's a cross a symbol of?

Death, exactly.

He's saying, I want you to die to that old life you had where you were in charge, where you had freedom to do what you wanted.

And I want you to come follow me now and do my will.

It's really uh very clear in uh a lot of Paul's epistles where he's talking about um you know, he talks about both things.

He talks about repentance from dead works, but he's also he talks about this coming to the realization that we're invited to repent, turn away from self-ownership.

And uh one of those places is in 1 Corinthians 6, you know, I was just I was just reading in Ephesians, there's a little section in the fourth chapter where he's talking about, you know, all the exhortations to love one another and do all the things that Christians do in community.

And one of the things he sticks in there is uh those of you who have been stealing, you know, what kind of people were these in Ephesians?

You know, so he has to address stealing as a normal uh part of their lifestyle for many of them.

He says, you need to quit stealing, you need and you need to get a job, and you need to earn some money so that you can be a giver, not a taker.

Uh that's an example of that second kind of uh repentance.

But in Corinthians, he's talking about a different kind of sex uh sin.

He's talking about sexual sin.

And in uh the sixth chapter, starting with verse 18, Paul says, flee from sexual immorality.

All other sins that a man commits are outside his body, but he who sins sexually sins against his own body.

And then you see, that's uh an example of that Holy Spirit getting into the conscience and saying, no, no.

And let's be honest, the Corinthians in the area of sexuality had been enculturated into a very, very different lifestyle.

And so this was necessary that he address that specific sin.

But then he goes to this first application of the word repentance.

He said, The reason you're going to do this and change your lifestyle, your sexual lifestyle, is because your body's a temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you receive from God.

You are not your own.

You were bought with a price.

You see where he goes to the foundation of the word repentance.

It is the understanding you are not your own anymore.

There's another manifestation of this that kind of I think passes, we don't notice it.

And that is whenever these writers of these letters begin their letters.

Uh, this is true of Paul, it's true of James, Peter, Jude.

They start with the line, Paul, a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jude, a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Look it up.

But the word servant there is doulos.

It's a lot more than just, hey, I kind of hang out and work for Jesus.

It is bondservant.

So it could translate it slave.

They had this self-consciousness because of their repentance at the ownership level that they now lived, served, worked, everything they did, everything they had, who they were, was a servant of Jesus Christ.

I want to encourage you.

If you haven't dealt with your life at that level of repentance, that is the beginning of a life of power and freedom.

It's revolutionary.

You and I have a problem.

It's a fallen nature that wants to own ourselves and look after our own well-being first and foremost.

A Christian does not say, look after number one.

He says, honor and obey number one.

And everything else is gonna work out, and we're gonna live the best life possible.

So repentance is the first one that I wanted to talk about.

Now that this second word, I this is the one I bet you nobody's used this word in a sentence.

Forever.

It is propitiation.

Okay, raise your hand.

Did anybody use propitiation in a sentence this week?

What is propitiation?

It is, it means to appease and make favorable, to conciliate or make peace between offended parties.

In other words, it's not just forgiveness, because I'll tell you, there have been people who've done me wrong in life, and I've forgiven them.

I've obeyed the Lord's commands.

I pray for them, ask God to bless them, and that really helps, by the way, free me up from uh wanting to, you know, you know what I early on when God would betrayed for the first time and get really hurt.

You know, I read the Bible and then you feel like you have to obey it, you know.

And uh and I said, okay, it tells me to pray for him.

So I wanted to pray, Lord God, you know, would you please bless them?

They're rotten people, so maybe bless them.

Bless them with a tree on their house or something, you know.

And I really felt the Holy Spirit counsel me.

He said, Why don't you let me take care of the details?

You know, just just say, Lord, bless them and give them what they need.

Okay.

All right.

God, Jesus is the propitiation.

Listen to this.

Paul or John, I should say, the Apostle John, first John, he says, My little children, I'm writing these things to you so that you may not sin.

But if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

He is the propitiation of our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.

In Romans chapter 3, there is a uh a little section that really describes how complete and deep the thing that Jesus did on the cross is in terms of removing everything that has stood between any human being and God.

Romans 3 · chapter mention

Anyone who enters into the covenant, he just says, Man, God went to the very core of the breaking of the relationship.

Let me read it to you.

Romans 3, starting with verse 21, he says, but now the righteousness of God has been manifest apart from the law.

Although the law and the prophets bore witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.

For there is no distinction.

All of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and are, number one, justified by his grace as a gift.

Justified is a legal term.

It means that in the courts of heaven, the righteous courts of heaven, the wages of sin is.

Through the redemption that's in Jesus Christ.

Redemption is an economic term.

When you buy something at the store, you take some of your resources, you put it on the counter, and you get to take a service or a material thing that you have now redeemed and you've purchased it.

We don't often talk about this as often as we talk about the justification, but we were slaves and servants of the devil.

That original sin didn't just break our souls and our spirits.

It gave authority to the one who lied us into it, to Satan himself.

The world, the Bible tells us, is under the dominion of the enemy.

And what Jesus did on the cross is, and they understood this so well because they saw markets where people were bought and sold.

They said Jesus went into the market of the eternal struggle of mankind and he purchased you from a cruel master from Satan.

He redeemed you.

And now you're under the care and the lordship of the Lord Jesus Christ, who we just sang is a good shepherd.

Isn't that wonderful?

You can get excited if you'd like.

So you've been justified legally by his grace as a gift.

You've been redeemed in Jesus Christ from the power of Satan and sin, whom God put forward, Paul goes on, as a propitiation of his blood to be received by faith.

I know many Christians who are really glad they're justified and looking forward to heaven because of it.

I know a lot of Christians who kind of get the fact that we're not under Satan's control anymore.

They understand redemption and they thank God for it.

But I know a lot of Christians who are still uncomfortable before God because they know, hey, I'm still a stinker.

I still do things that I know are outside God's will.

I still have thoughts and I have urges that I know don't please God.

And they have this sense that God is kind of tolerating them.

You ever had that thought?

A lot of believers.

I've been a pastor a long time.

I know people who've come up to me and say, you know, I really like Jesus, but the Father kind of makes me nervous.

You know why we know that?

It's because we know those of us who are parents or kids, and we all fit into that category.

We all know that human beings in families are sometimes stinkers.

We know that you don't always please your parents, or your kids please you if you are parents.

And we get irritated.

We don't like it when the kids do that.

And so we put that thought onto Father.

This is why we must understand propitiation.

He has made us reconciled.

Because of Jesus Christ, you are the delight of your father.

You are a child.

In fact, if I was going to say, you know, justified is a legal term, redeemed is a you know an economic term, propitiation is an adoption term.

And what does it say?

I mean, we know the famous verse in John 1: all who received him and believed on his name, he gave the right to become children of God.

He's not tolerating you as a kind of hosed-down sinner.

He's adopted you and beloved you like his own dear child.

And any residuals of the fallen life that are still in operation, he sees with concern and not with worry.

He knows he has the power.

As we give ourselves to him, as we yield to him, he has the power to transform anybody into somebody who looks like Jesus.

He delights in you.

If you haven't moved beyond just justification and redemption, to I'm a propitiated saint.

I'm reconciled.

My Papa loves me.

That's when you really start to see the joy and the freedom start to enter into it.

This is an important word to put into your vocabulary.

And by the way, if you don't find it in your Bible, it's in the English Standard Version, they still use the word propitiation.

The others have kind of changed it, which is sad, because it's such a powerful word.

I want you to say after me, God does not tolerate me.

He loves me dearly.

Despite who I am.

That's a revelation.

Everybody say propitiation.

Okay, I dare you to try to use it in a sentence this week.

You know, I know I really ticked you off, but I bought you a Dairy Queen blizzard to propitiate our relationship.

It's just a suggestion.

All right, the last word I want to go over, and this is the word that we have seen change in common usage.

It's the word admonition or to admonish.

Most of us have not said, you know, I really wish somebody would admonish me this week.

Because in our common usage, it's come to mean criticize or judge and uh, you know, treat harshly.

But that's not the meaning.

This is one of those uh things where wonderful words have very specific, defined meanings that we need to understand.

The word admonition means to gently or it means a gentle or friendly reproof.

It is counsel or warning against a fault or an oversight.

To admonish is to indicate duties and obligations, to indicate warning or disapproval gently, earnestly, and solicitously.

That's a great word, too, with great care and attention, to give friendly, earnest advice or encouragement.

You see, an admonishment is reminding somebody we care about to do something that's important that if they neglect it will harm them.

This is your music teacher, your piano teacher, telling you, remember to arch your fingers and practice your skills.

You know that, but you tend to forget it.

And so your teacher admonishes you to do that.

This is in sports where we hire people to admonish us.

I I was gonna I was gonna ask you to co cooperate here.

Uh, in all sports, there are admonishments that if you're in that sport, you will know them.

In golf, what is the common admonishment if you're a golfer?

Keep your eye on the ball.

That's right.

Don't lift your head, right?

You don't want to lift your head and see where the ball's going before you hit it.

So keep your eye on the ball.

In baseball, in batting box, what do they always tell you if you've been coached?

That's right, don't bail your front foot, stay in the batter's box.

Football.

Now, the Vikings are about to go into training camp, and you're gonna have 350-pound linemen who've been playing football for 20 years at least, being admonished by coaches who weigh less than 200 pounds.

Uh but what they're gonna tell them is stay low to maintain your leverage on your opponent.

They know this, they just forget to practice it.

And so you hire coaches to remind you and remind you and admonish you to do what you already know that will yield success.

Basketball.

How many of you basketball players?

What do they tell you about your shot?

Follow through.

If you don't follow through, it's not going where you intended it to go.

And finally, hockey is one of my favorites.

And Red Green is the great coach, if you know who he is.

What is it?

What do you know?

What do you admonish hockey players to do?

Keep your head on a swivel and your stick on the ice.

It's a good, good, good coaching.

Not as many hockey players in here as I hoped.

All right.

So, do you understand now the difference between criticism and admonishment?

Admonishment is a friendly thing.

It is reminding people.

Now listen to Scripture.

Um in Romans 15, again, uh in Romans, Paul writes this.

He says, Concerning you, my brethren, I myself also am convinced that you yourself are full of goodness.

He was saying, God's already been at work in you.

You know, you're Christians, you've got the Holy Spirit.

There's some redeeming, wonderful work going on in you.

You're full of goodness, filled with all knowledge.

They've been taught well.

And also able to admonish one another.

Now, this is important, and this is where I'll leave you today.

You've got awesome pastors around here.

God's blessed you.

And you come on Sundays and they teach.

And you know, I know this.

Most of us pastors, we don't come up with a new thing every Sunday.

We just go back to the gospel and we share it.

But what's happening is your pastors admonish you, encourage you to walk in the faith, to do the things that you've been told to do in Scripture, and to grow, to love one another, to forgive one another.

Somebody said in the early service, don't gossip.

That's a good admonishment, which we need to hear frequently.

Um, but that's not what Paul's saying here.

He's not saying, wait till I come to town and give you some admonishment.

He's not saying wait till Peter shows up and admonishes you to be a good, faithful Christian.

He says you have the power, the ability, the call, the commission, and the knowledge and ability to admonish one another.

But here's the question with admonishment, with admonishing.

Is you only receive admonishment from people you know care about you, love you, are walking the walk themselves, and want your best interest.

That has to be built.

And this is why I want to make something clear here.

This gathering together in a corporate body, that's so important, very important, very valid.

It builds us up, it encourages us, it shows us we're not alone.

But there's another level of Christianity.

I guess you call it small groups, small communities, fellowship groups, um, where you need to be with people that you get to know at a level and you know know you at a level.

The caring for you is undisputed.

They don't want to criticize you, they want to build you up.

Those are the people we will receive admonishment from.

First of all, they know you well enough to know when you're slipping, when you need a little boost.

They can say to you, you know, you seem like you've been anxious and worried.

Have you been praying?

Have you been in the word?

Have you been um, you know, walking with the Lord?

Or are you getting a little bit worldly?

And they can remind you and encourage you back into the foundational things that keep us strong in the faith.

I guess that's one of the things I wanted to leave you with today.

If you don't have that kind of community in your life, get it.

It is the thing that you and I need.

That in kind of love and encouragement.

Please think about the repentance thing we talked about.

Is there any sense of self-ownership in your life?

If there is, you will tend to live a double life.

Being religious and spiritual in one place, but then you'll take the reins and you'll live for yourself in another.

Repent of that.

Understand how much the Lord loves you and is committed to you.

That he has adopted you, that he's been your propitiation, that he has reconciled totally the relationship you have with the Heavenly Father.

He loves you, is committed to your well-being.

And finally, be in a place where you can get coached and you can coach and encourage others in the faith.

Let me pray.

Lord God, we want to just say, as your people today, and even if this day is the first day that somebody is going to um give their hearts to you, Jesus, become a follower of yours, become your disciple, or if we've been walking in the gospel for decades, God, I pray that these words, these incredible words that you've given us to communicate your love for us in the gospel, I pray that their meaning and their implications would soak deeply into our souls and grab hold of us, and that we might walk in your ways and benefit from your incredible righteous glory and goodness to us in Christ Jesus.

Lord, hear our prayer, build us up, use us to glorify you every moment of every day for the rest of our lives.

That is our prayer to you as your people.

In Jesus' name we ask it.

And everybody said, Amen.

Bless you all.