Resolve

Hello, and welcome to the Kalamazoo church of Christ podcast.

Thank you so much for listening.

We're startup church.

We just planted in September, 2020 and at the Kalamazoo church, we believe that Christianity is done best when it is done together.

And so if you live in the Kalamazoo area, we would love to connect, be it coming to a Sunday service, one of our small groups, or even just grabbing coffee with a member to learn more.

You can visit kalamazoo.church in order to do that.

We pray that you are inspired by what you hear today.

Amen.

Uh, well, it's great to see, uh, it's great to see you all.

Um, we've got a lot of, a lot of new faces and, uh, the reason for that is there's going to be, I sent an email to, you know, if you're on the church email list and you already know there's going to be actually a baby dedication, uh, right after service.

Uh, and so we're very excited for that.

Uh, before we get there, we, there, there's a lesson that I want to share with you all.

And I think there's going to be some connection that we're going to make even in our lives, even this week, uh, to God and even, uh, in the last few, few weeks, we've been working up to, to get to this, this spot and we've been having some really good conversations.

I think on a one-on-one basis, I think we've had great conversations in house churches and maybe, you know, in a group setting as well, we, we've been talking about, uh, getting our, ourselves to a spot of reengaging with God and not that we were totally off of the wall, but without a focus on reengaging, it's, it's, it's difficult to, to, to stay engaged.

You guys have perhaps been there.

And so we're building up to that point, the, the lesson this morning is, is resolve.

Uh, and so the, over the last, yeah, yeah.

Change up here over the last few weeks, first, we looked at, uh, the, the call that we need to reflect.

And then we said, we need to be refreshed last week.

And then, uh, this morning we're talking about, uh, being resolved, uh, you know, the idea of making resolutions is, is one that's, it's familiar to all of us.

And, uh, and, and so we're talking about that to some extent, but I really, there's a couple of, there's a couple of spaces.

There's a couple of spots that we're going to go, go to before we get to these, these resolutions.

Uh, if you will, you guys can open up to Matthew five, we're going to be in the book of Matthew predominantly for this lesson.

First point that I have is that we have to resolve before we resolve.

What am I talking?

What am I, what am I talking about here?

Okay.

If I lost you already, uh, well then you're, you're, you're in luck cause I'll, I'm going to make sense of it in a moment.

You got to resolve before you resolve.

Uh, the Bible says in Matthew five, this is Jesus preaching.

This is kind of his, his manifesto.

This is my, this is what I want the world to understand about why, what I'm doing is totally different than everything that you have learned to be appropriate.

Uh, he says in, in verse 21, you have heard, it was said to the people long ago, you shall not murder.

And anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.

But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment.

And anyone who says to a brother or sister, Raqqa is answerable to the court.

And anyone who says you fool will be in danger of the fire of hell.

Let's keep reading.

It says, therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there, remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar.

First go and be reconciled to them.

Then come offer your gift, settle matters quickly with your adversary who was taking you to court.

Do it while you are still together on the way or your adversary may hand you over to the judge and the judge may hand you over to the officer and you may be thrown in prison.

Truly, I tell you, you will not get out until you have paid the last penny.

You know, this this is not the easiest scripture to hear because it says that if you even if you say anything poorly about somebody, you're in trouble, basically, you know, this this this is is really it's a difficult passage.

And I don't know if you were to identify in your life.

Maybe there are people in this room right now where you feel like, yeah, we just don't see eye to eye.

And the Bible says, to be very clear, you've got to resolve matters with them.

But but also there's there's something else here that this this first, it says anyone will be subject to judgment.

Then it says anyone is answerable to the court and then it says anyone's in danger of the fire of hell.

This is these are three.

They're different phrases and they're all like they're building on one another.

Jesus is saying that we basically on this earth, you're going to be in trouble, but then you're going to have to answer to God in danger of the fire of hell.

This is it's a it's a difficult teaching.

You know, maybe maybe you would look at your life and maybe you say, you know, I don't hate anybody.

I remember I remember hearing lessons similar to this when I was when I was younger and just feel like I don't really hate anybody.

But that was because I didn't have conflict with anyone because I didn't do much.

You know, I like that was I mean, the most I did was play video games, but that was before you could go online and play video games.

So I was I mean, I was just playing against the computer.

Like the only conflict that I had was with my sister and with the computer and sometimes with my players because the computer animations didn't work right in Madden.

That was that was the extent of my frustrations and my my.

But the older you get, the more you might realize, well, I I've got I've got stuff that I've built up over the course of days, weeks, months and years of I don't hate anybody.

I of course, you know, let's assume you don't hate anybody.

Fine.

But I heard a preacher give his church the challenge just for one day, don't say anything bad about anybody at all, just for one day.

And then you might say, well, I don't say anything bad about anybody.

Well, under your breath, you do.

We think think about it and we're taught this is OK and it's appropriate.

You speak badly.

You think poorly of people every day.

Politics.

Sports.

Celebrities, your friends, the people who are driving you, you think negatively, your co-workers, you think negatively about people every single day.

And I do, too.

This this this call, it says, I find maybe you don't hate anybody.

And we if we were in the Old Testament times, we'd be OK with that.

Jesus came and he and he died and he rose from the dead.

We don't have the opportunity to say, I just I don't hate.

So I'm good.

I want to give us all a challenge.

What?

Don't think don't think or say anything negative about somebody just for the rest of the day.

And if you if you if you try to take captive your thoughts, I sincerely even preparing this lesson and and, you know, even last night and then this morning, like kind of like organizing all of this, I felt like, man, in the moments that I'm writing this lesson, I'm like, ah, you know, there's something or last night, you know, I know you you guys know, it's like the Packers lost the game and in the and in the middle and in the middle of that, I know what I'm preaching about less than 24 hours.

And yet I'm still thinking negative thoughts about this.

This guy playing a foolish or a dumb sport, you know, it makes no difference.

You know, I bet if you decided I'm not going to say or say anything bad about somebody at all, I bet we'd probably say a lot less things in general.

Right.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And then and then it says, if there's if there's any issue that we have here, we've got to resolve it.

That's it makes it extremely clear there's a there's a connection.

And we'd love to say this isn't true.

There's a connection between the way that we interact with people and the way that we interact with God so much.

So God says you can't divorce the two.

You can't say, I love God.

I'm good with God.

But with the with people, you know, you know, people are messed up and I have this issue and they're but it's me and God are good.

You cannot say that.

He says he says your worship of God is so closely related to your relationship with people that if you are going to bring God and do something amazing and good for God and if you're going to give yourself to him, but if you still have a conflict with somebody and says, don't even don't give this to God, leave it there, go back to it.

But you've got to go resolve your conflict first.

There's there's an urgency here.

And this is I found maybe you you've not found this way.

I found that conflict is often it's something maybe this is sincerely maybe it's just America or maybe it's just, you know, I think it might be even unique to the Midwest American culture of what's conflict.

You know, I don't mind them, whatever, you know, bless their heart.

And then you just kind of go go about your day.

You know, somebody does something to you, bless their heart.

And you just kind of you look down on them and you go about your day.

We can't do this in general, we certainly can't do this in the church.

I wonder if we've if we've thought this far and we might say, well, I know that I've got to resolve conflict, I wonder if we've done it with the urgency that the Bible talks about here.

It says on the way to to you getting in, you know, having to talk to somebody about your conflict, go ahead and resolve it.

Make make every effort to resolve it as you're worshiping.

I go ahead, make every effort right away to resolve it.

It's good to get advice.

It's good.

It's good to get advice about I've got this issue.

Am I wrong?

Where am I wrong?

I don't see that I'm wrong.

Please help me out and show me that I'm wrong in this in this matter.

But if you just get advice about a conflict and you're not urgent to resolve it, that's that's called gossip, that's gossip and slander is what that's called.

You know, conflicts, you don't understand, they start they start so small.

Right.

I was this this when I read it, I thought this there's no way this could be true.

There's a man who up until 2016, he'd been married to his wife for like 40 years.

But for the last 23 years of his marriage, they didn't speak a single word about it.

Not a single word to one another.

Absurd.

Right.

Like and people were interviewing him.

How did you do this?

How did you not speak to your wife for 23?

You didn't say yes or no or what?

And what he said, no, I just responded in grunts.

It's it's absolutely absurd.

I the point we bring it up, they asked him, well, how did this conflict begin?

He said, well, I just felt slighted by my wife for a whole week.

She was really serving the children.

And I didn't I she wasn't asking me how my day was.

So I decided I'm just not going to talk to her.

Something small, these guys are my friends, OK, I'm not saying like I.

But we did just say, don't think negatively about anybody, didn't we?

He felt neglected.

So for 23 years, he decided he's not going to talk to his wife, the person who he decided, I'm going to marry you and we're going to become become one.

Wow.

And we don't do that as as Christians, as followers of God, we don't do that.

But what we what we could do is maybe similar to I don't know.

I don't know how you guys grew up, but I grew up and, you know, me and Bianca, we've been in the ministry since we've been married.

And we started out just as interns in in the ministry, campus ministry in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

And so we didn't have an awful lot of money and we were not forced.

We chose to live near campus.

And our first apartment living was it was on the surface.

Like when you go through, if you guys have you guys have probably done it.

I've been in probably a half dozen different apartments and probably visited about 20 different ones to see, should we live in this place?

And you might walk in and you're like, well, it looks nice enough.

You know, it's kind of good.

I'm only here for a year and then I can go somewhere else.

You know what?

You know, you you kind of do this this dance.

And then when you move in, then you really see all of the issues with with this apartment, don't you?

Uh, one of the biggest issues that that we found in Milwaukee is that all of the landlords, instead of fixing things, they just painted over things.

And so you you end up and again, you paint over and it looks fresh.

It looks good.

It looks decent.

It doesn't look that bad.

But as you get closer to it, you start to see the flaws and you start to see the cracks and you're like, well, I wonder.

I wonder how many times this thing is painted over.

And then when it chips, it's it's really ugly because you see this thick layer of paint that is just that's been caked on and caked on and caked on.

Yeah.

I hope we don't we don't do this as followers of Jesus, though.

There's conflicts, there's issues, there's little things.

Let's just paint over it.

No big it's no big deal.

I'm just going to paint over it.

And it's no big deal.

I'm just going to paint over it.

And somebody from the outside might come in and think, wow, what a great group.

Just like we might walk into the Bummy apartment and think, well, what a great what a great apartment until you move in and you start to see, well, there's there's a little bit more here than I than I bargained for.

As we're as we're talking about the call to to resolve or make resolutions.

Let's let's put first the call to to become resolved with one another.

And this is not and I want to this quick caveat.

I'm not there's not any if there was a major thing, I think I would just speak honestly about it.

I hope I but there might be stuff in your heart that you feel like I I've got to say this to somebody.

I don't know how I can, but I've got to.

Go ahead and do it then.

Amen.

Amen.

And so let's say we're resolved or as we become resolved with with one another, then we've just got to be resolved to change.

This is, again, in Matthew seven.

It says in verse twenty four.

Therefore, everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock.

The rain came down, the streams rose, the wind blew and beat against that house.

Yet it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock.

But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand.

The rain came down, the streams rose and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.

This this parable is it it might be it might have been one of the first ones that you learned in Kingdom Kids class.

It's one that just this week, me and me and my four year old, about to be four year old, we're talking about it.

And she could understand it right away.

OK, she said, hey, you want to build on on rock, right?

Because it's solid.

And yeah, you're right.

And then I said, do you want to build on sand?

And she says, no, anything that I build when I go to the beach, anything I build on sand, it actually washes away really quick.

So I don't want to do that.

It's not good.

And so we understand.

And I think on the surface, we all we all realize this is true.

It's something you learned.

And I can read it and explain it.

But but you guys know it.

But this is the end of this.

Again, I said this amazing this is why Christianity is different is what Jesus is saying.

All of what happens in Matthew five, six and seven.

This this amazing lesson, he he shares it.

And then it's going to be the frame by which we can see the rest of the book of Matthew.

And we see him living out every one of these.

And he takes that the commandments, the ten commandments.

And he says, you just like you, you know, you heard it was said, don't murder.

Actually, you can't even say anything bad about anybody.

And he and he takes adultery and he says, you heard, don't commit adultery.

That's what the Bible says.

But he says, but if you even look at a woman lustfully, you've committed adultery in your heart and whatever.

He brings things to the highest level.

And this is how he lived his life.

So then he says at the end of all of this.

He says, it's great that you that you heard what I said, but if you don't put it into practice, you're a fool.

You know, if you ask anybody, do you prefer to be wise or foolish?

Everyone everyone knows the answer.

You know, I'm hey, who prefers to be wise?

Raise your hand.

Everyone's raising their hand.

Nobody would said I'd prefer to be a fool.

But but we know a tree by its fruit.

Right.

And so you can see you look at the life of many people and you can see, well, they're not living a life that that is preparing for the future, that is setting themselves up well for the future.

I.

One of my one of my friends in one of my friends in school, I remember when I first started to come to the faith and really I'd grown up in church, but I hadn't really invested an awful lot into it.

It was like a 50 50 investment, one foot in, one foot out.

And then I remember being a beginning of my sophomore year of college.

And I had, you know, I, you know, shared my faith a little bit.

And I was talking to one of my buddies and he was on like my prayer list.

And I'm like, man, I'm going to pray for this guy every single day.

And I remember talking to him.

And I remember saying, hey, in First Corinthians 1311, it just says when I was a child, I talked like a child.

I thought like a child.

I reasoned like a child.

When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.

And I said, Johnny, I'm trying to put the way the childhood behind me.

Don't you want to do the same thing?

And and I remember distinctly, we were walking to go to the gym and he just said, dude, I kind of still want to be a kid.

Nineteen year old.

And he just said, I still I don't want to be a grown up yet.

Wow.

You know, nobody, nobody.

And I felt like you went on one hand.

There's not there's no response I can give to that.

You know, if that's your decision, that's your decision.

But there ought to be some consideration.

Are we doing things that are setting ourselves up for eternity and for a better life?

Are we doing things just to get by?

I bet you if you're a homeowner, then I bet you you have stories or I bet you you inherited stories of those who made the home or came before you and how they they might not have done everything to the fullest extent.

Maybe they cut corners a little bit.

We don't want to be like that with our faith.

This is this is what the Bible is saying.

It says it's more difficult to build on a solid foundation.

It takes more time to build on a solid foundation.

It's going to take more money to build on a solid foundation.

But it's always going to be worthwhile in the end.

That's right.

You talk to somebody who's immature and you say you just show them the building itself and you say, which is a better building?

The one on the rock or the one on the sand?

I don't think I don't think they'd be able to speak to it.

Right there.

If you if I showed my daughter, my four year old right now, and I said, which which building is better?

She she might actually say, hey, the one on the sand, because then you can kind of you can you can play in the sand.

Oh, yeah.

And so but somebody who's mature is able to to to look at the foundation on the surface, all of this stuff, it looks good.

Any any church you go to, it's going to look good.

But where's the foundation?

And if it isn't in Christ, then amen.

And if it just says it's in Christ, then then we should question it.

You know, the the the Bible says you can actually stay in in Matthew because then we're going to close up there in just a moment.

But but the Bible says don't merely listen to the word and so deceive yourself.

Do what it says.

Anyone who listens to the word but doesn't do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in the mirror and after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.

But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom and continues in it, not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it, they will be blessed in what they do.

You know, as we as we seek to make resolutions, how are we going to change for twenty twenty four?

How are we going to change?

What decisions are we going to make?

Maybe not only for twenty twenty four, but for the rest of our lives.

We ought to be more focused on on looking good according to God and looking good according to everybody else.

And the last the last thing last topic I want to cover is to to resolve with with Jesus.

And so, again, we're in Matthew seven says when Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching because he taught as one who had authority and not as their teachers of the law.

Jesus preaches the most most amazing sermon that we ever have have had recorded in human history.

The people imagine being someone in the crowd who hears Jesus speaking these these words.

And I can I can only imagine the the energy that would be in the group.

I would I could only imagine.

Feeling like, did he really say that?

Did he he said that?

Oh, my goodness.

And then and then you might be feeling like, man, he knows what's going on in my life right now.

And then you might even consider, wow, this is this is different than anything I've ever heard before.

Says that Jesus is someone who taught with with authority, not as teachers of the law, these teachers of the law were those who some sincere and some insincere basically communicated what what was supposed to be done.

But Jesus is the one who's different.

He's he's the he's the only hope for lasting change.

We should look at the same Jesus and we should marvel at him.

Do we do that?

Good question, bro.

Do you marvel at Jesus?

I, you know, the teacher of the law are spoken spoken of negatively a lot in the Bible.

And in some ways, you could look at me like a teacher of the law, if you're going to say it that way, like I'm repeating a lot of what the Bible teaches, I'm adding a little twist on it.

And that's that's about it.

And so I want to challenge you guys.

But do you actually do you read the Bible?

Like, do you look look at the word or do you just come on Sunday and you just I want to hear it?

And I heard the word from a teacher of the law.

And that's all I've got to do.

If you sit with Jesus, if you interact with Jesus, there's a promise that you're going to leave being absolutely amazed and understanding that this guy teaches with authority that we've never heard before.

Wow.

We can't look at Jesus and Christianity as a means to an end.

And this is difficult.

It seeps into everything that we do.

Man, I'm following Jesus because he's going to bless me.

I'm a Christian for the security.

I'm a Christian so that I can just I can gain knowledge.

I'm a Christian so I can be seen highly.

I'm a Christian so that I can be a part of this community of people that are going to they're going to help me.

And that's why I'm a Christian.

That's that's not the right reasons.

The that's not the most mature reasons, I would say, are the that's that's a means by following Jesus or being a Christian to an end of receiving something, some prosperity or some some knowledge or some some security in this world.

The most mature place to be.

And this is the place that we're we're calling everybody to.

This is a place that we have to make decisions to do every single day or to get to every single day is to follow Jesus because of who he is.

Yeah.

You know, there's so many there's so many reasons there's so many reasons that you can be a that you can be a Christian or that you can show up to church.

The most mature place to follow Jesus for who he is.

If you don't have a relationship with him, then you're not going to be able to say who he is.

Wow.

You don't understand this.

If I have to ask you your best friend, I say, well, who who is your best friend?

Will you share their name?

And then I said, if I have to describe your best friend, you you would describe your best friend, but you you wouldn't probably say, oh, they have they have, you know, blonde hair.

And they're they're they're really they have a really they have nice teeth.

They have a really nice smile.

And oh, my best friend.

Oh, he's studying over at at this university.

And you would probably talk about your interactions with that friend.

Right.

You would share this is why is he your best friend?

Or why are they your best friend?

Describe them to me.

And you talk about, well, man, he's he's always there for me.

And he's just he's he's the one I can count on.

I know it's three a.m. and I call him up.

He's answering the phone.

And you'd you'd say, well, we've been through it.

And I was in a difficult time and I didn't want to reach out to him, but he decided I'm going to give this guy a call anyways.

And I'm going to walk with him.

And he he sacrificed for me when I was on my my lowest day.

He decided to drive however long he drove.

And he he just prayed with me.

He was there for me.

He he waited in these difficult waters of life with me.

And you would share, I bet, about those things more than you'd share about him, you know, having having a nice smile.

Yeah.

The people who are who are closest to us, we're able to describe and we're able to feel connected to and and and then we're actually able to feel a sense of of where we're able to marvel at them, not not the extent of them, but but parts of them.

Wow, I can't believe this guy does this so well.

Consider Jesus, if you if you get close to Jesus, you'll be able to marvel at everything he does.

There's nothing that you're going to look at in the Bible and understand about Jesus where you'll say, wow, I don't that there's there's nothing there.

I don't get it.

It didn't doesn't do it for me.

If you actually walk with Jesus, there's a promise.

You're not going to be able to say he just doesn't do it for me.

Every characteristic, every aspect of his life, you'll be able to say, well, I can I I am impressed and I'm amazed at him by him.

Right.

Yeah.

And so as we as we we're going to close up this lesson and then then Josh is going to share a communion thought.

And then after Josh shares communion thought, there's a few announcements and then there'll be the baby dedication.

But I I want us to consider a few things when I want us to consider where where you're at with with your relationship with people.

And or maybe I bet you there's somebody maybe there's a couple of people.

But who is it at the top of your heart when I say, hey, who do you have conflict with immediately?

You say nobody.

I don't know.

But then when you think about it, maybe that person, if the Bible is clear, go ahead and resolve with that person.

As you as you decide to make resolutions and you decide to resolve, then make it about more about how God views you than about how everybody else sees you.

And then lastly, in involved in these in these resolutions, look, look at Jesus, be amazed by him and be amazed at what he's doing and what he's done in your life and in the lives of others.

Amen.

Amen.

Josh, you can come up and share.

Come on, Josh.

Thank you so much for listening to the Kalamazoo Church of Christ podcast.

If you're in the Kalamazoo area, we'd love to get connected.

Please go to Kalamazoo dot church and fill in your information to come to a Sunday service or any other event that we have going on.

In any case, you'll be hearing from us next week.

So busy saving souls.