The Line of Compassion

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Morning, church.

I want to thank you all for lots and lots of prayers in January.

Um, if you're visiting, my father caught fire and was burned from calf to back and uh been in and out of um, not in and out, but been in the hospital.

And as of Thursday, he went home.

So praise the Lord for that.

I know he's very excited about that.

My mom might need more prayer now.

So, but thank you for praying.

Uh, also just want to say a word of affirmation yesterday.

Um, large in part by Pastor Dave's uh coordinating an effort with um Jamie Scruggs, who is a football coach at the Chelsea High School.

Uh we had uh FCA seven-on-7.

A bunch of the men from the church came out and were character coaches with I think 10 teams.

And um, anyhow, we got to share the gospel at the event, and about 20 students raised their hand for salvation during that.

So praise God.

Lots of seeds sown through those men.

So if you were if you're there, man, thank you so much, and thank you, Dave, for your passion to drive that.

It was an awesome day, it was a lot of fun.

Um, and so in Genesis chapter 50, we are looking at the holding the line of compassion.

Genesis 50 · chapter mention

And Jesus, there's a scripture that says you'll find that he's moved.

About eight or nine scriptures talk about Jesus being moved with compassion.

And one of those says Jesus looked out over the crowds, and as he saw them, he was moved with compassion because they were like sheep without a shepherd.

I learned, I have one day's experience as a sheep herder.

I learned at this shepherd, with this shepherd, he taught me some things and he said this about sheep.

He said, uh, Rick, sheep can get their wool very matted and dirty, and because their wool gets matted and dirty, it happens that day we were shearing the sheep, but he says, they will get disease from this dirty matting that's on their wool.

And he said, So you have to keep that clean.

He says, Sheep, told me the sheep are the only animal that can get lost in a fenced-in field.

He said, It happens all day long.

And then he said this: he says, Sheep will stand ten feet from grass and starve.

As Jesus looked out over the city, he said, looked at them like sheep without a shepherd.

He saw their need of shepherding.

This is the word for compassion, is splagnizame.

And it means from your middle to have pity.

Compassion, a compassionate life is spent loving God and loving people.

That's part of the mission of CCW, who we say we are.

And to know what compassion does, here's one thing: condemnation never cured one person, but compassion did.

Charles Spurgeon said if you wanted to summarize the whole character of Jesus Christ in one sentence, he said this he was moved with compassion.

Would you pray with me?

Father, we love you and are thankful today to be in your house.

I'm thankful for every person, God, who is motivated to be in church.

God, we love church.

We love your house and we love your people.

God, I pray that you would help us to understand and grasp this heart of Jesus for compassion.

And God, I pray that you would be with us.

Lord, we want to lift up our country right now.

Lord, we pray for those in leadership.

God, we pray, Lord, your word says the heart of the king is in the hand of God.

And we know that global leadership is held in your hand.

And we ask, God, that your will would be done and followed.

God, that you would intervene on behalf of people who are innocent, Lord, and just let your justice reign.

Lord, we ask for wisdom, godliness, and God, we pray for those families who have had hurt and harm, God, that you would minister, and God, some way, somehow, that your glory would be revealed in and through this.

Lord, we pray that you bless this time of message and sermon.

Open our hearts to what you have to speak to us in Jesus' name.

Amen.

The first point this morning is this perception of your duty.

Look at Genesis 50, verse 14 through 18.

Genesis 50:14–18

And after he had buried his father, Joseph returned to Egypt.

He and his brothers, and all who went up with him to bury his father.

When Joseph's brothers saw that their father was dead, they said, Perhaps Joseph will hate us and may actually repay us for all the evil which we did to him.

So they sent messengers to Joseph, saying, Before your father died, he commanded, saying, Thus you shall say to Joseph, I beg you, please forgive the trespasses of your brothers and their sin, for they did evil to you.

Now please forgive the trespass of the servants of the God of your father.

And Joseph wept when they spoke to him.

Then his brothers also went and fell down before his face, and they said, Behold, we are your servants.

So first we meet him, and there's this funeral that's taking place of Jacob, their father.

Martin Luther remarks that there is no burial in Scripture as honorable or with so great a wealth of detail as this, Jacob's.

Jacob, just to understand what they've just walked through, Jacob is ten times from Jacob, his grandfather is Noah.

So when you get to the history of history, and I believe nine times from Noah is Adam.

So we're talking about 19 generations, and here is Jacob, and it says that when you study it, 70 days the Egyptians mourned over Jacob.

And so there's this great funeral that leads to this part, and then letter A, the brother's weighty apprehension.

They're apprehensive, and it's not for no reason.

They are apprehensive with reason for things they have done.

And have any of you ever done something wrong to a sibling and mom and dad were in the waiting?

Right?

Well, now mom or dad are not there anymore, and these brothers who did this thing are looking at the one who's second in Egypt.

My uh, I've told this before, but my sister got to me real good one night, scratching and pinching and doing everything.

I mean, just dirt.

She was a dirty fighter, y'all.

Uh, fish hooking, I don't know, poked me in the eyes.

Anyhow, I had all of these scars about four o'clock in the afternoon on Sunday, and Sunday night, my dad was taking me to church, and I didn't know how to cover up all the damage that she had done.

So I'm like fourth or fifth grade.

I put five band-aids on my face and my neck, and I walked to church, and my dad let me.

I go to church like this.

Well, as was the custom in church on a Sunday night for a 10 or 11-year-old, you gotta have a bathroom break, right?

10, any 10, 11.

Well, I was taking my normal Sunday night bathroom break during church, and I walked around the corner, and there was the pastor's daughter.

And boy, was she an angelic sight for any of us boys.

There she was at the water fountain, and she looked at me, and I remembered as she looked at me what was going on with my face.

And so I think up a plot quickly what to say, and she she turned around and gasped.

She said, Oh.

And I said, Yeah, I got into a fight.

And then I said, You should see the other guy.

And she said, Oh.

I said, To myself, I said, the other guy's name is Jennifer.

So we see this apprehension that takes place.

That happened under my parents' watch, y'all.

Most of the time in those days, it was like, let them go.

As long as they don't die, I guess they're okay.

And but most of the time, parents, when parents are around, kids know exactly what the line is.

Y'all know I'm talking about?

There's the line, and they're gonna flirt with that line, and they know what the line is, but that line is a sense of protection.

If we get to this point, well, mom or dad are here.

If they hear me scream, if they hear me cry, if they hear this or that, somebody will come and protect me, right?

There's a sense of protection.

It's kind of funny that Joseph's second in command in Egypt, and their 130-year-old father passes, and here's these 50-year-olds who are going, oh my.

Dad was our shield, our 130-year-old father was the shield.

He'll ground them, I guess.

You 50-year-olds, right?

You go to your room.

Yeah.

I don't know, but dad was the shield, and about verse 16 and 17, commentators debate that this was just a lie, that this was a tactic, that he sent out a messenger and told the messenger to say, Your father said, tell your to forgive your brothers.

Okay?

But they are apprehensive about their sin because of what they've done to their brother.

And remember, if you go back to where we started in Genesis 37, it says that they hated him because of his dream.

This wasn't just some sibling rivalry.

This was something from deep.

If it had to be the opposite of how Jesus looks at us with compassion, from their gut, they had hatred for him when he told them their dream.

And so we see this goes back a while.

This is a war with a conflict.

Paul Tripp said this, church, we are often the biggest danger to ourselves.

Sometimes it's us and these brothers, maybe they were their biggest danger themselves.

Y'all remember the karate kid movie?

Remember seeing the first karate kid?

Some of y'all from the 80s.

That's if you haven't, I'm sorry, but it's an important movie for life.

But there's this moment where the sensei from the from Cobra Kai is choking his own student.

His name was Johnny Lawrence.

He's choking his student and Mr.

Miyagi, which is the most unbelievable thing, folks.

He comes up, he's 104 pounds, he's 104 years old, and he's supposed to be lightning fast, right?

And he comes to him and he says, you know, he's trying to stop this sensei from holding this student in a choke.

And then this sensei in slow motion punching punches at Mr.

Miyagi who dodges with lightning fastes.

And the man punches through a window, and then it happens on the other side.

And then Miyagi, with the lightest baby kick ever, goes, and he falls to his knees, and he's like, live or die.

And it's the most unbelievable thing that you've ever seen.

And in that moment, he walks away from him.

And as him and Daniel, this is what I want you to get, as him and Daniel are walking away, Daniel says, Mr.

Miyagi, you could have killed him.

Why didn't you?

And he says, Daniel's son, the person who lives without mercy, who lives without forgiveness, has greater punishment.

I want you to think on that.

These boys, for all this time, 20 years, have to have considered the weight of what they've done to their brother.

And so they have this apprehension.

Well, let her be.

Takes us to Joseph's wise awareness.

Look at verse 19.

Joseph said to them, Do not be afraid, for am I in the place of God?

You see, early on in Joseph's life, God used a dream to declare what God was going to do to this young man.

And Joseph just happened to believe the dream that God gave to him.

Sheaves, a sun, and a moon would one day bow down before him.

And early on we talked about this.

If you will dream, Psalms talks about delighting yourself in the Lord.

If you will dream a certain dream a certain way, if you will delight yourself in the Lord, fulfilling what God wants, then he will give you the desires of your heart.

So Joseph's had this dream for years and years, believing that God just does what he says he's going to do.

Now, if you delight in any other way, church, hear me.

It's a temporary delight.

You can follow a dream, you can follow a path, and it can come to even fruition, but it's temporary.

The feeling that it will provide is temporary.

Matthew 6, 19 goes through all that.

It says, Do not lay for yourselves treasure on this earth where moth and rust corrupts, where thieves can break through and steal.

It's all temporal here.

We're told in clash, sets your affections on things above, things that are eternal.

And so that's all about delighting in the Lord.

So Joseph at an early age, I think he got a case of the old hymnal, Turn your eyes.

It says this turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full at his wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim at the light of his glory and grace.

You see, Joseph at a young age just believed in who God said he was.

So he says, in this moment, as his brothers send this servant off and they're trying to make sure things are going to be safe, he says, Am I in the place of God?

Am I your judge?

Romans 12, 9, church says, Vengeance is mine, says the Lord.

Joseph rightly says, I am not your judge.

There's a pastor named Chuck Smith.

And he says this, church, and I want you to hear it for those who are trying to live and walk for the Lord.

If you dare do anything in the work of the Lord, you will get criticized.

He says, You can waste time trying to defend every critic, or you can go on working in the work of the Lord and leave the rest in the Lord's hands.

There's going to be even family critics, brothers that are criticizing, brothers who don't believe the dream that God placed in his heart.

Luke 6 26 reminds us, woe to you if all men speak well of you.

I used to tell this teenager, that's called chameleon Christians.

If you can fit in in every place, there might be a problem.

Woe to you if all men speak well of you.

Joseph wisely understood his role in the work of the Lord and understood that it wasn't his place to judge.

Second thing I want you to see this morning, the proximity of the divine.

Look at verse 20.

One of the probably most famous lines in Genesis, one of the most famous lines you'll hear in Scripture.

But as for you, talking to his brothers, you meant evil against me.

But God meant it for good in order to bring it about as it is this day to save many people alive.

Letter A, we see God's control in the pit and in prison.

I'm gonna talk about the down place, and then we're gonna talk about uh the up place.

Why do pits happen?

This is a question that every pastor, any person who's been in leadership, or any person who's been a Christian a long time is going to be asked.

Why do bad things happen to good people?

First, I want you to hear today some theology.

There is a problem in the definition of good.

That's ground level.

Why do bad things happen to good people?

Well, the problem is a perspective on what good is.

Romans chapter 3, verse 23 says, All men have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

Romans 3:23

All men are flawed.

Therefore, man with a free will is prone to wander.

Second, we see that sin in Genesis chapter 3, when the fall happened in the garden, that it present it produced the effects of sin.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

We have natural disaster, we have suffering, we have pain.

And so I remember somebody, this is a crass example, but somebody was vaping early when vaping just started, and they were talking to me and tell trying to tell me of the benefits, and I didn't know much about vaping, but how it really wasn't that dangerous.

And I'm like, I'm just thinking as they're sharing this, I'm like, yeah, I'm sure.

Inhaling chemicals mixed with banana and kiwi juice is great for your respiratory system.

But I've come to find out later, vaping gives you something that you can you can contract in your respiratory system called popcorn lung.

And contrary to what some people might believe, popcorn lung ain't good.

Some might say, I'm a good person, Pastor.

Somehow I got the popcorn lung.

And I'll say, Yeah, that's a bad choice.

That's a bad choice.

There is an effect of poor choices that just happens.

I was telling the students yesterday, you have the power of choice, but you don't have the power to choose the consequences of your choices.

He says, But what you meant for evil, now this is interesting because Joseph doesn't let his brothers scot free, right?

He calls it what it is in this moment.

He says to them, as they're asking for mercy, sending ahead the real or fake servant, who knows, dad's dead, what are we gonna do?

He says, What you meant for evil, six words, but what you meant for evil, he's no pushover.

It's a just indictment on his brother's sin.

He doesn't cookie cut the truth, and while it's God's to handle, he does say it to them.

What you meant for evil, what you surmised, and what you planned, what you intended was for evil, and simultaneously, brothers, God planned it.

God intended it, God used it for our good.

Church, I want to tell you today, God is not surprised.

God didn't see this and from the heavens go, oh, I need to spend this.

God was in charge at the dream, and God was still in charge at this moment that the brothers are for Joseph.

In Psalms 105, 16, it's it gives a little synopsis of the situation, and it says, When God summoned the famine and broke the supply, he sent a man sold as a slave.

Church, I want you to know this God is sovereign over your worst circumstances.

When you're in a pit, God did not lose an ounce of his sovereignty.

When you're in a trial, when that health need falls on you that was shocking to you, it didn't shock an almighty God.

And God uses both the pit and the precipice for his good and our betterment.

And so God is using things, God is sovereign.

He tests people through peril.

In the valley, our trust is deepened, our person is deepened.

God planned it and intends.

What you meant for evil, God used for good.

Now, this strikes an old debate to the core.

This, the forces of free will and God's sovereignty meeting this collision course.

Joseph's brothers acted on hate, and I believe that they acted.

They chose to act on their hate, and they did wrong, and God acted on his sovereignty as he does.

I believe it's both.

One pastor said this: God is always doing 10,000 different things in your life, and you may be aware of only three.

If God's hand was all over this, then here's the question: why didn't God just prevent it?

Why do we got to go through all these chapters to get to this ending, right?

Why didn't God prevent the pit?

Why didn't he prevent the wrongful accusation by Potiphar's wife?

Why didn't he prevent the butler from forgetting Joseph?

Why didn't he prevent all of these things?

Why?

Because God allows peril in his plans.

But Joseph, you never find him engaging any of this.

He saw God at work in everything.

Now we get tied up in all kinds of man made philosophies in search of understanding the mysteries of God.

And Joseph said, Look, you brothers didn't send me here.

God sent me.

You meant it for evil, but God sent me here.

So in the pit he understood God was a part of that.

Letter be God's control on the precipice.

I'll turn there, Psalms 24.

On the precipice.

Verse 3, it says, Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord?

Who may stand in his holy place?

On the mountaintop.

You see, in order to continue walking in trust for Joseph, he must believe and see that the God of the valley, when I was down in the pit in prison, is not set aside when I've gotten to the mountain.

That's important.

Many great men throughout scripture and throughout time, once they've arrived to the mountain, once they've climbed to the top rung of the ladder they were supposed to climb, they've reached that ascent just to fall.

Scripturally, think of a few.

Solomon.

I mean, he climbed and climbed and climbed, and what happened?

He just reached the top and fell.

David actually reached the top and fell and got back up again.

Peter fell.

He was right there.

God denied Jesus.

Elijah was on the mountaintop and saw the fire of God fall.

Ran the next week.

I don't know the timing, but he ran.

He reached the mountaintop only to fall.

So what are you gonna do?

Here's your question.

I'd write this.

What are you going to do when you get to the place that you're longing for, church?

Once you get there, what next?

I got a picture of Mount Lafayette.

I've shared this a time or two.

It's a favorite place that I've been to.

In Mount Lafayette, when I was in sixth grades the first time that I climbed that ascent, and I was the only in history of that youth group.

I was the only sixth grader ever.

So I'm just, you're I'm not gonna say I'm greatness, but it's a pretty big deal.

And uh the Green Leaf Hut is pictured there, the second picture as you just seen, that was three-fourths of the way.

And everybody, almost everybody that made it that far was done.

It was, I think, six hours ascent, and then it was like three hours back down or whatever.

But anyway, we we get up to that hut and it was still about another hour past that point.

And I think as a sixth grader, being on that mountain taught me something that I didn't know how to put in words then.

Now I have a different expression, but I didn't know that as a sixth grader atop that mountain that I was worshiping, I didn't know that the awe that struck my heart of everything that I could see and hear and feel in that moment had put such an impression on me.

But standing on that mountain, it was a place where the glory of God was.

And it did something in my heart as a young man.

And so Joseph's out of prison, right?

He's out of the pit.

And for seven years, he suddenly lifted up to second over Egypt.

Some would call this maybe a mountaintop.

And Joseph for seven years is stewarding and two more years of the famine that started before he met his brothers.

If Joseph have got to the mountain and forgot the God of the valley, this situation may go completely different.

The God on the mountain, if he had forgotten that, the story maybe goes a lot different.

But God, you're gonna see, and I want to take you through this just for a moment.

Take your finger, hold it there in Genesis 50, and I want you, we've gone over this, but go back to Genesis 41.

Look at verse 16.

But God.

So Joseph answered Pharaoh, saying, It is not in me.

God will give Pharaoh an answer of peace.

Look at Genesis chapter 45.

Genesis 45 · chapter mention

Look at verse 7.

And God sent me before you to preserve a posterity for you in the earth and to save your lives by a great deliverance.

You see who he's giving credit to?

God.

Verse 8 there.

So now it was not you who sent me here, but God.

Look at chapter 48, verse 21.

Then Israel said to Joseph, Behold, I am dying, but God will be with you and bring you back to the land of your fathers.

And here again in Genesis chapter 50, verse 20 and 24.

Genesis 50:20

But as for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good.

Verse 24, and Joseph said to his brethren, I am dying, but God will visit with you.

Over and over, we're seeing this theme with Joseph, who has made it to his life's pinnacle.

And you know what he's saying at every turn?

It ain't me.

But God.

Over here.

It's not about Joseph and my dream, but God.

And I wonder how much of us, when we reach the place we think we gotta be, is it a but God moment for you?

Church, I want you to know today, but God wants to fill you with compassion.

So when you get on that mountain, you'll never be the same.

But God is the answer.

I want you to think about people in scripture that made it to a mountain with God.

Moses, when he met with the face of God on a mountain, guess what?

He came back and he had a God glow on him.

It changed him to meet with God.

Abraham went up to a mountain, he met with God.

Peter, James, and John at the Mount of Transfiguration said, Can we make a tent and stay here in the presence of God?

It changed them to meet with God on the mountain.

So the mountain church is the place where you hear the voice of God, where you meet with the presence of God, where you deepen vision with God.

So if you're on a mountain, man, praise God, but get deeper and don't forget the God of the mountain or the God of the valley.

I read this quote this week: the summit is worth the struggle.

God didn't bring you to the mountain to leave you, so find him there.

So if you're at that place, find God.

Get deeper.

There's an old book I had to read in college.

Hannah Hernard wrote, Hind's feet in high places.

And the story is an allegory, and it follows Much Afraid, who joined by much afraid, is sorrow and suffering, who through the story turn into, transform into joy and peace.

But throughout her story, as they're climbing, she's learning to trust, overcome fear, embracing that God will find the place where her hind's feet can meet and rest on high places.

That picture of Hind's feet is talking about like deer's feet.

Deer feet.

Let me say it right.

And in a high place, they're able to continue.

It's going to great lengths to teach you, you have to be able to continue to walk in high places.

You don't stop, is the point.

When you meet with God on the mountain, you continue, you go deeper, you get strength and you get vision.

When you meet with God on the precipice, keep going.

Because he's God of the mountain and he's God of the valley.

We see in point number three Joseph's providing of a defense.

Verse 21.

He says, after he calls him out, You did mean this for evil, but now therefore do not be afraid.

I'll provide for you and your little ones.

And he comforted them and spoke kindly to them.

I know that you many of you know the story of the Good Samaritan.

The Good Samaritan, uh, this man gets beaten up, left for dead, and two men pass him by, and a third man comes by, and it says he was moved with compassion.

The person moved with compassion did something totally different.

The person moved with compassion stopped.

The person moved with compassion saw the man's wounds, and he bandaged his wounds.

The person with compassion put the man on his donkey.

The person with compassion took him to an inn, and to the innkeeper, he said, Put his bill on my tab, anything that's needed, so that he is righted.

You see, compassion tends to the need.

Joseph saw his brothers, and he did more than just alleviate their stress by not inflicting some harm, putting them in prison.

He says, I've got more for you, brothers.

That's compassion.

He had every reason to not have compassion, yet he looked on them and forgot the pain inflicted on him.

Letter A, we see a sorrowful admission.

It says, Now, therefore, we always say this, why is it therefore?

All of the things that led up to this that they have done, he says, Do not be afraid.

Now again, they said, the messengers, I beg you, please forgive their sin and evil.

But when you think on this, do you believe they have a legitimate case to be fearful?

When Adam and Eve ate of the fruit of the garden, what was their first instinct?

First time we're introduced to what it fear even is.

They run and hide, right?

The Bible says that the wicked flee when no man pursues, but the righteous are bold as a lion, right?

If you're sinning and you're doing wrong, you're trying to lie and hide and remember what you lied about, and it's a scary place, and you're wondering if somebody's gonna find you out.

So the wicked flee.

They're paranoid, living in their paranoia.

But the righteous are bold as a lion.

Living in sin makes you live in guilt, and that makes you live in fear, being found out.

So to fight sin, we have to flip that with a healthy fear.

A healthy fear and a respect for who God is.

That's why when we have like an altar call, we have a moment for people to have confession, to get their heart sort of right with you.

It's cathartic.

It's a good feeling.

When you confess something, when you've been trying to hide something, students, listen to me.

When you've been holding on to something, you've been trying to hide it, and finally you just come clean.

It's called come clean because you actually feel clean.

When you let loose of something that's been burdening on you for a long time, you finally say, This is who I've been.

And then let the chips fall wherever they are with people, whatever it is, but you feel different.

Confession is cleansing.

Some people will hold on to something, and maybe these brothers did this.

Some people will keep rehearsing a trial.

Twenty years, can you imagine?

You threw your brother in a pit, left him for dead.

20 years that's on your mind.

Your father has been lied to, and rehearsing a trial, and at this point God's dismissed it.

But this is what guilt will do to you.

Guilt will try to reopen the case that grace closed.

That's the work of Satan.

If you've gotten your heart right, if you've done your part, if you've come to God, then let it go.

He is responding, Joseph, to their fear and their sorrow.

The Hebrew phrase for this stop being afraid is Aliteru.

And it's literally telling them to calm down.

Have you ever yelled at someone, calm down?

That worked, didn't it?

Why don't you just calm down?

Get a hold of yourself.

Like you just made me amp up worse.

Why are you yelling at me?

2 Timothy 1 7 says, God hath not given us a spirit of fear, but of love and power and sound mind.

Joseph is not afraid.

Joseph is using God now not only to save and help his brothers, but he's using them to teach them compassion.

And he says, Don't be afraid.

Letter be, I want you to see this sensitive advocate.

He said to his brothers, God sent me.

God sent me.

It wasn't you.

You don't have to be afraid.

What is it, therefore, he's telling them.

You don't have to be afraid for what you've done.

You don't have to be afraid.

God placed me here.

God did this for the saving of people.

It was not you.

God was decisive.

You were sinful and hateful and jealous, and you showed me, but God's design was in it so that there would be this moment a great glorifying of God's deliverance.

God is sovereign.

And then he says even further, and I will provide for you.

More than forgiveness, more than I won't throw you in prison.

The Hebrew word here is K-U-L-K.

And in the courtroom of Genesis 50, Joseph assumes not judge, not prosecutor, but defender.

He says, I will provide security.

Instead of something that you deserved instead of some harm, Joseph said, I'll provide what I can.

Joseph said this.

He said, Am I in the place of God?

He says, I'm not your judge.

But Jesus is in the place of God, Church.

The very first time that we meet Joseph, I think, as we come closer to a close here, he is tending sheep.

When it says that Jesus was moved with compassion, it says that he looked out over the city, the multitude, and he saw sheep that were without a shepherd.

Joseph may have been the second in Egypt, but I think he's maintaining his management way by shepherding, by the spirit of shepherdship.

He's looking out at people and he's having compassion.

Joseph sees their fears and he moves towards it.

He doesn't move away from a problem, right?

He doesn't step away.

He sees them in a struggle and he begins to move towards it.

Y'all remember the story in Scripture of the 99 sheep?

It says that Jesus will leave the 99 and go after the one lost sheep.

Why?

Because he has a heart unfiltered with right love.

When a sorrowful sinner, Scripture says, lays down their heart, the Bible says that the angels in heaven rejoice over one lost sinner that comes to repentance and faith.

In John 10, Jesus says, I am the good shepherd.

You see, it was a line of compassion that made Joseph hold.

He held for sake of compassion.

I want you to see this picture of the Arlen D.

William Bridge.

This bridge is a bridge that I've driven over.

It connects Arlington County to Washington, D.C.

And in 1982, the Arland D.

Williams Bridge, it was renamed to that.

And it was renamed because of a famous incident that took place in Washington, D.C.

The air flight, the Air Florida Flight 90 crashed into the icy Potomac Rivers in 1982.

And the impact of the crash killed 73 of 79 passengers on the plane, leaving six.

Those six people were in the Potomac Rivers.

And as they were, Arland D.

Williams saw, he was the first man near to the rescue helicopter.

And as they threw down a line that was connected to the bottom of that, a lifesaver, Arlan D.

Williams sent that lifesaver.

He sent it the first time to the next person.

He sent it a second time to the next person.

He sent it time after time.

And five times Arlen D.

Williams caught, received the rope from the man in the helicopter and passed it down the line.

The sixth time it never reached Arlen D.

Williams.

He had the rope over and over that would save his life, and Arlan D.

Williams gave his life that day.

He drowned in the Potomac, having the power, but passing the protection person after person.

Today people pass over that bridge and the droves, but it means so much more.

Church, Jesus Christ had the right to condemn.

He had the right to judge, but instead he stretched out his hands.

Instead, he took judgment.

While he was taking judgment, as he was mocked, beaten, berated, he said to his father, Father, forgive them.

They don't even know what they're doing.

That is compassion.

He is agape.

That is sacrificial love.

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