More Than Circumstances

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Good morning, CCW.

Why don't you take your Bibles this morning and turn them to Luke chapter 7?

Luke 7 · chapter mention

I think every now and then I'll miss Pastor Danny before he used to preach.

He would give us all the college football updates from Saturday.

And all I'm gonna say is there's gonna be a shakeup of the rankings.

Got to catch some good football.

So any season, I am so glad that uh we finally got a little bit of weather that matches football season.

And uh next Saturday night, Harvest Jam that we put on each year.

I hope that you're signed up.

We'll be talking about that later and the need for some help, but uh we are so excited about that.

It's gonna be a great time.

Um, I would ask that church family, if you would please keep Ryan Lackey and his family in prayer of his mother at the funeral just the other day, and uh just keep them in your prayers, and we're praying that God will fill the gaps in your heart.

I know that is hard.

Thankful for you and your family.

Please, church family, keep them lifted up.

Romans chapter 7.

Romans 7 · chapter mention

We're burning in more than circumstances.

Identity theft.

Over one million people in the United States annually have to deal with identity theft.

When you could just get stolen from.

When there's a shady character in a back alley, and someone might even have to go through the door if they stole from you.

Now you gotta worry about the guy who gets your Wi-Fi password.

A thief used to have to work to steal.

Satan is the original identity thief.

God made you and me in his own image.

We found out the very first week.

You are God crafted, God created, God.

In Genesis chapter 3, Satan came in and he infiltrated whether called doubt.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

And in John 8, he is labeled by who he is.

He is a liar and the false.

And what he constantly does is deceives and purports, accuses, confuses, and he prowls, looking to alter your idea of your identity.

Look through many of those things.

It's not your image, the things you have on, it's not a sport or a trophy.

Your identity is not in what's your wallet, your purse, or your bank account.

Your identity is not a degree on a wall.

It's not your parents and their fame, it's not your kids and living through them.

And today, I want you to know you're not your circumstances.

Have you believed that you're just a sinner?

So be what you are.

But your position in Christ is stronger than your condition in life.

Can we pray?

God, we love you this morning.

Lord, the way that you fashioned us.

We're thankful for your handprint on planet earth and in our lives and in our homes, in our purpose.

God, I pray for each person here today that still has some things, God, that are bothersome, that they're holding on to, that have been a struggle.

I pray for some people today who are in the middle of a circumstance or months.

And God, it's hard not to focus on the problem.

God, I pray that work through your scripture, work through your word, work through your Holy Spirit this morning.

Draw us to exactly what you would have us to hear so that we can understand who we are in Jesus Christ.

And amen.

Luke chapter 7, the first point this morning is this redemption sees no sin.

Luke 7 · chapter mention

There in verse 36, it says, He's asked him, Jesus, to eat with him.

And he went to the Pharisee's house and sat down to eat.

And behold, a woman in the city who was a sinner, when she knew that Jesus sat at the table in the Pharisee's house, brought an alabaster flask of fragrant oil, and stood at his feet behind him, weep his feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head, and she kissed his feet with fragrant oil.

Now when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he spoke to himself, saying, This man, if he were a prophet, would know who in what manner a woman this is who is touching him.

For she is a sinner.

Letter A, this morning I want you to who hit rock bottom.

Luke gives this, she is, and then the Simon, who Jesus is sitting with, also again repeats it.

Woman in the city, a sinner.

Luke chooses to acknowledge her that way.

That's how she was known, at least here.

That would appear to be the title that she's given.

A sinner.

A collection of makes a life, but a bad choice is a bad choice.

It's just this.

Make bad choices.

Both of us.

Oh, okay.

Crowd this morning.

When I was in about ninth grade, Miss Carleton that she was number one.

That was a bad choice.

Now I told her with my ring finger because I'm not as bad as you think I am.

But I had been sewing in my hand because my Bible class shared the uh classroom with Homek, and I found a needle, and I began sewing the letter R in my hand.

And she stood up and she said, Mr.

Wright, in the world are you doing?

She was like, That is really not smart.

And when she turned around, I told her she was number one.

And Mr.

Waite, who was the Bible teacher, was over here, and he saw, and he was not enthused by my idea that Miss Carlton was sent me to the principal's office.

That was a bad choice.

And both of them, by the time we finished praying, were in tears.

Young girl was 14, and mom began to tell me how she snuck out and then began to tell me about her bad choice.

And it was a bad choice.

Stub.

I found out later about some choices that her mom had been making in her life.

Bad choices.

She had messed up.

Heather and I cared for this young girl, took her to camp.

We saw God working in and through her life.

But she kept coming to services.

And just a few years ago, this young lady was killed outside of a nightclub club in church.

Jesus loved her.

Her mom.

They were making some choices that were bad, but it didn't have to be an identity.

This morning you feel like you're just at the bottom.

Things have been hitting you left and right, and you just feel there.

And I want to tell you there is a better way.

There is a better day.

There is a better you.

It may not be right this moment, but there's a better you.

And I want you to hear, died loving you.

Your indiscretion is not the circumstances around you that you have nothing even to do with.

He is a new creation, old things are passed away.

Behold, all things are like new.

You're not your position in Christ is stronger than your condition in life.

In 2010, there was a song put out.

By 10th, I asked Benji if he would sing it, and he couldn't.

So I'm gonna do something that would be, I'm not gonna sing.

Y'all crazy.

Some of y'all believed it, didn't you?

Did I get well no?

Not for a second, probably.

I want you to think about this woman we It says, There's a girl in the corner with tear stains on her eyes.

From the place and the shame she can't hide.

She says, How did I get here?

I'm was.

I'm crippled by the fear that I've fallen too far to love.

And the chorus says, But don't you know who you are and what's been done for you?

Your choices that you've made.

You're more than the sum of your past mistakes.

You're more than the problems that you've created.

You've been remade.

Church, this morning I want you to hear.

Redemption doesn't see a status.

Redemption doesn't see you as lost and gone.

So we see this sinner, this woman in the city who's hit rock bottom.

Imagine the walk to Jesus.

I think on the connect groups tonight, there's a question that asks what it might have felt like.

What did she to get to that place?

We don't know exactly what it was like, but she's there.

And maybe this was her last attempt.

Maybe she had heard about all that Jesus had done, and she just wanted to get somewhere loved, cared for, changed.

Well, that was her walk there.

And then one sideways response, let her be.

Now when the Pharisee, verse 39, when the Pharisee who had invited Jesus saw this, he spoke to himself, saying, This man, if he were a proof, what manner of woman this is, who is touching him, for she is a sinner.

Answered and said to him, Simon, I have something to say to you.

Simon was a Pharisee.

Differences of people.

We have a sinner who is identified by sinfulness and Simon, centered in societal self-righteousness.

Pharisees, which we learned through were not Jesus' favorite group of people to come up with, but he's constantly around them.

I think there's a point.

They have a divisive heart.

They want to wield their way.

And let me tell you some of the things about them.

This is Jesus describing them to them.

Jesus said, Your whitewashed tombs looks like a tomb full of dead men's bones, the outside you clean up.

He says, You're blind vipers, blind fools, wolves, serpents.

You seek a convert to gum your way, but child of hell, you've shut up the kingdom of heaven, you lousy, low-lying, four flush.

Okay, not that last part.

But you get it, Jesus is pretty forward with his thoughts about these Pharisees.

But interesting, Jesus has a dinner invitation, and guess where he's at?

He's sitting right there with Simon.

In Luke 11, Jesus has a meal invitation with Pharisees, and Jesus is eating with Pharisees.

We think, well, he's got all this to say about him.

Why?

Study John 3.

There's a man named Nicodemus, formerly a Pharisee, who Jesus won to faith.

Paully a Pharisee.

The way of the Pharisee might correlate more to us than we think.

There may be more Simons here today than there are sinful women.

You see, Jesus loved the sinful woman, but he also loved the one he called hypocrite, whitewashed.

Jesus could see a different way for everyone.

Simon's actions.

Simon, it seems as though he is judging and he thinks what's going on is ridiculous.

He's looking at something based on status.

Here's this sinful woman.

How does he know she's sinful?

Interesting question to think on.

Was it based on what others said?

What did he know of her?

Did he have dealings with her?

Did he sin Simon know that this woman is a sinner?

But it just seems in this moment that he's just and when we think about that and try to stomach it, we might sit here and go, wow.

I want to ask you a question.

How do you treat people?

Say it, but do you stay away from people with sideways judgment?

Do you look at people different from you and kind of veer away?

Or do you look at some state and cut them off?

Because they made a mistake?

Because we can sit here and go, Simon, that was really rude, but how are we with people in our judgment?

Simon saw a sinner and Jesus saw.

Simon saw a problem, but Jesus saw potential.

Look at how they continued.

One is serving and one is seething.

Look at verse 41.

Jesus goes on to share with Simon there was a certain creditor who had two debtors.

One owed 500 denaires, and when they had nothing with which to repay, he freely forgave them both.

Tell me, we will love him more.

Simon answers that I suppose the one whom he forgave more.

And he said to him, You've rightly judged.

Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, Do you see this woman?

I entered your house, and you gave me no water for my feet, but she has washed my feet with her tears and wiped them with the hair of her head.

Kiss, but this woman has not ceased to kiss my feet since the time I came in.

You did not oil, but this woman has anointed my feet with fragrant oil.

So we see this back and forth of how Jesus entered the house and how the dinner was.

Before you come to Jesus, just come as you are.

The woman began immediately to serve.

We see her reaction.

She makes it to Jesus.

Again, I don't know the circumstances at that point, but she makes it to Jesus.

And as she gets to Jesus, we see this beautiful act of serving.

She's on her knees and she begins just to weep.

And it says that she washed his feet with her tears.

Now, I don't know about you, but it takes a little bit of water to wash some feet.

And so she commences to wiping and washing his feet with her tears, hair.

What a picture of an.

She's moved.

Someone who's in a particular place and they've gotten to the feet of Jesus.

That place, she can do nothing but weep.

In that place, like Isaiah, he says, Woe is me, I'm weak and undone, I'm a man of unclean lips.

And she began to weep and serve.

Hoping.

It was customary to clean your feet as you entered somebody's house.

You would take off your sandals, and that was often a practice.

Imagine those sandals.

You read about Jesus' sandals?

He said, John the Baptist, the greatest man that's ever lived outside of Jesus.

And John the Baptist said, I'm not worthy of his sandals.

And as Jesus' sandals came off, there she was, broken, wiping his feet, broken, crying, and serving.

Meanwhile, there's Simon put off.

I imagine his eyes.

If he knew this woman, and the thing just seems disgusted, disgusted at the situation.

I mean, have you ever been talking to somebody, somebody important?

And in comes one of your kids, looking a mess?

I mean, food on their face, the whole thing, and you're like, peasant child, don't you see?

You've had this happen.

Or somebody who, you know, you knew that society looked at them a certain way, and they come up and they're right up on you in this moment, and there is Simon with Jesus, and it's about to be this meal, great talk, all of the etiquette, everything is proper.

And this woman, if he only knew, if he just knew, if Jesus knew.

Think about that phrase.

He's unmoved.

Saved.

When Heather and I were dating, this is a sweet memory for me.

But when I when we were dating, we lived about 140 miles apart in Delaware.

And uh anyway, I would go and see her, and there often would be a wee, sometimes in between, seeing each other, maybe a little more.

Every time that I came to see her to the house and ran to my arms.

Isn't that sweet?

I mean, she would rap her.

She had this little hop jump and she'd take off to me.

And I was ready.

I mean, I can't remember a time when we were dating that you didn't do that.

And I don't know if that was all her own or she saw them, no.

But every time it was very welcome.

I'm like, yes, it is me.

I was so excited about her excitement.

People want to be accepted, church.

Simon is looking just disgusted.

People want to be cared for.

Let me give you a practical tip.

We would love, and I'm I'm thankful, seats fill.

I don't know.

Once the music's all done, our seats fill in.

There's sometimes I come in and it looks like there's 12 people, and magically, I mean, there's someone all the way to the back.

Just something practical.

We said, man, I would love for every seat to always be filled and overflowing.

Don't you each week find 10 people?

10 people to talk.

Just 10.

I mean, write them down.

Keep track of yourself.

Take a go.

I'm gonna talk to 10, at least 10 people this week.

Take, listen, take one person each week, a new person, and get a cell phone number that you can be in contact with somebody in your church.

Deeper than a hello, get to know this church body.

How can I make someone feel love and accepted?

I gotta take a step past, right?

And how about this?

I'm gonna meet one need of a person every week.

Do you think this church would feel accepted and loved, and people from the community would want to come to a church like that?

I tell you what, I don't know if you've been there, but I've been to a church or two where I walked in, walked down, and it seemed like nobody cared.

Barely a greeting.

Right?

Have you ever felt that?

And it's like, man, it was so cold.

That's all you hear, it's so cold in a place like that.

Simon is put off.

Jesus tells him, You haven't greeted me, you didn't bring me water, you didn't wash my feet.

This wolf stopped accepting me.

You're overcutting her.

But I think church often hate Simon.

I want people to meet Jesus, but I don't want to get uncomfortable.

No water, no greeting, no head anointing.

Simon wanted his experience with Jesus to be on his terms.

I want to meet with Jesus the way that I think meeting with Jesus should go.

Do you feel like that sometimes?

Pastor, don't be asking me something.

Don't don't be asking me to get uncomfortable.

And it aggravated him, then bothered by this obvious outcast.

If he only knew this messy sinner.

Just dry him up at his feet.

Well, let's look at point number two.

It continues.

Refuge sees no score.

Verse 48 through 50.

Then he said to her, Jesus says to the woman, Your sins are forgiven.

And they were with him began to say to the seven to themselves, Who is this who even forgives sin?

Then he said to the woman, Your faith has saved you.

Go in peace.

Letter A, ended Christ.

Positioned in him.

One of the hardest Hardest days of my teenage life when I turned 15.

And I know y'all hear me talk about it, but I started working for this moving company, and day one was the hardest physical day that I remember of my on for eight full hours.

Can you imagine?

Teenagers, eight full hours of work.

And you had to put things in crates.

And so I was walking upstairs, and that was it all eight hours.

Only thing that was furniture like that I got to carry was a saw, a circular saw on a table, pulling in my face and in my eyes, and I'm like, this is what people do to make money.

And so that was day one, and it continued.

And I remember I was the lowest of the low.

I learned then to pack boxes.

I became that, and I would go out on pack jobs, and I learned that.

And then finally, I started to make sense of the tech, and so I could pack a truck.

And then one day, because nobody else had a license that worked for a moving company, and I had one at 16, they're like, Can you drive a truck?

I'm like, I don't know.

We'll give it a shot.

And so after a few years, I got a CDL, and so I was driving a CDL truck.

They let me be a warehouseman, they let me on a forklift.

But all along the way, as I moved every step, it came with more money.

And then the scoreboard changed as I got more money, and I started to see that as a seventh, I was further above people that were much older than me because I had more money, and the score was getting, and my peers, they weren't keeping up, and so I was growing higher and higher.

And then I graduated college and I four-point plan of how they needed a Christian psychologist at a moving company, and they said, No, but you can be a receptionist.

And so I was a receptionist for two days, and that gave me more money.

Patch manager after two days, and that gave me even more money, and so I climbed, and like the scoreboard was just like the slot machines ding, ding, ding, ding, and I was like, this is amazing.

There was only two more steps.

There was sales and owner.

I mean, I had a pathway because the scoreboard kept lighting up the more money I made.

The problem with the score is that circumstances control the score.

Performance dictates the score, and you always need a higher score to have better feelings.

One day, as I was trying to run that score, my heart came back to the cross of Jesus Christ.

And the scoreboard changed.

The scoreboard always said, look at the sum.

But the cross said, look at the sun.

It said, look at all of your sins.

And the cross said, look at his scar.

The scoreboard said, look at your status.

And the cross said, look at your savior.

Church.

Your identity positions you in Jesus Christ, not the scoreboard.

It's not about the scoreboard.

And so this woman, the Greek word for forgive is aphiem, and that is to send away.

Her sins were sent away.

There was no more score.

There was no collection of her sins.

Those count anymore to her.

She stands forgiven, not because of her performance, but because Jesus takes guilt from the scoreboard and redefines it by grace.

Life will put everything on this scoreboard, and this was a good thing, and this was a bad thing, and this was really bad, and you went back down, and we have these scales to live in.

There's many religions today based on the scoreboard.

Islam is a religion based on the scoreboard, based on the scales.

Buddhism.

Catholicism.

Says it's faith plus.

Plus what?

There's some Anglican, there's some Lutheran.

They believe in salvation plus.

Long time ago at Tennessee Temple University, that salvation is plus nothing and minus nothing.

The conditions to salvation are repentance and faith.

Ephesians 2, 8 and 9 says, For by grace and not of works, lest any man should boast.

If you're going to work your way into heaven, I want to find out that formula, but you can't.

You are positionally different.

My children have earned benefits just because they're mine.

Actually, they haven't earned anything, just were born.

And because they were born to me and to Heather, they have certain rights and proof.

Because of my blood.

And nothing they do or don't do can affect it.

It's not about them, it's about me.

Jesus had the power to change the woman who knew she was a sinner.

And he did.

And he also had the power to change Simon, who said he was a sinner.

And for you today, your position in Christ is stronger than your condition in this life.

It's not circumcision.

You see, power in the Christian life isn't about the personal strength or the scoreboard, but the positional authority of Jesus Christ in you.

John Piper said about us being more than conquerors in Romans.

What we're going to look at, he says, a conqueror defeats his enemy, but one who is more than a conqueror subjugates his enemy.

A conqueror nullifies the purpose of his enemy.

Let's look at that.

Letter B.

A conqueror.

Look over at Romans chapter 8.

Romans 8 · chapter mention

If you look at verse 37 of Romans 8, it's familiar, but it says, Yet in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

I would highlight that last part.

You're not just more than a conqueror.

How through him who loved us.

There's a few things in this passage, that apex point of being more than a conqueror.

Let's talk about them.

If you look at verse 15 through 17, you're more than a conqueror because you're adopted.

Look at Romans 8, 15 through 17.

It says, For you did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, spirit of adoption, by whom we cry out, Abba, Father.

The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God.

And if children, then heirs, heirs of God, and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with him, that we may also together.

We are children.

We're more than a conqueror because adopted by Jesus Christ.

We come into family of Christ.

We are heirs with Christ, inherit the kingdom of God, which makes us more than a conqueror.

Adoption, think about what adoption is.

It is victory over all of the insecurities.

When a person is adopted, they're taken in.

And in the Roman world, adoption made the child, hear this, a legal heir.

Canceling all of that old me.

Canceling all of my old insecurities and past names.

And did you see the word they use in there?

Children, inheritance with God, and that says we use the word Abba.

That's important that it uses that.

Children that are heirs of God, that have the spirit of adoption, cry out Abba, which is Aramaic for Papa.

That's famile.

You're adopted into that family.

Because God doesn't love you because you're lovable.

He loves you because and he has chosen to adopt.

Adoption identified makes you more than a conqueror.

A second thing in this passage that talks about how we became more than a conqueror.

Look at verse 28.

We've quoted this verse over and again.

Assembly.

And it says, we know that all things work together to those who love God, to those who are called according to his purpose.

More than conquerors means that God has a plan for us.

We inherit the kingdom of God because we're heirs of adoption through Christ's blood.

And now not only this, we're more than conquerors because God has plans for his good.

God has plans.

The end goal is not comfort, but conformity.

Called according to his purposes.

We're adopted.

God has plans, and all his plans end in this book, if you've read it, victory.

You're heirs of that.

You're positioned in that.

Win in my family.

Guess who else wins?

The whole lot.

I lose.

I try to shield them.

But let me tell you something.

Does not lose.

There's only victory in Jesus.

For your life makes you more than a conqueror.

Romans 8, 31 through 37.

More than conquerors means, most of all, God's permanent love in our life.

Let's read it.

You've heard this, but let it sink in this morning.

Shall we say to these things, if God is for us, verse 31, who can be against us?

He who did not spare his own son, but delivered him up for us all?

How shall he not with him also freely give us all things?

Who shall bring a charge against God's elect?

Is it God who justices?

He who condemns, is it Christ who died?

Furthermore, is also risen who is even at the right, who also makes intercession for us.

Listen to this.

Who shall separate us from shall tribulation or distress or persecution or famine or nakedness or peril or sword?

As it is written, For your sake we're killed all the day long, we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.

Yet in all things we are more than conquerors.

Look at verse 3 that neither death nor life nor angels nor principalities nor powers nor things present nor things to come nor heights nor depths nor any other created thing shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

His love for you and for me.

Life.

Did you hear about the no separations?

There's seven non-separation.

That word separation there is a word that means like a courtroom declaration.

None of these can file a case against the love of God in your life.

You've been adopted, but nothing can separate you.

You've been grafted in, and nothing can take away that love.

If there were anything you can do to separate you from God's love, you'd have done it this morning on the way here.

God's love is not changed based on your performance.

Not due to make him love you any different.

And because of that great love, he sent his son Jesus to be the propitiation of all of our sins.

For all of our circumstances, all of our mess-ups.

And the Bible says he removes all that sin as far as East Israel.

That permanent love makes you more than a conqueror.

And it tells us again in that verse through him who loved us.

Because of his great love.

And when he fell, he dislocated his knee.

And he got several wounds, cuts badly on his leg on the pavement.

Aquwari, they said, You gotta quit this race.

That ain't worth it.

But he got back up and he began running again.

Hours passed.

The winner had crossed the line, and there was just a few thousand left in the stadium.

And here came as the sun was setting, John Akwari into the stadium, bloody and bandaged.

He came toward the finish line, and as he did, a few thousand of those spectators that were there stood to their feet and began cheering him as he crossed the line.

He got to a reporter after he crossed that line.

They said, Why did you go on in that connection?

He said something profound.

Church.

He said, My country did not send me 5,000 miles to start the race.

They sent me 5,000 miles to finish the race.

Amen.

Church, that's exactly what you and for me.

He didn't come to start something in you.

Aquari fell, he slipped, he made a mistake.

But he didn't let that slip.

Two thousand years ago, Jesus was wrongly judged.

But it wasn't his mistake, it was mine and yours.

And he took that on his back and he was whipped, called 10,000 angels.

He was spit on, he was mocked, he was pierced, the Bible says, for my trends, for my iniquities, and by his stripes we were healed.

So that Philippians 1, 6 could be true in our life.

And it says this he who has begun a good work in you will be faithful to complete it.

Church.

If you accepted Jesus today, we want to hear about it.

Take a moment and text CCW Connect to 94,000.

Thank you again for joining us on the CCW podcast.

We hope you'll make plans to join us in person on Sundays.