Uncommon Community | Love One Another (May 14th, 2017) - Mike Armstrong

Alright, so grab your Bible, grab uh, and turn it to 1 John.

1 John chapter 4.

1 John 4 · chapter mention

1 John chapter 4.

1 John 4 · chapter mention

And as you're doing that, I've got a quote for you up on the screen by Zoe Kravitz, the famed theologian.

No, she's not.

She's uh she's an actress, she's the daughter of uh of Lenny Kravitz, a musician, and uh this is what she says.

She says, beauty is when you can appreciate yourself.

When you now listen to this.

When you love yourself, that's when you're most beautiful.

That's when you're most beautiful.

Now, while you could say that this is a quote about beauty, all right, and it is in many ways, it also says a lot about love, doesn't it?

It says a lot about that.

And maybe what stands out the most about this is the inherent self-centeredness of these words.

Now, I would say that you know this this speaks a lot about love, but probably not uh with any real accuracy at all.

Okay, because according to Miss Kravitz, love is uh is a self-focused thing.

It's a self-focused thing.

Now, I mean this is just one quote, right?

And it maybe doesn't sum up her entire worldview on the topic and and what love is, uh, but what it does shed light on is that mankind in general is thoroughly confused when it comes to love.

Would you agree with that?

We you know we don't really know what love what love is, we we don't know where to find it, we don't know how to express it, and we don't know how to receive it.

Okay, and as a result, okay, relational chaos ensues.

Okay, again, would you agree with all of that?

I think that's pretty bang on.

All right, we don't really have a clue at all when it comes to what love is or or anything about that, and because of that, uh, mankind, the world, uh is a mess.

It's a mess in all of that.

Now, unfortunately, sometimes the church isn't all that much better when it comes to love.

We're not.

And uh, because of that, the strength of our community is severely weakened.

Would you, again, would you agree?

Well, our passage today shows us that love is best understood through the context of the gospel.

Through the context of Jesus Christ came uh and died uh to show his love for sinners.

So it's best understood through the context of the gospel, it's also best expressed through genuine care for each other.

Okay, to love one another.

Okay, it's not a it's not a self-focused thing, it's not that at all.

It's a it's a gospel motivated, others focused thing.

Right?

That is that's love.

Okay, so a big question for you as you kind of think about this, think about yourself and think about our church as a whole.

How are we doing with this?

Right?

How are we doing with this harvest?

Um, I would probably say uh that I have seen some phenomenal examples of how you have done an amazing job of showing Christ-like love to others.

I know that Angie and I have uh have absolutely felt your love and your encouragement.

And so I would not say that this message is in any way condemnation on where uh we are as a church or anything like that.

But hey, like in anything, uh, is there room to grow?

Yeah, I think there is.

There absolutely is.

So let's get into this.

Let's read this passage here.

1 John chapter 4, starting in uh verse 7.

1 John 4 · chapter mention

Here's what it says it says, Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

Anyone who does not love God does not know God, because God is love.

In this the love of God was made manifest among us that God sent his only son into the world, so that we might live through him.

In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Beloved, if God has so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

No one has ever seen God.

If we love one another, God abides in us, and his love is perfected in us.

By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us his spirit.

And we have seen and testified that the Father has sent his son to be the Savior of the world.

Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.

So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us.

God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.

By this is love perfected with by this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment.

Because as he is, so also are we in the world.

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.

For fear has to do with punishment.

And whoever fears has not been perfected in love.

We love because he first loved us.

If anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he is a liar.

For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.

And this commandment we have from him whoever loves God must also love his brother.

Lord, we we thank you for this passage, Lord, and uh it uh lays it out to us in very uh very stark terms.

And Lord, as we work our way through these verses and through these words that you have for us as your church today, Lord, I pray that we would take them seriously.

Lord, I pray that we would be filled with an appropriate sense of the impossibility of the task of us creating a church of people who love each other.

We cannot do this, not in our flesh, not in our own strength, not in our our own abilities.

Lord, we need you.

Lord, it is it is you that builds your church, it is you that that draws out true love uh that we would have towards others.

And it and it all comes back to the gospel.

And so, Lord, as we continue to unpack this series, Lord, I pray that uh that you would use this passage to uh completely transform us and how we relate to each other in our relationships.

And so, God, again, uh make your word known, transform us, change us, God.

We pray this in your name.

Amen.

Amen.

All right, well, welcome back to Uncommon Community.

Uncommon Community is our new series where we are, you know, laying out the kinds of relationships that we are committed to uh having with each other here at Harvest.

These are the kind of relationships that, you know, more important, it's more important than what we want to do and what we want to build, the kind of relationships that we see God wants us to build and He wants to actually build uh in our church here.

And so last week we looked at the idea that life is not meant to be lived in isolation.

Right?

You are not an island.

And now, of course, our flesh and our desire, not to mention our culture, is all driving us towards that.

Be self-made, you can do it on your own, you don't need people.

You know, strength is solidarity.

And what we found in the passage, and we see it all through scripture, is that strength is actually found uh in community and living with uh each other uh in a meaningful and God-glorifying way.

All right, so from here on out, what we're gonna be looking at over the next bunch of weeks uh are the one another passages.

You know, how we interact with each other as a church family and in our families, so that, why?

So that the unity of the church is strong, right?

So that so that discipleship is happening, so that people are genuinely cared for, and that ultimately, and we always say this, so that God, so that Jesus Christ his son is glorified.

Okay, when we when we do these things, and of course we need the Holy Spirit to empower us and to strengthen us in our abilities, okay.

When we do these things, it brings God's glory down on his church.

That's what it does.

God's manifest presence is here, manifest meaning that he is with us, right?

And that is what makes church awesome.

That's what makes church great.

It's not it's not a bunch of people just simply being nice to each other, right?

And you can go to any group, uh any any person, any any number of people gathered together at any kind of an event, uh, they can be nice.

Right?

What makes church great, what makes church unique, and what makes church powerful is when God himself is here.

And so when we live in obedience to him, he shows up to church and we are forever changed.

We're never, ever the same.

Now, does that sound like something worth going after?

I think it does.

I think that's exactly what we need to be going after because God's word shows us the way, all right?

So learning to love one another, that's kind of the first thing here.

Pretty good place to start.

And so here's the first thing.

You've got your notes, it'll be on it'll be on the screen there.

Okay, I will commit to loving those around me.

I will commit to that, right?

And here it is.

And failure to do so shows that I don't actually know God.

Boom.

Right?

Verse 7.

Take a look at this.

It says, Beloved, let us love one another.

All right, so in case there are there's any you know lack of clarity or anything like that, there's the standard, right?

There's the expectation that we're going for.

He jumps right into it.

Let's love one another, right?

That is the bar and where it's set.

All right, it says, For love is from God.

Whoever loves, that's you know, loves genuinely, has been born of God and knows God.

All right, so he's talking about salvation there.

If you love other people, it means that you're saved.

Okay, it means that you're saved.

And then look what he says.

He says, Anyone who does not love God does not know God.

Because God is love.

Now you might be, you know, reading that and thinking, whoa, right, strong words.

And I would say, yeah, absolutely they are.

Right?

There's no like, hmm, what is he really trying to say there?

No, I think it's I think it's pretty bang on, it's pretty clear here.

But here, here's what you need to understand.

You need to understand that the the book of 1 John was written to help believers be assured of their salvation.

Have you ever wrestled with that before?

You ever wondered, like, am I really saved?

Do I really get what's happening here?

Because a saved life is a changed life.

That's what we would say.

And so some people would kind of struggle with this.

Now, some people struggle with with doubt kind of more naturally than others do, and so you you maybe wrestle with this, uh, but that's why this book was written.

In fact, if you jump over to chapter 5, verse 13, take a look at that.

This is a line uh worthy of uh being underlined in your Bible.

And this is kind of the core core verse of this whole book.

It says this I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life.

That you may know assurance of our salvation is a very important thing.

We need to be sure of it.

We can't we can't flip-flop on this.

We we're, you know, we we can't be like, well, maybe I am, maybe I'm not.

And so what John does is he writes this book and he gives us a number of signposts, okay, a number of things that, hey, this should be happening in your life.

If you were a true follower of Jesus Christ and you didn't just say a bunch of empty words and you didn't mean it, and maybe you prayer to pray to prayer, but again, your heart wasn't in it.

No, if you if you truly are a follower of Jesus Christ, you're gonna see these things happen.

You're gonna see these things growing in your life.

One of them is you're gonna have a genuine love for other people, for God's people.

Okay, and he and then on the flip side he says, so if you don't, if you do not love God's people, okay, you can't have any confidence that you're actually saved.

You can't.

Okay, you may come to church, you may, you know, you may serve here, you might be involved in all kinds of ways, and you know, in a small group, you might read your Bible, you might pray, and all of that uh type of thing.

But again, if you don't have a growing love for other believers, again, you can argue all you want, but here's the thing you do not know Jesus.

You don't.

Those aren't my words, that's not my thinking, that's that's God's, that's what we see here.

And so you read a verse like that and you realize, wow, that's really one of those, that's one of those gut check time verses, isn't it?

You kind of look at that and you're like, wow, where where am I at here?

Where do I really stand, right?

It really forces you to kind of think this stuff through.

Do I love others?

Am I willing to sacrifice myself here for the good of the body?

You know, am I am I compassionate towards those who are hurting?

Do I do I have a desire to see people come to saving faith in Jesus Christ and then be discipled?

Okay, or is my focus far too inward?

Right?

Do I care mostly and only about myself?

Or am I the consumerist Christian?

We talked about that a little bit last week, right?

Take, take, take, but never investing in the life uh of the people here.

Okay, well, what these verses show us, of course, is the seriousness of the command to love.

It's not it's not an option.

Right?

A lot of us, you know, sometimes we maybe we don't intentionally mean to, but we read certain verses and we're like, hmm, nice suggestion.

No, your your salvation is at stake here.

That's that's what this is saying.

Now remember, we don't we don't love other people to earn our salvation.

Because I know what some of you might be thinking.

You might be thinking, well, yeah, I don't, I don't know if I've you know shown any love to other people, so I better like you know touch base with two or three other people and you know, and kind of ease my conscience a little bit and and and and show that you know I you know somehow earn my salvation and get God to love me and you know let me into heaven someday and all of that.

No, that's not what that's not what it is.

We can't earn our salvation.

Okay, rather the the salvation the salvation that's been earned for us through Jesus Christ reveals itself as genuine when we love God's people.

Okay, that's the way that it is.

It's it's it's a sacrificial love, it's it's a radical love, which is of course uncommon.

Right?

It's uncommon.

The world, if you think about it, the world loves in merely common ways.

They love when it's when it's easy, they love when you know when it's convenient, when when I get something out of it, when there's some some kind of benefit coming back towards me, that's when I'll love.

If I sense that you know all of those things aren't in place, then then I'm not gonna love.

And again, it's it's a self-centered thing.

All right, but the community that God is building here at our church is way, way, way better than that.

Would you agree?

It's uncommon.

We're gonna we're gonna love other people, we're gonna strive to do that, even when it's difficult, even when it's hard, when it, you know, when we don't have those those tangible benefits coming back towards us, we're gonna love because Christ commands it, and for so many other reasons, and that really leads us to the second thing.

All right, I will commit to loving those around me because God showed how committed he was to loving me.

All right, this is huge.

This is the crux of it right here, verse 9.

Check it out.

Yeah, it says, In this the love of God was made manifest.

Yeah, that word manifest there mean meaning that, you know, it was made, it was made noticeable.

Okay, it was made manifest among us that God sent his only son into the world that we might live through him.

Okay, in this is love.

Not that we have loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins.

Now that word propitiation, that's a big word.

Right, we probably need to understand that one pretty well.

And I heard a pastor kind of describe it or define it really simply, and it's always been kind of my favorite way, it's stuck for me, of a propitiation.

If you want to write this down, it means this.

Jesus suffered God's wrath, so I wouldn't have to.

Jesus suffered God's wrath, so I wouldn't have to.

That is propitiation.

All right, what else does he say here?

He says, Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

Okay, so what do these verses get at here?

These verses really get at the why, don't they?

They get at the why.

You know, why should I love other people?

Why should I, why should I put in the energy?

You know, why should I, again, have have compassion or you know, or spend resources in all kinds of different ways on people when the reality is that it's hard.

Right?

It's hard.

Some people are just you know harder to love than others.

Right?

Personalities, you know, don't click, and you know, that's gonna happen here within the body of Christ as well.

And it's gonna be difficult to love some uh as opposed to others.

You know, what you know, sometimes we feel like I don't I don't have as much to give, I don't have as as many resources, as as many spiritual gifts or finances or whatever it is, and so because of that, you sort of you let yourself off the hook in the loving other people department.

Or how about this one?

I'm tired, right?

I don't feel like loving, and I don't, I don't want to.

Again, we we've used all of these excuses, haven't we?

In many ways.

Okay, so why?

Why do we obey?

Why do we obey this command to love?

Why do we you know try and work and toil and struggle towards greater love for one another, greater effectiveness in all of that?

Well, here it is.

Because Christ first loved us, right?

That is the bottom line, right?

For God so loved the world that He that He sent, right?

That He sent His only Son.

That's John 3, 16.

That's the gospel, right?

Jesus died to show his love for us when we were so unlovable, when we were so broken, when we were so sinful and rebellious towards God, God says, you know what, I'm gonna I'm gonna love them anyways, no matter what.

And that is the gospel message.

And that is the message that so many of you have received, and you've recognized that, you know what, I've got sin in my life, and and I and I am an enemy of God.

And so I want to receive this gift, though, of salvation by grace through faith.

You are trusting that Jesus Christ really did all those things on the cross, that it was for you is to bridge the gap between you and God, that is to obliterate the barrier of sin.

For those of you who have not trusted in Christ, you've not put your faith in him, I would encourage you to do that now.

Do it.

Trust him, recognize, believe in faith that Jesus did all of this for you.

Okay, in uncommon community, okay, the gospel is the driving motivation in our love for others.

We don't love other people because they're popular or they look good or they have money or they're especially talented and gifted in in certain ways.

Okay, we don't we don't love because of those reasons.

We love because Christ first loved us.

Bottom line, that's it.

That's why we love.

Okay, and if that's not our motivation, then our church will at best reflect the uncommon, weak, and and worldly examples of love that are that are quite uh frankly uh broken and empty.

Right?

Is that is that what we want here for the culture in our church?

Is that what we want our community to be to be known as here?

I hope not.

I hope that you're not satisfied in that.

I know I'm not, right?

Because at the end of the day, any chump can love when it's easy.

Right?

We can.

You know, and again, when it when there's those benefits coming towards us, and you know, it's it's fun and it feels good and all of that.

But listen, the true church of God, right?

The true church will commit to loving others, okay, even when we get none of those things.

We got none of it coming our way.

Why?

Because we've been so captivated by the love of God for us.

Right?

That's it.

He gave his life.

Right?

That's the motive.

That's what we have to continue to remind ourselves on and reflect on as we uh build our church, as we do that every single day.

All right, here's the third thing.

Okay, I will commit to loving those around me as I grow secure in God's great love for me.

As I grow secure, this is huge for us.

Okay, verse 12.

Verse 12 says, No one has ever seen God.

Okay, meaning face to face.

No one's ever seen God face to face and live to tell about it, right?

Because God is so holy, He has He's white hot holiness, and we are we are sinful, we are unholy.

God is, you know, God is unable to dwell among sinful men.

No one has seen God face to face.

He says, if we love one another, God abides in us.

It uses the word abide here a lot.

It says it abides in us, and his love is perfected in us.

Now, that word abides.

What's that all about?

Well, it means kind of literally that he lives in us, that he remains in us.

Again, it's not saying abide in the sense that we've somehow we've somehow earned that abiding love from God.

You know, if I love people, then God will remain in me.

If I don't love God love people, then God will you know somehow leave me.

That's not what uh that's not it.

Okay, rather it's that that God, that it's proven that God is in us when we love other people.

All right, that's really it.

Okay, keep going.

Okay, by this, we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he is given.

Us of his Spirit.

And we have seen and testified that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world.

Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God.

So we have come to know and believe, we'll come back to that.

We've come to know and believe the love that God has for us.

God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.

Alright, so we've looked at the why, right?

Why should we love other people?

Well, it's because of the gospel, that's our motivation.

Now, these verses really get at the how.

Because some of you are thinking, well, how do I actually love that person down the road from me that I don't really get along with?

You know, or that person who seems to give me a, you know, uh, you know, just a kind of a weird vibe all the time when I see them.

How do I actually love that person that's that's hurt me?

You know, how do we do a good job of this?

How do we how do we grow in all of this?

Because again, loving people, it's not just like a switch that you turn on and turn off.

Right?

It's not like you know, you were terrible at loving people before Christ, and then second that you get saved, all of a sudden you're awesome at it.

Right?

That's that's not quite the way uh it works.

Okay, like all things, it's something that we grow in.

Right?

We need to grow in this love for each other as God's love is perfected in us, it says there.

Okay, but verse 16, this is a key verse.

I said that we would come back to it.

Here it is.

This is really, it really helps us understand the how.

It says, so we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us.

Right?

That's how we do a good job of loving other people when we are secure in the love of God for us.

Okay, let me put it this way.

Okay, uh the reason why a lot of Christians, you know, seem to be so so kind of lousy at exhibiting Christ-like love for other people, and and you know, the reason why, you know, so many churches, you know, are you know highly dysfunctional, and let's maybe even just say straight up bad at loving other people and loving each other well.

And the reason why communities can so easily become toxic and all kinds of you know bad vibes there, and you know, it's a culture that no one in the right mind would you know ever want to join and be a part of.

The reason for all of that is that people aren't truly secure in the love of God for them.

They're not.

They don't really believe that Jesus Christ loves them passionately.

Right?

Would this be true of you?

And I think really what this all shows us is it shows us that we just have a, you know, a very, you know, in many ways, a very shallow understanding of the gospel.

Yeah, sure.

I, you know, probably, you know, most of us here in the room could give a good gospel outline.

Any one of us, you know, on a quiz could jot down what the gospel is.

And if someone said, can you spell it out to me really simply or even in some very you know, kind of deep and complex and theological ways, you know, maybe some of us could could do that.

Okay, but the challenge for us, and here's where I think the problem is, is that is that we don't personally soak in the truths of it.

We we don't really absorb the truth of the gospel.

You know, we don't spend time pondering the realities of God's love for us, do we?

You know, we don't we don't think about the just the the sheer the sheer weight of it.

Right?

Like I am, I'm sinful.

Right?

And Jesus was tortured for that sin.

He went to the cross to draw me near to him when I was an enemy.

Again, we don't we don't absorb that in in a in a real deep way in the kind of the fiber of our being.

It's sort of like like oil and water.

That's how we are with the gospel a little bit.

Yeah, we've kind of got it on us, and we sort of understand it on some level, but maybe deep down not enough.

And so, as a result of that kind of lack of real, you know, gospel absorption, if you really want to call it that, as a result of that, we're insecure.

And we don't truly believe that God loves us as much as he actually does.

We don't know it, we don't believe God's love for us.

And what this is saying here is that Christians and and and church communities that that truly get how much God loves them will then in turn love other people well.

That's how it works.

Okay, if you're if you're wondering, it's not just about you know, you know, mustering up strength and and more determination.

We're using the word commit here, and that is important, but it's not simply about that.

You don't just grit your teeth and I'm gonna commit to you know to loving other people well.

No, you need to understand the gospel, and then you will naturally, as the spirit is working in you, he will empower you to love other people well, regardless of how easy or difficult uh it is.

It's one of the main reasons why we try to be gospel-centered around you.

You know, that's kind of a catchphrase or buzzwords that you know churches talk about.

We want to be gospel-centered, we want everything continually to come back to the gospel because the gospel transforms our motives for living for Christ.

We've already talked about how it transforms our motives to loving other people, but it also transforms our motives for any kind of obedience.

Why would you want to do anything for Jesus Christ?

Let me tell you, it's hard.

It's not easy.

You already know this.

I'm preaching to the choir.

Well, we do it because Christ went to the cross and he did it for us.

And the more that we're exposed to the message, the more that we hear the gospel, the more and more and more that that happens as the Spirit is working on us, the more he's gonna convince us of God's awesome love.

And then automatically, what's gonna happen?

We're gonna wanna share God's love with other people.

It's gonna come spilling out of us.

We're gonna want to demonstrate that love to others.

Okay, so here's what I would say: study the gospel.

Okay, study it.

Not just in an academic way, not just again, where you could have a conversation with somebody and not look foolish but have some answers for them.

Not just in that, but study the gospel to study God.

Study it to know his love for you.

Study it so that it teaches you your identity.

Study it so that it gives you a heart for people here.

All right?

Work to believe the gospel, work to absorb it.

And as you do that, listen, you're gonna be on your way to loving other people well.

And our church is gonna be on its way to being this amazing and incredible, uncommon community, where again, outsiders are gonna look at it and just be like, what's happening over there?

It is different than what I'm used to.

People are gonna come and it's gonna feel like home, it's gonna be family.

All right, here's the last thing I will commit to loving those around me when God's love drives out all my fear and hate.

Verse 17, take a look.

It says, By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment.

Because as he is, so also are we in this world.

Okay, so because of the gospel, we don't need to fear final judgment.

Right?

I mean, I remember just constantly walking through life in my you know early days with Christ, thinking like, oh no, you know, God just has like this, you know, massive fly swatter in his hand, so to speak, and he's looking to whack me with it constantly every time I make a mistake.

What?

Why would why why did I live like that?

Because again, I wasn't really secure in the love of God for me.

Right?

I didn't really, again, I hadn't absorbed the gospel, right?

I didn't have I didn't have any confidence.

I feared judgment.

Right?

And I have to remind myself, and every once in a while I still have to work this through for sure, that Christ has taken that that judgment on himself, and so I will be able to stand in the final judgment.

Right?

And I love that verse there because as he is, so also are we in the world.

That's that's an astounding verse.

Because it's showing us that as God the Father looks at Jesus Christ the Son, so he now looks at you and I.

Isn't that amazing?

We know that God the Father loves the Son, He is He is cherished, He is He is adored.

Well, listen, no different than uh uh for us.

It isn't.

That's how God looks at you now.

You could do like a whole sermon series on that verse, but let's keep going.

All right, there is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear.

For fear has to do with punishment.

And whoever fears has not been perfected in love.

We love because he first loved us.

If anyone says, I love God and hates his brother, he's a what?

He's a liar.

For he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen.

And this is the commandment that we have from him.

Whoever loves God must also love his brother.

Hey, listen, if you are not kind of like me, if you're not confident in the love of God towards you, okay, you're gonna find yourself living in fear.

You're gonna find yourself, you know, uh living in fear of the judgment.

You're you're you're not gonna be secure in your relationship with him.

You're you're gonna feel like God is just out there to punish you every single step of the way.

But listen, God's love for us, once we fully absorb that, it begins to wipe away all that fear, doesn't it?

It begins to wipe it all out.

And then on top of that, the more we realize God's love for us and we we probe the depths of all of it, the more it's gonna also wipe out our hatred that we might have for other people.

Okay, because you simply can't say that you love God, yet truly hate others, and then in any way be confident of your salvation.

You just can't.

People who have received the love of God seek to display the love of God no matter what.

Okay, that's just it.

And I mean, why wouldn't you at the end of the day?

Right?

Why wouldn't we want to display the love of God?

Because, again, we really have no fear, no need to fear judgment.

We have, you know, no need to fear punishment.

Again, at the end of the day, because of all that, there's no legitimate reason to hate anybody.

Now, you might be thinking, yeah, easy for you to say, buddy.

And you have no idea the the pain and the hurt that I've gone through.

I've been I've been burned.

I I've been hurt by by professing Christians.

I have been stung, and you know, I have been, I have been hurt, I have been constantly judged, and it's actually it's actually really easy for me to hate, and I feel like I've got you know a lot of good reasons to hate people.

Okay, well listen, with with all due respect and and sincerity and and understanding that you know you probably have gone through just horrendous and and and heartbreaking pain and and judgment and hurt at the at the hands of people.

Again, with all due respect to all of that, you need to hear this.

You're wrong.

You're wrong.

You don't have a right to hate people.

And whatever your reasons might be to hate, listen, Christ had more.

Christ had more.

We put him to death.

You put him to death.

I did that.

Yet what did he do?

He loved.

He loved.

So you need to remind yourself and and allow that that that example there to drive out your fear and your hate.

You need to think about the fact that that Christ has forgiven you.

He's forgiven you of sin that literally caused his death.

He has caught He's forgiven you of sin that that caused his pain and his anguish and his torture.

You need to realize that.

And the only way that we become this amazing, you know, uncommon community that we're talking about here is when we allow the love of God that He has for us to really be the fuel in like the wood-burning stove that drives our love for each other.

And so if you are struggling with you know unforgiveness and you're struggling with hatred or bitterness, or you know, you just can't look that person in the eye because deep down you haven't forgiven them and you haven't moved on of all of that again.

You need to remind yourself of the gospel.

You need to remember what Christ has done for you.

You need to spend some time thinking about that.

Pray that through.

Listen, if you're struggling with this and you're like, I've tried to fix all this on my own, well, that might be part of the problem.

You need community.

And maybe for you it's it's getting involved in a small group.

Maybe for you you're in a small group already.

You need to be more authentic and more transparent, more vulnerable in that small group and say, hey, listen, guys, I've got this area in my heart that that's not real great, and I've got this pain, I'm trying to work it through, but I'm not doing a good job.

Would you guys pray for me?

Would you help me?

Maybe it's it's getting counseling, maybe it's getting some people to you know help you work that through.

Now I know what happens when we think, when we hear the word counseling, we think that's only for the really messed up people.

It's not, it's for everybody.

Everybody needs that kind of thing.

We need help.

We can't fix this on our own.

Again, we need the community here.

So let me ask you, church, are you committed to this?

Are you committed to loving one another?

I will not stand here for a moment and say that this is an easy task.

It's not.

In fact, don't you actually read through these verses and listen to this and think about this and actually get to the place where you realize it's actually an impossible task.

Right?

I cannot do this.

I do not have the ability to change my heart.

I I can't just pretend love somebody when I actually don't love them.

Getting to that place where you realize the impossibility of the task is exactly where you need to be.

Because why?

It shows us that only through Christ can we do it.

Only through him.

I don't want us to be a church where we think that, well, if we just try harder, we're gonna be able to, you know, create something awesome here.

Nonsense.

What we will create here in our flesh and in our own strength will be garbage.

Only Jesus Christ can build the kind of community we're talking about here.

Only Jesus Christ can transform people and give them a love for other people that they previously hated and despised.

Only Jesus can do that.

But hey, we need to be committed to going after those things.

I'm gonna do everything in my power, everything in my ability, and lean into you, Jesus, to help create and be a part of this amazing thing that you call uncommon community.

And listen, here's the other thing, too.

I'm not gonna settle for anything less than that.

Is that your heart?

That is my heart.

I don't want us to settle on anything less than that.

There are, you know, there are too many, you know, Christian communities out there that have settled.

I don't want us to do this.

The Lord, more importantly than what I think, it doesn't matter.

It's what the Lord thinks.

He wants to create this in us.

Are you game?

Are you willing to go after it?

Hey, we need the Lord.

We need the Lord, don't we?

So let's pray.

Let's seek Him, let's cry out to Him.

Join me as we do that.