We Demonstrate the Love of God | Ps. Keith and Maegan Pittman

Welcome to the Celebration Church Orlando podcast.

Thank you so much for listening today.

We hope it encourages you and inspires you.

Here's today's message.

All right, all right.

Can we can we show some love to just the power of God?

Let's put our hands together and just celebrate the goodness of God and while we're at it, I know that um that Sam is uh around here somewhere.

Um, but but can we just can we just celebrate his his boldness to to share such an incredible story?

Um if you see him out in the courtyard or in the lobby, just just just just show him some love.

I remember when um when Sam first started attending the church, um he was basically like what Amy was describing earlier.

He would he would come in and dip out him, he was sitting in that seat right there, and he would worship and leave, and just so slowly seeing him progressively draw closer to God and then get connected to community and just the transformation that took place is just it's just one of the most um, I would say, inspiring things that I've seen in our recent ministry um experience.

And and we share these stories just to kind of to highlight the power of the love of God and all the other things.

And so um, let's give it up one more time for for Sam for sharing.

And and man, we're so grateful for for all that that God is doing in his life and in his family, and really being a vessel that that planted seeds that ultimately brought um salvation to his father.

And and and that's a that's a beautiful thing.

With that being said, um, man, it it is so good.

We're so happy um to be back, man.

We we really are.

Now, if you started coming to our church, I would say within the past four weeks, you would say, Who are you?

So so let me so so let me let me reintroduce who we are.

My name is Keith.

This is my wife Megan, and we serve as the lead pastors here at Celebration Orlando, and and we're so so glad that you are here.

Um, but we're also glad that we are back.

We've we've been gone traveling um in Greece for the past couple of weeks for our um our cross-cultural um class that the God is leading us on.

And um, it's been such an enriching experience that we can't wait to unpack and share with you guys.

But each moment we were away, we we thought of you, we prayed for you, um, and we've missed you so much.

So we're so, so glad to be back.

Yeah, and I always say that mental health is very dear to our hearts, and we believe that God is going to use us to bridge the gap between mental health and the local church.

We want to remove the stigmatism behind it, but we want to make sure that people get whole and get the care that they need also of this house.

But we're so thankful.

When I say I'm so grateful to be back, like so many of your hugs just meant so much to us.

Um, we were had we had fear of missing out, FOMO, uh, while we were gone, but we truly missed you guys and have so much to unpack, like Keith said, that uh we can't wait to share those experiences with you and um in hopes that it will benefit our church.

Um so I'm just thankful.

Grateful.

Indeed, indeed.

Um, we've we've um one of the things that we've been missing is this incredible series.

We've been watching it um online, this As We Gather series, and and really what this series was meant to do and what it's meaning to do is to give you some language, hopefully, to what it is that you have been experiencing here at Celebration.

There's tons of amazing churches, both locally and and beyond.

And each of us comes with our own context and background and histories and denominational things that we all kind of show up with.

And so a question that we'll often get is man, like what's the story with celebration?

Like, what do you guys believe?

What's your position on this?

What's your stance on that?

And and we can give you a list of the things that we believe, but I think sometimes the heart of who we are can get lost in that.

So we came up with these cultural values that were meant to communicate who we are, because I think who we are is reflected in what we do.

And so, as a community, we came up with these phrases that we felt like encapsulates who we are and what we're called to do.

As we gather, as a community, our church gathering, um, we celebrate the goodness of God.

We believe that God is good, we believe that God is for us, and so we're not a church that you're gonna hear us saying that the sky is falling.

What I mean by that is, in spite of what we may be seeing in the world, and we will acknowledge that we're a church that believes that Jesus is still on the throne.

We're a church that believes that we believe and we celebrate the goodness of God.

We also are a church that believes in engaging um the presence of God.

So you'll see the way that we worship, lift our hands, we we sing songs, we we we engage God's word.

Meg and I have a remarkable relationship because we engage one another.

We believe our relationship with God is a two-way thing.

It's not meant for us to be spectators, but we engage it.

So you'll see that when we offer classes and and groups and other things, it's meant for us to engage in our relationship with God.

And then the other thing that we talked about last week, and if you were here last week or watched last week, I mean, it was powerful.

Um, it was it was powerful hearing these transformational stories and testimonies.

But what that meant is that we believe in the power of God.

We we don't believe that the power of God has an expiration date, that we're a church that believes in the power of prayer, we believe in coming to the altar, we're a church that believes in writing down prayer requests, we're a church that believes in inviting the power of God into our situations and and and continuing to be faithful until we see God moving it.

So those are just some some some basic phrases that have profound theological history that is meant to communicate who we are as a church um and what it is that that we believe and what it is to be a part of this incredible community.

And then I think today um is is the day that undergirds all of it.

Because if we have all those things but we don't have love, then we don't have anything.

And so today we're gonna be talking about our last cultural value that undergirds all of it, and that is that we demonstrate the love of God.

We truly believe that we're called to be people that demonstrate it.

And we can have all the theology in the world, we can have all the highlights and the most worn pages in the Bible, but if we're not actually putting it into practice, if people don't look at us, and Jesus says they will recognize you by your fruit, and they're gonna recognize you by the way that you love one another.

Would you know what he doesn't say?

He's gonna recognize you because of the way that you're able to debate your point on social media.

He doesn't say that you're gonna be recognized because of the way that you declare God's truth and taking a stand for God.

You know what it says?

You will be known as my follower because you know how to love one another.

Yeah, that was the thing that Jesus said will set us apart from everyone else.

And so we want to spend some time talking a little bit about that.

And so the passage of scripture we're gonna refer to is one that that you've probably have heard, even if you have zero church background, um, it's it's it's 1 Corinthians chapter 13.

1 Corinthians 13 · chapter mention

It's the quintessential go-to for every wedding that I even personally officiate.

I did a wedding last week and I literally turned to 1 Corinthians 13 because Paul beautifully describes what love practically looks like.

But but but here's the thing that I think that we can that we can lose sight of when we look at this passage.

Paul was not writing this passage to be used in weddings exclusively.

Paul is writing to a church that is incredibly diverse, who is immersed in a paganistic culture.

Does that sound familiar?

And when he's writing to them, he hears about the conflict that is happening in the church with each other as well as their conflict with the culture and the world around them.

So Paul begins to say, listen, guys, like, first of all, we in the church knock it off.

We need to stop fighting.

But then, secondly, if we're ever expecting people to come to Christ, arguing with them and yelling with them and telling them how wrong they are, isn't the way to do it.

That is what influenced First Corinthians 13.

So let's read it in its proper context.

1 Corinthians 13, 1 through 8 says, If I speak human or angelic tongues, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.

If I have the gift of prophecy and understand all the mysteries and all the knowledge, and if I have all the faith so that I can move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing.

And if I give away all my possessions, and if I give over my body in order to boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient, love is kind.

Love does not envy, it's not boastful, is not arrogant, is not rude, it's not self-seeking, is not irritable, and does not keep a record of wrongs.

How many of you know that's one of the hardest ones that we tend to struggle with?

Love finds no joy in unrighteousness, but does rejoice in the truth.

It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.

You know, the scripture says that that God is love, that when we look at all the the varying laws, we look at all the things about God that we have built our mindset on and have kind of created an image of it, it's it's it's reduced down to God is love.

And sometimes it's so hard for us to wrap our minds around that because when we we hear that God is love, we we see some of the things in scripture that that seem harsh, we see some of the criticisms, we see some of the judgments, and and and and we can wrestle with that.

And so we can often have an unhealthy perspective of who God is.

But but what Paul and and the biblical writers are trying to do is they're trying to invite us into this journey of not looking at a single passage of scripture or even a narrative to summarize the activity of God.

No, let's look at the whole story and recognize that everything God did is motivated out of love, that everything he does is motivated out of love.

What we would often refer to as law were simply boundaries to keep us safe because he loves us as a as a father, as a grandfather.

There are things that I tell my children who are now adults, but for my my grandchildren, they they may not see it, but it's it's love, it's it's not control.

And and and Paul's trying to draw us into this journey of recognizing that that God believes for us, he is for us, but he also wants to ensure that his love is the thing that corrects us, that redirects us, that draws us in, but it's all done through love.

What's important for me is I recognize that each of us may have a different way that we see God, a different perspective of what God's love looks like.

And what I want to do is I want to recalibrate that today just so that we can have a healthy view of love and the love that comes from God in a way that's inspiring that also challenges us.

So today we just want to talk about what it means to demonstrate the love of God.

Let us pray.

Lord Jesus, we just thank you.

We thank you for today, and we thank you for the word that you're gonna uh allow us to hear today.

Lord, we just pray that you increase our love for you, our love for ourselves, and our love for each other.

We pray that it blesses us and transforms us in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen, amen.

You know, I think that there are certain words that are incredibly difficult to define.

We can look up words in a dictionary, and and I think that you'll ever look up a word and you're like, okay, like I get what you're saying, but I don't feel like that encapsulates the the totality of of of any given word.

And I know that there's some words that that stand out to me that are very difficult.

God is one.

It's really hard to really like you think of small children, like, mommy, who is God?

Like it's so hard to like reduce God down to a simple description.

Well, I think another word that's very difficult um to truly define is love.

Because I think we all have a different perspective and different understanding uh of love, and depending on the household we were raised in, love can look uh a lot of different ways.

And so I know for me, um, I experienced a lot of love in my household, but I I think I learned love by by listening to like R and B love music.

Just real talk.

Like that was that was the way that I that's the way that I learned what love was because I I genuinely, I genuinely didn't know what it meant from a definition standpoint.

I thought it was just this emotion, but but as I began to like listen to like some of these R and B songs, I'm like, yeah, I kind of I kind of vibe with that.

I would always think that, man, they made this song just for us.

It was written for us.

It was never it was like literally.

It was just it was just for us.

I still remember, Megan, um, when I knew that I I loved you.

And and and here's the thing, it it wasn't like this overwhelming emotion, but it was it was a you know, and I'm I'm a little bit older.

You know, don't don't let the good looks fool you.

There's a lot of mileage on this car.

My check engine lights on right now.

Um so so so, you know, I was I was born in in the 70s, so I had access to things that came before me, as well as the the music in that time and even up until now.

So I have a large library to pull from.

But I remember when I knew that I love you, it is when I had listened to the song My Girl.

Talking about there was a word, there was a phrase that was in there that that that spoke about like how like I have sunshine.

Like even when it's blistering cold outside, I got the month of May.

The month of May.

And here's the thing, here's the thing.

I remember when I was thinking about those words, it was in the middle of like a harsh winter.

We're from we're from the northeast.

It was freezing outside, and I remember letting you use my coat because you were like I was being a gentleman.

Listen, if you're not married, or maybe you are just 28 years in this, you can take notes on the notes.

I'm trying to help y'all.

I gave her my coat, walked her up to the door, got my coat back, and as I'm walking down, my mind was like, it's cold outside, but my heart was like, but there's a month of May going on in the inside.

And I'm like, I'm in love.

Like, based off of what the temptation said, this is this is what love looks like.

So that's how I knew.

Like it took these RB songs to help me to understand um what love was.

Yeah, I'll say, you know, there they have so many songs.

Like when you go to weddings, you're like, oh my gosh, this is my song.

Every song is your song.

Um, but you get there and you're like, oh my gosh, I remember this.

And I feel like love songs, they always trigger memories, you know, good memories of how we love one another, how we see one another through the filter of the love lens.

And I think that we have to have those reminders, even with Christ.

You know, what are those ways that He has loved me when we get in dark times?

Like, remember those things, those are milestones for you to reflect back on and all that, just like a love song.

I get it.

So here's the thing that I realized we don't actually have an official song for all the the weddings and all the things that we have like gone through and all the things that we've done.

Like, I'm still looking for like that song.

I I remember, watch this.

I remember when we went to, I remember when we went to Cancun and Lo and Jakari gave me a playlist.

And they were like, Man, they certainly wanted your song.

I'm like, these are possible playlists, but I still don't know what like our song is.

Like, if you could come up with a song, what would you say our song is?

I don't have one, but today, like I love um her, the song by her, the best part.

You're my best part, and I think that's say more than that.

Say more.

Say say more.

Like I just like I may not be familiar with the song.

We gotta make sure we provide context.

You're my coffee that I need in the morning.

Yeah, even though I don't like coffee.

I'm gonna say if you don't like coffee, something else.

Okay, okay, another drink.

All right, I'll I'll accept that.

We we need to actually find a song because I feel like we've we've missed the mark on that.

So if y'all have some suggestions, y'all can help us find like the song that's like our song that that even in the midst of when she's the most like when you're like mad at me, I can just play it in the car and you'll just look at them and be like, oh, I love you.

Like we don't have that.

When I'm when I'm mad at Megan, I just play DMX, y'all gonna make me lose my mom, up in here.

That's what I don't know why that song comes to mind the mother.

It's a little too hard.

Yep, a little bit.

Okay, so so let's let's pull it in.

Let's pull it in.

Okay, so here's why here's why we we say all that.

Because we all have been exposed to different things that communicate love and and and they kind of plant a seed in the way that we understand and and interpret it, whether it's a movie, um, whether it's music or some other experience that kind of helps shape the way that we think and understand love.

So this is why the the biblical authors, they they do a lot of hard work in order for us to understand that that the Bible is God's love story to us.

And he uses different narratives and different situations in helping us to understand that what we see in scripture is motivated by love and not control.

That when God is saying, Hey, don't do these things, when he tells Adam and Eve, don't listen, don't eat from that fruit, he's not holding anything back.

He just knows that if you go and do it this way, you're gonna usher in a lot of things where you feel like you got everything figured out, you're gonna define right and wrong on your own terms, and it's gonna lead you down a path of destruction.

If you can do things my way, it's motivated by love, it's truly gonna set you up for what I have that's best in your life.

So the biblical authors work really hard for us to understand that the Bible is motivated by love.

And even though there's tons of different phrases and transliterations of how you can render the word love, you have agape in Greek, but the one word that encapsulates all of it in the Bible is actually a Hebrew word of Hesed.

Hesid.

And what that word hesed is, is it's a word that literally is translated to meaning loyal love.

And what that loyal love means, it's a love that is unfailing, it's a love that is redemptive, it is a love that is generous, it is a love that is progressive, it is a love that pursues.

One word basically encapsulates all of these things, and God says, this is the word that I want you to think about when it comes to me and my relationship with you, but it's also the word that I want you to think about when you're supposed to demonstrate it to other people.

This idea of a love that is redemptive, this idea of a love that believes the best, this love that pursues, this love that that can withstand the test of time.

See, love is is such an essential aspect of the character of God.

It's it's very life-giving, and we understand how transformational it is.

Here's the main thought that I want you guys to really build deep in your minds and in your hearts.

What God is ultimately helping us to understand about love is that love is a posture of the heart, but it's also an activity in the hands.

It's a posture of the heart, but it's also activity in the hands.

It's it's something that we have to first begin to wrap our minds and our hearts around, but at some point we have to begin to demonstrate it.

It has to be seen in a practical way.

If someone tells you they love you, but you're not seeing it demonstrated in a way that's meaningful for you, it makes you question if that love is real.

What God is saying is I need you to get it in your mind and in your heart, but I also need you to make sure that you're transferring it in a way that other people can be the beneficiaries of this love.

We're gonna go into a lot of things that encapsulate love.

Um book of love and get your notes ready.

The posture of your heart refers to the attitude and disposition with which we approach others.

It involves like a compassionate, uh, selfless, caring mindset.

So just imagine um going into a room and you've been invited somewhere, and someone comes to you and they're like, Oh, I'm so glad you're here.

Like, oh, can I serve you something to drink?

You believe that, man, they generally care for me.

But you can also use that um when it pertains to love, it also shapes our thoughts, our intentions, and our motives.

So, in that very case, man, this person really cares about me, they want to serve me, they invited me here, they they're so glad that I'm here.

But on the opposite, if someone has a disliking attitude or they have uh hatred in their heart or whatever, that's gonna come out on their thoughts, their motives and attitudes.

There may be some distancing, there may be uh um someone restricting their their conversation with you, and it communicates, oh man, this person doesn't care for me, this person doesn't like me, they don't want me here.

So we always have to focus on what is the opposite of that, what is the Bible reflect, which is having compassion for others, having a selfless attitude, and having a caring mindset where we're exhibiting the true love of God wherever we go.

It also influences how we perceive and relate to others.

I think about when we went to Greece, um, we're in an environment where people don't look like us, they they have a lifestyle that's different different than us, and what a beauty it is to be in an environment where we can learn from one another and learn each other's cultures and learn how to relate to one another.

I I often think about if God didn't give us opportunities to have such a diverse church, how can we learn about different foods that are different from ours and embracing that?

We also understand that sometimes when we look at things that are different, it also means that it's kind of scary, but there's nothing to be afraid of when you have God.

God created all these things for us to be able to embrace it and embrace it with the true love of God that influences everything.

It helps us to understand one another even when we're so different.

Um I think to your point.

So when we think about this idea of this this love that that invites, this love that is welcoming, this love that is accepting, it can challenge us because there's Moments where we're trying to figure out, but but but where does challenging a person come in at?

Where where does where does conviction, where where does correction, where does these things come in?

Because I think that we have two ends of the spectrum.

We can have this this love that that lacks accountability, that's just like, man, it's all whatever, but then we have this other love that is condemning and it's very disinviting.

And so I think that we see um these two things come into practice when we look at the story of Noah and his sons.

Maybe you guys are familiar with this.

I'll give you the Cliff Notes version of it, but ultimately Noah is given this incredible task of building an ark that's gonna literally save all of mankind to preserve humanity and to move us forward.

So so Noah does it, and he spends a couple hundred years building this ship.

He he he they they're off the sail, it rains 40 days, 40 nights.

He's on the ship, all the things that he goes through, and then when he finally gets off and he's on dry land, he worships God, and then he goes off into the woods, and this brother gets drunk.

I'm talking about drunk drunk.

I'm talking about smash, like out of his mind drunk.

Like he's so drunk that he ends up naked drunk.

I don't even know what type of drinks that Noah was drinking, but this brother was done.

This is all in scripture.

Smashed a couple of graves.

Yeah, like he this this this brother, like yo, we this this this grave has been preserved.

Like he he gets he gets obliterated.

And and watch this.

His son comes in and his son sees him, and he immediately leaves there and he goes and tells the other brothers, like, yo, dad is in there laid out right now.

Yo, he is he is he is so he's he's supposed to be this man who's righteous.

He he's supposed to be this man that God says that he found favor in his sight.

Yo, he is passed out right now.

One son did that.

The other two sons, they walked into the room backwards because they didn't want to see their brother, their their dad's nakedness and vulnerability.

They covered up his shame, and and what they did is they didn't want to point out their father's flaws and his deepest, darkest moment.

And I think about like I can, I'm just inferring, but I'm thinking about being on a ship for a period of time, not being able to see people other than our family, um, being on there with stinky animals, being on there, like you can't imagine the mindset of what he had.

I can't imagine the mental uh space that he was in before getting off of that ship.

And so a lot of times we see people and we just see the last state of where they are, not knowing the story behind it.

And so this is where love comes into place because we don't know how they got there, but they're here.

Our job is to our job is to love despite what we see on the outside, and that can be very difficult.

I'm just telling you in the human flesh, you know, it's hard to love somebody who's rude and disrespectful to us and all of those things, but God is challenging challenging us to love, and we never know what God will do on the outside of that when we choose to do differently of giving back what we've received and uh replacing that with love.

Absolutely.

That's what's so well said.

I think that's the thing.

And and I want us to notice in this narrative with Noah and his sons that they covered him.

Here's what covering means when love inspires us to cover for one another, that means to extend grace, that means to extend forgiveness, that means to be mindful, to bear one another's burden, similar to what Megan says, I don't know the story in which you've gone through that has led you to this point of brokenness, that is, that you have a relationship with God, that that has led you to this moment.

So instead of me coming in and pointing it out and talking about how much you've how much you've dropped the ball, I'm gonna come in and cover you by extending grace and love.

But love is not covering up.

There's a difference between covering and covering up.

Covering up means that we never address it.

You were there's no accountability and there's no growth opportunities.

Love will allow someone to come in, acknowledge the shortcomings, cover you, show grace, show love, but also have conversations that are gonna help us grow.

Covering up means ignoring it, not addressing it, and not allowing us to come to a place where there can actually be conviction and growth that comes as a result of it.

We have a responsibility to acknowledge the shortcomings of one another, extend grace and love, have conversations that can help us to grow, but not to cover up, but certainly not to be people that bring in condemnation.

This is in essence what what Paul is trying to address to the church in Corinth.

They're going through so much drama, they're going through so much pain, they're going through so much suffering, and and because of their diversity, not only within their body, there's there's Jewish people that have been converted.

There are Greeks who are profound in philosophy who are there who have been converted, and they're wondering what their history have to do with their faith as they move forward.

You have people who are steeped in in paganism, and you have all these people at the church at the same time, and they're all trying to figure out how can they coexist with their differences, but then they also are in the middle of a culture war.

They're in the middle of Corinth, which was a major trading port where you have so many different people from different backgrounds.

And so Paul is writing them a letter saying, like, here's the thing, guys, like it doesn't matter how much knowledge you have, but if you are not inviting people in through love, you're not winning a single soul to Christ.

If you are arguing with people, if you're condemning people, if you're telling them why they're wrong, if you're being like Noah's son who's pointing everything out, how are you inviting people into the love of God?

What scripture says it is the goodness of God that leads us to repentance.

Not your ability to argue with someone on social media, not your ability to stand on the other side of the street and yell at somebody and tell them why they're wrong and why they're going to hell.

You never see Jesus do that, and you certainly don't see Paul talking about that.

What you see is him saying that we have to be people that demonstrate love first.

See, a lot of times I think that Paul gets a bad rap.

And here's what I mean by that.

We all know that the Bible can be weaponized in a way that we can use it to bring condemnation, to bring ridicule, to bring oppression, and we can use it to justify virtually anything.

I I've been around long enough that I've that I've seen it all.

And so what I've seen with the Apostle Paul is that people that are looking to control or oppress or suppress other people, they will often lean on the writings of Paul but out of context.

It's interesting how we can rely so heavily on a few of Paul's words and completely ignore the life of Christ.

Let me say that one more time.

We can rely on the words of Paul out of context and completely ignore the life of Christ.

Let me be more specific.

We see the way that Jesus treated women.

We see the way that Jesus treated the marginalized, we see the way that Jesus interacted with those who were oppressed and the least of these in society.

But then people will look at a passage that Paul writes and say, This is how you're supposed to treat women in the church.

Completely ignoring the life and not even looking at the context.

So let me give you some context of what we'll see here in the book of Corinth.

So in the church of Corinth, as I explained, it was incredibly diverse, and they were dealing with a lot of people who were being converted, and of that conversion were temple prostitutes.

There were some males, but there were mostly women who were once prostitutes that are now followers of Christ.

What the prostitutes would look like is they would shave their heads and they would have jewelry on and certain markings that let people know that they were open for business.

They would consider tattoos.

Yeah.

So tattoos, all these things that were kind of like setting off, like, hey, I'm available.

But now they've had uh, they've been invited in, they're now in love with Jesus, and they're trying to figure out what it means to be a follower of Christ, but when they're coming into the community, it's causing a lot of confusion and chaos because people are looking, they're staring at them, and all these things.

So Paul says, Let me render a ruling for you guys, because this is causing confusion and division amongst this community.

He then says, How about all the women here have their heads covered?

How about all the women there dress modestly?

What people will do is then take that out of context and say, This is why women need to have their head covers, this is why women need to do these things, and completely miss the context.

Paul was not trying to control, he was concerned about people feeling shameful and condemned, so he wanted to create a standard where they all felt equal.

When's the last time you heard that?

Paul was not motivated by control, he was inspired by love.

What if the church began to do something similar with our heart posture?

And instead of us being people that that wants to point out where people are falling short, that we began to find ways to ensure that we're not going to be in an environment that is going to lead people into feeling shame and condemnation.

That's the church that we are.

Yeah, I love our church because we're we're very diverse, but we also make sure that all are welcome, like all are welcome from all walks of life.

I'm so thankful that even once or twice a month we have a group that comes in here every month that struggles with drug abuse and they don't, or drug abuse or some type of a substance abuse.

When they come in, they don't feel any different when they come in here.

They love coming to our church because guess what?

We welcome them.

We don't look at them from their situation.

We're going to encourage them and we're going to stand by them.

That's the church we are.

We want to make sure this is a safe place for people, but this is also a place of conviction.

And conviction draws us closer to God instead of condemnation that draws us away from God.

Absolutely.

And I think that we have an opportunity as a community in how we engage and respond at and put it into action.

You know, demonstrating the love of God is taking our theology and putting flesh and blood on it, doing something practical with it.

Jesus was was was teaching his his community, and someone had come to him and asked him, Man, who's who's your neighbor?

Who's your neighbor?

Like who would they ultimately were asking Jesus, Jesus, can you give us boundaries around who we're supposed to love and who we're not supposed to love?

Can you just tell me, okay, love these people but hate these people, accept these people but reject these people?

They came to Jesus with this question in an effort to try to draw boundaries around who they should be nice to and who they shouldn't.

So so Jesus shares a controversial parable about the good Samaritan.

Now, we, because our culture is completely different, we're in the West, but we may not understand the weight of Jesus literally using a Samaritan as a metaphor of what does it mean to be kind to other people.

Samaritans were considered half-breeds.

They were half Jewish, but they were also half paganistic, and so they were considered to be enemies of God.

They were told to stay away from them.

The Samaritans were considered to be some of the worst people in that culture.

So Jesus then uses this example.

He gets robbed, he gets beaten, he's left half dead.

And then the religious people see him and they completely avoid him.

Religion walks by him, like, oh man, we don't have anything to do with that.

Who knows what he did to put himself in that position?

He needs to pull himself up by the bootstraps, all the things that we say to justify being completely indifferent to what the people are going through.

But I digress.

He he Jesus says the religious people did that.

But then he says, But then there was a man who was a Samaritan.

The one who should have been conditioned to avoid this man, he's the one who actually went and chose to show kindness.

He picked him up, he cleaned him up, he took him to a hospital, and he he paid his bill, he made sure that the man was taken care of.

Jesus says, This is what love in the kingdom of God looks like.

He says, Who do you think my neighbor is?

See, I I remember this story where there was a profound professor who shared this, who shared this very text.

He's sitting in a room full of people who are working on their PhDs and they're and they were talking about the love of God.

So he's sitting in a room similar to this, and he spends three hours talking to them about what does it practically look like to put the love of God into action in all of our lives.

He's going into Hebrew and Greek and culture, and how do we practically tangibly do this?

They walk away feeling inspired.

So he says, Okay, guys, like I'm glad you guys are inspired.

There's going to be a test on this.

So just study up and get ready, and we'll we'll talk about when it is.

One by one, the students begin to leave the lecture, and as they're leaving, um, right outside the lecture hall, there's a homeless man.

The man is sitting there, he he hasn't uh a stench on him.

You can clearly see that he's in an environment that he probably shouldn't be in.

And so as they're walking by him, one by one, they ignore him.

They look at him, he asked anybody if they have money, no.

People were just walking by, some won't even give him eye contact, others are like, What are you doing here?

And then somebody actually went and got security and said, like, hey, man, there's a guy in here that's not supposed to be here.

Like, why is he even here?

They make it to their next lecture, and then that professor that they just heard from shows up and he stands in front of them and says, like, hey guys, remember when I said there was going to be a test on the Good Samaritan?

They were like, Yeah.

He said, All of you have just failed it.

I was not interested in having you answer the test on a piece of paper.

I wanted to see you actually put it into practice.

That man was an actor that I strategically placed there after I talked to you for three hours about what it looks like to demonstrate the love of God, and not a single one of you actually put it into practice and you have failed this assignment.

I can't help but to wonder after we leave church services, after we highlight scriptures in the Bible, after we sing songs about the love of God, that if there's not certain situations and certain environments that are put into our lives, that if God's like this is a test, how are you going to respond to it?

Are we responding with showing people dignity, showing them love, letting them know that that God is for them, or are we not even giving them eye contact?

Are we walking right by them?

Are we ignoring them?

What what God is challenging and compelling us to be is to be people who actually puts the Bible into practice in our daily lives.

It's a challenge for us and it's and it's difficult for us.

But but what God is ultimately telling us is He never asked us to enlist in a culture war and become martyrs of something that He didn't even tell us to do.

Let let me speak very practically and very candidly to free some of us up.

It is not the grocery store, the banks, the schools, or whatever store you shop at's responsibility to demonstrate the love of God, it's our job.

Can we as followers of Christ stop being surprised when people who don't know God act like it?

I'm actually surprised when we as followers of God are surprised that people who aren't followers of God act like it.

Of course they're not.

So our responsibility in those moments is either to be people who build a bridge to truth through love or we speak condemnation and we tear down the bridges and people never have an encounter with the living God.

Yeah, and so the question is where do we find the strength and the ability to demonstrate this love?

Because it's crucial to recognize that love originates from God Himself.

First John 4 and 7 reminds us, beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God, and whoever loves has been born of God and knows God.

It is through this connection that his love flows through us to touch the lives of others.

I am truly convinced, and I'm gonna stand up because we're gonna we're gonna wrap up in just a moment, but but I'm truly convinced that that many of us struggle to demonstrate the love of God because we haven't adequately received it.

I remember many years ago in in ministry having a gentleman come up to me and and ask me, Why don't we preach harder against sin?

And I said, Well, well, we do.

We we actually we do.

We we preach about all these things.

There's no topic that's that we don't do.

He's like, Yeah, but I grew up in a church environment where we talked about sin all the time.

We we talked about these things, and I said, Well, it sounds like that's more behavioral modification than it is preaching the gospel.

And I said, So, so let me let me understand when when do we see Jesus spending all of his energy about tearing people down?

Just show me where he consistently does it, or or or walk me through the demonstration of his life.

And he's like, Well, that's what raised me.

And and let me tell you what I told him.

I said, just because you survived that doesn't mean others have to endure it.

Just because that was the way that you were spiritually raised doesn't mean that that's God's way, and that's the best way for us to demonstrate the gospel.

What I want us to understand about this journey that we're on, that when we're talking about demonstrating the love of God, we we look to Jesus.

What scripture says is that God so loves that he gave.

He invited us into a relationship.

We love him because he first loves us, that we consistently see God making the first step and inviting us into a relationship that then transforms our lives.

So do we stand on truth?

Absolutely, but I want y'all to hear me.

I stand on truth, but I don't stand against people.

Let me say that one more time.

We stand on truth, but we don't stand against people.

We believe what God's word says about it, but I also believe what God's word says about you, and those two things can coexist.

What we want to make sure of is that we can be just like what Paul says.

When you read the conclusion of chapter 13, I want you to look at the words of Paul.

He says this he says, There are some great things out there: faith, hope, and love.

But the greatest of these things is love.

Here's what that means.

Paul, in my opinion, is probably one of the most brilliant thinkers in mankind, aside from Christ, of course.

He was well versed in Greek philosophy, he was well versed in Roman culture, and he was a Jewish man that literally had the Old Testament memorized.

But when he said the greatest thing in the world, it had nothing to do with his mind and had everything to do with his heart.

You can have all the faith in the world, but if you are not loving people, you don't have anything.

You can have all the truth in the world, but if you're not speaking it out of love, he says that it's like like clashing symbols, you've missed the mark.

What I want us to be is people that can demonstrate the love of God, that are inviting people into the presence of God.

And as Adday has this encounter that even in spite of their shortcomings and their flaws, they can hear that God loves you and that he's for you.

And then through that love, they begin to experience the conviction of the Holy Spirit where God begins to reveal the areas of their lives where they're off track, and then they show up at church, and then they get involved in the group and they begin to serve, and God is continuing to work on them, and that is what we call the sanctification process.

And as they're on this journey, they begin stronger and stronger, and things that they used to be drawn to, they're no longer drawn to, and it's a journey that we're all on.

How is it that we forgot our own sanctification process and we want to judge somebody who hasn't even begun theirs?

We're going to be a church that understands that we're all on a journey of becoming more and more like Jesus.

And if we can't be a safe place for people to come to hear the truth of God's word, but more importantly, see the demonstration of God's love, how are we ever going to see a world that's transformed for Jesus?

So I want us to take a moment to just pray about how we can put this into practice even today.

See, when we gather as a church, we demonstrate the love of God by having a servant's heart, a servant's posture.

When we serve one another, that's how we practically demonstrate the love of God in our church.

When we leave here today, you'll see that there's opportunities to sign up for serve day and other opportunities to serve in his community.

We don't do that because we quote unquote feel like it.

We do it because Jesus says, I didn't come to be served, but I came to serve.

And I want that to be the posture of your heart as well.

We have opportunities to demonstrate the love of God through our activity of our hands.

But then also, we know that we are able to demonstrate the love of God through our generosity.

What Jesus, what God says to Abraham, is that I'm going to bless you so that you can be a blessing to others.

That everything I've entrusted into your hands is so that you can be a blessing to other people, that your finances are conduit to demonstrate my love to other people.

So as I mentioned earlier, we're saving our giving moment to this time right now.

And if you're part of our church services on a regular basis, we typically take a moment, 45 seconds, where we pause, we reflect, we celebrate the resources that God has given us, and then we willingly give, knowing that we're partnering with the vision that God has given us.

So I want to just pause for a moment and ask us just to pray.

Pray one about what does God want you to do with your hands?

Where does he want you to serve?

What does he want you to get involved in?

What community does he want you to get connected to?

But then, secondly, what is it that God wants you to give?

Maybe it's beginning to tithe, maybe it's offering, maybe it's it's helping with backpacks.

But when God puts something on your heart, he also wants you to do something with your hands.

So let's take a moment, let's pause, let's reflect, and then we're gonna come up and pray and we'll dismiss.

Thanks again for listening.

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