What Do I Do now?

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This morning we're kicking off a brand new series called Now What?

I think that's maybe how we collectively feel.

It's like, now what?

Okay, we're over halfway.

Can you even believe it?

We're over halfway through 2020, and it's just been a crazy year.

I just want to say some words that help put some of the uh year in context.

So think about this in our year, Kobe, and Kobe Bryant dying at the very beginning.

Doesn't that feel like that was years ago?

And then we had COVID and a global pandemic, George Floyd, and the racial justice movement that has uh erupted across our nation.

And then we look at ahead and going, now what?

And we have a presidential election coming up.

2020 has been one of those years that is unlike any other that we, or at least I have ever experienced.

And in these ever-changing, uncertain times, we need a spiritual roadmap to guide us.

And and we're diving into the book of James.

We're actually concluding at chapters four and five.

And what this is gonna give us is a roadmap for what's coming up.

Like, how do we engage?

Now what do we do?

See, I think there's two really pressing questions that all of us are asking right now.

This whole now what thing is like first question is like, what is going to happen now?

Or what's gonna happen next?

You know, I don't know if you're this way, but you're maybe kind of like holding your breath, like, okay, now what?

What's gonna happen now?

And what's gonna happen now with the world?

What's gonna happen now with the economy?

What's gonna happen now with our country?

What's gonna happen now with uh the pandemic and social justice?

What's gonna happen now with my job?

What's gonna happen now with my marriage?

What's gonna happen now with my my schooling?

As maybe I know have friends whose kids are starting their first year of college and some are starting online.

What's gonna happen now?

And we don't have an answer to that.

We don't know that question.

And we're looking to that question often to answer this next question.

What do I do now?

What do I do now?

What do I do now that the world has been flipped completely upside down?

When my world has been flipped completely upside down?

What do I do now that that we have a new and fresh awareness of the injustices that are going on in our country?

What do I do now when my marriage is in crisis?

When I lost my job, when when actually someone I love dearly, or maybe it's you, your health is just failing, or you're sick.

What do we do now?

And to answer this question well, we actually, I believe, need a spiritual recalibration.

If you think about a compass, a compass is what directs us.

Like you may not know exactly all what's along the path, but if you have, if you know where north is, you know the direction you're headed.

And in an emotionally disorienting time where we're literally turned upside down, chances are the compass of our life has been knocked askew.

And so then we're not able to make decisions that are gonna lead us in the way we want to go or the way we need to go.

Like the compasses of our soul need to be recalibrated so that we are able to take steps in this turbulent, ever-changing times that are gonna help us to follow in the ways of Jesus.

What do we do now?

Well, the first thing is for you and me to engage in a spiritual recalibration.

And this is what James is actually uh addressing with the followers of Jesus who've gone through their own emotionally disorienting time, they've been persecuted, their lives have been turned upside down, and there's they're on, they're fried.

Maybe you're that way.

You're fried, like your whole world is just like like I'm at a 10 all the time.

I respond too intensely, or I'm I'm I'm at an all-time low and I'm I'm negative and I'm Nelly.

Negative and Nelly, negative Nelly, you know what I mean.

Uh, and he here James is gonna go and he's gonna walk us through as a good pastor the spiritual recalibration so that when we say or when we speak or when we act, we can be confident that we're actually walking in the ways of Jesus and it's leading us in the ways that we are to go and the person we long to become.

And the first thing he says for a spiritual recalibration is this he says, if we're gonna engage in this, we have to first examine our motives.

Examine our motives.

Listen to what he says.

What causes fights and quarrels among you?

And you might answer, um, my spouse causes the fights and quarrels among us, or my friends, or those idiots on social media that keep responding to my thing or whatever.

What causes fights and quarrels among us?

And you're always looking, or at least maybe I am, it's that person over there.

And notice what he says.

He says, Don't they come from what is uh your desires, that battle within you.

He's saying there's a war within you.

We we say things like this, if only they would change.

If only, you know, uh they would kind of see things from my perspective, they're the problem.

And what James is saying is actually we got to look inside first.

We have to examine inside.

He says there is a battle, there's a war going on in us.

He says, You desire, there's there's, but you do not have, so you kill.

And it clearly he's using hyperbole here, but but it leads to things that are cutting and and and hurting one another.

He says you covet, but and you cannot have, and you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and you fight and you argue.

Notice this, and this is one of those powerful prayer verses in the Bible.

You do not have because you do not ask God.

There's just some things we don't have because we just simply aren't praying.

Important for us in this season to lead with prayer.

And then he goes on, and he says, When you ask, you do not receive because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

First area for us to recalibrate spiritually to know that the internal compass of our soul is pointing in the direction of the person that God has intended us to become, is to examine our motives.

See, we often assume the worst of other people's emotives, and we rarely take a deep dive of our own emotives.

In fact, it's easy.

It's easy to point out the wrong of other people's emotives, and you defend your point of view, and this is what we do all the time, or maybe said another way, we're very quick to defend our point or perspective, yet slow to examine our motives.

You know, this is one of those areas for you and for me that we before we speak, before we act, before we respond, we have to look in and go, what's behind that response?

What's behind that emotion?

What's behind those words?

And I don't know about you, but this practice during COVID and this emotionally disorient time has been so powerful.

And I haven't done it perfectly, but what I found is as I became so close to reacting or addressing something in anger or responding over here, what I realized is the motives behind it weren't as pure as I thought they were.

In fact, it was selfish, it was self-centered, it was self-preservation.

A lot of times it came back to my own heart of insecurity.

And we have to stop and we have to ask, what is behind my response?

Psalm 139, 23 says, Search me, oh God, and know my heart.

Test me and know my anxious thoughts.

Would you do that?

Would you begin to engage in spiritual recalibration of the soul by saying, God, would you search me and show me anything in me that's not of you?

Well, he says, first, examine your motives, and then secondly, identify your allegiance.

You have to identify your allegiance.

Who are you living for?

Notice what he says, you adulterous people.

Wow, that's strong words.

He's saying you're having a spiritual affair.

Okay.

You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world means enity against God?

Like you can't be friends with the world and enemies of God.

Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.

Well, first, let's talk about what friendship with the world is.

Because you're like, well, what does that even mean?

John in his letter, 1 John, unpacks it for us.

And actually, if you can flip over there, 1 John 2, uh, verses uh, let's say, start at 15.

He says, Do not love the world or anything in it.

If anyone loves the world, love for the father is not in them.

For everything in the world, and we're talking about an ideology, we're talking about a way of life.

He says, for everything in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life comes not from the Father, but from the world.

What he's saying is when you fall into the ideology that pleasure is the most important thing to live for, when you fall into the ideology that your possessions or your position is what you're living for, your prestige or your power.

And these are the ways that the world says you're a somebody.

When you make those your ultimate thing, you have made friendship with the world, and it's so subtle, and we get swept up into it, especially in Silicon Valley.

And some have have had that come crumbling down during this COVID season.

And what James is saying here is you got to identify your allegiance.

Notice what how he finishes this.

Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us?

Now, let me unpack this picture a little bit because we're missing this.

And for some, you're like, well, this is kind of weird.

Throughout the Old Testament and into the New Testament, the picture of relationship that God has with his people is the idea of marriage.

It's this oneness, this intimacy.

That's why he says, you adulterous people and this jealousy.

Now, let's just imagine, I'll use myself, the hypothetical, I've got to make sure it's hypothetical.

You really get this, so I probably shouldn't have used myself for this.

But let's just say I was on a date with my wife.

And on this date, I begin to flirt with the latress.

Again, I probably shouldn't have used myself on this one.

I get it.

We're sitting there, and I begin to talk to her and hang out with her, and I leave her at the table.

That's not good, right?

This is the picture that James is painting.

You're married.

You're married to God.

You've made a commitment, you have an intimate, loving relationship, and yet you're flirting with things, and it's flaunting in the face of God.

That's why he's so strong here.

That's why he says that it creates enmity.

Like you can't have it both ways.

You can't be married and then playing, you know, the game out there.

It is one of these pictures that we have to get because I think sometimes we misunderstand and we say things that sound so good, uh, but aren't really that helpful.

Like I want God to be my number one.

Well, I I got news for you.

God doesn't want to be your number one, He wants to be the only one.

So imagine if I went to my wife and said, Jenny, I just want to let you know I really want you to be my number one wife.

It's not a compliment, is it?

And yet then that's what we do.

And he says, No, no, no.

You have to identify your allegiance.

Okay, God, you have saved me, you have loved me, you are the one who died on the cross for me.

And when I become a follower of Jesus, I say, your ways, I'm following you.

You are my God.

It's it's how Joshua, as he ended his time as the leader, and he's looking out across and speaking to the people, and you know, what's his kind of final discourse, and he says, Choose this day who you will serve.

And he goes on, but as for me and my household, we will serve the Lord.

Question Where's your allegiance?

Spiritual recalibration.

It we have to ask that question because it's subtle, and there's things that pull on us, and friendship with the world and distractions that pull on us, and whether it's you know, possessions and having just the right car or house, and there's nothing wrong with those things, but when they're ultimate things or pleasure, power, or your position, he says, identify your allegiance, and then he goes on.

And if you have chosen to serve the Lord, then this is the natural response out of that.

Examine your motives, identify your allegiance, and then submit your will.

Submit your will.

Notice what he says.

But even when we are flirting with the world, he says, but he gives us more grace.

Isn't that good news?

He's a God of grace, he's a God of grace, he is a God of grace.

You can keep coming to him.

He loves you, he longs for you, he longs to have you back.

That is why the scripture says, and then he says, God opposes the proud.

He's against those who who who boast about themselves, who have themselves at the center of their lives, but he shows favor or gives grace to the humble.

He gives grace to those who aren't just like thinking less of themselves.

That's not humility, it's thinking of themselves less.

It's when your eyes are fixed on Jesus.

He says then this, and he's going to give us 10 aorist imperatives.

I mean, it's just like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

And these imperatives are aorist, meaning they demand immediate action.

This isn't like, hey, this is a nice idea or you should do this.

This is a call for us.

Hey, this is something you need to do now, immediately.

He says, Submit yourselves then to God.

Resist the devil and he'll flee from you.

Come near to God and he'll come near to you.

Resist.

Submit, come near.

Like, like if we're gonna submit your our will to God, first we have to say, okay, I'm choosing to submit my will and recognize I've submitted my will to something else.

It might be your will submitted to a political party.

You know, Democrat or Republican.

Your will submitted to maybe your comfort, maybe your work, maybe your identity and what you do or your family.

And he says, no, no, submit yourselves, bring or arrange your life under is what submission means.

That leads to obedience, and then resist.

I love this.

There is an enemy that's in opposition to you.

And the minute you begin to take this step, you're going to experience opposition.

He says, resist the devil, promise he'll flee.

You have power.

No need to be afraid.

Resist him, he's out of there.

And great news, come near, draw near.

As you resist him, as you go step near to God, God will meet you and he'll come near to you.

Then it goes on wash your hands, you sinners.

Purify your hearts, you double-minded, those that are trying to live, you know, in both the world and with God.

Grieve, mourn, well, change your laughter to mourning and your joy to regloom.

Now he's not just talking about feeling bad.

And this is where we confuse regret and repentance.

He's talking about repentance here.

Where regret is really you feel bad because you got caught.

I'm bummed, you know, but I'm really more bummed that I got caught.

And if I didn't get caught, I'd still be doing it.

Repentance, repentance is an internal change of heart and mind that results in an external change of life.

In fact, the way the apostle Paul would say it in 2 Corinthians 7, he says, godly sorrow brings repentance that leads to salvation and leaves no regret.

But worldly sorrow only brings death.

See, repentance starts with a mourning, a lamenting.

We're learning how to do this as a country and as a church when it comes to the social and racial injustices and repenting and grieving and mourning and sitting with it.

Not because there's a getting caught, but because we see that it's wrong and it breaks the heart of God.

And we want we want to be different and we want God to meet us there.

He says, humble yourselves before the Lord and He will lift you.

Spiritual recalibration.

What's behind what I'm doing?

Identify your allegiance.

Who are you living for?

And then submit your will.

Not my will, but your will be done.

Where is your will currently submitted to?

And would you begin to go, God, you got me.

Man, this is a great time, by the way.

This is one of the most important times.

You'll never get a time like this back in your life where you'll have this type of space and this type of distractions taken away so that you can actually return to God and truly submit your will to him.

Would you lean in?

Don't waste this season.

And then finally, he says, He says, after submitting your will, know your job.

Christians, we need to hear this.

Know your job.

Notice what he says.

Brothers and sisters, do not slander one another.

In fact, the way it's constructed in the Greek is stop slandering, stop speaking against.

Like the the followers of Jesus here had fallen into a habit of speaking negatively and speaking against each other.

And he's specifically talking about those within the community of Christ.

But we can expand it out there.

But he's like, stop being critical, stop being a fault finder, stop speaking negatively and cutting someone down.

Critics and fault finders jump quickly to every little misstep they see in others.

And he's saying, stop, stop it.

And then no why?

He says, anyone who speaks against a brother or a sister or judges them speaks against the law that it judges.

So now you're speaking against the law.

You're placing yourself in a position of authority.

He says, when you judge the law, you're not keeping it.

And some of us feel justified, right?

I'm holding the law, I'm holding them to the fire.

He says, you're not keeping it, but you're sitting in judgment on it.

As if you're the creator and maker of it.

Then he goes, there is only one lawgiver and judge.

That's his job, not your job.

The one who is able to save and destroy.

No, no, this is but you.

But you.

Who are you to judge your neighbor?

No.

Your job.

Question.

Am I a critic?

Or am I a contributor?

Question.

Am I a fault finder?

Or am I a grace giver?

See, we gotta know our job.

You know, early on in my marriage, um I thought part of my job was to be a coach to my wife.

By the way, anyone who's newly married, like Taylor, right here, um, I just gotta give you a little marriage advice right here.

Your job is not to be the coach of your spouse.

It'll go really Really badly.

Trust me on that one.

I've failed.

And my personality and my role on staff here is to be a coach.

That's kind of my thing.

I love coaching kids, you know, and doing this.

But my role, my job with my wife is not to be a coach, it's to be an encourager.

Not to be a coach, it's to be a cheerleader.

She has the spirit of God to bring things in her life, and I can cooperate and walk alongside there.

But my role and my job is not to be that coach and trying to help, it's to be a cheerleader.

It's interesting, my two boys and we've been doing um different athletic things and training over this COVID season together.

And my older son, and it comes from such a heart to help his younger brother get better, but he goes into coach mode.

And coach mode corrects, right?

We and we tend to correct.

Oh, we need to correct this, oh, we need to correct that.

And you can just see his younger brother who looks up to his older brother, just kind of like get frustrated or sad.

And and I and so I tell Ryder, I'm like, Ryder, your job is to be an encourager, not a corrector.

Your job is to be an encourager, not a coach.

And so as we're doing these workouts, like right now, we're doing P90X together.

Uh, hopefully you'll see some difference in a few weeks or so.

But we're doing these P, you know, my 10-year-old, 13-year-old doing this, and Ryder's starting to speak, and I'm like, know your job.

It's just one of those phrases we have, and it's a reminder of me, know your job.

My job is not to be a coach, be an encourager.

I was first introduced to the power of encouragement uh from the Comers.

And if you know Phil and Diane Comer, you know they are the most encouraging people on the planet.

And what I saw with them and learned through their parenting thing is they've put encouragement in the toolbox of discipline.

Said it's one of the more powerful tools to discipline your kids.

I I mean, I've never thought about it that way.

And yet, even as I watch my boys, and when Ryder encourages his little brother, whoa.

I mean, you can just see that boy's confidence.

He wants to do it right.

Bam! I mean, his whole world expands.

And when I try to coach Jenny on anything, which I'll stop, by the way, you you can see it just doesn't add to it, but it takes away.

But when I encourage, whoa.

See, friends, I think because we've been emotionally disoriented and we're not sure how to navigate the times ahead.

I think as a church, we've become critics when we're supposed to be encouragers.

We've become fault finders when we're supposed to be grace givers.

We gotta know our job.

We gotta be encouraging one another.

That's what the author of Hebrews would say.

Encourage one another.

Don't mess gathering together, encourage one another as long as it's called today.

That we would be encouragers of one another.

Friends, what do we do now?

First, we need a spiritual recalibration so that the compass of our soul is pointing true north, so that we know the next steps we're taking.

We may not know what's in the future, we just know that we're taking the right next steps because we're we're in alignment with God.

We got to examine our motives, we got to identify our allegiance, submit our will, and then know our job.

We are encouragers, not critics.

Now, as we close, I want to speak back to that, like, okay, now what moment.

Now what?

Where are we at?

Now what?

And I was reminded as I was scanning Instagram the other day, a friend of mine had this post, and it was a quote from Lord of the Rings.

So I get it.

I'm kind of nerdy and geeky.

I loved it.

I love Lord of the Rings, read them all.

And um, and as I I saw it, it was so uh convicting and encouraging to me.

And it's in the moment, if you've seen the movie or read the book when they're in the Mount Moriah or the minds of Moriah, and it's a particularly dark, hard season.

And Frodo says to Gandalf, Gandalf's the wizard, you know, the wise old wizard.

And go to Frodo says this.

I wish none of this had happened.

And I think that's when we're looking at 2020 and we see so much things, and certainly not all of it, we'd say that, but I think we'd say, Man, I wish none of this had happened.

This isn't the way we started out 2020.

This isn't the dreams and the way we thought this decade was going to begin.

And I love Gandalf's response.

And he says, so do all who live to see such times.

He doesn't rebuke them for that.

And if that's where you're at, I wish none of this happened, not rebuking you for that.

But that's not for them to decide.

All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.

Now what?

You have to decide what to do with the time that is given you.

And in this moment, would you take the steps forward this morning to do a spiritual recalibration?

And it begins just with asking the Spirit of God to search your heart.

And as you pray that honest prayer, and I'm gonna lead you in it, he will speak to you and show things and reveal areas.

And then as you submit your will to him, you'll notice that your words will be encouraging and life-giving.

Lord, I pray for my friends, I pray for us as a church right now in this moment that this would be the beginning for us to be reoriented in a disorienting world, reoriented back to your will and your ways, our vision on you.

And so, God, we collectively pray together in this moment.

Search us, oh God.

Search us.

See if there's anything in us that is not of you, examine our motives, reveal it.

We want to know.

Align our heart with your heart.

Align our vision with your vision, that our lives and our words might be healing, encouraging, grace giving to a hurting and broken world.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.