I Peter 5:1-5 "Rejoicing and Weeping in Community"

You are listening to a message from Southwood Presbyterian Church in Huntsville, Alabama.

Our passion is to experience and express grace. Join us.

Open your Bibles, if you will, or if you don't have one, in one form or another.

Yes, you may pull out your phones and turn them on, if there's a Bible on there.

Romans chapter 12.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

You'll see there, if you don't have a Bible, there should be one in the pew pockets in front of you.

And you can turn to page 948.

We're going to be looking at just a couple of verses.

I'm going to read from Romans 12, verses 9 through 10, and then verse 15, which will be the primary focus of our time together.

Romans 12:9–10

Let love be genuine.

Abhor what is evil.

Hold fast to what is good.

Love one another with brotherly affection.

And then verse 15.

Rejoice with those who rejoice.

And weep with those who weep.

Let's pray together as we enter into the study of God's word.

Father, would you meet us and speak to us through your word.

Speak into our hearts so that we might see the glory of your face.

And we might be filled with the hope of your coming.

Come and meet us in that place where we are today.

And make yourself known.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

We're in this series through the summer of one another.

Talking about gospel community.

And as Will began last week, the core of all of this is that we love one another.

Father, this is the one primary quality that distinguishes us from everybody else in the world.

It's not the crosses we wear around our necks.

It's not the bumper stickers on our car.

It's not the causes that we are so passionate about.

It is the way we love one another.

That's how the world will know that Jesus is in our midst.

And so we see here, this text, what Paul is doing in Romans, is unpacking that.

We have to see it in context, though.

What Paul has done from chapter 1 all the way through chapter 11 is to lay out for us this glorious picture of what Christ has done.

All that he has done for us.

Who we are in him.

And the hope we have in Christ.

And then you get to chapter 12 and there's this word, therefore.

Which calls our attention back to all that's just been said.

And then we are called there to present our bodies as living sacrifices.

That we, I mean, simply put, we are to, in response to all that Jesus is, lay down our lives.

Not just for God himself, but to lay our lives down for one another.

A few verses pass.

In verse 5 he says, we are members of one another.

We do not live in just proximity with other individuals.

We are not to live in isolation.

God has made us into a body, a family that is intricately, deeply united to one another.

That's who we are.

And that is why love, as he says here in verses 9 and 10, is key.

It is primary.

We cannot minimize it.

We cannot do without it.

Love is everything in gospel community.

But what does that love look like?

And from verse 9 down through really the end of the chapter, Paul is describing for us.

He's unpacking this whole concept of what it means to love one another.

And in the midst of that unpacking, we have this verse.

It says, to rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep.

And it's very easy for us as we read through Paul.

We could read through that and say, oh, okay, yeah, understand it.

Over and done.

We just kind of blow past it.

But in this short little verse, Paul is saying a lot.

And I want us to unpack that together this morning.

The first thing he's telling us here in this verse is he's telling us a lot about what life is.

And life is a mixed bag.

There is rejoicing.

There's weeping.

Life has its share, a wonderful share of joys and blessings and pleasures.

Ecclesiastes chapter 9 verse 7 says,

Ecclesiastes 9:7

Go, eat your bread with joy and drink your wine with a merry heart.

For God has already approved what you do.

When we enjoy the pleasures of this life, God approves.

In fact, more than that, he's the one that has poured them out for us.

And what Paul's doing, he's combating an error here that was very common then.

But I also think it's very present among us that there's something less.

There's something inferior about what is material, what is physical, what we experience in this life.

There's something that we're not supposed to enjoy it too much.

That's just not spiritual.

Well, yes, what we experience is broken and corrupt.

It does not have the power to satisfy us.

And it can be abused.

We should not put our hopes there.

But they are good.

All things in God's creation are good because he declared them to be good.

And so we can rejoice in these good things.

One of my great pleasures is just sitting out on my patio with my bride of 37 years and enjoying an evening.

I love the smell of burning fat.

I love perfectly steeped tea.

Or fresh bread out of the oven.

You kind of get a theme here.

A lot of my pleasures are things that I intake.

I can listen to harmonies and music that when they're perfectly together, it brings tears to my eyes.

In all of these things, we are to see them as gifts of God.

To give thanks for them.

To enjoy them.

Don't minimize them.

Enjoy them.

Because God is showing his goodness to us.

That's one side.

There's another side.

Life is hard.

There is this erroneous, equally erroneous view.

That these pleasures are the norm.

This is the way life should be.

And when it's not, we get frustrated.

We can be shaken.

We might even get angry.

As much pleasure as we can experience in this life, this life, this world, and all that is in it is deeply broken.

The pleasures of God that's not what is normal.

We live in a world of cancer.

Of divorce.

Of little boys dying.

It's a world that leaves us empty.

And in many ways, it fights against us.

I feel like I'm constantly at war with my body and my yard.

I can make my yard look really good.

For a couple minutes.

And then it says to me, wait to see what's coming.

Because of sin, the world is cursed.

Every last millimeter of it.

Nothing is escaped.

It is not the way it should be.

It's not the way it was.

It is not the way it will be.

But in this between time, what we will experience in this life is pain and hardship and trouble.

Am I just being too negative?

Am I just being too negative?

I'm actually trying to save you from deep disappointment when it does not turn out the way you think it should.

It's normal.

It's normal.

It's normal.

Again, from Ecclesiastes 1.13.

He writes, it is an unhappy business that God has given to the children of man to be busy with.

He's talking about life.

This is the norm.

So, too many of us just go through life with the idea that things are just supposed to work out.

Pain and suffering are the exception.

And I think where a lot of this idea comes from is that we think we have become so technologically and scientifically advanced that we can actually put an end to the trouble and the hardship and pain.

But all we can do is as we maybe solve one issue, we create five more.

We still die.

We all will.

We will all hurt.

We can't escape it.

We live in a world that's full of hardship, disappointment, and tragedy, and no amount of scientific or technological advance can do anything about it.

Not until the day that Jesus comes and makes all things new.

That said, Paul now comes and charges the hearers of this letter with, how do you love in a world like this?

How do you love?

I mean, in this world where, as one pastor told me, seven out of ten people that you look at will be suffering and the other three will be.

How do you love others in that kind of world?

Well, he said, it's very simple.

You rejoice with those who are rejoicing.

And you weep with those who weep.

Why do we need to be commanded to rejoice with those who rejoice?

Because it's an act of faith.

Let me illustrate why faith is required for us to rejoice with our brothers and sisters when they are experiencing God's gifts.

During the early years of our caregiving with my mother-in-law, we were in Atlanta, and I had a good, one of my best friends was also in a caregiving stage with his father.

His father was a whole lot more difficult.

He was, they'd try to put him in a sister living home or a nursing home, and he'd get kicked out because he was so abusive.

And my friend was an only child, so the weight of all of that was on him.

And so we would get together and talk about the gospel to one another in the midst of these struggles.

Well, after a couple of years of this, his father died.

And my friend inherited a pretty sweet inheritance from me because he was the only child.

And so with that, he sold his house, a simple house that he'd been living in, bought a lake house and a boat.

And then on Facebook, I kept seeing day after day after day pictures of the boat in the new kitchen in the lake house.

Now, was that easy for me to rejoice with him?

You know what I did?

I quit following him on Facebook.

Because I wasn't there.

I was still caregiving.

I was not going to come into a nice inheritance.

There will be, would be no lake house or boat.

And I struggled.

When our brothers and sisters enter into those good gifts, those pleasures that God gives, most of us are not going to be in that state.

We're going to be in that state.

We're going to be in that state.

We're going to be on the other side.

We are still in the normal life.

We're in that state.

Where it hurts.

Where there's toil and hardship and envy can make it extremely difficult for us to rejoice when others are experiencing these blessings.

I mean how can I rejoice in this couple's pregnancy when me and my wife can't get there

how can I rejoice in this couple's anniversary

when I'm living in this big alone called divorce how can I rejoice

when they are laughing and celebrating and I have trouble holding back the tears

the love we are required called to by God through Paul here

is that we get outside of our self-focused self-centered look at life in our neediness

and enter into those that I am a member with to enter into that joy and celebration

I am to celebrate with them and why is that so important

because when we join in the celebration of someone else we intensify it

it's not the same when we celebrate alone

I'm close very close to meeting my 10th grandchild Nora

you've probably heard about her well you will

you know it's because when I'm happy about the birth of Nora

it's not the same if I'm doing it in isolation

why do we have parties at special occasions

why do weddings have all these guests to come

it is because it's the gathering

it's the body and the fellowship

that makes the celebration so much richer and fuller

and so to help and to love

we enter into that celebration

with our brothers and sisters

our participation enhances those pleasures for them

and this is why Paul calls it a living sacrifice

in our living

we lay aside

the attention and the help that we want

we lay aside this sense of neediness

and we rejoice that these

our brothers and sisters at this moment aren't there

then in the same way

when the normalcy of life continues or crashes in

we need to be there

ready

to not just enter into their celebration

but we enter into their pain

their weeping

their hardship

their toil

their discouragement

and this calls us to identify

to identify

with our brothers and sisters

in their pain

we are not called

to stop their weeping

we are not called

to fix

their problem

we are called

to enter into the

to their pain

to the point

that we feel it

as acutely

as if

it were our own

there's too many of us

I think are in the habit

of

when we try to help

those who are suffering

we do it

from a distance

we do

like I call

we lob these

comfort grenades

from a distance

words of wisdom

theological

philosophical

truths

we kind of

lob them in there

that don't do

anything

to actually help

we need to

quit

telling people

when they go through

hardship

that God is sovereign

he is

but it doesn't

help

they don't need

these

truths

they don't need

this

these ideas

they don't need

understanding

they need

somebody

they don't need

somebody to

explain to them

that God has a

purpose

or that this

awful thing

that has happened

to them

is somehow

good

cancer is not

good

it never has

been

it never will

be

death of a

child

is never

good

betrayal of a

spouse

is never

good

it is far

too normal

in this world

this cursed

world that we

live in

and God

does not

promise

that things

are going

to

turn around

and be

good

good

in this

life

yes

he does

in some

mysterious

way

when it's

all said

and done

he can

take those

things

and redeem

them

and do

good things

for us

but those

things in

themselves

are not

good

when we

weep

over a

cancer

diagnosis

so does

he

because it's

not the way

things are

supposed to

be

it's not

the way

he meant

it

don't stay

away

because you're

afraid of

saying the

wrong things

go and

say

nothing

at all

let your

tears

do

the

speaking

your

words

are not

needed

your

ears

and your

arms

are

love

calls us

to

weep

and maybe

just

weep

love

calls us

to enter

in and

identify

so much

that we

are willing

to learn

just how

deeply

others

hurt

so much

so that

we feel

it

as if

it's

our

own

and it's

actually

in the

sharing

of the

pain

when you

come

alongside

someone

you

share

it

that's

where

comfort

really

comes

from

because

somebody

knows

somebody's

willing

to be

there

somebody's

willing

just to

wrap

their

arms

around

you

they're

willing

to

believe

the

promises

of

God

that

you

are

struggling

to

believe

but

they're

going

to

do

it

for

you

and

they're

going

to

hold

you

up

that's

what

it

means

to be

a living

sacrifice

when

we are

suffering

we just

need

somebody

to hold

us up

to the

one

who

can

make

all

things

new

so

how

are

we

supposed

to

love

like

this

well

humanly

it

is

impossible

but

Paul

gives

us

this

wonderful

little

phrase

way

back

up

in

Romans

Romans 12:1

12

verse

1

and

it's

key

to

all

the

rest

he

says

therefore

by

the

mercies

of

God

by

the

mercies

of

God

that

is

how

we

love

that

is

where

the

ability

to step

outside

of

ourselves

comes

from

God

because

we

have

experienced

mercy

from

the

one

who

made

all

things

who

entered

into

our

own

lives

our

world

and

made

our

lives

as if

it was

his

God

himself

and this

is what

we see

Paul talking

about all

back

through

Romans

God

himself

came

he

entered

into

our

cursed

life

in his

baptism

it was

pictured

of how

he took

that all

on himself

he

suffered

our pain

he took

upon himself

our

disease

all our

brokenness

and when

we hurt

he

wept

but he

did more

than that

he

identified

with us

so

clearly

and deeply

that our

sin

our

death

that we

should have

died

he made

his own

he died

for

us

look at

these

words

from

Romans

Romans 12 · chapter mention

chapter

12

chapter

6

excuse

me

do you

not know

that all

of us

who have

been

baptized

into

Christ

Jesus

were

baptized

into

his

death

we

were

buried

therefore

with

him

by

baptism

into

death

in

order

that

just

as

Christ

was

raised

from

the

dead

by

the

glory

of

the

father

we

too

might

walk

in

newness

of

life

for

if

we

have

been

united

with

him

in

a

death

like

his

we

shall

certainly

be

united

with

him

in

a

resurrection

like

his

he

came

died

but

there's

a flip

side

he

was

raised

into

newness

of

life

and

because

we

are

so

deeply

identified

with

him

we

will

know

that

life

as

well

that

is

free

from

the

brokenness

from

the

curse

from

the

disease

the

hardship

and

the

toil

it

is

free

made

new

in

Christ

that's

what the

mercies

of God

gives

us

we

remember

back

to

what

he's

done

that

because

he

was

raised

we

can

now

look

forward

to

what

is

coming

he

is

making

all

things

new

and so

in our

rejoicing

and in

our

weeping

our

calling

is to

enter

into

the

lives

of our

brothers

and

sisters

that we

never let

them forget

the

mercies

of God

we have

already

seen

and the

ones that

are still

to come

so that

as we

deal with

the normal

life

we can

do so

with hope

let's

pray

father

help us

to remember

we do

struggle

we

hurt

we

don't

like to

think

about

it

father

help us

to remember

Jesus

help us

to remember

his mercy

what he's

already

accomplished

and help

us to

remember

what he's

going to

do

and give

us hope

and father

then use

us

in the

lives of

each other

that we

might give

hope

that we

might

encourage

hope

that we

might all

together

stand firm

in hope

for more

information

visit us

online

at

southwood.org

for more

information

visit us

online

at

southwood.org

disfrгу

becomes

one

one

glaub

that we

should

ask

Lou

that we

joke

well

that I

know

that

you

that

there

are