what should i look for in a church?: compassion that’s ...… · april)5)&6,2014)))))

Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved.

Transcript April 5 & 6, 2014

What Should I Look For in a Church?: Compassion that’s Bigger than Me Jake Barker | Luke 10:25-37 What’s up Traders Point? I hope you are doing well. I hope you had a great week leading up to this very moment. If you are new or this is even your first time, I want to extend a special welcome to you. Whatever your motivation was for showing up today, we are incredibly glad that you joined us. You are joining us in week nine of a ten-‐week series, where we are asking the question, WHAT SHOULD I LOOK FOR IN A CHURCH? Now the reason that we are asking that question for you is because we get it all the time. We know that life is full of change and we are under no impression that Traders Point will be your final destination. So if you find yourself in the market for a church that you want to belong to; contribute to; give to, then we want to equip you with some healthy, biblical marks of what God’s church is supposed to be and identify what the Bible says the church is supposed to be about and we have been working through that. Now, we’ve said this a couple of times throughout the series and I will reiterate that this is not a commercial for Traders Point and how great we are. In fact, this has been a challenge for us to stay sharp and stay on point. I’m really glad you have been joining us. So far, we’ve been talking about preaching, theology, and discipleship. If you have missed any of those weeks, I encourage you to go back online and catch up. Or, you can download our church app and all the messages are there as well. Today, we are going to dive into the mark of compassion. So what would a biblical church – what kind of compassion would it show? We are convicted that a church that honors God, and loves Jesus, and is guided by the Spirit will have compassion that is bigger than just me; that this church will have some kind of impact beyond anything that I could do personally. So we are going to ask the questions, why should the church be involved with people locally and globally? Also, why would we reach out a helping hand? Why should we reach out to the vulnerable, to the marginalized, the poor, the needy; why are we motivated to do that at all? Why should we ever have an impact? We are going to dive into that today. If you have your Bible or a Bible app, I would love for you to join me in Luke 10. If you do not have a Bible, we would love for you to stop by Connection Central on your way out and we will give you one; our gift, completely free. We would love to give you a Bible to take home with you. But Luke 10 is where we are going to be hanging out today so I would love for you to get there. Now as are you getting there, I am about to do something that is pretty crazy – just pretty wild so you should probably buckle up. I am going to break every rule that they give you in all the preaching classes in Bible college. I’m going to give away the end of the sermon at the very beginning. Huh? Were you expecting maybe a motorcycle or fireworks? I don’t have the same budget that Aaron does, alright? I don’t know where he comes up with that stuff. So here is what I want you to do. If you are taking notes, if you are writing something down, at the very top I want you to write this phrase (this is the point of the sermon)’ “Our Compassion Reflects Jesus’

What Should I Look For in a Church?: Compassion that’s Bigger than Me April 5 & 6, 2014

Intellectual materials are the property of Traders Point Christian Church. All rights reserved. 2

Compassion”. Our compassion, yours and mine collectively, is the church. “Our Compassion Reflects Jesus’ Compassion”. I want you to get this so much, that at the count of three, we are going to say it together, okay? One – Two – Three – “Our Compassion Reflects Jesus’ Compassion”. Alright now, that sounds pretty simple. It’s only five words. It doesn’t sound that revolutionary. But as we are going to find out as we work through Luke 10, if we took that seriously, like it was something that really applied to our lives, then that would radically challenge many of the ways we are living. The reason I gave you the end of the sermon at the very beginning is because I want that to be the lens through which we understand God’s Word today. You see, every time we read God’s Word, we are reading through a very particular set of lenses. Now my daughter is five years old and she just got glasses. We were having this problem to where she would have all these toys out and we would tell her to pick them up. They would be right in front of her and she wouldn’t pick them up. We thought, “Why are you such a terrible child? Why are you so disobedient?” Then all of a sudden, we took her to the optometrist and found out her eyes are so bad it is a medical condition. So I felt like a pretty awesome Dad after that, “Time out for not being able to see!” All right, not your fault. So now she has these really thick lenses in these awesome purple frames – and she still disobeys. I don’t know, but I thought that there was some kind of guarantee there, but apparently not. Now, she can see the world. Before, it was all fuzzy and blurry and now she can see better, which is the whole point of looking through corrective lenses. So often we look at the Bible through a very particular set of lenses. Sometimes we put on the wrong glasses. Sometimes we put on the glasses of confirmation bias. Like, I read the Bible and I want it to reaffirm what I already think, what I already believe. So I will read into it, even if that is not what it is saying. I will read into it what I already think. Sometimes I have really small lenses and I only get a fraction of the big picture of what God is doing. Today, this is our lens through which we want to understand Luke 10. “Our Compassion Reflects Jesus’ Compassion”. Now if you are at Luke 10, I want you to take a look at verse 25. If your Bible is anything like mine, there is going to be this heading over it that says, “The Good Samaritan”. Now even if you haven’t been around church for very long or you are unfamiliar with God’s word, there is a pretty decent chance you have heard the phrase “being a Good Samaritan”. See what has happened is that our world has co-‐opted that into our vocabulary. We have removed it from its original context in God’s Word. We’ve kind of made up our own definition. So if you listen to the world, “Good Samaritan” really means just be a nice person; reach out a nice hand; help somebody in need; just be as nice as you possibly can. If you listen to the world, that’s kind of a point of life, right? Just be nice and try to make a difference. If you can leave this world a little better than when you first showed up, that’s great. Just be a Good Samaritan. Be nice. But as is often the case, when we remove God’s words – especially Jesus’ words – from their immediate context there in the Bible, they lose a lot of their meaning; they lose a lot of their punch. So what we have done is kind of sanitized the Good Samaritan parable, which is one of the more controversial stories that Jesus ever told. It is going to rock our world. It is going to challenge our socks off if we let it, so let’s dive into Luke 10:25. Here is how it begins.



“And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” Okay, let’s pause right there because we need to set the scene for where the story of the Good Samaritan is told. It’s all about context. The story was told in a very real context, and this is what that means. Jesus would often teach in the public arena. And this was in the day before Ticketmaster so this was all general admission. The religious experts would be standing right next to the town drunk, listening to the exact sermon that Jesus was preaching, because Jesus drew people from all walks of life. They were all there hanging out and listening. Now, this lawyer was not like one of our lawyers today who was part of a private practice or was a public defender. No, this guy was a religious expert. He was a lawyer in God’s law. If you read the Old Testament, you are going to find a bunch of rules and regulations that God set for His people. It’s going to sound like, “Do eat this; don’t eat that. Do wear this; don’t wear that. Do worship like this; don’t worship like that.” This guy’s whole job was – his whole game was to know it inside and out. He was a religious expert, a lawyer in God’s law. Now what was happening was that Jesus was showing up and He was doing all this teaching. He was the new rabbi on the scene and He was teaching these incredible sermons. He was talking about this Kingdom of God that was near. Then He would refer to God as his Dad. Then He would have the audacity to forgive sins Himself. Not like pointing out sins, but He was forgiving sins. Then He was making the blind see and the lame walk. Needless to say, He was growing very popular. So everyone was showing up to hear Jesus, but this religious lawyer used to be the one guy in town that everybody listened to. Jesus is infringing on his market share and the lawyer is growing a little jealous. So these religious experts would show up in the public arena where Jesus was teaching and their efforts would be to lob these loaded questions to Jesus in front of people and try to trick Him. They were trying to test Him. Hopefully, He would stumble over His words and be exposed for the false teacher they thought He was. Now you have all been asked loaded questions before, right? It is a question that has this underlying meaning to it. So guys, when she asks, “Does this dress make me look fat?” or, “Do you prefer your mom’s cooking over mine?” you just run out of the house, like physically remove yourself from the situation. That’s the best way to handle a loaded question. That’s what this guy was doing. He is lobbing this loaded question in front of Jesus and thinks he is going to trick Him. Here is the one piece of information that this lawyer had not taken into account as yet, he was attempting to trick Jesus with the Law. Jesus wrote the Law. It’s going to be very difficult to trick the author of the Law with the Law itself. The lawyer just didn’t totally get that yet. So he lobs this question – and let’s look at it again in Luke 10:25. There is a really important piece that we need to understand. The lawyer says, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” That word ‘do’ is so important. You see, the operating assumption that this guy was under was that eternal life, that the reward of eternal life, was something that could be earned. That if I can do the right things and avoid the wrong things, then I will be righteous in front of God and He will reward me for how great I am. That was the lawyer’s working assumption; that’s how he operated in life. The technical term for that is called “works righteousness”. The idea that if I do the right things and avoid the wrong things, then my bank account will be high enough to where God will honor me at the end of my life and give me eternal life.



Some of you, that is exactly your world view. That’s exactly how you have been operating with God thus far, “If I can do good things He will like me. If I do the bad things, then He is mad at me. So I try to do more good than bad so that I can have a good relationship with God.” In fact, that’s why some of you showed up today. You think that church attendance is going to be another “gold star” on your chart of righteousness that you can hand in to God as your assignment due, “Then maybe, if I do enough good, God will love me.” If that has been your operating assumption, which it has been for many of us, I really want you to pay attention to how Jesus answers this question. It is so important. The lawyer thought that he had painted Jesus into a corner. He thought he had lobbed this loaded question, but again, he was trying to trick the author of the Law with the Law. The lawyer thought there were only two options. A: Jesus could affirm the Law and affirm the lawyer and say, “Keep it up man. Do all the right stuff, avoid all the bad stuff; you are on the right track, keep it up.” And the lawyer would walk away affirmed. Or, B: Jesus would just throw the Law out the window and say, “You know what, that doesn’t matter anymore.” Then they could dismiss Jesus as a false teacher, which they thought He was. So either way it was a win-‐win. So in his head, this lawyer was either going to walk away affirmed or he could dismiss Jesus, win-‐win as far as the lawyer saw it. Again, it’s going to be hard to trick the author of the Law with the Law. Watch how Jesus responds here in Luke 10:26. Jesus’ response is brilliant, “He said to him, ‘what is written in the Law? How do you read it?’” Don’t you hate it when someone answers your question with another question? Isn’t that the worst? I don’t know about you, but when I’m in an argument with someone, I usually think of my best come-‐back about three hours after the argument happened. Right? Anybody else? I will be in the middle of it and then about three hours later I will be eating a hamburger and I will think, “Oh, this is what I should have said! It would have got ‘em so bad!” Jesus doesn’t have that problem. And the reason He doesn’t have that problem is that He knows that guy’s heart. Jesus knows why the lawyer is asking the question. You are not going to fool Jesus. He knows that the lawyer is trying to trick Him. So He puts it back on the lawyer. Saying basically, “Well you are the expert, you’ve got the name badge; you’ve done all the studying; you tell Me. If you have read the Law, then you should know the answer.” So this lawyer had two options. Options #1, he could have sat there and recited the entirety of God’s Law, verse by verse, or option #2, he could summarize. Luckily for us, he summarized. Here is how he put it in verses 27 and 28. The lawyer boils down all of God’s Law into these two commands, “And he answered, ‘You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” Jesus said to the lawyer, “You have answered correctly; do this, and you will live.” So the lawyer does what is commonly understood; he boils down God’s Law into two things. Just love God with everything that you have and then love other people like you love yourself. This is kind of amazing and maybe this surprises you, that all those rules and regulations in the Old Testament come down to these two truths; love God with everything that you have and love other people like you love yourself. So the Lawyer boils it down and Jesus says, “Yeah, that’s right. You’ve got the right answer.” I imagine the lawyer kind of puffing up his chest and saying, “Yeah, I know I’m right; that’s why I asked that question! I know I have the answers.” And then, Jesus drops the bomb that should completely dismantle any religious pride we could ever feel. Jesus says, “Yeah, you’ve answered correctly, now go



and do that.” See, Jesus is saying that there is a difference between knowing the answers and living them out. There is a difference between knowing the right thing to do and then doing it. Anybody felt that tension before? So the lawyer comes and he is affirmed that he is right, but now he has to go and live it out. See, this is the point where “works righteousness” implodes upon itself. It’s that our idea that we can do enough good and avoid enough bad to make God love us completely dies on this hill. Because here is the problem; the Law of God sets the bar at perfection. In fact, if you want to obey the Law of God, you must always do the right thing and never, ever mess up. Okay? Never sin, never break a promise. You just never do anything wrong. That’s all you have to do. If you want to be good in front of God with your works, just never, ever, ever mess up. Has anyone ever pulled that off? Anyone here perfect? Feel free to leave, because you don’t even need this; this isn’t for you. No? Everybody is still here? Great! So the lawyer as he is trying to position himself to be this proud, accomplished religious guy is completely dismantled. The lawyer understands that the Law says never, ever mess up. Even with that stark reality in front of us; even though we know that the Law can never be on our side, so many of us try to use our good works to justify ourselves in front of God. There may be all kinds of reasons that you do that. Maybe it is what you were taught. Growing up in your family or your church, it was all about “do the right thing, don’t do the wrong thing”. If you do enough godly things then God will love you; if you do enough sin then He is not going to love you. And that is really where your value is found. Maybe you caught it. Maybe you saw someone live that life and they were always obsessed with doing the right thing. They were completely depressed when they messed up, so you just adopted that as your world view. Maybe you surmised that if every other one of your relationships in life is completely conditional, then why would it be any different with God? Because with my spouse, it seems like they love me more when I’m good to them, when I’m doing all the right things. But when I mess up, they seem to love me less. Growing up, my parents affirmed me when I succeeded, but when I failed, they were all over my case. My boss only rewards me when I produce – so if every other one of my relationships in life is completely conditional, why would it be any different with God? So we try to present our gold star, sticker chart and say, “God, did I do enough? Did I make you happy?” I was recently reading a book on God’s grace and the author made a great point. He said, those of us who try to live by the Law, those of us who try to live by the rules, we don’t have the high view of the Law that we think we do. We pose ourselves as man and say, I just want to be holy; I just want to please God. That’s why I live this way. In reality if we had a full understanding of what the Law asks and how imperfect we are, we would not try and justify ourselves. The only response to looking at God’s Law in the eye is complete devastation and understanding that we need help. The Law is not your friend. The Law is not your advocate. It is a cold and unrelenting prosecutor that is pointing its finger in our faces and saying, “You are guilty, caught red-‐handed. There is no hope for you.” Paul writes that the Law actually exposed how bad he was. He didn’t even know how bad he was until the Law showed up. Then he realized he was even worse than he ever thought. James writes that when we break one of the laws, we are guilty of breaking the entire thing. The Law is not on our side. So when we present ourselves with our sticker chart of righteousness we are making a terrible, terrible mistake. We can’t live up to that expectation. Now this is the point that we need to



remember that line that we wrote at the top of our page, “Our Compassion Reflects Jesus’ Compassion”. This is where Jesus’ compassion comes in. You see, He wrote the Law. He was part of it with the Father and the Holy Spirit before all time began. He wrote that thing. He knows it inside and out. He also knows how imperfect we are. And before we could ever say that we could pay him back; before we could even express how sorry we were; He chose to live among us and die for us and rise again. Here is the way the author Paul writes it in Colossians 2:13-‐14, “And you, who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.” So Jesus, looking at us, the poor, the pitiful, the powerless, the completely guilty, with nothing to offer back, knowing all of that, He still came to live amongst us. He died for us. He became sin on the cross for us and rose again in the most unbelievable fashion. In the most ridiculous act of compassion and generosity, He paid our debt in full; then turned around and gave us the reward that only He could earn, which is right-‐standing in front of God and eternal life. Ladies and gentlemen, that’s the Gospel of Jesus Christ. That’s the good news. That’s what the story is all about. It says that Jesus paid our debt and then gave us the reward – the greatest act of compassion that has ever happened. Ever. Now, that statement at the top of your page, “Our Compassion Reflects Jesus’ Compassion”, is not so small anymore, is it? That if my life and the way that I act compassionately toward others in my world is supposed to reflect what Jesus did for me, this is far bigger, far greater than anything I had ever considered before. This is the lens through which we understand the way that we operate in our world. The Gospel, the good news of Jesus, informs every action, every day, every relationship; so if our compassion reflects His, how in the world are we going to pull that off? Well, look at Luke 10. We are going to rejoin our lawyer and Jesus as they continue this dialog. What the lawyer does is, he hears what Jesus is saying, and says, “Okay I need to go do that.” But what the lawyer does is try to manage God’s commands. Have you ever done this? I know I have all the time. What happens is, God gives me a command in my life and it is usually big, right? It’s huge, it’s right out here. And then what I say is, “Actually, God, you probably didn’t totally mean that. It was probably just somewhere in here, right? God, you are like at a 10, I need you at like a 3. Okay? If we could just kind of manage that down. So God, I know that you said to love my enemies, but that is kind of crazy because they are jerks and that’s why they are my enemy! So I don’t really want to do that. You probably meant more like ‘frienamies’ right? Like, they are my friend, we are kind of having a spat, but it’s not that bad. Right? That’s what you meant, God? Or when You said to give everything up for you, like all my money, my resources, my career and you really called me to something, you didn’t mean ‘this’, you probably meant something like ‘that’.” What we do is try to manage God’s commands down to a reasonable size to where we think we can pull that off without any of God’s help, “That’s my goal, to do the right things, but I don’t want God’s help in that. I want to be able to pull that off in my own strength and my own willpower and my own efforts.” So I say, “God, I hear you say love God with everything that you have and love everybody as yourself, but what did you really mean?”



Look at the question that the lawyer asks here in Luke 10:29, “But he, desiring to justify himself,” like that is so important; desiring to show how good he is; desiring to show how he is not that bad, “said to Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’” So the lawyer is saying, “Okay, Jesus, I hear what you are saying, but really who is my neighbor?” Right? “You can’t mean everyone; you probably mean the small circle of friends that I really like and I enjoy. I can love them as I love myself, but you couldn’t possibly mean every single person. That’s a lot of people. I don’t love them. I love these people.” And Jesus, in his inimitable style, tells a story. These stories are called parables and they are a way that Jesus teaches the Kingdom principles here on earth. So Jesus launches into this story. That’s the set-‐up. Let’s read it in its entirety and then we are going to go back and break it down a little bit. Starting in Luke 10:30, “Jesus replied, ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and he fell among robbers, who stripped him and beat him and departed, leaving him half dead. Now by chance a priest was going down that road, and when he saw him he passed by on the other side. So likewise a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he journeyed, came to where he was, and when he saw him, he had compassion. He went to him and bound up his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he set him on his own animal and brought him to an inn and took care of him. And the next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, ‘Take care of him, and whatever more you spend, I will repay you when I come back.’ Which of these three, do you think, proved to be a neighbor to the man who fell among the robbers? He said, ‘The one who showed him mercy.’ And Jesus said to him, ‘You go, and do likewise.’” Now this story has been removed from its context and has lost a lot of its punch. It’s been a little watered down, a little sanitized. So we want to go back and break this thing down to fully understand what Jesus just said. So Jesus is talking to this Jewish audience and He says this Jewish man was from Jerusalem, going to Jericho. He is on his way, in the days before police forces and security cameras. He is beaten, robbed and left for dead. Then by chance, these two Jewish religious experts pass by, see the man in his need, and they keep on walking. Over the centuries, there have been many creative explanations as to why these guys kept on their way. Some have said that road was obviously very dangerous and they too could have been beaten and robbed and left for dead. So they did this out of self-‐preservation. They just kept on going. Others have said, “Well they were Jewish religious leaders and if they had gotten in that guy’s mess, they would have become unclean. They didn’t want to do that, so they kept walking.” Others have said, “Well obviously they were just heartless jerks and that’s why they kept walking.” We don’t know. Jesus didn’t explain the motivation. All He does here is say what they did. He explains their actions. Enter, stage left, the Samaritan. This is one of the pieces that loses its sting two-‐thousand years later. You see, the Samaritans and the Jews hated each other. The Samaritans were a culture that began when Jews began marrying and reproducing with pagan religions and pagan people. So they were this mixed race and the Jewish people saw them as half-‐breeds. They saw them as the lowest of the low. This was not just like some friendly rivalry. They hated Samaritans. In fact, if they were somewhere and they had to go through Samaria to get to their next place, they would walk around it. They hated those guys. So for us, because you have probably never met a Samaritan, much less hate one, we have to think through the lens of who is the person that you disagree with the most? What is the type of person that really gets under your skin; the people that just really bother you? That’s who Jesus makes the hero of the story. So if you are an Indiana basketball fan, Jesus is telling the parable of the “Good Kentucky Wildcat Fan”. I don’t know if you heard, but we are playing tomorrow night. Apparently if you win a



bunch of games in a row, they let you play for a trophy. You should try that sometime, whenever you get around to it, just let me know. We will be insufferable if we win, right? Just know that. It’s going to be the worst for you guys. So, I digress. Maybe if you don’t have a sports affiliation, it would be like the parable of the good person that drives 45 mph in the left lane on I-‐465. What? They are the worst! Or maybe on a more serious matter, it would be like Jesus telling you the parable of the good Democrat or the parable of the good Republican – maybe the parable of the good strip club owner; the parable of the gay rights activist; the parable of the pro-‐choice politician. You see, Jesus doesn’t qualify who the Samaritan is. He doesn’t say, “Yes the man is a Samaritan, but he is one of the good ones.” He doesn’t say that the Samaritan was getting close to God. All Jesus said was that he was a Samaritan. So Jesus is looking at this religious lawyer and He is saying, “I know you think you are awesome. And I know you think that because you obey all the rules that you are ‘in’. Let me tell you a story about a guy that you hate, the lowest of the low, and how he shows my compassion.” Do you feel that sting? Do you feel that burn? That is what the lawyer would have been hearing right there in that moment. So we need to notice some things about the way the Samaritan behaves toward this beaten, robbed, and left for dead Jewish man in the road. Number one, he stops. You see, he was on his way from Jerusalem to Jericho. I don’t know about you, but when I’m traveling, I usually don’t have built into the itinerary, save someone’s life. It is just not part of my thing. I don’t make that Step 4 of my directions. I am usually going somewhere; I have somewhere to be. I have a reason to be there so I am on my way. Is it possible that in our driven culture where we have things scheduled out for not just days but weeks and years that we pass up opportunities for compassion because it would be an inconvenience? “But I was headed to Jericho, man. I don’t have time for this.” So this Samaritan who didn’t know this guy – in fact, he probably hated this guy, stops what he is doing. Second of all, he becomes vulnerable. You see, those robbers could have still been around the corner. The Samaritan could have easily been robbed and beaten himself. In order for the Samaritan to address the wounds and put the injured man on his own animal, he easily could have been attacked himself. So he became vulnerable. Then finally, he made a massive investment for this guy – this guy that he had never met. They hadn’t pre-‐arranged some kind of reimbursement plan. He makes a massive investment. The Samaritan shows up at the inn and says, “Whatever it takes, here is a blank check. I don’t know the injured man. We haven’t really agreed to terms, but I am just going to pay whatever it takes.” See, true compassion requires risk and sacrifice. Author, Tim Keller calls it getting sacrificially involved with the vulnerable. That if we are really going to get close to the mess, we are going to have to stop what we are doing and we are probably going to become vulnerable ourselves. It is going to require an investment from us. That’s what the Samaritan shows. So as an answer to the lawyer’s question – the lawyer was at a “10” and he was trying to get it down to a “3” asks, “Who is my neighbor?” And Jesus says your neighbor is the person who needs your help. Jesus doesn’t shrink it. He doesn’t qualify it. He actually blows the doors off of it. Jesus says your neighbor is not just someone that you like, not someone that you get along with. Your neighbor is the person that needs your help. So as we often do in these situations, we like to substitute the word “brother” or “sister” for the word “neighbor”. “I’m totally cool with taking a risk for my brother. I like him. We get along. We hang out. We



agree on stuff. Like, I could totally take a risk for him.” Or, “I’m totally fine taking a risk for my sister. There is a really good chance that she might pay me back. There is a really good chance we are going to see each other next week.” Jesus says while everyone is not your brother or sister in faith, everyone is your neighbor – all seven billion of them. The people whom you have met, the people whom you haven’t met, the people who are close and the people who are far away, the people who you agree with, the people who you disagree with – they are all our neighbors. If our compassion is to reflect Jesus, it seems to be the case that our job is to reach out and help. Now this idea of widening the category of neighbor and really sacrificially and vulnerably getting involved in a life can leave us with some – well, it’s a little uncomfortable. This is a massive challenge. I know that there are a few objections to this idea, so let’s work through a few of them. Number one is this: “The poor that I see are not that needy. I mean, we live in America. We have government institutions that help people in need. There are jobs out there. They aren’t that needy. Then on top of that there was this one time when I took these Christmas presents to a poor family and I walked in their house. They had this HD television and an X-‐box. They weren’t very grateful and really left me with a bad taste in my mouth. I’m just not sure I’m ‘in’ on that anymore.” I can’t tell you how many times I have heard that exact same story. Here is the problem. If our compassion is to reflect Jesus’ compassion then that means that they have to be one and the same. Question: Did Jesus wait until every single one of us was completely destitute, at rock bottom and had nothing left before He stepped in? No, He met us at all varying levels of brokenness. Some of us were at rock bottom. It was the worst moment in our entire life when we met Jesus. Others of us had just started down that path when He stepped in and He saved us. It doesn’t matter the varying degree of need that is there. If it is a need, it’s a need and we step in, if our compassion is to reflect Jesus’ compassion. Here is objection number two for why this might not work for us: “I cannot help without burdening myself. I can’t do it. I would love to step in. I would love to make a difference, but I just can’t right now.” If we extended that phrase a little further we would say, “I would love to step in right now but I just can’t without giving something up. For me to step in it would immediately impact the way that I’m living right now.” So our idea is, “I would be compassionate the very moment that I have so much money and so many resources that it doesn’t hurt.” Let me break that myth – it is always going to hurt. No matter how much we have, we feel like it is ours, so giving it away is going to sting a little bit. Here is the second question: If our compassion is going to reflect Jesus compassion, did Jesus burden himself for us? Yes, quite a bit. In fact, it’s kind of the whole reason He showed up in the first place. The reason He showed up was so that He could live among us, die in front of us, and rise again. On that cross He did not just take 25% of our burden; He didn’t take 50%. He took the whole thing. He became our sin to pay the debt that we could not pay and then in turn gave us the reward that only He could earn. The reason that we are not compassionate right now is because we can’t without it hurting a little bit; we can’t without it stinging. Maybe that’s the point. It’s time to burden ourselves. Objection number three sounds like this: “They (the needy, the poor, and the down and out) are facing the consequences of their poor decisions or bad choices. If the people over there would just stop doing



drugs; if they would just stop selling their body; if they had just stayed in school, this wouldn’t be a problem for them. I worked hard and I made good choices and that’s why I am where I am. So why should I step help in and help them get out of the circumstance that was caused by their bad decisions?” Let’s be super clear. Yes, there are absolutely consequences to bad decisions (drug use, infidelity, laziness) but here is the problem with our lens. Our compassion is to reflect Jesus’ compassion. Did He maybe step in and maybe help us because of our poor choices? Did He maybe come in because of our sin? Yeah, that’s why Jesus showed up in the first place because we couldn’t save ourselves. He needed to save us. Now does that mean that we go in and we enable people? No. Do we teach them life skills and help them into a better life style? Absolutely. But because there are consequences to their poor choices, that does not disqualify us from reaching out a hand of compassion. That’s exactly what Jesus did. Objection number four, the kind of final one: “That sounds a lot like the social gospel.” If you have never heard that term, let me give you some background. In the late 1880s there was a reaction to the over-‐reaction. Isn’t that always the story of our world? There is always an over-‐reaction and then another over-‐reaction to the over-‐reaction. So the pendulum swings from one extreme to the other. At that time, the pendulum was way over here; the church was just focusing on people’s spiritual salvation, but never addressing their physical needs. It was all about getting saved, getting baptized, all about going to Heaven, which is super great, but they did not feed anybody; they didn’t house anybody; they didn’t educate anybody. So this movement rose up that said, “Well, why wouldn’t we take care of both their spiritual and their physical needs? It’s going to be difficult for them to hear about Jesus over the grumbling of their stomachs. Let’s do both.” Which is super admirable. But as is often the case, when we take the pendulum from one extreme, we usually swing it all the way over to the other. So the leaders of the social gospel ended up abandoning Christian teaching and were saying, “We are just going to do the physical stuff. We are not going to talk about Jesus; we’re not going to talk about the truth because that seems divisive; it kind of closes doors. So we are just going to feed; we are going to educate; we are going to house and that is going to be our thing.” So often – young people, I would like to have your attention right now. One of the things that is kind of in vogue for your generation is this compassion idea. It’s going out and making a difference; going internationally, going locally. Stepping in and making a difference. This is a super great thing to be in fashion and we should absolutely encourage that. One of the dangers is that if we swing that pendulum all the way to the physical side and we never talk about the spiritual needs of people, we have only done half of our job. The reason we meet physical needs is because it opens the door so that we can preach the absolutely essential truth of Jesus Christ. If we open the door and don’t say anything, we’ve left them hanging. They are going to get hungry again; they are going to lose their jobs; bad things are going to happen here on this earth. The only truth that is eternal is Jesus. So we need to bring them together and meet both physical and spiritual needs. That is our call. That is our compassion. So how does this play out? There is one more detail in the Good Samaritan story that I want to make sure we hone in on. It says since Jesus was talking to a Jewish audience, He made the guy beaten up and robbed the Jewish guy. So ultimately what He was doing, Jesus was looking at this Jewish lawyer and He



was saying, “You were on your way from Jerusalem from Jericho and you were beaten up and robbed. How would you want to be treated by the passersby? Imagine that was you bleeding out. Imagine that was you that couldn’t stand up. How would you want to be treated? Would you have stopped the Samaritan and said, ‘Hey do we agree on everything? Hey, are we going to have to be friends after this?’ No, you would have totally accepted his help.” So the question is, for us, if I was on my way from Jerusalem to Jericho and I was beaten and I was robbed, how would I want to be treated? Jesus says to go and do that likewise. Now all of us have opportunities on a daily basis. We have our personal spheres of influence where we can make a big difference toward this end of compassion. If you are in the medical field, there are local and global clinics that reach out to people who can’t afford healthcare. That’s an act of compassion. If you are in the education field, there are kids who are in both low and high income areas who need a friend; who need a tutor; who need help. If you are a student, there are dozens of your classmates who have no friends; have no one to sit with at lunch. You could be that friend that really raises them up and you can even tell them about Jesus. That’s your opportunity for compassion. It comes in all shapes and sizes. Today, we want to give you a very real, a very immediate opportunity to respond to compassion, to reflect Jesus’ compassion in our own lives. We have multiple strategic partners here at Traders Point who go and make a big difference, both locally and globally. We have three partners in particular who are immediately involved in the lives of children. The way that we can get involved is through child sponsorships, so I want you to check out this video. Video: What happens when one person steps out and becomes part of a crowd? A crowd that acts as one, stepping into the life of a child, a family, a community, a country, serving social, economic, spiritual and physical needs in response to the Great Commission, to go, to make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. What would it look like for 1,000 children to be released from poverty? It starts with one. One sponsor, one child to radically transform lives in Jesus’ name. So here is the opportunity we have. We have strategic partners in Kenya, Nicaragua, and Haiti and they are immediately meeting both the physical and spiritual needs of those kids. I know that there is a very good chance that you would never meet that kid. There is an excellent chance that they could ever pay you back, but maybe that’s the point. Here is what I want to ask you, is that you today? We are talking about just over $30 a month. Can you come in and make a massive difference? Can you come in and reflect Jesus’ compassion for you in the life of that child? Maybe it is one child for you and your family. Maybe it’s two or three. Maybe God has blessed you beyond your wildest imagination. Maybe you need to take on ten kids today. Because the compassion is so overwhelming to you that you want to pass that along to others so that they too can hear the good news of Jesus. So in the gym, right after the service there are going to be opportunities out there to see their pictures; you can read about their circumstances. Then you can immediately step in, just like Jesus did to show compassion. There you can also learn about another one of our strategic partners, the International Justice Mission (IJM). What IJM does is boldly and courageously step into very dangerous situations and literally free people from slavery. Just wild and crazy stuff, you can be a part of that.



You can also check out our Live117 ministry, our adoption ministry. We encourage families who are wrestling with that. There are resources. We want to come around you, and support you, and encourage you. What better way to show Jesus’ compassion as an adopted son or daughter into the family of God than to pass that along to a child who needs a mom, who needs a dad? I just want to ask the question, what is it for you today? It’s going to be really hard for us to wiggle out of this one and say, “That’s not for me.” It’s something. So what is it? Right now we are going to do offering and communion. What we do is through our offering, we return a portion of what God has so graciously given to us. We are able to show compassion through that. We respond to Jesus’ compassion. And finally we are going to take communion. That bread and juice represent Jesus’ body and blood. It is a weekly reminder, one that we cannot escape, that the greatest act of compassion that has ever existed, saved us, and we can extend that on to others. So my question to you in this time to yourself, this time between you and God, is what is it going to be for you? Will you pray with me? God, we love You so much and we do not have the words to express our gratitude that the depths that You pulled us from and the life that You have given us is something we can never pay back. We don’t deserve it, but You have so graciously and freely given it to us. We want to pay that on. We want to extend that same message to as many people as possible. God, please work on our hearts; shave away those objections; get right to the root. Please make us soft and mold us into who You want us to be. It is in Your Son’s name we pray. Amen.

what should i look for in a church?: compassion that’s ...… · april)5)&6,2014)))))

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