The Model Prayer

The Model Prayer

Sermon on the Mount Series: Matt 6:5-15

            We are continuing in our journey through the Sermon on the Mount, asking the question, “Can anyone live out the requirements Jesus laid out in today’s society?” The Sermon on the Mount is Jesus’ longest continual teaching recorded in scripture, and is found in Matthew chapters 5-7. Matthew was a Jew writing to Jews with the goal of presenting Jesus as the Messiah. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus, as the King of kings, is laying out the rules of His kingdom—not only for life in Heaven, but for life on earth. In particular Jesus was calling out the Pharisees, who were a group of people that were very religious and very legalistic. He was saying, “You think you’re all that, but you ain’t.” In chapter 5, Jesus said “Your view of theology isn’t right.” Later in chapter 6 He says, “Your view of the material world isn’t right.” And right now in He is saying, “Your religious practices aren’t right.” In particular Jesus focuses on three religious practices: giving; fasting; and praying. Last time we discussed how we are to give in such a way that our left hand does not know what our right hand is doing.

            Of these three prayer is the most important. Prayer is communion with God. Paul said to pray without stopping. That’s a long prayer. How many of you would run out of things to say after a few minutes. Some of us would run out faster than others. I’ve seen people talk on the phone without ceasing. Every time I drive now I watch the other drivers and see who is talking on their phones. Women are always on the phone. I’m convinced that some people think their cars won’t run if they aren’t talking on their phones—like the batteries are somehow connected and feeding off of each other. I had two friends in Atlanta who both had really long commutes at the same time. They would talk with each other on the way, but as soon as it hit 6:59 they’d hang up, because that’s when the free minutes were over. They were communing with each other—building each other up in a godly way before heading off into their secular jobs.

            I’m probably like most of you. I’m going to run out of things to say really quick. But Paul says to pray without ceasing. He must have meant something else. When I first met Rebekah, she’s all I thought about. I thought about her night and day. She was the first thing I thought about in the morning and the last thing I thought about at night. I even dreamed about her. I couldn’t wait to get home from work so I could call her, because she wouldn’t call me. That’s what she said, “I don’t call guys.” Hmmm. And then one day my phone rang, and it was her. My heart skipped several beats because it showed me that she also was thinking about me. But guess what? I still remember the first time God spoke back to me in prayer. My heart skipped several beats then, too. For the same reason—He thought enough of me to talk to me.

            Maybe that is what Paul meant when he said to pray without ceasing. Get your mind focused on one thing—God, and concentrate on Him and His attributes all day long. That’s why memorizing Bible passages has been so effective for me, it forces me to focus on God and His word all day and not on whether the Indians will have a bullpen this year, or what a politician said the day before. Focus on God. Concentrate on Him. Tell Him how your day is going and the things that are concerning you. Even if He knows what you are going to say, He still would like to hear it. Don’t be like the old married man—his wife said, “You don’t say I love you anymore.” He replied, “I told you I loved you on our wedding day. If anything changes, I’ll let you know.”

            Giving, fasting, and praying. Of those three, prayer is the most important because it is constant communion with God. We can’t give like we are supposed to if we aren’t praying. And fasting is totally useless without prayer. The whole idea of fasting is to gather your focus on God and pray for specific concerns in your life. Fasting without prayer is like taking a shower with a raincoat on. Of those three, giving, fasting, and praying, praying is the only one where Jesus gives us instructions on how to pray. In giving: “Don’t do this, don’t do that.” In fasting: “Don’t do this, don’t do that.” In praying: “Don’t do this, don’t do that, instead do this.”

            Let’s read today’s passage: “When you pray, don’t be like the hypocrites who love to pray publicly on street corners and in the synagogues where everyone can see them. I tell you the truth, that is all the reward they will ever get. But when you pray, go away by yourself, shut the door behind you, and pray to your Father in private. Then your Father, who sees everything, will reward you. When you pray, don’t babble on and on as people of other religions do. They think their prayers are answered merely by repeating their words again and again. Don’t be like them, for your Father knows exactly what you need even before you ask him! Pray like this:

Our Father in heaven,
      may your name be kept holy.
   May your Kingdom come soon.
   May your will be done on earth,
      as it is in heaven.
   Give us today the food we need,
   and forgive us our sins,
      as we have forgiven those who sin against us.
   And don’t let us yield to temptation,
      but rescue us from the evil one.

 If you forgive those who sin against you, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you refuse to forgive others, your Father will not forgive your sins.”

            The prayer Jesus taught is sometimes referred to as The Lord’s Prayer, or even The Disciples’ Prayer because in the Gospel of Luke it was the disciples who asked to be taught how to pray. Many of you probably have it memorized. I had to memorize it growing up as a Methodist because we said it every service. And then I had to memorize it in German when I was in seminary. The problem is that for many of us, it is just that—a memorized prayer, something Jesus had warned about in verse 7, “do not use vain repetitions….” It is just something we say that no longer has meaning behind it.

            The Lord’s Prayer was never meant to be something we memorize and utter every once in a while. It was meant to be a model. It was meant to be a basic outline, to help you commune with God in a more fruitful manner. It is a skeleton that we are to flesh out into a real conversation with a real God. Imagine if you had a boyfriend or a girlfriend who would speak to you only once a week (if you were lucky) and only said the same memorized 60 word paragraph week after week. “Hey Becky, who lives on

Stewart St

. Amazing is your smile. I liked it when we went out and got some food, and or watched a movie. Please forgive me if I said or did anything wrong. I think you are neat.” How many of you would be excited about that conversation? Jesus, in a display of divinity was able to boil down every perfect prayer, and every aspect of a perfect prayer into a 60+ word model.

            Let’s break it down. “Our Father in Heaven” We have a Father/ son or a Father/ daughter relationship with God. That right there is awesome. Some of you might be thinking, “Big deal. My dad’s a jack-wagon.” Yeah, but everything that is wrong with your earthly father is more than made up for by your heavenly Father who is perfect in every way. “may your name be kept holy.” We have a deity/ worshiper relationship with God and there needs to be a level of reverence that is maintained. “May Your kingdom come soon.” We have a sovereign/ subject relationship with God. He is our king and we should desire that His kingdom be established soon. “May your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” We have a master/ servant relationship with God. He is like our boss, and we are his employees. We do His bidding. Our response should be “Yes, Lord” before we even hear His request. “Give us today the food we need,” We have a benefactor/ beneficiary relationship with God. He supplies us with everything we need to survive. He wants us to depend on Him for everything. The apostle Paul said in Philippians, “I have learned to be content in all circumstances.” Don’t worry about tomorrow. God will give you enough to get through today. “And forgive us our sins,” We have a savior/ sinner relationship. Only God can cleanse us from our sin. “As we have forgiven those who sin against us” We have a teacher/ apprentice relationship. God wants us to do to others what He has done for us, to us, and in us. In case you missed His point, He says it again in verses 14 and 15, “If you don’t forgive others, God will not forgive you. “And don’t let us yield to temptation, but rescue us from the evil one.” Another common translation is “Lead us not into temptation….” We have a guide/ follower relationship. Just like if we all were taking a guided tour of an active volcano, we would be sure to follow the path of our tour guide.      

            But this is only a model. Once you understand the parts of the prayer you have to fill in the particular details of your life into the conversation. That’s how you make it a living prayer instead of a memorized passage. You can’t have a growing relationship without meaningful dialogue. You can’t have meaningful dialogue if you never say anything, or when you do it is something some else wrote for you.              

Love Your Enemies: Sermon on the Mount Series

Love Your Enemies

Sermon on the Mount Series: Matt. 5:43-48

            We are continuing on in our journey through the Sermon on the Mount, asking the question, “Can anyone live out the requirements Jesus laid out in that sermon in today’s world?” Last week we discussed turning the other cheek, going the extra mile, and what you should do if someone demands or asks something of you. We finished off with a story from Matthew 15 where a gentile woman had the opportunity to be offended and fight back when she requested help from Jesus to heal her daughter. Remember Jesus first ignored her, His disciples asked Him to send her away, He separated himself from her due to her race, and finally He called her a dog. She took all of those insults and pressed on, because if she got mad at Jesus, mumbled something under her breath about how Jesus is all uppity, or how he ain’t all that and a bag of chips, she would have went home and her daughter would still have been demon possessed, and she would have lost all hope. What would she have lost if she did not turn the other cheek? She would have lost everything.

            Today we’re going to talk about loving our enemies. We won’t ask what will we lose if we don’t love our enemies, we’ll ask what will we gain if we do.

            Matthew 5:43-48 says, “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor^[a] and hate your enemy.’ ⁴⁴ But I tell you: Love your enemies^[b] and pray for those who persecute you, ⁴⁵ that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. ⁴⁶ If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? ⁴⁷ And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? ⁴⁸ Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”

            In the 1950’s there were five men and their families who set out to bring the gospel to a primitive, stone-age Amazon tribe. The five men were Nate Saint, Jim Elliot, Ed McCully, Pete Fleming, and Roger Youderian. There main problems were that nobody knew where they were and that they were extremely violent. They were a nomadic tribe, which means they roam around depending on their need, in the rainforest of Ecuador. They were so violent that nobody wanted anything to do with them. So violent that nobody got close enough to them to know their real name. They were known as the Aucas, but their real name was Waodani. It would be like the boogey man’s real name was Walter but everybody avoided him and didn’t know that.

            They were so violent that it was unheard of to live long enough to be a grandparent. When scientists eventually were able to study them, they were able to go back five generations in their research and killings and revenge killings were everywhere. Six out of every ten deaths were homicide. That is extremely high, when you realize that they had no hospitals, doctors, or basic medical supplies. A lack of basic healthcare should have resulted in six out of ten people dying.  Everyone had a story about how a loved one was killed, and how they got revenge by killing someone else. It was a part of their lives. In fact, they had a motto, “Spear and live, or be speared and die.”

            In 1937, the Dutch Shell Oil Company cleared out a landing strip and set up business to drill for oil. A few years later, they abandoned the project because too many people were getting killed by the Waodani. When they left, an opportunity arose for missionaries to use the landing strip as a base for flying in supplies, and missionaries. A plane had crashed and Nate Saint became the new pilot/ mechanic for the base. He talked a few others into joining him, and eventually he had his group that would change the world.

            Around this same time, a young Waodani women named Dayumae, escaped from her tribe when she saw a canoe with foreigners in it. She ran to them. They obviously were frightened of the Waodani tribe and raised their gun at her. She still ran to them. She got in their boat and they took her to a missionary base. She learned English, but the missionaries learned the Waodani language.

            One day when, Nate was flying Dayumae over the rainforest, she spotted a Waodani village. They marked it on their map and made plans to make contact. They adapted a plan that one of them came up with years earlier. When he was in school, he tied a pencil on the end of a string. He noticed that if he made wide circles, that the pencil also made wide circles. But if he made tight circles, the pencil would barely move. He even said, “Someday, I’m going to use this method to deliver supplies to missionaries.” They flew over the village with a bucket tied to a string, and slowly dropped it as they made tight circles. The Waodani took the gifts from the bucket. After a few weeks, they began to put gifts back into the bucket. After 13 weeks, they decided it was time to make contact. They found a sandbar in a river that they thought they could land on.

            They made contact with three Waodanis and set up camp. The initial contact went really well, until the next day when some of the tribe became very angry that one young man was walking alone with a young woman. The young man lied and said they had to be alone because they ran away from the foreigners who were trying to kill them. It wasn’t more than a few hours later that all five of the missionaries were dead.

            It seems like such a waste of life. Why would God send five of the brightest missionary minds to a remote part of the rainforest and have them killed within a day of making contact? All of them had wives, a few of them had children.

            Elizabeth Elliot, wife of Jim Elliot, was invited by her parents to come back home to the states, and they would help her raise her two children. She said it sounded good at first but she turned them down, because she was a missionary before this tragedy happened and she would be a missionary afterwards. So she went to a missionary medical clinic where Nate Saint’s sister Rachael was working. Around that time two more Waodani women showed up. Elizabeth and Rachael made quick friends with them. Eventually the Waodani women said that they wanted to return to their village and that they wanted Rachael, Elizabeth, and her family to come and live with them. Elizabeth asked, “Do you think they will spear me like they speared my husband?” The two women laughed and said, “Of course not! You are our friends.”

            Dayumae became the preacher and gathered everyone around her on Sundays to hear about God, and all throughout the week, Rachael was teaching Dayumae. In a few short years the village became a Christian village. The homicide rate was reduced by around 90%. One tribe decided to stop killing and revenge killing, and so the other tribe did as well. Revenge killings documented for five generations disappeared completely.

            Steve Saint, and Valerie Elliot, two children who lost their fathers, both had a strong connection to the Waodani. Steve said he felt an immediate bond because everyone in the tribe had lost someone close them. And Valerie, when she decided to get baptized, she wanted it to be significant, so she was baptized in the river where her father’s body was dumped, and standing on both sides of her were the men who killed him.

            Their entire village was changed by the power of the gospel. What would have happened if the missionaries, who had a gun but refused to shoot at the Waodanis because “They aren’t ready for heaven but we are.”? Could they have made peaceful contact after killing off a few of them? No. What would have happened if the families would have turned their backs on the tribe that killed their loved ones? They would have kept on killing each other and when they were all killed off, they would ultimately spend an eternity in hell, separated from God. But these men and women loved their enemies, they blessed those who cursed them, and did good to those who hurt them.         

            Who are your enemies? How can we love them? Well, we can pray for them—that they receive Christ and that they might be blessed. Here are three more ways we can love our enemy: 1) Respond to the harm done to us in a non-violent way, just as the missionaries responded to their loved ones being killed, by teaching them how to live according to Christ’s commandments. 2) We must completely and unconditionally forgive them for the wrongs they have committed. This is easy to say from the pulpit, but much harder to do if you were the one who was raped, abandoned, or had your family member murdered. 3) Serve them. Just as Jesus washed Judas’ feet after the last supper, we can serve them by providing for a need. We can give them food, clothing, shelter, money, and help them during a time of distress.

            But to be quite honest, loving your enemy is an impossible task if you do not have the Holy Spirit living inside of you. And the only way to have the Holy Spirit alive inside of you is to accept Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior.  

Turn the Other Cheek: Sermon on the Mount Series

Turn the Other Cheek

Sermon on the Mount Series:

Matt 5:38-42

            One of my favorite movies is The Last of the Mohicans, a movie about the French and Indian War. There is a scene where Nathaniel, the adopted son of the last living Mohican, walked bravely into the enemies camp with a Wampum belt held out to his side, which was a sign of peace. As soon as he was seen, he immediately started an uproar. People clamored to him, he was surrounded and yelled at in their native tongue. A man approached him, hit him and pushed him over, but Nathaniel calmly got up. Another man stood in front of him, blocked his way, and cut him with a knife. In pain, he moved forward. A third man clubbed him in the back of the head. This dropped him to his knees, while he grimaced in pain. All the while, he calmly walked forward, never raising his hands to defend himself or strike back. He was on a mission, and that mission could not be compromised.

            His mission was to rescue a British officer, and two daughters of a British general—one of whom was his girlfriend. Nathaniel knew that if him, his father, and his brother would to attack the camp all six of them would be killed. He had too much to lose if chose to fight back.

            There is an Old Testament law known in the Greek as, lex talionis, “the law of retaliation.” This law determined what amount of retribution an offender would have to endure if he harmed someone. Does anybody know what that law is? “An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.” Quite simply, if you knock someone’s tooth out, you have to endure your tooth being knocked out. If you cause someone to lose an eye, you will lose an eye.

            But as we have observed over the last few months as we studied Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, that He may not have changed the law, but He change how we apply the law. For instance, the law says not to murder, but Jesus said, if you hated someone murder has already begun in your heart. The law said do not commit adultery, but Jesus said if you look at someone with lust in your heart you have already committed adultery. Here we have an old law and a new application. The law states how you are allowed to retaliate, but let us see how Jesus said we should apply it.

            Matthew 5:38-42 ³⁸ “You have heard that it was said, ‘An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.’ ³⁹ But I tell you not to resist an evil person. But whoever slaps you on your right cheek, turn the other to him also. ⁴⁰ If anyone wants to sue you and take away your tunic, let him have your cloak also. ⁴¹ And whoever compels you to go one mile, go with him two. ⁴² Give to him who asks you, and from him who wants to borrow from you do not turn away.”   

            Quite clearly, Jesus laid out the situation: “Here is what you are allowed to do, but here is what I suggest you do; Here is what you are obligated to do, but here is what I suggest you do. These are just suggestions but, if you are going to called one of my followers, I’m going to have some expectations of you.”

            There are four mandates Jesus laid out for His followers.

1) Physical Attacks: Has anyone here everybody maliciously hit by someone? How did you react? Did you fight back? Did you turn the other cheek, and allow him or her to strike you again? What is gained if you fight back? What is gained if you don’t?

2) Legal Suits: Here is an example of what to do in a legal situation. A tunic was like a shirt, but a cloak was an outer garment like a coat, that could be used as a blanket. A man could take your tunic in a lawsuit but he could only keep your cloak until sundown. Jesus said if someone takes what he is legally allowed to take, give him what he is not legally allowed to take, too.

3) Government Demands: The Roman soldiers could make any citizen carry their heavy bags for exactly one mile, but not a step further. Every Jew of the day knew exactly how far one mile was. Jesus again said do more, go farther than what you are obligated to do and go.

4) Financial Requests: Give to those who ask.

            But let us look more closely, at the physical attacks. There’s more than one way to be attacked. You can be physically attacked, verbally attacked, and emotionally attacked. Just like in the scene from The Last of the Mohicans, there’s a story in the Bible of a woman who was attacked four different times, but the mission was to important for her to fight back. She had to turn the other cheek.

            Matt 15:21-28 “Then Jesus went out from there and departed to the region of Tyre and Sidon. ²² And behold, a woman of Canaan came from that region and cried out to Him, saying, “Have mercy on me, O Lord, Son of David! My daughter is severely demon-possessed.”
²³ But He answered her not a word.
And His disciples came and urged Him, saying, “Send her away, for she cries out after us.”
²⁴ But He answered and said, “I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
²⁵ Then she came and worshiped Him, saying, “Lord, help me!”
²⁶ But He answered and said, “It is not good to take the children’s bread and throw it to the little dogs.”
²⁷ And she said, “Yes, Lord, yet even the little dogs eat the crumbs which fall from their masters’ table.”
²⁸ Then Jesus answered and said to her, “O woman, great is your faith! Let it be to you as you desire.” And her daughter was healed from that very hour.”

            She was attacked when they ignored her, wanted her sent away, put her down because of her nationality, and called her a dog. What would she have gained if she fought back? What would she have lost?

What's in a Name?

What’s in a Name?

            My name is Adam and after doing a little bit of research, I found that my name means, “Mankind.” Pretty boring, unless you are talking about the wrestler. My wife Rebekah, on the other hand, her name means, “Bound, Trap, or Snare.” The name implies that she is so beautiful that she will be a snare or a trap for her man. Carrie’s name means “melody,” or “song.” Juliette’s name means “soft haired.” And finally, there’s Caleb. Caleb means, “faithful,” or “bold.” It comes from the Hebrew word for dog. Dogs are awesome now. They are part of or families, but back then they were scavengers. Whoever named the Biblical character Caleb was not doing him a favor. It’s almost like that song made famous by Johnny Cash, “A Boy Named Sue.”

            What’s the name of that guy I talk about every week? That’s right Jesus. I talk about Him every week. God help me if I don’t. Jesus’ name is very important. There was an old woman who lived in Alaska. A missionary visited her and told her about Jesus when she was about 90. She was illiterate, but asked that man to teach her how to spell the name of Jesus. When he came back to visit her, she had written the name of Jesus on everything she owned—tabletops, countertops, oatmeal containers, scrap paper, everything. She couldn’t stop writing the name of Jesus.

            The Bible is pretty clear about its importance, too. In Acts 4:12 it says, “for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” And later in Philippians 2:9-10 “Therefore, God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

            So let us start with His name. Jesus Christ. Jesus is His first name. Christ is not His last name. And His middle initial is not “H.” Jesus’ earthly father was named Joseph. Both Jesus and Joseph’s name mean “God will help.” What a perfect name. When we celebrate Christmas, we are celebrating the fact that God, bankrupted heaven and took on flesh to save humanity from its sin. “God will help.” God did help.

            So if Jesus is His first name, what is “Christ”? Christ is His title. It’s like Pastor Brian. Brian is his name. Pastor is his title. Christ comes from the Greek work cristo, which means “anointed one.” Anointed means “dedicated to the service of God.” Generally, there would be a service or a ceremony where a priest would rub oil on a person’s forehead and dedicate them. Jesus—God will help, and Christ--He was dedicated to God’s service.

            When I was a kid, I would watch Charlie Brown’s Christmas Special, other school and church plays, and I would listen to preachers tell the Christmas story and they would always quote this prophetic verse from the Old Testament. Isaiah 7:14, “Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a Son, and shall call His name Immanuel.” Immanuel means “God with us.” I used to get so confused, why didn’t they name Jesus “Immanuel”? Just because He would be called Immanuel (which He was literally God with us) doesn’t mean He had to be named that. I’ve been called many things in my life, but that doesn’t mean that any of those should be my name. I’ve been called, “awesome,” “amazing,” “super cool,” but none of those are my name. The Dallas Cowboys, as much as I disagree with it are called what? “America’s Team.” Green Bay, Wisconsin is called “Title Town” but they haven’t officially changed the name, and most likely never will. There’s a difference between being named and being called.

            We could look a few chapters later in Isaiah to see a few more names that our Lord will be called. Isaiah 9:6-7, “For unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given; (What’s the difference between a Child and a Son? Child speaks of His humanity, Son speaks of His divinity) and the government will be upon His shoulder. And His name will be called Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Prince of Peace.” That’s the Jesus we can get with, right? Wonderful, Counselor, Mighty God, Prince of Peace, taking care of the government for us? We can move deeper into Isaiah and read all about how God would redeem His people and give us all kind of warm feelings inside, but lets talk about something that doesn’t give us warm feelings. Let’s read a passage that the High Priests in Jewish synagogues have removed from their yearly calendar for readings. The reason they removed it from their reading schedule is because it obviously pointed to one person, and they didn’t want to deal with that reality. In fact, there was a young Jewish man that talked his father into letting him attend a Christian college. Part of his required classes was to take Biblical classes. He was required to read Isaiah. When he read Isaiah 53, he was sure that the Christians wrote their own version of that passage, and went and looked it up in his Jewish version of the Old Testament. It was exactly the same. He then had to come to a decision. Would he ignore what he found? Or would he embrace it? He had to embrace it. That young man is Jay Sekulow, founder of American Center for Law and Justice, one of the principle opponents to the ACLU.

Let’s look at Is 52:14, “Just as many were astonished at you, so His visage (appearance) was marred more than any man, and His form more than the sons of men.” Isaiah 53

Who has believed our report?
      And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?
       ² For He shall grow up before Him as a tender plant,
      And as a root out of dry ground.
      He has no form or comeliness;
      And when we see Him,
      There is no beauty that we should desire Him.
       ³ He is despised and rejected by men,
      A Man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.
      And we hid, as it were, our faces from Him;
      He was despised, and we did not esteem Him.
       ⁴ Surely He has borne our griefs
      And carried our sorrows;
      Yet we esteemed Him stricken,
      Smitten by God, and afflicted.
       ⁵ But He was wounded for our transgressions,
      He was bruised for our iniquities;
      The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,
      And by His stripes we are healed.
       ⁶ All we like sheep have gone astray;
      We have turned, every one, to his own way;
      And the LORD has laid on Him the iniquity of us all.
       ⁷ He was oppressed and He was afflicted,
      Yet He opened not His mouth;
      He was led as a lamb to the slaughter,
      And as a sheep before its shearers is silent,
      So He opened not His mouth.
       ⁸ He was taken from prison and from judgment,
      And who will declare His generation?
      For He was cut off from the land of the living;
      For the transgressions of My people He was stricken.
       ⁹ And they^[a] made His grave with the wicked—
      But with the rich at His death,
      Because He had done no violence,
      Nor was any deceit in His mouth.
       ¹⁰ Yet it pleased the LORD to bruise Him;
      He has put Him to grief.
      When You make His soul an offering for sin,
      He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days,
      And the pleasure of the LORD shall prosper in His hand.
       ¹¹ He shall see the labor of His soul,^[b]and be satisfied.
      By His knowledge My righteous Servant shall justify many,
      For He shall bear their iniquities.
       ¹² Therefore I will divide Him a portion with the great,
      And He shall divide the spoil with the strong,
      Because He poured out His soul unto death,
      And He was numbered with the transgressors,
      And He bore the sin of many,
      And made intercession for the transgressors.

            I believe we are all here for a specific reason. I believe we were all born for a specific purpose. Nobody has ever been born by mistake. God knew you, made plans for you, and formed you. We may not know what our purpose in this life is, but God does. And as weird as it may seem, we celebrate the birth of a little baby boy, who was born to die. He was born to be humiliated, tortured, and eventually killed to take away our sins.

            We talked about the name of Jesus, and what He would be called, but one question remains, what are you going to call Him? Good teacher? Prophet? Lunatic? Some guy who died a long time ago? Savior? Lord? Jesus asked Peter 2000 years ago, “Who do you say I am?”

Marriage is Sacred and Binding

Marriage is Binding

Matthew 5:31-32

            --Have a drawing and give out a bunch of worthless certificates. i.e. “Free hot dog at Pelican Park,” “Good for one Lamborghini,” “Good for a house”

            I can give out any certificate for anything I want, but unless the person, or corporation that has to honor that certificate believes it to be valid, then the certificate is only worth as much as the paper it is printed on, which isn’t much because it has already been printed on. There was a belief in the Old Testament times that if you wanted a divorce, you could write out a certificate and give it to your wife and that would be that. The Pharisees took what started out as a way of protecting women and turned it into a belief that God Himself approved of such divorces.

            Let’s look at a passage that shows how the Pharisees believed these certificates of divorce were approved by God and how they tried to test Jesus on the legitimacy of them. Matthew 19:3-9, “³Some Pharisees came to him to test him. They asked, "Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any and every reason?"

            ⁴"Haven't you read," he replied, "that at the beginning the Creator 'made them male and female,'^{[a] 5}and said, 'For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one flesh'^[b]? ⁶So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has joined together, let man not separate."

            ⁷"Why then," they asked, "did Moses command that a man give his wife a certificate of divorce and send her away?"

            ⁸Jesus replied, "Moses permitted [Notice difference between “command” and “permitted”] you to divorce your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the beginning. ⁹I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, and marries another woman commits adultery."

            The only reason that Jesus mentioned where divorce was permitted was adultery. The greek work used for adultery is Porneia, which is where we get the word pornography. In short, it implies all forms of sexual immorality, including what we talked about the last two weeks, namely lust being the same as adultery. But there were other grounds for divorce mentioned in the Old Testament. This had to do with polygamy and how a wife should be treated. In Exodus 21:10-11 it says, “If he takes another wife, he shall not diminish her food, her clothing, and her marriage rights. If he does not do these three for her, then she shall go out free, without paying money.” I believe if a spouse is abused, neglected, or abandoned they have a Biblical reason for divorce.

            The Pharisees idea of a certificate came from Deuteronomy 24:1, “If a man marries a woman who becomes displeasing to him because he finds something indecent about her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, gives it to her and sends her from his house….” But typical of the Pharisees, they took a small idea, meant as an allowance to be used in rare occasions, and turned it into a huge idea to be used whenever. Now, according to the Pharisees a man can divorce his wife for any reason as long as he gives her a certificate of divorce, which would allow her to remarry. There is historic evidence of Jewish men divorcing their wives for extremely ridiculous things. For example, a man could divorce his wife for burning his food, using too much salt in his food, and for saying insulting things about his mother.

            But once again Jesus saw through the trap, turned the Pharisees’ question on its head, made them look foolish, and used it as a teaching point. The Pharisees knew what Jesus’ views on divorce were and wanted him to publicly disagree with what Moses had written, which would have been a big issue to the Jewish culture. But Jesus didn’t disagree with what Moses had written, He disagreed with how the Pharisees interpreted and applied the teaching.

            Jesus believed that marriage was sacred and binding. If we look at our next passage in the Sermon on the Mount, which is Matt 5:31-32, Jesus said, “It has been said, 'Anyone who divorces his wife must give her a certificate of divorce.'^{[a] 32}But I tell you that anyone who divorces his wife, except for marital unfaithfulness, causes her to become an adulteress, and anyone who marries the divorced woman commits adultery.” The NKJV starts out with, “Furthermore, it has been said….” Jesus’ last two teachings started out with “It has been said….” This is the third in the series of teachings that Jesus was telling them that what they thought they knew was wrong. It is like what happened when people first heard someone argue that the world was round, or that it revolved around the sun instead of the sun revolving around the earth. It challenged the way they thought, and made them extremely uncomfortable. And the religious establishment treated Jesus the same way they would treat Copernicus and Galileo 1500 years later. Galileo was found guilty of heresy, or holding a belief contrary to the established church’s beliefs, which at the time was punishable by death. And Copernicus waited until he was dead to have his book released that contained his theory.   

            The certificates that Jewish men were giving their wives were as worthless as the certificates I gave out today. In God’s eyes, except in cases of sexual immorality, abuse, or neglect, the couple was still married, certificate or not. In fact, Jesus said that if a man gave his wife one of those worthless certificates of divorce and she re-married, he caused her and her new husband both to commit adultery.

            Marriage is serious business. It takes a lot of work and effort. I remember in college there was a married couple who were a couple of years older than me. They were both Christians. We were talking one day and he said, “Marriage is hard work.” I remember as if it were yesterday thinking, “How hard could it be?” What do you have to do to have a birthday? You have to stay alive. What do you have to do to have an anniversary? You have to work. The institution of marriage should not be taken lightly and it will take commitment, not only commitment to each other but commitment to Christ. Rick, from Rick and Bubba, talked about his one step plan for a successful marriage—you have to have Jesus Christ as your lord and savior. Triangle illustration. Having Christ in your life will help you face whatever problem that is in your life. That goes for married couples and for singles. Jesus is the answer to whatever problem you are facing. 

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It Starts in the Heart, pt II (Matt 5:27-30)

It Starts in the Heart, pt. II

Matthew 5:27-30

            We are continuing our journey through the Sermon on the Mount, where we have the nerve to ask, “Can anyone live out the Sermon on the Mount in today’s world?” The Sermon on the Mount is:

            -Jesus’ longest, sustained teaching

            -Three chapters long

            -109 verses

            -2400+ words give or take.

We are finished looking at the first 26 verses and are now moving into, what I personally feel is the hardest teaching in the Bible.

            There may be a few people out there who may be like me. I was an athlete through college and into my post-graduate studies. I have gone through many hard workouts from 7^th grade when I started to run through Seminary where I trained with other college programs. I never seemed to mind the hard workouts. Sometimes, I even looked forward to them because I knew they were going to do two things: 1) Challenge me—if the coach wasn’t challenging me with the workouts then it meant he didn’t believe in me; 2) Make me a stronger runner—which is why I trained so hard in the first place. I remember in HS doing 32 repeat 400’s at race pace for a 5K, on the track, which I always found boring. That’s eight miles for anyone doing the math. I had an epiphany that day. An epiphany is a sudden insight into something. I thought, “If I die and go to hell, I don’t want to run repeat 400’s for all of eternity. Maybe I should get right with God.” I remember running speed workouts in the dead of summer, all by myself. I remember working outside in sub-freezing temperatures on Christmas break until it was too cold to work and then went home and ran for 10-15 miles. I wanted to be the best and working hard was something that I looked forward to.

            But when I hear a preacher say, “This is one of the hardest things you’ll ever do,” I don’t look forward to it. It’s one thing to endure a workout. It’s something completely different to endure a trial. A workout has a beginning and an end. The trials that God allows you to go through have a beginning, but you may not know when it started. And it has an end, but you may not see it in this lifetime. But the worse part about it is the fact that you can’t get away from yourself. If you mess up a play, or can’t finish a workout, you may feel bad about it for a few minutes but eventually shake it off and move on. But if God has you going through a spiritual workout and you mess up, good luck sleeping that night. There have been times when I messed up a spiritual challenge and God took me to the woodshed. Is there anyone else here, that messed something up in their spiritual walk, maybe you were the only person that knew about it, and God took you to the cleaners? If He has, then that is a good thing. Proverbs 3:11-12 says,

My son, do not despise the LORD's discipline
       and do not resent his rebuke,

¹² because the LORD disciplines those he loves,
       as a father ^[a] the son he delights in.

We are going to talk about something today that will make a lot of you feel like failures. Maybe God has rebuked you. Let not your heart be troubled! God rebukes the ones He loves.          

Last week we studied what I believe to be one of the hardest teachings in the Bible, which was Jesus’ teaching that it was not enough not to murder someone, because even if you hated a person you were in danger of facing the same punishment as if you did murder them. This passage is very similar. Matthew 5:27-30, “You have heard that it was said, 'Do not commit adultery.' ²⁸But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. ²⁹If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to be thrown into hell. ³⁰And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to lose one part of your body than for your whole body to go into hell.”

            This passage, just like last week’s, is designed to show you as a failure. No one can perfectly fulfill Jesus’ commandment. Everyone who listened to Jesus teach this passage that day who were feeling pretty good about themselves and their righteousness, suddenly felt pretty bad about themselves. Once again Jesus was saying, “It’s not enough to just not commit adultery. You have to take it to the next level. If you even look at someone with impure thoughts, you’ve already committed adultery with her in your heart. On a side note, there was a scientific study that showed the chemicals released in the brain after viewing pornography were the same chemicals released after having sex. So Jesus was scientifically and spiritually correct when He said, “You’ve already committed adultery in your heart.” According to your brain, you had sex with that person. The Greek word for “heart” is kardia, which means not only the organ, but it also stood for the center of man’s entire mental and moral activities.

            How many of you have ever watched Wipeout? How many of you watch it because you like watching highly successful members of society race through the obstacle course with cat-like reflexes and amazing precision? How many of you watch it because you like to watch “good’uns” face planting into immovable objects? That’s what I watch it for, that and the witty and sarcastic commentary. I’m old school. I watched that show on Spike TV when it was the Japanese game show with the English over-dubbing. I like watching the people fail. The worse they fail, the harder I laugh. I have to muffle my laughter or Rebekah with think I’m a mean person. And I can’t be alone in this because they show 50 minutes of people face planting and 1 minute of people succeeding.

I like watching them fail because I don’t know them. If it was a loved one or someone I knew, I would be cheering for them and praying that they would make it through the obstacle course unharmed and with the fastest time. That’s the same way God is with us. He loves us and believe it or not, wants to see us win, not face plant into the Big Balls. He loves us, He gives us direction and guidance. It is like if the contestants each had a coach that was willing to train them on how to get through the obstacle course. That’s what He wants to do for us.

            Proverbs 5:21 describes God’s desire to be our coach in this obstacle course we call life. It says, “For a man’s way is in full view of the LORD, and He examines all his paths.” God can see our entire journey and knows which steps we should take and which steps we should avoid. If we think about Wipeout, it is like He has all of our jumps timed out for us. All we have to do is listen to Him. But that’s the problem. Two verses later in 5:23 it reads, “He shall die for lack of instruction, and in the greatness of his folly he shall go astray.” We are too prideful to listen to Him, and we suffer for it.

            In this passage, Proverbs 5, Solomon, the wisest man to ever walk the face of the earth, was trying to pass his wisdom down to his sons about the dangers of adultery. Let’s look at what he advises.

 ¹ My son, pay attention to my wisdom,
       listen well to my words of insight,

 ² that you may maintain discretion
       and your lips may preserve knowledge.

 ³ For the lips of an adulteress drip honey,
       and her speech is smoother than oil;

 ⁴ but in the end she is bitter as gall,
       sharp as a double-edged sword.

 ⁵ Her feet go down to death;
       her steps lead straight to the grave. ^[a]

 ⁶ She gives no thought to the way of life;
       her paths are crooked, but she knows it not.

 ⁷ Now then, my sons, listen to me;
       do not turn aside from what I say.

 ⁸ Keep to a path far from her,
       do not go near the door of her house,

 ⁹ lest you give your best strength to others
       and your years to one who is cruel,

 ¹⁰ lest strangers feast on your wealth
       and your toil enrich another man's house.

 ¹¹ At the end of your life you will groan,
       when your flesh and body are spent.

 ¹² You will say, "How I hated discipline!
       How my heart spurned correction!

 ¹³ I would not obey my teachers
       or listen to my instructors.

 ¹⁴ I have come to the brink of utter ruin
       in the midst of the whole assembly."

 ¹⁵ Drink water from your own cistern,
       running water from your own well.

 ¹⁶ Should your springs overflow in the streets,
       your streams of water in the public squares?

 ¹⁷ Let them be yours alone,
       never to be shared with strangers.

 ¹⁸ May your fountain be blessed,
       and may you rejoice in the wife of your youth.

 ¹⁹ A loving doe, a graceful deer—
       may her breasts satisfy you always,
       may you ever be captivated by her love.

 ²⁰ Why be captivated, my son, by an adulteress?
       Why embrace the bosom of another man's wife?

 ²¹ For a man's ways are in full view of the LORD,
       and he examines all his paths.

 ²² The evil deeds of a wicked man ensnare him;
       the cords of his sin hold him fast.

 ²³ He will die for lack of discipline,
       led astray by his own great folly.

            Solomon’s teaching is pretty wise and pretty powerful even today. Have you ever seen a road sign that warned against a curvy road ahead? This is what Solomon is doing for his sons, and is what God is doing for us, too. It’s like He’s saying, “There is some trouble up ahead. You need to slow down to prepare for it.” I’m telling you there is some trouble up ahead and you need to slow down to prepare for it.

            Jesus said if we look at a woman with lust, we have already committed adultery in our hearts. So is the problem with looking, or with lusting? The problem is with lusting, but looking leads to lusting. According to scientific studies, a person using pornography can get addicted to those same chemicals that we spoke about earlier, and that addiction is even harder to break than the addiction to heroin. If all of you had access to heroin on a minute by minute basis throughout your day, I would be shouting warnings against the dangers of heroin all day every day to you. But you do have access to pornography anywhere and everywhere. People may feel pornography is a victimless pursuit but it is not. It destroys lives. It destroys the lives of people producing it, using it, as well as the innocent family members of the person engaged in it. And it all begins with lust. Jesus said it would have been better if we would have just gouged our eye out. After the service today, we will have an eye gouging ceremony for anyone who wants to participate.

            What separates pornography from drugs, alcohol, and tobacco addiction is that when you see an image, that image, good, positive, or neutral, is in your brain forever. That isn’t necessarily the case with the other three. So when you’re sitting in math class and your brain recalls an image you’ve seen at some point in your life, you now have to deal with it. Last week I told you that you can’t help if a bird lands on your head but you don’t have to let it build a nest in your hair. The same holds true for these thoughts, too. Think about something else. It’s as easy and as hard as that.

Secondly, you can be watching TV, minding your own business and a seductive commercial comes on. You didn’t ask for it. You weren’t seeking it. But there it is and you have to deal with it. Imagine a recovering alcoholic watching a ball game, and then a person jumps out of the television, and slams a beer down their throat. They weren’t asking for it. They weren’t seeking it. So what do you do when that tempting vision comes on the TV, or you see an ad in a magazine, or a billboard? You look away, and as for me and my family we won’t spend our money on their businesses until they get a marketing representative with some moral fiber.

             There are several things that make pornography wrong. 1) It glamorizes sin. 2) It causes the person using it to lust, (which is sin) and then moves them further and further down a path of destruction as they have to seek out different ways to maintain that chemical high. 3). Pornography reduces human beings to sexual items to be bought, sold, used and discarded.

 Johnny Hunt, former president of the Southern Baptist Convention, said about pornography, “If you look at something that isn’t real, as if it was real, it makes what is real appear not real.” In other words, let’s say you never seen what a horse looks like and so with my limited drawing abilities I draw a picture of a horse and show you. You may look at my picture all day, everyday, in fact the longer you look at my picture the more convinced you are that my horse must be an exact copy of what a real horse looks like. The problem is when you get around to actually seeing what a real horse looks like you’ll have trouble believing it to be real because all you have to compare it with is my picture. What do you think a lifetime of looking at pornography will do to you when you do eventually get married? Will it affect your relationship with your spouse? Yes, because you will be comparing what is real to what isn’t real. Now imagine inserting pornography into a young person’s mind that doesn’t know what’s real and what’s not real. The earlier a young person is exposed to pornography the more normal they are going to think it is. They are going to think it’s as normal as the sun rising in the east and setting in the west.

So what if you have been looking at what is not real as if it was real, what do you do now? The first thing you have to do is stop! You are dealing with a sin issue and a chemical addiction, so it will take more than will power and behavior modification. You are going to need God’s help to get you through this. Anyone who has decided to quit and failed. Decided to quit again and failed will tell you it takes more than will power.

Here are some practical suggestions to help you:

1) First and foremost, you need to pray to God, confess your sins (Confess means to agree with God. Can you agree with God on how He feels about pornography?) and ask for His forgiveness. 1 John 1:9

2)  You need to find someone that you can trust that will hold you accountable in your attempt to walk free from your addiction. This includes your parents. You were man or woman enough to get into pornography. Will you be man or woman enough to come clean?

3)  Serious behavior modification. Don’t get on the internet when there is no one else around. Don’t go to certain websites or watch television programs that might trigger something in you. Change your friends. Change the music you listen to.  Everything that you put into your brain is there forever. You can’t get rid of it, but you can dilute it. Water it down so it won’t be as poisonous.

4) Detox your brain. You have to change your thoughts or they’ll destroy your attempts.

            Whether you personally struggle with pornography or not, you will be affected by it at some point in your life. It is a sin problem and there is only one cure for a sin problem, and that is Jesus Christ….

             

          

    

It Starts in the Heart, pt I (Matt 5:21-26)

It Starts in the Heart

Matthew 5:21-26

            There was one time when I was a little kid that I made myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Apparently, I had been yelled at repeatedly by my parents to put everything away when I was done. I must have thought that I was being treated unfairly because after this particular sandwich, I walked into the living room and with the hint of being a smartaleck, I began to describe to my mother in painstaking details about how I made my sandwich. I got out the plate. I got out the bread. I took two pieces of bread out. I put the bread away. I got out the peanut butter (because you always put peanut butter on first). I put the peanut butter on the bread. I put the peanut butter away. I put the knife in the sink. I got out the jelly. I put the jelly on the bread. I put the spoon away. When I was finished describing this, my mother said, “Good.” She completely missed my point. So I said it again, stressing this time about how I put everything away individually when I was finished with it. Then she said, “That’s good.” I looked at her dumbfounded and angrily walked back into the kitchen. You know I must have been really upset because that story was from like 25 years ago.

            I thought I was being way over the top in my actions, but to my parents I was just doing what I was supposed to do. You hear people say every once in a while, especially adult men, “I’m a good guy. I pay my bills. I take care of my kids. I’ve never been arrested.” I’m never really sure what to say to that. You are supposed to pay your bills, and take care of your kids. And almost everybody I know has never been arrested. So if you’re looking for extra credit points with me, you’re not getting any. Extra credit comes in when you go above and beyond what you are supposed to do.

            Now don’t get me wrong—the world functions when people do what they’re supposed to do. But sometimes we need to take things to the next level. What if that guy that pays his bills, takes care of his kids, and has never been arrested, begins to save up his money and is able to bless other people? What if he not only provides for the basic needs of his kids but invests his life in them? What if instead of just avoiding doing illegal things he helped to make his community better? What if he took his efforts to the next level?

            Sometimes going to the next level can be very humbling. Just watch how good “star” college athletes do in the NFL. Look at some of the Heisman Trophy winners and how good they’re doing in the NFL. Some of them barely make the team, or ride the bench their entire career. Tim Tebow, arguably one of the greatest collegiate football players and Heisman Trophy winner just got dropped to third string and probably won’t play all year unless something bad happens. Colt McCoy, Heisman candidate for the last couple of years, holds the record for most yards thrown, (or something like that) almost got cut by the Browns this year.

            Hollywood is filled with actors and actresses who are working at restaurants and bars until they get their big break. They left home with dreams of making it big, but for one reason or another were not able to get to the next level. Nashville is the same with country musicians. Sometimes taking it to the next level is very difficult.

            I like to play guitar and I know I could be much better but in order for me to get to that next level, I know I have to work at it really hard. What is it for you? What are you doing, or what can you do that you could take to the next level? Maybe it is school work. Maybe it is soccer. Maybe it is something completely different. In the passage we’re going to look at tonight, Jesus is asking us to take our relationships with other people and the way we think to the next level.

            We are continuing our trek through the Sermon on the Mount, asking the question, “Can anyone live out the Sermon on the Mount in today’s world?” We, of course can’t answer that question if we don’t know what’s in the Sermon on the Mount.

            Today’s passage is from Matt. 5:21-26, “You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, 'Do not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.' ²²But I tell you that anyone who is angry with his brother will be subject to judgment. Again, anyone who says to his brother, 'Raca,' is answerable to the Sanhedrin. But anyone who says, 'You fool!' will be in danger of the fire of hell. ²³"Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother has something against you, ²⁴leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to your brother; then come and offer your gift. ²⁵"Settle matters quickly with your adversary who is taking you to court. Do it while you are still with him on the way, or he may hand you over to the judge, and the judge may hand you over to the officer, and you may be thrown into prison. ²⁶I tell you the truth, you will not get out until you have paid the last penny.”

            In that one thirty second passage from His sermon, Jesus turned everyone who thought they were doing pretty good to feeling pretty lousy about themselves. Jesus was basically saying to them that it is not enough to simply not murder anybody. Why? Because 99.9% of us will never murder anyone or even meet someone who has murdered someone. Again don’t get me wrong, not murdering people is good, but is it enough? Imagine coming to church on Sunday, “Hey Pastor Brian. How’s the day going?” “Well I haven’t murdered anyone.” Is that a standard you want your pastor to strive for? I want my pastor to have a higher standard than that. “Adam, as youth pastor at Ferris Hill, what are your goals?” “Well, I’d like to not murder anyone.” Jesus wants His followers, the ones that will be called by His name, and the ones that will carry on His reputation to have a higher standard.

            Remember there were two ruling classes in Israel during Jesus’ time. These two classes both sought control over their government in much the same way as the Democrats and Republicans do today. They were the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The Pharisees were passionate about the keeping the law. So much so, they made up other laws to make sure the Ten Commandments weren’t broken. They eventually created 1,000’s of other rules and regulations which they followed wholeheartedly, and persecuted those who didn’t have the same zeal as they did.

One of the rules they had, which was punishable by a fine and imprisonment was saying, “Raca” to someone else. Raca means “empty head” in English. Jesus was telling them, “Hey, if you call someone an empty head, you might get thrown in jail, but I’m telling you if you so much as even call someone a fool you are in danger of getting thrown in hell.” Jesus equated “hate” with “murder.” If you hate someone, it is like you are murdering someone.

Have you ever had a teacher, or even a parent, threaten to punish you for something and you have to stop and think, “Are they serious? Or are they just bluffing?” How many of you think Jesus was joking or bluffing in this passage? OK, just in case there was someone to chicken to raise their hand, Jesus said later in Matt. 12:36, “But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken.”

That was Jesus’ first point of the passage: Murder begins in the heart. His second point dealt with conflict resolution. Paul wrote in Romans 12:18, “If it is possible, as much as it depends on you, live peaceably with all men.” Sometimes it is just not in your control to live in peace. Sometimes people are just jerks and don’t want to live in peace. That’s why there’s “likes—to—fight—guy.” But Jesus is saying here, “Do your part to resolve the conflict. Stop whatever you are doing and try to make things right.”

An old man once angrily returned a set of car tires to Home Depot that was not up to his standards. He did not have a receipt but the manager refunded the man his money. What makes this story interesting is that Home Depot never has and probably never will sell care tires. The man returned the tires to the wrong store, but desiring good customer service, the manager resolved the conflict, as much as it depended on him.

This is not to say that we should let people walk all over us, or even that we can never be angry. Remember Jesus became angry, thrashed at people with a whip, and threw tables at them. This is commonly referred to as righteous indignation. Eph. 4:26, “Be angry and do not sin.” But what if we all resolved our conflicts rather than letting them fester and boil inside of us? What if we learned to love each other for being a child of God, someone created in His image rather than hating them? What would Milton High School look like? Kings Middle? Hobbs Middle? Would there be less strife?

This is one of the hardest teachings Jesus had. It’s hard not to be angry at times with even your closest friends let alone your worst enemy. So how can we play this out in our lives? Because I don’t think Jesus would have asked us to do something that was impossible.

-Get to know the person. Try to see things from their perspective, or maybe understand how they were raised differently than you.

-Find nice things to say about them rather than a few bad things.

-Pray for them. It’s hard to hate someone you’re praying for.

-In conflict resolution figure out what’s important and what’s not.

-Humble yourself. Perhaps you’re wrong.

-Figure out what will lead to the greater good.