Close To His House, Far From His Heart

Well, a very good morning to the church family. I hope you're having a great weekend. It's a joy to be with you on this beautiful, bright, sunny, little cool February day. If you have your Bible, we'd invite you to take it out to 1 John chapter 4. We'll be there in just a minute, 1 John chapter 4. And man, it's been both a heavy and a joyful week, a heavy side because of the passing of our dear friend, Chris Green, a brother here who helped found Redland Hills Church. He was one of our first members who went to be with the Lord on Wednesday night. And so tonight I had to, yeah, he's with Jesus and we're grateful for that. Tonight I head to Tennessee to do his funeral tomorrow, so I'd be prayerful for his family. I know a lot of you can't get up there because of the distance, and so that will be on Facebook live tomorrow on Chris's Facebook page and prayer for Colton, his son, whom he leaves behind. On the other side, it's also been incredibly joyful for me at the same time because we have a new staff member coming on board. I'd like to introduce you to Tony Mest, who is going to be our new pastor for leadership and ministry development. He will start with us March 2nd. He preached last Sunday. It's that guy that was here. So I am overjoyed to welcome Tony. He's going to be an incredible addition to our staff team and fit in so beautifully. Tony is currently the teaching and dream team pastor at Journey Church in Prattville. And his wife, Laura, their three kids, who are 11, 6, and 4, will be joining us as well. And so can't wait for you to see him again. If you didn't get a chance to meet him last week, make sure you welcome him on March 2nd. And for all of our Journey folks that are like, who is this church over in Wetumpka today that are watching online, we are praying for you guys as well as you find your next pastor over there as well. Well, a lot of you, if you grew up, if you were around in the 80s, in the 70s and 80s,

you probably remember this guy, Jim Baker, along with his wife, Tammy Faye. They started a television program in 1974 called the PTL Club, short for Praise the Lord, a television ministry, which was on cable originally, and then became so popular, they actually moved to satellite channel and were being broadcast worldwide. And they gained enormous popularity, and even so, they built their own Christian theme park in South Carolina called Heritage USA that was four square miles, okay? Pretty gargantuan project. And at one point, their ministry was raising a million dollars a week through the TV. Now, that's a lot of money now. That was especially a lot of money in the 1980s. And if you know the story, of course, eventually the scandals began to break. And it came out publicly that Jim had paid off a lady with whom he had had a sexual encounter. And then Jim was arrested and charged with eight counts of mail fraud, 15 counts of wire fraud, and one count of conspiracy, for which he was convicted in court and given a 45-year prison sentence. and had to pay a $500,000 fine. Before he was paroled in July of 1994, after serving eight years of that sentence, he tells an interesting story about something that happened to him in prison. He says one day that he was cleaning toilets in prison and the prison guard came and got him and took him to kind of an interrogation or meeting room and he thought he was in trouble, that the guards, he didn't know what was going on and was really concerned. And he was sitting there for a few moments and the door opens and in walks Billy Graham into his room. And you can imagine, much to his startling surprise, Billy Graham coming to see him in prison.

And Jim tells the story that Billy Graham opened his arms and gave Jim Baker the biggest hug he could give and said, Jim, I love you. Now imagine in that moment what that did to this guy who had fallen so far and now find himself cleaning toilets in prison, to have one of the most amazing, respected men in the country and in the world come into his prison cell and say, I see you, I care about you, I love you. That, Jim says, was a transformative moment in his life. In fact, this is how Jim summarizes it. He says, he represented Jesus to me. For somebody whom the world said was fallen and would never preach again, what the world saw was discarded goods, but Billy Graham saw a person who needed love and redemption. And they didn't just do that in prison. When Jim was paroled, they invited him into their home in North Carolina and then even to church together with them and Ruth Graham asked him to sit next to her in church. Not just a statement of I love you, but actions backed up with, we don't wanna just keep you over to the side, we want you here beside me. That's an amazing kind of love, example of love, isn't it? And I think the church has to recover this kind of love that Jesus not only taught, but he modeled for us. I'm afraid in our modern form of Christianity, we have lost that kind of love for our fellow humans,

our neighbors, our brothers and sisters, for an unbelieving world around us. We've gotta put that kind of love that Jesus taught into practice. Not just talk a good game about love, but to be love to other people. More than just intellectual ideology about that God is love, which is true, but if the world doesn't see that love in action, it will never know that. It's gotta feel that from us. And so we gotta declare that with our actions to a world that's desperate for hope and looking for that kind of love and healing. And here's why. First John chapter four, verse 16. John says, God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God and God in them. This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment. In this world, we are like Jesus. Not just in the next world, where we experience our transformation and our resurrected selves. In this world, we're like him. Today. Because God is the inventor of that kind of love, not Hallmark. It's more than words on a page. God is the essence of what love is.

It's his nature and he has an endless supply to give. He doesn't just have a little bit, he doesn't get emotionally exhausted or worn out. We just sang about this endless love that God has for us. And John, the closest disciple to Jesus, instructs us that we've got to live in that love. Not just know it, not just believe it, but live in it, practice it. It's gotta be seen. And there's gotta be tangible evidence that that love is alive in me. So that the world doesn't have to. have to be guessing, what does that love look like? They see it in action. And so John reminds us that Jesus is the model for that, and that's what we're gonna be looking at over the next few weeks together. What does love in action look like when it is put into practice? And there's no greater example for us to look at than the ministry and life of Jesus. And we're gonna be asking ourselves this really important question, do I love like that? Do I? We're not looking at other people. You don't have to look around the room today, your spouse or anybody else. We're asking ourselves, I'm asking myself, do I love like that? And I know as far as I've come,

I still have a long way to go. And I wanna keep moving in that direction. I want us collectively to keep moving in that direction. Am I living in love? And if you call yourself a Christian, that isn't optional. It's not like I believe in Jesus and sometimes I love, and that's okay. It's not. We are followers of Jesus, and we're called to live in that kind of love in its fullest example to us. It's essential. So I wanna put some skin on it the next few weeks and give us some tools to challenge us to love better. So let's start with the problem. If God is love, and he's given us his love in the life and example of Jesus, and we're called to live out of that love, why isn't it easier for us? I don't know about you, it's hard, isn't it? To be the kind of love that Jesus modeled for us. And when you really study the love of Christ, it's kind of mind-blowing at how amazing he loved even the people that were against him. And it's the number one thing the church should be known for. But often we're known as judgmental and hypocritical. We can be known for what we're against rather than who we're for. Man, why is it such a struggle?

I don't think any of that catches God by surprise, by the way, that it's hard and it's a struggle for us. It's one of, in one of Jesus' most famous parables we've sung about, and Jason talked about a moment ago, is the parable of the prodigal son, where Jesus tells the story of a young man who decides to collect his father's inheritance early before his father had died, which is a way of saying, you're dead to me. He takes his inheritance, runs to a far country, squanders it in wild living, runs out of money and finds himself one day eating the same things that the pigs were eating, and reaches a point of brokenness and decides, I'm going back to my father's house. Maybe I can just be a servant there. And the text says that while the son was still a long ways off, the father had his eyes on the horizon waiting for the son to come. And the son receives, not a scolding by the father, but receives an embrace and a party, because my son is now home. And he's given a luxury welcome with the fattened calf and a robe and a ring as a symbol of the father's joy and amazing love that his son, who was lost, is now found. Now there's a part of that story that often we skip and we don't tell, and that's the part we're gonna focus on today.

Starting in Luke chapter 15 in verse 25. Same story, second part. Meanwhile, the older son was in the field, and when he came near the house, he heard music and dancing, and so he called one of the servants and asked him what was going on. "'Your brother has come,' he replied, "'and your father has killed the fattened calf "'because he has him back safe and sound.' And the older brother became angry and refused to go in. And so his father went out and pleaded with him. But he answered his father, "'Look, all these years I've been slaving for you, "'and I have never disobeyed your orders. "'You never gave me even a young goat "'so I could celebrate with my friends. "'But this son of yours who squandered your property "'with prostitutes comes home. "'You kill the fattened calf for him.' "'My son,' the father said, "'you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. "'But we had to celebrate and be glad "'because this brother of yours.'" was dead and is alive again he was lost and is now found so the older son is invited to the celebration but he was so bitter he couldn't even eat his steak dinner his brother's been restored and all he could think about was his own loyalty and quote goodness the father is showering love and the brother is seething with bitterness and anger now if anybody had the right to be angry it was the father who had been shamed who had gone through being ostracized by his

son but the father's heart is for his child and no celebration could express his joy at the restored relationship my son is home throw a party but the brother couldn't feel what the father felt he literally was so mad he skipped the party and the older brother reminds us that you can be in the father's house and be far from his heart on the inside of the house was music and dancing and celebration and joy and feasting a reflection of the father's heart my lost son is found but standing on the outside was bitterness and anger and resentment and the father even goes out to the bitter brother he doesn't even stay on the inside and be like he's just difficult let him do his thing right the father even goes to the bitter brother and ask him leave your resentment behind come and join me in my joy and in the redemption party and if we aren't careful we might also find ourselves standing on the outside of the party completely missing the heart of the father this happens when Christians turn up our noses and look down at people we stand on the outside of what God is doing on the inside it happens when the addict is made to believe the label on their life is their new identity rather than they are a son or a daughter of God it happens when Christians stand at a distance from the poor because we've decided they're lazy it happens when we condemn the prisoner that they got what they deserved but I'm a good person it happens when our churches look like exclusive country clubs rather than open spaces where broken and wounded people are celebrated and received it happens when the divorced person is made to feel like their second rate in a church happens when we focus on people's past and not their future it's the attitude of us and them and not only does the world hate that attitude God hates it too here's why self-righteousness blocks love the smug arrogance of the older brother caused him to be unable to love his younger brother back into the family his focus was on his own behavior that made him blind to the needs of his younger brother so he couldn't step into his pain nor his joy that's what self-righteousness does it alienates us from other people pushes them away says I don't want you in my life I have no need for you it resents when grace is given to other people self-righteousness

says I earned my place and then we can't and won't enter into their pain if we think that we're better than them but what if our hidden self-righteousness is a bigger issue than somebody else's open sinfulness The older brother is just as lost, isn't he? He just doesn't know it. And that, for Jesus, I think is the scarier thing. At least when you're in the bottom of the pig pen, you know where you're at. You know what you need. The older brother in the father's house did not realize how much he needed the father. Henry Nowen, one of my favorite writers, he was a Catholic priest who spent his life ministering to adults with special needs, living with them, writes this. "'In order to be of service to others, "'we have to die to them. "'That is, we have to give up measuring our meaning "'and value with the yardstick of others. "'To die to our neighbors means to stop judging them, "'to stop, to stop evaluating them, "'and thus become free to be compassionate. "'Compassion can never coexist with judgment "'because judgment creates distance, "'the distinction which really prevents us "'from being with the other.'" What a true statement. We are unable to love people and to be compassionate to them if we stand in judgment over them. If we think that we're better than them.

And because that's true, Jesus always calls out self-righteousness because it thwarts his mission. If the mission is to be the extension of God's love to the world, if we stand in self-righteousness, we defeat the very mission that we've been called to do. This parable itself, if you look at the beginning of the parable of the prodigal son in Luke chapter 15, is set in the context of Pharisees who were complaining about Jesus spending time with prostitutes and quote, sinners. And so Jesus uses the story to call out their superior attitude. In Luke 18, Jesus tells another story of two men who go to the temple to pray and one is desperate for God, broken man. The second man, in his prayers, God, I thank you, I'm not like that guy. And Jesus condemns the self-righteous prayer. Here's how the parable in Luke 18 starts. To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable. We could look at the seven woes in Matthew chapter 23, they're all about self-righteousness and hypocrisy and false judgment. The sinful woman who anointed Jesus in Luke chapter seven, the woman who was caught in adultery in John chapter eight, they all make the same point. You can't walk in the love of the Father and look down your nose at other people.

And here's what I love about the parable of the prodigal son and the way that the father goes to the older brother. The father will not compromise his love for all of his children to meet the demands of the self-righteous one. We've gotta be careful about that. You either adopt the heart of the father or you'll become like the very thing you despise in the other. Your self-righteousness makes you just as stinky as the younger brother's behavior. And so the church has got to reflect the heart of a party-throwing father who is excited that his child is back home. I used to struggle with this as a kid, growing up in church. When I was in high school, my youth minister one day was planning a mission trip for us high schooler kids. Was gonna take us to another state, do a VBS at another church. And I was signed up for the trip as some other folks. And my youth minister, one Wednesday night, heard me inviting another kid to go and heard me say something like, hey, I want you to go so we can hang out together so I don't have to be around so-and-so over there. The next day, I got a invitation to breakfast with my youth minister. And I had no idea he heard me,

but as an adult, I'm glad he did. So he takes me to Hardee's on Vaughan Road. That dates myself a little bit there. He repeated my words to me. me and said, you know, that attitude defeats the whole purpose of a mission trip, Wes. And that's not who we're going to be. So unless you change your heart, you can stay home. No compromise. And while I was humiliated in the moment, I'm so thankful for it now, because he was like the father coming out to talk to the older brother. I had a really rotten attitude. He was saying to me, don't stand outside in your bitterness and resentment. Come inside to the party and experience my love. And he changed the trajectory of my life and freed me to love people. And maybe the Lord needs to gently and lovingly confront some of us today to move away from our love-blocking self-righteousness. So here's a couple of leading indicators you might need a talk from the Father. Number one, do you use language that distances yourself from other people? Sometimes it's the us versus them or those people over there kind of language. Our language and the way that we refer to people matters. In the New Testament, it's most frequently addressed as the Jew-Gentile divide. Sometimes it was the Jews and Samaritans. They didn't associate with one another, which is why the disciples are astonished that Jesus is talking with a Samaritan woman at the well. In John chapter 4, they're stunned. He was bridging the gap between the alienation of these different people groups. And Paul is very clear, Jesus came to destroy the us versus them mentality. This is Ephesians chapter 2. For he himself, Jesus, he himself is our peace who has made the two groups one and has destroyed the barrier, the dividing wall of hostility by setting aside in his flesh

the law with its commands and regulations. His purpose in himself, one, was to make one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross by which he put to death their hostility. So what Paul is saying here is the cross levels the playing field across humanity. All humanity, all of us, myself, need salvation and reconciliation to God. And if you don't believe that, that all of us need it, just some people need it, but I'm a good person, then you won't ever move towards the other person in love to share what God has done in your life. You'll stand outside in arrogance and bitterness when God throws a party for them. The second question we could ask ourselves is, is there someone that you secretly struggle to see restored? If that person maybe that had wounded you or whether you know them personally or it's just a story that you know about, a person that's far away, but usually we feel that way about people who've wounded us personally. If that person walked in today into the room broken and repentant, seeking healing, would you be moved to compassion and love or standing in the back skeptical and jaded? We'll see how long this lasts. They just want attention. They haven't really changed. It's just a show. That's older brother language, by the way. We've got to repent of silent superiority. We must see ourselves accurately as a fellow son who also needs the restoration of the Father. And then we have to take a step towards that person. And if you can't, you'll miss the party that God is throwing and you won't reflect His heart. So what are a couple of things that we can do to fight against... the very human temptation to be self-righteous.

Well, first we can try inviting someone different or someone who's having a struggle in their life into your life rather than keeping folks at a distance. Notice in the parable the older brother defined his circle. You didn't give me a young goat so I could celebrate with my friends. So here's his little club over here that excluded the younger brother but the father's heart was for both of them. Ephesians 2 reminded us that Jesus came to break down the dividing wall of hostility. And when our heart doesn't reflect the father's heart we got to start practicing and pushing ourselves to fight against the flesh and that mentality that can easily creep in. We got to practice that. We need those kinds of relationships in our lives where people are different than us because if you only welcome people that talk like you, look like you, have the same economic status as you, have the same categories as you, then you are missing the bigness of the father's heart. And finally, I think we need to practice celebrating when people take a step towards the father. The church ought to be really good at throwing parties because Jesus not only talked about it, he went to a lot of them. Because he's spending time with people that want to hear the good news, that wanted to hear about the kingdom of God invading our space and Jesus embraced and welcomed and spent time with. And of course he tells that story as an example of a God that has an amazing heart, a party-throwing God. And so when we have people in our lives, in our church, who come to take a step towards that healing, who finally realize like, I don't want to keep living that way. That's not who I want to be anymore. We ought to be the people of love who embrace. We ought to be the first ones there,

the first one to hug, the first one to embrace. And when we do that, we help people see love in action. If you want to be that kind of church, say amen. Let's stand to our feet. Lord God, we thank you that you're a party-throwing God for broken sinners, that you welcome us, that you have moved heaven and earth to redeem us from our sin and from our death that we deserved, Lord. And you put a robe around us and you put a ring on our finger and you killed the fat and calf for us. And Lord, I pray that we would respond to that in the way that you desire, which is to share it and to be excited when other people experience the same thing, God. Keep us from self-righteousness that blocks your love flowing through us. Lord, may we repent for those of us who are struggling with self-righteous attitudes and looking down at others, God. Would you help us to see, as Ephesians reminds us, the level playing field that the cross makes happen. That none of us are any better, any worse. We all need the blood of Jesus to cover us and cleanse us. And we thank you for that reality in our life, for the amazing love that you have for us, God. May we be a church that displays that. And we pray this in Jesus' name, Amen.