Where Love Lives

witness the end of time witness the end of time the house today so good to have you with us today if you have your Bible would invite you to John chapter 13 today the gospel of John chapter 13 will be there in just a moment and I want to add my good morning and welcome to those of you who are new in the room and who are new online as well so grateful to have you watching wherever you're in the world especially in Brazil today so grateful for that I'm always fascinated by surveys about religion and America obvious what I do for a living so I like to follow what the statistics are saying and pay attention to things and so some recent statistics that came out especially about what non-christians think about Christians and so one of the first questions we could frame about church in America these days is how many people attend church on a regular basis so you'll see on this graph on the screen the statistics from 2024 say about 21% of Americans attend church weekly or very regularly then next you'll see 56% of people are seldom okay those are the folks that randomly show up at church every once in a while and then 31% of Americans never go to church at all when you dig down deeper and they ask the question well why is that why do people not have any interest in Christianity and Jesus in particular some other things get revealed and the number one thing is about overall trust or lack of trust we should say in institutions and they frame it this way first of all they say that people reject church because of political polarization tied to religion that they don't see religion as bringing people together they see it as pushing people apart from one another of course there are unfortunately institutional scandals that rock various churches sometimes those are well-known sometimes they just affect certain communities and those are always incredibly discouraging for work in the kingdom and then declining trust in institutions overall that people are just mistrusting or distrusting of the system if you will and then non- Christians are asked to describe what they think about Christians in general and you'll get some of the typical answers here these probably won't

surprise any of us is that they're considered judgmental hypocritical and even close-minded but what's interesting about this question in particular when the researchers ask them but do you know any Christians in your life like personally know them would you describe them and they say oh that person is kind and generous and sincere but when asked about Christians globally these are the stereotypes that are pervasive and so then the researchers ask another question like okay what would make church meaningful like someplace that you might want to be a part of and to to let your life be a part of and this is what they said well first of all if a church helped people in need I would want to be a part of that number two if a church practices what it preaches that would be very appealing to me number three if a church provided hope and meaning in a seemingly meaningless world and a hopeless world that we'd live in I'd want to be a part of that and number four that Christians were honest about their struggles you know what I find fascinating about that list that's also what God wants isn't it that's amazing and so even our non-christian friends who may not know the very nature of the God that we know they also want the thing that he's designed and ordained in the world which is his church to be about so what does that tell us it tells us that people actually aren't rejecting Jesus or faith in general they're rejecting what they perceive or what they may see with their own eyes as the expression of that lived out in his body the church And so our question this morning is, well, what is it gonna take to reach our non-Christian friends in the world? Like, how will we help them to understand and know the God that we know, and that loves us, and that we love Him? And I would just say to you this morning, I don't think it's when we write better tracts to hand out in evangelism,

although tracts can be a helpful tool. I don't think it's when we get better messaging and better advertising out there, although I'm not opposed to any of those things. I don't think it's going to be when we learn to debate our non-Christian friends better and have better proof texts, although I think apologetics is essential. I don't think it's when our worship services get more polished, although I think we should bring God our best. And I don't think it will come through imposing our will through politics, although we should want laws that are just and defend the poor and needy. I think the way that our non-Christian friends will be reached is when they experience the church expressed as God designed it to be loving in the world, and loving one another. That's how the world is going to come and know and see who we are as a people. In fact, this is what Jesus Himself said in John chapter 13, verse 34. A new command I give you, love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this, what's the this here that we're looking at? By this, what is pointing back to your love for one another. By your love for one another,

everyone will know that you are my disciples. You belong to me. Not a religion, not a club, not a social experiment. You belong to me, you wear my name. If, this is conditional, you love one another. What's the vehicle for this? By this. In other words, this is the primary way that Jesus has designed for the world to know who we live for and what we are about. And I'm just wondering this morning, do we love this way? Do I love this way? So I have to ask myself this question this morning. Does that's our goal? If Jesus is our Lord and our master and He gets to rule and reign over His church, then He gets to tell us how to do this thing. And He's told us pretty plainly here, this is the way I have chosen. That you will let the world know that you live for me by your love for one another. I'm afraid sometimes we take worldly ideas about relationships and love and we baptize them as Christians and then we're surprised when churches fall apart or don't reach people who don't know Christ. A church can have a full calendar and all kinds of great programs and still have empty relationships.

A church can have sermons and songs and great worship services and still leave people alone in their suffering, unseen in their needs and unchallenged in their holiness. And my premise for us today is that if we want the world to know and to see Jesus as He really is, then we shouldn't start by throwing rocks and attacking our non-Christian friends. That doesn't usually get us very far. How about change should begin in the church? Change should begin in us so that the love that Jesus describes is made visible in us. And if we do that, we gonna be all right. Now, let me say this is not national beat up on the church Sunday because I am grateful, I'm incredibly grateful for having been raised in a Christian home and my church experiences and I love, I do it for a living, not just because I get a paycheck but because I love the body of Christ and what it brings and what it can do in the world. And I think we do a lot of things well, but we haven't arrived at the destination. We're not fully there yet. We have room to grow in our love for one another. So what does that love look like as expressed through our lives? Well, fortunately, the New Testament gives us

some examples through the teachings of Jesus, the apostles and the life of the early church. Jesus modeled it for us because that's what Jesus says here. As I have loved you, so there's love by example and then the apostle. Also lived that out and they wrote it down and gave it to us in instructions And so we're gonna look specifically this morning dive deeper into one of Paul's instructions If you have your Bible in Romans chapter 12 would love for you to be there in verse 9 where Paul says That love must be sincere Hate what is evil? Cling to what is good? Be devoted to one another Be devoted to one another in love Honor one another above yourselves Never be lacking in zeal But keep your spiritual fervor serving the Lord be joyful in hope patient in affliction and faithful in prayer and Share with the Lord's people who are in need practice spirituality so Paul gives off some rapid-fire statements here and Aspirations for what this kind of love should look like This is a literary style that would sometimes be employed by Paul and other ancient writers And these are not optional add-ons to the church like hey, this would be nice to have These are essentials. They're they're written in the imperative they're their commands for the kind of community that Christ has formed in us and through us and The church this has got to be our culture

Now on the surface when you read kind of these rapid-fire statements here They may look like they are separate and apart from one another But the whole context here is the kind of love that the church should have for one another So on the surface it might appear like verse 12 or the second half of verse 9 May not fit in there isn't about love in the church, but we're gonna unpack some of it I want to show you how all these things Work together here and we're gonna kind of group some of these together into four different groupings this morning The first one is this is that love must be sacrificial not superficial Because Paul says love must be Sincere Sincere means like it's genuine or you really mean it The word sincere in verse 9 could literally be translated as unhypocritical so if the world has this Idea about Christians as being hypocrites. How do we counter that? We actually love people with a genuine love imagine that Because when it isn't genuine Non-christians and Christians too can smell that a mile away. Can't we? They might be smiling and nodding and acting like care But as soon as you walk away or hang up the phone, then they somebody expresses how they really feel They're such an idiot, you know And it's possible to have this thin veneer of niceness about us That camouflage is backbiting gossip and prejudice And God's design for the church is not just to be full of friendly or fake smiles Here's the reason that's true and that God commands it is because if love is half-hearted You won't be willing to pay the price that love requires When love gets hard you won't care because you didn't care in the first place But when love is sincere that we really care for people that we do Genuinely in our hearts hold people in great value and esteem in our lives

Then when love requires tough decisions and hard conversations, we'll be willing to step into that It won't be just surface level or we won't just do the minimum to make ourselves look or feel good We won't act in a sacrificial way and the challenge for that is spelled out in the second sentence here hate what is evil and Cling to what is good These phrases that's why they're in one verse they go together. In other words real love realizes Destructive evil forces at work in the world that are trying to take people that you and I love out and love Steps in to protect and confront when needed. I Don't hate them. I hate the evil that's coming after them and so it means that We're willing to enter into other people's lives in deep ways because we genuinely care for them One of the worst things that you can do to do for somebody is to let them go their own way. If love is superficial, we'll be more likely to say something like, it's a free country, they can screw up their life if they want to. Just understand that's not a Christian idea. Like when we're in relationship to one another and bound together through Christ, that's not the design for his church that we like, I don't care, they can do what they wanna do. Love goes after people, it clings to what is good and it hates what is evil because it has the best interest of the other person in mind, because I know Jesus and God's best interest for them. It doesn't make me all knowing, it just means I care. Which is why the next phrase in the text

is so critical and descriptive, be devoted to one another in love. Not just be devoted, because people are devoted to lots of things that they don't love. Like your job tomorrow. Some of your text, some of your translations may say, be devoted to one another in brotherly love. And the reason that is is because in the original language, the word for love there is phileo, which is a type of family or brotherly love, the type of family love that many of us know and appreciate. Paul said we should love one another as if we are blood related to one another. Now I realize we have some in the room who may come from very broken and difficult family relationships, where there was not devotion to one another in love. And my heart hurts for you. But in the absence of what should have been in your biological family, God did not leave you as an orphan, he gave you the church community where there should be that devotion that should have been present in your biological family. He's given you a great gift in the church that we get to be there for one another in our lives. Consider the power of this word devoted. There ought to be something that binds us together in difficult days and difficult situations and circumstances when it would be easier to turn away and walk away

and be like, I'm done with that. This is especially true in our individualistic American culture that we live in. Because then people will only hang around or be a part of something when it benefits them personally. Some people change churches like I change socks every day. When they get upset about a decision or feelings get hurt, they slide out with ever learning how to work through issues. Not ever having to have hard conversations or conversations in love. I mean, what if Jesus treated the church like you treat it? Jesus' commitment to the church was based on covenant, not convenience. My participation in love for Christ's body isn't about what I can get out of it in some selfish way, although I get a lot out of it. But it is about being a part of an organization that God designed and ordained to show his faithfulness to the world. And so when we're not devoted, it is a reflection on Christ himself, who is the ultimate picture of devotion and laying his life down. So do you see how we need to accurately represent that to the world in our relationships to one another? That means when somebody's life is messy, I don't ignore them, but I step into that to help advocate for their healing. And when there's a disagreement between me and someone,

I don't shut them out of my life. When there's a need, I do what I can to contribute towards the solution. All of that works together to show that we're devoted to one another in love. Number two, love puts other people first. Verse 10, honor one another, how? Above yourselves. When you have a church full of people that are competing for honor and the spotlight, it will be self-destructive. But when everybody is working to honor the other more than themselves, something amazing happens. People feel valued and precious. Now don't confuse. But he's saying here, it isn't that you are less than others, but that you're not so self-absorbed that you only think about yourself. The church community isn't just what you get from others, as in the many blessings that you receive, but how can I be a blessing to somebody else? In other words, reciprocal community. Some of your translations may say, outdo one another in showing honor. In other words, there's a friendly competition going on here that we're trying to see how much I can honor you, honor the other, and you're trying to do that for me. And rather than focusing on getting attention ourself, we're looking for ways to pay attention to others. Our human nature will want us to focus on self.

And whine and complain when we don't get enough spotlight or attention in our life. And that may come out with phrases like, no one spoke to me this morning. I guess I don't fit in. Why am I not appreciated? How come I didn't get invited? But I always push back and say, when was the last time you invited somebody into your life? Like you're wanting what you're not giving. We can be so self-absorbed that we only look to our own interests and we come blind to the needs of others. And this isn't rocket science. It simply requires retraining our brains to think about other people, because in your human nature, nobody had to teach you to think about you. Like two-year-olds, when they don't get what they want, they throw themselves down in the floor until they get what they want. Where does that come from? Like I didn't teach my child to do that. They just innately fell down in the floor and whined and screamed, right? We have to retrain our brains through the power of the Holy Spirit so that we think about and focus on what are their needs. And I have a couple of friends in my life who've taught me this principle by modeling it for us.

I have a couple of friends that every time, if we're on the phone, I can never ask about them before they've already asked about me. Not like superficial, like what's going on, man? How you doing? Okay, and then they move on. Like no, they get deep and they're like, but how are you really doing? Like what's going on with you? How's Amanda? How's the kids? What's going on in church? They like press in and keep asking deeper questions in my life and making me feel loved and heard and seen. Because when somebody asks you good questions and they really care, they're not just being superficial, but when they really care, don't you feel like this person cares about me? That's just conversation, that's free. That doesn't cost any money. And when I try to beat them in asking questions about their life, I usually lose. That's the gift of listening and caring and it's one of the most profound gifts of love that you can offer somebody. It doesn't mean that we have all the answers when we have conversations with people, but it does mean they have our heart. And it would radically change your life if every day you would decide

that you would just check on one person. A phone call, a text, you're driving into work or certainly a home from work, you got a 15, 20 minute commute and you just shoot off a message or a phone call to somebody where you didn't have an agenda where you needed something from them, but just like, hey, I was thinking about you today. How's it going? You were on my heart. How can I pray for you today? And if people only see us or think about us calling them when we need something, that won't feel very loving. But when we call just to say, hey, I was thinking about you, man, it radically changes the game. Because every time the preacher calls somebody, they're like, uh-oh, what did I do? I get called in the principal's office. Like, no, sometimes I just call because I care. Or maybe we learn to start celebrating each other's successes without jealousy. So that when somebody's kid makes the team, man, we're like celebrated and exciting with them. Or they get a raise or they get a promotion. ocean at their job. We can show this kind of love by simply writing a note of encouragement. Hey, you're such a blessing to me. Thanks for being in my life.

You bring joy when you walk in the room. Or maybe acknowledging the giftedness of other people. When somebody contributes to the kingdom in a special or extraordinary way, that you let them know, hey, I saw that, and that's awesome. And that blessed me in my faith. You encouraged me by modeling something incredible. Or maybe just expressing gratitude for the role that somebody plays in your life. This is what it means to do ministry. It isn't self-promotion or about titles. Ministry is service to others, and when we do that, people feel valued, and wanted, and encouraged, and the church is built up and strengthened. And our non-Christian friends will see that. Number three, love perseveres through the ups and downs. It isn't wishy-washy or flighty. It's consistent in the good times and the bad. That's verse 12. Be joyful in hope, good times, patient in affliction, bad times, but always, both of those, faithful in prayer. Good times and bad times, we're faithful in prayer. What are we praying for? The context is our love relationship with one another. I'm praying for you, you're praying for me, we're praying for our corporate witness in the church. And so that when we're joyful in hope about what God is doing, and God's breaking through, and when somebody comes to faith in Christ, or somebody has a victory in their family,

love steps into the joys of other people. And I'm afraid that we don't know how to celebrate with other people very well. That we may stand at a distance, and you know that when you have something amazing that happens in your life, you want other people to come around you and share in your joy. And he says here, be joyful in that hope. Encourage one another with that. The church doesn't need to feel like a funeral. The church needs to feel like we're coming in and cheering for one another, and what God is doing in our lives. But we're also committed to one another in the worst moment of our lives. And we're patient with one another in horrendous moments where it feels like the world is crashing in. When somebody is in a mental health crisis, and their behavior is erratic, we don't run away from people. We work towards getting them the help they need. When your brother or sister is going through a divorce, and at the lowest moment of their life, we don't shun and judge. We step into. When your close friend loses their job and doesn't know how they're gonna support their family, love is listening, and caring,

and entering into that pain with compassion and care. But hope is held out in these moments because I'm holding out not just my needs, but your needs before the Lord in prayer. That I'm faithful, and you're faithful, as we're praying for one another, interceding for your marriage, your kids, your job, your health issues, your future. And I try to make it a practice to let other people know I'm praying for you. Sometimes I text them shortly after my morning time in the Word, and I've written some people's names down in my prayer journal, and just let them know. Isn't it a blessing when you get a text from somebody, if they say, hey, I prayed for you today. As you go forward in your day, just know you've already been covered. That's one of the most encouraging things you could do for me. And I'm blessed to get those kinds of texts, but I also need to be the kind of person sending those texts out, or phone calls, or messages, or notes. I walked in the other day, and the person who cleans our building had left me a Post-it note and says, I've prayed over your office. You are amazing. Keep doing what you're doing. What would the culture of our offices be like if every day you walked in and had a note

like that on your desk? It's not rocket science. It's just faithfulness, and devotion, and thinking about other people. If we love receiving that, why don't we try giving that? Number four, finally, love meets practical needs. Because verse 13 starts off about sharing with those who are in need. So in community, because we're devoted to one another, I can't ignore you when you have a need that I could step into and help out with. And of course, you could traverse the spectrum of needs that somebody could have in their life from simple things, little things around the house, or letting you borrow something that you don't have the money to go buy or don't need to go buy. Stepping in to provide a gift card to cover an expense for a need that you have that you can't meet or don't have resources to do, or sharing my time and hands to help out with a project that you can't do on your own. And I feel blessed. I have so many church friends that live on my street, and I can pick up the phone and say, I can't put this couch in the back of my truck by myself. Could you come over for a few minutes, right? That's sharing in a need, but it is also showing up at my house when I'm gone for five weeks

because my daughter's in the hospital, and I come home and all the needs in my house are met. That's love. Like, I felt so incredibly loved in that time. And then he mentions here, practice hospitality. By the way, it's in the command form. It's not an option. Practice this. In other words, do this. What is hospitality? Hospitality is creating welcoming spaces so that others feel like they are invited and wanted in your life and in your space. And sometimes that can happen in your house where you open up your house, but you can also be hospitable in a restaurant table that you sat down at. When you practice something here, you do it regularly, and we can be great at excuses of why we can't do something. You know, my house needs new flooring, and maybe one day when we get this ugly old carpet out of here, then we'll start having people over. Or we don't have a big enough space, and I wish our dining room table was bigger, and we can go on and on about the excuses of why we can't do something. But I can tell you, as someone who's been welcomed into mud huts and grafts roofs in Africa, some of the most extravagant hospitality

I've ever received in my life were people who were the poorest in the world. Hospitality has nothing to do with house and has everything to do with heart. And if we'll start changing our hearts, we'll start being more hospitable. And that's about in our church culture as well as we welcome people into our space here, is that we want people, as soon as they step on the front of our property, to feel like I am wanted in this place. And so this week, try inviting someone out to eat, or get coffee, or have someone into your home. Make a plan, and you get bonus points in the kingdom if you do that for somebody you don't know as well, all right? Because we tend to invite our best friends over, and that's good. That benefits community as well, but when we move across the aisle to get to know somebody we don't know as well, extra things happen. And if we'll practice these kinds of foundational principles of love, then people on the outside will take notice. If this is our culture, the world wants to be a part of that. And they may not even know what they're agreeing or disagreeing with. They may not even know about the person of Jesus,

but we know they were created to be loved, and when they are loved, everything else opens up in their heart and mind to receive that. And we think, I think we have to debate and compete with our non-Christian friends' ideology. I don't think that at all. I think if we just love people the way Jesus told us to love them, barriers fall. Hardheartedness falls. Obstacles in our minds, they fall away. You don't have to argue with them that Jesus is the way. They'll see it and know it. Because Jesus said, how will they know you? By your love for one another. And if you've been around here for a while, let's all make sure that we continue to make the kind of hospitable environments where people know that. Does that get more difficult as we grow as a church? sure but I don't think it's impossible because we have the Holy Spirit in us don't we and I think what we as a church and I realize some of you are like oh I'm afraid that we're gonna get too big and and I hear your heart in that like you're gonna lose relationships or feel lost in the crowd but we don't have to worry about that if we follow Paul's guidance for the church because everyone will feel loved because we're making the intentional effort to do that and we'll continue to make space for other people because somebody made space for us and

it may be for others of you in the room maybe you've been hanging out on the edges of community and you haven't gotten involved you haven't built deeper relationships then I want to say to you this morning I think you're missing out on the kind of community that God created you to be a part of so don't wait for somebody else and don't think that you will find the perfect church as my previous pastor used to say all the time if you ever find the perfect church don't join it because you'll mess it up alright if you've been hurt in the past by Christian community don't abandon God's design it is his vehicle he has no other plan it is the church take a step of courage to love and to be love it may be the best medicine and healing that exists and if we'll do that then church isn't something that we just attend it will be something that we belong to because we are devoted to one another in love and may God continue to fill this place and our other churches around here we're not competing with him we want every church to be filled with the love of God in Christ and may he pour out his blessing on us if you want to be that kind of church of love say amen this morning let's stand up today father today as we come into your presence Lord we thank you for filling us with Holy Spirit love Lord a sacrificial kind of love that came not from within us but from Christ himself that was poured out for us on the cross of Christ and Lord today we look to him we look to Jesus as the example as he said as I have loved you so you must love one another so Lord would you pray I pray you'll help us to lay our lives down to set agendas aside to set our tiredness aside to set our own agendas aside Lord so that we can do the thing that you've called us to do and called us to be about father that you would give us your passion and purpose for our non-christian friends who look out and they think that we're judgmental and hypocritical and close-minded but Lord we pray father for them to be overwhelmed by a kind of love that only comes from you and I pray father you'll give us the strength and blessing to do that it's in the mighty name of Jesus we pray amen