EVBC Summer Camp 6/11/2009

Tom Shrader shares the core message from summer camp, walking through humanity's sin problem in Romans 3 and God's grace solution in Romans 5. He outlines three essential elements of Christian life: a heart transformed by grace, a mind informed by Scripture, and a radical life marked by love rather than religious activity. The teaching emphasizes that true Christianity moves beyond behavioral modification to heart transformation that produces genuine love for God and others.

“Sin always involves us being unreal, pretending, duplicitous, excusing ourselves, blaming others, always a victim, never the villain.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: Miscellaneous

Recorded: June 11, 2009

Duration: 44 min

Themes: transformation, grace, sin, love, truth, scripture, heart, renewal, youth ministry, struggling with sin, new believer, mentor, parent, young adult, camp ministry, feeling hopeless

Scripture: Romans 3:10-18, Romans 5:6-10, Romans 6:23, 2 Corinthians 5:14-19, 1 Corinthians 13:4-7, Genesis 3:8-10, Colossians 3:2, Romans 12:1-2, John 13, James 1:14-15

Theological Themes: sanctification, heart transformation, biblical authority, romans, sin nature, grace theology, spiritual formation, christian living

Full Transcript

I was, as you all know, if you were here last week—I wasn't here because of summer camp for us. It's kind of our annual trek over to the coast where we take about ten or twelve junior high and high school kids over to Point Loma. That's our summer camp.

We stay there with the kids, and this was—I think we say every year it's the best camp ever, I don't know if it is—but these were the best behaved kids. They're not all church kids; some are our kids. I think the difference was, this is my observation, we had more senior boys there who set the tone for our time together. It was incredible.

Two Things We Underestimate About Young People

This reminds me of two things about camp. Now I'm going to teach you what I taught them. You're so much sharper than they are—it took them seven sessions, we're going to get it here in one. But I'm reminded of how we can approach those kids and underestimate their capacity for two things.

One, their capacity to understand. I'm reminded every year the Word of God is so powerful and it's not age-specific or graded. In other words, the principles that are true for you at 44 are true for them at 14. It's the same principles with some specifics and application given.

The second thing is you can underestimate the pain in their life. I think there's a tendency to look at them—oh they're 14, what do they know? They don't understand subprime mortgages or any of this. I had a girl come up and she was talking about something. I was saying Father's Day is coming up, and my girls and I every year go to the father-daughter tea at the Ritz. We've done it every year—they've taken me for like this will be our sixth or seventh year. She said, "I remember Father's Day last year because that's when my dad left and never came back."

Well, that's everywhere. So I'm reminded of just the power of the Word of God in the lives of people everywhere. Fundamentally we say this all the time: everyone is the same, our issues are the same. I'm going to try to prove that to you today by just teaching and following the pattern they did.

The Hope of the Next Generation

The second thing is I will tell you I think my generation I gave up on a long time ago. The one under me is not so hot, but if you can get down far enough there's still some hope there. There's no reason to be hopeful circumstantially.

As you look around, we have not made governmentally a right decision in so long other than honoring the Ronald Reagan centennial. We haven't done one thing right in so long. You're going to spend a trillion dollars without any funding mechanism, you own GM, you own the banks, you're appointing a pay czar. We could not screw this up more. This thing is so screwed up and it's going to get so much worse, and I think I'm optimistic. I'm painting the best-case scenario.

If I wanted this I'd have moved to Paris a long time ago. I'm not looking for this. Every decision is wrong. None of this is right. It's systemically wrong. It's damaging to the very fiber of who we are.

To clean this up you better hope these 20-year-olds can figure it out because we're not going to. You're not going to change it in an election. You got so much to do, and besides all that I'm convinced God uses moments like this to remind us that our hope is in Him and so we have to go through those things. You still fight. You're still a warrior. You're still involved in the culture battles, but it is really difficult and it really is not bright out there. Part of that I believe is by God's design.

Three Things: Transformed Heart, Informed Mind, Radical Life

Three things and I'm going to take you through these. This is what we taught the students. I talk about it all the time—talk about it here, talk about it at church.

There's three things here. We want to have a transformed heart and an informed mind that results in us living a radical life. That's what we talked about.

When we talk about problems—even when I talk about the governmental stuff or a little girl whose dad leaves, whatever the problem is, however big your problem is—God's bigger. I have to come back to that again and again and again because it doesn't always feel that way. It actually gives me a new appreciation of God because I'm starting to see these problems are so huge, and to know that He's way beyond any of that. He has us right where He wants us at this point in time for some reason.

Why We Need a Transformed Heart

I need a transformed heart. Now when I say that, implied is that something in me needs to be changed for a reason. Why does my heart need to be transformed? Well the answer, the biblical answer, is this thing called sin.

Adam and Eve are in the garden and you know the story, Genesis 3—don't need to turn there, you know the story. The serpent appears and tempts Eve. Adam eats. When Adam eats, in Genesis chapter 3, God—all of a sudden things happen. They realize they're naked. At the end of chapter 2, they were naked and innocent. Literally no clothes, no nothing. Innocent, no problem, no sin. Don't even think about it. The first thing they do is cover themselves up physically.

Then Genesis 3:8 says, they hear God and they hide. Genesis 3:10 says, and they were afraid.

The First Effect of Sin

Now that's what sin has done. The author writes this: the first effect of sin in our life is it always makes us try to hide, get this now, what we are. And I might add who we are.

Sin made our first parents hide behind the trees of the garden and it has the same effect on us. Sin always involves us being unreal, pretending, duplicitous, excusing ourselves, blaming others, always a victim, never the villain. That's what sin did.

Sin took your heart—who we are, we talk about our heart, we don't mean just the muscle here that's pounding in us, our mindset, who we are—and took us from innocence to guilt. Here's what God says about everybody in His Word. Genesis 6:5,

The Lord saw the wickedness of man was great on earth and the thoughts of his heart were only evil continually. Ecclesiastes 7:20 says, "Surely there's not a righteous man on earth who does good and never sins." The beat goes on.

Turn to Romans chapter 3. That is the blanket indictment that Paul gives us of mankind. What Paul's doing in the book of Romans is he's painting a picture and he's saying here's these people who don't believe anything and then here's these people who are morally good and then here's these people who are religiously good. Now when he uses that word or I use that word "good," what he has in mind there is at least in a sense superficially before man.

In Romans chapter 3 verse 10, Paul then gives us a blanket indictment of all mankind without exception. "There is none righteous, not one. There's none who understands. There's none who seek for God. Together all have turned aside and they have become useless." That word means worthless. Worthless in their own efforts. His context here is trying to please the Holy God. "There is none who does good, not even one." And we would drop down to verse 18: "There is no fear of God before their eyes."

The Five Effects of Sin

When sin comes into the world, it has this effect on us. Five things that it does. Number one, it separates us from God. Paul in another place says all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and then in Romans 6:23 he said the wages of sin is death. Death means separation. So sin has separated me from God. I'm in an adversarial relationship with Him now. I'm now deficient. I'm not in union or communion with Him.

The second thing is it keeps me from understanding. See that's what Paul said. Nobody understands. 1 Corinthians 2:14 tells us the natural man, fallen man, all of us can't understand the things of God. So when you come to somebody, you've got a friend in your life and they don't share your faith and you say well I'm going to talk to him. And you're talking to him, talking to him, talking to him. And then you'll come and say it was like talking to this door. Well yeah, that's exactly what it is. There's no decoder. They don't understand. Your lips are moving and they're hearing blah, blah, blah. I mean they can't get it. It's not their fault. So you say, "How can they be so stupid? How can they not get it?" Well because they can't hear. That's the effect of sin.

The third thing it does, it keeps us from seeking God. Now here's where you might get some push back because they'll go, "Wait a minute. All sorts of people are seeking God." They're not seeking the one true God. They're seeking the God they want. So Voltaire said it this way: "God made man in His own image and man has been returning the favor ever since." John Calvin says it this way: "Our hearts are idol factories." I'm continually creating my own God. We make God as we want Him to be. It's somebody who's under our control really. It's a God who makes sense to us. It's a God that we create.

The Search for False Gods

So we instinctively know. The numbers vary but they vary very small over the last 30 years. Essentially about 94% of the American public say they believe in a God, higher power or whatever it is. We define it as God. Do you think 94% of those people are biblical Christians? Not even close. I mean the number is we think around 7% or 8%, something like that. What's this gap in here? What about these other 86%? Well they believe in whatever their gods are.

The fourth thing is it causes me to turn to these other things. So I begin to try to find my meaning, my satisfaction there. So you start to ask yourself, where do you look for your security? Where do you look for your identity? Where do you look for your comfort? Where do you look for your significance? What's the most important thing to you? Is there something in your life, if you didn't have it, you couldn't live anymore? When everything starts coming in, where do you turn? Because what instinctively we do is we will worship whatever we're serving. So it will become its top priority.

And then the last thing is that we don't fear the one true God. We become almost ambivalent to Him. Even if He's out there, we think we're okay. Well that's what sin does. Sin comes along and it's just, if we're going to take it all down, it just separates us from God. It puts us on our own. We're trying to fend for ourselves. We try to create our own, literally, create our own reality. Deny how things are, deny how God's created them, deny His very existence and then come up with our own solution.

Our Religious Response to Sin

So when Peter delivers this incredible sermon in Acts chapter 2, the first thing people say is, "What must I do?" Separated from God, I become incurably religious. I want to worship something. I want to try to find some way to make this right. I'm going to try to find some way to create a situation, because I know the gods are angry. I'm going to find some way to appease them. I'm going to kill a goat. I'm going to be good. I'm going to go to church. I'll work with junior hires. I'll do whatever. You fill in the blank. I'm going to do this.

Biblical Christianity has this thing that separates us from everything else and that is called grace. So if you're in Romans 3, you turn one page to Romans 5 and we're just going to look at verse 6, 8 and 10, because God gives us in His word here one principle with some nuances to it.

God's Solution: Grace

Romans 5:6: "While we were still helpless"—so that's the effect of the sin there, still helpless—"at the right time Christ died for the ungodly." That ungodly would be you. Verse 8: "God demonstrated His love toward us in that"—here it is again—"while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." Verse 10: "While we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son."

So it says in verse 6 we're helpless, verse 8 we're sinners, verse 10 we're enemies. And the solution in every one of those instances was

that Christ died for us. It's grace that transforms us. It's grace that changes us. It's grace where I find resolution to that persistent guilt. It's where I find forgiveness. So what God does is He reconciles us. He restores us into the right relationship with Him.

So if we said those are the five effects of sin, we can say for us as followers of Christ, for those who respond to the gospel, the difference is this now. We're no longer separated from God, we're united with Him. We're seeking after Him. We understand Him. We aren't seeking other gods. We aren't afraid of Him. That's our condition. That's our position. That's where we are. All through what Christ did.

That's why Jesus said, "All who are weary, come to Me." What He was talking about is not just physical exhaustion, He was talking about spiritual exhaustion from trying to live this life because you can't do it. People will say all the time, "I can't live this." That's exactly right. And yet we keep trying. That's why religion never satisfies. That's why religion never brings rest. You never get a sense that you're good enough. You never feel that because you aren't. You're not united with Him. You're not living with any power other than the power you yourself have.

The New Creation in Christ

So if we were to turn, when you're in the book of Romans, if you go to the next book, 1 Corinthians, the next book 2 Corinthians, when I get to 2 Corinthians chapter 5, Paul talks about this idea of this right relationship again. So he says this in 2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 17: "If anyone is in Christ," so the operative phrase there is now I'm in right relationship with Him. So I understand I'm a sinner. I understand there's nothing I can do. I accept and respond to the gospel. "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life."

God loves, He moves, He gives the Son. When I believe that's true, I now have eternal life. Heaven is as secure for me as it is for the saints that are already there. I believe with all my heart, not based on me at all, but based on the truth of God's Word that when I die, and I know that's coming, when I die I will be with Christ forever. That's a done deal. I'm as certain of that as the saints that are already there. You can't break this union. He who began the good work in you will continue it if I'm truly a follower of Christ.

So when somebody says to me, "As a Christian can I lose my salvation?" I'll always try to stop and define terms and go, "What do you mean by Christian?" If the question is this: can somebody who's genuinely a follower of Christ ever lose that salvation? The answer is no. My heart is now transformed.

Our Ministry of Reconciliation

Look at the great work, look at what He's done. The word reconcile, reconciliation, all through it. These things are from God. What things? Well this grace and this mercy, this new life. Who reconciled us to Himself through Christ and then gave us a ministry of reconciliation. He has committed to us, verse 19, the end of it, the word of reconciliation. Therefore we are ambassadors for Christ. That's all something He's done.

So in Romans chapter 6, 7, and 8, Paul's talking about this incredible struggle we're in. We know the victory is won. I know that I am with Him and will ultimately be with Him forever. But there's a whole bunch of battles along the way. And what drives us, Paul says, is no longer just our sin or our desires. We don't live like an animal who's just driven by impulses.

What controls us now, 2 Corinthians chapter 5, verse 14, what controls us now is the love of Christ. His love for us. He began the work. He'll continue it. What can separate us, Paul asks in Romans 8, from the love of Christ? Nothing. That is done. It's sealed. We are now in union with Him. We know Him. We're forgiven. We have the Holy Spirit in our life. We have the ability to defeat sin. We have an unbreakable union. We have heaven in our future.

The Battle Shifts to the Mind

But I still have a struggle. Now the battle shifts from my heart to my head. Now I need an informed mind. I'm in union with Him, but I still have this massive struggle that's going on inside of me.

And I'm going to tell you something. Susan and I go over to summer camp a few days early. And we're walking down the beach. And I started talking. And we probably walked 40 minutes or so. And I realized that as it was going on, it wasn't a dialogue. It was a monologue. And it wasn't a conversation. It was a message. I was preaching. And what I was really doing was trying to think this thing through. And three or four times she would go, "That is really good. That is really good." And I'd say, "Is that right?" And she'd say, "I think that's right."

Well the sad thing is we got it all done. And then happy hour at the deli is from 4 to 7. So you want to be there for that. So we're at the deli. And we're up on the deck. And we're looking at the ocean. And I said, "You know what's sad? I can't recreate that 45 minutes. I don't know. I wish I had that. I wish I had a recording of that. Help me figure it out." She goes, "It was kind wandering." I said, "I know that. But the essence of it was this." And I keep making this statement, looking for pushback. And I don't get much.

God's Purpose for Our Discomfort

I'm convinced God doesn't care if we're happy. He wants us joyful. I've become more convinced that I think God wants us unhappy. Now He gives us these moments of happiness. There are those moments. And you can go click. And you get a snapshot of it. There's a time. But it's brief, isn't it? Where there's this ecstasy that takes place. Not a joy. But I mean a happiness. It's like when everything comes together.

The problem with that is, when I'm in that mode, I become very independent of Him and have a false sense of self-sufficiency. So that God gives me my daily bread. That used to bug me. Why wouldn't He give me my weekly bread? Well, here's why. Because if He did, He wouldn't see me for

seven days. If He gave me my monthly bread, He wouldn't see me for a month. If He gave me my yearly bread, He'd see me annually. If He gave me a lifetime of bread, He wouldn't see me again.

I believe that's just so true in our life. I know all these things. I know we have this. I know what it is. And yet there's a heaviness. There's a weariness. And we can get all worked up.

I've got a bunch of friends whose shorts are in a knot. They're all tied up theologically and politically right now. They want to throw this out and vote this out. Everybody's a jerk. Whatever. I can't even get to that. I've got a problem way bigger than that: me.

The Real Problem is Me

I'm my biggest problem. I'm the one who screws up my life. I'm the one who sins. I'm the one who says and believes that He's my Lord and my Savior and my Master. And yet I'll wander over here and follow this. And I follow this over here. And then I move over there.

I think it is to be human. I think that is the normal Christian life. This Christian life is not where I just start here and go straight up. It has moments where it's going like this and it looks like a stock chart. And then it drops over here and stays down here for a while. And it pops up here but only for a few seconds so everybody sees a profit. But if you were to trace it, my swing should be in this direction. God wants us to remain dependent upon Him.

The Battle in Our Minds

I'm coming back to this. I think the battle takes place in my head. We just looked at James chapter 1 verses 14 and 15 that talked about how there are things outside of us that entice the things inside of us.

Here's just like a list. This is from a day of just looking at billboards and watching TV and thinking. Basically everything around us is saying this: Buy me. Take me. Drink me. Use me. Sleep with me. Touch me. Kiss me. Snort me. Rent me. Try it just once. This will make you happy. And then I put my own line in there: Nobody will ever know. No one, even if they know, will care. We're big people.

There's a little thing we tell the kids that's kind of cool because they're hearing it for the first time. You've all heard it a million times. But sometimes the reason you hear it a million times is because it's true, and when it gets in there it's really helpful. When sin comes into my life, it will always take me further than I want to go. It will always keep me longer than I want to stay. And it will always cost me more than I want to pay. Always. It's just always going to take me way further.

The Reality of Temptation

My assumption is that you guys aren't totally naive here. If you're dealing with a 14 or 15-year-old girl or boy, they pretty well know what's going on. A lot of oral and anal sex with these kids. And they do that and then say, "I'm still a virgin." It's a really interesting mindset. They'll even call it the Clinton deal, which is kind of interesting to me too. It's good to be known for something, I guess.

I try to tell these kids: Think about the first time you went on that internet site. There's a click and your heart is pumping. There's another click and then there's one more click and you exit. But then you go right back. And you click. And what happens, almost always, is that you end up going way further than you want to go. And you stay way longer than you want to stay. And it costs you a ton. That's just what sin does.

That may not be your deal. You might say, "I don't even relate to that." Okay, well you're really special. But you've got something that does that for you.

Setting Our Minds

This battle is in here. Paul says this: "Set your mind on the things above" (Colossians 3:2). The battle's in there. Those are the questions: What do you worry about most? What's your greatest nightmare? Where do you find what we would call worth or value? What's the most important thing in your life?

What I've learned, and I have to absolutely live here, is I have to say this to myself: Don't let your mind go there. Just don't let it go there. If what you're worried about more than anything else is someday one of my kids will... you can't let your mind go there. You can't live in that world. If it's a fantasy and it's some sexual thing, you just have to stop. You've got to put something in there.

Replacing, Not Just Resisting

The Word of God is a powerful thing to put in there, but I don't want to over-spiritualize it. You can start thinking about the Diamondbacks. I don't know, I'm desperate here. You can start something. Your mind has to go somewhere. You can't just say, "Don't do it." You can't just say, "Stop." You have to replace whatever that desire is with something else. You used to love the world; now love Christ.

I've used this illustration. Susan's perfect at it. I stink. We've got the grandkids. When there's a problem, if Braden's got something and I don't want him to have it, I'll go, "No, no, no." And it's just a total waste of time and it just brings tension into the room. She will go over and literally take away what he's playing with, but give him something else to play with.

That's the same thing you need to do. You can't just say to yourself, "Stop, stop, stop. No, no, no." That's the first step, but you've got to replace that with something. Because if it's "no, no, no," it's a vacuum and whatever was "no" is going to come racing back in there.

I've got to not let my mind go there, whatever it is. Way before I ever get to that action, my brain and heart are engaged. That's right back to what we looked at in James 1. When I'm enticed or carried away—two different words, two slightly different things, but a similar idea. The idea of carried away is a bait that comes in front of us and we grab it. The idea of enticement is something that has me in a safe place, but pulls me out of that.

temptation, when sin's conceived, brings forth death. I have to take my mind, I have to understand the things of God. That's why this book is important. It is really important for me to understand the world I live in. Understand God and who He is. The only way for me to do that, because I need to reorient my thinking entirely, is to see the world as God sees it.

I read something the other day, and I'm paraphrasing now, but essentially it went like this. Ever since sin came into the world, our feet and heart have carried us toward what we hope is north when in fact we know it's south. We think instinctively one way.

The Natural Bent Toward Sin

I can play it for you, but my grandson Brayden, Brayden's three and a half, and he calls every day and says, will you come down and watch me hit? So it's really interesting. His dad's side of the family is really baseball, but Tyler's been great. He doesn't push him at all, but he's just like the kid watches it. And Tyler hasn't worked with him, and just from watching TV, he's picked up this, I mean he just has this boom, he sees it, come down and watch me hit. Well he can't hit in the backyard anymore. I mean he's really starting to drill these things.

And Tyler will pitch to him, and I mean he's living there, and is he ever going to play Major League Baseball? Of course not. But he's really into it. So he'll call every day and say, why don't you come down and go to the Greenbelt and watch me hit? And I want to go, have you got a thermometer at your house, or what's the deal here?

So he's three and a half. Yale is, what's Yale? Yale's almost two. So he calls, Brayden calls yesterday and said, Yale wants you to come down and watch me hit in the Greenbelt. Where did he learn that? Think about that. Think of how, now I started to unpack this with Susan and she said, you're making way too much out of this. And I said, well I'm not. Think of how wicked his heart is. He somehow knew, manipulative that is.

Oh it's cute. It isn't cute. That's all going to change as he gets older, if God doesn't intervene. That's our flinch, so ingrained in us that even when God gives us a new heart, our flesh and the world pulls us back toward that. That's that struggle. That's that informed mind. My heart transformed, I've won it, I've got it.

False Hope vs. True Hope

I'm watching a guy on TV the other night, I'm not going to give you his name, but he's one of the TV preacher guys, and he's saying, this is the year of Jubilee and Restoration. Okay. There's no way you could know that. Even, how would you know? How would you possibly know 2009 is the year of Jubilation, Jubilee? I mean, there's just no way. That's just total bunk.

But he's not done. This is the year that spouse will come home. This is the year that kid will believe. This is the year that loan will be paid off. And I said, Susan, I don't know how you can say that. I don't know how, I could not say that. You are either incredibly stupid, or you're a crook. There's no reasonable, and I know if I sat with him, he'd say, I'm just trying to give people hope. And I would say, you're giving them false hope.

Because what are you going to do? You're telling me in your church of 32,000, you're not going to have a funeral this year? You're not going to have a divorce this year? You're not going to have a kid kill himself this year? You're telling me all your people, there's no foreclosures here? I don't mind giving people hope, but I don't want to give them false hope. Man, if you're telling me it's my year of Jubilee, and they're coming home when the 365 days is up, and they aren't home, what's going on there?

You know what's going to happen there? Because we look at, I look at that and I go, that's nuts. That's goofy, it's destructive. If I was king, I'd wipe them off the face of the earth. Okay? Because that really hurts people.

Our Own Version of False Hope

But then here's what all of us do. We do our own version of that. And it sounds like this. Man, I've prayed and prayed and prayed and done my thing, and yet still business isn't working. Well, you know what? That may be God's plan. This is really important. If your mindset is like that, you'll go, oh my gosh, things are wrong. I need to pray more, study more, do more. See how religious we become?

Now, I'm not saying don't pray, but here you go. Tom, do you pray enough? No. Do you love Susan enough? No. Do you study enough? No. Do you do anything enough? Watch TV, eat. That's all I do enough. This is so wicked. There's no freedom there.

And that's the problem even with a good church, is that I'm so incurably religious that even as somebody with a transformed heart and a mind that's informed, I still can flip right back into religion. Be courageous. Okay. That ain't working for me right now. What do I do now?

Moments of Weakness and Dependence

I had a guy call me yesterday, and he just starts giving me a whole bunch of stuff. And he said, I knew I could call you, and you wouldn't give me a Bible verse. Now, there's one side of me that is moderately insulted by that. But I'm not going to give up. I know what he's saying. He's saying, I know all the verses. I've given the verses to everybody. I know what they are.

There are just times, and you know what? It's okay to say them, when I just feel so weak, impotent, empty. And yet I have a transformed heart, and I'm in the right union with Him. But that is the normal Christian life. And the sweetness of those moments is that it draws me back to Him. It may get me moderately discouraged, but ultimately it makes me dependent upon Him.

Living a Radical Life

So to complete the trifecta, I have a transformed heart and an informed mind, and now I want to live a radical life. Let me read you Romans 12, 1 and 2 from Eugene Peterson's Paraphrase, the message. "So here's what I want you to do, God helping you. Take your everyday ordinary life, your sleeping, eating, going to work, walking around, and place it before God as an offering." Romans 12, 2. "Don't become so well adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention..."

on God, and you'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what He wants you to do, and respond to it quickly.

If I say to you, live the radical life, you immediately think activity. Well, if there's anything we learned from the Pharisees, it's that I can have all the right activity and still have the wrong motivation. I need to make sure what drives me is right.

The Radical Life Is a Life of Love

I want to suggest to you that I left you in 2 Corinthians, if you turn to the left to 1 Corinthians chapter 13, I'm convinced and want to convince you that the radical life is a life of love.

Jesus has the disciples together in John 13, the night before He's killed, and He says to them, here's my commandment: love God with all your heart, love your neighbor as yourself. And here's how the world's going to know that you're my disciple. Now He could have put anything in there. He could have put Bible study, go to church, pray, read, whatever. But what He said is, here's how the world's going to know that you love one another. Here's how we're going to know we're followers of Christ. And here's what the world's going to see. If you want to impact them, they're going to see in you love.

What Love Actually Looks Like

Well, what is love? 1 Corinthians 13 tells us. And Paul does it by saying, it is this, it's not this.

It's patient. It means long-suffering. And the word there deals with people, not with circumstances. It's patient with people. It's kind. That means it's courteous, gracious. It's not jealous, meaning it doesn't want what somebody else has, or, this is really hideous, doesn't even want it but doesn't want you to have it. It doesn't brag. It's the only time the word appears in the New Testament. It's not arrogant, overbearing. It's not haughty. It doesn't act unbecomingly. That means rude.

Here's the key to the whole thing. It doesn't seek its own. So Jesus came not to be served but to serve. So Paul says, have the mind in you that's also in Christ Jesus who humbled Himself. There it is. So I have this idea of love. I can't have this idea and concept of love in my life and not also have this idea of humility, of this idea of looking at and looking for and around and out for other people.

It's not provoked. That means it doesn't move to anger or irritation. There's a great story of Jonathan Edwards. There's a young man who comes and wants to marry one of his daughters. And the daughter had what is recorded to be an uncontrollable anger. So he came and he asked if he could marry her. And Jonathan Edwards says, you can't. But I love her and she loves me. Edwards says it doesn't matter. And the man said, why? And he said, because she's not worthy of you. But she's a Christian, isn't she? Yes, said Edwards, but the grace of God can live with some people with whom no one else should ever live.

It doesn't take into account a wrong suffered. It's a bookkeeping term. It doesn't keep score. It's the classic. The guy said, when I fight with my wife, she doesn't get hysterical. She gets historical. Remember in 1973 at 4:15 when you... It doesn't rejoice in unrighteousness. It doesn't take satisfaction in sin, but it finds its joy in righteousness, in right living.

Love Bears, Believes, Hopes, and Endures

And then the last four. In both the church and in here, I've been really emphasizing 1 Corinthians 13, verse 7. Because it says it bears all things and believes all things and hopes all things and endures all things.

The word bear means to protect. It doesn't listen to or participate in gossip. It protects people from ridicule. Think how easy that is to apply to junior high or high school kids. But think about your life. I mean, I've been in and around church almost all the time since I've been a believer, but I've been at the church I'm at now for 18 and a half years. In that time I've just seen a ton of things. By far, the most destructive thing I've seen in our church is gossip and slander and people talking. It's so destructive. And there's no way to fix it. And it goes on everywhere and the people who know the Bible the best seem to be the most guilty. And it's clothed in self-righteousness and it makes me sick when I see it. And I see it all the time. I've participated in it a little. I've been on the receiving end of it a lot. It makes me sick. Love bears all things.

It believes all things. It means it's not cynical or suspicious but gives people, I'll add, other than politicians, the benefit of the doubt. See, there's the cynicism. I can't even control that. It is believing all things. It's hoping all things. It endures all things.

This Is What the Christian Life Looks Like

Now, I want to make sure because I think we're done. Our time is up but you get a sense of that. That's the Christian life. And somebody said to me, what's it mean to be a Christian? I'd give him this and say, well, this is what we're talking about right here. Because there isn't just that moment in time. There's this life that is then transformed or changed outside of it.

But rather than think about the 50 people you know who should hear this, let's just take a second and look at your own life and see if your heart has been transformed and if your mind is informed and if you're living the radical life. And by that I mean a life that's marked by love. Because if you love, because you can't do it on your own. You can only do that with the Holy Spirit working in your life. If you love like that, you will do the prayer, the Bible study, all the other things that go with it.

But all of a sudden, religion won't be what's important to you. But relationship, vertical and horizontal, will be what's important to you. So you won't walk out of the office, as you're walking out, somebody's coming up to you and saying, can I meet with you? I really have a need. And you say, no, I have to go. And you're going to a Bible study where they're teaching you that people around you have needs and you need to

meet them. I mean, it's okay. I'm going to say this to you. There are probably some Sundays where you just need to miss church. Because there's probably things more important. There's probably just some stuff going on. There may be some things that pop up into your life.

We had a guy who I'm talking to and he was coming to our Good Friday service and he got talking to a guy about Good Friday and the cross and it took him right through the service. Where do you think that guy should have been at that Friday? I don't think he needed to be at Good Friday. He needed to be there. And you can always give online. That's what I try to tell them at the end.

Let's not get too carried away with this thing. But we don't care about the religious as much as that relationship. So there's a whole bunch in there and that's not a very formal ending, but you get the point.

Let's pray. Father, help us see this. Help us see and understand and sense this truth and use it in our lives today. Bring us to a point where we understand who You are, who we are, and now we are ready to live a life that we pray is pleasing to You. God, thank You for that power. Because we feel, and we're right, like we can't live this way. It's a huge call, but we can through You. God, will You give us that grace and mercy and power? We ask it of You in Jesus' name. Amen.