SPEAKER_00: Morning, my name's Cameron.
SPEAKER_00: I'm one of the pastors here at CrossPoint.
SPEAKER_00: Good to be here with you guys.
SPEAKER_00: One of my, you know, I do a lot of different things as part of my job, uh, which is really fun.
SPEAKER_00: I like the variety.
SPEAKER_00: One of the things I've gotten to be a part of over the last few years is launching our Celebrate Recovery Ministry, which you've probably heard us talk about a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and so I just wanted to share, after we've been launched for over two years now, our Celebrate Recovery Ministry is coming to a bit of a pause.
SPEAKER_00: I say pause intentionally, because we don't want to just like end and be like, hey, we're done.
SPEAKER_00: Um it's been an awesome couple of years.
SPEAKER_00: Lots of people coming through the doors, lots of people, you know, like discover rediscovering faith in the midst of their rock bottom moments.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but there have been some challenges.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not to say anything negative about our current leaders, they're all awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, but one of the things we've realized is we've kind of had some rotation of leaders, and the current people that are in that spot of like the main leaders never signed up for this.
SPEAKER_00: They're like, hey, we kind of signed up to be support leaders because of their stage of life and other commitments they have going on.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and so it's been a little bit of an unsustainable pace the last couple years as we're like been praying and hoping God would bring someone or a couple people who's like, this would be their main area, like their main passion area.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and that just hasn't happened yet.
SPEAKER_00: And so over the last couple months we've been meeting, we've realized, hey, this is kind of unsustainable for our leaders who are in place right now.
SPEAKER_00: And we would rather pause before they get burned out and are totally done with it, so that whenever God does bring that person or those people who are passionate about this area of ministry, we're able to relaunch at some point with a really strong support structure in place.
SPEAKER_00: Um, because this has been an awesome ministry to have as a church, to have a resource to point people to, uh, for people to find healing and hope in the middle of.
SPEAKER_00: So I just wanted to let you guys know though, because I know we talk about it a lot, and you know, many of you also refer people to our celebrate recovery ministry.
SPEAKER_00: We're ending at the end of December.
SPEAKER_00: We're taking our pause and then just praying and in kind of a waiting, uh, like waiting spot as we wait for God to bring about the right leadership to help us relaunch this ministry at some point.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe that'll be this fall, maybe it'll be a couple years.
SPEAKER_00: So I just ask if you think about it, um, that you would spend some time also praying that God would bring about the right people to be in place uh so that we can provide this um really great ministry opportunity as a church.
SPEAKER_00: So make sense?
SPEAKER_00: All right, let me pray for us uh and uh just pray for that as well before we jump into our sermon today.
SPEAKER_00: Uh God, I just thank you so much for just all that you're doing in our church in so many ways.
SPEAKER_00: And God, I just ask that um you would really raise up or bring to our church community uh a person or a couple people who are really passionate about this area of ministry so that we as a church can provide this incredibly helpful resource for members of our community who are struggling and members from our own church who are struggling.
SPEAKER_00: God, as we open up your word, I just ask that you would help us to have soft hearts towards you.
SPEAKER_00: God, that we would not be defensive or have walls up, but we would be open to whatever it is you want to say to us today as we study your word together.
SPEAKER_00: So we thank you for your love and your grace.
SPEAKER_00: It's in your name we pray.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: All right, so a little bit about me.
SPEAKER_00: Oh boy, this wiggly table.
SPEAKER_00: Hope I don't knock it over.
SPEAKER_00: Um, I don't I'm gonna tell you something I really don't like about myself, okay?
SPEAKER_00: It's something I'm not necessarily proud of.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and that is that I can be kind of a snob sometimes.
SPEAKER_00: Now, if you look at my car or the way I dress, you might be like, hey, I don't know if that's quite so true.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but it's only about some things, okay?
SPEAKER_00: So one of the things I can be a snob about, uh, if you've uh heard me talk a little bit, you know, one of the things I love is board games, playing games with people.
SPEAKER_00: My favorite game of all time, I have a picture, is a game called War of the Ring.
SPEAKER_00: It's like a three-hour Lord of the Rings strategy game.
SPEAKER_00: I know super nerdy, that's David who's back in the booth.
SPEAKER_00: I know it looks like he has a migraine right now, but I promise he's having fun with me as we play this.
SPEAKER_00: Um, so I love games that are like kind of big and crunchy and full of lots of decisions and strategy, but I also like lighter and sillier things as well.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but I remember when, this is back when we lived in Oregon, um, we went to a friend's house for Thanksgiving.
SPEAKER_00: It was after I'd already kind of like been learning a bunch of new card games and different things.
SPEAKER_00: And we played a game that I used to like.
SPEAKER_00: Like growing up, I would have said, Oh, I love that game.
SPEAKER_00: The game is phase 10, okay?
SPEAKER_00: And I was sitting there, I'm like, this is the worst thing I think I've ever done.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I hate this.
SPEAKER_00: Sorry for those of you who like phase 10.
SPEAKER_00: I'm assuming there's like a bunch of nostalgia around it, or maybe you just haven't played it for a while, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because you get gear up for like three hours of just sitting there trying to get to phase seven, right?
SPEAKER_00: That's just so frustrating.
SPEAKER_00: I remember thinking, like, man, there are so many better things we could be doing right now.
SPEAKER_00: I can also be a snob about audio and video quality.
SPEAKER_00: So anytime, and this one I try to suppress because I know how annoying it is.
SPEAKER_00: Anytime someone wants to show me a video on their phone, or if I'm gonna show a video, there's a part of me that is like, let's just take like three minutes and hook this up to a real speaker, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's 2025, we shouldn't have to like live like animals listening to iPhone speakers for these videos.
SPEAKER_00: Even a 15-second video, to me, I would rather plug it in and let's hear it for real, right?
SPEAKER_00: Or last night we uh we were gonna watch a Christmas movie, uh family Christmas movie, and we're sitting there talking about, and all three of my girls wanted to watch a different movie, and all of a sudden I realized like, oh, we are in that stage of life now.
SPEAKER_00: Like this is this is where we are.
SPEAKER_00: So Gwen, my oldest, really wanted to watch Elf.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, my middle one really didn't want to watch Elf, right?
SPEAKER_00: So we're going back and forth, back and forth.
SPEAKER_00: And I realized, I was like, oh, actually, I just got on sale last week, like the 4K Blu-ray of Elf.
SPEAKER_00: It should be coming on Monday.
SPEAKER_00: So let's just wait till after that so we can watch it in the best possible quality, right?
SPEAKER_00: This feels like this solved all the problems.
SPEAKER_00: My daughter's like, so we're not gonna watch elf tonight.
SPEAKER_00: And Megan, ever helpful, goes, but Gwen, would it help you to know when we do watch it, it will be in 4K?
SPEAKER_00: I was like, oh.
SPEAKER_00: No, we still didn't watch elf because we're not savages at our house.
SPEAKER_00: Right, we'll wait until the best quality comes in.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So I can be kind of a snob, but there is something to say that sometimes things are just better than other things.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, this Christmas, we are looking at all the traditional themes of Advent.
SPEAKER_00: Hope, joy, peace, love, kind of mixing up the order a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: And what we're doing is talking about how these things embody the better way that Jesus has for us.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: That in our world we kind of get sucked into all sorts of things that feel natural, or that the habits we fall into, or that just feel true, but that Jesus often has something better for us.
SPEAKER_00: Last week Mac talked about hope and how, you know, if you're having a hard time, like God wants to give you hope in the middle of your despair or grief.
SPEAKER_00: So if you're struggling and weren't here last week, I'd encourage you to go listen because God has hope for you this Christmas season.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, this week, though, is a little bit different.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, we're talking about love today.
SPEAKER_00: And as I was thinking and praying about this, I realized like one of the challenges of receiving Jesus' better way of love is not so much that we're like consumed by hate all the time, although there's a lot of hate in our world today, but I think what often happens is that we're tempted to follow a different way of love that isn't necessarily bad, but it's not as good as the way Jesus has for us.
SPEAKER_00: Right, which in my mind makes it particularly challenging.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's usually easy to be like, no, I don't want that, so I'll do this instead.
SPEAKER_00: But when we're presented with an easy good choice or a harder, better choice, we often settle for the easier good choice.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And so some of the things our culture says about love or trains us up in how to love, they're good, but they're not the best, right?
SPEAKER_00: They're not the better way.
SPEAKER_00: They're usually partially true, uh, but Jesus' way is full and complete.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Kind of like listening to music on your phone speakers or playing face 10.
SPEAKER_00: Like there is something better waiting for you if you were to embrace Jesus' way.
SPEAKER_00: Um, however, to live into this way of love, I think requires us to confront all of our normal impulses, the things our culture tells us about love, and then hold that up to what God says.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're gonna do that today.
SPEAKER_00: Uh three kind of like partial truths that we learn in our culture, and then what the better way Jesus has for us.
SPEAKER_00: We're gonna be looking at the book of 1 John, which is one of my favorite books.
SPEAKER_00: Anytime I don't quite know what to read in the Bible, I usually just turn to 1 John because you can kind of read it in one sitting.
SPEAKER_00: It's really good.
SPEAKER_00: Talks a lot about love.
SPEAKER_00: So as I was thinking about this, praying about this, like all these first John verses came to mind.
SPEAKER_00: So I was like, let's just stay in 1 John.
SPEAKER_00: Our bottom line for today is that loving in the way of Jesus isn't always convenient or natural, but it is better.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: When we're willing to get over that hump of what's easiest or comes naturally to us, there is something beautiful waiting for us on the other side.
SPEAKER_00: 1 John 4 uh says this in verses 7 and 8.
SPEAKER_00: Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God.
SPEAKER_00: Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.
SPEAKER_00: Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
SPEAKER_00: So God is love, and we were created to love, to love God, but also to love other people.
SPEAKER_00: All right, so kind of our first uh thing our culture would say is our culture, I think, would say that love is a warm, fuzzy feeling, right?
SPEAKER_00: That this is what love is.
SPEAKER_00: It's like it produces good feelings inside of me.
SPEAKER_00: Now I'll be honest, when I say I love something, most of the time this is what I'm talking about, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's just so natural.
SPEAKER_00: Like when I see, you know, Friday night, we had a movie night here in the sanctuary.
SPEAKER_00: So if you find popcorn on the ground, I'm sorry, we really did our best to clean up.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but if I say, man, I love movies and popcorn and hot chocolate and cookies, like I'm thinking, oh, I have really good feelings towards those things.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: I might even feel this way about things that are important to me, like our church.
SPEAKER_00: Like I might say, I love cross point.
SPEAKER_00: When I say that, I'm primarily thinking of like all the like warm, fuzzy feelings I have towards this church community.
SPEAKER_00: Right, even most of the time when I tell my kids, hey, I love you, it's like, oh, I had something like well up inside of me and I want to say it to them.
SPEAKER_00: It's only by slowing down and with deeper reflection that I might even think about like saying that I love something apart from a feeling.
SPEAKER_00: Um, or it reminds me of um my wife, one of the things that other people have picked up on too, so it's kind of a joke, is if she says, Cameron, I love you so much, like she's I don't know if she's reminding herself that she loves me right before she's gonna blast me for something or reminding me that she loves me, so I don't take it all too personally, whatever she's about to say.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And so we can tell talk ourselves into love, but most of the time, I think when we talk about love, we think about like warm, fuzzy feelings, like good feelings we have towards something.
SPEAKER_00: Now, again, what makes this difficult is that there is truth to this, right?
SPEAKER_00: Love is partially a feeling.
SPEAKER_00: Like God created us as emotional beings with feelings.
SPEAKER_00: I don't want to say, like, hey, we just need to throw that out or it's not good, right?
SPEAKER_00: Love created or God created us to love and to have those feelings.
SPEAKER_00: So they're not wrong, they just aren't the whole picture of our life.
SPEAKER_00: Feelings are important, they guide us and they help us maybe understand things that we can't quite like quantify in our brains, but our body and our emotions know on a deeper level.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: If I'm not feeling warm, fuzzy feelings towards my job, say, that might be an indicator that there's something going on that I need to pay attention to.
SPEAKER_00: And so feelings can sometimes clue us in before we even like think about what the problem is.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: If or if I'm not feeling warm, fuzzy feelings towards my wife or in my family, like that's an indicator that hey, maybe there's something going on.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's between us, maybe it's something just in me, but I need to pay attention to that.
SPEAKER_00: And so the feeling can be really helpful to help us know what's going on.
SPEAKER_00: Where we run into trouble is when we take like that half truth and like buy it as the whole truth, right?
SPEAKER_00: Letting our warm, fuzzy feelings or lack of feelings just run the show and determine what we do with our life.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: How many people dip out of friendships when things get difficult or when something happens?
SPEAKER_00: How many people end their marriage when the warm, fuzzy feelings dry up, or quit serving and serving in some sort of ministry area when things start to get difficult?
SPEAKER_00: And so God's better way for us is that of course love is connected to our feelings, but also love is a verb, love is rooted in conviction, uh, love costs something often, and it's ultimately about the other person, not just what I'm getting out of it.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what you see in 1 John 3.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Dear children, let us not love with words or speech, but with actions and in truth.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Love is not just something we say or we say we believe, but it's something we do with our actions to the people around us.
SPEAKER_00: So love should come from a place of conviction, not convenience.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: It's too easy to let our love just bubble up whenever it feels convenient for us, but it should really come from a place of conviction.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: It's about faithfulness, not just whatever we're feeling in the moment.
SPEAKER_00: Like I feel like um, you know, one of my biggest calls in my life right now is to love my family well, my my wife and my three daughters at home.
SPEAKER_00: And little secret, it's not always easy to do that, right?
SPEAKER_00: Uh, but when my warm, fuzzy feelings aren't there, my conviction rooted in God's call in my life, helps me to not just love with words, but also with action, even when it's difficult.
SPEAKER_00: And here's what I've seen in my life.
SPEAKER_00: Like on a hard day, when like I lean in, even though I don't want to, it's not always the most fun thing in the world.
SPEAKER_00: There's things I'd rather be doing, usually.
SPEAKER_00: But as I look back over my life, I see the trajectory trajectory of my life is so different than if I just did whatever felt easy in the moment each day.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Like I've been able to build something in my life in my family that is rooted in more than just whatever my passing feelings are that day.
SPEAKER_00: Um, or I think of church, right?
SPEAKER_00: I've loved being a part of this church community.
SPEAKER_00: I've been here nine years now, this last November.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and so I love it as a job, I love it as a church community.
SPEAKER_00: It's great, but there are so many times that it would have been easier just to leave, right?
SPEAKER_00: When things got difficult here or when something enticing was on the horizon.
SPEAKER_00: It would have been easier in that moment, maybe, to walk away.
SPEAKER_00: But yeah, I've seen how God's way is truly better than my own way, right?
SPEAKER_00: Of holding me in a conviction, not just whatever my passive feeling was.
SPEAKER_00: Or it's one thing to say you care about people who are struggling, right?
SPEAKER_00: We'd all probably say, hey, yeah, we care about people who are struggling.
SPEAKER_00: We know God cares.
SPEAKER_00: Um, or just post about it on social media.
SPEAKER_00: It's very different to actually do something about it and serve and love people who are struggling.
SPEAKER_00: Because love is an action that's rooted in conviction.
SPEAKER_00: All right, so that's that.
SPEAKER_00: The second one, um, and this is kind of the opposite of that, is I think sometimes our culture talks about love like it's an obligation.
SPEAKER_00: And some of this is Christian culture because if we know, like, hey, love is not a feeling, some of you are like, yeah, that's been driven home, you know, my whole life that love is not a feeling.
SPEAKER_00: And so you, that's just what you gotta do.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta put your big girl panties on, you gotta like love, that's what my wife always says to me.
SPEAKER_00: You gotta like love people, and you no matter how hard it is, you white knuckle your way through it and you do it, right?
SPEAKER_00: Or in our culture, a lot of times, I see, especially around Christmas time, right?
SPEAKER_00: There's like this definition of if you love your kids, you're gonna buy them everything they want, you're gonna put them in all the sports and activities that they want to be in, like all these kinds of things.
SPEAKER_00: Like these are you have to check all these boxes, create all these fun moments for them if you're gonna be a good parent.
SPEAKER_00: And so love becomes like an obligation.
SPEAKER_00: Now, there is some truth to this, right?
SPEAKER_00: Again, with all of these.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, if you're going to take the fact that love is a conviction seriously, like that seriously, it won't always be convenient or easy.
SPEAKER_00: You won't always be in the mood to love people.
SPEAKER_00: And love can feel like an obligation at times.
SPEAKER_00: But I think Jesus has a better way for us to relate to love than just as a burdensome obligation that we have to kind of white knuckle our way through.
SPEAKER_00: I think Jesus wants to reframe it into something else for us.
SPEAKER_00: Because the problem is when love is just an obligation, it turns into resentment pretty quickly.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I think there's two types of people, as I was thinking about this, that relate to love as an obligation.
SPEAKER_00: There's selfish people, this is me.
SPEAKER_00: Uh full like I am very selfish at times with the way I think about my time and what I want to do and what I want to be focused on.
SPEAKER_00: And so when I think of love as an obligation, it's primarily as like an obstacle getting in the way of all the things I want to do with my life.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And so all the pressures, all the extra things feel like they're taking from me, like taking my life away when I want to do what I want to do.
SPEAKER_00: And so I'm either too focused on myself and don't show up and love well.
SPEAKER_00: Um, or I do love, but I'm super grumpy about it, right?
SPEAKER_00: I'm like checking the box, but kind of like, ugh, I can't believe I have to do this right now.
SPEAKER_00: Now there's other people, which I'm sure is all of you, are selfless generally, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so you feel the pressure or the obligation of all the things you have to do.
SPEAKER_00: You internalize them, you impulsively rise to meet all of those challenges and all those things.
SPEAKER_00: And so you give of yourself so much that it ends up leading to resentment and frustration, right?
SPEAKER_00: They're like you're like just giving all that you have and there's nothing left for you.
SPEAKER_00: And so instead of being love, what that actually becomes is just hustling to keep all the people around you happy, hustling to check all the boxes, which is not really the posture of love I think Jesus has for us.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: I think he has something better for us than grumpiness or hustling or just people pleasing the people around us.
SPEAKER_00: And so I think the better way to see love is that love is an opportunity, not an obligation.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Love, when we stop and think about it, is ultimately an opportunity to show God's love to the people around us.
SPEAKER_00: Like we are able to reflect and channel the love God has for us to the people around us and show them that same kind of love, even if they don't deserve it, even if they're difficult to love, we get to show them who God is in a real way.
SPEAKER_00: It's about helping build other people up, not about people pleasing, resentment, or frustration.
SPEAKER_00: Or it's a very different heart posture.
SPEAKER_00: Now, of course, there will be days that love feels like an obligation, and that's okay.
SPEAKER_00: Like if I come home from work on Monday and you're like, I really don't want to love my family, but I do it anyway and check the box, like that's great.
SPEAKER_00: That's probably what Jesus wants me to do.
SPEAKER_00: However, if all of 2025 just feels like an obligation to love my family, there's probably something wrong that I need to tend to.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: God has something good.
SPEAKER_00: Better for us than that.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what he says in 1 John 5, 3.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, this is love for God, to keep his commands, which in 1 John is all about loving God and loving other people.
SPEAKER_00: So those are the commands he's referencing.
SPEAKER_00: And his commands are not burdensome, for everyone born of God overcomes the world.
SPEAKER_00: So I think there's this sense that if we're actually rooted in God's love, full of the Holy Spirit, even the commands to love other people that are difficult won't just drag us down all the time.
SPEAKER_00: Won't be so burdensome.
SPEAKER_00: Now I don't say this, if this is you, to make you feel bad about it, but to like say, hey, there is a better way.
SPEAKER_00: If your life with your family or your coworkers or whatever it might be just feels like a frustrating, burdensome obligation all the time, I think Jesus has something better for you.
SPEAKER_00: A better heart posture.
SPEAKER_00: Not a not a, hey, just buckle down and try harder and white knuckle it even more, but a better way to go about loving.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And I realize how annoying this probably sounds.
SPEAKER_00: Like love is an opportunity, not an obligation.
SPEAKER_00: Most of you have probably already written me off at this point.
SPEAKER_00: But if I look at my own life, I notice what a huge difference it makes when I'm rooted in God's love and when I'm not.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: When I'm internalized that opportunity that love is to love the people around me, and when I haven't done that.
SPEAKER_00: To me, there's a huge difference in my life.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna tell you a tale of two Saturdays.
SPEAKER_00: Two Saturdays ago, not yesterday, but two before that, um, I was in a really grumpy, grouchy mood pretty much all day for some reason.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and you know, maybe you've been here, maybe you haven't.
SPEAKER_00: Everything my kids did like annoyed me in some way, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so to love them well felt like I'm just like, okay, don't get too mad about this.
SPEAKER_00: It's really not worth it, right?
SPEAKER_00: And then and then do my best and usually blow it or some way, right?
SPEAKER_00: Just for some reason, every little thing was kind of setting me off, making me feel grouchy.
SPEAKER_00: And I failed many times.
SPEAKER_00: Last Saturday, so the weekend of Thanksgiving, uh, we have a three-year-old who is like really like learning what it means to be a toddler in a visceral way for us, which is really fun.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and we had probably the biggest temper tantrum, at least that I've experienced out of any of our kids, just screaming and trying to hit and like a little, like almost looks like a demon-possessed child, like, you know, screaming like slobber coming down her mouth for like 45 minutes straight, right?
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like doing all the things that have worked with all the other temper tantrums I've dealt with.
SPEAKER_00: It's like, wow, nothing is working right now.
SPEAKER_00: This is wild.
SPEAKER_00: But to me, the difference was I was in a really good space, right?
SPEAKER_00: It was Thanksgiving, so there's a little extra time.
SPEAKER_00: And instead of using that time to just do what I wanted, I made sure I spent some time intentionally, like praying, connecting to God.
SPEAKER_00: So I felt full of God's love for me and full, like deeply rooted in my call as a parent to love my kids even when it's difficult.
SPEAKER_00: And for that 45 minutes, yeah, it was difficult, but for the most part, I was just sitting there fairly peacefully, like, wow, okay, God, you want me to love this girl, even though she's freaking out right now, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like, I was rooted in God's love and care and compassion and his call for me.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So on the outside, you'd say, well, that was terrible compared to my kids just like leaving food on the ground, which isn't that big of a deal.
SPEAKER_00: But internally, there was a huge difference in how it was relating to each of these situations.
SPEAKER_00: And the main difference was not, as I was reflecting on it, was not anything about the circumstances around me.
SPEAKER_00: It was all about my heart posture.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: When I was deeply rooted in God's call that, hey, this is an opportunity to love even when it's difficult.
SPEAKER_00: What do you know?
SPEAKER_00: I had a different presence and posture.
SPEAKER_00: Even though I was trying my best to love in both situations, one felt way better and way easier in that moment than the other.
SPEAKER_00: Right.
SPEAKER_00: I think sometimes we can trick ourselves into thinking, like, well, if my circumstances were different, or if my spouse could act this way, or if my kids or my coworker would just act this way, then love would be so much easier.
SPEAKER_00: Which is probably true.
SPEAKER_00: Probably would be easier if they acted a little better, right?
SPEAKER_00: Um, but at the same time, I don't think we give enough credit to our own heart posture in those moments.
SPEAKER_00: That it's not just about the circumstances, it's about how rooted we are in God's love and care for the world around us.
unknown: Right?
SPEAKER_00: The same thing can happen when it comes to serving, right?
SPEAKER_00: Um, sometimes for me when I go to have to serve somewhere, whether it's in kids' ministry, something else, right?
SPEAKER_00: It's easy, there's days it feels just like an obligation, like, oh, I just gotta do this and check this box, and I'm a little grumpy about it.
SPEAKER_00: But when I like take the time to be like, okay, God, this is an opportunity you've given me to show love to people for the next hour and 15 minutes or whatever it might be, like I show up in a very different way in those moments.
SPEAKER_00: And so even though it can feel love can feel like an obligation and a big box to check at times, I think Jesus has something better for us.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: I think one of the things that gets in the way of that, if I'm honest, at least with myself and I think a lot of people, is that we let other stuff get in the way of our love.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: One of the differences between my tale of two Saturdays is one of them, I was trying to get a lot of my own stuff done or do my own thing, and so every little annoying thing my kids did interrupted me.
SPEAKER_00: The other one, I was fully present in that moment to love.
SPEAKER_00: And a lot of times I think we let worldly things kind of get mixed up in our love.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what uh John says about loving the world in 1 John chapter 2.
SPEAKER_00: Do not love the world or anything in the world.
SPEAKER_00: If anyone loves the world, love for the Father is not in them.
SPEAKER_00: For everything in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life, comes not from the Father, but from the world.
SPEAKER_00: The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.
SPEAKER_00: Right, so this passage is contrasting love for the world with love for people.
SPEAKER_00: Um, right, the love for others is about the other person.
SPEAKER_00: This love of the world is about me and what I can get.
SPEAKER_00: And so when we put all our energy into loving things in this world, whether it's through our own selfish desires, whether it's through um the approval of the people around us, people pleasing, whether it's like our own ambition and our sense of accomplishment of being able to hustle and check all the boxes, all of that is will just pass away at some point.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter in the long run like we think it does.
SPEAKER_00: So we put our energy into that instead of a love that's grounded in God and centered on extending that love to others.
SPEAKER_00: And this requires some difficult honesty, right?
SPEAKER_00: To ask ourselves honestly, are my kids being annoying, or am I just multitasking too much and not being present in this moment?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Are my motivations loving, or am I trying to check all the boxes so I keep everyone happy around me?
SPEAKER_00: Is my schedule actually too full to serve, or is my Netflix watch list too long?
SPEAKER_00: I know that one hurts me too.
SPEAKER_00: Um, when we're grounded in love and connected to him, though, it's actually much easier to see when we're pivoting out of something unhealthy, right?
SPEAKER_00: And that we need to repent of and come and become re-centered ourselves on God's love.
SPEAKER_00: And then we can say no to those things that are just of the world that will pass away, that get in the way of our ability to love other people.
SPEAKER_00: All right, last one here.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, our culture says love is something conditional that needs to be earned, that isn't just given.
SPEAKER_00: I think this shows up in a lot of ways.
SPEAKER_00: Um, right, love is sometimes something we only give to the people we feel like deserve it.
SPEAKER_00: Um, people pleasing is all about this.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I assume the people around me only love me as long as I'm doing something good for them or keeping them happy with me.
SPEAKER_00: Um sometimes this shows up in like feeling like you need to prove yourself to people all the time.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Social media has only made this way worse because you're literally like your uh status is quantified by numbers of likes or hearts or whatever it might be, right?
SPEAKER_00: Or you feel this pressure to present the best version of yourself, right?
SPEAKER_00: And make sure that you look good on the outside.
SPEAKER_00: This is what cancel culture is rooted in.
SPEAKER_00: Like any mistake is punished immediately with no uh no opportunity for grace.
SPEAKER_00: Um, or like in your workplace, right?
SPEAKER_00: Like there chances are your boss probably is valuing you based off of what you're doing for the company or not, or him or not, or her or not, or whatever.
SPEAKER_00: And so in our world, this type of love is not a firm foundation, but it's something that can be given or taken away at a moment's notice.
SPEAKER_00: Now, again, there's some truth, this is just how people act in our world, right?
SPEAKER_00: And this is how we act when we're um not rooted in God's love.
SPEAKER_00: And so this is just partially true, but what we need to be careful about is that as followers of Jesus, that we don't let this type of love become our love, where we only love people conditionally.
SPEAKER_00: But most importantly, I think, is what I see a lot of people do, right?
SPEAKER_00: Myself included, is we can accidentally um take this type of love.
SPEAKER_00: Like love is conditional, and we need to prove ourselves and apply it to our relationship with God, right?
SPEAKER_00: To think that God's love for me is conditional, and that God's love for me is only based off of what I can do or what bad stuff I haven't done or what good stuff I have done for him.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and the truth is God's love for you is not dependent on any of those things.
SPEAKER_00: Here's what uh we see in 1 John chapter 4.
SPEAKER_00: There is no fear in love, talking about God's love specifically, but perfect love drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment.
SPEAKER_00: The one who fears is not made perfect in love.
SPEAKER_00: We love because he first loved us.
SPEAKER_00: See, if you are in Christ, you don't have to worry about punishment, right?
SPEAKER_00: Uh, you don't have to fear or wonder what God thinks about you, whether he's happy with you or not.
SPEAKER_00: Um, he loved us first, before we did anything to make ourselves lovable or unlovable, right?
SPEAKER_00: He knew what we were gonna do, he knew who we were gonna be, and he chose to love us anyway.
SPEAKER_00: And God's love is a perfect foundation from which to build our life on because it's unshakable.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: It's not gonna go away when we screw up or don't meet up to meet up to our expectations or other people's expectations, right?
SPEAKER_00: When we're grounded in God's love, we are then free to extend that love to others.
SPEAKER_00: Um, his love, like we don't have to just present our best selves to God.
SPEAKER_00: We can present whoever we are to God, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because he already knows it's all there and has so much grace for us.
SPEAKER_00: Two things come to mind.
SPEAKER_00: One is my three-year-old, the one, the terror, who is also such a joy at times.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, one of the things she's gotten into saying recently, which I think is really cute, and it was reminding me of this when I was thinking about this, is she'll say, Daddy, I love you and I like you, right?
SPEAKER_00: To say, like, oh, she loves me and she likes being around me.
SPEAKER_00: And I think sometimes we think of God as like he loves us, but like we're kind of on thin ice because we've probably done too much already, and so we have to be careful.
SPEAKER_00: No, he loves us and he actually likes spending time with us.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: That was the whole point of why he created us, because he wanted to spend time with us.
SPEAKER_00: Um, the other thing I think of is so I just recently got a haircut.
SPEAKER_00: I usually go from letting it grow out and being really lazy and being like, I can't take it anymore, I need a haircut.
SPEAKER_00: And so I cut it really short.
SPEAKER_00: And the people always say, like, why are you cutting it so short?
SPEAKER_00: It's like, so I don't have to come back for another like five or six months.
SPEAKER_00: Like, I hate doing this.
SPEAKER_00: Um, without fail, what happens almost every time after I get a haircut for like two or three days because I think I'm an idiot, is I get I go to take a shower, get some shampoo, and totally forget how much hair I have on my head.
SPEAKER_00: And so all of a sudden I'm standing there or with like all this shampoo just dripping out of my hands.
SPEAKER_00: Like, what am I gonna do with all this?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: I have like nothing up here to use.
SPEAKER_00: And I imagine God's grace is a little bit like that.
SPEAKER_00: There's so much of it, we don't even we can't even hold it all in our hands.
SPEAKER_00: It's just like dripping and going everywhere, right?
SPEAKER_00: And there's there's too much for us to even use in one lifetime.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: It's not like we just barely scrape by and he's like kind of frustrated, but he knows he has to love us, right?
SPEAKER_00: His love is bigger than what we can imagine.
SPEAKER_00: And when we're grounded in God's love, we're free to extend that love to other people, right?
SPEAKER_00: A love that they don't have to earn in order to receive.
SPEAKER_00: A love that's rooted in conviction, not just warm, fuzzy feelings.
SPEAKER_00: A love that sees what an opportunity love is to give ourselves for the sake of other people, to show people the radical love of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: So I don't know about you guys, but that sounds like something way better than what we see in our culture or what usually bubbles up inside of me.
SPEAKER_00: And this better way of love Jesus invites us into isn't always easy.
SPEAKER_00: It's not always convenient or doesn't always feel natural, but it is so much better than what we try to do on our own.
SPEAKER_00: So as we wrap up here, a key part of this is to understand that this better way of love isn't something we can just create on our own.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: We can't just be like, okay, so here's what perfect love is and just create it.
SPEAKER_00: We actually have to receive it from God in order to extend it to other people.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: It's not something we can just white knuckle our way through and check all the boxes.
SPEAKER_00: It's something we receive and that overflows into the life of the people around us.
SPEAKER_00: So in order to live out this better vision of love, we need to receive it from God.
SPEAKER_00: One of the things Drew last year was preaching on love for Advent.
SPEAKER_00: And I loved what he said, it stuck with me all year.
SPEAKER_00: That loved people love people, right?
SPEAKER_00: Kind of playing on that hurt people, hurt people um phrase.
SPEAKER_00: That when we are loved by God, we extend that same love to others.
SPEAKER_00: And so if you find yourself like, man, my life does not look as loving as I want it to, this is not the time you beat yourself up and be like, I guess I gotta try harder.
SPEAKER_00: It's the time to go to the loving arms of God and say, God, I obviously must be running on empty.
SPEAKER_00: I need you to fill me up right now.
SPEAKER_00: Um and it might seem counterintuitive, counterintuitive if you feel like you already can't keep up, but pausing to stop and allow God to fill us with his love is the best way that we can extend that to the people around us.
SPEAKER_00: So as we wrap up, here's some action steps.
SPEAKER_00: Uh if you know what to do, if like something was bubbling up in your mind or your heart, like do that, follow the Holy Spirit's prompting.
SPEAKER_00: If not, here's a couple ideas.
SPEAKER_00: You can find all these on our website too.
SPEAKER_00: So don't feel like you have to write them down.
SPEAKER_00: But I encourage you, right?
SPEAKER_00: We would be doing exactly what John told us not to do if we go, hey, here's a lot of cool thoughts about love, and then do nothing with them, right?
SPEAKER_00: We want to love with action, not just word and speech.
SPEAKER_00: Um, so spend some time praying, like just asking, like praying with God, what are the ways you settle for the world's vision of love?
SPEAKER_00: What blocks your ability to extend a Jesus-looking love to the people around you?
SPEAKER_00: And then a few like practical ideas.
SPEAKER_00: Read the Advent Guide.
SPEAKER_00: This whole week is about love.
SPEAKER_00: There's a five different devotionals written by people in our community with little practice steps and scriptures to go along with them.
SPEAKER_00: Read first John this week.
SPEAKER_00: It's all about love.
SPEAKER_00: It's awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Spend some time receiving God's love for you each day.
SPEAKER_00: If you're running on empty, just even like five or ten minutes in the morning or at lunchtime will work wonders in your life to receive God's love and soak it up like a sponge.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and then if you have someone in your life, whether it's your kids, your spouse, your boss, whatever it might be, that is really difficult to love, I'd encourage you to spend some time before you go into that situation praying and centering yourself on God's love, like rooting yourself in God's call in your life so you can be in a good place to love them, you know, this week as you go into those environments and situations.
SPEAKER_00: All right, so let me pray for us.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and then we can go and enjoy the beautiful day.
SPEAKER_00: God, thank you so much for the beauty of snow this morning and just the beautiful world that you have created.
SPEAKER_00: God, I ask that as we um enter into all of the Christmas plans and festivities and all the things, that you would slow us down.
SPEAKER_00: You would create space in our life so that we could soak in your presence and so that we could be a community that shows your love to the people around us.
SPEAKER_00: God, I ask that you would, if if there's any of us who are really struggling with this, God, that you would protect us from the voice of the enemy that just wants to beat us up and make us feel really guilty and shameful about how much we've dropped the ball, and that you would instead fill us up with your love and a vision for a new way of living life, um, so that we could step into your grace and invite others to do the same.
SPEAKER_00: So we thank you for your love and your grace, and that no matter how much we screw this up with the people around us, you still love us and call us back into relationship with you.
SPEAKER_00: So we thank you for that.
SPEAKER_00: In your name we pray, amen.
SPEAKER_00: All right, have a good week.