SPEAKER_00: It's good to be with you.
SPEAKER_00: My name is Mac.
SPEAKER_00: I'm one of the pastors on our team.
SPEAKER_00: Also, I want to welcome all of you who are joining us from home.
SPEAKER_00: Thanks so much for tuning in.
SPEAKER_00: We're in a sermon series right now called Maturing in the Mess, and we're going through 1 Corinthians.
SPEAKER_00: The big idea in this series is that we don't grow as followers of Jesus by escaping the mess that is the church, but rather by maturing within it.
SPEAKER_00: No church is perfect.
SPEAKER_00: Every church is messy, and yet, if according to the New Testament, this is the context in which we grow and become more like Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And so doing life with other people, even messy people, is not an obstacle to your growth.
SPEAKER_00: It's actually essential to it.
SPEAKER_00: One of the challenges with this is that we don't really like the mess.
SPEAKER_00: We'd much rather stay outside the mess and sort of consume and watch the mess as a form of entertainment.
SPEAKER_00: One example of this, I think, is our obsession with celebrities.
SPEAKER_00: Think about People Magazine, right?
SPEAKER_00: You guys are all smiling a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: People magazine has a readership of 147 million people.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's a lot.
SPEAKER_00: And what they do is they essentially publicize uh celebrity drama and scandals for our entertainment.
SPEAKER_00: So one week this Hollywood couple is breaking up, the next one, the next week that Hollywood couple is hooking up.
SPEAKER_00: And what do we do?
SPEAKER_00: We eat it up.
SPEAKER_00: We gobble it up, like Mullins ice cream in July, okay?
SPEAKER_00: We're like, hey, I'll take eight scoops on that chocolate-covered waffle cone, right?
SPEAKER_00: We just can't get enough of it.
SPEAKER_00: So did you guys hear the news?
SPEAKER_00: Did you guys hear the news?
SPEAKER_00: Um that Travis Kelsey and Taylor Swift are slated to get married on July 3rd in New York.
SPEAKER_00: It's a big deal.
SPEAKER_00: Surprised you didn't hear about it.
SPEAKER_00: Um everyone's gonna be there.
SPEAKER_00: It's gonna be huge.
SPEAKER_00: Um I'm quite frankly shocked that they made it this far.
SPEAKER_00: That's just me.
SPEAKER_00: Um and they haven't publicly confirmed this.
SPEAKER_00: And we know that, you know, rumors of marriage are sort of notoriously inaccurate when it comes to Hollywood uh celebrities, so we'll see if it happens.
SPEAKER_00: But if it does, man, that's big news.
SPEAKER_00: Um sad news.
SPEAKER_00: Sad news.
SPEAKER_00: Uh Keith Urban and Nicole Kidman uh called it quits after two decades of marriage.
SPEAKER_00: Um they finalized their divorce.
SPEAKER_00: I've been losing sleep over this one.
SPEAKER_00: I hadn't realized how invested I was in their marriage until it ended.
SPEAKER_00: Um here's another one.
SPEAKER_00: Katie Perry recently split from Orlando Bloom, but she's rebounded with a Justin Trudeau.
SPEAKER_00: So we'll see how long that one lasts.
SPEAKER_00: Um Brittany Spears was recently in the news.
SPEAKER_00: Uh she got arrested in March for a D D UI at Dewey.
SPEAKER_00: She got a Dewey.
SPEAKER_00: Megan and Harry are uh going back to Britain in July.
SPEAKER_00: And apparently there's a lot of unresolved tension between them and the rest of the royal family.
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna want to keep our eye on that one to see how that visit that visit goes.
SPEAKER_00: Ryan, though, the interwebs are talking about Ryan Seacrest because he either got some major plastic surgery or figured out how to lose a ton of weight in just his face.
SPEAKER_00: So we're gonna want to get to the bottom of that one.
SPEAKER_00: You see, we consume this stuff as entertainment, don't we?
SPEAKER_00: Uh whether it's uh, you know, Will Smith slapping Chris Rock across the face at the Oscars or a wardrobe malfunction during the Super Bowl halftime show, which I'm still scarred from.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we eat this, we eat this stuff up.
SPEAKER_00: There's literally a TV show called Scandal.
SPEAKER_00: Did you know that?
SPEAKER_00: It went for seven seasons.
SPEAKER_00: Uh that shows our obsession with um sort of consuming scandals for entertainment.
SPEAKER_00: It centers on this woman at Washington, D.C.
SPEAKER_00: D.C.
SPEAKER_00: who um has this crisis management firm uh where essentially when powerful people find themselves in a scandal, you know, politicians and other people, um, she fix it fixes it for them.
SPEAKER_00: Okay?
SPEAKER_00: And so, and by fix it, I don't mean tell the truth and like make amends.
SPEAKER_00: No, she she hides the true story, she spins, she manages perception in order to keep those powerful people in power.
SPEAKER_00: The show at its peak had 12 million people watching it um every week.
SPEAKER_00: My point is that scandals function as clickbait in our culture, right?
SPEAKER_00: This is why we uh binge Netflix series that exposes corruption.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, we like this kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_00: We click on headlines about moral failure and we troll public meltdowns.
SPEAKER_00: We get out the popcorn and we watch it while acting outraged at what we're seeing.
SPEAKER_00: Our culture disciples us to consume scandals as entertainment.
SPEAKER_00: And here's the twist, friends, is that at the center of the gospel is a scandal.
SPEAKER_00: At the center of the gospel is a scandal, and yet the scandal of the gospel is not meant to entertain us, it's meant to confront us.
SPEAKER_00: It's meant to do what a scandal should do, which is scandalize us, offend our sensibilities, confront us.
SPEAKER_00: And so, what is this scandal that I'm talking about?
SPEAKER_00: Well, Paul outlines not only what it is, but why it scandalizes us in 1 Corinthians 1, 18 through 25.
SPEAKER_00: So this is our text for today.
SPEAKER_00: Paul says this for the message of the cross is foolishness, it's nonsense to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved, it is the power of God, for it is written, and now he's quoting from the Hebrew scriptures, Isaiah 29, 14, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate.
SPEAKER_00: This quote is a judgment against Israel for trusting their own wisdom rather than trusting God's wisdom and direction.
SPEAKER_00: Where is the wise person?
SPEAKER_00: Where is the teacher of the law?
SPEAKER_00: Where is the philosopher of this age?
SPEAKER_00: Now watch this.
SPEAKER_00: Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world?
SPEAKER_00: For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.
SPEAKER_00: Jews demand signs, and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews, and foolishness to Gentiles.
SPEAKER_00: But to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, Paul is confronting the divisions at Corinth.
SPEAKER_00: People in Corinth were rallying around their favorite apostle, their favorite leader.
SPEAKER_00: Then they formed subgroups underneath these leaders who are now competing for power and influence in the community.
SPEAKER_00: This is what Paul is addressing.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul is naming the root of the problem is not behavioral, it's theological.
SPEAKER_00: Because if the Corinthians really understood the gospel, they wouldn't be competing against one another for influence and power.
SPEAKER_00: They wouldn't be acting with pride and boasting.
SPEAKER_00: So Paul is going to confront this community that's divided with the cross because he wants to see them exchange their rivalry for cruciformity.
SPEAKER_00: You see this?
SPEAKER_00: So the center of Paul's argument is really found in verses 22 through 24.
SPEAKER_00: So I want to read these again and really zoom in on them and unpack them a bit.
SPEAKER_00: Notice what Paul says.
SPEAKER_00: He says, Jews demand signs, Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews, and foolishness to Gentiles.
SPEAKER_00: But to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God, and the wisdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: So let's break this down and I put together a little diagram because there's a lot going on here, and I want to unpack it with you.
SPEAKER_00: So notice Paul's argument.
SPEAKER_00: He starts by saying, Jews demand signs.
SPEAKER_00: Jews demand signs.
SPEAKER_00: And what he's getting at here is that Jews expect God to show up with demonstrative power.
SPEAKER_00: Kind of like the Exodus, when God delivered them from slavery in Egypt.
SPEAKER_00: The Jews are expecting a Messiah who's going to power up and dominate Israel's enemies.
SPEAKER_00: A nationalistic Messiah who's going to crush all of Israel's enemies and put Israel on top.
SPEAKER_00: That's what the Jews are expecting.
SPEAKER_00: Demonstrative power, signs.
SPEAKER_00: But Paul says, we preach Christ crucified.
SPEAKER_00: This is the center.
SPEAKER_00: This is the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: We preach Christ crucified, a messiah who is murdered.
SPEAKER_00: Notice that this is the exact opposite of what the Jews are looking for.
SPEAKER_00: This is an oxymoron.
SPEAKER_00: They're looking for a nationalistic Messiah who's going to win.
SPEAKER_00: Paul is preaching a messiah who is murdered.
SPEAKER_00: And because of this, the Jews are getting tripped up over this message.
SPEAKER_00: The word stumbling block in Greek is scandalon.
SPEAKER_00: It scandalizes them.
SPEAKER_00: They're tripping over this message because it's the exact opposite of what they expect.
SPEAKER_00: Jews demand signs.
SPEAKER_00: And he says, Greeks, Greeks look for wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: Now, wisdom here isn't just like high IQ or intelligence, especially in Corinth, but perhaps more broadly than that, wisdom was the pathway to prominence.
SPEAKER_00: It was the sort of key to status, influence, and success.
SPEAKER_00: They didn't have Hollywood.
SPEAKER_00: But what they did have was powerful rhetoricians who were able to describe reality, and those were the celebrities in that day.
SPEAKER_00: And that's what Paul is referring to.
SPEAKER_00: People who were impressive, who had status, and who were considered significant.
SPEAKER_00: This is what Greeks look for.
SPEAKER_00: They look for a God who is impressive and is going to make them impressive.
SPEAKER_00: And so to proclaim, think about this, to proclaim there aren't many gods but one God, and that one God took on flesh as a Jewish carpenter from the backwater of Rome and then died in the most humiliating way imaginable on the cross.
SPEAKER_00: Well, from that perspective, it's absolutely foolish.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, the word for foolishness here is Moriah, where we get our word moron from.
SPEAKER_00: It makes no sense.
SPEAKER_00: And so they're tripping over this message as well.
SPEAKER_00: The cross is tripping up both Jew and Gentile alike.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason why is because it defies their expectations.
SPEAKER_00: For the Jews, the Messiah must show up and crush their enemies, not die in order to forgive their enemies.
SPEAKER_00: See that?
SPEAKER_00: And for the Gentiles, God must be impressive, not die naked on a cross in humiliation.
SPEAKER_00: And so to both groups, they're tripping up over this message because it's offensive.
SPEAKER_00: It scandalizes them.
SPEAKER_00: And it's not just offensive and scandalizing.
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't just challenge their expectations, it completely upends them.
SPEAKER_00: And so Paul is saying, look, at the center of the gospel is the message that Christ is crucified.
SPEAKER_00: That's the center.
SPEAKER_00: And this message, Christ crucified, is offensive.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the word gospel is good news.
SPEAKER_00: So it's offensive good news.
SPEAKER_00: It's good news, but it's offensive good news because it scandalizes us.
SPEAKER_00: It offends us.
SPEAKER_00: It defies all of our logic.
SPEAKER_00: It confronts all of our misconceptions.
SPEAKER_00: The Jews want a powerful Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: A crucified Messiah is an oxymoron.
SPEAKER_00: The Gentiles are looking for something impressive, but Paul says we preach Christ crucified.
SPEAKER_00: Christ crucified.
SPEAKER_00: And what he's getting at here is this is what God is like.
SPEAKER_00: This, the cross, was God's self-revelation.
SPEAKER_00: It was God revealing himself to us.
SPEAKER_00: And in that revelation, God is revealing who God is.
SPEAKER_00: That God is cruciform.
SPEAKER_00: God is cross-shaped.
SPEAKER_00: God is Calvary-like love.
SPEAKER_00: This is who God is.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the exact opposite of what the world expects.
SPEAKER_00: They're not expecting a cruciform God, a God of self-giving love.
SPEAKER_00: What's more is that Paul says that the cross is actually the wisdom and the power of God.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, the cross isn't devoid of God's power and wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: It's actually where God's wisdom and power are most profoundly revealed, if you as eyes to see it.
SPEAKER_00: So just think about it.
SPEAKER_00: Through the cross, God defeats all evil that is opposed to us and to his humanity, his creation.
SPEAKER_00: That's power.
SPEAKER_00: On the cross, God destroys and overcomes all evil.
SPEAKER_00: And then in addition to that, through the cross, God redeems all things to himself through counterintuitive brilliance.
SPEAKER_00: God, the cross doesn't, isn't devoid of power and wisdom, it actually reveals it.
SPEAKER_00: But in order to understand it, you've got to reframe how you understand power and wisdom in the first place.
SPEAKER_00: The very thing that Jews are looking for, Jews are looking for signs and Greeks are looking for wisdom, is actually revealed in Christ crucified.
SPEAKER_00: The problem is you need to change your definition because cross-wisdom and cross-power is not the same thing as worldly wisdom and worldly power.
SPEAKER_00: And see, cross-wisdom and cross power has a way of scandalizing us, offending us.
SPEAKER_00: The Jews look for signs, they demand signs.
SPEAKER_00: Greeks, well, they look for wisdom, but the cross reveals the very power and the wisdom of God, who God is and how God accomplishes his purposes in the world.
SPEAKER_00: When you drill down to the center of the gospel, this message of Christ crucified, there is a scandal, and it's simply this.
SPEAKER_00: This is our bottom line for today.
SPEAKER_00: God wins by losing.
SPEAKER_00: God defeats evil by laying down his life, not by taking life.
SPEAKER_00: God triumphs over God's enemies through crucifixion, not through domination.
SPEAKER_00: The all-powerful God shows off his power not by flexing his omnipotent muscles, but by becoming powerless.
SPEAKER_00: The all-honorable God, the one who has all glory and honor that we just got done singing about, shows off his glory, not by defeating other people, but by laying down his life for the very people who betrayed him and by going to the cross.
SPEAKER_00: You guys, it looks pathetic.
SPEAKER_00: It looks shameful.
SPEAKER_00: It looks weak.
SPEAKER_00: And it is.
SPEAKER_00: But it's actually the very power and wisdom of God on full display if we have eyes to see it.
SPEAKER_00: Not only is this who God is, but this is how God establishes his kingdom in the world.
SPEAKER_00: Not by taking life, but by giving up life.
SPEAKER_00: Not through domination, but through crucifixion.
SPEAKER_00: Not by coercion, but through the cross, not by exalting himself, but by humbling himself.
SPEAKER_00: And see, for those of us who want a God of raw power and strength, who appears really impressive, this makes zero sense.
SPEAKER_00: It offends all of our sensibilities.
SPEAKER_00: But to those who follow Jesus, to those who believe, it not only reveals who God is, but it reveals how God is at work in the world.
SPEAKER_00: You see, the world wants a God who wins by winning.
SPEAKER_00: The cross reveals the opposite, a God who wins by losing, and it still scandalizes the world.
SPEAKER_00: And it even scandalizes us.
SPEAKER_00: You see, here's the question.
SPEAKER_00: I realize I've just dumped a lot on you.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the question.
SPEAKER_00: Why in the world is Paul explaining all this heady theological stuff in the first place?
SPEAKER_00: Like, why is he doing this?
SPEAKER_00: He's writing a letter to the Corinthians.
SPEAKER_00: Why is he doing this?
SPEAKER_00: Does he just like to talk about heady stuff?
SPEAKER_00: And the answer to that is no.
SPEAKER_00: Remember, Paul is addressing the divisions at Corinth.
SPEAKER_00: He's still confronting them on the fact that they're divided.
SPEAKER_00: They're sort of got their favorite leader forming subgroups that are now competing for power and influence in the community.
SPEAKER_00: And Paul's solution to this is to explain the cross.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because if the Corinthians understood the cross, if they really understood the cross, if they really understood that God wins by losing, then they wouldn't be grasping for power and control over one another.
SPEAKER_00: They wouldn't be relating with rivalry, but they would be relating with cruciformity.
SPEAKER_00: And those, so the solution for Paul, the solution to these divisions is not to give the Corinthians a conflict training class.
SPEAKER_00: It's to name the implications of the cross.
SPEAKER_00: The solution to their divisions is not a conflict seminar, it's conformity to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: See, their priorities are all jacked up.
SPEAKER_00: They still want worldly power and worldly wisdom within this church community.
SPEAKER_00: And so the gospel still needs to scandalize them.
SPEAKER_00: And I think it still needs to scandalize us as well.
SPEAKER_00: The Jews expect demonstrative power, the Greeks look for wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: And the truth is we're no different.
SPEAKER_00: We want a God of demonstrative power who looks impressive.
SPEAKER_00: We want a God who powers up and fights for us, who secures victory on our behalf, who flexes his omnipotent muscles to crush our enemies and put us on the top.
SPEAKER_00: We want a God of raw power who is impressive and makes us impressive, who ensures that we're on the top, you know, with status and influence.
SPEAKER_00: But the cross doesn't reveal a God like that.
SPEAKER_00: The cross reveals a God who looks like a cross, a cruciform God, a cross-shaped God.
SPEAKER_00: Christ crucified, the message of the gospel confronts, confounds, and upends all of our assumptions about power and wisdom by revealing a God whose power is revealed through self-sacrifice and whose wisdom looks foolish.
SPEAKER_00: This is what God is like.
SPEAKER_00: God is cruciform.
SPEAKER_00: God is cross-shaped, Calvary-like love, a God of self-giving love who dies even for his enemies.
SPEAKER_00: And this is how God is at work in the world that hasn't changed.
SPEAKER_00: God accomplishes his purposes through humility and self-sacrificial love, enemy love, not by powering up and dominating those who are against him.
SPEAKER_00: And so if we want to be in on God's work in the world, if we're going to genuinely follow this Jesus who told us to pick up our cross and follow him, that means we need to become a cruciform community.
SPEAKER_00: We need to become cross-shaped as well.
SPEAKER_00: You guys seeing this?
SPEAKER_00: And to the degree we don't want that, we're going to keep tripping over this message.
SPEAKER_00: We're going to keep tripping over it, stumbling over it, and viewing it with suspicion as if it's nonsense.
SPEAKER_00: A couple weeks ago, I preached a message entitled Divided by Politics.
SPEAKER_00: I thought it went pretty well.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, you guys didn't get too angry.
SPEAKER_00: That was awesome.
SPEAKER_00: But in that message, and if you haven't listened to it, I encourage you to go back and listen to it.
SPEAKER_00: I wasn't trying to stir us up, I was actually trying to unify us, but I suggested that we're actually no different than the Corinthian church.
SPEAKER_00: If Paul were here, he'd say, hey, there's divisions among us as well, as a community.
SPEAKER_00: Only the difference is we're not divided around uh apostles, we're divided around politics.
SPEAKER_00: You all know this.
SPEAKER_00: We're living in a politically divisive culture.
SPEAKER_00: And the divisions out there have come in here and now are dividing us.
SPEAKER_00: And I suggested that at the root of this problem is That we have given our loyalty to partisan politics in a way that's compromised our commitment to Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And so at the heart of regaining unity as a church is giving our exclusive loyalty and allegiance to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: In other words, Jesus has to be up here, our top priority, and everything else has to be down here, including politics.
SPEAKER_00: Not even a close second.
SPEAKER_00: All right?
SPEAKER_00: It's not God and Jesus here and then politics right here.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: Like way down here, right?
SPEAKER_00: And so the key to regaining unity as a church is to actually demote how much importance we're putting on politics and get re-centered on Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: That's the 30-second, maybe minute and a half overview.
SPEAKER_00: But um, go back and listen to it.
SPEAKER_00: As I was praying over this message and noticing what Paul is doing in this section, I realized, uh, as much as I just want to be done talking about politics, I sense God asking me to take it one step further.
SPEAKER_00: So this is like politics 2.0.
SPEAKER_00: Divided by politics 2.0.
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so here we go.
SPEAKER_00: I want us to notice, this is so important, notice the parallels between Corinth and us.
SPEAKER_00: Notice the parallels.
SPEAKER_00: The root of the problem in Corinth was allegiance.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of giving their allegiance to Jesus, they've given their allegiance to these human leaders and now are forming subgroups that compete against each other.
SPEAKER_00: Paul's solution is to name that problem.
SPEAKER_00: You need to give your allegiance to Jesus, not human leaders, but he doesn't stop there.
SPEAKER_00: He then goes on to name the cross to further scandalize them, because if they understood the cross that God wins by losing, then they wouldn't be competing in the first place.
SPEAKER_00: You following?
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
SPEAKER_00: Notice the parallel.
SPEAKER_00: We too are divided, and at the root of that problem is allegiance.
SPEAKER_00: We need to give our allegiance to Jesus over partisan politics.
SPEAKER_00: All of you seem to get that.
SPEAKER_00: Yes?
SPEAKER_00: But notice that we wouldn't be divided in the first place if we really understood the cross.
SPEAKER_00: If we really understood the cross, we wouldn't be dividing over partisan politics in the first place.
SPEAKER_00: The fact that politics are dividing the church, not just here, but across the country, reveals an allegiance problem, but not just an allegiance problem, also a cross problem.
SPEAKER_00: It reveals that we who follow Jesus actually don't understand the Jesus we're saying we follow.
SPEAKER_00: Because if we really believed the gospel that God wins by losing, that God's kingdom advances through self-sacrificial love, through cruciformity, humility, sacrifice, enemy love, then we wouldn't be treating politics like the hope of the world.
SPEAKER_00: And we certainly wouldn't be dividing over whether this politician or that political tribe should be in charge.
SPEAKER_00: We wouldn't be dividing over this.
SPEAKER_00: If we understood the cross, we wouldn't be divided over partisan politics at all.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because the cross, friends, completely reframes how we understand power in the first place.
SPEAKER_00: The problem with politics is that it operates on power over, worldly power.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not naming anything you shouldn't know or anything new.
SPEAKER_00: You zoom out and look at the history of the world.
SPEAKER_00: Every nation and every empire, it runs on power over.
SPEAKER_00: Every single one of them.
SPEAKER_00: It relies on getting power and then maintaining that power over as long as possible.
SPEAKER_00: Winning elections, defeating opponents, advancing agendas, protecting interests, controlling outcomes.
SPEAKER_00: That's power over, friends.
SPEAKER_00: It's not cross power.
SPEAKER_00: Power to rule, power to control, power to call the shots.
SPEAKER_00: You zoom out and look at the history of the world, and you look at the rise and falls of nations and empires.
SPEAKER_00: It's all about gaining this type of power, worldly power, power over, and then holding on to it as long as you can.
SPEAKER_00: And it works until it doesn't, until someone else gets more power, and then they get to be in charge for a while.
SPEAKER_00: This is the sad story of nations and empires.
SPEAKER_00: Now, listen, I'm not saying that politics don't matter.
SPEAKER_00: This is my view.
SPEAKER_00: Um, I think that God actually can work through governments to restrain evil in a broken and fallen world.
SPEAKER_00: Governments are not holy, they're corrupted, just like every other system and structure, and yet God graciously works through it to restrain evil in a fallen and broken world.
SPEAKER_00: Not because he prescribes it, but because of who God is.
SPEAKER_00: God is always at work in the world to maximize good.
SPEAKER_00: I'm also not saying you shouldn't care about American politics.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying you shouldn't.
SPEAKER_00: Politics is just how we order the world.
SPEAKER_00: That's what politics are.
SPEAKER_00: How do we order the world to set up society where people can flourish?
SPEAKER_00: That's what politics are.
SPEAKER_00: There's no avoiding it.
SPEAKER_00: So you should care about that.
SPEAKER_00: Because the people who get elected, well, man, they make some pretty important decisions that either move us towards God's design for a just and flourishing society towards shalom or away from it.
SPEAKER_00: And so, yes, every single one of us has to do our best to critically think through all the issues, and there are a lot of them, and then vote responsibly in light of Jesus' values and kingdom ethics.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah?
SPEAKER_00: All of us have to do that.
SPEAKER_00: That's just part of it.
SPEAKER_00: And quite frankly, it's getting increasingly hard from my standpoint because there aren't very many good options.
SPEAKER_00: It's just me.
SPEAKER_00: But you I'm not saying it doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_00: I'm saying it is it does matter, but but don't confuse that with the gospel.
SPEAKER_00: Don't confuse that with like the hope of the world that everything's hanging on this election or that person.
SPEAKER_00: That's ridiculous.
SPEAKER_00: As Christians, we don't put our hope in politics, we put our hope in the person of Jesus who died for us and is restoring all things to himself.
SPEAKER_00: Let's not be confused about this.
SPEAKER_00: The cross shows us that God's kingdom doesn't advance by power over.
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no.
SPEAKER_00: God wins by losing, God wins by going to the cross, God wins by way of cruciformity.
SPEAKER_00: And so if this is true, if this is true, then why in the world would we, as followers of Jesus, who declare our ultimate allegiance to the Savior who died for us, why in the world would we end up dividing from one another over which worldly political party can best wield power over in order to make America great?
SPEAKER_00: Why would we do that?
SPEAKER_00: When it's not even the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: The kingdom of America is not the same thing as the kingdom of God.
SPEAKER_00: Why would we do that?
SPEAKER_00: And so the fact that we're dividing over this stuff just reveals we crave worldly power and worldly wisdom.
SPEAKER_00: And the sad thing is that many people have so fused the kingdom of America with the kingdom of God that they can't distinguish the difference between nationalistic idolatry and fidelity to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: That's where we are.
SPEAKER_00: It's a travesty.
SPEAKER_00: And it's a sham.
SPEAKER_00: And it's a mockery.
SPEAKER_00: It's a traversam mockery.
SPEAKER_00: To quote an old commercial.
SPEAKER_00: The Corinthians are clearly struggling to get this, the implications of the gospel, right?
SPEAKER_00: That that to follow this Jesus means they need to become cruciform.
SPEAKER_00: But here's the good news.
SPEAKER_00: And this is a corrective for us.
SPEAKER_00: The early church, and by the early church I mean the first 300 years of the church, they seemed to figure out, they find, they found their footing on what it means to follow in the footsteps of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: They learned how to live in a cruciform way, a cross-shaped way.
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm not saying the early church was perfect, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we can over-idealize it, but the early church, the first 300 years, there's a lot of markers to go.
SPEAKER_00: This community knew how to live a cross-shaped way of life.
SPEAKER_00: Part of it probably was because they had no political power whatsoever and were sort of a persecuted minority, so they didn't really have any other option.
SPEAKER_00: But man, there are records that show that they specifically resisted power over and dominance.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, there are records that show that those who were in positions of incredible influence and power walked away from it.
SPEAKER_00: They resisted that when they came to faith in Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: They walked away from positions of power, from military advancement and social status because they knew that if I'm gonna follow the Savior who is crucified, I need to become cruciform as well.
SPEAKER_00: And so how did this show up?
SPEAKER_00: Well, you've heard this list before, but I'm gonna remind you, they were known, the early church for the first 300 years, they were known for feeding the poor and hungry.
SPEAKER_00: That's what they were known for.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody was hungry among the early followers of Jesus because they made sure everybody was fed.
SPEAKER_00: Friends, we have enough food to feed the world.
SPEAKER_00: The problem is that we don't distribute it.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: And why don't we distribute it?
SPEAKER_00: Because there's powers at play, right?
SPEAKER_00: So the early church, they cared for the sick and dying during plagues when everyone else fled.
SPEAKER_00: So when COVID hit Rome, right?
SPEAKER_00: It was the Christians, while everybody else was fleeing away from crowded areas, the Christians stayed behind to care for people and often lost their lives in the process.
SPEAKER_00: The early Christians uh were known for rescuing abandoned and unwanted babies and raising them as their own.
SPEAKER_00: That was their form of abortion, infanticide.
SPEAKER_00: They just leave babies on uh in the in garbage places to die.
SPEAKER_00: And Christians would patrol those places and then raise them as their own.
SPEAKER_00: You guys, I'll just name this.
SPEAKER_00: Many of you are pro-life.
SPEAKER_00: That's great.
SPEAKER_00: But don't get on the platform and start naming how pro-life you are if you're not willing to take in someone who needs a home or walk alongside the woman who's having a crisis pregnancy, because the early church did that.
SPEAKER_00: They they walked past the place in order to welcome them in and then raise these boys and girls as their own kids.
SPEAKER_00: That's what it looks like to be cruciformed.
SPEAKER_00: They disrupted social hierarchies by treating the poor, women, and slaves with dignity.
SPEAKER_00: It was so confusing to the Romans because when Christians gathered, all of those social distinctions went away and everybody was considered equal.
SPEAKER_00: They loved their enemies.
SPEAKER_00: They forgave those who persecuted them, and they refused to retaliate.
SPEAKER_00: You see, the early church embodied the teachings of Jesus, not perfectly, but man, they're getting more right than we're getting right.
SPEAKER_00: They actually lived out the way of Jesus, and what ended up happening was their cruciformity became a catalyst for church growth.
SPEAKER_00: We want fast growth, instant conversions, but the early church was like more like a patient ferment.
SPEAKER_00: They got that this takes time, and the way the kingdom grows is by becoming Christ-like.
SPEAKER_00: And so over time it began to grow throughout the Roman Empire.
SPEAKER_00: Now, guess when that changed?
SPEAKER_00: Guess when all of this sort of took a negative turn?
SPEAKER_00: The answer is when the early church was given power.
SPEAKER_00: In 312 A.D., this guy named Constantine, he was the emperor at the time, he supposedly converts to Christianity.
SPEAKER_00: I say supposedly because historians debate whether it was authentic and sincere or whether it was just like strategic.
SPEAKER_00: And uh I'll just tell you, I think it was just strategic.
SPEAKER_00: I don't think it was authentic.
SPEAKER_00: But he comes to faith, and the following year in 313 A.D., they passed the Edict of Milan, which legalizes Christianity, and pretty much overnight, Christianity goes from being a persecuted minority to being the favored religion in the Roman Empire, and now Christians have seats at the political table.
SPEAKER_00: They're tasting power for the first time.
SPEAKER_00: And I imagine if we were alive at the time, we would see it as a win.
SPEAKER_00: Why?
SPEAKER_00: Because you've been persecuted and fed to lions for the last 300 years.
SPEAKER_00: So now that that's ending, right, and you're actually being put in positions of power and influence, that might feel really good.
SPEAKER_00: But the problem is, is it corrupted the church.
SPEAKER_00: It corrupted the church.
SPEAKER_00: What mess felt like a win actually led to considerable compromise.
SPEAKER_00: When the church gained uh power, they lost their cruciformity.
SPEAKER_00: And so now instead of loving enemies, um, they're wielding uh swords against their enemies and embodying power over.
SPEAKER_00: They're dominating their enemies with violence and force.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of upending social hierarchies, they're partnering with those in power and they're reinforcing them.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of caring for the poor, they become complicit in exploiting the poor.
SPEAKER_00: That goes away.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of embodying humility, they become obsessed with status.
SPEAKER_00: Instead of serving with self-sacrifice, they end up living out of a power over mentality with control.
SPEAKER_00: Cruciformity was corrupted, slowly giving way to power over.
SPEAKER_00: At the heart of this shift, notice, was a fusion between the church and political power, what historians now refer to as Christendom.
SPEAKER_00: And we've been living in a Christian framework for the last 1700 years, and I think it's rooted in a lie.
SPEAKER_00: I think it's a lie from the pit of hell that is destroying our witness in the world, that God's kingdom is going to advance and depends on us obtaining political power rather than living cruciform lives.
SPEAKER_00: The church has lost sight of how God wins.
SPEAKER_00: God wins by losing.
SPEAKER_00: And instead of seeking, instead, we as a church seek to win by winning, by gaining power over, and it's compromising our witness in the world.
SPEAKER_00: And then it's dividing us as a church.
SPEAKER_00: Because now we're split on who should be in charge of wielding worldly power.
SPEAKER_00: I love you guys.
SPEAKER_00: Felt like I need to say that.
SPEAKER_00: I know it's hard, but this is just where we're this is where we are.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm hopeful that we can like regain and live into something more beautiful.
SPEAKER_00: But I can't not name this stuff because this is what Paul is doing.
SPEAKER_00: He's going, hey, at the root of your divisions, Corinthians, is two things.
SPEAKER_00: You've got to regain, re give your allegiance to Jesus, and you've got to get the cross because this is how you're supposed to relate to one another with cross-like love and self-sacrifice.
SPEAKER_00: And I want to say it's the same thing for us.
SPEAKER_00: The uh uh politicized culture we live in is dividing everybody.
SPEAKER_00: Those divisions are coming in here, and the solution is twofold.
SPEAKER_00: Number one, we have to give our allegiance to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus here, everything else, including politics, way down here.
SPEAKER_00: But then we gotta go one step further and learn how to live into cruciformity.
SPEAKER_00: We've got to learn to uh embody cross power and cross wisdom, not its opposite.
SPEAKER_00: You guys tracking?
SPEAKER_00: Kinda?
SPEAKER_00: Alright.
SPEAKER_00: Great, the three of you.
SPEAKER_00: Here's some action steps.
SPEAKER_00: All right, here's some action steps.
SPEAKER_00: Some things to pray through this week.
SPEAKER_00: Where am I still uncomfortable with a God who wins by losing?
SPEAKER_00: Where does that still disrupt me?
SPEAKER_00: Where am I relating to others out of rivalry rather than cruciformity?
SPEAKER_00: Is the way I'm engaging in politics producing the fruit of the spirit in my life?
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: This is the problem with Corinthians.
SPEAKER_00: There are divisions, not a sign of the fruit of the spirit.
SPEAKER_00: Is the way that you're going about politics and talking about it with other people?
SPEAKER_00: Is it producing the fruit of the spirit in your life?
SPEAKER_00: And then here's a practice, a few practices that you might try on this week.
SPEAKER_00: Practice winning by losing in one small way.
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's just letting someone else have the last word this week, right?
SPEAKER_00: If you're married, I guarantee you'll have some opportunities to lose this week, okay?
SPEAKER_00: Fast from social media, notice its impact on you.
SPEAKER_00: I did this for Lent, and it was amazing.
SPEAKER_00: It was amazing.
SPEAKER_00: Social media is very much corrupting our minds and getting in the way of us being renewed in the image of Christ.
SPEAKER_00: And then finally, intentionally choose humble service at work or at home.
SPEAKER_00: Again, countless opportunities just to embrace that humility of serving other people in love.
SPEAKER_00: Make this the normative part of your everyday life.
SPEAKER_00: I want to circle back to an announcement before we close out, and that's our moonlit movies.
SPEAKER_00: What we really want to do this summer is form a kingdom community around moonlit movies.
SPEAKER_00: What I'd love to see is a group of people who go, Oh, I want to own this as a primary way of living on mission this summer.
SPEAKER_00: So I'm gonna be at all three, and then Cameron's gonna host a training to go.
SPEAKER_00: This is what it looks like to be present in our community with love.
SPEAKER_00: It's just gonna be between two services.
SPEAKER_00: But like, hey, I'm gonna commit to being at all three of these.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna be on the team of either setting up or tearing down and serving, and I want to learn how to live in the way of Jesus by being present to those who don't know him.
SPEAKER_00: Does this make sense?
SPEAKER_00: So if you're not connected or living on mission in some way, please sign up to be part of Moonlit Movies this summer.
SPEAKER_00: We want to kind of push the envelope a little bit there.
SPEAKER_00: That's all that I have for you this Memorial Day weekend.
SPEAKER_00: Um again, love you guys.
SPEAKER_00: Let's stand for a closing prayer.
SPEAKER_00: Uh Jesus, you died for us, and then you invite us to participate in dying for the world.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, you invite us to suffer for the world in cross-like love.
SPEAKER_00: And yet we resist that.
SPEAKER_00: I know I do.
SPEAKER_00: Uh nobody wants to appear weak or foolish, and yet that's how you accomplish your purposes.
SPEAKER_00: Give us an imagination of what cross power and cross wisdom looks like so that we can join your work and the world and look in love like you.
SPEAKER_00: We pray this in Jesus' name, and all God's people said, Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Go in peace.