Demolition precedes renovation.
Luke 10:25–37 (NLT) 25 One day an expert in religious law stood up to test Jesus by asking him this question: “Teacher, what should I do to inherit eternal life?”
26 Jesus replied, “What does the law of Moses say? How do you read it?”
27 The man answered, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind.’ And, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
28 “Right!” Jesus told him. “Do this and you will live!”
29 The man wanted to justify (to be declared right) his actions, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
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Demolition precedes renovation.
Luke 10:25–37 (NLT) 25 One day an expert in religious law stood up to test Jesus by asking him this question: “Teacher, what should I do to inherit eternal life?”
26 Jesus replied, “What does the law of Moses say? How do you read it?”
27 The man answered, “‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, and all your mind.’ And, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
28 “Right!” Jesus told him. “Do this and you will live!”
29 The man wanted to justify (to be declared right) his actions, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
#alivewesleyanchurch
For the latest sermons, stories, & training: https://alivewesleyan.com/sermons/
STAY CONNECTED:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ALIVEWesleyan
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ALIVEwesleyan
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alivewesleyan/
Website: https://alivewesleyan.com
Newsletter: https://alivewesleyan.info/weeklyupdate
I sure hope you're doing well. I got to say something funny. So first service, um, you know, Matt was doing his senior thing and uh, he uh, he said in the service, he said, hey, what all of you seniors, please stand. And so we had some students stand in, one old lady, like in her eighties in the back stood up. So I don't know if she got a picture made or not, but if you call yourself a senior, get your picture made, that'd be fantastic. That'd be great. So Laura, thank you so much for these good folks to high on her being able to share with them today. And I do pray, father, that you would hide them in your cross. They didn't come here to hear from, from a person. We all came because we want to meet you. Want to hear from you now and kind of want to hear what you have to say about our lives and what you want to have, what you have to say about who we are as people and what you want us to do while we're here on this planet. So Lord, um, I do ask that you would meet with us and meet with whatever need we bring in whatever thing comes to the forefront of everybody's mind when we talk about that meet, that need. I pray and when we leave this place, drive down the hill and may we know that man God is doing something here and a in a in me and your name we pray. Amen. I've been doing this series called Demo Day and the basic idea of Demo Day is this, we all build our lives on certain things. We have foundational elements that we all build this life on. And so like there are things of maybe morality or family or or ideals or finances, whatever. We build our lives on these things, but that's not a complete process. So like as life grows, as we grow, those things change in our lives. And so we find ourselves having to address, address those changes and maybe change some things. So everybody has these times in life when what we built our lives on isn't necessarily working. So like we may, like in our, you know, early life may say, well, you know what, I'm just an angry person. Everybody's got to deal with that. But then we have kids and we realize, well that's no longer maybe acceptable or um, you know, we may think, well, I want to make it a whole lot of money with my life. And then you realize that your priorities might change. So things change or, or maybe like you have a time clarifying times like, um, you know, times of loss and grief for maybe there's some times of, of, of disease or marital stress or relational stress or acre, maybe a kid rebels or something like that. And all these things happen and they help us evaluate the things we built our lives on and we find ourselves sort of needing to go through some, if you will, sole renovation. And so we ask ourselves in those soul searching seasons, what areas of my life, what foundational areas do I need to renovate? And some of you are actually in church now because you went through a season where he said, you know what? We need to get our rear ends back in church. We know we need to be back in, in church. And that's how come you're here. You went through some kind of soul renovation. And so maybe, maybe the one way you would say it is this, I need a renovation in some areas of my life. So what do I need to demo? And that's because this is the big idea for this series. That demolition always precedes renovation. If you're not into construction, say it this way. Deconstruction always has to precede reconstruction. And so you know, when you think about trying to reevaluate or re re change the trajectory of one's life, that will involve some demolition. And when we do go through this period of demolition, everything's on the table and it's not always great thing. So when I was a post to after high school, before I went to college, I worked for a number of years before I went on to college. And, um, we worked in our family business, which involves a lot of construction stuff. Uh, my dad ran the business and I basically worked with Glen with cause some other crews and we did the deal. So one particular project we had was um, a person had a crawl space, if you're not familiar with the term houses are built on like a slab or a basement or crawl space and across spaces like two to three blocks of, of, of cinderblock usually. And then like there the floor is set on those cinder blocks in the, in the floors dirt. Everybody familiar with what I'm saying so far? So this was like a crawl. So what had happened is the homeowner didn't like their floor joist in the insulation being exposed. So they had someone like, um, the nail up what's called cell a tech's board or plywood pieces on their floor joists. What that does is it had created some moisture problems in their, on their floor. So like the floor joyces we're getting moldy and the insulation was wet and all the kinds of stuff. So our job was to go into the crawl space and remove those four by eight sheets of plywood. The problem then that's fine. The problem was that the crawl space went from like two feet on one end and as they're prone to do and like, you know, you know, three inches on the other end. And so here's what we did. Uh, I got, we got in there in the hammer, my buddy got in there with a hammer and we would lay under these four by eight sheets and we would just pull out the nails as much as we could and we'd pull the board down, shove it down our bodies, and then kick it with our feet toward the door. And eventually we'd work it out by with me. This is, this is when I felt God's call to ministry, by the way. I was like, I'm not gonna do this the rest of my life. So everything was going fine, but then we were working our way back up. We're in the crawlspace laying on our backs and no kidding. It is, my forehead is on the bottom of the floor joist. I mean, there is no movement at all. So we're taking the hammer and like, you know, doing this number and we're pulling the nails out and we pull it down and my friend makes a sound I have yet to hear ever again. It's Kinda like woo. And then he's out of the crawlspace and I'm laying there with this four by eight piece of wet plywood on top of me, my head of the floor joist and I look and notice he's gone and I look where he was and there's like a seven foot black snake that had curled up right there at the end of the plywood. And what had happened was this huge snake when he pulled the board down, had crawled across his chest and curled up beside him. My buddy used to have a beard and I say used to because when he went outside he was trying to light a cigarette and he put his whole beer on fire. But it's okay. I just stopped dropping role. He was fine, but I mean the beard was gone. Yeah. Oh yeah. The reason I told you that story that I wanted to kind of pass on with you is that this, when we go through some kind of soul demolition process that I'm actually encouraging you to go on. Sometimes what you reveal, we'll be scary and something you'd rather not deal with. We may have a whole lot of hidden things that we would rather not discover when we go through this process. That's a perfectly natural response. It can be painful sometimes. It's really scary stuff that we'll deal with and the story I want to share with you today, some really scary stuff was revealed and Jesus was the one who had his hand on the on on the, on the steering wheel of the whole process. The stories told in Luke chapter 10 so one day there's this expert in religious law and he stood up to test Jesus by asking this question, teacher, what should I do to inherit eternal life? Now, this is one of those times if you're going to study scripture, looking at the words of this verse will tell you everything you need to know about the verse because there's a major words that stand out here that wouldn't necessarily be normal. The religious lawyer isn't asking to learn something from Jesus. He thought asking for Jesus to give them some kind of Aha insight into his life. He's actually asking to test everybody. Everybody, t e, s t. So test. He said he's asking to test Jesus. Right? Okay. I'll try to be a little clear. And so he's trying to, he's trying to test Jesus. That's his motivation. He, he's not trying to learn something. He basically wants to put Jesus on a trial. The other thing I want you to notice is how common the question he's asking his teacher, what do I have to do to inherit eternal life? Because that's a question that I get and it's a question that you get. Maybe. Let me think of alarm. Yeah. Oh, okay. Is it over? Okay. So, so, uh, it's, it's a question of, um, what do I have to agree? You have eternal life. Well, that's something that everybody asks. It's one of the reasons. Some of you are believers. That's why some of you are in the room because you want to make sure when you leave this place or whatever's next, you're ready for it. Fair. But what's weird is the way this particular dude asked it, because of that word, you don't have to say it this time, but because of the inherent word, because they're almost like he's saying, hey, how can I make sure that I finish well? And then how can I make sure that as a, when I get to heaven or go in with God, I get what I really deserve, my full reward. So like he's a religious lawyer, so he keeps over 600 different laws and he teaches other people how to, how to, how to live God. He does all that. And so he's telling the crowd in front of the crowd, how do I make sure I inherit everything that God has for me? Of course that's the wrong question, but Jesus has that to you. So Jesus revealed, what does law of Moses say in how do you read it? Now, what's happening here is Jesus is sort of stroking the guy's ego. So like the guys are religious lawyer. He knows the law of Moses forward and backward. He knows he's been studying it for years and he teaches on it. And so he says to Jesus says to the guy who I don't know, what does the law say? You tell me this is the guy picks up his chest. He's amazing how brilliant he is. He wants everybody to know. And then he says this, while the law says you must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. Now the religious lawyer has just quoted something called the Shema. It's found in the book of Deuteronomy. And just for comparison, this question was a softball. This question, Jesus has lobbed it up there and it was easy. It would be like me saying or us and our children who, what was the name of the guy who died on the cross? It was, it was that simple as far as what he was telling me or what he was saying. So Jesus says, that's exactly right. Do this and you will live. The problem is this guys a religious expert. And he stood up and Jesus through the softball and he said like he did said something like a school kid would know. And so he's kind of embarrassed. He was like, well, you know, that didn't turn out the way I exactly wanted this. And so the Manz tries to kind of cover himself by doing a follow up question and this is what he said the man wanted to justify, appears being right or to be made right his actions. In other words, asking Jesus dumb question and have an obvious answer. So he said to Jesus, ah, but who is my neighbor? Now be honest with you. The thing that gets me here is he jumps right over the all the god stuff. He is an ask. How do I make sure I love God with all my heart, mind, soul and strength? That's what I would want to know. Neighbors, y'all on your own. I want to make sure that me and God are right. Does that make sense? They, how do I make sure me and God are going to be in good stead? He doesn't ask that at hall. He goes right to, well who's my neighbor? Which is crazy to me and the reason is because this particular lawyer assumes he and God are perfect because he keeps 600 laws. So of course God likes him. He's the religious expert. What the lawyer really needs from Jesus. Is it real small, narrow definition of what a neighbor is kind of like we will. He's hoping what I hope and maybe you hoping that is that our neighbor will only include friends and family members. We like. That's who the neighbor is. See when we go through this renovation of our inner lives are interior worlds and we start pulling down things and looking at things in examining things and we discovered some scary stuff that maybe we'd rather not deal with. Like this sense of being self righteous or some righteous superiority like this guy's going through and his demo that's happening, hid in his life reveals a bunch of bad things. First, he's got a low view of God's law. He doesn't even ask about God. He says, Oh, I've got that nailed down. I'm following all the laws I need to. I'm perfectly loving God. He's got a low view of himself because his understanding of himself and God is he has to keep all these laws perfectly and if he doesn't, then he's going to be toast, but then he's got a low view of other people. Jesus, how much, who really is the neighbor and how much do I have to love them to actually pass? Jesus never answers the guy's question. Instead, what he does is he tells a story and I think he tells us is probably the most second most popular story Jesus ever told with the first one being probably the prodigal son. Jesus says this story, a Jewish man was traveling from Jerusalem down to Jericho and he was attacked by bandits. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him up and left him half dead beside the road. Now the crowd at this point would say, that makes perfect sense because this was a stretch of road from Jerusalem to Jericho. Nobody traveled alone. It was something that you always went in a huge group because people are always getting beat up on that particular part or particularly road. Like you might've have a place in your neighborhood that you don't go there at night because you might get beat up or maybe you went there at night to beat people up. Whatever issues you got. So you know, we don't go to that place at night. Well, that's what this place is. That's what this place is. So everybody was with him by chance. Jesus says a priest came along, but when he saw the man lying there, he crossed to the other side of the road and passed him by then a temple assistant walked over and looked at the dude lying there in the ditch, but he also passed by to the other side. Now this is surprising, the crowd. This is a big deal. So the priest went, certainly the priest is going to help, but then, well let me, the priest had something to do. So then they have the temple assistant. They're like religious. Certainly those religious people are going to help but they don't. And Sarah was kind of like, well, where's this story going to go? Then Jesus drops the bomb. Then says, uh, despised Samaritan came along when he saw the man in the ditch. He felt compassion for him. So I want you to think of racism at its worst point. And we've got a lot of examples in history of racism. We've got the Holocaust, we have the black white situation we even have right now, even the area where it's not really racism, but we think of terrorism, whatever, those kinds of things. Think of racism at its worst, run a muck. And that's what was happening between these two races, Jewish people and Samaritan people. The Samaritan would be the last person, any Jew or any Samaritan would expect to stop and actually help. But there was one thing that set this Samaritan apart from the other two people that went by. The guy lying in the ditch and it was this, he had compassion for him. So the other two guys, they came along, they see him. It's not like they missed them, but they actually saw him looked and says, oh, sucks to be you. And then they went on by and went on another way.
Speaker 2:Okay,
Speaker 1:not this dude. He saw the guy lying in the ditch had compassion. And this is what I think the Bible means by compassion. Compassion is when someone's paying someone else's pain moves from my head to my heart so greatly that I have to do something with my hands. And that's what, that's what was going on in this story. The Samaritan cares for the man's wounds. He bandaged him up, take some good, takes time out of his journey, puts them up in a Motel six and they pee, pays for the time they're in to. The Guy can heal up.
Speaker 2:But now
Speaker 1:Jesus has just revealed something scary that he'd rather not deal with. The black snake is just crawled out from on top of the piece of plywood. And with circled right there, he's revealed something scary that he'd rather not deal with in the heart of this religious leader. But probably in the heart of everybody listening. And I would suggest even in the hearts of everybody listening here in this room, and here's what it was,
Speaker 2:okay,
Speaker 1:everybody has somebody we would most likely leave in the ditch.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Isn't that convicting? I hope that was offensive to you because you should say, no, I don't. And I understand that. I do, I do. But the truth be told, even though I like to think if I see someone laying in the ditch, I'm probably going to help them. I'm not going to walk over and say, Oh, you're one of those. But the truth be told in my dialogue, in my conversation, in my attitudes and in my perceptions, there are some recurring things.
Speaker 2:Okay?
Speaker 1:Certain people, certain ideas, certain political persuasions, and you're like, yeah,
Speaker 2:ah Nah, Nah.
Speaker 1:So once the story's been told, Jesus turns to religious leader who asked the question. And Jesus says to the man, so let me tell you, Mr religious expert, lawyer Dude, which of these three is the neighbor to the man that was in the ditch and the man who sought to put Jesus in a place of awkwardness in front of the crowd now finds him that he has been placed in a place of awkwardness in front of the crowd. Because this religious lawyer had taught, had followed the rule, had followed the laws that said, don't mess with the Samaritans as Jewish people don't touch them, don't associate with them, don't do business with them. They're unclean. Don't be part of their lives. This religious expert had taught that when Jesus has just exposed that heart, which one of these dudes was the neighbor?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And the man says, look, I says it.
Speaker 2:Okay,
Speaker 1:the one who showed him mercy.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:He couldn't even say Samaritan. He couldn't even say the Good Samaritan. It was so deeply ingrained for him to hate. So let me ask you this story, this kind of review I'm imagining. Who Do you identify with in this story? Anybody else when they read this story? Thank well I'm probably the Good Samaritan. Would you raise your hand if you say that's the one that counted? Primarily identify with everybody's okay. Yeah, me too. So that's Kinda, I like to think I'd be the Good Samaritan. How many of you say, well I'm proud of the preset walked by and that we don't mean we probably don't. Let's find out how many of y'all think you're Jesus cause you're not, then you should know that. I mean that's kind of, you need to know that that's someone else that's already taken.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:See, I think the story is revealing something scary that the modern church would rather not deal with. Dare I say that maybe even alive would rather not deal with. I think there's an attitude that's revealed of religious superiority in this story. And so some of what happens often characterizes religious people today. Maybe if you're here and you don't believe you're here with a friend or whatever, and you would say, yeah, Tom, this is the first thing you've said I agree with because we sort of have this, I air about us that we're better than whoever. Well, you know, we're got our kids in church, we're in church, we serve, we give back. So therefore we're obviously better than the rest of y'all is, you know, ditch, ditch dwellers. So I got a call, I've got an illustration I will share with you from a strange source. It's a Buddhist parable. So just send an email. So there's this Buddhist parable that says, one day the Buddha was sitting under a tree and this young trim fit soldier walk by looking at the Buddha noticed is fat and said, you look like a pig. The Buddha looked up commonly at the soldier and he says, ah, and you look like God. Well, the fit young soldier was kind of taken aback by that response. And he says, why do you say that? I look like God. And the Buddha replied, well, we don't really ever see what's outside of ourselves. We see what is inside.
Speaker 2:Yeah,
Speaker 1:and projected out.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I sit under this tree all day and I think about God so that when I look out, that is what I see. And you, you must be thinking about other things. There's an axiom in philosophy that says this, the way that we perceive and judge is deeply influenced and colored by our own interiority. How we perceive others speaks volumes about what is actually going on inside of us. Do you see, here's what, here's what I told the second service. I didn't tell the first service and I probably shouldn't tell you, but I'm going to go on Facebook and see if you can see the interiority of people's lives. Don't say it if you do or just to let you know, don't, don't post know this is what's happening with you. Don't do that. Don't do that though. That'll start problems, but how we speak about other people, how we speak about society in general, how we speak about our friend group or lack of friend group, how we speak about our families all is more revealing about what's actually going on inside of us and for some of us to follow that pathway reveals something scary and something we would rather not deal with. What Jesus was trying to get the religious leader to see, and perhaps all of us to see is this the core DNA piece. For those of us who believe is we are the man in the ditch. That's who we relate to in this story. First and foremost as believers. When I was first starting to understand, uh, what Christianity was all about, I had no problems coming into a place like this and saying, I'm the dude in the ditch. I would've never thought that I was the dude, that when I was Jesus, that I was the dude that was gonna be religious or the dude that helped. I was the dude in the ditch. In fact, I would come into a room like this, here's somebody speak and I just be beaten to a pulp because of stupid decisions I made or maybe stupid decisions someone else made that impacted me and I would feel beaten up laying alongside the road. I knew I needed help and I knew I needed saving. That is a key piece of the interior life for everybody who believes. Let me say it again, because your interior life, the core building block is you one time dwelled in the ditch. You did you, you dwelled there,
Speaker 2:okay.
Speaker 1:And that's key. When we were helpless, Christ died for us and he pulled us out of the ditch and he paid for our recovery with his blood. And once we see ourselves as the one in the ditch who has been rescued by the savior, we can finally begin to see others in the same way. What my concern is for the modern church, for people that had been churched for a long time is we forget. We used to live in the ditch and so I used to live in the ditch and I had no trouble remembering it. I gave her heart to Jesus. I've got my heart right with God. I started hanging out in church with church people and I started singing the songs and I started in knowing where the Bible verses where I even got a bible and started taking notes during the message and I really got saved and I put a fish on my car and I did all these wonderful, wonderful things. And then, and then I forgot that I used to be in the ditch. And instead of looking at people dwelling in the ditch with compassion, I looked at people do on the ditch with why can't they get their lives together? Fair. Why can't they just snap out of it? Why don't you get a job? Why don't you stop the addiction? Why don't you just stick it out? There was no compassion.
Speaker 2:Okay?
Speaker 1:And I'm afraid I'm seeing this as a trend in modern church and as we grow in our faith and as we stay around church people long enough, we get so focused on what God has done in our hearts and lives. We forget the whole neighbor thing. Forget the whole responsibility for those people still dwelling and ditches, especially in our culture. We, we can make the entire Samaritan story about ourselves and we can be so self centered in our renovations that we forget or ignore what Jesus said to the religious leader after telling his story. What he said to the religious leader was, you now go and do the same thing you now go and do what the one who showed mercy, did you now go Jewish leader and be Samaritan, be the Good Samaritan. And I just wonder in church world if somewhere along the way we're losing sight that role. Cause I had a couple of takeaways. I've had a couple of weeks out to speak of and traveling, all kind of stuff. So I've been thinking about this and one of the things that I think that set this whole thing apart for the Samaritan is the Samaritan approached this scenario with a very prepared heart. It didn't surprise him, it wasn't like he wasn't ready. His heart was in such a place that God knew he could entrust him with this act of compassion. And the Samaritan could have had a cynical heart, always a Jew, forget it. Samaritan could have had kind of a jaded, harder, bitter heart and nobody would have blamed him. And you know what the exact same things happening in our culture. Oh we got these people over here and they're hurting. And you're like, well you can't fix everything. Let's just hope they get out. Oh there's people who get their soda. But of Tom, if you get involved in that, you know it could mess your life up. Ah, good point. And you all let me get away with it. You would give me a pass and I would give you a pass, but our hearts aren't prepared. This dude's heart was moved to compassion. So I'm going to allow you to sort of process this just for yourself on your own, for, for you individually. But what I want to do is kind of give you a precursor about what's going to happen tonight at core night. Because core night is this moment where I get to kind of just share with you what's in my heart. A may not even happen does correlate well, but what's in my heart may not even happen. But I just kinda like to share, here's the things I dream about these days and the staff will come up and they'll share, but all the things they've worked on and are doing and the successes and failures, and it's a family night. And then I'll just sit down here and share with you kind of what I've been thinking. So I'll give you some of that and I just kind of give you a precursor. What if we lifted the Samaritan to something a little higher than individual and made it about our community? So let me ask it this way. Are we ready as alive as a church to care for people in the ditch? Do we even care that there are people in the ditch still? And then are we willing to sacrifice for the people in the ditch? Even if it means we're going to have to go, it's going to be, I have to go out of our way for that to actually happen. This church was founded and we started a tremendous growth movement happen 15 years ago when we realized there were 96,000 people in our community who were not believers, 96,000 just in this county and when we realized that, we said we've dropped the ball. It's not the Rutins, it's not the lion's club. All these things are great, but none of them are going to actually help resolve this situation. Only the church, but only if we have a prepared heart and care for people in the ditch.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Are we willing to do that? Because here's the reality. We live in communities of people lying in ditches. They're in your neighborhood. You passed him on the way here. They will wait on you at lunch today, people lying in ditches all over the place. We have addicts that are struggling to survive and find a way out and there so discouraged and so defeated because everything they have tried is not working and they're not sure they can get the courage and the gumption to try one more thing and they're lying in a ditch in close proximity to you and me. We have folks that have huge aches in their hearts because of a love that broke or love that did not last. They made a covenant forever. That covenant wasn't forever, got betrayed and now they're lying in a ditch, split wide open because of of a betrayal. Had a prayer in between service with a guy who came up with Tom. That's me. I had that happen.
Speaker 2:Yeah,
Speaker 1:they're lying in the ditch and we go by him every day. We drive by him all the time. We have people who are at a place sexually that they never thought they would be. Hey, you've experimented. They've had multiple partners. They're trying multiple of expressions of their sexuality. They've tried everything except for God ordained kind of sexuality and they're piling of shame, piling up regret and they're hurting people. They love and Kensci and they're lying in a ditch and you probably know them by their first name. We have people in our community who on the outside look amazing like you people. You look great.
Speaker 2:Yeah,
Speaker 1:you smell good.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:Oh, Christian up.
Speaker 2:Okay.
Speaker 1:You got the house in the car and family, but inside you are wounded and rotting and you're lying in a ditch and your whole life is committed to image management. So nobody finds out you're lying in a ditch, broken and wounded.
Speaker 2:Okay,
Speaker 1:well, as a church, what I'm getting ready to say it it, I don't even want to tell you this because what I know is that, I mean, some of you will leave and that's hard on a pastor, but I feel, I gotta be honest.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:As a church, we need to boldly reach out to those very people in the ditch. No apologies. Reckless, crazy, Phil, you're risking reaching out to people in the ditch. And what we want to do as a church is we want to provide these lifesaving stations beyond this point of worship and we want to spread it into other communities in God is opening doors. I cannot wait to tell you tonight what's going on, but if we, if we could get, if we could just vote in this room, let's see, and let's say you had a vote. I'd vote. And what if we could get 10 families, just 10 10 families. You can even pick them, your friends and neighbors and families. Let's say we could get 10 families. Would it be worth it to do some kind of expression and risk adventure to reach those 10 families? Because Jesus said in his mathematical situation and God economy, Jesus said this, I'll leave all you good people at alive. All y'all to go get that one is still stuck in the ditch. That's what he said. You're not gonna. You're gonna come back to us. Don't worry about that, but he, he doesn't want to leave one.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:What would it look like for us to do that? Not only did he have a prepared heart, but the Samaritan was also living in proximity. He was walking on a very dangerous road. He had no business being on and Jesus his story. What if we started to place ourselves in proximity to those people, campuses or plants or Michael Church or micro sites or whatever. I don't think we have the whole list, but my basic thing is this. What if we started to set up shop on the edge of the ditches, Kinda like dollar generals, you know, they're everywhere. What if we, what if we tried to set up something like that? Italian is one thing, but don't tell anyone when others. So you can tell tonight, but not now. But anyway, so every year our church sets aside 150,000 bucks out of tithe and offering nothing. You don't have to give anything more. We set it aside every year and we have for the last three years and what our plan is this, we're developing a strategy to be able to create those sites, campuses, plants, micro churches, microsites, whatever. They are right on the edge of ditches for people to come to. And we're doing that and we're sacrificing for that. And an age in which we're taught to make this whole thing bigger and bigger and bigger. We're saying we're going out in, out in, out, and some of you are going to be excited about that. Some of you are going to think. Yeah, thank you. Teresa of Avila was a Spanish Jewish woman who became a Roman Catholic and lived as a nun. As soon as I've read that about her, I said I want to know everything she's ever written. She wrote these words, she said, when one reaches the highest level of maturity, one has only one question left.
Speaker 2:Yeah,
Speaker 1:how can I help? Faith is not, faith is no longer about what God can do for me, how God can help my family, how God can repair my marriage and all those things have value. But as we grow in our faith or what that identity looks like, as we grow in the renovation, demolition occurs over and over. We get to the point of our lives. We say, you know what Lord, with whatever I've got left, I want to help. I want to help. And so I want to set up this site right here on the edge of this ditch and dragged their sorry rear ends out of those ditches and put them up here. Cause that's exactly remind was and introduce them to the saving love of Jesus Christ. So I have two prayers for you to consider. God reveal what is scary or what I would rather not deal with in me. And here's the second one. Open my eyes to those in proximity of me. I, I couldn't figure out how to end this. So what I want to do is I just want to read a passage of scripture over you.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And um, we've done this a couple times now and I just feel like it's the best way. So I want to invite you to bow your head now just for clarity. Um, this isn't like by your head's all hands raised, that kind of thing. And I'm not going to do anything weird. The reason I encourage you to bow your head is just so you won't be distracted and just allow the word of God to sort of wash over you. And then I'll pray. So if you would, if you're comfortable, just bow your head with me. This is the fusions too. As for you good folks at alive, you remember that you were dead in your transgressions and sin. You remember in which you used to live in those sin. When you follow the ways of this world and the rule of the Kingdom of the air and the spirit who is not working, those who are disobedient. You remember being in the ditch. All of us also lived among them. At one time. We were all in the ditch, gratifying the cravings of our flesh, following its desires and thoughts and like the rest of people in the ditch. We were by nature deserving of wrath, but only because of of his great love for us. God who is rich in mercy made us alive with Christ even when we were still dead in our sin. It was by grace. We were drawn out of the ditch. It was by grace. We were saved and God raised us up with Christ and he seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, in order that in the coming ages he might us the incomparable riches of his grace expressed in the kindness to us in Christ Jesus. Make no mistake and never forget it is by grace that you have been saved through faith. This isn't something you did on your own. It was God's gift to you, not because you worked in acted good. This isn't something we can boast about for we, we, all of us, even in the ditch and all of us out of the ditch, we are all God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God has prepared in advance for all of us to do so. God, I ask by the power of your spirit that you would affirm this heartbeat and the heartbeat of your church. I pray that right now you would raise up people listening to the sound of my voice. Even I got to set up shop on the edge of a ditch for someone. I want to be part of that reach out. I want to be part of that, that plant, that campus, that micro site I want to be part of. When I started in my neighborhood, I just had people come into my house and we'll start, start it. I don't know what it looks like. What did it start? And I pray that that spirit would permeate, I pray that you would raise it up, Lord, in a mighty way. That we would start training our people to be good Samaritans. We would start courageously taking steps of risk in order that some might get out of the ditch like we did. And I pray that it would start a mighty move. We would have so much, so many people that live in Victoria's life, so many people that have been renovated because of the process that then we would know what to do. But your spirit would lead and your spirit charged. So Lord, don't let anybody walk out of here without a little conversation with you. How do you want to use me? You know what? Some of you got one foot in the ditch and one foot out and God still wants to use you prepared heart proximity. Thank you God for your goodness to us in your name. Amen.