The Riches of God - Week 1

[00:00:02] Good morning, Christ Church. Good morning. [00:00:06] Good morning. Good morning. [00:00:08] Good morning. All right, thanks. [00:00:12] Hey, can we say a nice thank you to our parking team out there? Raven, the weather. Thank you, guys. [00:00:21] I'm thankful for them. [00:00:23] This was, like, one of the first Sundays that we haven't had, like, a nice day. So, you know. But grateful for all the nice days. But grateful for the team slugging it out out there. Yeah, There we go. [00:00:37] And thanks, Morgan. That was awesome, man. What a great way to serve our community and what a great opportunity for the church in this area. That's such important work. Well, I want to read to you. We had an election this week. I don't know if you knew that. Did you hear about that? Yeah. [00:00:57] But I want to read First Timothy one after every election. I think this is always a great text to read, and it's a great time for us to do what God calls us to do, which is to pray. [00:01:11] And so let me read this scripture to you. It says this, first of all, then I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions and thanksgiving be made for all people, for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way. This is good and it's pleasing in the sight of God our savior. So let's take a moment to do that. Would you bow your heads in prayer with me, Father? We just. We thank you, Lord, for all the blessings that you've given each of us. Lord, we have so many reasons to give thanks, and we give you thanks. Lord, I pray that you would bless us, Father, as your followers, that we could honor you in every way. Lord, I pray that all our newly elected officials, that you would bless them, that you would anoint them with your wisdom, with your ways, with your righteousness. Lord, bless President Elect Trump. But all the changes that have made. Father, I pray that, Lord, you would unite us together as people, Father, no matter what we disagree about, help us to prioritize brotherly love and Christ likeness towards one another. And, Father, most of all, I pray, Lord, that we would put our hope in you above all. And that, Lord, as your church, we would seek to serve you, to honor your no matter what and to glorify your perfect and holy name. Ask all this in Jesus good name. Amen. Amen. Well, hey, we're starting a new sermon series today, and we're talking about these parts of the New Testament where it talks about the riches of God and all these different phrases and how they're used and what they point to. And today we're gonna open that up. But I was thinking about this passage this week, and I don't know about you, but my kids are always pointing out what the other isn't doing. [00:03:09] Very. You know, this is a very consistent theme. So many times at breakfast, at lunch, at dinner, Emory will be like, dad, Abby's not eating. She's playing with something. And then Abby will be like, emery's not eating. She's playing with something. You know, and this game goes back and forth, and I get frustrated with it, you know, and eventually, what I always kind of gravitate towards is, hey, you need to worry about you and dad will worry about the other one. Parents, you ever feel Amen. And so, like, we kind of, you know, play this game a lot, but. Because what often happens is, while they're worrying about their sibling, they're not eating. And I'm like, I need you both to eat. Dad's got a timeline today. All right? We need to. You're slowing things up. You're jamming up the system. [00:04:09] And so you're worried about them, but you're not doing it. And it would be nice to think that as human beings, it'd be nice to think that we outgrow that mindset, but I'm sorry to say, I don't think we do. [00:04:27] And I think that sometimes the Lord looks at us and he said, hey, I'll take care of them. But you worry about you. Because, brother, sister, there's plenty to worry about right there. Can I get an amen on that? [00:04:42] And I wish that we would just naturally outgrow this mindset, but I think that we can't outgrow it. We actually need God's help to overcome it, because it is a deeply human thing, but it's also a deeply unhealthy thing. And so today, we're gonna look at Romans, chapter 2. And the apostle Paul explains this and these verses, I'm gonna warn you right now, they are very challenging. [00:05:09] You read these, and if you feel like you gotta take a step back, look in the mirror, and think about it, then I think you're experiencing them in the right way. But they're good for us. And so let's read these. Here's what it says. Therefore, you have no excuse. Oh, man. Every one of you who judges, do you feel good yet? [00:05:34] For in passing judgment on another, you condemn yourself because you, the judge, practice the very same things. We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you Suppose, O man, that you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself, that you'll escape the judgment of God. Or do you presume. Now, this word presume. If you have a copy of the scripture, circle that. Because this word is really disdain. [00:06:07] So it's not. It's. It's very. It's a very negative word. It's to disdain or to despise. So, you know, presume. I don't think it really shows the intent, the negative intensity of that. So do you despise disdain, the riches of God's kindness, of God's forbearance? Forbearance just means, like God, he puts up with a lot. [00:06:36] He tolerates a lot of nonsense from us as human beings. And patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance. Isn't that an interesting phrase? God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance. God doesn't. He could power up in our lives, but he wants to change us through kindness, through patience, through forbearance. So powerful. Now, what these verses show us and what I wanna talk about today is that when we indulge that human tendency to look at others and to disdain them, to look at them in what we might say a judgmental way, to look at them and kind of have in our hearts some sense of superiority over them. I know we don't like to admit these things out loud, but Church, is it fair to say it happens in our hearts a good amount? [00:07:41] Can I talk to any sinners today? Any broken people or. I got a group of angels here. [00:07:48] It happens in our heart, doesn't it? We look down on others. We don't want to. We don't want to admit it. We don't want to be like that. But it's something that happens. And every time we indulge that, here's what happens. We miss what God wants us to see in our own lives. [00:08:07] We miss what God wants us to see about him and about ourselves. [00:08:15] But yet, when we feel that sense of disdain, when we learn to actually move towards. We're going to talk about this repentance, which means we invite God to change our mind and change our heart. Then we begin to see what God wants us to see. So this is a very important thing, and I think it's so healthy and relevant to talk about this. Now, I want to talk about the origin of chapter two here because we're just kind of jumping in the middle of an argument that the Apostle Paul is writing in the book of Romans. And it's an argument that has been building. And here's what the argument is. Paul is writing. He's saying, here's what's wrong with the world. [00:08:58] In chapter one, he explains it, and here's why the world needs rescued by the grace of God in Jesus Christ. And in chapter one, he begins this argument, and he basically says this. He says that many people, they know God. If you're a human being, the reality of God is imprinted on your heart. [00:09:22] We can play all these games. We can deny it, we can suppress it, we can run from God. But yet there's something in us when we actually slow down and we quiet our hearts and we get real. There's something in our hearts that knows God exists. But here's what Paul says. But instead of responding to that, what we will do is that we will suppress it and we'll say, you know what? I'm gonna live how I want to live. And Paul begins to explain what that looks like. And he says, because of that, that messes up our thinking. That messes up our affections, our emotions. It messes up our actions, and we deceive ourselves and to think we're doing all these right things and we're on the wrong track. And so he has these huge lists of sins and behaviors and all this, and he paints a very, very ugly picture. Now, what Paul is saying in that he's saying that's the first way to be far from God is you just wake up every day, you say, I'm gonna do whatever I want. [00:10:35] And you do it, and you just indulge it and you don't question it, and you live life that way. And that certainly has probably been times in our lives where we've done that. Known others. One of the. The most extreme examples of this, I recently read Mike Tyson's autobiography. [00:10:52] I regret doing it, but I am a big boxing fan, and I've had the book for a while, and I started it, and once I start, sometimes I have a hard time stopping. So I read it, and it is the epitome of someone who just said, I'm gonna do whatever I want. [00:11:08] And then you have hundreds of millions of dollars to do whatever you want. And guess what? It was absolutely destructive in every day. He never said no to himself, and it destroyed everything in his life. And this is what Paul's talking about. He's like, hey, we can live our life. And if you don't submit your thinking, your desires and your actions to God, and you just give Yourself a green light for everything you will miss. [00:11:40] It will lead you away from him and into destruction. Now Paul lays us all out in chapter one. In the Roman world, who he's writing to, they were known to kind of live like this. They were known to have these extravagant parties and extravagant lifestyles and, you know, all these kind of unhealthy things. And so, you know, Paul is probably expecting that many of them, they see themselves in what he's saying. They see others, they're like, oh, yeah, I know people like that. Gosh, they're the worst. I know, yeah, my neighbors like that. Oh my, you know, my second cousin twice removed never known how all that works is like that. And you begin to think about these people, you say, yeah, Paul, yeah, you're right. But here's the deal. In Roman culture, although most of the culture was like that, they all weren't like that. [00:12:34] There were some really self disciplined Romans. In fact, there's a man named Seneca who would have been alive during Paul's time when he was writing this. And he is a Stoic philosopher and he was a consultant to the Roman emperor, to Nero. And he was known for extreme self discipline. He was known for a very, you know, rigorous approach to life and to be very introspective and a lot of things that wouldn't connect to what Paul is saying in chapter one. And so people like Seneca and people like, they would say, yeah, Paul, I agree with you. There's a lot of messed up people in the world. I'm glad I'm not one of them. [00:13:22] You hear that? [00:13:23] And yeah, Paul, amen. I hope the Lord just, you know, gets them, you know what I'm saying? But Paul says, whoa, whoa, slow down, buddy. And then he goes into chapter two. And chapter two, what I just read to you is the other way. Chapter two is where I look at life and there's something in my heart that says, you know what? I'm doing okay, because I'm better than them. [00:13:52] And that's where they find their righteousness. And Paul's saying, if that's you, you have fallen off the horse the other way. Remember, there's two ways to fall off a horse. I love that analogy. You can go this way, Romans Chapter one. You can go this way, Romans Chapter two. But either way, you're off the horse. You with me on this. And so Paul is saying, slow down. Now here's what I just want to clarify a little bit, that what Paul's talking about in Romans 2 is the disdain in our hearts, in Other words, you can look and you can say, I don't agree with that. [00:14:35] You can look and say, man, that doesn't honor God. But when it becomes a problem is when that concern grows into disdain. You with me on this? When it's not just recognizing what is maybe displeasing to God, but it's having a sense of moral superiority because of it. You with me on this? When it grows to become a sense where I get my own sense of righteousness from it, that's when it becomes problematic. And that's what Paul is talking about. And he says when we get to that place, it has some really blinding consequences in our lives. [00:15:25] Paul says, you condemn others while doing the very same thing. [00:15:30] Have you ever noticed that it's really easy to have double standards in life? Have you ever noticed that? Hey, you know what? If you do it, wow, what's wrong with you? If I do it, Give me a break. [00:15:43] That's what we do. Paul says, hey, be careful because we have double standards. Here's a quote from John Stott. He's a great, was a great pastor and Bible commentator. He says this. We work ourselves up into a state of self righteous indignation over the disgraceful behavior of other people, while at the very same time this very same behavior seems not nearly so serious when it is ours rather than theirs. [00:16:14] Paul said, we gotta be careful of that. [00:16:18] I think it was last week, my daughters, they woke up real early chapping sometimes. And we kinda have a rule. We say, you can't come out of your room till 7am cause we don't wanna be up at 5am with you. And. [00:16:32] And so they were up and they were playing in the room and you know, woke us up and we heard them and everything sounded like it was going okay and then it wasn't. [00:16:43] And there was screaming and crying. And so I went in there and I was like, you know, what is going on? It's like, you know, it's the wee hours of the morning. I'm not at my best self. Not gonna lie to you. What is happening here? And Emery goes, you know, Abby hit me in the face. And I was like, oh great. I looked at her face and she did have a little cut on it. And I was like, oh man. So I said, abby, you can't hit people in the face. That's kind of one of our rules around here. [00:17:19] And I said, you need to apologize. [00:17:22] And then she just lost her mind. [00:17:26] It was like full exorcist moment there and she just got so amped Up. So worked up. And I was like. I was trying to be calm, you know? Cause, like, when you're on an airplane, take the oxygen mask, put it on yourself first. I was trying to do that. And so I was just like, abby, like, just. I'm not mad. Don't do that. But just apologize. Like, you know, you need to know that this isn't good. Don't be hitting people in the face unless they deserve it. But this didn't. This didn't. [00:18:00] This doesn't count at that. And she just. Was. [00:18:04] Just. Would not budge. So it just kind of escalated. Escalated, escalated. And I just finally, like, went downstairs and I threatened to take everything away, you know, like, hey, all this fun stuff. We had some fun stuff planned that day. And I was like, you're not gonna be able to do any of it. You're not gonna be able to come out of this room. You know, all those vain threats that I have no real intention of following through on. But it's just, what do you do when you're helpless? You know? And so. But nothing. Nothing would budge. And I was like, girl, like, I'm just. All you have to do is say, sorry, we can move on with our day here. Like, let's go. And this went on for longer than I would like to admit. And then I was sitting downstairs, and I was like, you know, it's like the wee hours of the morning. And I was like, you know, as a dad, is this a time you need to really make this point? You know, they're tired, they haven't eaten. Everybody's like, is this. Do you really need to, like, make. Can you maybe do. You'll have more opportunities to make this point. And I was thinking about all that, and I was like, no, now is the time. [00:19:13] Yeah. [00:19:16] I was like, where? Why is this kid so stubborn? You know, it's not cute when she does it, you know, But I'm perfectly okay with the unnecessary stubbornness. Amen. That's called double standards church. [00:19:32] It was like looking in a mirror, and I'm like, we're making this harder than it has to be. But it's a problem when someone else does it. It's okay when we do it. This is what Paul is talking about in these verses are disdain. It blinds us to our double standards. [00:19:51] It deceives us in how we view ourselves and how we view others. Another day, I had a funeral to go to, and I went to the car, and the key wasn't there. And it was the only key that we have that works and so I called Allie. Allie was at work. I was like, babe, did you take the key? I was like, yeah, I took the key. And I was so mad that she. I was just, you know. Cause I was stressed, I had to go. And then again, I thought for a second, I'm like, no one in this house has forgotten more stuff than me. [00:20:27] Like, it's not even close. [00:20:31] But here I am, you know, Allie, probably the one time in six years she's forgotten something. [00:20:38] And I'm ready to lose my mind. This is what Paul's talking about. We have a messed up sense of evaluation of others. You with me on this? Have I made this point? Can I move on? All right, we have a messed up. Here's what. John saw it. Let's go back to John saw it. He says this. Paul uncovers in these verses a strange human characteristic, namely our tendency to be critical of everybody except ourselves. This device enables us simultaneously to retain our sins and our self respect. [00:21:11] It's a convenient arrangement, but also slick and sick. [00:21:17] That's a great quote, isn't it? [00:21:20] And it hurts a little bit, but you know, it's good. And what Paul is saying is again, no matter. We can never find our righteousness by tearing other people down. [00:21:31] We can never find our righteousness in comparison to others. [00:21:36] That when we start playing that game, we are missing the work and the grace of God in our lives. And then here's what Paul says, and here's what really got me about these verses. He says, do you disdain the riches of God's kindness, of God's forbearance and God's patience? [00:21:59] Here's what he's saying. When you disdain others, you're actually disdaining God. [00:22:09] And when I put that together in my mind, I was like, whoa, these verses just wrecked me. [00:22:16] When we disdain others, we're disdaining God because here's what he's saying. He's saying we're acting like we got our act together and it wasn't the absolute grace and mercy of God in our lives that did it. He's saying when we begin to disdain others. He said we're failing to realize what God did, to reach and to save us. You with me on this? Paul's saying you've completely lost touch with it and you're actually despising it. [00:22:54] Which is not something I want to do. [00:22:57] I don't want to despise God's kindness, I want to celebrate it. I don't want to despise God's patience. I need a lot more of it. Amen. I don't want to despise God's forbearance again. I want as much of it as I can get because I know I need it. And Paul's saying, when you disdain others, you miss it. So here's what he says. The kindness of God is meant to lead you to repentance, the kindness of God. [00:23:26] And so when we feel a growing disdain in our hearts, here's what it is. It's a signal to make a beeline towards repentance. What is repentance? It's a change of thinking that ultimately leads to a change of acting, a change of living. So it first begins in the mind and then it goes to the hearts and to the hands. That my way of thinking, my way of viewing things, my way of relating to God, it needs adjusted, it needs change, it needs turned around. And that as that happens, I begin to live a different life. So Paul's saying as we gravitate towards disdain, when that happens in your heart, that's a signal. [00:24:11] It's like the gas light coming on. Go to the gas station, go to repentance and allow God to shape your heart. Now let me just kind of give you some suggestions of what that looks like, what this practice of repentance looks like. Here's a couple thoughts. Number one, it means acknowledging the kindness, forbearance and patience of God in my own life. [00:24:39] If you're a follower of Jesus today, has God been kind to you? [00:24:44] Has God been tolerant of you? [00:24:48] I'll tell you, he's been incredibly tolerant of me. At any point in my life, God would be fully righteous and saying, I'm done with you. I've given him countless reasons. Anyone else at so many times, if God were to just quit being patient with me and give up on me, no one could argue that God would be wrong in doing that. [00:25:15] Everybody could argue, lord, why did you wait so long? Amen. And church. We need to be in touch with that. [00:25:24] We're messed up people, we're broken. And the reason that any change has come into our lives is not cause we figured it out and got our act together. It's because of God's patience and kindness and grace and mercy to us. And we cannot forget that. And we cannot lose touch of that. And we cannot start thinking what God did. Oh actually I did that. As soon as we go down that path, Paul says, you are in dangerous territory. Here's the second thing I think what repentance can looks like I want to remind myself I'm Unjust and unrighteous too. [00:26:04] Here's what Tim Keller says. When you consider how those outside your church live, do you shake your head and judge in your heart or do you think my heart is by nature just like theirs? It just shows itself differently. [00:26:20] Church. We all have different flavors of brokenness. [00:26:25] Now I may really not like your flavor of brokenness, but it doesn't mean that it's really any different than mine. You with me on this? [00:26:33] I may get on my, you know, my self righteous pedestal over this or that. But what I have to realize is there's plenty of unrighteousness in me too. May just look different. We are all equally in need of God's grace. [00:26:50] But that also means there's hope for every one of us. There's hope for every person that you've ever locked eyes with because of the good work of Christ. [00:27:00] 3. Here's what repentance looks like. It means I'm going to continue to invite God to change me, to change me. [00:27:07] You can spend your whole life inviting God to change other people and you can have some of that. But here's where the real fruit is, is inviting God to change us. [00:27:22] Wouldn't it be, I think it would be so powerful if followers of Jesus were known for their repentance. [00:27:30] Followers of Jesus can be known for their self righteousness and judgment. We see that in the world. But I think it would be beautiful if we were known for our repentance, for our willingness to humble ourselves before the Almighty God and say, change me. Teach me your way, Guide me, help me. And here's what I believe. Church, you can. You can look at your family, the place you work, the people in your community, and you can shake your finger at them. [00:28:07] Or you can look in the mirror and you can say, lord, fulfill your purpose in me. And I'm telling you that will actually change the world around you in a more significant way. [00:28:22] I need to worry about me and what God wants to do. And the more that I submit to God, the more God can do through me to bless other people, to strengthen them. Where is your focus? Where is our focus? [00:28:40] So many times when marriage gets rough, talking to people, man, my spouse just needs to change. I'm sure they do. [00:28:50] But I think that this moment, you know who God is really concerned about changing is you. [00:28:57] And then that's my last meeting with them. [00:29:05] You guys think I'm kidding, but that church, we don't want to go there. [00:29:12] We don't like going there. But that's where God is inviting us I think that's usually where God's inviting us. [00:29:22] They're not eating their breakfast, Lord. [00:29:24] Neither are you, and you can't control. All right, here's the last one and the most important. Where does my righteousness come from? It comes from Jesus Christ. [00:29:40] That's what Romans wants to leave. It says, look, if you fall off the horse this way, you need Christ. If you fall off the horse this way, you need Christ. Guess what? We all need Christ. [00:29:50] And as we connect to him, that is what makes our lives healthy, that is what makes our families better, that is what makes our marriages better, that is what makes our communities better, is as we connect to the righteousness and the goodness of Christ. [00:30:10] Listen, if you grow and you humble yourself before the Lord and you seek him with all your heart and you say, lord, search me and try me and see if there be any grievous way in me, and you invite God's spirit, I'm telling you, you're gonna see the environment around you be different. [00:30:30] You don't even have to worry about what God is doing in them. If you are just focused on what God is doing in you. [00:30:39] Because then you'll be the type of person that God uses to overcome evil with good, and it will just happen around you. But where is our focus? When the disdain comes in my heart, I cannot indulge it. I cannot afford to indulge it. I can't afford to go into that self deception. I need to go into repentance and invite the grace of God in me. This last week, I'm trying to get some projects done before winter, you know, in the yard. And my yard has this really huge dip in it, and I wanted to fill it in with a bunch of dirt, you know, to raise it back up. Because, like, I know the kids are going to break their ankle in it one day. Just like a very sharp dip. So I got like this huge pile of dirt. And Emery, my oldest, she loves to help me, like, with anything. And she's like, dad, can I help you move the dirt? And I'm like, you better believe you can. [00:31:44] And you can invite every friend that you have to help me move this dirt. [00:31:50] This is an open dirt moving party. And she just, you know, she was so excited about it and wanted to help so much. And so the one day I got started without her while she was at school or something like that. And she came back, she saw some of it was moved. She's like, dad, you started without me. I want to help you move the dirt. And I was like, emory, there is more dirt to move than you are going to want to help. Does that make sense? [00:32:17] There is plenty of opportunity. Like you just. You want to move dirt. I promise you this week there will be much dirt moving opportunity. And sure enough, there was. And we finished it the other day. Yeah. Thank you. [00:32:36] Thank you. [00:32:39] I really forced that. [00:32:42] But we got it. We got it done. There's plenty. And here's my point in that story. There is a point. [00:32:51] Here's what my point is. [00:32:54] You're a big project. [00:32:59] I hope that does. That's right. Yeah. Well, maybe for others, too. I don't know. But for the Lord for sure. [00:33:06] We're a big project. There's a lot to be done. [00:33:11] And if we're worried about all the other things out there and how those projects are doing, we're wasting valuable time on what God wants to do in us. You with me on this. [00:33:23] And the more that we can partner with God with what he wants to do in your heart, the better it is for everybody, especially us and those around us. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we thank you that your kindness, your patience, your tolerance, Lord, are at work in our lives. [00:33:51] Father, I pray that they would be at work in us, that they would continue to be at work in us in just rich ways. But, Lord, I also pray they would be at work through us. [00:34:04] Father, I pray where we gravitate toward disdain. [00:34:11] I pray it could lead us toward repentance. [00:34:16] Father, we know the world's a broken place and it needs to change. [00:34:22] But, Lord, often the way that it really changes is by your spirit changing each of us. [00:34:30] Father, help us to not live our Christian lives going around trying to take the speck out of everyone else's eye. [00:34:38] But, Lord, help us to live our life first, taking the log out of our own. [00:34:45] And, Father, I pray that that would be our lifestyle, our focus, our hearts, us. And that would be our beginning point. And I pray it would honor the grace that you've given us, the mercy that you've shown us, the kindness that you've poured out on us. [00:35:03] Help us in all this, Lord. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.