Week 4-NEIGHBOUR

Announcements:

Want to become a member?

we believe in membership here at parkland. But being a member is more than just a status card.

Church membership is about having a group of people who have committed to being actively committed to and connected to their local church.

it’s a way of saying, ‘I am a part of this church,I call this place my home church, and I’m an active part of the growth and health of my church’.

As a charity, we need a membership for the sake of voting, and things like that.

But membership isn’t about the benefits or the rights of being a member. And it’s my desire that every person who attends this church regularly would consider being a member.

So if you’re interested in being a member, it’s a simple process. Please connect with me, either here or by visiting parklandchurch.ca/contact, or call the church during the week, whatever works. it’s an easy process.

But we’re inviting everyone today - if this is your home church, and you’re committed to being a living part of the health and growth of this church - we’d love to have you on board.

What will being a good neighbour look like?

This isn’t the practical ‘what do I do’ question. It’s ‘after what do I do - what should I expect?’

This is a REALLY important question. because if we have the wrong motives here - we’ll miss the boat. Not out of judgment, or God hating us because we did something wrong - but

Our motives determine our direction - and our destination

Our heart decides which way we’re facing, and which way we’re facing determines where we end up.

Proverbs 16:2 NIV

All a person’s ways seem pure to them, but motives are weighed by the Lord.

And our motives are our reasons - why are we doing this or that or the other thing.

STORY - Caleb giving a piece of cereal out of generosity, so that his sister will respond in kind, and him doing it so THAT he can try some of his sisters.

But they’re also our expectations - We do something because we want to see health. But what does ‘health’ mean to us?

FREEDOM is a big keyword. And even the Bible says, it’s for freedom that we have been set free.

But what does the world expect freedom to look like? - the ability to do whatever you want, whenever you want.

But the bible’s definition of freedom is ‘obeying God, developing the proper desires, and humbly serving other people’.

And those two definitions clash. The world’s freedom leads to greed, self indulgence, self centeredness. The Bible’s freedom leads to humility, servitude, and love for others.

Right motives and wrong expectations lead to wrong places

Saying ‘We want God to be glorified!’ is wonderful - saying ‘God is glorified when the poor get shuffled out of the way to make way for the rich’ or ‘God is glorified when the world knows how much we hate them’ is blasphemy.

So it’s not enough to just say ‘I want to see God glorified’. ‘I want to see his church holy’. ‘I want to see worship be true’. We need to put our expectations, our definitions, on the table laid bare for God to examine, and let Him do His thing.

Psalm 139:23–24 NIV

Search me, God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

David here is saying, ‘look deep into me God, and see even those secret, anxious things that I myself may not even know about’. And if anything’s off base - get rid of it.

So that said - what does being a good neighbour result in? What should we expect life to look like when we’re taking this seriously?

So I’ve got 3 good expectations:

Expect to let go of a lot of issues

Luke 6:27–30 NIV

“But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you. If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back.

This is radical. We’ve always taught ‘turn the other cheek’ to mean ‘forgive the person’. And that’s valuable. But what it really means, if they hit you on one side of the face, turn the other side to them. If they steal one thing, give them another. I can’t wrap my head around this.

Leviticus 19:18 NIV

“ ‘Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.

Note - it doesn’t say here, don’t seek revenge if the other person hasn’t done something deserving it. It doesn’t say, don’t bear a grudge against someone if they’re actually innocent.

It just says - don’t do it.

As we commit to loving, expect to let go of a lot of issues. As Christians, we are committing to following a God who forgave more things that he was justified in punishing us for than we even know about.

He’s a God who chooses to work with people who are weak, who drop the ball constantly, who make mistakes, who turn on him periodically.

Some will be easy to let go of. Some will not be as easy. But loving your neighbour isn’t a path to get more of what we want or deserve:

Loving our neighbours is a path for more people to hear about Jesus

and there’s that expectation piece. If we’re in this to get more for ourselves, or to feel like we’re higher up on the ladder than somebody else - we’re going to end up in the wrong place.

Freedom means serving the other guy. Loving our neighbours means the priority is placed on that OTHER person hearing about jesus, being saved, being forgiven fully for whatever may come.

And we’re the vessels for that. We have been given the wonderful and holy chance to be able to sacrifice for someone else to meet God.

We die to us in order to honor the one who died for us.

In a world full of selfishness, we’ve been given the supernatural ability to do something different.

And that ties into my second point:

Expect to Sacrifice

The first point was about us giving up our grudges, our problems - even if we have good reasons to want to hold them.

This is different. Loving other people as yourself is not a path to build up your own kingdom. Loving others is not a shortcut to profit. It costs.

Luke 9:23–24 NIV

Then he said to them all: “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me will save it.

But here’s a secret about sacrifice -

Sacrifice may cost what we want - but it gives what we need

STORY - something I do as a dad with treats. I’m always counting. Not calories - quantities. There’s 5 people in my family. If there’s 4 - then I’m not taking one. But let me tell you what’s more rewarding than sitting and eating the last cookie out of a box of my favourite cookies - sitting my 3 kids down, and giving them the last 3 cookies.

I don’t sit awake at night and think, man, I wish I had that cookie. I don’t scroll through my phone and smile at pictures of all the nice desserts that I’ve had in my life (And no judgment on you if you do, foodie tiktoks totally exist). I look at my family and what they’re becoming.

When we sacrifice, we see a different kind of power from God, something that we can’t make happen through selfishness.

Jesus said, whoever wants to save their life will lose it. But in giving up our lives, we choose the only true way that leads to life. We choose to rely on the power of God every single day, rather than the power of what we can make happen with our own two hands.

And that’s my last point:

Expect to see the power of the Lord in new ways

I love reading through the book of acts, because of two big reasons. First, you see the amazing movement of God in power and might. Thousands being saved. People being healed.

But second - in the characters in acts, you see a template and an expectation for how we should be. And it’s very humbling.

I want to read a section of that story to you.

Acts 16:22–34 NIV

The crowd joined in the attack against Paul and Silas, and the magistrates ordered them to be stripped and beaten with rods. After they had been severely flogged, they were thrown into prison, and the jailer was commanded to guard them carefully. When he received these orders, he put them in the inner cell and fastened their feet in the stocks. About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. Suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the prison were shaken. At once all the prison doors flew open, and everyone’s chains came loose. The jailer woke up, and when he saw the prison doors open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself because he thought the prisoners had escaped. But Paul shouted, “Don’t harm yourself! We are all here!” The jailer called for lights, rushed in and fell trembling before Paul and Silas. He then brought them out and asked, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” They replied, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved—you and your household.” Then they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all the others in his house. At that hour of the night the jailer took them and washed their wounds; then immediately he and all his household were baptized. The jailer brought them into his house and set a meal before them; he was filled with joy because he had come to believe in God—he and his whole household.

See, there’s two stories here. There’s paul and silas - being dragged before the authorities, stripped, beaten, thrown into prison. But this story isn’t really about them.

Then there’s the jailer - he goes from about to kill himself because his life is forfeit, to his entire household filled with joy because they came to know Christ.

Some people believe that this jailer went on to help start the church in philippi.

Loving our neighbours isn’t just about what to do with leftover pie. Loving our neighbours is the way that God moves His body to do miraculous things in a broken and dying world. It’s how He pushes the natural out of the way to show a dying world His supernatural power.

And this is what we should expect. God being glorified in the lives of those who don’t know him. Those who are lost, and broken. God’s power taking a human life, and redeeming it, changing it ,saving it.

Jesus thought that was worth dying for. Isn’t that worth sacrificing for? Isn’t that the big victory? Jesus said that there was more celebration in heaven (ETC).

When Jesus says that loving our neighbours is one of the two greatest commandments, what he’s really saying is, ‘I need more people who are willing to die for others, so that they can be saved’.

That’s what God calls us as a church to do. Sacrifice ourselves, to bring the lost back to Jesus.

GOSPEL MESSAGE:

Jesus loves you no matter what

Romans 6:23 NIV

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The kind of life that we can make ourselves. It might be good - but it’s not eternal. It’s still cracked, and broken.

In Jesus, by His death, we have access to a real and eternal life. We can get to know a God who works towards our good, who’s prepared a place for us in heaven and in eternity.

God promises us purpose and meaning. But he also promises to send peace beyond our understanding when we feel rocked by life. He promises to send power when we’re too weak to do it ourselves. In all the ways that we’re not enough, he promises to be more than we could imagine.

When we choose him, when we admit that we’re actually broken and not enough, when we believe that God is real and loves us, and when we confess and say, ‘Jesus, I want to live for you, I want my life to be better and to be defined by your power and your goodness’ we open ourselves to something entirely new. Something great.