Do you live like family?

Romans Passage

How do I live in family when nobody is around

Your relationships in God’s family is defined by your relationship with God.

If you have every watch fast and furious you’ll know Vin Diesel acting as the character Dom Toretto is famous for talking about family. It’s importance and how it does not matter if you are not born into it you can become apart of it.

Now I have never actually seen those movies, but I do hear from my actual family how awesome they are and even though I have never seen them I am still loved by them.

`Lets define family first, if you want to track with the series we are in the family I say is the church, however I am a complex sermon writer and this whole sermon has two meanings; how does he do it! I just swapped one word in my script and it changes the meaning so here is the two meanings as we dive in;

Do you live like a family;

it’s

A call to family relationships

a call to church relationships

And as any good artist must understand is that the interpertation is not up to the creator but the viewers of the peice and so I am going to let go of what I think the conclusion of this message is and let Jesus guide you to place this message into your lives.

Becuase some of you might need to take this home and apply this with your family,

but

some might need to put this to use in this room,

I will let you choose but if you here the word family it’s a twofold word of church and family.

Romans 12:9–12 NIV

Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil; cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor, serving the Lord. Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.

What a good call but I get really caught up in part of it, there are these ideas of greatness, weven when I hear the word Zeal which is defined as such a passionate affection to God.

This passage is not calling for unfounded optimism, it is not looking for boundless joy that cannot be contained because it is beyond our understanding how someone can be “so happy”

This verse is actually calling for Joy, joy in hope and that Hope being the person that is Jesus.

If we are to love each other we need to do all these things but to centre in on that heart of the passage, Spiritual fervor, Zeal, Faithful in prayer and in my opinion joyfulness in Hope. We must be people we eagerly are joyful in the Lord and what he is doing.

It is not a unfounded optimism in our perspective, only in someone who does not believes eyes does it look like crazy optimism.

I have put all my trust in Jesus that he will bring about a outcome that is better then the one I expect or can theorize. See if I was optimistic I would be looking for the best possible outcome, that means I know it! But how can I know what God’s plans are, and so I am hopeful. I want to see something that only Jesus can bring about.

At the heart of this all is that who I am in the core being of myself, the deeper person then people see on the surface will appear in front of others.

This is the shifting of a heart to be more like Jesus and when it comes to your Church or your Family, you need to understand one thing. Your heart will be evident in your family.

So how do you live like a family in any of those spheres? you must first choose to live how you want to, how Jesus is calling you to by yourself.

How do I follow Jesus when nobody is around

If we took away Parkview Alliance Church, we locked the doors, threw up a closed sign. Would you still follow Jesus? that’s the heart of it, if you want to join the family the understanding is what makes the family, the unified cause that is praise and worshipping Jesus.

It’s like this:

I told one of our teens who enjoys running that I would run a race with them, but I get to choose the race.

They respond with that race is that? I then tell them that I want to run the colour run with them. I think it would be lots of fun.

They agree;

I might be in the “club” or me and this teen are now running partners for this event. HOWEVER, I need to actually be a runner, and I don’t think anyone has seen me go for a jog around town yet....

So now it’s my choice to be the person that I am set up to be, I can choose to take the role and position of running. and I will say this is what I plan to do, to train and practice at running so this teen does not out pace or lap me.

The other choice is fake it, I could run and have a miserable time by faking it.

Do you worship Jesus to fake it or is it a call of your heart?

See the church came second, Jesus was never made for the Church but rather the church was made for Jesus, so that his people could gather and support each other.

That’s shown through the passage I did not read just before this one where Paul talks about Spiritual gifts and how the church needs to support each other. I don’t want this to get hung up on Spiritual gifts today, rather it’s the idea that if we never had Spiritual gifts would we be people who live like a family of believers.

Romans 12:9-13 is a list of what a believer looks like, among other things that Paul talks about. But lets use this as our basis to saying here is how I live and function in the family that we call the Church.

So if you decide to follow Jesus in this public setting, then I encourage you to follow Jesus in the private settings too.

Jump into a bible study, pray before your day, encourage people to keep you accountable to your personal readings in the bible. There are apps to do that!

How do I live in family when there is people around

Ok so lets actually get into the relationships around us.

Romans 12:14–16 NIV

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn. Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited.

Here it is, how to live within the church and with it’s people, a difficult calling.

We are told to bless, not curse and to rejoice even with those not in a state of rejoicing and then lastly we are told to live in harmony with one another. that living in harmony is important.

See Paul is building on what he previously says, most of the letters that this guy the apostle Paul who writes the most books in the New Testament he writes the big idea first. His big idea was “Love must be sincere” everything else he says builds that big idea.

Who when we get to live in harmony, this is how he summarizes what he previously said into one simple point. The blessings over curses bring about harmony.

Then you might say “Liam if I curse people privately I can keep the harmony”

No! because your heart will become hard, the call is to bless all people so that your heart, the person you are will not hold a grudge or be resentful or hate others.

If you curse in quiet you store up bitterness, but here is the trick, if you pray blessings on those who you have grudges against you will store harmony in your heart.

Living in harmony requires you to make harmony with your own heart first.

How do I make harmony

1. Pray blessings on others

2. Live in unity

That is why Paul says to rejoice with those who rejoice and mourn with those who mourn! That we would not be people who ignore the needs and emotions of another.

Harmony requires unity in every matter, that if your neighbour is sad that you would join in that sorrow as a form of unity with that person. This is principles of the Church that we would do live together and be in harmony even in our emotions.

If your friend goes through tragity do not be absent as the world is, trying to hide away from the hard things. Join in the mourning to comfort those in need.

Same as rejoicing, do not get envious over those who celebrate but join in their joy so they might see more of God’s greatness through their rejoicing.

3. Speak of respect

I say this in the terms of pride so write a little “pride” beside that.

Because if I am boasting about my life to others I am not showing how high and mighty that I might be. I am belittling others positions, and I am talking about shameless boasting, again rejoice with the rejoice thats not wrong but never let pride and seeking approval through others by the means of showboating come from your mouth.

Paul says lower yourself, because if we bring ourselves to another level we show a eye to eye respect, thing of it like this.

If you have young kids you’ll know this trick.

When you talk to a kid and like want to get real or personal because either the information is important, the child is acting up or if you want to have a real momment with a child, you have to drop down to their level. Eye to eye contact.

This is the same principle but just not a physical one, don’t do that to short people thats just rude, but Paul is suggesting that we need to bring ourselves to a eye to eye level of respect.

If I live in the clouds and am called to talk to people who don’t have much, well it’s time to lower myself, in manner, speech, hey even the attire. That’s why my wardrobe is full of T-shirts instead of dress shirts - I am a youth pastor!

How do I live in family when family fights

Lets move on though because if you know anything about families is that they fight, they have disagreements and arguments.

That is where Paul talks about difficult love and what love needs to look like when people don’t get along, so lets keep reading at verse 17.

Romans 12:17–18 NIV

Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.

Listen to what Paul says and what I say, there is not a easy answer, when your family or people in the church fight there is no easy answer. We need to understand that there will not be one easy outcome to a disagreement.

Paul says first do not repay evil for evil and thats at the heart of love, never fight a fire with another fire. but rather seek a outcome that is most profitable of all parties invovled.

Let me tell you that if you have a disagreement with someone in the room you must seek to do what is right in everyone’s eyes. Coming to a 4 win scenario:

1 win: I win

2 wins: both parties win

3: wins: everyone even the moderator of the disagreement wins

4 wins: All those parties win and so does the organization overall.

See the tricky part of being in a church is that becuase we each care for eachother on this journey to grow in faithfulness to Jesus, we get mixed into other peoples lives.

So if there is a disagreement we have to realize that more then just two people might know about it. that is why doing what is right in the eyes of everyone is so important, because if you have a private conversation over here, it might translate differently over here and sudden more people are seeing the issue.

That is why we must live in peace with everyone. Try to make peace, harmony with each and every person. Ignoring the problem won’t go away but rather if you see harmony with others that is what peace is.

Living in peace with everyone means; EVERYONE

You can’t ignore them. That’s not doing what is right, thats just drawing lines.

I have been through this more times then I can count at this point, where I draw a line and realize that that is so unbiblical. Listen choosing to ignore your enemy is choosing to not love them, it’s just choosing to not hate them too! You are called to love, and by every defintion of the word Love I know, I know it is not ignorance.

Living in peace means reconciling

Reconcile:, repair, restore, recreate, renew.

Let me move on to the end of the passage and you’ll see why you need to reconcile instead of drawing lines.

Romans 12:19–21 NIV

Do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for God’s wrath, for it is written: “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” says the Lord. On the contrary: “If your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals on his head.” Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Paul straight up says those psalms where they prayed for the destruction of thy enemy is no longer a valid request! Paul is calling back to when Jesus spoke the sermon on the mount and called us to love our enemy, and so those Psalms that call for the destruction of your enemy, they care less wait becuase we know now that we are called love love them.

Feed your enemy, give them something to drink if they are thirst. Fill their needs, but why? this brings coal on their heads well it becuase you have shown them love instead of hate. Their were potientially looking for hate, a fuel for arguements and enemies but rather you give them a cleansing agent that is love, and love abundant.

Are you hungry? come and eat with my family,

are you thirst? take from me.

Give away yourself in love, you won’t look back, becuase that is reconciling broken relationships.

Do not be evil but defeat evil with good.

How to live in Harmony

So how do we live in harmony today, as family units but more importantly how do we live with the people beside us right now?

Love God - He will change your heart

That’s my best advice, seek him and his ways and even if it’s not a instant change that you love everyone around you, he will show you harmony in community. See it from his eyes, you are a child of God, but so is every person in this room. Keep loving each other as if they too are a child of God (cause they are)

Bless those around you - You’ll see them differently

When you actively seek to pray blessing and spread blessings around, its hard to get into arguments or disagreements. You’ll grow your own heart for them if you choose to share in time through pray, through time in community, in gifts, in words, in handshakes at church. All the five love laungues, hey it’ll be hard to be mad at someone who you keep showing love to.

Seek to restore broken relationships - You’ll restore someone and feel restored yourself

If you have a broken relationship with someone in your family, your place of work, here in the church, wherever you go I want to challenge you this week to reconcile that relationship.

I want you to repair that relationship, even if you don’t talk to them anymore.

I have had a few broken relationships in my life, but when I lived out this passage of romans 12 I realized that I needed to show love to those who don’t show it to me.

I got my phone out and sent out messages, or met with people to not even confess wrong yet. I met first to show them love, to bring them blessing. My agenda was first love and blessing, only after I showed them my heart did I ask to reconcile with them.

It was never the same relationship before the lines were drawn, but here is the thing. I don’t carry around the hurt from the relationships anymore.

Parkview Alliance Church, I want to call you to a higher standard today.

That as we walk forward in what Jesus is calling us to, that you would be loving to one another, even if their vision from Jesus is different from Jesus, or their vision of church is different, or their idea of this new lead pastor is different, or if they aren’t where you are spiritually, or if you just don’t click with them.

choose love today not evil, because we are all called to that higher standard of loving one another,.

So as I have been ending this series with a question each week

Do you live like God’s Family?