Canceling Christian Cancel Culture

Intro:

Harbor Church it is so good to finally be with you in person, I gotta tell you the Apostle Paul writes in his letters on multiple occasions to churches that he yearns and desires to be with them and in their presence but can't at that time. And I can relate, over the last several years as you have planted and grown I have talked with Joel about coming up and it just hasn’t worked out until now, but here we are God is good.

As Joel said (if he introduces me) my name is Cam and I have known Joel and Julie for the last 21 years. Our relationship is officially old enough to get a drink with us. To say that Joel and Julie have had a profound impact on my life and ministry is an understatement, it was in his ministry in 7th grade that I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior and a year later I was baptized in Havasupai Falls in the Grand Canyon with him right there. We have Karlee we have been married for 8 years going out for 13 years. If you do quick math you find out that we are high school sweethearts. She told me one time that as soon as she saw me I ruined all other men for her, because there was no way she could do better….We also have 3 kids (picture)  and Lilly is 6, Atticus is 4 and Dean turns 2 in just a few weeks. So now you know me and we are friends.

We are in week 3 of this series intitled “My Way or the High Way” and we are looking at the toxicity of Cancel Culture that is prevalent in our world, and if we are honest, can I be honest at harbor? It has a firm grasp in our churches. Cancel culture says this, My right trumps your right and that makes me right. So, When Joel asked me to speak on this idea of Cancel Culture I was thrilled because I have a lot to say on the subject. So I prayed about it, and I got to the point where I could look out and point the finger at everyone else when it comes to Cancel Culture, but I felt a sense from the Holy Spirit that I wasn’t supposed to preach about what happens on the outside of our church walls, but to confront the “My Way or the Highway” mentality inside of our churches, and inside of Jesus followers. As you are taking notes todays Message is Entitled: Correcting Christian Cancel Culture.  I have a lot to say few minutes with you and I’m long winded as it is, so lets pray to start:

Prayer:

In the early second century around 140-144 we know that the writings and letters of the new testament were traveling all around the roman empire, and really all the way around the known world, as people from all nations were coming to Jesus, hidden churches in places where Christians were being persecuted were meeting and reading these words and worshipping Jesus. Around this same time a man named Maricon of Sinope traveled to Rome, and Marcoin was a heretic. A Heretic is someone who denies core doctrines of our faith and teaches principles that are counter intuitive to what God has already said. But here was Marcions issues, as he read the Old Testament and the New Testament he couldn’t reconcile what he called the “Righteous and Wrathful” God as the same “Loving and Merciful God” of the new testament. So he came to the conclusion that these two were complete different Gods and the God that has sent Jesus is not one that has revealed himself to us, expect in the person of Jesus.

But here is the problem with that, The Old Testament of Israel’s God and Israel’s Messiah and the New Testament of Jesus as the fulfillment of those prophecies are interwoven and connected to a point where if Marcion wanted to teach his belief he would have to completely disregard, deny, delete some of the writings of the New Testament. And that is exactly what he did.

As he read through the Gospels he completely rejected Matthew, Mark, and John and only kept parts of Luke, but any writings in the Gospels that connected Jesus with the God of the Old Testament he took it out. He rejected Acts, and all the epistles except for Paul, but then again even in Pauls writings anything connecting Jesus to the OT you guessed it gone, canceled, out. Marcion handpicked and edited the scriptures he wanted to back up his belief system to make it believable. He basically said when it comes to what I believe about God, when it comes to God’s word, “It’s My Way or the Highway.”

This right here, is one of the prevailing issues I see in our churches and our Christian culture today…maybe not to the same extent, but with the same intent. Maybe you have noticed this, because I know I have, Jesus followers and churches are picking and choosing what they want to follow, what they want to believe, and what texts they think are inspired by God and what ones are not. Like Marcion they are deleting, taking out, removing, ignoring and disregarding the Word of God to fit what they think is true about God, not what God has already said is truth. They are saying “I don’t like it so I don’t want it.”

Many Christians have bought into the lie that opinions are greater than God’s Truth, their feelings are greater than God’s facts and their own rationality is greater than God’s Revelation. And that isn’t just believers and churches far out there, for many of us, that’s us and maybe we don’t even realize it. We treat scripture as our own little bible buffet. Forgiveness of my sins, well I definitely want that, forgiving those who have hurt me, I don’t think so. Others not judging me, I definitely want some of that.

So that leaves us to answer the question, “ So how do we correct this in the Church?

I think the apostle Paul has the answer…

The Apostle Paul when writing to his protegee Timothy says this about the Scripture, All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the servant of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.  (2 Tim 3:16)

When my right goes against what the bible says is right…who’s right? Not a trick question the bible is right. Here is the amazing thing about this book, it is as Paul says inspired by God, and as it says in Hebrews is it living and active, it is sharper than any double edge sword, so what does that mean? As you read the bible, the bible reads you. God is in the process of making sinners saved people and saved people saints. As you read this word if there is anything in you that disagrees with it, ask God to change you, because God’s word hasn’t changed in 2000 years and it won’t change.

“But the problem is, we try to change it we want God’s word my way or the highway, or we cancel certain parts of it.

“We cancel parts of God’s word, no wonder we cancel God’s people” Because the way we treat scripture directly affects the way we treat other people.  Christians throughout history have been notorious thought history for canceling people, distancing themselves from others because they are different then them, live differently than them, act differently than them, believe differently than them, and it is funny because one of the first moments we see this happening after the Church was founded in acts, the apostle Peter is right there in the middle of it and it is with other Christians! In acts 15 we see that there was a group of Pharisees that become Jesus followers, and a group of gentiles that became Jesus followers and it was all great until the Pharisees made that claim that in order to be really saved it was belief in Jesus and circumcision. Here is the problem, circumcision was for the Jews not the gentiles. So guess what Peter did. He distanced himself from them, wanted nothing to do with them until Paul came and confronted him and said, In the body of Christ there is no Jew or Gentiles, Man or Woman, Slave or free all are apart of the body.

Here is the problem though, this has happened in the Christian world ever since then Christians canceling Christians for secondary issues and making them Gospel issues. Denominations are split on styles of worship, women pastors, politics, divorce, alcohol, smoking, when to take communion, gifts of the spirit money, eldership, social justice issues, baptism and the list can go on and on, and everyone else believes they are right and everyone else is wrong. That’s just on certain issues don’t get me started on how we treat people.

I am convinced that if we met the heroes in our faith on their worst day most Christians today would try to cancel them. Abraham gave his wife over to the Pharaoh of Egypt in fear. Noah was a drunk. Jacob a liar and a cheat, Rahab a prostitute, Samson a playboy, Gideon a coward, David an adulterer and a murderer, Solomon had 300 wives and 700 concubines…Solomon was described as the wisest man who ever lived, but I do question that, not because of the 300 wives but because of the 300 mother in laws that brings…Peter a deserter, Saul later Paul a murder and hunter of Christians. Yet here is the amazing, God does not define people by their worst day or their worst action. He defines them by who they are in Christ.

So that leaves us once again to answer the question, “ So how do we correct this in the Church?

We have to get back to the way of Jesus when it comes to how we treat on another and how we treat and love those who are not Jesus followers yet. Jesus while he was on this earth constantly got judged by the religious leaders for hanging out with and healing the sick, those social outcasts that nobody wanted around, prostitutes, sinners, tax collectors basically anyone who was far from God or canceled in the eyes of the Jewish people. And the amazing thing is, Jesus called Canceled people his friends, and he was in the business of restoring people back to God.

This brings us to one of my favorite moments in all of the scriptures, and one that if we learn from Jesus and truly apply it to our lives we can begin correcting the cancel culture problem when it comes to people in our church.

John 8 starting in verse 2: At dawn he (Jesus) appeared again in the temple courts, where all the people gathered around him, and he sat down to teach them. 3 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4 and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” 6 They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

But you see the deviousness, this woman is caught in adultery yet where is the man? Adultery isn’t a sin that one does in solitude all by themselves, it must have a second party, yet the man isn’t around which leads me to believe that these religious leaders Set her up so that they can use her as a pawn to trap Jesus. And we might be and we should be angered on how these men are treating her, but don’t be mistaken, Jesus followers today do the exact same to others. What if they are gay or apart of the LGBTQ community? Different faith than us? Vote different then us? Think different than us? It breaks my heart to see so many Jesus followers condemn those who are not Jesus followers instead of loving them.

The religious leaders plotted against Jesus and were hoping for a 2 for one special, not only were they wanting to cancel the women for being an adulterous and they wanted to catch Jesus. If he tells them to let her go, he breaks the law of Moses, if he agrees with them to  he is harsh and cruel but also breaks a Roman law, as Roman ruled declared that the right to execution only happened by Roman rule. So what does Jesus do? I’m glad you asked…

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger.7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.”8 Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

(somewhere – The religious leaders tried to used the word of God as a weapon to condemn her of her sin while Jesus uses it as a revealer to convict people of their sin.)

The brilliance of Jesus. I can imagine the tension in the air, this naked woman maybe only having a sheet around her, and it is silent after this question except maybe for the muffled and chocked back cries of this women thinking her life my end any time.,  The onlookers wondering what Jesus is going to do, and all he does is stoop down and write and all you hear is the sound of gravel moving and words appear. Now we don’t know what Jesus wrote, some think it was names of those around them, or the 10 commandments, but I think personally based off the reaction of the crowd that we will see in a moment, that it was general sins, starting small and leading to big. Certain sins that nobody would be able to deny, nobody would be able to explain away, nobody could stand there and condemn this woman in front of them with their sin written on the ground.

And Jesus just says, Let anyone one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her. He is not denying that she has sinned, he is not claiming that she shouldn’t receive a punishment he is just putting this whole situation into perspective, that everyone around them are no different than her, except her sin is immediate and it can be seen. We are no different, we judge others and cancel them based on their sin that we can see while ignoring the sin that is within us.

Jesus isn’t done yet, 9 At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. 10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you? 11 “No one, sir,” she said. “Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

One by one they left, even the religious leader who condemned this woman. Coming face to face in their own sin they could not stand there and condemn anyone else. Which gets to my final point of the night/day.

How do we correct this cancel culture in the church? We have to realize that there is a lot more to deal with inside of us then outside of others. When we are too concerned and overwhelmed with other people’s sin or issues that we don’t take the time to take care of our sin and issues we have it backwards.

Personal story – What sin in my life needs to come out?

What’s in you that Jesus wants to get out of you?

- Pray Out