Heroes
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Heroes - With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility
Heroes - With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility
We all love a great Super Hero story where the whole population’s survival is at stake, and along comes the villain who tries to flaunt their superiority over the general human population, and begins mocking the Super Hero who for the moment, is unable to use their strength or power to beat the villain. But, then comes the miraculous moment where something changes and they find a way, often an unlikely way, to make one last attempt to defeat the enemy before all of humanity is wiped out. When that final attempt begins to work, hope begins to build in the people. They start believing again that they might be rescued. Then finally the plan works and the Super Hero is able to defeat the foe and save humanity from the clutches of death. Everyone shouts with a cheer for the Super Hero and how once again, they were able to overcome the bad guys and win the day.
Now imagine in that moment, if the Super Hero silenced the crowd and said, “Thank you, thank you. I’m awesome!” “I really appreciate all of the cheers, but I already know that I’m great.” “Why don’t you build a 140 foot statue of me and place it right in front of City Hall so that everyone can be reminded of how awesome of a hero I am.” “And, while you’re at it. Please name a high school after me so that just in case I am not immortal, I can be remembered by future generations.”
“Okay. Now, can somebody give me a foot massage? My feet are sore.”
Just imagine if that were the script of an upcoming movie. I think that the people would be grateful, but that attitude, that arrogance would wear on people’s nerves and that Super Hero would also become a source of annoyance.
When we do something for God, do we want to be recognized? Or, are we content in just knowing that we did the right thing?
Let me give a couple of examples...
Some of you took part in the last month’s Operation Christmas Child…now imagine if you brought your shoebox to church and you brought it in with a furniture cart and stated making a big deal out of how heavy your box was because you bought more stuff to put in it than anyone else. In fact, your box is 10 X larger than anyone else’s. “Can I get somebody in here to help me carry this thing in here.
That’s called ____boasting_______.
That’s wrong (expand on this) tells us a lot about how our devotion to God is not for show…read it. When you give, when you pray, when you fast...
Or, imagine that scenario going like this… now imagine if every Sunday you came into church and walked right by the Operation Christmas Child table and ignored it and never even thought about signing up to help a child in need somewhere else in the world. You said hi to your friends, got a cup of coffee, you sat through church, you took 15 mints from the candy dish and put them in your pocket and walked out the door after church and walked right past a women who was sitting in the alley with her 2 children holding a sign that said, “We haven’t eaten today.” And in this scenario, it didn’t cross your mind to want to help someone in need.
That’s called __apathy___.
That is also wrong.
Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it.
But those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.
We know what real love is because Jesus gave up his life for us. So we also ought to give up our lives for our brothers and sisters. If someone has enough money to live well and sees a brother or sister in need but shows no compassion—how can God’s love be in that person?
Dear children, let’s not merely say that we love each other; let us show the truth by our actions.
We love each other because he loved us first.
Let’s face it. Sometimes people just do things to get noticed. And some people don’t do things, because they too centered on themselves to notice that people need help.
Well if we fit into either one of those categories, there is hope for us. I believe that when we look to God for advice on how we are supposed to live our lives, and when we put that advice into action, we become better people for it. That is called being a follower of Jesus. So we are going to look at a few more of God’s instructions for us in the Bible and see if we can learn to follow Him more closely by putting these words into action.
Verses
Stark
Even hope for him? or look how an imperfect human hero still saved the world. there’s hope for him. A perfect savior paid a great price to save the world.
“For this is how God loved the world: He gave his one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in him will not perish but have eternal life.
John 3:16
We love because...