Love God 2

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I - Passion at new life, I wondered “Now What?”

When I was 15.
walking up front at New Life Church after "Passion" Felt convicted, knew something had to change.
I was so grateful for God’s love I wanted to love him back, I wanted to do anything. I felt like I needed to love God better.
They gave me a new testament and some sour patch kids
I ate the sour patch kids before I got home and I’m not sure what happened to the New Testament.
I really wondered, Now What? I prayed the prayer again, I accepted Jesus, now what?
I’m not sure much changed in my life accept that I felt more guilty doing anything but Loving God what I thought of as church stuff.
I already went to church on Sundays, youth group on Sunday Nights, small group during the week

W- Some ways we have answered that question

We have been talking about OUTREACH a lot lately. And its super important, but it raises the same question I had in that GIANT auditorium. If we do reach out and when someone comes to christ, how do we answer that now what question?
And frankly how do we answer that “now what” question in our own lives
You believe in Jesus! Now what? We haven't always had the best answers to that question.
Go to church?
“How do I follow God best?” become a pastor - bible scholar - teacher
Go to church? Go to church more?
Give more? Pray more? Study the Bible? Go become a pastor? Serve? Preach? Worship?
sing Christian songs more?
Read the bible more?
Give as much as you can to the church?
Pray more?
Stop Sinning so much?
Put it away during the week and bring it out on Sunday?
Serve more?
Give more?
Devote more time/talent/treasure here?
As a Pastor I have been asking myself that question a lot lately and we have been wrestling with it as a church. Why do we do what we do? What are the next steps we want people to take after coming to faith?
What are we supposed to do?
When you meet Jesus now what? What is the mission, why do we come together. We are a church, now what?
Transition: We turned to scripture for the answer to this question. For our now what, for our mission. Jesus when talking to his disciples sums up the now what nicely I think in something we call the Greatest Commandment and the Great Commission.

The Greatest Commandment

22:34–40pp—Mk 12:28–31

34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

37 Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ i 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ j 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

The Great Commission

16 Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

We are your church
At Bethel we break it down to three simple statements, and we are going to look at each of them over the next 3 weeks.
34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”
LOVE GOD
LOVE OTHERS
37 Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ i 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ j 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
MAKE DISCIPLES
I believe everything we do together and even in life can fall into that mission.

G- How do we Love God

Jesus vs the pharisees, set the stage.

34 Hearing that Jesus had silenced the Sadducees, the Pharisees got together. 35 One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: 36 “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”

37 Jesus replied: “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ i 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ j 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Love God with heart, soul, and mind?
Love God Love others Love God with heart, soul, and mind?
What do we do with that?
Love God with heart, soul, and mind?
Love neighbor as yourself? Will get to that one next week.
Love neighbor as yourself? Will get to that one next week.
Love God Love others Jesus says all the Law and Prophets hang on these. Seems pretty clear.
w/o these 2 command everything in Jesus Bible the OT falls apart...
Loving god - At first this sounds just like what I have often thought.
Do more “churchy stuff”
Join more churchy groups
hang out with more churchy people
Pray and read the bible more. Right? How else do you “LOVE GOD”
But its still pretty confusing. Love is such a vague emotion...
It sort of makes sense but...
what does it mean to love God with my heart soul and mind? Does that “feel different.”
Our reaction to this, my reaction would not have been theirs.
For its first hears though, i don't think they would have heard it this way: Not new, Deut. They knew this command
In fact all the teachers and anyone listening had said similar words to this that very morning....
SHEMA explain
שְׁמַע

4 Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one. y 5 Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. 6 These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. 7 Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. 8 Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. 9 Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates.

Moses says this right before he tells them the whole law. Full of relentlessly practical commands about life, relationships, and yes even work.
Moses says this right before he tells them the whole law. Full of relentlessly practical commands about life, relationships, and yes even work.
When we read many of those laws today, they can seem strange and sometimes don't make a whole lot of sense.
But they communicate one thing very very clearly. That every part of your life matters to God.
The way we often think about loving God is terribly limited. But the SHEMA reminds us that every time you get out of bed, talk to your family, or walk out your door you have an opportunity to practice loving God.
Love for God inst just expressed in a beautiful worship song or an hour spent in prayer. But it can be tasted in the perfect chocolate chip cookie, the 3rd poopie diaper you changed that day
Deut says loving God isn't just about what you do in the temple or at church. Its not just about reading the bible, praying, or making great sacrifices. Its about living your whole life differently. Letting God have a say in everything you do.
DEUT’s MESSAGE, SHEMA SAYS, How do you love God? In everything you do. By doing everything differently.
Ties back to the VERY FIRST command in all of scripture. The Purpose of human beings.

27 So God created mankind in his own image,

in the image of God he created them;

male and female he created them.

28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

29 Then God said, “I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. 30 And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds in the sky and all the creatures that move along the ground—everything that has the breath of life in it—I give every green plant for food.” And it was so.

31 God saw all that he had made, and it was very good. And there was evening, and there was morning—the sixth day.

LOVING GOD according to DEUT is about way more than whether you are at church on Sundays or not.

27 So God created mankind in his own image,

in the image of God he created them;

male and female he created them.

28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

We believe that Jesus in his death and Resurrection defeated evil and that because of what he did, if we accept him his spirit dwells in us. And by his spirit we are finally able to together start to live this out.
We are finally able to love God, because of how he loved us.
We believe that Jesus in his death and Resurrection defeated evil and that because of what he did, if we accept him his spirit dwells in us. And by his spirit we are finally able to together start to live this out.
Not perfectly all the time, not without making mistakes and slipping.
Because of his spirit we can live out the SHEMA like never before and every part of our life can be an act of worship.
From the very beginning God’s dream for the world was that it would be a place where He and the People he made could work together. The SHEMA and the Law was an oppertunity for God’s people to do that with him.
1st command in genesis, SUBDUE and MULTIPLY “God wants the world full of people doing amazing work” Thats the dream, thats the vision of creatoin. GOD WANTed his people, in his image to RULE, to be his coworkers in creation.
But of course human work can be done in a way that doesn't cooperate with God, that doesn't LOVE GOD. Adam and Eve choose to do their own thing, and we choose to do our own thing all the time. Choose to not accept God’s love or love him back by following.
Even thought God’s people recited those words morning and night, and often obeyed the law. Many times they fell short.
Over and o
The whole Old Testament turns on this idea. “What if
Many times they decided like Adam and Eve in the garden that they would rather decide for themselves what Good and Evil is.
the OT is the story of how God tried to have a people as coworkers on earth again as he intended.
BUT it failed. Sometimes it went great the people followed the law and partnered with God in creation. They built beautiful things, planted vineyards, raised animals, and used all those things to care for everyone. But other times they exploited people and used their creative power for great destruction.
the perfect apple, an amazing building, elegant code, a great movie. I think this is what GOd had in mind.
But of course human work can be done in a way that doesnt cooperate with God, that doesnt LOVE GOD.
But it failed?!
Until Jesus. Because God first loved US
But now we have been set free from Sin and Death and God's spirit the holy spirit dwells in us. We can pursue this, we won't get it all the time but it is the call.

Y - Go Love God -

When I was riding home from that church. The taste of sour patch kids in my mouth. The only what now I could think of was going to church
Sometimes we think this is the place we go to love god, but we have to let God out of this box. You are the temple, God's spirit dwells in you.
Love for God inst just expressed in a beautiful worship song or an hour spent in prayer. But it can be tasted in the perfect chocolate chip cookie or seen in the 3rd poo pie diaper you changed that day. Let your love for God show
LOVE GOD.
In the way you farm At work At your school At the lake In creation With your family In your home
Be the best damn cookie maker on the line. Be the person that makes it fun to work in your workplace Care about the people you are with and do a great job for God's sake
May your work display the care of someone working for God. May you spend your money, and your time out of love for God. May you vote like it matters to God.
Whatever you do...
I cant tell you what this looks like in your world. You have to figure that out for yourself.
Do it for god
This is not easy, and it's not just a thought exercise. This is hard and you might find that what you are doing can't be done for God, and isn't being done for God. You may find that parts of what your doing are wrong and need to change.
Our Mission is to support each other in doing that.

W- the lie is that nothing matters

When I was planning this sermon series I wanted to paint the words LOVE GOD above the doorway as you walked into the sanctuary.
I thought when it comes to our mission “LOVE GOD” is what we do in this room. I imagined preaching about bible study, prayer, and worship services. How we love God by giving to the church, joining a bible study, or praying together.
Of course all of that is true. Of course this is a room where we worship and LOVE GOD together.
But as I have been wrestling with Jesus words this week and the words of Deuteronomy, I think I had it all wrong. Of course keep serving, of course keep giving, of course keep worshiping. But don’t let that be the only place where we practice LOVING GOD.
My friends the bible tells us that as a church,
Our mission is NOT to be a place where you GO to meet and Love God on Sundays.
Our mission is to be a people active loving and Glorifying God in all we do Monday through Saturday
Our mission is to be a people active loving and Glorifying God in all we do Monday through Saturday
The bible says we Love because God first loved us. Because of what he has done.
May we love God at home today.
May we love God as we make lunch
May we love God as we respond to emails
as we change tires
as we answer phones
as we check power lines
as we cut hair
as we run races
as we ride dirtbikes
as we play baseball
as we file tps reports
as we make dinner
as we vaccum floors
as we milk cows
as we make things
as we drive trucks
May we love God with our friends.
May we love God at the lake.
May we Live Lives glorify the God who made us to work with him.
.
The lie is that because of Jesus nothing much matters here on earth. That the most important things we do in life
Lets pray together.
Love for God inst just expressed in a beautiful worship song or an hour spent in prayer. But it can be tasted in the perfect chocolate chip cookie, the 3rd poopie diaper you changed that day
It does, it all Matters now Go and love God in your life.
Bagles for Benny
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