Live and Love - Recklessly

Thanks - Guests and Series tie in.

-How does graduation tie in to this moment in the Lord’s prayer, and in our text for the day?

-…Graduation is a moment to start again. A time when the slate is wiped clean.

[graduation is a moment to start again…the slate is wiped clean…the past is gone, there is only potential and future…just like Grace]

…talk about how graduation is an opportunity to look at life differently, to understand that you have cleared this hurdle, and clearing it allows you to take on bigger challenges and bigger tasks. This moment gives you freedom to chase after more…]

[and that is where we are in our prayer too…talk about series so far, and our line specifically…forgiveness....grace...

[move toward scripture]

Luke 15:1–7 ESV

Now the tax collectors and sinners were all drawing near to hear him. And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying, “This man receives sinners and eats with them.” So he told them this parable: “What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it? And when he has found it, he lays it on his shoulders, rejoicing. And when he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep that was lost.’ Just so, I tell you, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.

Luke 15:1-

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pray

[shepherdlostsheep]

- Immediate Context (brief)

- Context (brief)

three stories, all have to do with something lost.

no matter how smart, or even how lucky or how much we have been “raised right,” we will all, at some point, realize that we are lost. And without God loving us as recklessly as He does, we would never be found!

[picofoverwhelmingrecklessloveofGod]

What do I mean by, reckless?

I don’t mean reckless just like we know it...

…after all, reckless is defined as not thinking or caring about the consequences of an action.

examples - don’t try to justify yet…that’s next

But what I mean, is that Grace is a Holy representation of a love that is like that. It doesn’t think about or care about our actions! It is a reckless love that forgives freely! A love that forgets every shortcoming, every flaw, but at the same time, persists infinitely and constantly pulls us back toward our God!

That is what I mean by reckless.

[pic of lords prayer with verse focused in]

And that is what this prayer is offering us, and reminding us to ask God for.

Bigger than that…this prayer is asking us to remember that forgiveness, grace, reckless love, it can only flow from God if it flows from us to others too!

Forgive us our trespasses, our debts, our sin, our mistakes, our shortcomings, AS we forgive others the same!

- after reminding us that we are called to get rid of all the bitterness, all the rage, all the anger, slander, and malice that is in us - Paul goes on to tell us to “be kind and tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as Christ forgave you.”

In other words, live, and love, recklessly.

Don’t just do what the minimum, but through Christ’s strength, dig deep and set your mind to the hard work of living and loving as God loves us! Leaving the 99 for the 1! Accepting the prodigal’s back into our lives! Extending Grace to all, especially those that hurt us!

That’s hard, church. But hear this clearly, “IT IS SUPPOSED TO BE HARD! IF IT WASN’T HARD, EVERYONE WOULD DO IT! THE HARD IS WHAT MAKES IT GREAT!”

Forgiving others, living with reckless love and grace, is one of the hardest things we do, but let me tell you, it can change this world if we would just do it.

1. Forgiving others, living with reckless love and grace, is one of the hardest things we do, but let me tell you, it can change this world if we would just do it.

[picofgraduationline]

Mrs. Alexander/my story

my first real example of grace

a. BECAUSE OF THAT GRACE I STAND HERE TODAY! IT ISN’T THE SCHOOL, IT ISN’T ANYTHING THAT I COULD EVER HAVE DONE! IT IS A RECKLESS GRACE THAT ALLOWED MY LIFE TO CONTINUE ON A TRACK TOWARDS CHRIST THAT ALLOWED ME TO LEARN TO LIVE OUT GRACE IN MY OWN LIFE!

BECAUSE OF THAT GRACE I STAND HERE TODAY! IT ISN’T THE SCHOOLING, OR THE DEGREES, IT ISN’T ANYTHING THAT I COULD EVER HAVE DONE! IT WAS A RECKLESS GRACE THAT ALLOWED MY LIFE TO CONTINUE ON A TRACK TOWARDS CHRIST THAT ALLOWED ME TO LEARN TO LIVE OUT GRACE IN MY OWN LIFE!

Because of that reckless love, I had a chance. And because of that, because I saw that and lived it out, I understood that we are all called to live and love recklessly too!

b. Examples – Jobs, relationships, politics, positions

Examples – Jobs, relationships, politics, positions - EVERYTHING WE DO IS AN OPPORTUNITY TO LIVE OUT THIS PRAYER! TO FORGIVE AND LOVE OTHERS AS RECKLESSLY AS GOD LOVES AND FORGIVES US! TO LEAVE THE 99 FOR THE 1! TO BE THE EXAMPLE THIS WORLD NEEDS!

[picofsomeoneseeingGodinus]

Living with reckless Grace, living with the slate having been demolished, fuels our walk, guides our thoughts, and ultimately opens doors to Christ that could never be opened by those who refuse to offer the same reckless grace of God!

You can see that played out in the lives of children. Everyday, they choose to live and love recklessly. They can be hurt to the core, and turn around and forgive freely. …I hate you! And then turn around and ask them to forgive them and to play with them…church almost nothing can get in the way of a child and loving others, even those that hurt them. And they only stop when we teach them to stop; when the world hardens their hearts.

- BUT HERE IS THE TRUTH, unless and until we learn to live and love recklessly, like a child, there is no way this world can ever truly know what God’s love looks like! Because, y’all, we forget! Our minds and hearts are hardened by this life, and if we don’t show the world how much God loves them, how God is giving Himself away, how He loves us beyond our mistakes, then we aren’t living out our faith!

CHURCH, GOD WOULD STOP AT NOTHING TO FIND YOU! TO FIGHT FOR YOU! TO DIE FOR YOU! THERE IS NO MOUNTAIN THAT CAN STAND IN HIS WAY! NO SHADOW TOO GREAT FOR HIS LIGHT TO PENETRATE, AND NO WALL THAT WE CAN BUILD THAT HE CAN’T KICK DOWN AS HE RECKLESSLY CHASES US DOWN AND CARRIES BACK INTO HIS FOLD BY GRACE! NOTHING CAN STAND IN HIS WAY!

And that reckless love, that overwhelming passion that God pours into us. It has to change us. It teaches us. It molds us. Just as our teachers, mentors, parents, have. And through our faith, our confession, and our baptism, we graduate into this new life. A life that you graduates are called to today as well.

Ephesians 4:20–24 ESV

But that is not the way you learned Christ!— assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.

-14

When you put on the mantle of Christian - Christ follower - you wear your cap and gown, and put your diploma on the wall, to remind the world that you have graduated! You have learned how to think and live like Christ!

[read]

Today, church, today we get to graduate together. We get to throw off our former lives, and put on the new self, one created in the likeness of God. Created to live and love recklessly, just like Him.

to forgive as we have been forgiven.

[graduationpic]

I want to Close with advice to our graduates, and actually, to us all, church…

Take every moment you have. Every graduation. Every milestone. Every hurdle you overcome. Even just leaving these doors here today. Take them all as an opportunity and call to live recklessly! To love recklessly! To pray for every ambulance, to sit with every person you see is hurting, to value time with the lost, the hopeless, the searching; to look at it as some of the most precious time you have to offer this world!

Humble yourself, and take time to learn from those who you think aren’t as smart as you, and consider their life and experience as far more valuable than those who sit at those places of honor! To come face to face with every hard moment, every difficulty, every joy, everything in life – to come face to face with it, and take the time to make the best of it, knowing that you followed Christ the best you could as you lived in that moment!

Live and love recklessly! Try to look at those you disagree with with love! Forgive the one who wronged you! Help those who hurt you! Live out all that advice given to you by every teacher or parent in your life! The advice that seem like fantasies, all those things that seem ridiculous! Things that this world laughs at! Turn the other cheek! Pray for your enemies! Feed them! Clothe them! Love them! Because church, if you think that God doesn’t love them, and wouldn’t leave the 99 for them, you don’t know God!

Graduates, church, use this moment as the launching off point of the greatest adventure every written! The adventure of living your life with God, for His creation – just as He did for you! Not that we earned it, not that we could ever deserve it! No, God just gave Himself away to us, church, and we must do the same for this world. They are waiting on us to give ourselves away. To love and live like God, and if you don’t hear anything else, church, know that no matter what this world might say, or what they might think. You can do it. Because you have graduated into His life for you. So live and love recklessly, church. Letting God’s reckless love - His Grace for us all - flow down on your life, as you forgive the trespasses of all, because you have been forgiven of all by God.

Let today be the day, that God’s reckless love - His Grace for us all - flow down on your life, as you forgive the trespasses of all, because you have been forgiven by God.

[Invitation]

gives His love away…constantly…loves us beyond our mistakes

[bridge..no wall you won’t tear down…]

things to include…movie quote…IT’S SUPPOSED TO BE HARD, IF IT WASN’T HARD, EVERYONE WOULD DO IT. THE HARD IS WHAT MAKES IT GREAT!

[life is hard…the next step is hard…leaving home, getting a new job, starting a new chapter…it is all hard! And bigger than that, forgiving those who have hurt you is hard! Asking to be forgiven when you have messed up, is hard! Grace is hard! But church, the hard is what makes Grace so unbelievable! God’s recklessness with which He loves us is amazing! Y’all I don’t know if you really know this, but I want you to hear it as clear as day today. There is no wall.....[all the bridge stuff]....BECAUSE OF THAT.....

WE HAVE A NEW LIFE IN CHRIST! WE HAVE GRADUATED! WE HAVE BEEN AWARDED OUR DEGREE - GRACE UPON GRACE! AND IN THAT NEW LIFE THAT WE ALL NOW FIND OURSELVES IN, WE MUST (PARAPHRASE )

for CTW or use in sermon?