Get a Life
Get a Life!
43 ‘‘You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. Mat. 5:43-48 (NIV)
Intro:
► Intrusion has become the most hated crime (but it leaves us lonely).
► Personal responsibility is considered a quaint icon of the past.
► Violence gets turned into book-deals and exclusive film rights.
► AIDS has now become the #1 killer of young adults.
I. Life in the 90’s: Solitary, Superficial and Short
“Solitary, Nasty, Brutish and Short”
A. The 90’s obsession: Filling the Emptiness.
1. Consumerism (formerly a disease) is now a life-style: “Whoever dies with the most toys wins”
2. Frenetic busy-ness leaves us little time to ponder our hollowness.
3. Lotto and other gambling is the new religion for those believe the only answer to emptiness is a statistical improbability.
4. We fill up all the quiet with talking or music.
B. The Ship is sinking and we’re fresh out of Donuts!
1. It’s not that we feel our life has an empty center, like a donut hole. We’re not sure we even have a life. The donut has gotten stale and moldy.
2. The ship is going down and we know it, but we’re still more interested in the donuts and the piña coladas.
3. We are stuck in the winter of our discontent like a clipped wing goose. Honking at the cold. Stealing bread crumbs from the pigeons.
C. Don’t trade in one Empty life for Another
1. In their quest for meaning some turn to the Church and this is what they too often find:
a. People just going through the motions of life, content to follow long lists of “do’s and don’ts,” not really alive, just waiting for their lives to end.
b. They find “churchianity” the religion content with “churchiness” where it’s enough to say “it sure felt like church today.”
c. In some churches style is the thing, whether it’s business suits, or denim, or Tony Lama, or an anti-something hair-cut.
(1) Buxtehude , or Brooks, or Bono are the demi-gods of good taste.
d. In some churches miraculous displays are what’s hot.
(1) Like baseball, even most of the players are content just to watch most of the time — just to be close to something real.
e. Some churches are just morality clubs. Just be decent and help the unfortunate once in a while (to satisfy your guilt). Get on the right side of their pet issues and you’re in.
2. Don’t settle for that! Don’t trade one empty way of life for another! God made you to LIVE life!
II. What does Jesus say about Life ?
A. It all hangs on Loving God and people.
Jesus said “‘Love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and intelligence.’ This is the most important, the first on any list. ‘but there is a second to set alongside it: ‘Love others as well as you love yourself.’ These two commands are pegs; everything in God’s Law and the Prophets hangs from them.” (Matthew 22:37-40; The Message: The New Testament in Contemporary English, by Eugene H. Peterson)
B. What does Jesus say that’s New?
“This is my command: Love one another the way I loved you. This is the very best way to love. Put your life on the line for your friends.” (John 15:12-13, The Message)
“Let me give you a new command: Love one another. In the same way I loved you, you love one another. This is how everyone will recognize that you are my disciples—when they see the love you have for each other.” (John 13:34-35; The Message)
1. And Jesus practiced what he preached!
C. Jesus offers this to bring meaning to life: Love Imperfect People!
1. Loving imperfect people is the real test. Is our love for people stronger than the hurt we feel because of their imperfections.
2. Every friend you’ll ever have will hurt you, even if only inadvertently, some time. Can you love them anyway?
“You’re familiar with the old written law ‘Love your friend,’ and its unwritten companion ‘Hate your enemy.’ I’m challenging that. I’m telling you to love your enemies. Let them bring out the best in you, not the worst. when someone gives you a hard time, respond with the energies of prayer, for then you are working out of your true selves, your God-created selves. This is what God does. He gives his best—the sun to warm and the rain to nourish—to everyone, regardless: the good and bad, the nice and nasty. If all you do is love the lovable, do you expect a bonus? Anybody can do that. If you simply say hello to those who greet you, do you expect a medal? Any run-of-the-mill sinner does that. In a word, what I’m saying is, Grow up. You’re kingdom subjects, Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you.” (Matthew 5:43-48; The Message)
III. Time to Grow Up.
A. Learning to loving Ordinary (Ornery?) people brings out the Best in us.
1. We grow up a little when we let go of our unrealistic expectation that people need to relate to us perfectly before we can love them back.
2. Real living begins when we love people for who they are instead of who we wish they were.
3. You can’t really love someone you don’t like, but you can learn to like and love them.
B. Real loving relationships are more like Rain Forests than Orchards.
Full of improbably combinations yet teaming with life. They are unpredictable and follow no set patterns.
1. Looking for the best in people brings out the best in us.
C. Real happiness is found almost exclusively in the context of Loving Relationships.
1. Love for human life is like rain to a rain forest.
a. Yes, there’s life in a desert. You just have to know how to look.
b. In a rain forest, life overwhelms itself in a wild display of overdoing it.
The Bottom Line:
Life with a big “L” is about Loving Relationships with God and Imperfect People.