Compassioning - Part 2
Notes
Transcript
Review
Review
Last week, Desiree kicked off this new message series. She introduced her triple filter for understanding the world. She started with All Truth is God’s Truth and that is filtered through the lens of God is Love, Scripture is True, and Our Experiences are Valid.
And that this series, called Compassioning, means we are talking about the experience of having compassion enacted upon you.
Like, "I compassion you!"
She raised the idea that through this series of messages we are going to work on doing, “Soul Work.”
Soul Work is the work of becoming who Adonai, the Holy One, created you to be. We can do this soul work because we are made in His image and therefor we are
Creators
Healers
Relational
And, when we are doing deep level sour work we should begin to appreciate and love ourselves even better and in turn love other people even better. On the other hand, if we think we are the enemy, we are the problem not only do we become harmful to ourselves we become dysfunctional in other relationships. And that then gets trafficked into religion, parenting, marriage and many, many other areas of life.
And she ended by showing us to contrasting models. One where Satan is working on your soul (Slide 54) and one where the door is closed on Satan and the Spirit is doing deep level soul work with you (Slide 59) which she called kosi reva’ya “my cup runneth over.”
And today, I want to build off the foundation Desiree laid for us last week and expand. This week I am going to build off of the area of relationships. Desiree gave us a good starting point to understand relationship:
You, Me and the Space in-between us.
Here is what I am going to add into Desiree’s definition, I know she is where I am on this because we are both looking back to a particular Theologian named Dietrich Bonhoeffer who said
Christian community means community through Jesus Christ and in Jesus Christ.
What does that mean?
First...a Christian needs other Christians who speak God’s Word to them...second...a Christian comes to others only through Jesus Christ...third, from eternity we have been chosen in Jesus Christ, accepted in time, and united for eternity.
You, Me, and the Messiah defined space in-between us. Another way to say this is that you are supposing to be becoming the right person for the other person not always trying to find the right person. We are becoming the right person rather than finding the person(s). Dietrich Bonhoeffer used to say that the person who is always looking for the right person is looking for a “wish-dream” He was adamant and said
God hates this wishful dreaming because it makes the dreamer proud and pretentious. Those who dream of this idealized community demand that it be fulfilled by God, by others, and by themselves. They enter the community of Christians with their demands, set up their own law, and judge one another and even God accordingly.
For Bonhoeffer it was about: We are becoming the right person in Messiah.
So how we fill that space in-between you and the other is crucial.
Let’s do a little experiment. Are you ready
No
Yes
How did “no” make you feel? How did “yes” make you feel. That “no” according to Dan Siegel creates destructive states and makes the whole system unhealthy. Yes, leads to joy, elation, gratitude and produces well-being.
Dan Siegel said about relationships, “something happens between us and it is related to what happens in us.”
I am Becoming, like the Messiah, reducing suffering and producing flourishing.
Ha-foke-bah
Ha-foke-bah
De-Cola-bah
Ha-foke-bah
Ha-foke-bah
Mashiach-bah
Turn it, and turn it,
for everything you need is in it.
Reflect on it,
grow old and gray with it.
Do not turn from it.
The Messiah is in it.
We are going to turn to one of my favorite personal letters in the entire Brit Chadashah, the letter of 1 John. Most people are aware of who John the Apostle is. He is the writer of the 4th Gospel, and Revelation and of three letters one of which we will dip our feet into today. What most people don’t know is that John is one of the most Jewish writers and characters in the Brit Chadashah.
It was his mother who came to Yeshua and essentially asked if John and his brother James could be president and vice-president of the KOG. That is a good Jewish story, a mom trying to get a good job for her two boys. John’s writing are deeply rooted in the Torah and in good Jewish thinking.
This letter written at the end of John’s life around the year 90 AD after he was released from the island of Patmos is crucial because of its topic:
What we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so you may have fellowship with us. Indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and His Son, Yeshua the Messiah.
The operative word here is “fellowship.” In Greek it is the word κοινωνία (koinōnia).
κοινωνία (koinōnia) - the invisible ties that bind us together. We see this in programs like AA where the invisible ties that bind people together are the 12 recovery steps. You see this in story after story of the heroic and epic courage of our WWII soldiers who were bound together by a belief that there was such a thing as good and evil and that evil should be faced down and fought against. Recently, we watched, I watched in glee as Harvey Weinstein was found guilty of rape
“Eight women who have changed the course of history in the fight against sexual violence,” and “...pulled our justice system into the 21st century by declaring that rape is rape and sexual assault is sexual assault, no matter what.” These women were bound together not by HW but by their pursuit for justice.
What we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so you may have fellowship with us. Indeed, our fellowship is with the Father and His Son, Yeshua the Messiah. These things we write so our joy may be full.
What John is after in this book is healing, protecting, and creating those invisible ties that bind us together. We might just as well say that κοινωνία (koinōnia) is what we put in the space in-between you and me. This can be positive “yes” or negative “no.”
He gives us three controlling ideas about what that means:
First, it is light:
Now this is the message we have heard from Him and announce to you—that God is light and in Him there is no darkness at all.
If we say we have fellowship with Him and keep walking in the darkness, we are lying and do not practice the truth.
God is light, for John, light simply means “truth.” There is nothing secretive, there is no mis-information, there is no relativity in God’s truth, all truth is God’s truth and that is unchanging.
Light is the tie, the truth, that binds us together. Light is what we are supposed to put in the space that exists between us. Light and darkness are relational words they are what create healthy relationships or toxic and deadly relationships.
What John is talking about, wether he understood this or not, is light years beyond what you can imagine.
Attunement -we get God’s take on the world.
The one who loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling.
Attunement -we get God’s take on life and create bonds with others that reduce suffering and increase flourishing.
We are not somehow removed from other people, we are touched by their joys and by their heartaches, we want to do something about it; we want to take actions.
I want you to remember, this not dream world relationship building. I am not trying to make you into a better person. I am first and foremost, becoming something, I am become a student of God’s truth and getting God’s heart of love for people all around me. That is why John says
The one who does not love does not know God, for God is love.
This is the reason why a few weeks ago when I was part of a panel discussion with two scholars and another messianic leaders I made a comment that shocked many in the audience and definetly one of the panel speakers.
The other messianic leader told a room full of Christians that it was there job to defend the Jewish people from anti-semitism because, well, much of modern anti-semitism was created by Christians. It was a knee jerk statement he was making but i understood his point. He was saying if you love the Jewish people you should stand up to anti-semitism for the Jewish people.
I responded with, “yes, i agree with the thought behind his statement; however, I said if we as Jews love our neighbors as God commanded then we must then be the first to sit down at the table with our Muslim brothers to bring about peace. And that is why I am part of a group of Jews, Christians, and Muslims and Hindus that meet regularly for this purpose.”
I was asked one day by a muslim friend of mine if i understood how dangerous it was for me to go to such-and-such mosque that I went to meet with a Imam, this person said, “They will kill you.”
I said, “I am alive.” And she said, “Why? Why do you do this?” My answer was simple, “God is love and he extends His love to everyone not just to one group of someones. I want to see an end to muslim suffering as much as I want to see an end to Jewish suffering and well human suffering, I want to see an increase in flourishing.
This is not something that I am doing for humanitarian purposes, it was I experienced in the Messiah, like John said
This is love—not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son as an atonement for our sins.
The light, the love that I put in the space between us is Messiah shaped. This is important and the second key metaphor John uses:
Purifying
But if we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another and the blood of His Son Yeshua purifies us from all sin.
If we are walking in truth, All truth is God’s truth, and the Scriptures are true. And you know what else we know is true, “God is love” and you know what else “your experiences are valid.”
When we are walking in light, we are walking in love and creating κοινωνία (koinōnia) those ties that bind us together. I am not trying to find the right person, I am becoming the right person.
And as that is happening the blood of Yeshua is repairing, repairing, repairing. Let me help you understand John’s Jewish imagery here.
The imagery comes from Leviticus 13-14 and relates to a Leper. No where in the Bible does it ever say that leprosy is the result of sin. We see this word “sin” here in verse 7 and we think “moral evil or moral violation.”
You have to know your context. When you see the word “purify” in connection with the word “sin” what it means is “something that quarantines you.” Much like today, we see countries around the globe quaranting those with the corona virus for the protection of society so in the ancient world leprosy was the coronavirus of its day. But this is not sin, this is seperation from family, loved ones, friends for the protection of soceity.
Here is what John is saying, when you come to the truth, walk in the light, the quarantine on you has been lifted and the leprosy is falling off of you.
But notice it does not happen all at once, it is a present active verb “purifies.” It is happening today, tomorrow and in every social interaction you have. As you enter into relattionships, creating new ties to new people there inevitiably is going to be something that can separate you from the other or create a negative tie but if you and the other are both committed to that core idea: All truth is God’s truth: that means, God is love, Scripture is true and your experiences are valid, well then in every relationship we are going through a process of repair, repair, repair.
Our relationships are going to need constant repair. John Gottman, psychological researcher and clinician, conducted a study with newlyweds that followed them for six years:
The couples who stayed married practiced repairing ruptures in their relationships 86% of the time, whereas those who divorced turned toward each other to repair only 33% of the time. - Secure Attachment, p. 43
Here are simple, “here is how” - you have to link this back to the leper being cured and the purging birds and water.
Listen Deeply - fill the space between you and me with listening that empowers them to share their real feelings.
Practice Presence - fill the space between you and me with undistracted and undivided attention for “our” sake.
Attune to Them - reduce suffering, increase flourishing in the space between you and me.
Attend to the Cross - make the cross the place in the space between you and me where the anxiety, the fear, the anger, the ....gets placed.
Declare the Resurrection - the story in the space between you and me is one of new life, renewed love and healing.
Remember, John is trying to get the believers in this congregation in Ephesus, probably to have:
κοινωνία (koinōnia) - the invisible ties that bind us together.
Walking in Light: Attunement -we get God’s take on life and create bonds with others that reduce suffering and increase flourishing.
Purify: Repairing the damage done to the ties that bind and strengthening them through repairing them.
This is:
Soul Work is the work of becoming who Adonai, the Holy One, created you to be.
I want you to know this requires compassioning yourself and others. What I mean is you have to be able to love yourself enough to accept that you contributed to this problem, you fell short, you had some leprosy.
Being honest with yourself and doing the hard work.
Illustrate: my run this Thursday.
κοινωνία (koinōnia) - the invisible ties that bind us together. John describes it as “walking in the light” which is God’s truth relieving our suffering and increasing our flourishing. That is a love-light. And it requires purifying, repair, repair, repair.
Last, and this is only last for this sermon but John as so much more to say about κοινωνία (koinōnia).
THE REVOLUTION OF MY MODEL: PUT HERE
What do you do when you see someone slipping up?
Backhanded statement - Your so chill, I wish I did not have any responsibilities like you.
Questions that are not questions - What’s wrong with you! Why are you so irresponsible!
Demands - If you don’t… then I will....
Gossip - Let me tell you how irresponsible this person is.
Slander - That person is so irresponsible I am just sure it is because of .....
Accountability Partner Approach - I know you are struggling with irresponsibility and I want to help you.
Matthew 18 - I sent you text about your irresponsibility and then I told on you to the Rabbi and now I think we should banish you from synagogue.
Now this is the confidence we have before Him—that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us.
And if we know that He hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have the requests we have asked from Him.
If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he should ask, and God will give life to those who commit sin not leading to death. There is a sin leading to death—I am not saying you should ask about that.
All unrighteousness is sin, but there is sin not leading to death.
When his readers see fellow believers (‘a brother’) committing a sin, the author says they are to pray for them. The fact that the readers may ‘see’ a fellow believer fall into sin indicates that the sin is observable, not some internal attitude. In his exhortation the author uses a future form of the verb ‘to pray’, but here it carries the sense of command. In response to such prayer, the author adds, ‘he will give him life’. Thus it is not absolutely clear whether the author is saying that it is God who will give life to the repentant believer, or that the believer who prays for him will give life to him through his prayers. Either way, it is God ultimately who gives the life in answer to prayer.
What is the sin that leads to death? That is like really scary stuff. Is Veniel Sins “nickel and dime” sins versus Mortal Sins “the Big Serious stuff like.” Some people say it is blasphemy of the Holy Spirit but that is not really even in the context.
We have a little bit of context from one place in 1 John that seems to help us:
It is clear who are the children of God and who are the children of the devil by this—anyone who does not act righteously or love his brother is not of God.
For this is the message you have heard from the beginning—we should love one another.
Do not be like Cain, who was from the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his deeds were evil, while his brother’s were righteous.
Do not be surprised, brothers and sisters, if the world hates you.
We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love our brothers and sisters. The one who does not love remains in death.
Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer—and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.
Explain
back to
All unrighteousness is sin, but there is sin not leading to death. We know that anyone born of God does not keep on sinning; rather, the One born of God keeps him safe, and the evil one cannot touch him.
Explain: There is a person who through their hatred is doing everything they can to destroy koionia, the ties that bind us, that space in between us filled with the Father’s light, the Spirits love, and purifying cross of Yeshua.
What they are trying to destroy is a sacred bond. And he says don’t pray for this, like God told Jeremiah not to pray for Jerusalem because her sins were so repugnant. This sin of destroying God’s koinonia, the ties that bind us together is repugnant.
But for everything else he says give prayer a fighting chance.
If anyone sees his brother committing a sin not leading to death, he should ask, and God will give life to those who commit sin not leading to death. There is a sin leading to death—I am not saying you should ask about that.
I imagine there are many places we can see someone in sin and we should not ignore it but we should give prayer a fighting chance. We should give the Word of God a chance. We should give that sacred bond that ties that person to God and to another individual chance.
We walking light
We purify ourselves
We intercede for one another