Well Done

Message Transcription

Too good to be with you again this morning. And I was here pre-COVID, which seems like that was about a billion years ago. Right. And so good. I love I love the history of your church, uh, the desire to be making a difference around the globe. Uh, always, always. You've been such a strong missions church and, uh, and missions actually begins right here at home. And so your desire to impact your community and be a part of what's happening here in the city is a big deal thing. And I'm grateful for that and enjoy, uh, Carl, a lot. Uh, and I've appreciated him and his ministry. And so, uh, it's a privilege to, uh, get to be. Before we start, let me pray. I want to ask God to speak into our life. You know, we come in a building and we make an assumption. A lot of times, I think we gather together like this, and we assume that however our week is going is how everybody else's week is going. And the reality that's not true. We've all had different experiences this week. And so let's pray and ask God to meet us in the middle of whatever we have going on and to speak into our lives. So let's pray together. Father, we're thankful for the privilege we have to gather here and to come and worship you and be reminded of your grace and hope and love extended to us. And Lord, we pray that you would help us set aside the things that right now are, we're anxious about or distracted by, and allow you to speak into our hearts and lives.

And and Lord, you know what kind of things right now we're stressing over. We're preoccupied by. And, Lord, I pray that you would meet us in the middle of those things. We thank you for Jesus, for the hope we find in Him and Father, for the blessing we have to be gathering together like this today. We just pray in Jesus name. Amen. Yeah. So I live out in Colorado. Uh, I'm out in Boulder, Colorado, which is 20mi² surrounded by reality. We got like every fruit and nut possible thing you can have out there and and what one of the things that we try to do as a church was to say, how can our church engage our community? How is it that we actually connect with people because we're living in a culture today right where we're being told, don't talk about your faith and keep that private and, and, uh, stay away from, uh, controversial issues like that and keep faith in the church if that's where you want it. Um, and we as a church said no. What would happen if we actually got in the stream going by the front door of our church? What would that look like? Because here's what I discovered. Uh, the great American philosopher Forrest Gump said, that's true.

Still, he said, when you go to the zoo, always take some food to feed the animals, even though the signs on the bars say, don't feed the animals. It wasn't the animals that put those signs up. And that's true, isn't it? And the reality is, I have all kinds of spiritual conversations today with people who aren't interested in church now. People want to talk about God. They want to figure out why their life should have purpose and meaning. They want to know how to answer some of the big deal questions in their life, but they're not necessarily looking for the church today. In fact, people aren't just showing up in our services anymore. And so the church has to figure out how it becomes missional in so many ways, how we engage our community, what does that look like, and how can we do a better job of that? Um, we actually have eight grandkids. I forgot to update, uh, that Carl. And, uh, we love our grandkids. I'm. Grandkids are the reason you're glad you didn't kill your kids when they were growing up, right. And and do you know why grandparents and grandkids get along so well? They have a common enemy. Uh, so. So we love our grandkids. Last weekend, we had four of them for the weekend. Last night, Diane had two of them, uh, spend the night and and our, our kids, when they come to our house, our grandkids, they love the cousins, love playing together, but they like to play hide and seek.

And I have to be honest, our three year old Braden, he's. I mean, you want to brag on your family, right? But he's terrible at hide and seek. He's just he's just he's just really he's just not very good at it. He hides in the same place every time. And here's how it works. So when Braden's at the house and he wants to play hide and seek, he goes and hides behind the curtains, right, uh, next to, uh, in our dining room. And he stands there really quietly. And I'll start out in the laundry room and I'll say, Is Braden hiding in the washing machine? I sure hope not. And I'll hit the door, you know, and and then I'll go out in the kitchen and open up the refrigerator. I sure hope Braden's not hiding in the freezer. And I can hear him start to giggle in there. And then I go in our bedroom and I hunt around and I yell, and. And he's just he's starting to. And before I can get to where he's hiding, he comes tumbling out behind the curtain and runs and jumps. Because the point of the game for Braden isn't to hide. It's to be found, isn't it? And I love the fact that we're living in a culture where there is so much opportunity for people to connect with God, who cares about them and loves them, who want to be found and don't even know they're lost.

Who has a God who has extended hope and grace to them. And so in this passage we're looking at here in Luke chapter ten, here's what happens. One of the those experts in the law, right, comes to test Jesus with a with a question. The Scripture says, and he asks him, what's the greatest commandment? Well, that's because there were 613 commands officially from the Old Testament, from, uh, from God and the prophets and Moses and others that they were following. And the Jews had taken those 200 and 613 commands, and they twisted and turned them. So there was no agreement on anything. You think we have political division, racial division, social division going on today? It was rampant in Jesus culture. And so they come with the question, what's the greatest commandment? And Jesus says, well, how do you read it in the man? And the man says, well, to love God with your heart and soul and mind and strength, and love your neighbor as you love yourself. And and we find that same scenario with a another expert coming to test Jesus. And he gives the same response about the greatest commandment. And then Jesus makes this statement in the Gospel of Matthew that all the law and all the prophets hang on these two commands. In other words, here's what Jesus is saying.

Everything that God has said up to this point, everything he's spoken, every command he's given, everything he's breathed out, all the law and all the prophets hang off of these two commands love God and love your neighbor. What would happen if we would get better at the two things Jesus said mattered most love God and love our neighbors. I didn't grow up in the church. I'm from upstate New York and, uh, first Christian in my family. And we have trouble even today doing family reunions. We can't get parole dates to line up. And, and, uh, and, and so for me, when I went to a high school retreat, and that was their very first time I'd heard that. I remember hearing that there was a God who loved me. Loved me. Period. No if, ands or buts. No comma in there because the love you and I experience is I'll love you if I'll love you when I'll love you. But right. And God is saying, I love you, period. I'm a bit of a skeptic. It took me a while to get there, but came to faith and, uh, was baptized and and discovered God's grace in my life. And then my parents became Christ followers. And my sister, who a few years later was killed in an accident with a drunk driver, became a Christ follower. And and then my mom, who had kind of grown up in foster care, who she had reconciled with her mom.

I had the privilege of baptizing my grandmother, and then my dad's parents, who were kind of dysfunctional as well. I had the privilege of baptizing them and some aunts and uncles. Grace changed our family. Changed us. Changed the trajectory of our lives. And I'm grateful for a God who loves me. And I want to love him back. But I love some other things too, don't you? I love my spouse, and I love my kids and my grandkids. And I grew up in New York, so I love the Buffalo Bills and, and, uh, which have been painful over the years, losing two Super Bowls to the Cowboys and a long time ago, my two favorite teams are Buffalo and whoever's playing Dallas. So sorry about that, but. I love Italian food. It's my favorite. I really love Oreo cookies. I love Oreo cookies. And sometimes I love Oreo cookies more than I love God. Whatever your bag of Oreos happens to be, that thing that gets ahead of God. That thing that you care a little more about than you actually care. Loving God isn't easy for us. And then Jesus goes on and ramps it up and says, and love your neighbor as yourself. Are you kidding me? I don't even I mean, I know. We gotta love everybody. They're just people I don't like. Look at the person sitting next to you. Actually, sometimes they're hard to love.

Love our neighbor. And this is tough. And here's what I love. This guy comes to Jesus with this big deal question that people are still asking today. What happens when I die? How do I get to be with God? What does that look like for me? Jesus says, What's the Bible say? What's the Scripture say? What's the commands? Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength. With every fiber you have, with all that's within you. Love God and love your neighbor as you love yourself. What would happen? What would happen if you and I could get better at those two things? What if I was a little better tomorrow at loving God and loving my neighbor than I am today? What does that look like for you? What has to change for you? And I love what this attorney does. He wants to see the fine print in the contract. So he says to Jesus, so exactly who is my neighbor? Actually? Is it everybody in my zip code? Everybody that lives in the same city I do, everybody in my cul de sac who is my neighbor technically. And Jesus tells a story. We heard it read for us. Now here's what's going on. The road from Jericho to Jerusalem was called the Road of Blood. It was a dangerous road. You were often mugged or beaten up or left for dead on this road. So Jesus says the guys on his way from, uh, Jericho to Jerusalem, and he gets beaten up and he's left on the road half dead, naked and bleeding.

And a priest comes by. Who's the priest? Well, he's the guy who's got the corner market on. Love God and love your neighbor. He's the one who's supposed to have that dialed in. And he sees the guy, and he passes by on the other side. And then a Levite comes who's a Levite? Levite is kind of like a biblical scholar, like a theologian of the day. I mean, if anybody has dialed in the commands of God, love God, and love your neighbor, it'd be this guy. And he sees the guy laying there half dead, naked and bleeding, and he passes by on the other side. And for a long time I would read that and go, how could those guys do that? Until I discovered they're probably asking a very same question that I was asking for a long time when our church decided to get in the stream, going by the front door of our building. Which was what? Which was this? What's going to happen to me if I stop and help this guy? What's going to happen to me? Am I going to be left on the road half dead, naked and bleeding? Am I going to get mugged and robbed? Am I going to be late on my way to talk to people about loving God and loving their neighbor? What's going to happen to me and what needs to shift is when we start asking the question that the Samaritan guy asked, which is what's going to happen to this guy if I don't stop and help? And here's one of the things that I find challenging for all of us.

Just because we can't fix everything doesn't mean we don't try to fix some things. Just because I can't solve all the issues in my community or in my neighborhood, doesn't mean that I actually don't try to help somebody. And Jesus tells this story, and then he says, and then here comes the Samaritan. Now remember, Jews and Samaritans hated each other. And the Samaritan comes by and he helps this guy. So Jesus gives us an ironic twist of the knife or his culture, speaking to mostly Jewish audience here when he tells this story. And in fact, Jews and Samaritans hated each other enough that if you were in the marketplace and you had just bought your vegetables and and you were walking out of the marketplace, and a Samaritan walked by and their shadow hit the box of goods you were carrying, you would drop them in the street and go get new stuff. They hated each other. And it's the Samaritan who stops and helps. And he says to the expert in the law, so who's the good neighbor? And he said, well, I guess that's Samaritan. And Jesus says, go and do the same.

And let's look at very quickly some things the Samaritan guy did. The first is this. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was, and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He had compassion on him. He had he extended mercy to him when he saw him. Do you know what I'm amazed by is how often I didn't see things going on when our church started getting involved in helping out on issues in our city, I was amazed by the things we were engaging with that I didn't see, I didn't recognize as a need. I didn't see it as an issue. And here's a basic truth. A basic God truth for us. You and I are never, ever going to lock eyes with anybody who isn't as loved and valued by God as we are. But what do I do? Either I don't see people or I see through them. Or worse, I see them and I put a label on them. I put them on a right shelf for me. Well, that person is this. This person is that. And it keeps me. From really seeing the person our our church got involved with foster care. And here's how it happened. There was a guy on our staff, Brian, who was reading a devotional book with his daughters, and they got to the place about praying for widows and orphans. And he said, we had plenty of widows.

Our church had a lot of folks that he knew were widows. But he said, who are the orphans? I mean, actually all the orphans are like in Haiti or or, uh, overseas, somewhere in Europe. And. And and it led them to praying for where there might be orphans in the community, which got them involved in foster care. And so they did the training and they became temporary foster care parents. And and then he said, I think our church should do that. So again, remember, I'm in Boulder County. We have what we call ABC people, anything but church. We're good with anything but church. And we went to see the director of Child Protective Services, and we said to her, is there anything our church could do lifebridge that we could help with fostering? And she said, no, I appreciate you asking, but I don't really think there's anything the church could do with that. But one of our associates said, well, over in Longmont. So Boulder and Longmont are sister cities, same county. Over in Longmont. We need to have a community meeting for fostering. Could we host that in your building? And we said, yeah, we would do that. And and that led us to getting involved. And we started recruiting families for them. We started helping out. And uh, and then after four years, she stood up among her peers, 75 counties in, in Colorado among her peers and said, we've had something happen that that we've never had happen in our entire history.

And child protective services in Boulder County, we have more homes available than we have kids who need a home right now. And she said, well, that's because there's some and I hate to I don't even know how to explain this, but there's some church in Longmont that's been helping us with that. Well, then we found out there were 1280 kids in our state that were eligible for adoption. In other words, they'd been set free legally from their parents. And if a child ages out of the foster care system without a family, they're permanently connected to either officially or unofficially. Almost 80% of those kids end up in prison, homeless, addicted, or trafficked, or some combination of those things. The state of Arizona and the state of Florida predict their prison populations by two things their future prison populations by the number of children that can't read at a third grade level by the time they get in the fifth grade. And the second is by how many kids are in the foster care system in that state. And so we said, what can we do about that? So we started connecting with the state around this issue, and we found out we could tell these kids stories. So we started videoing these kids. And then we would go to churches and businesses all over the state, and we would show these kids stories.

And it led to us going from 1280 children who needed, uh, an adoptive home to under 200 that needed an adoptive home. And 16 states asked our church to come and do the thing. We launched a thing called America's Kids Belong. And today, I think we're in 14 states around the country helping connect the need. How did it happen? Because somebody opened their eyes and saw a need. I don't know what the needs are in Lubbock, but I know you have issues. I know you have challenges. I know there are things that you could do. Do we see the needs in our own neighborhood? We're really good about talking about stuff going on overseas, and I love that. But what about across our street? Where are we engaged? Here's the second thing this guy did. He got his hands dirty. He went to him and bandaged his wounds. And he poured on oil and wine. You know, if we're going to love our neighbors, it gets messy sometimes. Why? Because people are messy. The reality is hurt people hurt people. And if you and I are going to be involved in our communities, if we're going to get engaged in our neighborhoods, it means it kind of gets messy sometimes. And things don't always go like we want and sometimes we got. Now, I have to admit, I'm a bit of a germaphobe. Like, not a bit of a germaphobe. Like I'm a legit germaphobe.

I just like, like after the service here in a few minutes, you know, you're going to want to some of you, I'll be out in the lobby and some of you are going to want to shake hands and and here's real I don't want to as I watch you coming. I ain't touching that. You know, maybe an elbow, fist bump, fist bumps. God's greatest invention is if I would have had to do mouth to mouth resuscitation on this guy laying on the road half dead, naked and bleeding, it would have been like this. Yeah, I just don't want to get that close. Right. And the reality is, if we're going to get involved in our communities, if we're going to be a good neighbor, what does it look like if I'm going to be a good neighbor? Then it's going to get messy. When our church started leaning into neighboring, we made a commitment among our staff and our elders while gathered in my backyard for a barbecue. And we said, in a year, we're going to launch this as a church, that we're going to get better at these two things Jesus said, matter most love God, love your neighbor. But first, everyone here is going to be a better neighbor first. And I had to work at that. I thought I was a great neighbor, my dog didn't mess in your yard. We kept our grass cut, mostly because Diane likes to mow the lawn.

Our kids didn't misbehave too much and I didn't really know my neighbors. Hey. Hi. And we started practicing for things. Stay. Pray. Play safe. Stay connected. Learn your neighbor's names. Pray for them. Not that they'll necessarily become Christians. We hope so, but pray for them because you are a Christian. Play. Have more for a neighbor, uh, for a meal or do a barbecue, or go to a game together and say, eventually you get to talk about why grace matters. And. But it gets kind of messy. Our neighbors on the one side have become great friends. Close friends have started showing up at our church. Our neighbors on the other side are kind of challenging for our whole neighborhood. It can get messy sometimes. Here's the third thing this guy did. He put the man on his donkey. He took him to an inn and took care of him. He was inconvenienced. He went out of his way. My guess is he didn't get up that morning and say, hey, I've got to do some business. And and I'm going to be traveling on that road from Jericho to Jerusalem. And I want you to pray. I find somebody laying on the road half dead, naked and bleeding. He didn't have behind his donkey the little trailer that said the half dead, naked, bleeding 501 C3 Ministry. He was doing what you and I are going to do tomorrow. We're going to head to work.

We're going to be on our way to wherever we're doing. We're going to be driving a school or in our neighborhood, and and there's going to be a need. And we get to make a choice. And it's never convenient. My parents both have heart issues, and so my doctor has been encouraging me or paying attention to my heart. And the truth is, the stuff that's good for my heart is not stuff I want to do. He wants me to eat like salads and stuff and like, okay. And, and and, uh, and and I love donuts. If donuts were a drug, I'd be on a corner with a sign. And I've given up donuts and. By about two months ago, though, I'd gone like nine months without a donut and I was driving down Main Street. We had this donut shop I really like on Main Street in my town, and I started praying, God. If you want me to have a donut, have a parking place open right in front of the store. When I get there, I'll take it as a sign. And you're not going to believe this. My sixth time around, the block boom thing got great and my doctor wants me to exercise more. I don't like how many of you are runners. There's a few of you like. Good for you. Yeah, you. You're all chippy. I hate that stuff. My friends keep saying just wait.

The endorphins will kick in. They have not ever kicked in. They're not going to kick in. I don't have endorphins. I just the stuff that's good for me is usually the stuff I don't want to do. And the stuff God wants me to do, to love him with every fiber of my being and to love my neighbor, my real neighbor as myself. Those aren't easy for me. Here's the thing. I think he also did. It's implied here. He took him down to the end. I think he befriended the guy on the way. I'm pretty sure he chatted him up, learned his name, learned his circumstance enough so that he even said, hey, when I come back, I'll make sure that we take care of things. Here's what I've discovered. The disenfranchised of the world want your friendship more than they want anything else. What a guy show up in our church and his name was Paul. We would always have a pastor, uh, kind of on call. So if someone walked in the building with a need or an issue. And so Paul shows up and he's talking to one of our ministers, and he said, I'm 53 years old, and I ran away from home when I was 12. He described the horrific sexual and emotional and physical abuse he'd experienced, and he said, I've been on my own since I was 12. I've been living on the streets, been homeless a good chunk of that time.

I'm pretty sure I'm going to die before I know what it's like for someone to love me. And he said, I don't even know why I'm here, because I don't. If there's a God, I don't know why he would have allowed all the stuff to happen to me that he's allowed to happen to me. And, uh, Brian took him to lunch and or Dan took him to lunch, and they they started hanging out, and Paul started showing up more, and, uh, we found him, uh, someone, uh, that took him in and, uh, that didn't work out very well. After two weeks, he kind of blew that up. He had a number of recovery issues, and and we found him a job, and they would last about four weeks, and then he'd blow that up and get fired. Finally, we just hired him at the church. He was on our custodial staff and and we found our trailer, and we had him living up behind our building, and, and I'd be coming out of my office some nights late at night, and Paul would be standing by my car, and I would stand in the parking lot and talk to him for an hour. And he he would say to me, you know, I don't get this whole God thing, and y'all a bunch of hypocrites. And I was thinking, yeah, we found you a job, got you a place to live. But and you know how that works, right? And we had great conversations.

He was really a great thinker. And I'd say, Paul, you ought to come to church. I'm not coming to church. And then one Saturday night, I watched him come in the back. We had two services on Saturday night, watch him walk in and the first one and and he was standing back there, you know, just glaring, which I'm kind of used to that. And and I knew he had a little liquid courage to get in the building to begin with. And then he walked right down the middle aisle while I'm preaching, stood right there, didn't even sit down. Just stood right there, arms crossed. And then he turned around and he flipped the church off and walked back out. First of all, he had no idea how personally over 28 years I'd kind of wanted to do that. But that's but that's a different story. Like, that's another thing I like. And then the next week he showed up again. And the next week he showed up again. And after several months, I remember the day when. When Paul gave his life to Christ and was buried in baptism. And we'd have prayer time on Sunday mornings before our services would start and he'd start showing up for that. And one Sunday morning, he he wasn't there. And he had passed away overnight in his little trailer behind our building. And the next weekend in every one of our services, we held a celebration service for Paul.

Who about eight months earlier, when I was walking in to a funeral service I was leading. He walked with me and he peeked in and he said, you know, no one will ever show up for a funeral service for me. But here's what I know. That's scruffy. Left on the road. Half dead. Naked bleeding guy. Just needed somebody to see him. And befriend him. So let me ask a phenomenally inappropriate question, because I don't even know the best way to ask it, and how I'm going to phrase it is terrible. But who are you friends with? That is somehow less than you in some way, meaning there there's no benefit you're going to get. I have friends that I get benefits from their players. They they know how to do stuff. I love the connection they've been. But who are you friends with that you're maybe not getting any that you're going, boy, that'd be tough for me to be friends with them, because what I found out was Paul became a great friend and would sit in my house and I'd learn more from him than I learned from a lot of people. But he's not someone I would have picked. If that makes sense. Well, here's here's the last thing this guy did. Um. Next day he took out two dinari and gave them to the innkeeper. Look after him, he said, and when I return, I'm going to reimburse you for any extra expense you have.

You know, one of the first things I did for a long time was give money to causes. I'd feel better about it. Someone was doing something for homeless in our city. I'd write a check, and I felt like I did something for homeless. And you know what? Your money matters. And you're after a big goal here. 164,500 is a big goal, and I hope you do it, because all of those places you're supporting need those dollars, those resources, and you have the capability to do that and maybe more. But we decided as a family and it led to our church deciding it as a congregation that we weren't going to give money to things. We also weren't going to get our hands dirty with that. We weren't going to get involved with that. We were also going to find a way where we connected. Because sometimes it's easy to write a check and it's a lot harder to go across the street. And so I want to encourage you write the check. But are you loving your neighbor, your actual neighbor neighbor like the one who lives next door to you? What would it look like if you were the best neighbor your neighbor ever had? When we wrote the first book, Externally Focused Church, it was about the church serving in its city, and we asked the question, if your church disappeared, would anybody care? Would it matter to anybody? Like if you were nuked out of the city somehow, would Lubbock miss you because you were so ingrained in the services and social issues going on? Now my question is this if you got nuked out of your neighborhood, would anybody miss you? What would happen if you got better at the two things Jesus said mattered most love God and love your neighbor.

You know the best thing this guy actually did? He's right back up at the beginning of the story where Jesus tells when he saw the man, he got off his donkey and he helped him. Wouldn't it be great if the church in America today, if we would just get off our. Donkeys. You and I, the church. Because the needs that exist in our communities, we could help reach. There are 400,000 children in the foster care system. The church alone, the faith community alone could solve that issue. Could be a part of that. A lot of complicating problems. We do a lot with single moms, single, fastest growing household in America. Our church is really involved with single parents. We do a bunch of stuff with them. We could actually be engaged in those issues. Our church provided 95% of the mentors in the public school system. In a place where people don't want the church showing up, what would happen if you and I got better at the two things Jesus said mattered most above.

My mom and dad grew up in dysfunctional families. My dad moved 14 times by the time he was in eighth grade, and so he quit school and he tried the last of that generation where when he was 18, he and my mom got married and they said they had no idea what they were doing, but they decided they were going to try to have a different life than the one they had both grown up with. And so they moved out of the city, inner city of Syracuse, out in a little suburb where they kind of figured out how to get a house there. Someone helped them out with that. And, and, uh, I had a phenomenal growing up. My dad went to work for Bristol-Myers pharmaceutical company when he was 18, sweeping floors. And, uh, when he retired, he was in middle management, had opened up all of their facilities down in Puerto Rico. And and so he was retiring after 31 years, staying at the same place. His dad would quit jobs every six months. My dad stayed in the same place 31 years. I called my mom and said, hey, don't tell dad I'm coming home. But on his last day of work, I want to be there. And so I flew back from Colorado. My mom picked me up. We worked it out so he didn't have his car that day. And and so he's coming out of the gate out of his second story office.

He's walked down, he's got his box of stuff. And I knew it would be emotional day for him. Glad to be starting something new. Sad to be leaving a people in place. He'd been invested so long and he's coming through the security gate at Bristol-Myers. And and as he's coming through the gate, I'm on the other side. And I started clapping. He had no idea who the idiot was. Saw. It was me. I had a great time of reunion. And, uh, I was only able to be there at night. We went and played golf with his friends, took a bunch of a bunch of their friends out for dinner, and. And then I flew back home, and about two weeks later, I got a really nice thank you card from my dad thanking me for coming, what it meant to him, um, how proud he was, how surprised he was. Said some really nice stuff, but he closed with this line. He said, someday, uh, when this life is over for me. I hope God will let me stand at the gate and applaud you on your last day of work. And here's the truth. When you love God. With all your heart, soul, mind and strength. And you love your neighbor. There'll be a day. You draw your last breath. And the father of the universe is going to stand at the gate and applaud you and say to you.

Well done. Well done.