Lavishing Grace on Others

This is our 4th message in the series called getting along with each other, Biblical strategies for avoiding this with others. And Steve and I have been tag teaming on this and thinking about this question. How do we be better, better friends with each other? How do we be better partners and coworkers and

believers and give greater encouragement? Greater joy, greater insight, greater direction to one another. And so we've been working on that next Sunday, obviously in the kindness of God. Resurrection Sunday, celebrating the Resurrection of Christ and then Amen on that is going to be a wonderful day.

LISTEN! I am all stocked up on condemnation. I bet you are as well.

We're going to make the gospel as clear as we possibly can. And then all the week after that, Steve is kicking off the first sermon series in the book of Philippians. So that's where we're headed in our teaching time.

Colossians 3:12 to 13 A couple of short verses I want to read to you.

“So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience, bearing with one another and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone, just as the Lord forgave you, so must you do also.”

Let me pray for us. Lord, we began first of all by lifting up Ed again and praying for great mercy for Him. Keep Him in our minds and our hearts during this day and intercede for Him in amazing ways. Thank you for

this good day and this chance to be a part of giving you glory. This chance to be a part of giving encouragement to one another. There's a chance to think about your book and what you said. And Lord, we're deeply grateful for

revelation that we are not left. To flounder in darkness, beating ourselves up on the rough edges of life because it's too dark. Thank you. And so let us listen, hear, respond. Obey your word today. We need your grace in this. We

pray in Christ's name, Amen.”

Here are the sources of condemnation in my life: Satan, lost people, saved people, myself

Friends, I am all stocked up on condemnation. Got a lifetime supply. In fact, to be truthful with you, I was stocked up by the age of 7. I had all I needed.

Now, more has continued to come to me in the intervening years, but I had all I needed way back then and I bet you are stocked up as well. If I had a farm, I would bet my farm that not one of you got up this morning and said, I hope I get a great dose of angry condemnation from somebody today.

Man, would that make my day. You didn't say that. You're done. You got enough. We've all got enough. Unfortunately for us, there's more coming. Here's the major sources of condemnation. Satan, Revelation 12:10 says he is the accuser of the Brethren. He hates you. He's accusing you to God. He's accusing you of being yourself. There's more coming from Him until we see Christ. More condemnation coming from unbelievers, either at the workplace or the neighborhood or especially on the highways. You're going to experience some more condemnation. More condemnation coming from us as believers toward each other, unfortunately. We get crossways, we disagree on something you know I do something you don't like, or you do something I don't like or believe something you don't think I should believe. And then we can cross over

the line from criticism, constructive criticism to condemnation and give it to each other. So we're getting more from saved people.

My main source of condemnation is me. I'm a first born high pleasing. Raised by a very black and white dad. Raised in a works religion. I mean, I am the perfect storm for condemning Dave Gibson. Lots of condemnation has come to me from myself, D, L Moody said. “I've never had as much trouble with any man in the world as I've had with myself. That's me. I'm just after myself all the time in terms of I'm a bad person. So Satan lost people, saved people ourselves.

There's plenty of condemnation to go around. And I got to thinking, why do

we do this? Why do we condemn others? Well, maybe to elevate ourselves.

Maybe because we're just exploding in anger and revealing the condition of our hearts. Maybe because we're jealous and they're clearly more diligent, more gifted, more mature, more kind. Who knows what goes on in our hearts when we lash out on people, and many times when we lash out, we're really not saying something about them. We're saying something about us. We'll say more about that in a minute.

Now the good news, friends, is even though we've got all these sources of condemnation.

 “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who

are in Christ Jesus.” Romans chapter 8:1.

I started under the condemnation of God when I was born. So did you. We have a sin problem. We're standing in sin. We're condemned before the court of God. We're going to spend eternity without Christ because God is a holy being and we are sinful people. We are under as bad of condemnation as we could possibly imagine. It couldn't be any worse than it was. And I was there. You were there. And in the kindness of God, most of us, maybe not all of us, most of us heard this amazing message.

Somebody said to us, you have a sin problem. You've done things that violate the character and the law of God. Somebody said to us or the Bible said to us, that results in death. You're going to be separated from God forever. You'll be apart from him. He's a holy being. He can't tolerate sin. Friends, we sang this

morning. Holy, holy God is a holy being. He's set apart from all unrighteousness. He cannot tolerate that which is profane or evil. If he tolerates it, he stops being God. And then the great news that Jesus paid

for me. It's the core of the Christian faith substitution. It's not about dressing up on Sunday. It's about somebody who died in my place and your place. He paid for our sin on the cross. It was supposed to be us. And substitution is the central truth of the Christian faith. When I understand substitution, then I have some hope and then the message of trust. God says, listen, I will forgive you if you make a simple decision, but your trust and hope in Jesus Christ.

I will hand it to you as a gift. And a lot of people say, in fact, when I share

this with people, they say it's too easy, that can't work. Oh, it's bitterly easy

for us. It's free. Not for God. His son paid. He paid. Now friends, if I liquidate all my assets and buy my son a Lamborghini, I'm not going to darling, be calm. If I liquidate all my assets and buy my son a Lamborghini and I go to him and say, son, I bought you a car. I hand him the keys to a brand new Lamborghini and he's going, you're giving me a car. How much do I owe you? Nothing. So it's a gift.

I paid like crazy to buy a Lamborghini. What's free to you? God paid an amazing gift and it's free to us. Just put out your hand, put out your heart and say please forgive me. I'm putting all of my hope and trust and when I make that decision, I'm never under condemnation from God ever again.

“There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:1 My problem is not that God condemns me. My problem is my other sources of condemnation. So question for us, how do I stop condemning other people? I want to start with some definitions that I think are important before we get to these passages. First of all, the idea of disagreement. We have a different opinion, we have a different value, we have a different theology. We disagree with each other. We don't just see things. We really like the other person sees them and it's generally a good thing if it's dealt with with grace because when I experience disagreement with somebody and it's dealt with with grace, then I learn something, I see other perspectives. Maybe I've changed my mind. A lot of great things can happen if I disagree in a kind and gracious way or I can lose friendships over it.

For today’s message, I want to give some definitions:

●    Disagreements

Elders are reading a book together right now called “The Art of Disagreeing.” How to keep calm. Friends in hard conversations. It's a terrific book. It's a terrific book. I've benefited from it a great deal. I really appreciate it. Written by a believing man. So what we're talking about is it's fine to disagree. No problem, as long as I do it with grace. Second issue, criticism.

●    Criticism.

Criticism is where it's the act of expressing disapproval or saying I think that was wrong. It can be offered with other grace and can be offered with a path of redemption and personal improvement.

When somebody says to me that wasn't good, I think you should adjust that.

Friends, I was preaching 35 years ago, Idaho Falls, ID. Big auditorium of people, I'm preaching away. I ask a rhetorical question. Right in that one silent space, before I spoke again, a little boy answered it. And he answered it wrong and the people laughed and Dave Gibson said take that boy out and spank him.

A bunch of people laughed. So I didn't think a thing about it. I walk out of the church. A man named Lee Davidson comes up to me and says, Dave, what you said to that boy was very hurtful. Light comes out of my head. I go to their house. I apologize to the boy. I apologize to the parents. I apologize to both services next Sunday. Because it was wrong.

I did something I shouldn't have done and Lee graciously said to me, Dave, think about that. That's not right. Lee helped me. In the intervening years, I've had another 6-8 kids answer questions in a service and rather than say take him out and spank him, I say, folks, there's a 7 year old listening to a sermon, give him some applause. I'm better in relationships now because Lee said something to me and we have that opportunity to help each other.

●    Condemnation.

Condemnation is in the realm of interpersonal relationships. It's a strong statement that you are wrong, and not only wrong, but you are bad, and not only bad, but you're probably irredeemable. You're just that bad. It's usually followed. It usually involves anger. It involves just a statement of extreme unkindness. A sort of a sentence against you. It's like the judge giving the final jury no constructive feedback. There's no hope that you could be redeemed. It's you are a bad person. And that's the condemnation that I want to ask us to think about today. It's usually punitive, usually demeaning, usually unkind, often full of anger. And that's what I'm all stocked up on. And I'll bet you are

as well. Don't anymore.

●    Grace.

It's a relational style of kindness, compassion. I'm going to talk about more of that in just a minute. The commitment to say I'm going to cut people slack because God cut me slack. Unbelievably, I'm going to treat people with grace.

There is a difference between intent and impact.

This is critically important, there's a towering difference between intent and impact between what I intended to do with what I said, what I didn't say or the way I acted, what I intended to do. And that's my own motives in my own heart. What was I trying to? What was I trying to do there? I can say something with purely godly and great intent and not have a good impact on them. What was my intent when I said take that boy out and spank him?

Well, it was to be funny. Was to make Dave look clever. It was to demonstrate to everyone that my mouth often works before my mind kicks in. That was my intent. I didn't intend to hurt the boy. But I did, and I hurt his parents, my intent and my impact. My intent wasn't great, but my impact was even worse. And so impact is the question of how does this affect the other person? What is

felt by them? Impact is felt by them and not by me. It is felt by them as a result of what I did in a particular situation. I read a study about a psychiatrist who was. Dealing with married couples and what he would do is he would have him in a conversation about something that was very intensely concerning to them and he would videotape them and the couples would be really going at it now. Not angry, not mad, not cussing, but really intense.

And then he showed them the video of themselves without sound, with just the video. And people looked at their faces and thought, whoa, I look angry. Wow, I'm intense. And just by seeing their own faces, they realize even though I wasn't intending to harm, the impact I'm having is clearly amazing.

And so the impact and intent are the two different issues that I need to say to myself. I need to be careful about that. I'm talking today about condemnation. I'm all stocked up. I'll bet you are. I had a student at Alaska Bible College who, after knowing him for two months, I decided he has a spiritual gift that I didn't know existed. And that is the gift of condemnation. Everybody and everything is wrong and he's very happy to make it clear to you, friends.

If I'm condemning in many, many cases, I'm telling you the condition of my heart. I'm not telling you about yourself. Especially if I'm after it a long time.

If I am here at work, I go down the hallway to Bonnie's office. I get a cup of coffee. I'm walking back the hallway, someone bumps my arm and jostles it, and coffee comes out. Did they put the coffee in or did they jostle it out?

They only jostled it out. I put it in.

If I'm relating to somebody and I just explode in anger. Did they put the anger in or did they jostle it out? They only jostled it out. Did they put the condemnation in me or did they just jostle it out? So many, many times

the things I'm doing and saying is a comment on me.

Romans 8:1. “There is, therefore, now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” If I am condemning other believers, I am doing to them what Jesus is unwilling to do to them. And what he's unwilling to do to me.

If I'm a person who's condemning others, how many of you know who Billy Dunn is? God bless you if you don't. Billy Dunn is our consultant. He helped us, still helping us. He'll be here tomorrow. He's helped us for months and months. Wonderful man, loves Christ, very mature, knows us better than probably any person in this room, probably including better than the elders. He looked. He read all of our documents. He read hundreds of pages of emails. Literally, he looked at all of our questions. He interviewed 48 people face to face. I mean, the guy understands who we are. And he said something to our elders about 8 months ago, he said. “FCBC has an unusually high critical spirit. It's not the worst I've ever seen, but it's unusually high.”

And so I called Billy two weeks ago to say, man, I used that quote and he said absolutely, and please add one thing to it. “FCBC has an unusually high

critical spirit, and it must stop.”

It must stop now, friends. You might be sitting there thinking, hey, I like Billy Dunn, but what's the matter what he says? Well, here's the same opinion as Jesus about this. So what Billy says, what Steve says, what Dave says, yeah, you can evaluate it against this book. But what Jesus says is not a debatable issue.

It's critically important what he says. He rescued us. He's our master. He has the right to tell us what to do. You know the childhood thing? Third grader says

to 5th grader, “You're not the boss of me!”

Don't say that to Jesus. He is the boss of me. So he's saying to us, I want you to treat each other in different ways. There's a huge number of biblical passages. We're only going to look at 3 very, very briefly about the necessity of giving grace to others, about the necessity of not condemning others and being a person of grace.

Here are some of the many Biblical commands in giving grace to each other:

Luke 6:36 A direct command of the Lord Jesuis to us, His disciples:  “Be merciful, just as your father is merciful.”

●    Merciful:

●    Why? Because it is commanded and God has been, and continues to be merciful to us!!!

Exactly like God be merciful. These are the most terrifying verses in the Bible. Husbands, love your wives exactly like Jesus loved the church. Terrifying verse. If you're married, if you're a husband that is, that is a bar that is up there. So he's saying I want you to be merciful to others just exactly like Jesus was merciful to you.

It means to be compassionate, tender hearted, have pity on someone, have concern for them, ache for their best, to care for them, to be unwavering for them, have a sense of compassion toward them. And why do I do that? I

do it because God was merciful to me. And because He continues to be merciful to me and He continues to show me kindness and grace is when God gives me what I don't deserve, forgiveness and eternal life. But mercy is when he withholds from me what I do deserve.

Even though I deserve eternal punishment, he withholds it from me. It's due to me, but based on the death of Christ, I don't get eternal punishment. So we're commanded to give mercy, not because we're holy, not because we're better than anybody.

Not because they deserve it. Not because we're good at it, not because it's fun, not because we are naturals at it.

Well, because he said we should do that and because he said I have done that for you.

Question, friends, who is there in this body who needs a huge dose of mercy from you? Who is there in your family or your neighborhood or your workplace? It just needs a great dose of mercy for you. One of us, or maybe several of us going home this afternoon are going to need to give mercy

to another driver. Today. Jesus said to do that

Ephesians 4:32 A direct command from the Lord Jesus through the apostle Paul, when he says. “Be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ also has forgiven you.”

●    Kind:

●    Tender-hearted:

●    Forgiving: Full pardon

●    Why? Because God is continuously kind, tender-hearted and forgiving to us!!!

Here's how I want you to treat each other, he says. Be kind, benevolent behavior, pleasant, seeking their best interest Tender hearted. It's a compassion that comes from my heart. The Bible literally talks about it as a gut level response of care.

Literally uses the word for intestines and intestine level response of care.

Compassion. That person matters to me. Friends, if there's five couples sitting on a lawn in lawn chairs chatting, there's five fathers and then five wives, mothers. And this little 4 year old is riding down the sidewalk. He's learned

to ride a bike. He's wearing his helmet and he's not real stable, but he's doing it. And he comes down and just as soon as he gets in front of all adults, he gets too wobbly. He crashes over in the lawn. He didn't hit the sidewalk.

There's no concussion,

there's no blood, there's no scrapes.And all the dads are saying, hey get up

cowboy, get on that horse again. Come on babe, don't let a horse throw you. And

the moms are jumping up and saying oh you poor baby, what's wrong? Are you OK?

They have a heart level compassion for the child. It just comes out of their

hearts. Not that their dads don't love the child, but they have a different

response. You've got to get on that bike, cowboy.

There's a heart level compassion that I am commanded to have toward you.

And you toward me. No matter who we are, this is not based on us being good people or nice people, not based on us believing like each other. It's just a heart level response that we respond to them forgiving each other, granting them full pardon for everything they've done.

Remember what Pastor Steve said last week? Not making you pay for what you did to my satisfaction at my hands. That's not my business. God's business. My business is the command to forgive you. Why do I do that?

Because God did it for me. And because he keeps doing it for me. There's not a day goes by that I don't need God's forgiveness, not one day that you don't

need God's forgiveness. He does it for us all day, every day. He doesn't do it begrudgingly, not reluctantly, not partially, not after we've paid it off. He just does it.

Colossians 3:12, 13, direct command from the Lord Jesus through Paul to us, His disciples.

“So as those who've been chosen by God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness. Humility, gentleness and patience, bearing with one another, forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone, just as the Lord forgave you, you should also forgive.“ And this starts with a heart level response, he says. I don't want you to give compassion, I want a heart level compassion. Then that. Particular adjective applies to all these words.

●    A heart of compassion. Strong gut level concern for another.

●    Heart of kindness again. benevolent, pleasant.

●    Heart of humility. Preferring one another like Philippians 2 says. It's

an understanding that I'm not morally superior to anyone. It's understanding who I think I am? I'm rescued, I'm forgiven, that's who I am. I'm just in the same boat with everybody else. It's a clear stance that says I have moral need, I need grace. And therefore, because I have the gift of grace

●    heart of gentleness, A mild disposition toward people. Even in disagreement, even in intense disagreement, a mild disposition toward other people, not like the couple who are seeing their face without words, saying my word. I look angry. My word, I'm coming across as a

very aggressive person.

●    Heart of patience, long-suffering.

●    Heart of bearing with each other

●    Heart of forgiving each other:

●    Why? Because we are chosen by God, and holy, and beloved of God. God has been continuously compassionate, kind, gentle, long-sufferering,and forgiving.

Enduring sins and foibles of others friends. You can be in a relationship with people for decades and need to do this for decades. I've been in a relationship with a man for decades and I get so sick of his humor. I could just slap him because it's not funny. And because I've heard it before. My kids aren't here today, they'll be here for the second hour. Maybe I won't put that in there.

Bear with your old man. A heart of forgiving each other. It's a heart level pardon of sins. I'm not holding that against you. Don't. Don't hold that against me. A heart of forgiving each other. It's a crazy high bar, friends. It's a crazy high bar. How do I do it? I depend on the Holy Spirit. I renew my own mind

about what God did for me.

I remind myself that we're brothers and sisters in Christ. We're in the family. I remind myself that I'm spending eternity with you. And I remember what

God did for me. It's about disciplining my own heart and mind to say I have to treat people not based on their maturity or their attitude or their words. I have to treat them based on my heart. I'm convinced that God says, hey, you're chosen, you're holy, you're beloved, I showed you compassion.

Now I'm calling you to do that. If you're not convinced yet, please read, this afternoon Matthew chapter 18:21 to 35. I'm not going to talk about it. Matthew 18:21 to 35. If you're not yet convinced about how to speak to each other and how to how to relate to each other, how to forgive each other

because God's basic concern.

Speak to people, not about people. And that's what he's calling us to do in a humble, quiet sort of a way. Now, friends, those are only three of the commands in the Bible about treating each other with grace. I bet the Bible would be half as long as it is if God didn't spill so much ink. Telling us to get along. That's an estimate. I'm not a scholar, I didn't work on this. But

there's a lot of ink spilled about this question of how do we relate to other

believers? How do we relate to other unbelievers? How do we relate to so many people? So I mentioned this book earlier. The elders are reading The Art of Disagreeing. I'll read you a quote out of it in just a minute.

Gavin Ortland, wrote a book, he has this illustration which he takes from the novel called “The Brothers Karamazov.” Out of personal curiosity, anybody read that book? Some of you read that book. It's a stunning book. It is an amazing book. In The Brothers Karamazov, there is a father who is an utterly evil person and an oldest son who is utterly evil in a little bit different ways, and a second son who is utterly evil in different ways. And a third son who is introduced as a servant, but it turns out he's a half brother of these others who is an utterly evil person. And then there's the youngest son whose name is Ali OSHA.

Alyosha has been training to be a priest. He's being mentored by a man named Father Zosema. At some point, Father Zosema says to him, Alyosha, you would be better used of God out in the world and not in the monastery, so you need to leave. And so Alyosha obeys Fathers Osema and goes out into the world.

And this novel, which is almost 900 pages long. Alyosha is the one person in the novel who's not an absolute utter scoundrel. Here's what Ortland says.

The hero of Theodore Dostoevsky's novel The Brothers Karamazov is a 20 year old man named Alyosha. He's an unusual hero. He doesn't do much. In contrast to the bolder characters around him, he's often quiet and receptive, observing their arguments and actions without response. Yet when all the dust settles, it is what is represented by Alyosha that triumphs in the novel. His sincerity, simple faith and love for others continually redeems those around him above all.

What stands out is Alyosha's lack of contempt for the other characters, even in their wretchedness. He does not despise others. He does not consider himself above them. He exemplifies the redemptive power of love. An utter lack of contempt for the people around him. Even though they know he knows who they are, they're pure scoundrels.

Friends. Between all these other 9 or 10 main characters, there's rape, murder, adultery, fornication, greed, dishonesty. I mean in terms of the 10 commandments, they're all covered in a negative way by these other characters, but Alyosha has an unwillingness to have contempt for them. Here's a core idea, friends, I want to ask you to think about. Believers who are unusually mature can disagree with others, even be harmed by others, without adopting contempt toward them.

I can disagree, I can be harmed, but I don't adopt a stance of contempt toward other people. I can disagree, I can be harmed, I can be talked about what?

Whatever a disagreement is just fine debates, just fine discussion, wonderful persuasion, no problem. It's contempt that God is saying to us. It's not like Jesus. I can't condemn others. I have to give them grace because that's the way Jesus approaches them.

Father, we thank you for the remarkable grace you gave us and continue to give us. I pray we'd be people with an utter lack of contempt for one another.

For the drivers on Eagle Rd. For the people in our HOA. For the people at work.

For the people on social media who are out of control and unkind. An utter lack of contempt for others. Let us be people of truth for sure, but people of grace, people of kindness. People who will not do to one another what Jesus will not do to us. We need your help in this, and we pray in Christ's name, Amen.