Pastor Brian and Jacque Lother
Brian: Thank you, Kelly. When Jacque told me that she was meeting with the ladies, I said, well, how long is that? How long are you going to go? She said it's only going to be an hour. I thought to myself, I'm going to have the two to three hours to practice tonight. I was right. It was like two and a half hours, but that was good.
Jacque: It was good. I need to fix your collar. I'm sorry. I can't take it. There. Yeah.
Brian: It was dark when I got dressed this morning. Thank you. If it falls down, just feel free to grab it and kiss me on the cheek while you are doing too if you want.
Jacque: Okay.
Brian: Yesterday was a terrific day. We called it an all-day of prayer. It was eight hours or 12 hours rather from eight in the morning until eight at night. We had 12 different prayer leaders who did a fantastic job just leading each hour. When we were thinking about doing this, my thought was, well, we will be there at the beginning and then maybe we will pop in once or twice during the day, and then you and I were going to lead the last hour. It was like, I had this thing going and I had all these things I was going to do yesterday and I couldn't get away from it.
Jacque: It was so amazing.
Brian: I just had it playing by my ear all day long, listening to all this prayer going on in the day went just like that. It was unbelievable.
Jacque: If somebody would have said you are going to pray for 12 hours, I would say you are crazy. It was such a delight.
Brian: It was.
Jacque: God just gave me the grace even. And I thought, well, I'll just listen all day and get a lot done while I'm listening. Nah, I couldn't. I didn't get anything done. I was stuck to that screen. I had to stop and listen during making us lunch and a few things, but it was just wonderful.
Brian: It was a wonderful day.
Jacque: I was so blessed by the prayers of the people of hope. At the end, a few of our friends who watch us online came and joined us from seven to eight. It was wonderful. I just want to do this again.
Brian: This is incredible because on that last hour we had people from really the Southern part of the city and then some people from Arizona and Calgary, Alberta and all... It's an incredible thing, this Zoom. It's a gift from God because it can bring us (33:00) all together in such a way that we've never been able to be together before.
Jacque: Because we can be in the comfort of our own home and be connected, praying together.
Brian: That's nice to have too.
Jacque: It's amazing.
Brian: Yes. Amen. Amen.
Jacque: So thank you to everybody who made it happen. Thank you to Joanne Hackland who did so much organizing. Thank you, Joanne.
Brian: We will probably have another one here in the future. When we do, if you weren't able to participate with us yesterday, you have another chance coming up here real soon. Before I get into the message today, we have a special announcement from Julia Oats and she sent us a video announcing some things that the young adults are going to be doing. So just watch this video real quick.
[Video]
Brian: So anyways, thank you Julia, for that a video announcement and I've already watched it so I can thank her for that. The rest of you who are here, you'll get to watch it a little bit later. One of the things I wanted to really talk about was... One of the things that Joel and I are going to be covering tonight is obviously the whole social media opportunities that we have, but also the pitfalls of social media. I've noticed some things during this whole COVID issue that we've been dealing with now for a number of months. That is, there is a lot more fallenness in Christians than what we would like to believe. If you don't believe me, just go onto Facebook and see how they talk to each other and so forth, engage with each other. Sometimes I just walk away shaking my head. Yesterday I was really blessed by a prayer that Pastor Jeff prayed, because he was saying in his prayer, “Lord, just mix us all up. Mix us all up.” It was not in a bad sense, but in a good sense. I feel like that's what this message is just going to be a little bit today, is to get you thinking about some things in a different way than maybe you've thought about it in the past. It's so easy to let the ways in thinking of this world make inroads into our minds. We know that, right? It's just so easy to let the ways of this world and how the world thinks. I'm not talking just... When we talk about like the world, I'm not talking about like sin. I'm just talking about the system and the way that the world does things, the systems of this world, the kingdoms of this world, how they operate and the principles that the kingdoms of this world live by. It's really easy to let the kingdoms of this world or the principles of this world make inroads into our minds and hearts. You and I have been given an admonition and that admonition is that we are to be in the world, but not what? Of the world. We are to be in the world, but not of the world. There are two different kingdoms on the earth and they operate on very, very different principles. We have the kingdom of God, and then we have the kingdoms of this world. By the kingdoms of this world, I'm talking about earthly governments, which obviously are subject in many ways to the demonic realms that we've been talking about in the last few weeks. Unfortunately, there are many who have fused these two kingdoms together. They've taken principles of this world, how the kingdoms of this world operate and they fused it, those principles into how we do the kingdom of God business. The results for the kingdom of God, I believe have been very damaging and very devastating. I'm not trying to cause anybody cognitive dissonance here this morning. I think you know what I mean by that. Just like, “I don't want to think about this stuff”, but the truth is there is a lot of worldly thinking in the church. There is a lot of how this world does its thing in the kingdom of God.
Jacque: I remember a teacher that used to say, think about what to think about. It's really good for you to bring this to us.
Brian: Yes. I want to begin today by reading a lesser known story from the book of Luke. It's a story of Jesus. I want to give it a little backdrop for you. Jesus has a huge crowd following him, probably over a thousand people, maybe more than that. If there were a thousand people following you outside, it would be hard for everybody to hear, wouldn't it? So he tries to get himself in a position where everybody is going to hear and he begins to teach, as was his custom. In the middle of his teaching… We see this story. We find it in Luke chapter 12, verses 13 through 15. Why don't you read it, sweetie?
Jacque: I'm reading out of the message. Someone out of the crowd said, "Teacher, order my brother to give me a fair share of the family inheritance." And Jesus replied, "Mister, what makes you think it's any of my business to be a judge or mediator for you?" Speaking to the people he went on; take care, protect yourself against the least bit of greed. Life is not defined by what you have, even when you have a lot.
Brian: In the middle of this big crowd, this guy comes to Jesus. This was a cultural thing that only the firstborn actually inherited the family inheritance. It was similar to Norway. Only the eldest son inherited the farm. That's why there were so many immigrants from Norway that came to America back in the 1800, because only the eldest son inherited the farm and the younger brother could work for the older brother, but he would just always be a laborer and he would never really have a farmer his own. That's why so many immigrants came to America. Very few of them were first born. They were second, third, fourth, fifth born and stuff like that. Well, in this story, it's a similar thing. In Jewish custom, whether it was right or not, the Jewish law or tradition was that the firstborn got the inheritance. So obviously this wasn't a firstborn. This was a second or third or fourth born. He came to Jesus and he said, "Order my brother to give me a fair share of the family inheritance." I find it really interesting because Jesus was concerned with fairness in his life, and yet he didn't weigh in on this issue. He didn't weigh in on it. He said, “I'm not going to weigh in on that, but I will give you a kingdom perspective that it's important for you to understand.” That kingdom perspective was, protect your heart against greed. That was a kingdom perspective; protect your heart against greed. Be careful of greed. Guard your heart. What this brother wanted was for Jesus to order. He said, order my brother to do this. This is not how the kingdom of God works. Jesus was not going to let the culture set or establishes agenda, even though he prayed, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. God does want his will done on earth as it is in heaven. But sometimes they think we don't really understand clearly what that will really is. The kingdom of God, my friends is a power-under kingdom. The power comes from underneath. It comes from serving. The kingdoms of this world are a power-over kingdom. This is what this guy wanted Jesus to do; order my brother to give me part of the inheritance, an order coming from over top. The kingdom of God is a power-under kingdom, and it works through love, and it works through grace. It works through mercy. It works through forbearance. It works through kindness. It works through gentleness. All of those things begin to change a person's heart. That's what happens. How many know this, that you are never going to change a person's heart by simply giving them an order? Hearts are never changed by being ordered, by having a finger stuck in your face and being yelled at. It's interesting to me that the more people want their way in marriages or in relationships, oftentimes the louder the decibel level gets in communicating. The louder you yell, oftentimes you get less response. Yelling never changes a person's heart. The power that is operating in the kingdoms of this world is a power-over. It's a controlling power. It's a power by force. It's a power by might. The kingdom of God has Jesus as this Lord, of course and the kingdom of this world has Caesar as its Lord. Ultimately, Caesar is in the control of the enemy of our souls. The kingdom of God is a kingdom of the cross. We sang about that today. Let the power of your cross be revealed in us, but what is that power today? It's the power to look at your enemies as Jesus did and say, father, forgive them for they know not what they do. That's the power of the cross. The kingdom of God is a kingdom of the cross where followers replicate Calvary. You and I, we call ourselves Christians. That means we follow Jesus Christ, but Jesus Christ was not a power-over guy. He was a power-under guy. He was a guy that worked through mercy and grace and love for barons. That is the way the gospel of the kingdom is spread versus the kingdom of the sword or the kingdom of the hammer, where we are always pounding down on people. A ploy of the enemy, a ploy of Satan, and we know he's real, and the ploy of Satan is to fuse these two kingdoms or to take the principles of the kingdoms of this world and try and do the kingdom of God business with it. We see it all the time - manipulation, control. It doesn't work. It does great damage to the real message of the gospel. And when we actually fuse... and the title of my message today is, fusion is a terrible thing. When we fuse these principles of the kingdoms of this world into doing the kingdom of God business, what ends up happening is a great compromise happens in the kingdom of God. The devil's strategy is to fuse loyalty that belongs to Christ and an allegiance that should singularly be done to God, what he wants to do is get that allegiance that should be for Christ and singularly devoted to God to be shifted to other principles, to get the kingdom of God work done. When that happens, there are all sorts of great catastrophes in the kingdom of God. When our allegiance and our devotion is to a cause or a philosophy or even our state or even our country or even our theology, because we all have a theology… My theology has shifted and changed a little bit through the years and I have certain beliefs about God, but when my allegiance is to a theology or philosophy or a cause, no matter how good that cause might be, what is happening is the allegiance that I am to have in my heart for God becomes over towards this cause or this theology or my country. When this happens, we have just walked into 21st century idolatry. That's what we've done. In reality, any time that you or I get our worth or self-value or significance, any time we do that, anytime we get our self-righteousness or our righteousness in a sense from anything other than Jesus Christ, that is idolatry. When we get a sense of our righteousness from our theology, when we get a sense of value from what we believe about God, we are border lining on idolatry because theology is not Jesus. He's a person. He's not a philosophy. He's not a concept. We love to tell people they are heretics because of certain things that they may believe Dave about God. I think God has a lot bigger swath of tolerance for those things than what we have had during the course of our lives. But when a person's identity and worth comes from being an American or a Democrat or a Republican or conservative or liberal, or from this philosophy or that philosophy or this cause, or that cause, we are in danger of idolatry. We really are, because the cause, no matter how great it is, is not Jesus. There are a lot of people who are pro-life as a cause, and I am in pro-life, but being pro-life is not Jesus. You can be very committed to all sorts of good things, but that's not Jesus. We have to understand that we need to get our value from our relationship with Jesus Christ. Our life should not come from which theological camp we agree with the most, my life should come from Jesus. It should come from Christ. My life shouldn't come from what cause I'm championing. My life should come from Jesus Christ. Our value comes from knowing him and him alone. That's why it's so important for us to not create as we prayed yesterday about us versus them. I was really blessed by so many of the prayers yesterday, because for so many years, the church has even created this us versus them way of thinking. That's not the kingdom of God thinking. That is a kingdom of this world thinking. What is this world all about? Divisions, not unity and so forth.
Jacque: Brian, I'm just brought back to a time in our life when we were with a group, when we were very young and all they did was argue theology. All that was when you would meet with people, it would just be arguments, trying to prove our side of the theology. I remember saying to you one time, why don't we talk about Jesus anymore?
Brian: And we never did. meet with people, it would just be arguments, trying to prove our side of the theology. I remember saying to you one time, why don't we talk about Jesus anymore?
Brian: And we never did.
Jacque: Truth, but there was no peace.
Brian: No.
Jacque: No.
Brian: I remember sitting there because then our practice was, well, you shall know the truth and the truth will set you free and if you don't believe like I do, you don't believe the truth. So I can't be in a relationship with you, so we have to divide. Well, how, how do you think there was 35,000 Protestant denominations in the world today?
Jacque: If we would have stayed there, we would end up sitting alone somewhere.
Brian: That was my point. It became very clear to me that inevitably the only person that was ever going to agree with me was me.
Jacque: Because I didn't agree.
Brian: Because she didn't even agree with me.
Jacque: And you know what? It all started out in such a wonderful way of just trying to show...
Brian: The truth.
Jacque: Yeah. It's just a slippery slope.
Brian: It was a very slippery slope and we lost sight of the person of Jesus.
Jacque: But we learned a lot.
Brian: Thank God.
Jacque: Yes.
Brian: I wouldn't be here today if I hadn't learned something.
Jacque: We learned a lot.
Brian: I would probably be dead. I probably would be dead. A kingdom of God person's sense of worth and identity comes from Jesus Christ. It comes from Jesus Christ and in him alone. Nothing is to compete with that because we can't serve two masters. Can we? We can't serve two masters. I have a deep concern for many things that I see in our church culture because I see a fusion of the kingdom of God with the kingdom of this world happening at times in how we do, how we think, how we think of the kingdom of God and what we even think the kingdom of God is. I just want to give a little bit of an example in this. You have to be from another planet to not know there is a huge division in our country over the political arena. There is even a huge division even in the church. I would say this, as an American... and by the way, I love America. Remember, most of my relatives are from Canada. My cousin, Glen from Calgary is probably watching this morning. God bless you, Glen. Thanks for praying with us yesterday. I would go visit my cousins up in Canada. I still remember as a young boy when we would come back and we would cross the border from Canada back into the United States, I would say to my mom and dad, “Doesn't the air smell better down here in America?” I was like an American...
Jacque: No offense.
Brian: No offense, Canada. I was just like an American through and through. I love America and there are so many things I love about America, but you know what? America is not a Christian nation. I'm going to show you that it never has been a Christian nation if you hang with me. But as an American, I agree that we have a lot of light to shed in this world. If you look at light as kindness and goodness and so forth, America has lot of light to shed in the world, but the light that America has to shed in the world is not the light of Jesus Christ. Only Jesus Christ can shed the light of Jesus Christ. The way that America sheds at slate will not be the way that Jesus Christ shed his light because he shed his light by dying for his enemies. That's how he shed his light. He said, "Father, forgive them for they know not what they do." The very people who were crucifying him, the very people that planned and plotted his death, who were crucifying him, he said, father, forgive them. I'm telling you today, no country will ever do that for their enemies. No country will ever say, let my enemy win. That's why the kingdom of God and the kingdoms of this world cannot operate the same way. There has never been a country ever on the face of this earth that has been willing to die and no longer exist for their enemies. Calvary, what it represents is what you and I, as followers of Jesus are to be, people who are willing to lay down our lives, even for those who despitefully use us, who are enemies, who complain against us or to bicker, or to try and undermine us. Those are still the people that you and I are commanded as followers of Jesus to love. That's not an easy thing, is it? It's not an easy thing. The way we do the work of the kingdom of God is not the way the kingdoms of this world do their work and do their operation. When the two try to come together and they are fused together, especially the kingdoms of this world principles into the kingdom of God, when those two are fused together, there is some devastating consequences that happen. I have a bunch of examples of that, but I'm only going to cover one this morning because we don't have any more time for me to cover than just one, but I'll probably continue with this next week. So if you don't show up next week, I'm going to know that you really disagree with what I'm saying. One of the first consequences of fusing, the kingdoms of this world principles with the kingdom of God is our witness for Christ is compromised. It's completely compromised when we do this, because as followers of Jesus Christ, you and I are invited to take up our what?
Jacque: Cross.
Brian: Say it again.
Jacque: Cross.
Brian: Yeah, take up our cross.
Jacque: Daily.
Brian: Daily, and be willing to what?
Jacque: Follow him.
Brian: Yeah, follow him. Be willing to lay down our lives for others.
Jacque: Daily.
Brian: Daily. We are given the invitation to lay down our rights, aren't we?
Jacque: Yes.
Brian: We are given that invitation. This principle of laying down our lives for others, it's actually… This principle is wired into the DNA of Christianity, because that's what Christianity is. That's what Jesus is. That's who he is. That's who he was on this earth and that's who he is today. By laying down our lives for others, this is the way the gospel is supposed to be preached. This is the way the gospel is supposed to go forward, is supposed to be spread. When the world sees our love and the world sees our mercy and the world sees our compassion, they don't see us judging each other and judging them for their behavior and all of the things that we disagree with and the things that they believe in, when they see us not judging them, but valuing them because they are made in the image of God and they see that we are willing to lay down our lives for somebody that we don't actually even agree with how they are living, because isn't that what Jesus did? He layed down his life for everybody who was living differently than what he agreed with. When we do that, when the world sees that from us, I believe they will really begin to know the gospel of Jesus Christ, that the gospel of Jesus Christ is real. They will see a reality in your life, in my life. That's how the gospel is supposed to work. It's not supposed to work by manipulation. It's not supposed to work by threats. It's not supposed to work by over powering coercion. It's supposed to work by coming under and serving. But if a kingdom of this world gets identified as Christian like America has in the past, because we've all heard this, haven't we? America is a what? A Christian nation; America is a Christian nation. That's how America has been defined. I tell you when I started to make my change in my thinking on this I asked myself the question, obviously, because I heard people talking about the fact that we are now living in a post-Christian America. I asked myself the question, well, obviously that means that it's no longer Christian, so when was it Christian? When was America...? When did America operate like Jesus? Well, was it before Roe versus Wade? Well, no. Was it operating as a Christian nation before prayer was taken out of school? Because I remember when that happened. I was in sixth grade. I remember every year the Gideons would come to our schools and hand out Bibles and all of a sudden that stopped. Maybe that was when America quit being a Christian nation. But then I looked at all the things that America actually endorsed and allowed as a nation, Jim Crow laws, and on and on and on. That's just one minor area. Not minor in insignificant way, but just one of many areas. So how far back do you have to go to find America to be a Christian nation? You can go back to our founding fathers and their whole discussion when they were trying to put the 13 colonies together was we will never have unity if we don't allow slavery. Was that Christian? Well, of course not. So I just would submit to you, America has actually never really been a Christian nation. America has been a nation built on certain biblical principles, certain Judeo Christian ethics, but as followers, of really being a follower of Jesus, America has never done that. It has never done it. So why are we worried about this post-Christian nation in America, because it never has been a Christian nation? I know I'm offending a lot of people when I say this, but we have to come to the stark reality that you know what, the kingdom of God is not a political system and the kingdom of God and political systems and earthly governments function entirely different from each other. When the kingdom of God gets identified... or let me say it this way. When the kingdom of this world gets identified as being Christian, like America has in the past, that country can't possibly function like the cross of Jesus Christ. Can't possibly function like the cross of Jesus Christ. You see, the kingdoms of this world won't turn the other cheek, will they? You fly a plane into my building on my land, what are we going to do? We will bomb your nation. That's how countries work. That's how the kingdoms of this world work. The kingdoms of this world won't turn the other cheek. The kingdoms of this world won't offer to be last. The kingdoms of this world will not love their enemies and the kingdoms of this world won't bless those who persecute them. The kingdoms of this world will not do that. So you and I have a decision to make. What kingdom are we really going to be part of? What are we going to try and support with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength? What are we going to support? Are we going to support a kingdom who doesn't purport to love their enemies? Are we going to support a kingdom who doesn't purport to do good to those who persecute you? Are we going to give our all to that? Where is our allegiance going to be? Jesus said for you and I to be in this world, but not of this world. Be in this world, but not of this world. By definition, a power-over kingdom cannot be an example of a power-under kingdom. By definition, you can't have the kind of principles that countries need to implement in order to survive, you can't have that in the kingdom of God. You can't, by definition. You can't be tall and short at the same time. You can't be black and white at the same time. It's impossible to have a kingdom of God nation if it's a power over nation. You can't. When we call America a Christian nation, then that implies that what America does is what Jesus and followers of Jesus are doing or would do. That's what that implies. If you say America is a Christian nation then what we are saying is America is doing what Jesus would do and what the followers of Jesus would do. The problem is America has been called a Christian nation for so long that people around the world who live in other cultures who live in other religious systems, who have been raised in all other sorts of philosophies and ways of doing things, when they hear that America is a Christian nation and they look at America and what do they see? They look at the kind of movies that we produce. They look at the sex trafficking that comes out of America. They look at the drug culture of America. They look at the crime of America, that far more people are incarcerated in prisons in America per capita than any other country in the world. They look at the pornography that comes out of America and they even look at the war machine that America has, and they say, that's Christianity. I don't want to have anything to do with it. That's why when we fuse the kingdoms of this world’s principles with the kingdom of God principles we have a great destructive effect upon our witness for Jesus Christ. These people have a big blockage in their minds regarding Christianity, because they've been told America is a Christian nation when it really isn't a Christian nation. The shift happened, as I mentioned, when I began to examine, when was America ever a Christian nation? And by the way, I would rather live in America than any other country in the world.
Jacque: We need to pray for America.
Brian: I go on record saying that. There isn't another country in the world that I would rather live in than America. Jacque has some things on her bucket list about traveling to some other countries that she would like to see, but I'll tell you right now, I would be content the rest of my days, never to leave this country. There is plenty of this country that I've yet to see that I would like to see and I love my country. I love America. I am very pro-America when it comes to loving my country, but I also know America is not the kingdom of God. Has America been blessed by God? Absolutely. Has God wanted to use America? Absolutely, but let's not confuse that with the fact that America has been a Christian nation, because it never has been. It has never been a Christian nation in the same way that Jesus gave his life for his enemies, that Jesus was willing to lay down his life and take up his cross and to serve all those that he came in contact with. I believe it's to the kingdom of God's advantage to say, as loud as Jesus said to Pilot, “God's kingdom is not of this world.” He said that to Pilot, didn't he? He said, "My kingdom is not of this world." It's not of this world. It's to be in the world, but it's not of this world. They are two separate entities. They operate completely on different principles. The way the kingdom of God goes forward is not at all the way the kingdoms of this world go forward. It's not. That's why you and I have to be very, very committed to the ways of Jesus. You can't just be kind of a Jesus supporter. That's like being kind of pregnant. There is no being kind of pregnant. You either are, or you are not, right? We are either really a follower of Jesus and his ways or we are not. When things look like Calvary, what does that look like to you? What does Calvary look like to us?
Jacque: Sacrifice.
Brian: Sacrifice.
Jacque: Pain.
Brian: Pain, place of death or dying. Dying to what? Dying to your desires, right?
Jacque: Yes.
Brian: Jesus actually prayed, father remove this cup from me. Some people debate over what that was. Some people debate over whether it was the cross itself or people debate it was the separation between God and Jesus. I'm not actually sure. That would be a good question to ask Jesus when we get to heaven, what did you mean when you prayed that? But I think we can all agree that this wasn't something that he was really looking forward to, the cross. But when things look like Calvary, in other words, laying down our lives for others, laying down our lives, even for our enemies, laying down our rights, laying down our claims in order for us to serve, ascribing worth and value to those whom the culture deems worthless and who the church even has deemed at times worthless in the past. Haven't we done that as the church? We looked at certain groups of how they behave, whether it is anarchist or other groups like that, and we would like to squish them like someone stepping on a grape, but that is not God's heart for these people. This may rattle your cage a little bit here today, but the fact of the matter is, those people, God loves. Now the question is, how are their hearts going to be changed? By putting the squeeze on them more, by punishing them more by putting better consequences, deeper consequences on them? What were you going to say?
Jacque: This came out in our prayer yesterday, Lou, during your hour, how we need to bless those who persecute us or bless our enemies. We hear so much complaining, like what good is all this complaining about people going to do? But if we could pray for them, that's going to make a difference. Complaining, just discourages us too, and adds nothing to the mix to help them. It sounds kind of simple.
Brian: God is always a long-term vision kind of guy. Don't be offended by you calling God a guy. But God is a long-term vision, the end game, in a sense with God and the kingdom of this world operates very shortsightedly. It's immediate retaliation. We've got to stop them. We are going to stamp them out. You know what we forget my friends? As much as I love America, we are citizens of heaven before we are citizens of any nation on earth. We are citizens of heaven before we are citizens of any nation on earth. I would encourage you to carry that badge of being a citizen of heaven very proudly, very proudly. There is a scripture in Jeremiah, I think it Is chapter 9 verses 23 and 24 that says this. "Let not a wise man glory in his wisdom. Let not a rich man glory in his riches or a strong man glory in his strength or boast in his strength, but he that boasts in this, that he knoweth and understands me." sayeth the Lord. God allows us to be proud in one sense. That's being proud that we know God and God knows us. We know God, and God knows us. I want to finish by reading a portion of the scripture. I'm sure you were thinking, “I can't wait until he's done here today.” I would like to read a portion of scripture from Philippians chapter 3, verses 20 and 21. Look at this real quickly. You read it, Jacque.
Jacque: From the message Bible. But there is far more to life for us. We are citizens of high heaven.
Brian: Yes. Read that again.
Jacque: But there is far more to life for us. We are citizens of high heaven.
Brian: Yeah, so let's not... You know what? I pray for America. We prayed for America yesterday. We prayed for all sorts of things. I pray for our state. I pray for our community. I serve in our community. Some of you may not know this, but I was appointed to the city council out here in Corcoran for a few months. I believe in serving. I believe in being involved in these things. I believe in that to bring godly influence in a sense, but I'm also not naive enough to think that the earth kingdoms are going to operate in kingdom principles. They are just not. And so there is far more to life for us. That life is that we are citizens of heaven and we are waiting for what? Go on.
Jacque: We are waiting for the arrival of the savior, the master Jesus Christ, who will transform our earthly bodies into glorious bodies like his own.
Brian: Sometimes I think that we actually aren't waiting for Jesus. Sometimes I think we are so preoccupied with what is happening here and what we are trying to build here... and Jesus said to occupy until he comes. I agree with that. I believe a wise man leaves an inheritance to his children's children. So I'm trying to not only leave an inheritance to my two sons, but also to all my grandchildren. That's what a wise man does. And so I have a long end game thing in mind, while at the same time, I don't want to forget about the fact that Jesus said he's coming back and that he is coming back for me, because I'm a citizen of his kingdom. Go on.
Jacque: He will make us beautiful and whole with the same powerful skill by which he is putting everything as it should be under and around him.
Brian: He's putting everything as it should be around and under him, like we talked about last week, reconciling all things to himself. Let me just finish by saying this. The church has tried to deal with sin in a power-over principled way. That's how the church has tried to deal with sin. I was raised in it. I'm very familiar with it. I also was instructed how to practice that and I've cast it aside. There was an interesting study that was done recently, and I'm not sure how they did this study, but the study showed that churches with the highest alcoholism rate were the same churches that preached abstinence from alcohol, that the harder they came down on the sin of alcohol, the more alcoholism was actually in those churches. I think we could learn something from Jesus, and that is this; that people's hearts are not changed by power-over approaches. People's hearts are changed by being willing to come alongside of them, walk with them, feel their pain, in a sense, have empathy with how they have been in their lives, what has happened in their lives and their circumstances and coming alongside of them in mercy and grace and patience and tolerance and acceptance of them, not acceptance of their behavior, but acceptance of them, and encouraging them and saying something like, there is a better way for you to live. I'll help walk with you towards that. When we come down hard on sin, that's a power-over approach to holiness. My friends, you can coerce a certain kind of behavior externally, but God wants our behavior to come from the inside out, where he loves us and our hearts are transformed. That's why, again, I love America. Like I said I could be completely content, never, ever going to another country, the rest of my life, and I've traveled to a lot, but America is not the kingdom of God, and it will never function like the kingdom of God, because I don't believe America will ever be willing to die for its enemies. I don't believe America is going to be willing to bless those nations who are trying to persecute us. Because of that, America can never be called a Christian nation. We have to separate the kingdom of God from the kingdoms of this world so that you and I, as followers of Jesus, actually know what we are called to do and how we are called to do it.
Jacque: I have this thought that when we are standing up for America and for what is right and what is good, I want to make sure those principles of the kingdom of God are showing in my life.
Brian: That's right. That's right.
Jacque: Yes.
Brian: So I do believe we are to raise the conscience level of America peacefully, nonviolently. That's how Jesus did it. Did he not come in and raise the conscious level or the conscience level of all he came into? All of these teachings, in fact, this man who said, order my brother to give me part of his inheritance, what did Jesus really swing him around to? Don't let your heart be filled with greed. There is always a raising of the bar of the conscience with Jesus. There is always that with the followers of Jesus, but it's never done in a bullying kind of way. We will talk about that probably tonight with Joel and social media. It's never done in a threatening kind of way. It's never done with the power-over kind of way. It's always done from the power-under kind of way. That's the kingdom of Jesus. That's what he calls you and I to be. So let's make a commitment to truly be followers of Jesus. I believe as we live the true kingdom of God in this world, America will become a much better place. I believe we would see better movies. I believe we would see less pornography. I believe we would see less drug abuse, I believe we would see a reduction in sex trafficking and all the things that are ills with America.
Jacque: We would see people of every ethnic... I can't say the word.
Brian: Ethnicity.
Jacque: Yeah. Love each other.
Brian: That's right. We would see that. We would see racism start to dissipate if we truly live the way of the kingdom of God. I want that for America. I want that for all the nations of the world, but our witness has been tremendously compromised around the world because we've fused the principles of the kingdom of God with the kingdoms of this world.
Jacque: Brian, our witness has been diluted in the church too, because we are so busy wanting to point out other people's sins and we don't look inside ourselves and look and ask God to show us where we missed the mark.
Brian: I had a conversation with a person last evening after our prayer time. I just said to this person, as sad as this may be, the fact of the matter is it's always harder to see the effects that our sins have created on somebody rather than the sins they've created for us. It's much harder to see the effect that of our sins. When we have victimized somebody with our sins, it's so much harder for us to see the level of pain and hurt that that has caused than it is for us to feel and sense the level of pain and hurt from someone else's sins against me. I think that the more we move in the direction of real repentance and humility and following Jesus, we will begin to see more clearly the effect that our sins have had on other people. Won't that create a greater humility in us? Won't that create a greater commitment to never sin again? Because it's not coming from this external pressure; I have to live this way because I'm a pastor or I have to live this way because I'm a Christian, but rather it's coming from here, inside of us, a heart that has been changed and transformed by the love and patience and mercy of Jesus. So let's pray. Father, you have such a great way of dealing with the failures of mankind and the hatred that is in man's hearts, but it's not the way of the kingdoms of this world. It's a much more difficult way. It's a way of patience and forbearance and long suffering. It's a way of kindness and mercy and gentleness. Lord, I pray that you will eradicate judgment out of our hearts. I pray that you will eradicate this tendency that we all have to just rise up and control what other people are going to do. We ask, Holy Spirit that you empower us to truly walk in love. May the power of the cross be revealed in us today, but the power of the cross is the power to lay down your life for those who persecute you. It's a power to love those who are different than you. It's a power to accept somebody because of their intrinsic value being created in the image of God. It's a power that goes beyond this earth's comprehension. There were those including Pilot, Jesus that thought you were crazy and you were a mad man, and yet you were the only sane one in the bunch. You were the only sane one in the bunch. The whole rest of the world was out of step. You were the only one in step, because you and your father were one. So I pray today for those who are watching on our live stream and those who are here today. Help us, Jesus to be committed to doing it the way of Calvary; loving the way Calvary loves, loving the way Jesus loves. When we see sin and the horrible consequences of it, let us come in with mercy and grace, because of that is your answer to the sins of the world. I pray this, Jesus in your name and for your sake. Let's raise our hands together, shall we? May the Lord bless you and may the Lord keep you and may the Lord make his face to shine upon you and be gracious to you. May the Lord turn his face towards you and give you his peace and may your heart desire to rule from under, rather than over. This, we pray in the name of the father, son and Holy Spirit. Amen. God bless you. Have a wonderful day. Keep pondering this. Don't let the kingdoms of this world be fused with the kingdom of God. God bless you. Thank you for being here today.
Transcript taken from the Sunday morning service 7-26-20. If you would like to watch the full service, click the link below.