The scripture reading comes from Romans chapter 12.
Please follow along on the screen, the bulletin, or your own Bible.
Starting in verse 1, we read,
I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God,
to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God,
which is your spiritual worship.
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind,
that by testing you may discern what is the will of God,
what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Then in verse 14, we read,
Bless those who persecute you.
Bless and do not curse them.
Rejoice with those who rejoice.
Weep with those who weep.
Live in harmony with one another.
Do not be haughty, but associate with the lowly.
Never be wise in your own sight.
Repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all.
If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.
Beloved, never avenge yourself, but leave it to the wrath of God,
for it is written,
Vengeance is mine.
I will repay, says the Lord.
To the contrary, if your enemy is hungry, feed him.
If he is thirsty, give him something to drink,
for by doing so you will heap burning coals on his head.
Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
This is the word of God.
Thank you, Celeste.
Well, good morning once again.
It was good to meet some of you, maybe for the first time,
and some that haven't been back at Watermark for a while.
It's great to have you with us again this morning.
Now, we've been working through Romans chapter 12 for the last six weeks or so,
and today is the last sermon in the series.
And next week we start a series called Gender, Sex, Relationships, and God.
And we're going to be looking at all things in that category for four or five weeks.
But today is our last series in Romans chapter 12.
And one of the things that Romans 12 has been teaching us and showing us
is that the gospel is not just something that should be theoretical.
It actually has real implications for our lives.
One of the charges that I constantly hear and we constantly hear against Christianity
is that sometimes people feel like Christianity, for all that it says and promises,
doesn't seem to make that much difference in people's lives.
I mean, what difference does Jesus really make?
Maybe you're here this morning and you're not a Christian.
Maybe you're still on a spiritual journey.
Maybe that's one of your questions.
You think you look at those that claim to be followers of Jesus,
you look at those that aren't Christians,
and you say, I don't see any difference in their lives.
Their lives look the same.
What difference does Jesus and the gospel actually make
to the nitty-gritty realities of our lives?
And one of the things that Romans 12 has been showing us
is that the gospel has radical implications for the way that we live our lives.
And today, the passage is going to talk to us about how the central thesis of Christianity,
that Jesus Christ came to earth in order to die for people like us,
how that central thesis has real traction and relevance
to some of the most painful and intimate and nitty-gritty areas of our lives.
And that is how the gospel speaks to the areas of our lives
when people treat us less than we'd want to be treated,
when people are cruel or mean towards us,
when people use and abuse us or sin against us.
And so the question that this passage asks us today is,
how do we respond in these situations?
All of us have encountered difficult people from time to time.
It could be a colleague that sabotages your deal in order to steal your client, right?
It could be your boss that just shouts vitriolic things at you
and tells you you're rubbish and you're useless and they threaten to fire you all the time.
It could be a neighbor or family member, a sibling, a parent that belittles you.
It could be a spouse.
But all of us have had these encounters, and how do we respond to such situations?
Well, I think there's a couple of natural responses, right?
The one way that we can respond is we respond like for like.
We respond in kind.
So someone slanders you and you think, you just wait, I'm going to get back at you, right?
Somebody curses you and you curse them back.
I remember a few years ago, I was reminded of this this week,
when I lived in South Africa, I'm ashamed to say I was a pastor at this stage,
and I had a colleague who I felt like he was pressurizing me into a corner,
kind of forcing my hand, and I was getting a bit agitated.
And remember, he sent me an email, and I can still picture where I was on Seapoint Main Road.
I wrote this email back.
I said, if you're going to play hardball with me, buddy, I'm going to play just as hard back to you.
And that's how our hearts often want to respond, right?
You like that to me?
Just wait until I get back at you.
That's a kind of very Western way of handling things.
Another way of handling things is we like to save face, right?
So we nod our heads and say, yes, yes, it's all okay, it's all okay.
But inside, we're seething with anger, right?
So we nod our heads, but inside, we're thinking, stuff you.
I'm going to find a way to let you know who's boss.
Well, I guess the third way is the way of passive-aggressive, right?
We just become experts in just that look or dropping that comment or just in the boardroom setting.
We just drop that very witty little line that lets everybody know how you feel without really attacking the person directly.
And so all these ways of responding.
Well, our passage today tells us that there's another way.
And it actually reveals to us the problem with all of these, and it shows us the beauty of another way.
And so look at what Paul says.
Let's read it again together.
Paul starts off, and remember, all this is under Romans 12, verse 1, where he says,
Appeal to you, brothers and sisters, by the mercies of God, by the kindness of God,
to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, in other words, all of life, holy and acceptable, pleasing to God.
This is your spiritual act of worship.
And then he says, remember, don't be conformed to the ways of this world,
but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, by thinking new thoughts along the lines of the gospel.
Be transformed.
And then look at what he says in verse 14.
He says, bless those that persecute you.
Bless them and do not curse them.
Verse 17, repay no one evil for evil, but give thought to do what is honorable in the sight of all men.
Verse 19, beloved, never avenge yourselves, but on the contrary, if your enemy is hungry, feed him.
If he's thirsty, give him something to drink.
Paul hits us in the face, in the solar plexus, with this radical, shocking, counter-cultural, counter-intuitive idea.
Paul's saying that contrary to the way we want to handle these kind of situations, there's another way.
And it's not what comes to any of us naturally, but it is the way of Christ and it's the way of the gospel.
Now, in the Bible, to bless somebody doesn't just mean to pat them on the back and say, bless you, brother, or say good morning to someone.
In the scripture, to bless somebody is to invoke God's favor and blessing upon them.
It's to go before God in prayer on behalf of that person.
To pray for God to rain down his favor and his blessing upon them.
And that's what Paul says we should do.
Which is exactly, actually, if you remember, what Jesus says in the Sermon on the Mount.
Matthew 5, Jesus says,
And that's what Paul says here.
He says,
And in verse 15, he actually goes further.
And look at what he says in verse 15.
He says,
Martin O'Jones points out,
It's easy to weep with those who weep.
Anyone that's got an ounce of compassion in their hearts.
You hear of somebody that's suffering and you can extend some compassion to them.
But to rejoice at somebody else's success, that takes a unique kind of humility.
But remember the context here.
The verse before says,
Bless those that curse you.
Paul's not just talking about your family member or your friend.
He's talking about the colleague that's out to get you.
When hardship falls upon them, find some way to sympathize with the person that's out to curse you.
When the colleague that's out to sabotage your deal, when they get promotion,
find some way in your hearts to even be glad and rejoice with them.
Oh my goodness.
Are you serious, Paul?
Well, look at the final verse with me.
Look at verse 21.
Verse 21 gives us a kind of summary statement of Paul's thinking.
He says,
Do not be overcome by evil,
but rather overcome evil with good.
When all this is going on,
when you're being cursed and persecuted,
when you're being sidelined and maligned,
when others are fighting with you,
when you're being unfairly treated and belittled,
don't be overcome by evil,
but find a way to overcome evil with good.
Now, the word overcome here is actually a military word.
It's a word that's used for the army,
and it's in the context of when a battle is raging,
the one that overcomes is obviously the victim,
the one that wins the battle.
And what Paul is saying here is that much of the Christian life is actually a battle.
There's a battle that's going on in the Christian life.
But the battle, Paul says,
is not between myself and my colleague,
or myself and my family member.
There's another kind of battle that's going on.
The battle that Paul is talking about
is not played out in the corridors of the workplace or the boardroom.
It's played out in the contours of my own heart.
You see that?
And he's saying there's this battle,
and whatever happens,
make sure that you win this battle.
In Genesis 4, God says the same thing.
You might remember,
it's a beautiful poetic language.
Cain and Abel,
the two sons of Adam and Eve,
and Cain is angry with his brother.
He's jealous of his brother,
and he's angry with him.
And he's seething in his heart.
And God comes to him and says,
Cain,
sin is crouching at the door,
and its desire is to overcome you,
is for you.
But you must rule over it.
He talks about sin as being this kind of crouching tiger
that's just outside the door,
and it's waiting for you to drop your guard.
It's licking its lips,
and it's waiting to eat your life.
But he says,
but Cain,
there's a way for you to be victorious
over this thing.
Don't let it rule over you.
You must rule over it.
And that's the same thing that Paul says here.
Don't be overcome by evil.
Make sure that you overcome evil.
What Paul is telling us here
is that it's possible
to win the argument,
or to win the kind of tussle with your colleague,
and yet lose the battle.
It's possible that you think you've won the battle
because you get back at them,
and then you put that person in their place,
but actually,
you've lost the battle for your soul
because you've become overcome by evil in the process.
It's kind of like,
I'm sure many of us know this,
if you have a disagreement with your spouse, right,
and you and your spouse are,
there's some argument that's going on,
and let's say you are a lawyer,
and you've got the gift of the gab,
and you know how to argue,
and you can argue your case,
and you can out-argue your spouse,
and you argue them into a corner,
and you put them in their place,
and you make them feel like it's all their fault,
and you're the innocent victim,
and you get them to pretty much,
you argue them into a corner.
What's happened?
You've won the argument,
but you've lost the relationship, right?
You might have won the argument,
but actually, you've lost.
The way to win marital conflict
is when you both come to the place
where you say,
hey, this sucks.
I'm sorry.
No, no, I'm sorry.
Hey, let's reconcile.
That's what winning looks like,
and that's the problem
with the whole victim mentality of our day.
When we feel victimized,
when we feel like somebody else's evil
entitles me to either act evilly,
or to think evil thoughts in my mind,
and think I'm justified because of their evil.
But what happens is that
we let evil win in the end.
And as we all know,
evil only begets more evil.
Wickedness only gives birth to more wickedness.
And so Paul's contention here
is that the gospel gives us another way.
It's a way that not only allows us
to not be overcome by evil,
but actually to overcome it.
And that is, he says,
to pray for,
to bless,
to serve,
to find a way
to extend good
to those that do wrong to us.
Now, there are hundreds of stories of this,
and I heard one story this week,
and it's a very old story,
but it captures it so well.
One of my heroes
is a man by the name of Charles Spurgeon.
He lived 150 years ago.
He was this preacher in London
in the late 19th century.
And he tells a story of,
he led this wonderful church,
but he also oversaw many organizations,
orphanages,
and many, many charities.
And there was,
one of the organizations he was leading,
there was a decision that he made,
and there was another person
that was convinced
it was the wrong decision.
And Spurgeon said,
okay, I hear you out,
but I'm still going to go with my decision.
And this man was angry and furious.
He said, you can't do that.
That's wrong of you,
and was very angry with him.
And so this man said,
if you go ahead with your decision,
I'm going to write a pamphlet,
I'm going to get it printed,
and I'm going to expose you.
I'm going to distribute it all over London
so that everyone will know what you're like.
That's like the ancient version
of writing a blog post.
They didn't have blogs in those days.
So he said,
I'm going to write this thing,
I'm going to expose you,
and everyone's going to know about it.
And Spurgeon says,
really?
He says,
that's going to cost you a lot of money.
You really want to pay for the printing
and then pay for someone to distribute it?
And then he said,
I don't care what it costs,
I'm going to do it.
So Spurgeon said,
I'll tell you what,
I'll pay for the printing.
And then he said,
and if the story becomes a sensation
and you're able to sell it,
sell it to newspapers
and make some money from it,
you keep all the profit.
And Spurgeon ends the story saying like this,
he says,
I never heard any more about that pamphlet,
and that man is now
an exceedingly good friend of mine,
and I hope he always will remain so.
You see what happened?
It wasn't just that he got his way
and the pamphlet died,
you know,
fell in the wayside.
That's one part of the story.
But actually,
it wasn't just that he wasn't overcome.
He overcame this
and was able to establish reconciliation.
The man who was once his enemy
actually became his friend.
To repay evil with evil,
whether in thought or in action,
is actually to be overcome by evil.
But on the other hand,
to repay evil with good
is to overcome it
and to defeat it.
Now,
in this passage,
Paul's going to give us
a couple of other reasons
why this is good.
And so let's look at those reasons.
I want to give us three reasons,
extra motivations,
for why this is the way
of the Christian.
If you follow Jesus this morning,
why God calls us
this radical,
counterintuitive,
countercultural way of life.
And the first reason is this.
Because God alone
is supremely faithful
and perfectly just.
God alone is supremely faithful
and perfectly just.
One of the reasons
why I think we are so tempted
when somebody belittles us
or maligns us
or treats us wrongly,
one of the reasons
why I think we're so tempted
to hit back at them
or to repay kind for kind
is because often we think
if I don't do it,
who's going to do it?
Right?
It's not like you can
call the police
when your colleague
sends you a nasty email.
Right?
It's like,
if I don't do something about it,
I'm just going to be trampled on.
Who's going to ever
put this thing right?
There's a sense of injustice
in our hearts
that feels like
this thing is not right
and somebody's got to
stand up for this.
But look at what Paul says
in verse 19
in our passage.
Paul says,
let's read it together.
He says,
beloved,
never avenge yourselves
but leave it
to the wrath of God
for it is written,
vengeance is mine.
I will repay,
says the Lord.
Now,
what does Paul mean here?
What's he saying?
Is Paul saying,
listen,
don't take matters
into your own hands
because you're just
small potato, right?
Leave it to God.
He'll bring in the big guns
and then he'll really
nuke the guy.
You know, right?
Is that what he's saying?
No,
that's not really
what Paul's saying.
What Paul is saying here
is he's saying
that when we take matters
into our own hands,
because we ourselves
are fallen
and we are finite,
we don't have
perfect perspective,
the chances are
we're going to just
perpetuate evil
as much as evil
has been done to us.
Because we don't have
perfect perspective,
we don't know
the whole story,
we're not perfectly just,
our own hearts
are deceptive
and broken and crooked,
chances are
that we're going to
do evil back
and then the cycle
just continues.
And Paul is saying
that we tend to
perpetuate evil
rather than
bringing about justice.
I think that's the point
of verse 16 and 17.
Look at what he says here.
He says,
don't be haughty.
In other words,
don't think of yourself
more highly than you ought to.
Never be wise
in your own sight.
The problem with pride
is that it blinds us
to who we really are.
It blinds us to reality
and it blinds us
to handling things well.
Miroslav Wulf says this.
He says,
forgiveness flounders,
in other words,
it doesn't flourish
because when I exclude
my enemy
from the community
of humans
and I exclude myself
from the community
of sinners.
See what he's saying there?
When there's somebody
that's out to get me,
I think of this person
as less than human
and I somehow
think of myself
as more than
everyone else.
I've got perfect perspective.
They're all sinners
but I know how to handle
the situation.
And Paul's contention here
is that there is one
who has perfect perspective.
There is one
who sees down deep
into the reality
of the human heart
and he sees perfectly.
And there is one
who is perfectly just.
And he is faithful.
And you can leave it
in his hands
and you can trust
that he will handle
it perfectly.
His justice
is never thwarted.
His justice
is never too harsh
or too soft.
God's justice
and God's mercy
are not mutually exclusive
but they are perfectly
married together.
When we take things
into our own hands,
we are sometimes
too harsh,
other times too soft.
But God knows
how to handle things
perfectly.
Friends,
when humanity
has tried to
play God,
it always ends
disastrously.
Let God be God.
Let you be you
and leave matters
in his hands.
Your life, friends,
is not in your hands.
Do you know that your life
is in God's hands?
Do you know, friends,
that there is not
a single door
that God wants to open
that anyone can shut.
And if God wants
to shut the door,
there is no one
that can open it.
Your life is in his hands.
Commit your ways
to the Lord.
He will look after
your steps.
And the problem is
when we try and take
things in our own hands,
we tend to mess it up.
Friends,
for those of us
that are parents,
can I urge us,
let's teach our children
this,
that their life
is not in their hands.
They don't need
to hustle their way
through life
to get to the top.
Those who get to the top
still don't necessarily win.
Jesus said,
you can own the whole world
and yet still lose
your soul.
So friends,
let's teach our children,
let's teach our own hearts.
There is a God in heaven.
He really does hear
the cry of every broken heart.
He really is supremely faithful.
He really is sovereignly majestic.
He really is perfectly just.
Okay?
So first reason,
God is supremely faithful
and he's perfectly just.
Second reason is this,
because blessing those who curse
is always,
or did not say always,
is usually redemptive.
Redemptive.
Look at verse 20 with me.
Verse 19,
Paul says,
beloved,
never avenge yourselves,
leave it to God.
Verse 20,
to the contrary,
if your enemy is hungry,
feed him.
If he's thirsty,
give him something to drink.
For by doing so,
you will heap burning coals
on his head.
Now here again,
we have the same situation.
What's going on here?
Is Paul saying,
listen,
you know,
when someone's unkind to you,
you be kind back to them
and you'll cause fire and brimstone
to fall out on them, right?
Fire,
thunder and lightning
to fall on the head
and to smite them dead.
No,
that's not what Paul is saying at all.
What he's saying here is that
when we respond with kindness to cruelty,
there should be some kind of,
the hope is that
that arrests the person
and causes them to sit up
and think,
what's going on here?
It should arrest their action
and cause them to stop doing
what they're doing
and to give thought to their actions.
If you ever have a burning coal on you
or an ember from a fire on you,
let's say you're barbecuing
and you stoke the fire
and the sparks fly
and embers fly out
and an ember lands on you,
you don't just carry on doing
what you're doing,
talking to your mate, right?
You quickly stop
and you stop doing what you're doing.
Paul is saying the same thing.
When we respond with kindness
to cruelty,
that should cause like a knife wound,
a stabbing,
to say,
hey,
what's going on here?
And to cause the person
to stop and reflect
and possibly to redeem the situation
or the relationship.
One of the greatest stories,
examples of this
is a fictional story,
but it's awesome.
I don't know if you guys know
the story of Les Miserables.
Anyone know that story?
If you don't know the story,
it's one of the greatest stories
in Western literature
the last 500 years,
written by Victor Hugo,
this French guy,
and set in,
I think,
17th or 18th century France.
And so the story of this guy
called Jean Valjean,
and he doesn't have
a whole lot of money,
and one day he steals
a loaf of bread,
and he's caught,
and he's sentenced
to 12 years in prison.
And he tries to escape
a few times,
so he delays it,
delays it,
eventually 19 years in prison
for stealing a loaf of bread.
And he's eventually
released from prison,
but he's branded
a criminal forever,
he's got to report
to his parole officer
all the time,
he can't get a job,
there's no jobs in France,
he can't find anything to eat,
and the whole system
is stacked against him.
And so life just goes
from bad to worse,
and eventually one day
he's sleeping on the street
outside of a church,
and he hasn't had
anything to eat in days,
his clothes are torn,
and the vicar of the church,
the priest,
sees him outside there,
and he says,
listen,
you can't sleep here,
come on inside.
And he gives him
some new clothes,
and he gives him
a hot warm meal,
first good meal
he's had in days,
and he gives him
a bed to sleep on,
and he says,
listen,
sleep here tonight,
and tomorrow
we'll fix you up
on your way.
And so he comes in,
and he's tatty,
and he's ragged,
but while he's eating
this meal,
his eyes fall
upon all the silverware
in the dining room
of the church house,
right?
And all the cutlery
is this amazing
polished silver,
and he's thinking
to himself,
these guys have got
more money than I've
seen in my entire lifetime.
And so later that night,
the priest goes to bed,
the house is quiet,
and Jean Valjean,
and he gets up,
and he goes downstairs,
and he steals
all the silverware,
puts in his bag,
and he flees
into the night,
and he runs away.
But he doesn't get
very far
before he's found.
And some police officers
catch him,
and they see he's looking
a bit scraggy,
and they look inside
his bag,
and there's all
the silverware,
and I don't know
if it's stamped
with the church,
you know,
emblem or something,
and they realize
what's happened,
and so they take him
back to the church.
And so in the early
hours of the morning,
they knock on the church
door,
and they say,
Vicar,
look what we found,
this man with all
your silverware,
and he claims
that you gave it to him
as a gift,
but we've returned him
to you along
with your silver.
And the priest looks
at Jean Valjean,
and he says,
Jean Valjean,
what have you done?
He says,
you left these behind,
and he goes back
into the church,
and he gets these
two massive
silver candlesticks,
and he says,
here you are,
you left in such a hurry,
you must have forgotten,
I gave these to you
as well.
And he puts them
in his hands,
and he says
to the police officer,
release this man,
this is my gift to him.
And the officers
look at each other,
they don't know
what's going on,
they can't believe it,
they know what's going on,
but they can't believe it,
and they trunnel
from the dark,
and the priest
turns to Jean Valjean,
and he says this,
he says,
you must use the silver
to become an honest man.
God has raised you
out of darkness,
I have redeemed
your soul
for God.
And this act
of kindness
releases this firestorm
of an explosion
in Jean Valjean's heart.
He doesn't know
what to do,
he's this bitter,
angry,
scoundrel,
thieving man
who's hated the world,
and suddenly
this act of kindness
blows his world apart,
and it completely
transforms him,
and revolutionizes
his life
into a whole new man.
Listen to what he says,
this is from the play,
he says,
I had come to hate
the world,
this world
that always hated me,
take an eye for an eye,
turn your heart
into stone,
that's all I've ever lived for,
that's all I've ever known,
and one word
from that man,
the priest,
and I would have been back,
beneath the lash,
my hands upon the rack,
instead,
he's offered me
my freedom,
I feel my shame
inside me
like a knife,
he's talking about
the coals on his head,
right,
and he goes on to say,
Jean Valjean is dead,
a new life
has been born,
and if you know
the rest of the story,
Jean Valjean
is a new man,
he spends the rest
of his life,
rather than bitter
and angry
and hating the world,
he spends the rest
of his life
pouring himself out
for the marginalized
and the poor
and the vulnerable
and those that cannot
look after themselves,
and that's what
Paul's saying here,
Paul's saying that
if we will allow
the gospel
to soak into our hearts
and to transform us
and to humble us
of our pride
that wants to get back,
if we allow the gospel
to so transform us,
not only will we
possibly win back
our enemy,
it'll change us
from the inside out
and it'll change those
that malign us
and belittle us
and curse us.
Friends,
the gospel,
this gospel power
is redemptive,
it changes people's lives.
But there's another reason,
a far more profound reason
why Christians
are called to live lives
of radical generosity
and grace.
And if you've been
part of Watermark,
I think you'll know why.
And the reason is
because this is how
God in Christ
has treated us.
Friends,
remember the night
before Jesus dies,
where is he?
He's celebrating
the Passover meal
and the Passover meal
is the greatest celebration
in Israel, right?
It's like the family
reunion meal
at Lunar New Year.
People travel
from miles away,
they come
and they celebrate
and they're at
this Passover meal
and who's there with him?
His disciples,
including Judas Iscariot
and Jesus knows
that Judas is there,
right?
He says,
one of you is going
to betray me.
But Jesus celebrates
with his disciples
and at one point,
Judas sneaks off
from the meal
and while Judas is there,
he's busy plotting
and scheming
how he can betray Jesus
and he goes off,
he sneaks off at one point
and goes down to the temple
and goes to religious leaders
and he says,
listen,
I'll sell him to you
for 30 silver coins.
They make a deal,
shake hands on it,
it's a deal.
And Judas says,
listen,
later tonight
he's going to go
to the Mount of Olives
and to Gethsemane
and go arrest him there.
So they make this deal,
he hands over the coins.
Later that night,
Jesus goes with his disciples
to the Mount of Olives
and he goes to Gethsemane
and he's praying there.
And Jesus' heart
is in agony.
He's in agony
because he knows
in a few hours' time
he's going to be arrested.
He knows that he's going
to be put through
a sham trial.
He knows he's going
to be beaten
and mocked
and scorned
and spat upon.
But more than that,
Jesus knows
that the entire weight
of God's wrath
for the sins
of those who will come
to trust in him
is going to be poured
out upon him.
Jesus is in such agony
that the blood cells
or whatever it is,
under his skin,
burst,
and he literally
starts to perspire blood.
The agony of his soul
as he anticipates
the cross.
And while Jesus is there
and he's on his knees
and he's crying out
to his Father
in prayer,
over the hill
he hears
this sound,
this clanging
of clubs
and swords
and shields.
And he hears
this rumbling noise
and he sees lights
coming over the hill
and there's a mob
coming his way.
And there at the front
of the mob
is Judas.
And Judas walks up
to him
and he gives him
a kiss on the cheek
and he says,
greetings, Rabbi.
And the word for greeting
is the word
be glad, rejoice.
It's like Judas is saying,
it's good to see you,
my Rabbi.
And Jesus looks him
in the eye
and he says,
friend,
do what you've come to do.
Friend,
do what you've come to do.
And Peter
quickly realizes
what's happening.
Peter grabs his sword
and he starts lashing out
and he cuts off
the ear
of one of the soldiers.
And Jesus says,
Peter,
put your sword away.
And he reaches out
and he puts his hand
on the ear
of the man
who has just been
slashed with the sword
and he instantly
heals him.
And they drag Jesus
off down the hill,
down into Jerusalem
and they take him
to that house
of the high priest.
And there in his house,
they are accusing him
of things
and bringing up accusations
and they're spitting on him
and they're pointing
their finger
and they're bringing up
all these things
and the high priest says,
this man is guilty.
And they say,
we've got to take him
to Pilate.
And so in the morning light,
they take him to Pilate
and they say,
Pilate,
this man is causing
an insurrection.
He's causing a riot here.
He says that he is king,
not you,
not Caesar.
He's causing trouble here
and he's causing insurrection.
Pilate,
you've got to deal
with this man
and they bring in
some false witnesses
and they lie
and they tell their story.
And Pilate is caught up
in this
because he knows
that Jesus is innocent
but his job
is on the line.
If he lets Jesus go,
then Caesar's going
to come down on him.
And so Pilate
wants to let him go
but he doesn't want
to lose his job
and so he says,
Pilate says,
well,
what must I do
with him?
Well,
what should I do
with this man
called Jesus?
And they say,
crucify him.
Pilate says,
crucify him?
What has he done?
And they don't even
answer his question.
They just say,
crucify him.
And so Pilate realizes
it's either my job,
my head,
or this man.
So he washes his hands
and he says,
okay, fine,
take him away
and crucify him.
And they take Jesus
into barracks
and they beat him
and they whip him
bits of bone
on the end of the whip.
They rip his flesh
that you cannot even
recognize.
It's a human body.
And all the while
that this is going on,
Jesus is thinking,
I'm doing this for you.
The very people
that are doing this,
I'm doing this for you.
And eventually
they get him up
to Calvary.
They lay the cross
on the floor.
They lay him down.
They tie his hands.
They smash these nails
through his hands.
He's nailed to the cross.
They hoist up the cross
and while they're there,
they're laughing at him.
The soldiers are
bringing out some dice
and they gamble
for his clothing.
The passers by
are mocking him,
saying,
what an idiot,
what a scumbag.
He said he could save people.
Look at him now.
And the two criminals
on either side of him
are mocking him
and laughing at him.
And while this is going on,
Jesus is suffocating
because he cannot breathe
and he finds some air
and he cries out,
Father, forgive them.
They know not what they're doing.
Friends, after all that,
Jesus cries out,
Father, forgive them.
And Romans chapter 5
says this,
while we were still weak,
in other words,
trapped in sin,
Christ died for the ungodly.
Scarcely will anyone
die for a righteous man,
perhaps for a very good man,
someone might be willing to.
But God shows his love for us
that while we were still sinners,
Christ died for us.
While we were his enemies,
we were reconciled to God
through the death of his son.
Friends, the natural state
of every human heart,
no matter what your nationality
or your culture
or your background,
the natural state
of every human heart
is that we are self-seeking
and self-serving.
And that means
that we always tend
towards enmity with others,
but not only that,
enmity with God.
The God who made us
and loved us,
who breathed his life into us,
that we might know him,
our hearts by nature
are at enmity with him.
We want to be our own king.
We want to be our own God.
And friends,
if you and I were in the crowd
on that fateful day,
the chances are
we would be shouting,
crucify him.
We would be throwing
our fists of rage as well.
Say, do away with this man.
And Jesus doesn't repay us with good
because we were good to him.
Jesus doesn't look at our hearts
and say, oh, you know,
they love me so much,
I guess I'll be good to him.
While we were his enemies,
while we were sinners,
while we were throwing our fists
at Christ and rebelling against him,
Jesus went to the cross,
allowed himself to be nailed there
for you and for me
and for the brokenness of this world.
Friends, are you a Christian this morning?
If you're a follower of Jesus,
you follow one who died for his enemies.
Friends, every one of us here this morning
that are followers of Jesus,
you're only a Christian
because Christ went to the cross
for his enemies.
Jesus laid down his life
for you and for I.
None of us would be Christians
if Christ had not loved his enemies to death.
Friends, are you not a Christian this morning?
Are you still on some kind of journey?
I want to tell you today
that Jesus literally loved you to death.
He went to the cross for you
and he drank to the very bottom
the cup of God's wrath
that you wouldn't have to.
And if you don't ever come to Jesus,
you will die in your sin
and you will face judgment.
But if you come to him
and surrender your life,
if you hand over your life to him,
Jesus takes that judgment
that we deserve upon himself.
Friends, if you come and surrender to him,
you'll find that Jesus will overcome
the evil in your heart
and Jesus will transform you.
And the radical thing is
he'll make you an agent for good in this world.
Friends, come to Jesus.
Don't go another day living your own way.
Don't go another day being your own king and master.
Come and surrender and bow down to King Jesus,
the one who is Lord of all,
but the one who loved you to death.
Friends, what difference does Christianity
and the gospel make?
What difference does Jesus actually make
in anyone's life?
He makes every difference in every way.
If only we'll come to him
and allow his gospel to wash our hearts
and to transform us from the inside out.
Let's pray together.
Lord Jesus Christ, sovereign God,
awesome Father,
tender and gracious Holy Spirit.
Father, when we read these words
throughout the New Testament,
Jesus, your words,
and the Apostle Paul's words,
and others,
God, our natural inclination is to say,
how can that be?
It's impossible.
How can anybody respond to evil with good?
But Jesus, when we contemplate
your profound love for us,
your profound goodness to us,
God, we see a glimpse of hope.
We see a glimmer of possibility
that, God, you really can change us
from the inside out
and that we really can experience
heaven on earth.
God, I want to pray,
won't you make us this kind of community,
won't you make us this kind of church, Lord?
Won't you so get the gospel in our hearts
that we become those
that live like you
and act like you
and think like you
and behave like you.
And Father, I want to pray,
especially for those of us maybe that,
for whom this isn't just
a theoretical idea,
that are really in the reality of this,
that there's relational tension,
there's hardship,
there's those that are treating us
cruelly and wrongly.
God, won't you help us, I pray.
Won't you give us grace.
Won't you help us to take
the one first step on the journey.
We pray this in your wonderful
and your gracious name.
Amen.