Good morning. Oh, that's not bad. The sun is out. It feels like there's some light at the end of
the rainy tunnel. And today's passage has got nothing controversial in it at all.
One of the great things about when you're preaching through a book of the Bible is you
come across passages which you just can't hide from. And that's a good thing because we don't
want to hide from what the Bible says to us. And what we're going to do, we're going to look at
this passage over a couple of weeks. So I'm not going to say everything here. There'll be some
juicy stuff for next week. So come back next week and we'll talk about that next week.
By the way, if you don't know me, my name is Chris. I'm on the pastoral staff here.
I'd love to meet you afterwards if I haven't met you already. I used to have an aunt who,
she was a great aunt, and she had Alzheimer's disease. And for those of you who have got
relatives or friends who've had Alzheimer's disease, you know that it's a terrible disease
and it causes you to kind of forget a whole load of things about yourself. You forget your identity.
You forget who you are. You forget who your family is. You forget what you're doing often
a lot of the time. And my abiding memory of my aunt is going around to visit her in her
flat. And we were there with the whole family. And I remember seeing her that she would forget
that we were there. And she would go out to the kitchen. And outside of the kitchen, there
was a goat. And she would stand there talking to the goat as if she was talking to her own
family. And you didn't know whether you would laugh or you cry. It was one of those kind
of strange situations because she'd forgotten who she was. She'd forgotten what she was about.
She'd forgotten how she was meant to relate to all the people around her.
And that's the kind of case of the church in Crete that we're looking at in the book of Titus.
And that's often the case with us. We get what I might call gospel amnesia. And that's why we're
looking at the book of Titus to remind us of what it means to be a healthy, living church,
knowing who we are and what we're meant to be here for in an unhealthy world around us.
And we kind of mentioned a little bit last week some of the issues that were going on
in Crete at the time. You see, the church planter Paul is writing to his crack elite soldier Titus.
Okay, you know when there's, Titus is like the Navy SEALs. You know, when everything's going out of
hand, you send in your best troops to deal and sort out the situation. That's what Titus is.
He's sent in to deal with a messy situation. The small church, which is in Crete, is surrounded
by a culture which is filled with just lying, corruption, greed, drunkenness, sexual promiscuity.
It's every man and woman for themselves. This church is supposed to be a beacon of light
in this community. But what's happened? Some false teachers have come in and they've started
teaching and saying things like, okay, you've got to stay pure from everybody else around you.
Okay? Sounds good. But then what they would say is, well, the way you do that is, first of all,
believe in Jesus to get saved. But after that, you've got to keep lots of rules. Okay? To be a
really good Christian, you've got to follow the rules. And you should do this. You shouldn't eat
that. You should do this. And that's what's going to make you a good Christian. And that's what we
called last week the performance-based religion. We call it the PBR virus, right? It infected the
church. And when they got the virus, what was happening? It was creating division in families.
And some people who kept the rules felt they were superior. Some people who didn't keep the rules
felt they were inferior. And everybody in their actual lives reflected nothing of the fruit of
love, joy, peace, and the goodness that is meant to flow from the gospel. They've got gospel amnesia.
And so Paul starts off the passage, and have your bulletin with you. And he says, basically,
Titus, but as for you, not like these guys, these other false teachers, but as for you, Titus,
teach what accords with sound doctrine. The way you as the church in Crete are going to be who you're
meant to be is not by telling people to keep all the rules. That's not going to change you. The way
that you're going to be this transformed community is if you teach and you model a lifestyle which is
infected with another virus, which is the gospel of grace. You see, when you get grace, then it shines
out in your actions because you get the PBR virus and it tells you you should not sin. It tells you
you should be different, which only makes you feel bad because you're struggling to do that anyway.
But the gospel tells you, you need not sin. You can be different because we have a savior,
a greater savior, who has defeated the power of sin and whose love and approval is more significant,
more satisfying than any reputation that you could seek, than any desire that you seek to be fulfilled.
And this is good news, that we have an amazing savior. And if you get that seed continually sown in your heart,
his love for you, fruit will be born. That's what he's saying. Okay? And he's saying that where you begin
to see the difference, if you want to know whether this seed of the gospel is really working in your life,
then look in, not just here on a Sunday, look in your everyday trenches of life. That's where you'll see
whether you've actually understood the gospel. It's in your private life. It's in your public life.
And what Paul's going to do in this passage is he's going to go through the whole household, basically.
He's going through older men, younger men, older women, younger women, and bond servants.
All of them would have lived in the same kind of house together, and there would have been people coming in
and out of the home. It wasn't like our private kind of Hong Kong homes. It would have been open.
People would have come in, come out. And so your faith is to be seen in the kitchen.
It's to be seen in the living room. It's to be seen in the workshop.
What shines out, if you've got the gospel, is a life which is different.
And Paul basically says, if you look in verse 10, the kind of climax to all of this,
and today we're really just going to focus on older men and older women.
And if you're younger, listen in, because if you don't think you're old,
well, this has still got something for you.
But verse 10 says, do you know what God's great mission strategy for the church is?
Verse 10 tells you what his mission strategy for the church is.
It's not great speakers. It's not great programs. It's not great events.
It's God's mission strategy is ordinary Christians living out their lives,
and verse 10 says, in everything, so that in everything, everything, that means in Greek, everything.
It means like how you're disciplining your kids, how you're treating your colleagues,
how you're changing the diapers of your kids, all those different things.
In everything, our lives may adorn the doctrine of God, our Savior.
Adorn means make attractive.
You know, like when I cook food, the food doesn't taste great,
and the presentation doesn't make you even want to taste it.
But when a Michelin star chef makes food, the taste will be amazing,
but the way he presents it draws you, attracts you to want to taste it.
That's in the same way that gospel is meant to do in our lives.
The gospel is always meant to be amazing.
It is amazing news.
But in our lives, our marriages, our relationships are like God's presentation,
so that the world can see this is good, come and taste it.
That's God's mission strategy.
That's what this is all about.
It's all about counter-cultural living,
which draws people to see how beautiful our Savior is.
So the question is, when people look at you,
when people look at Watermark, do they see any difference?
Do they see any difference?
So we're going to focus today on character.
Next week, we'll look at younger men and younger women.
But I want to talk about what character to develop
and then how we build that character.
Okay, just two simple things.
What character did you develop?
You know, we live in an age where we lack heroes, right?
If a Martian was to come down and say,
take me to your leader,
who would you take him to?
Like Taylor Swift, Tim Cook, Li Ka-Shing?
Who would you take them to?
You probably wouldn't take them to somebody of character,
known for character.
Because a hero is someone who has courage to sacrifice themselves
for the sake of others.
But we live in a society which values self-fulfillment
and self-expression more than self-denial and self-sacrifice.
You know, in the past, duty and sacrifice,
particularly for your family,
everyone thought that's what you should do.
And selfishness was wrong.
But because many of you have experienced,
people are just dutiful, often devoid of love.
So what happens is now, culture has shifted.
And the great philosopher Elsa says,
It's time to see what I can do,
to test the limits and break through.
No right or wrong, no rules for me, I'm free.
Let it go, let it go.
And I'm not going to sing it to you, okay?
It's okay.
You can be...
You see, what she's saying,
that's the kind of song of the age, right?
What she's saying is,
you mustn't let others dictate to you how to live your life.
Don't be restricted.
Fulfill your dreams.
Be true to yourself.
Achieve your potential.
Right?
So, work, we have to be fulfilled.
If you're not fulfilled, change your job.
In marriage, you've got to feel fulfilled
if you don't change your partner.
And we're left with very few models of character
who self-sacrifice for the sake of others.
You know, like people in the past,
Nelson Mandela and Gandhi and people who were put in that.
We have very few of those.
Instead, we have celebrities
who do self-expression,
like Lady Gaga or Elsa or continue the list.
And Paul is speaking to his culture,
to the older guys and women,
and he says,
you are to be a people,
not of self-fulfillment,
like all the other Cretans were following that,
but you are to be people of character.
And when the Bible talks about older and younger men and women,
we don't exactly know what age they're talking about,
but in Judaism,
we know that older men or women
could be anywhere from 40 upwards.
So, if you're going through a midlife crisis at the moment,
okay,
40 or upwards was considered to be an older man,
more or less,
and an older woman.
But let's look at what the passage says
about older men and older women.
Verse 2.
I'm looking at your bulletin.
It says,
older men are to be sober-minded,
dignified,
or worthy of respect,
that's what it means,
self-controlled,
sound in faith,
in love,
and in steadfastness.
I don't know if you noticed
that pretty well
every one of those characteristics
are everything that the Cretans weren't.
Okay?
Everything,
sober-minded,
that means not drunk.
Everyone else was getting drunk.
Dignified,
that means worthy of respect.
Something in your character
that is worth respecting
and looking up to.
Nobody else was doing that.
The sound in faith,
love,
and steadfastness.
Sound means healthy.
You ought to be healthy.
And this sound doctrine
is meant to lead to sound faith,
love,
and steadfastness.
We don't always kind of say the word
steadfastness.
Do you know what that means?
That means grit.
That means godly grit.
You know,
there's a psychologist
who's done a study on grit,
and she's called Duckworth,
and she says,
grit is the ability
to persevere
in pursuing a future goal
over a long period of time
and not giving up.
It's having stamina.
It's sticking with your future
day in,
day out,
not just for the week,
not just for the month,
but for years,
and working really hard
to make that future a reality.
Grit is living life
like it's a marathon,
not a sprint.
That's what Paul's saying.
Older men should have that.
Now,
I know not every older man
fits into this category,
and if you're younger,
listen up to these things,
but I know many older men
get to the point
where you feel like
you've done enough.
You know,
you've made enough money,
you've served enough,
and you begin to coast
spiritually.
You know,
what I often see is
people lose themselves
in their work.
You know,
they lose themselves
in their hobbies,
in their golf,
in their gadgets,
in all these different things,
and the whole direction
of your life
becomes about
getting enough money
to make sure
your kids
are just safely in college,
and then you can retire,
and then life
will be wonderful.
Wonderful.
And some of us
have lost,
have stopped
boldly
taking steps
of faith,
and having a godly
day-to-day grit
where we're seeing
how can I serve?
How can I love people?
How can I,
who are the people
that I can be investing
my life in?
Because you're coasting,
and you've lost
godly grit.
I don't know
if that's you.
Because if that's you,
what I often see happening
is as people go on
later in life,
and life has been
all about your own
fulfillment,
then things don't
kind of work out
your way.
You get kind of grumpy,
and cynical,
and stubborn,
and you think,
oh,
these young kids
these days,
you know,
they think everything
should fall into their laps,
not like we were
in the old days.
I wonder
if you can see
that in you.
Because if you can,
in the Bible,
there's just this amazing
guy who I think
is so inspirational.
He's called Caleb.
Caleb,
I mean,
he's the dude.
I mean,
when Israel
is going into
the promised land,
and they kind of
go in,
they send spies out,
first of all,
to go and scout out
the land.
And they go in there,
and there are these
big guys in there,
but it's an amazing
land.
The spies come back,
say to the people
of Israel,
hey,
this land,
it's amazing,
but there's some
big people there.
They're frightening.
Don't think we should
go in there.
But Caleb,
and one other guy,
Joshua,
say,
no,
we can go in there,
because our God
is bigger than those guys.
He's bigger than those guys.
But everyone else
refuses to listen to them,
and they just kind of
wander around the desert.
Fast forward 40 years.
Whole generation
has died out
except for two people.
Caleb and Joshua.
Caleb
is 85 years old.
He's 85 years old.
The people of Israel
go into the land,
they take Jericho,
and they're kind of
just beginning to settle
into the land.
And do you know
what Caleb does?
He's 85 years old.
He goes up to Joshua,
and he says,
hey,
Josh.
He says,
God promised me
that there's an area
over there
where there are people
who are against God,
and he's promised me
that I should go in
and take that land.
And I want to go in there
because my God is great,
and he's always done
what he said he's going to do.
So will you let me go?
And Joshua says,
okay, fine.
Go in and take that mountain.
And off goes Caleb
on his, like,
Zimmer frame,
on his little walker,
up the mountain
to go and fight
these people,
to overtake it
so that this land
becomes part of God's
promised inheritance
to him.
85 years old.
Most of us
would be wanting
just to sit and watch
the TV at that age.
Not Caleb.
Caleb was still going.
He had godly grit.
I want to be like him
when I'm older.
Don't you?
Do you want to be somebody
who's just managed
to get a handicap
of 25 in your golf
and you're content?
Because when you get
to heaven,
God's not going to say,
how good was your handicap?
He's going to say,
how were you faithful?
Where did you persevere?
Where did you have
sound love,
faith,
and steadfastness?
So some of you here,
you need to hear,
have you got gospel amnesia?
Have you forgotten
what God has called you
to be?
And the call for you
is stop coasting,
step up.
God wants to use you
to be a godly man
who's going to influence others.
So look out,
serve,
look to see who you can mentor,
look to see who the people
around you are
because God will use you.
That's the guys,
someone worthy
of looking up to.
But it works the same
with the older women too.
Verse 3,
it says,
the older women,
they are to be reverent
in behavior,
not slanderers
or slaves to much wine.
Reverent in behavior,
that's a word
that means
there is a godliness
that flows
from the inside out.
Flows from the inside,
there's something
innerly attractive
which just flows out,
it flows out
into your speech,
it flows out
into your conduct,
it flows out.
Just like with men,
there's temptations
for older women.
I heard one speaker
who said it like this,
older women
can sometimes
quit caring
what people think,
so they lose
their filters
on speaking their mind
or talking badly
about people.
Anyone know
what I'm talking about?
He said,
what is significant
is that that ugly spirit
was always there.
It was just hidden
under the charms
of beauty
and the desire
not to appear mean.
But as you get older,
he says,
your natural physical
beauty fades
and you quit caring
what people think
and then this selfish,
ugly character
comes out.
You see,
by contrast,
there are older women
that I know
who are tough as steel.
They've been through life.
They are not
pushovers at all
but they are the sweetest,
most loving people
that I know.
And they seem
more beautiful
in their older age
than they ever did
in their younger years.
Their beautiful character
grows and shines.
I don't know if you know
people like that.
I know people like that.
There is something
attractive about them.
I used to go
and visit two old people
in their 80s.
Every time I visited one,
I went away thinking,
when I'm your age,
I want to be like you.
I went to another one
and I came away thinking,
God,
please don't ever
let me be like her
when I'm her age.
Because you see,
we will display
in our old age
the fruit of the seed
that we've been watering
in our lives.
And what would it look like,
this preacher said,
if your physical beauty,
charm,
and your filters
were stripped away,
how beautiful would you be?
It's challenging, right?
It's challenging.
Because whether you're a guy
or whether you're a woman,
there is a,
we talked about
there's an outside of the cup
and there's an inside of the cup.
There's what you want others to see
and then there's what's hidden
in your heart.
You can clean the outside
and make yourself look beautiful
on the outside.
But what happens is
old age strips much
of the outside away.
Your success,
overtaken by others.
Your physical beauty,
sagging.
The education background
where you can't remember
anything you learn.
And what you're left with
is what spills out
from what was inside.
Someone once said,
be more concerned
with your character
than your reputation.
Because your character
is what you really are
while your reputation
is merely what you think,
is merely what others
think you are.
Right?
Be more concerned
with your character
than your reputation.
But the question is,
if you want to be someone
worthy of respect,
if you want to be someone
reverent in behavior,
how do you grow
to be somebody
of that character?
And so this is the second thing
I want to talk about.
It's just this growing,
how do we develop
this character?
There's a few things
I want to just mention.
First thing is this.
Character
is built
in the ordinary,
everyday moments
of life.
There's one or two,
there's three or four
major things
that happen in your life,
you know,
school,
marriage,
kids,
retirement.
In between
all those years,
there is 10,000
little moments
that come our way.
It is in those moments
and how you see
and respond
to those moments
that will develop
and change your character.
It's the annoyances,
it's the struggles,
it's the things
that you're facing right now.
This is what is shaping
your character.
Whatever age you are,
whatever age you are,
you are right now
becoming the person
you will be.
You are right now
making decisions,
you are choosing
who you will become.
Did you know that?
This week,
you are becoming
part of that process.
You know,
you're forming
the bedrock
of the rest of your life
this week.
And the thing is,
you can't say,
well,
when I'm less busy
then I work on my character.
You can't say that
because every day
you put off forgiving,
every day
you stay utterly obsessed
by your work,
every day
you actively continue
in criticalness,
you're adding another brick
into sealing up
the wall of your heart
and cementing in habits
of ungodliness.
That's challenging.
And as you get older,
you know,
it becomes even harder
to change
and harder to knock down
those walls.
But where do we go with this?
How does God change us?
James 1 verse 2 says,
Consider it pure joy,
my brothers and sisters,
whenever you face
trials of many kinds.
Consider it pure joy
because you know
that the testing
of your faith
produces
steadfastness,
grit.
Let steadfastness,
let grit
finish its work
so that you may be
mature and complete,
not lacking anything.
Testing of your faith.
Romans 5 says this,
We rejoice in our sufferings
knowing that suffering
produces endurance.
That's grit.
Endurance produces character
and character produces hope.
And hope doesn't disappoint us,
it says,
because God's poured out
his love in our hearts.
Did you hear what it said?
He said,
there's no three-month course
on character
where at the end
you get a certificate
and it's like,
ooh, made it.
Character is built every day
through the testing
of your life,
through the circumstances
that you go through,
the ups and downs of life,
everyday life
in your home.
What's going on
in your workplace?
That's where you learn character.
You know,
do you know how you get a,
you make a gemstone
like a diamond
or a ruby
from being a rough stone
to being smooth?
Do you know the process,
how it works?
It's through abrasion.
It's through rubbing
the rough stone
with all of its imperfections
against another hard,
gritty surface
continually over time
until it gets smoother.
right?
But do you know
what happens is
as the process
of kind of grinding
happens,
it creates heat
and you have
to stop it overheating
because if you allow
that heat to continue,
it will crack the gem.
So what they do
is they pour cold water
onto the gem
to stop it
from overheating
and cracking.
over time,
it then becomes
this beautiful
shaped diamond.
That's how God
grows our character.
You see,
we're all rough diamonds.
We all have
so many things
in our lives
where if I was
to create the list
of all the things
I wanted to change,
it would reach
higher than the room.
But what God does,
he brings abrasion,
he brings rubbing
into our lives
through circumstances
to knock off
those edges.
Tim Keller said,
suffering is
God's gymnasium.
It reveals
our spiritual weaknesses
just as a workout
reveals physical weaknesses.
You see,
I don't know
what he's bringing
into your life
right at the moment.
You know what
I tend to do?
When he brings
people,
annoying people
into my life,
when he brings
circumstances
frustrating circumstances
into my life,
I think everything else
and everyone else
is the problem.
Right?
It's,
I mean,
it's my wife,
it's my family,
it's my job,
it's my this,
that's the problem.
But actually,
what God is doing,
he's inviting us
to see what is
inside of the cup
in our lives
and to begin
to knock off
the edges
in our lives.
I think I may have
shown you
this before,
but let me,
let me get in trouble here.
There's some water
here.
If I,
if I shake this water,
it came out of the cup,
why did the water
come out of the cup?
Why?
Okay.
Did it come out
because of shaking?
Maybe.
But why didn't tea
come out?
Because water
was inside the cup
already.
Right?
You see,
the shaking in life
is our circumstances.
People,
things.
That shakes us.
But what comes out
your reactions,
your anger,
your frustration,
all of those things,
that actually reveals
what's actually
already inside.
inside.
And so,
it's amazing
how God,
God brings people
into your life.
Like,
I thought I was
fairly sensitive
before I got married.
And then I realized
I'm as sensitive
as a sledgehammer.
Do you know,
I'm,
you know,
God brings people,
if you're married,
your marriage is
one of the greatest
tools God wants
to use to make,
grow your character.
If you're single,
the people God
places around you
and your work
is one of your
greatest tools
to grow your character.
But we look at it
and we think,
God,
get me out of here.
And God says,
I'm growing grit
in you.
Keep looking to me.
Because the choices
we make when we're
faced to those things
determine whether
you'll become
a beautiful old person
or one you want
to avoid.
How do we do this?
Because
when I'm infected
with the PBR virus,
my own performance,
how do I choose
to change?
The way I respond
is this,
to these things
which come out
in my life
when I see my
imperfections,
all of those things.
I justify myself.
I justify myself
because what I do
is I show all the good,
all the things,
the big sins
that I've avoided.
Okay?
I've show all the big sins,
I've avoided those things
and I forget to see
the blemishes
of my character
which are kind of
inside the cup
and I just say,
that's just me.
And, you know,
it's just small.
And again,
Tim Keller says this,
he says,
while our thoughts
always seem small to us
due to the natural
self-justification
of the heart,
they often don't look
small to others.
As a result,
these small thoughts
cause large swathes
of the Christian population
to have little influence
on others for Christ.
You see,
we stop adorning
the gospel
in our responses
because we justify
ourselves
because we don't realize
that the good qualities
that we think we have
also have a shadow side.
For example,
you're a person
who has strong convictions.
That's good.
But you're also
sometimes unteachable,
opinionated,
don't listen to others,
won't admit you're wrong.
Yeah,
won't admit you're wrong.
Right?
You may be friendly
and outgoing,
that's good.
But we're so easily offended
and hurt by others'
real or imagined criticism.
You may be laid back,
it's good,
not stressed easily.
But maybe you're also
apathetic
and not passionately
loving people.
We all have,
every one of us,
myself included,
we look at one side
of the coin
and say,
look,
I have strong convictions,
I'm very friendly,
I'm great.
But we don't see
the flip side
of the coin.
But our spouse
sees the flip side
of the coin.
Your colleagues
see the flip side
of the coin.
Everybody else
sees the flip side
of the coin.
But how do we
work through that?
What we need
to keep us from cracking,
when those things
come out,
you need the cold water
of the gospel
poured into your life.
Because otherwise,
what you're going
to go away with
is you're going
to go with,
either you're going
to go with feeling
crushed and condemned
because I'm not good enough.
Or you're going
to get into how,
okay,
I should do this,
I shouldn't do this.
That's going to be
moving to PBR virus syndrome.
The gospel does
a couple of things.
What it does is this.
First,
it helps you to see
your own sinfulness,
your own flaws.
You recognize.
You recognize
that your worst
character flaws
are the ones
that you're most blind to.
Do you know that?
The worst character flaws
that you have
are the ones
that you probably
don't even realize
you have.
You see,
they're the ones
that I minimize
and I justify.
You know,
when I'm in a fight
with my wife,
I can see all her flaws
very clearly.
It's amazing.
But I'm totally
blind to my own.
And I say things like,
I'm not worrying,
I'm just concerned.
I'm not being harsh,
I'm just honest.
And you know,
those things
are good things,
but actually,
on the right occasion,
those are good things,
but often,
we allow them
to mask the shadow side
that we fail to see
that our worrying stems
from not trusting in God,
our harshness stems
from pride
and lack of love.
And the gospel
helps you to see.
So if you're married
and I was to ask
your spouse,
what's your biggest flaw?
Character flaw.
I wonder
whether you would say
exactly the same thing
as your spouse would.
If you're not married,
if you're single,
I wonder
if you went up
to a friend
and asked them,
what do you think
my biggest flaw is?
What they would say
and whether you would agree.
And I challenge you
to go and do that.
Go and do that.
Because if you're concerned
for character,
then you want to be able
to see
where the areas
in your life
you need to grow in.
Or you'll see
where,
if you don't want to do that,
where you're just concerned
about outside of the cup.
But the second thing
that you'll see
to help you
to see
your own flaws
is people around you.
You know,
in a world of celebrities
with few role models,
you need to surround yourself
with godly people.
Because you know,
that's what our community groups
are about.
Do you realize?
It's trying to surround yourself
with a group of people
who want to grow
in their walk with God.
because you rarely
learn your faults
just by being told
your faults.
You need to be shown
your faults.
And do you know
how you get shown
your faults?
It's,
when you're brought
next to a person
who's living
the way you should
be living but aren't,
okay,
it's,
you may not think
yourself as impatient
or abrasive
or oversensitive,
but then when you come
next to somebody
who's incredibly patient
or who's very gentle
or who's very compassionate
or very content
and then you suddenly see,
oh.
You see,
that's God
putting his finger
on something
to say,
now I want to begin
that process
of refining you.
So are you surrounding
yourself with godly people?
That's the question.
Because don't expect
to grow character
if you're not.
Not godly,
character.
Because the people
you surround yourself
with,
you'll become
like those people.
But it's all very well
to say,
okay,
now I see my character
flaws.
That can be quite depressing.
We see all the things
which are wrong with us
that still can sound like
you should,
you should be better.
But what the gospel
comes in and says,
how do you change?
How do you stop
from cracking
under the weight
of condemnation
or the weight
of your own
sinfulness
that's released?
You need the cool
water of the gospel
to flow into your soul
daily.
And what I mean
by that is this.
If you take time
to consider
just how deep
God's love
and kindness
for you
really is.
That's why we did
communion.
That's why
when you spend time
with God,
you remember
that in spite
of the fact
that I and you
are as broken
as anything,
He didn't give up
on us.
He showed
complete compassion.
He died
to make you
perfect and delightful
in the Father's eyes.
He gives you
His righteousness
which means
He takes off
this stinking,
filthy clothes
of all my sinful
character flaws.
He takes it off
the performance
that I couldn't do.
He then puts
on His beautiful
robes of righteousness
on me.
He looks at me.
He looks at you.
If you have trusted
in Christ
and says,
beautiful,
beautiful.
There's nothing
you can do
to make me love
you anymore.
There's nothing
you can do
that will make me
love you
any less.
You're secure.
And we say this
every week,
but you know,
do you know
the reason why?
It's because
I'm going to go out
tomorrow and I'm
going to forget it.
And you're going
to forget it.
Because when you
begin to see
that kind of love
daily,
it will melt
your heart
and you'll
begin to hate
the character
flaws in you,
not tolerate them.
And you won't
be about
justifying yourself
and ignoring them.
You will hate
them because you
think,
if God can love
me that much,
how can I keep
rebelling against
Him in these ways?
And character
is grown,
not through being
perfect.
We'll never get
there until
Christ comes,
but it's
through repentance.
And repentance
will become a
habit,
a way of life
as a child
learning to walk
who keeps
stumbling
and she reaches
her hand back
to her father
to pick her up,
set her back
on her feet again,
and that just
becomes a habit
of the heart
again and again
and again.
And repentance,
not justifying
myself,
but running
back to a
father who
loves me
will give you
godly grit
to run a race,
to give you
a humility
to see your
character flaws,
but a confidence
that you are
loved and
accepted and
you'll shine out
like a diamond
increasingly in
the world.
So when you go
into your home,
when you go
into your
workplace,
you don't have
to justify
yourself.
You're secure.
And that,
in an insecure
world,
will adorn
the gospel.
Let's pray.
Father,
I pray that
you would,
I pray that
you help us
to actually
want to be
people of
character.
But we
can't make it
just by
ourselves.
We need
you.
We need
you.
I recognize
in my life
I so often
trivialize the
things which
are just as
blemishes,
but Lord,
help me to
face them.
Help us to
face them,
but not to
run away
because it's
so painful
facing what
we're really
like sometimes,
but to realize
that that cool
water of the
gospel pours
onto the heat
and takes
away that
heat so
that we
see you
and we
love you
and we
see how
beautiful you
are.
And that
causes us to
want to
follow you,
to want to
love you,
to want to
love our
families,
to want to
love the
people around
because you're
good.
In Jesus' name,
Amen.