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Morning, everyone. How are we? You look good. Welcome to first b. Very glad to have you.
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What do you say we stand up? We'll sing to our lord. Psalm one zero five. Give thanks to the Lord. Proclaim his greatness.
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Let the whole world know what he has done. Alright. With enthusiasm. Are you ready?
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Children of the living God come Sing for the morning. Sing the morning when he comes in the clouds. Glory suns. The morning when he
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Amen. Y'all can be seated.
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Amen. How are you this morning? Great. Alright. So, last week, I mentioned the announcements and how I wanted to shorten them.
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So, here are some brief announcements, okay? Welcome. I forget to say that a lot. Y'all are welcome. I'm glad that you're here and all summer long when I don't say it to the visitors, I still mean it.
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Welcome. Weekly events are all on at the normal times. Is there any ministry I absolutely must announce right now? Grab a bulletin for all the other announcements and that really is it. Would you stand up and greet one another?
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When I was sinking, when I was sinking, I was sinking down, sinking down. When I was sinking down, sinking down. When I was sinking down
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From Colossians, it says, since you've been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above where Christ is. Seated at the right hand of God. Set your mind on the things above, not on earthly things. For your die for you died and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. We have a new life.
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We have a new identity. When Christ, who is your life, appears, you also appear with him in glory. That verse provides a lot of hope and a lot of encouragement to me. And, I've got another one for you too I wanna share, and it's from John six. Jesus said, I'm the bread of life, and whoever comes to me will never be hungry again.
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He fills that void. Whoever believes in me will never be thirsty again. God, I thank you for just being you, for being great and awesome and worthy of our praise and being the well that that doesn't run dry. Lord, as we give our our gifts and offerings to you, it's it's more than just a little bit of money in the break. It's really we're saying that we we love you and we trust you.
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And we're thankful. And I pray God that you would use these use these gifts. Use these offerings God to to build your kingdom. To advance your kingdom. You say that we we can't take anything with us when we go.
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And so we're paying it forward, storing up treasure in heaven. And just trust in God that you'll use it to just draw more and more people to yourself and draw us to yourself as well too through this. It really is an honor to give to you. I pray that you would bless the gift and the giving. In Jesus' name.
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Y'all can have a seat.
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Some songs are more you know, they're more like prayers, and, we'll sing this one and, just invite you to to kinda take it in. It might sound familiar, might not, but the words really are rich and the prayer is saying, God, would you give me your eyes to see?
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Amen. So, I am going to invite up Eric Wakab who is right now the chief, well, the moderator now, chief elder, moderator of the church.
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Good morning. It is one of my jobs here at the church and a privilege to head up the board of trustees and kinda be the bridge between the the board of elders and board of trustees. And I have something very exciting to announce, and that is that you've heard rumblings for a long time now about a potential remodel of the kitchen and the the fellowship hall, and we are gonna move ahead with that full steam. It's been it's been a long time coming. I'm I'm I'm excited about it too.
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I'd I appreciate those cheers. It's something that we started thinking about two years ago when we passed out a survey to the to the whole congregation and to lots of different folks who are involved with all the many different ministries that we have here at the church. And we came back with several safety concerns that that we needed to address with the church building. One of those things was the the egress window down in the nursery and there's some other things that are are still making their way up to the top of the list here. But nearly universal on that survey was that the kitchen really needed improvement.
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Almost every ministry in our church at some point over the course of the year makes use of of the kitchen and the fellowship hall. And we as a as a leadership team have looked at that and said it is integral to everything that we do here as a as a church body. It really is. So I'm gonna call up Kevin Olson and he's gonna tell you some more details about it. But I wanted to let you know that the the questions that might be in your your mind are, why this?
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Why this project? And the answer is because because you as a congregation have come back to us and said, yes, that kitchen really needs help. And the the second question is, why now? And Kevin is going to share a bit about that. And over the next several weeks, we're going to hear from some of these different ministries about about why now, about why it is really important.
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The final thing I want to leave you with is that as a as the board of elders, as the board of trustees, as the heads of various ministries, the the the men's ministries, the women's ministries, the children's ministries, the Monday night, the the whole leadership of the church and the body, I think, as a whole is excited about this and is is deeply supportive of this project. So with that, Kevin's gonna share a bit more about it and tell you about how that project is gonna move forward.
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Thanks Eric. Yes, I'm Kevin Olson and I missed a meeting and so now I'm in charge of the capital campaign for this project. So I wanted to take a few minutes and introduce you guys to our family fellowship faith. And this is our capital campaign to raise $250,000 to completely remodel and renovate our kitchen and fellowship hall. And so over the next couple of minutes, these are not mine, whose are these?
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Are these yours?
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They are.
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Okay. So over the next couple of minutes, we're just gonna walk you through a few slides to introduce you to the project. And kind of show you and ask you how you can join us in this campaign together. So, you know, it all starts where it ends and that's what the mission here at First Baptist Church. And as many of you know, our mission is to, with all we are, love God and love people through Christ.
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And as a body, that's been our rallying call for decades. And as the decades have gone by, our body has grown and grown. And some of you may not know that we are a formidable force when we take a look at this capital campaign. Because we have over 400 weekly attendees through all of our services and over two twenty members. And when you look at that commitment to what Christ can do through our church and what we as a church body can do in our community, we have great confidence as your church's leadership team to go forward with this.
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And it's great to have a mission, it's great to have a body, but all this culminates in what we do here in Jackson Hole with First Baptist Church. And first and foremost, that's to grow our faith but then more importantly, take that faith out to the streets and out to the world through our calling. The fellowship aspect of what this church does manifest itself through the various ministries that you see here on the slide. On the worship side of things, we all participate in the various services at 9AM, 11AM, Monday night in our Spanish speaking service. On the outreach side, you know that Steve Landis rallies us hard to commit to missions both here in the valley but also in The United States and around the world.
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On the Connect side, you see the volunteers that come forward and greet us, pass the offering plates around, set up things in the connect hour in the fellowship hall, and also plan a lot of events that bring folks from outside of the church family into our walls. On the grow side, this is where our ministries happen with our men, our women, our youth, our small groups, and many many more that happen behind the scenes that you may not even be aware of. And then lastly, our service ministry is the nursery, the bereavement, new members, bridges, and others. And so as Eric alluded to, as we completed that survey, it was two years ago October, we felt that the highest priority because of how many of these ministries interface with the kitchen and how conveniently we didn't even plan that, Carl the bread of life. And if we have that bread of life through Christ, we will not go hungry.
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And so it's appropriate that we take a look at how we use the kitchen and the fellowship hall to bring people into our walls and how to connect us as a church body. And so as we looked at this project, as you guys know, we operate on a very tight budget. I also serve as the volunteer treasurer. And our giving is really what sustains all these ministries. And fortunately, our giving has been strong and consistent but it does not have the capacity to take on a project of this magnitude.
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And so that's why we're opening up this capital campaign. But just to give you one little slice of how we look at the church's finances, many of you know that we have a parsonage in Rafter J. And with the suggestion of one of our church members, the mortgage on that parsonage has not been looked at for a while. And so we recently looked at it and we found a way to refinance that mortgage into a significantly shorter period of time without a big impact on our monthly mortgage payment. But the reality is we saved $200,000 in mortgage payments by reducing the life of that loan.
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And so in our mind when that gear clicked, that gave us some financial freedom as we move forward to not have that liability but to channel that opportunity to move forward with this project. And so over the course of a couple of years, there's been a lot of prayer that have gone into this and that's why the time is now. So I'll walk you through real quick what the project entails. This project is not about expanding buildings, making things pretty. It's more about equipping ministries.
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And so to that end, we are gonna do a complete upgrade to the kitchen which will include commercial grade appliances, an expanded pantry, new cabinetry, counter surfaces and storage, a new meal preparation counter, a double sided buffet line for all those who've been waiting in line for minutes and minutes and minutes and minutes. New flooring and then a coffee and beverage station that's adjacent to the kitchen area. In addition to that, we'll at the same time working on the kitchen, we'll update the fellowship hall and improve its capacity to serve the different fellowship areas that we do in that room. We'll put new carpet tiles in so that when we get that coffee spill and it won't come up, we can pick up that carpet tile, put a new one down, and then we're all good. We will expand to the west of the fellowship hall including new patio doors and a new deck that will give us great flexibility and freedom in the summertime to go outside and make things happen on Monday nights and to to sit around, have coffee, use the patio chairs and the seating that'll be on that deck.
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We'll put new storage on the southern end of that building so that the chairs don't have to impede our sitting area in that building. And then most importantly, as it relates to safety, we'll put egress windows in the library from the basement up and in the nursery from the basement up. And that's one of the last little safety areas that we wanna address through this project as well. So just to help you envision and the light's not great here but this is a rendering that we've worked with Chris Carter at Bison Lumber and Cabinetry to help us picture how the improvements will manifest themselves into this new space. And while you can't see this that well here, I would invite you to go out to the back as you leave today.
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You'll see a couple of these renderings there and they're also in the fellowship hall. And this doesn't happen cheaply. Whenever you do a remodel project, I'm not a contractor, but all the contractors we've talked to, they're like, oh, man, it's a remodel. You never know what you're going to run into when you start going into those walls. And so we've worked with contractors and John Heisey on our board of trustees is serving as kind of the construction lead on this project.
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But as you can see, when you start cycling through all the various components of a remodel of this type, it all adds up. And that brings us to us. And so we in faith are stepping out on this capital campaign to raise $250,000 And we're gonna attempt to do that over the next nine weeks. So literally kicking off today and trying to culminate by December 23. And the great news is we're not starting from scratch.
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The church and a challenge within the leadership of the church has come together to already commit $50,000 towards getting this project up and off the ground. And so, that in large part reduces the burden that we have to try and make this project happen. And we are literally starting today with our contributions and pledges. We hope to those of you who would rather donate a cash or a check up front versus pledging, we're hoping to have those contributions in house by the thirty first. For those of you who want to make pledges, we'll be wrapping up the pledge part of the campaign on June 30.
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And the construction time line will run from April through July and we think that's a good window to get all of this done. And so it all comes down to how we make it happen and that's us. That's you, that's me, that's how we come together as a church body to help fund this campaign. We like the timing because many of you start to prioritize your year end giving as we get closer to December and so we prayerfully ask you to contribute to consider contributing during time of year. All of your contributions to the church are tax deductible and as you leave today, our elders will be at the exit doors and they'll have pledge forms to give you so that you can consider how you can help us move this project along.
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And in closing, hopefully that gives you a little bit of the essence of what we're doing here. I'll be in the back to answer any questions you may have. Please understand that this is fluid. There are some of you in the congregation here who are in the trades. Some of you may have a particular passion for certain areas.
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So for instance, if you're passionate for pancakes or you have a belly for bacon, you can offset the cost of the range with your gift that you give us. So please let us know how you want to be involved and if you have suggestions, if you're in the trades and you want to donate in kind toward making this project happen, I'll be the person that can work with you to help facilitate that gift. Also, you can track me down to the church office as we go through this campaign so that we can work with you one on one with your needs and your wishes for the project. So, thank you very much for listening to how we're going to make the family fellowship faith pledge campaign happen. And we look forward to opening up the new kitchen and fellowship hall in July with all of us in attendance and in celebration.
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Just a little bit. Alright. Now, the kids, that's good. Faith, family, and fellowship, good to have the family stick around. Kiddos, Peak Children's Church is starting up right now.
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Imma give you a minute. We usually lead in with the song. I'm going give you thirty seconds. How about that? Fifteen seconds.
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Just to center yourselves a little bit. You can pray about that or pray about what I'm going to say. Either one of em works. God, I thank you. I do thank you for all that you have provided and all that you are providing.
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I thank you that you're good and I pray that we can reflect your goodness in everything that we do. In Jesus name. Amen. So, Romans thirteen eight through 10. Here we are.
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Romans thirteen eight through 10. Y'all know that we're continuing the study and I mentioned last week that this part of Romans actually when we got to 12, it went from theology and answering a few questions for a few chapters. So, it went theology really up through eight and then nine, ten, and 11, we're answering a couple of questions about Israel and then, when it gets to 12, it's application. All the way to the end of the book, it's application, application, application. So, if I say exactly what it says, it's an application sermon.
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Twelve one and two talks about us presenting our bodies or presenting our members as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to God for that's our reasonable service. So, that is the center of the bull's eye. I mentioned this several times last week because as we move out from that bull's eye, if we are aiming at this, the next concentric circle around that will be the church. How we use our specific gifting to do what it is and a project like the kitchen, you do see a lot of different people working together for the last two years to figure that out and then definitely within their gifting. The church, how are we going to serve the church in those next few verses?
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And then outside of that is outsiders. For the next few verses and then, last week, we talked about the government. I don't know what it is. Maybe it's this season but I have had more request this week for that sermon than any in a long long time. It almost feels like that those verses feels like an antidote to what we've been going through politically in this season.
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So, that's the government. Now, we're starting to go back inward and it's going back towards the center of the bull's eye in this week's. I mentioned this last week and I try to always think about this when I'm preparing to present is I want for you to understand what it says, what it means, and that's why we spend the time in the original languages and things like that. Why spend the time with the grammar. What does it say?
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What does it mean? And how am I gonna be obedient to it? So that's the think about that as we go forward today. So, with that, I'm going to start off. I've been doing this study in Romans primarily out of the New American Standard Version of the Bible.
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I think that that's the one that to to me, it seems like it's the closest to the way that y'all speak that we as Americans speak with great consideration given to the original word order and what it actually says. But I like all the modern versions, I'm not that particular. New American Standard says, owe nothing to anyone. The new revised standard version says, owe no one anything. So, if you see these two, owe nothing to anyone and owe no one anything as Americans who've just finished school, is it wrong to lend or to borrow?
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I mean, if those are the two two statements, owe nothing to anyone and or owe no one anything, is it wrong to lend or to borrow? What do you think? Is it? Other places in the Bible, we kind of have to go to shed a little bit light on this. First of all, this is a dependent clause.
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I've got a few bankers that are smiling back there. Is it wrong to lend or borrow? Well, Matthew five forty two, Jesus says, give to him who asks of you and do not turn away from him who wants to borrow from you. I did not plan this either, Kevin. I'm sorry.
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That's just where we are. Psalm thirty seven twenty one, the wicked borrows and does not pay back but the righteous is gracious and gives. The does not pay back part is the part where the Bible always points out. There are expected that we will have some obligations in life. It's saying pay your bills.
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Pay your bills on time even. Actually, the NIV which I don't use very often. The NIV says, let no debt remain outstanding. This is one of the most poetic verses to me in the new in the New International, in the New Testament. Let no debt remain outstanding and that is a good translation although it pays no attention to what the Greek says.
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Let no debt remain outstanding is a better because of the action of the verb. Does that make sense? NASB and the new revised standard pay real close attention to exactly what it says but this gets what it means a little better. So, you know I do the R McD version every once in a while, the Ray McDaniel version of the Bible. Usually, it's when there's a second person plural y'all in there because I want to emphasize it to y'all.
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Well, today, I'm going to use the T McD. That is not Tanya McDaniel. That is Toby McDaniel. That's Toby right there. That's my younger brother and Toby and I grew up in the same house and y'all think I have a southern accent.
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I don't. I'm completely neutral compared to Toby. So, I'm doing the Toby McDaniel this morning. Don't be owing nothing to nobody. Exclamation point.
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That is really close to what the Greek says. It's really really close to it because it's actually triple negative. Double negatives intensify things and it says, don't know nothing to don't know nothing to nobody. And then it says, but set to love one another. The loving one another is what this is about.
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So don't be owing nothing to nobody but set to love one another. That's what it's about. The love part of this. NASB says, owe nothing to anyone except to love one another. The new revised says, owe no one anything except to love one another.
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The loving one another is what it's about and we'll see that because it keeps on going for the next three verses. I only have three verses that I'm covering today from this section but it points a lot of different places in the New Testament when you say this. Let no debt remain outstanding except the continuing debt to love one another, NIV says. That is paying attention to the verb tenses of the Greek. Not the exact words, but the verb tenses.
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Do not be owing anything perpetually. Do not be in lack. You should be gaining on your debt and not falling back on your debt. That's convicting for me. It's a convicting for our society, I think, if we pay attention to it.
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So, let no debt remain outstanding. Pay your bills and pay em on time. Except, you're never going to catch up with enough love. You owe love Especially if you're a believer and you've been given the love of God. We love because he first loved us.
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You owe that love to everyone and you're never gonna catch up with it. You can't get to the point where you say, I have loved you enough. I am paid off. Get out of my house. Okay?
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It's a continuing debt and that is very reflective of what it says. Don't be owing nothing to nobody, my brother would say, but except to love one another. Indeed. He loves the word indeed. Indeed, it's an intensifier.
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Loving the other has fulfilled the law. This is exactly the sense of it. That participle loving, loving the other has fulfilled the law. Now, there are two ways you can look at this and most of the English translations say, the one who loves or whoever loves or if you love, you have fulfilled the law. Loving the other has fulfilled the law.
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Jesus said, do not think that I came to abolish the law or the prophets. I did not come to abolish. I came to fulfill. Praise God. Love has fulfilled the law.
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Jesus has fulfilled the law but he lives his life out through his continuing body that is the body of Christ. So, he came to about not to abolish but to fulfill. The law and the prophets NASB, oh no one, oh nothing to anyone except for to love one another for he who loves his neighbor has fulfilled the law. Oh, nothing to oh, no one anything new at revised standard says except to love one another. For the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.
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Now, the another right there. Usually, when Paul says, love one another, usually it's for Christians. Now, I've already showed you the bull's eye. Loving God means loving the church and loving outsiders and even being obedient to the government and when he starts honing back in, he says, love one another. Every soul is the way we started off last week.
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Let every soul be in subjection to the authorities that are over it. This is not just for Christians. Everyone does owe love. Now, some people are more equipped to pay that debt than others and if you've been given love from God, you can give it to others. The one who loves another has filled the law, opens it up to where this is not just our family.
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It's not a circle the wagons only for our people. It's for everyone. The other, another. He follows it up in a few minutes with neighbor. So, we'll go into that for a minute too.
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Let no debt remain outstanding and these says, except the continuing debt to love one another for for whoever loves others, that's all others, has fulfilled the law. Amen. I could stop right there. That's a powerful verse especially when you hear it from three different, four different versions, six different times. If you meditate on that for a while, love is what fulfills the law.
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Paul will start to explain in verse nine and then he comes back around and covers it again in verse 10 but he says, thirteen nine, for this, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not covet. Where does that come from? 10 commandments, right? And if there is any other commandment, so it's a representative list, not an exhaustive list right there but you shall not commit adultery, you shall not murder, you shall not steal, you shall not covet, and if there's any other commandment, it's summed up in the saying, you shall love your neighbor as yourself. You agree with that?
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If you love your neighbor as yourself, you would not cheat on them or invite someone else into your marriage or seek out and destroy a marriage. If you loved your neighbor, murder, obviously, I think, to take someone's life, not a nice thing to do. To steal from them, covet. I started looking up images for the golden rule. You know, do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
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That's pretty good rule to live by. That's why they call it the golden rule. You should love your neighbor as yourself. When I'm looking at these, I've told that, I've said this a bunch of times. God starts off with the foundation that I am the Lord thy God.
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I am. Period. Just that is. That's not a commandment. I am the Lord your God.
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Because of that, the first four have to deal with our relationship with God, having no other gods before God, not making any graven image to worship, not taking the name of the Lord, thy God in vain. Remembering the Sabbath day and keeping holy but this whole tablet over here, the next six have to do with our relationship with people. Honoring your father and mother. That's a personal relationship. Not killing.
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That's a very personal relationship. Not committing adultery. I don't think there can be a closer human relationship that that one interferes with. Thou shall not steal, thou shall not bear false witness or lie, thou shall not covet. So, he's repeating that back and I just thought, is this something that's pretty central to the Bible?
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Yes, it is I've said a bunch of times, there's no mercy in the 10 commandments. It just shows us where we can go wrong but I wanted you to see. It's in Exodus 20. You shall not murder, commit adultery, steal, covet. Same ones that he list in Romans.
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It's in Deuteronomy. Deuteronomy actually means a second statement of the law. You shall not murder, you shall not commit adultery, shall not steal, covet. It's in Leviticus that you shall love your neighbor as yourself. Now how do you get from you shall love your neighbor as yourself to an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth?
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You shall not take vengeance nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. I'm the Lord. It's in Matthew 19. Someone came to him and said, teacher, what good things shall I do that I may obtain eternal life and he said to him, why are you asking me about what's good? There's only one who's good but if you wish to enter into life, keep the commandments.
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Jesus says, keep the commandments. He did come to fulfill the law but he says, just do that. You know what it is, don't you? Then he said to him, which ones? Jesus said, don't commit murder or adultery or steal, bear false witness, honor your father and mother, and love your neighbor as yourself.
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So, he brings in both the 10 commandments and that passage from Leviticus. The young man said, all of these things I have kept from my youth. What am I still lacking? And Jesus said, if you wish to complete, go and sell your possessions, give to the poor, and you have treasure in heaven, come follow me. But when the young man heard this statement, he went away grieving for he was the one who owned much property.
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Now, that's a whole different sermon. But it backs up that Jesus is saying, these commandments still have some force, people. Now, we've set up a lot of hedges around those commandments. Jesus bores in on em. I had a good friend when I was in seminary, a really, really good friend who had speech impediment and had some real difficulties with communication.
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He's a brilliant guy but could not communicate very well. We were doing a project about the 10 commandments and so we went around, we were videotaping the answers of people, catching them on the street, catching our professors off guard and saying, do you believe in the 10 commandments? Yes, what are they? Oh, and they start listing them off and a lot of them were kind of, oh, professors all got them eventually. When I asked Nathan, I said, Nathan, what are do you believe in 10 commandments?
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He said, yes. I said, what are they? He said, love, lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength and your neighbor as yourself and I said, that's not the 10 commandments. He said, Jesus said it was. Alright.
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So, the same thing we had in Exodus, we we get again in Romans 13, that Exodus and Leviticus. Now, the problem is, Jesus expanding the definitions for those sins. We know when I say murder, y'all all know what murder is. It's killing somebody. Jesus said, oh, if you have hatred in your heart towards your brother, adultery.
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We know what adultery is but Jesus says, if you even think about that, if you would do that, entertaining that lust in your heart going after you've already done. Wow. Are there any of us who don't stand guilty? No. Verse 10 says, love does no wrong to a neighbor.
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Therefore, love is the fulfillment of the law. That's the NASB. Love does no wrong to a neighbor. Therefore, love is the fulfillment of the law. To a neighbor and when I when I hear this, I always think of the same story.
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Y'all probably do too. If you've been in church, you think of this story from Luke ten twenty five to 37. On one occasion, an expert in the law. You see how people just came up and ask him questions. He spoke with as one having authority and he had an ever increasing conflict with the religious folk.
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On one occasion, an expert in the law, religious guy, stood up to test Jesus, teacher. He asked, what must I do to inherit eternal life? Now, it was the same thing the other guy asked him. What's written in the law? Jesus replied, how do you read it?
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And he answered, love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and love your neighbor as yourself. So, this is not new to Jesus, right? This has been since Leviticus. It's been all the way back. This is the way it should have been.
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Love is what the law is about. And Jesus replied, you have answered correctly. Do this and you will live. You know, he was testing Jesus though. He knew the answer.
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Was he practicing that answer? It's hard to tell. We don't get that from the text but he was testing Jesus. What we're supposed to test and approve? It's not necessarily that it was a bad thing.
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Pharisees get a bad rap. Maybe he was really sincere. I hope he was. Do this and you will live. But he wanted to justify himself.
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Do you wanna justify yourself? I do. I want for the things that I do to have been right. Now, they're not always right. So in humility, I should say, I will I'm doing the best that I can where I'll fall short.
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Will you forgive me? To my fellow people and to my God. Wanting to justify himself, he asked Jesus, and who is my neighbor? And in reply, Jesus said a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho. How many of y'all been to Israel?
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I have not been to Israel. How many of y'all been to Israel? I see one hand. Few hands out there. Good.
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Have you been from Jerusalem to Jericho? So it's 23 miles from Jerusalem to Jericho and it's a 3,000 foot difference in height. 3,000 feet. From the valley floor to the top of Teton Pass is only 2,000 feet. 2,140 something feet.
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It looks like that. Now, what's that look like to y'all? It looks a lot like looking off a Teton Pass down towards Jackson. That is going down from Jerusalem towards Jericho on an old Roman road, old rocky road. There are lots and lots and lots of places along the Wadi Kilt, this dry bed, riverbed that's dry most of the year.
50:58
There are lots of places along that to hide. There are lots of places to have a rock to pick up. And going down through there is a pretty lonely road. All you have to be is around the curve and not be able to see what's going on in front of you or behind you. That's that's actually a modern shot of it right there but it's still there.
51:20
Road's still there. And in replied, Jesus said, a man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho. 3,000 feet of elevation change, 23 mile trip. When he was attacked by robbers, they stripped him of his clothes, they beat him, and they went away, leaving him half dead. Now, a priest happened to be coming down the same road and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side.
51:46
So to a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, he passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, who are the most hated folks by the Jews? Whoo. They wouldn't even walk through Samaria. Walking down if I showed the map again from Galilee down to Jerusalem.
52:03
They wouldn't even walk through Samaria. They would walk along the river to get around it and then come up at 3,000. Would you go over to you know, 50% more of Teton Pass to keep from walking through a neighborhood you didn't want to be in? Instead of camelback and there was a way. There's it's not like there wasn't a way.
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But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring an oil, pouring on oil and wine, medicinal. Then he put the man on his own donkey and brought him to an inn and took care of him. The next day, he took out 2 denarii and gave it to the innkeeper. Look after him, he said, and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.
52:58
Now, which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers? And the expert in the law replied, the one who had mercy on him. And Jesus told him, go and do likewise. The good Samaritan by I'm terrible with French but from 1880, The man was stripped naked, and he put him on his own donkey, loaded him up after doing what he could medicinally for him and took him from there to an end. This is actually a Rembrandt.
53:38
This is the first one I thought of. Was Rembrandt's Good Samaritan, and it's an oil painting from 1630. He did a lot of studies for it as he was preparing to do this and some of them the scene is a little wider, some of them is a little narrower but he wanted to show him that he was turning him over to an innkeeper and taking care continuing to love him instead of just picking him up. Although the religious people had already passed him by. So he picks him up.
54:04
He takes him into town. He pays his way. It's not his obligation, but he's stepping into the territory of loving. So that's an oil painting. Actually, this one too was an illustration that this is an intaglio print.
54:22
So he made the thing. This is actually probably from all of those studies that he did for this painting. He did this one. Now they're looking opposite directions because it's a plate. You draw on the plate, you engrave onto a plate, and then you ink it and you make multiples of it.
54:37
And so this is the same thing. This one has a dog and a little boy, and it's a little expanded scene. The point is he's taking this guy and he's talking to the innkeeper, and he's trying to make sure that he's well cared for. Then ASB says, love is the fulfillment of the law. This road is still there.
55:05
This is a guy hiking along this path right here. It's still kinda dangerous. So our, you know, our paths, not just in the mountains, but our paths day to day are still kinda dangerous. There are people who will take advantage. And there are people who will just pass by.
55:28
The song that Carl sang that we sang during the offering today, the give me your eyes. That's a little bit outside of our range. It felt a little funky for us to try to play that one but we wanted to give give me your eyes for just one second. Give me your eyes, lord, so I can see. How did I miss this?
55:42
How have I missed this? I want to be in the spot of being the good Samaritan. I want to be the guy who is a neighbor. I wanna be the one who sees it and does something about it. So, I wanna read something the last when we were in chapter 12 of Romans, I said, you know, what we have received for years and years as imperatives about loving.
56:04
I want to just read what love is so that we recognize it, okay? You hear this one in weddings but if you want to, you can read along with me. You can close your eyes and just let it kind of bathe over you. This is from first Corinthians and I'm going go straight to Romans 12 and close out with what love is. Love is patient.
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So, love is a fulfillment of the law and love is patient. If you're not being patient, you are not fulfilling the law. Does that make sense? Love is kind. If you are not being kind, you are not fulfilling the law.
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It's not things done begrudgingly so that you can do them. It's love seeks the best of the other. Love is not jealous. It doesn't look at what someone else has. Oh, what's that one about?
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Coveting. Do not covet. Don't look at something that somebody else has and wish you had it. Don't be jealous. Love is not jealous.
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Love does not brag. Recognizing that God has given every good and perfect gift outside of our merit and because he is good and merciful, do not brag. Love does not brag. Love is not arrogant. Love does not act unbecomingly.
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Love does not seek its own way. Love is not easily provoked to anger. I struggled a bit with anger this week. Pray for me. Love does not take into account a wrong suffered.
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I like better. Love keeps no record of wrongs because I think that a lot of us have a list that we're carrying around. Love keeps no record of wrongs. Wipe that slate clean. Love does not rejoice in unrighteousness.
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Love rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things. Love believes all things. Love hopes all things hope that I know that there's a certainty out there. The women's retreat was last weekend and it was about heaven.
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The incorruptible hope of having that on the other end of this. Love hopes all things. Love endures all things. Love never fails and that's from first Corinthians 13 and then, in twelve nine through 12, we talked about love without hypocrisy and love without hypocrisy is and I put people in front of it because it it matters here. Demonstrable love.
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It's not just a sentimental feeling. It is demonstrable. Love without hypocrisy is people abhorring what is evil. People clinging to the good. People being devoted to one another.
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People esteeming one another in honor. People not lagging in diligence. Love without hypocrisy is people being fervent in spirit and people serving the Lord and people rejoicing in that hope. It's people being patient in tribulation. It's people being constant in prayer.
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It's people contributing to the needs of the saints. It's people practicing hospitality. It keeps going and this is just from five verses. People rejoicing with those who rejoice is love without hypocrisy. People mourning with those who mourn, people being like minded towards one another.
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People not being haughty minded, people willingly associating with the downtrodden, people not being wise in their own minds, people not repaying evil for evil, people preparing in advance to be good to all, People living in peace with others. People not avenging themselves. People trust in God to judge and to repay. It's people feeding the hungry and people not being overcome by evil, but it is people overcoming evil with good. Amen.
1:00:10
So for me, I'm gonna start using Romans 12 in weddings. I think that it's just as much a picture. It's a really clear picture. So the application point for today is how is it that we can be fulfilling the law? Be loving people.
1:00:26
Be loving people, not just our people, but other people. Last week when I talked about the government and being obedient to the government, being actually subject to the authorities that are over you. There's a greater authority than government and God is it. When you're shooting for the center of the bull's eye and in his case, the government had this document that they went by or they said they were going by and he was calling them out to go by the documentary, non violent, very civil. He's a baptist preacher from Georgia.
1:00:55
I'm a baptist preacher from Georgia. I love this guy. I listened to a couple of his sermons this week and one of them struck me. It was called Love Your Enemies from 1957 and this part of it hit me pretty hard. He goes, I think that the first reason that we must have love for our enemies is that hate for hate only intensifies the existence of hate and evil in the universe.
1:01:21
If I hit you and you hit me and I hit you back, then you hit me back and go on, you see. That goes on in ad infinitum. It just never ends. Somewhere, somebody must have a little sense and that's the strong person. The strong person is the person who can cut off the chain of hate, the chain of evil, love because hate destroys the hater and the hated.
1:01:47
He also told a story about and since we're talking about the Wadi Kilton Teton Pass, he told a story about driving from Atlanta to Chattanooga. 1957, that was a more dangerous journey especially for a black man and his brother, AB. So, he's riding along with his brother and his brother's driving and he said, this particularly even in the people being mighty discourteous and people were not dimming their lights. For some reason, they were not dimming the lights and so the brother said, don't go next one of those jokers that comes along and Dutton dim his lights at me. I'm just going to blind him back and he said, oh no, don't do that.
1:02:20
Martin Luther King says from the passenger seat, no. No. There'll be way too much. Way too much headlights in this highway. Don't do that because you blinded him and him blinded you were doubly destroyed.
1:02:32
You pay attention. You do the right thing and you pay attention. Somebody, somewhere got to have some sense. The strong person is the person who can cut off the chain of hate. It's the person that can just take it and turn another cheek.
1:02:51
So love your enemies. That's the application point. This one I've I've had in my rattling around in my head since high school. Everything else is just evil one upmanship. Do you get that?
1:03:06
Everything else is just evil one upmanship. You're just waiting on your opportunity to get them back. So love your enemies. It's the only way to break that cycle of hate. Carl, you wanna come on back up?
1:03:24
I did Google that to see if I I stole it from somebody. I don't think I did. Everything else is one upmanship. Love your enemies.
1:04:55
We will work.
1:06:09
Amen and the benediction today is from Romans twelve fourteen. Be blessing. Be blessing even those who are persecuting y'all. Be blessed and do not be cursing them. In Jesus name, lord, that's the only way that's going to happen.
1:06:26
Lord, I thank you for your perfect sacrificial love that you came and you love the other. God, thank you for sending Jesus. Jesus, thank you for coming and thank you for walking out that life in full obedience to the law of love. In Jesus name, lord, would you allow us and use us to be blessing and not cursing. In Jesus name, amen.
