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NewCity Orlando Sermons
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NewCity Orlando Sermons
Vision Series | Imagine People Who Have Enough
Pastor of Formation & Mission Benjamin Kandt continues our fall Vision series. Pastor Ben uses his experience at a silent disco as a springboard to discuss how we can all live in tune with the "kingdom of abundance and mercy." The Lord's Prayer serves as our choreography for life, reminding us to trust in God's provision and embrace a mindset of abundance, even when the world clings to scarcity and merit.
Pastor Ben addresses the unique challenges faced by the rich and the poor, highlighting the temptations of self-sufficiency and a forgetfulness of God. He draws from Proverbs 30:8 and the story of manna in Exodus to emphasize our daily dependence on God. He also discusses the call for socioeconomic diversity within the church, advocating for a community built on generosity and justice, inspired by Paul's teachings in 2 Corinthians 8.
Forgiveness and community are at the heart of the Lord's Prayer, and we see this as we explore the transformative power of seeking and extending forgiveness. Pastor Ben highlights the necessity of confessing sins within a trusted community, drawing from Dietrich Bonhoeffer's teachings. He underscores the importance of rapid repentance and maintaining clear relationships with God and others to prevent bitterness. Through Jesus' teachings, we are guided to live in dependence on God, embrace forgiveness, and practice sacrificial giving. In doing so, we gain practical wisdom for living a life rooted in abundance, justice, and community.
Hello everyone, this is Pastor Daniel. You're listening to Sermon Audio from New City, new City. At New City, we believe in all of us, in all of Jesus for all of life. For more resources, visit our website at newcityorg. Thanks for listening.
Speaker 2:In your presence. Let your word be our rule, your spirit, our teacher and your greater glory our supreme concern, through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen, if you will please remain standing for today's scripture reading, which comes from Matthew 6, 9 through 15. Pray then like this Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Pray then like this and lead us, not into temptation, but deliver us from evil, for if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. This is God's word. Thanks be to God, you can be seated. The American Pronunciation Guide Presents ''How to Pronounce Alana'' for our 10-year anniversary and Alana had one request.
Speaker 1:She said hey, if we go on this cruise, you have to do the silent disco with me. She had done one before. If you've never done the silent disco with me, she had done one before. If you've never done a silent disco, you're in a room that's eerily quiet because it's full of people with headphones on that are different colors that represent different songs that they're listening to. So you might have half the people blue, half green, or maybe there's a third and you've got red. And so you can tell who's dancing to your music by looking at people and seeing the ways that they move right. And so I go and do this because I promise I'm a good husband, da-da-da, and we're in the silent disco and it's weird because bodies are gyrating to different songs with different beats and tempos. And my favorite moment was when the two songs that I at least knew were playing were DJ Snake and Lil Jon's Turn Down For what? And Miley Cyrus' Party in the USA. I mean, right now I could take a hand, pull. Which one would you dance to in that moment? If you've ever danced with Alana, you know which one she danced to in that moment Lil Jon, and as I'm engaging in this and watching and, if you know, turn down for what? There's? A really amazing beat drop and you just see the whole place move in the same momentum, with the same choreography, at the same time, and I was reflecting on it and I actually think I did this I think I took out my phone and wrote down this sermon illustration in that moment, and here it is.
Speaker 1:At any given time, every human being is dancing, is moving through life to the choreography of one of two songs. One of two songs, one of which Jesus articulates in the Lord's Prayer. The other one is the default one that we are born into and that we have to constantly be turning away from and towards the one in the Lord's Prayer. Let me make that plain. You've got two worlds on offer in this existence of ours. The first one is the kingdom of abundance and mercy, articulated in the Lord's Prayer. The other one is the empire of scarcity and merit, which is the default assumption of every human being. And so what Jesus is doing in teaching his disciples to pray the Lord's Prayer, and what we're doing in putting forward the Lord's Prayer as our vision is, it's not simply a prayer, it is, that it's not even only a philosophy, it's also a choreography, it's a way to live and move through life according to a different beat and a different song with some different lyrics that has a different set of movements that go along with it. And so, to be really simple and succinct, people who live within the kingdom of abundance and mercy the father's house, if you will they live like a people who have enough. They live like a people who have enough. And so what I want to look at together is there's three of these petitions within the Lord's prayer that I want to ask the question what would it look like if we lived like we had enough? What would it look like if we lived like we had enough? If we tuned in to that song, the song of the Lord's prayer, that portrays this father who has a kingdom where there's enough to go around, there's abundance and mercy rather than scarcity and merit.
Speaker 1:And so, if you have a Bible or a device, go ahead and get Matthew, chapter 6, out in front of you. Many of you have memorized the Sermon on the Mount. All right, some of you memorized the Sermon on the Mount. If you've been in one of my dreadful circles, sermon on the Mount. All right, some of you memorize the Sermon on the Mount if you've been in one of my dreadful circles, wonderful circles but many of you have memorized the Lord's Prayer at the center of the Sermon on the Mount. The Sermon on the Mount builds like a mountain to this pinnacle which is the Lord's Prayer, and we're going to look at that together.
Speaker 1:So what I want to see is what does it look like to live like we have enough? And I want to look at the first petition here in Matthew 6, verse 11, which says this Give us this day our daily bread. Give us this day our daily bread. Now, one of the best places to learn about the Lord's Prayer is by reading the catechisms of our faith the Westminster shorter and larger catechisms, the Heidelberg catechism, luther's small and the catechisms of our faith. The Westminster shorter and larger catechisms, the Heidelberg catechism, luther's small and larger catechisms. They're amazing expositions of line by line of the Lord's Prayer. And this is what the Heidelberg catechism says about this petition.
Speaker 1:In the Lord's Prayer it says that when we pray this to our Father, we're saying take care of all our physical needs so that we come to know that you are the only source of everything good. Isn't that beautiful. That's what we pray when we say give us this day our daily bread. Or in Luther's larger catechism, he says that when we pray, give us this day our daily bread, we're praying for everything that contributes to your having and enjoying your daily bread. He goes on to say you have to open up your mind, you have to expand your thinking when you pray this part of the Lord's Prayer.
Speaker 1:This is why what does it take to get the Lord's bread I'm sorry, the daily bread on your table? What does that take? Bread on your table, what does that take? Well, luther encourages us to be a people who have enough to value vocation, and this is what I mean by that. In order for you to have the daily bread on your table, you have to back up. You have to go to the farmer and the miller and the person who drives the trucks and the baker, and the person who drives the trucks and the baker and the person who designs the websites and the systems and structures to make sure all those things happen. And then you have to have the public store clerk in the bakery who is able to give you the bread that you need. And then the person, the cashier, who checks you out, and then on and on and on. You see there's this incredible web of interdependence, just to get your daily bread to your table.
Speaker 1:Luther goes on to say if you don't have a government that's protecting properly and creating enough peace in order for that harmony of these different vocations to work together to get the daily bread to your table, what do you have? You have famine. And so when we pray, give us this day our daily bread. It means that we are a people who have enough to value vocation. We value all that it takes in order for God to answer that prayer in the way he prefers to answer it. What do I mean by that? Well, if we were to read on in Luther's catechism, he goes on to say this God could easily give you your grain and fruit without your plowing and planting, but he doesn't want to. Why? Because God loves to use secondary causes. Now, that's nerdy speak, but let me break that down for a moment.
Speaker 1:In the Westminster Convention of Faith we're getting like real Presbyterian up in here. I hope that's okay with you all. Bear with me. In the Westminster Confession of Faith, chapter 5, verse 3, or section 3, it says this God, in his ordinary providence, makes use of means, yet is free to work without above and against them at his pleasure. But listen to this in his ordinary way of working, god uses means. Here's what that means. God loves to work through your work. God delights in working through your work. When we pray, give us this day our daily bread. Your daily labors are part of the answers to those prayers for other people, even if you're not a baker or a farmer.
Speaker 1:I was fixing a pipe. We don't have a garbage disposal on our kitchen sink, which causes problems sometimes, and so our pipe got clogged up a couple weeks ago and I was pulling everything out from underneath the kitchen sink and I invited Augie, my oldest son he's about five and I said Augie, sit here and join me as I do this and guess who did not contribute helpfully to the fixing of that sink Augie, augie. But guess who brought a level of delight and joy to my father heart, as I did a pretty disgusting task, augie, the father doesn't need you, he doesn't need your work to accomplish his work, but he wants your work to accomplish his work. You see, we have enough to value vocation, because the Father is inviting you to join with him, as he provides for everyone in this world through your daily vocation. That's a big deal.
Speaker 1:It's a reframe on how we understand our jobs and what we do. Okay, the relevance to this is your vocation is the primary means by which God works in the world. Now, that's a very different way to view vocation in the Father's house, if you will, in the kingdom of abundance and mercy, versus the empire of scarcity and merit In that world. Empire of scarcity and merit In that world. What is work for?
Speaker 1:Work is a really good means to develop my sense of self-worth. In fact, it's a salvation narrative of sorts. If I work really hard and I get a high-paying, high-status job, then I've arrived. I am somebody you know. Instead of work being the means by which God brings goodness into the world, instead work is the means by which I secure an identity for myself, and so what that means is you are trapped in this performance cycle that presses on and on, relentlessly pursuing more and higher and greater, and achieving, or you've given up on the whole thing and you have zero ambition whatsoever. You see how that works. But Jesus is coming along and he's wanting to free us. He's saying, hey, we have enough for you to value vocation, because if you think about your work as vocation, it sets you free from thinking some jobs are more sophisticated than others and pursuing those, looking up to those or having a more sophisticated form of labor that you do and looking down on those who have seemingly more menial forms of work. That's one of the ways it sets you free. Another way it sets you free is it makes it so that you have the Father is the one who loves you and calls you and invites you and then sends you out to do work in his name, and that actually sets you free from having to secure a source of self through the work of your hands.
Speaker 1:Dorothy Sayers thought this was a big deal, so much so that she says the essential modern heresy is that work is not the expression of man's creative energy in the service of society, but only something one does to obtain money and leisure and I would add to that and status and self-worth. Do you see that she calls this an essential modern heresy, that your work is for you to get money and leisure? Some of you are like what else would it be for? For the creative expression of your energies, for the building up of the common good. That's the other alternative, because your work is joining in the Father's work as he provides for people who pray. Give us this day, our daily bread. And so the Lord's Prayer teaches us to be the kind of people who value vocation rather than getting caught up in a culture of careerism, and that's the kind of church we want New City to be. That's how the Lord's Prayer can function as vision for who we want to be as a people here. Second, under that same petition give us this day, our daily bread. We have enough to do generous justice. We have enough to do generous justice.
Speaker 1:As I was studying and meditating on this, I asked the question how do the rich pray? This part of the Lord's Prayer Give us this day, our daily bread. What does it look like? What does it look like for those of us who will never know what it's like to have an empty stomach if God doesn't answer this prayer? Now, I'm not saying everybody in here is in the same category. I know some of you are financially pressed right now, but rich is relative and all of you are relatively rich. So when I say that, when I ask that question, what I'm really getting at is what does it mean to pray? How can we pray for God to give us this day our daily bread when all of us can pay for our daily bread? What does that mean for us?
Speaker 1:Now, right here is where I'm going to avoid a pitfall In progressive Christianity. It's fashionable to do this move right here, where plenty and prosperity is unholy and poverty has this weird elevation as if it's a holier status. That's foolish, it's nonsense, it's not even biblical. But what I am saying is that the rich and the poor have unique temptations. Turn with me, if you have a Bible, to Proverbs, chapter 30, and we'll see one of those articulations of those unique temptations. Proverbs, chapter 30, verse 8, says it like this Proverbs 30, verse 8, says it like this Proverbs 30, verse 8.
Speaker 1:Remove far from me falsehood and lying. Here it is Give me neither poverty nor riches. Feed me with the food that is needful for me. That sounds a little bit like give us this day our daily bread, lest I be full and deny you and say who is the Lord, or lest I be poor and steal and profane the name of my God. You see, these unique temptations, the temptation of the full is to forget God and take all the credit. The temptation of the empty is to forsake God and take all. They need unique temptations, and so the reason why this matters is because beneath each of those temptations is a temptation that is kind of the substructure of sin, which is self-sufficiency. Both the full and the empty, the rich and the poor, are tempted in unique ways towards a version of self-sufficiency.
Speaker 1:And so, when we pray, give us this day our daily bread. It's bringing us into contact with our dependence and our interdependence. It pierces, it punctures our false sense of self-sufficiency. That's one of the ways in which this part of the text can actually really help us, you know, because many of us we actually either despise the poor or at least distance ourselves from the poor, because they remind us of our own vulnerabilities. Their neediness reminds us of our neediness, and we don't like that.
Speaker 1:And so, when we pray, give us this day our daily bread as rich people who can pay for our daily bread, what we're doing is we're extending open-handed trust, what Jesus calls being poor in spirit, and we're saying God, everything I have comes from you, all of my good comes from you, everything is from your hand. But there's something that happens when we pray this prayer One, it heightens the ways in which we defend ourselves against our own neediness. All of us have these complex structures to defend ourselves from our own sense of need. But when we pray this as the rich and the poor together and we say, give us this day, our daily bread, what it does is it challenges the arrogance of those of us who think that we get our daily bread on our own. But it doesn't just do that. It establishes the poor, the needy, among in our midst as a place of dignity. Now, if you look around New City, we are aware of and sensitive to the fact that we lack the diversity that we long for here. But one of the places of diversity that I think is maybe most close to the heart of God for this congregation is socioeconomic diversity that the rich and the poor would be able to pray together give us this day our daily bread, and that the rich would experience that as an invitation to do generous justice. What do I mean by that?
Speaker 1:If you're biblically, if you're tracking along, you hear this language of daily bread and it reminds you of the Exodus story, where God fed his people with manna in the wilderness and he gave them this miraculous bread that came down. He was not using secondary causes in that situation. They woke up to bread on the ground that they could pick up. But if you remember, they were not allowed to gather and store up any bread for tomorrow. Some of us would rather say give us this day our monthly bread. That'd be great right. Not in God's economy, why? Because he prizes dependence, he prizes you living not in the realm of scarcity and merit, which is what Israel grew up in in Egypt, but he wanted to free them from that, from the tyranny of that world, that empire, and bring them into the kingdom of abundance and mercy that depends daily on the Father. Give us this day our daily bread.
Speaker 1:But you'll notice, there's this thing that happens in Exodus 16, where the people who store it up, they actually get worms and it starts stinking the next day. It just gets disgusting. But there's this line in there where it says something to the effect of and everybody who gathered had enough and nobody had any lack. And the Apostle Paul picks up on that in 2 Corinthians 8. If you have a Bible, you can flip over to 2 Corinthians 8. And in 2 Corinthians 8, paul uses this to challenge the Corinthians who had wealth. The Corinthians were like New City in this sense they had resources. He challenges them and he says this your abundance at the present time should supply their needs, so that their abundance may supply your need, that there may be fairness.
Speaker 1:As it is written, and he quotes Exodus. Quote whoever gathered much had nothing left over and whoever gathered little had no lack. When we pray, give us this day our daily bread. It causes us to look around and say who goes without? Who goes without? Because there's a call on the church to be the kind of people who make sure that nobody goes without in our midst. Here's the principle. We are called, as the church, to eliminate poverty in our midst. Eliminate it. And we are called, as the church, to alleviate the poverty outside of us. You see the difference. We eliminate it within us. There are no poor in our midst. That's the call of the New Testament on you, new City.
Speaker 1:Now, if you don't believe me, look at Acts. You see how the early church worked this out. Acts 2. Says it like this and all who believed were together and had all things in common and they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all as any had need and day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. Praising God and having favor with all the people, and in my Bible, if you just flip over a couple pages to Acts 4, it says it like this there was not. This is verse 34 of Acts 4, there was not a needy person among them, for as many as were owners of land or houses, sold them and brought the proceeds of what was sold and laid it at the apostles' feet and it was distributed to each as any had need. Goes on to talk about how there was this equity among the people of God within the church.
Speaker 1:Now, some of you are still all hyped up on the following Jesus in politics series and you're like this sounds too socialist to me. Okay, well, notice, it was private property. That's a big deal. So they had private property and out of the willingness, cheerful giving of their own heart, they sold their own private property to give to the people who had need. But bear with me here. I really actually think this is an interesting. It's funny, it's a little tongue-in-cheek.
Speaker 1:Nassim Nicholas Taleb says it like this I am, at the Fed level, libertarian, at the state level, republican, at the local level, democrat, and with family and friends, I'm a socialist. What does he mean by that? It's a cheeky way of saying trust does not socially scale. The larger the number of people, the less trust you should have. That's essentially what he's saying, but what that means, though, is with our family and our friends, we are generous. We make sure there's no needy among us. That's what he's arguing for.
Speaker 1:That's me just taking somebody else commenting on politics and whatnot, but I'm saying the early church was known for the fact that you gave generously from your abundance in order that you could do generous justice. Why? Because you have enough. You live in the kingdom of abundance and mercy, and so one of the things that, if you read this in the context of the whole Sermon on the Mount, you realize, in Matthew 6, verse 2, just above this, few verses earlier Jesus says when you give to the needy and a little bit later he talks about how you cannot serve both God and mammon so Jesus expects that give us this day our daily bread. One of the ways the Father is going to answer that is through the secondary cause of the generosity of the brothers and sisters within this community. We have enough to do.
Speaker 1:Generous justice. That's what this petition is causing us to learn. Now, one of the things. I've said this before I think we're going to stand. Generous justice, that's what this petition is causing us to learn. Now, one of the things. I've said this before I think we're going to stand before Jesus. I have to give an account with your other elders for you. Okay, as a church, I'm going to stand before Jesus one day and give an account. That's Hebrews 13. It's a big deal and one of the things. I think Jesus is going to look and he's going to have a glint in his eye and he's going to smile and he's going to say New City had the Internal Mercy Fund and it was a way in which you practiced generous justice and I was so proud of it. I think he's going to say something like that. Now, we'll find out one day, but this is why I say this.
Speaker 1:I say this the Internal Mercy Fund you give 3% of your tithe, your gifts, your offerings to New City goes towards an Internal Mercy Fund to provide for those who go without within our congregation. It's a big deal In 2024, this year. So thus far we've given away $51,000 from the Internal Mercy Fund. Last year it was $77,000. And the year before that it was $54,000. The Internal Mercy Fund Last year it was $77,000 and the year before that it was $54,000. So we're building. We're on track for this to be the highest giving yet from the IMF to people who have anything from cars that break down to covering expenses for like rent and things like that, to counseling, to on and on and on.
Speaker 1:The IMF is one of the very practical ways in which we call you to give sacrificially so that we can distribute to any who has need. One of the calls of being apostolic, to being a leader in the church, is you have to be able to give. You have to be able to deal with money well, and so you entrust your elders with your generous tithes and offerings and the elders and the deacons distribute those to those who have need. That's the way that this works itself out practically here. Why do I? Why does this matter so much? Bruce Waltke said to be wicked is to disadvantage others in order to advantage yourself, and to be righteous is to disadvantage yourself in order to advantage others. I'm after your righteousness, I'm, after you, becoming the kind of people who have enough to do generous justice in a culture of competition and consumerism. Third and finally, we move from this to forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
Speaker 1:And with this petition, you notice that there's economic language being used here. The way in which Jesus frames this out is to think about the economies of the two different songs, if you will. In the economy of scarcity and merit, there's not enough to go around, and so it's a zero-sum game. If I have 25% of the pie, that means 75% is all that's left for anybody else. That's the economy of scarcity and merit. In the kingdom of abundance and mercy, there's always enough to go around. There's enough to cover all of our debts. There's always enough to go around. There's enough to cover all of our debts. And so Jesus is calling us to live as if that's true, and the way in which he wants to invite us into that is to leave the empire of scarcity and merit, because in that world there's no way to deal with our debts, and so we deny our debts. This is what I mean by that.
Speaker 1:In modern culture, we have mostly lost the category called sin. We live in what many have called a therapeutic culture. It shapes the way in which we think about ourselves and the world and everything in it, and so there's really two ways in which we get rid of our own sin in our modern culture. The first one is we psychologize it. The second one is we sociologize it. I made that up, I don't know if that's a word or not, but track with me. We psychologize our sin because it's never my fault, it's my trauma, it's my addictive potentiality, it's my family of origin, my mom and dad. They really did me a number. So when I get angry, it's because I'm just reacting the way I saw my father.
Speaker 1:Here's the thing. There's enough truth in everything that I just said to make it dangerous, because we psychologize ourselves out of sin. Nothing's your fault, or scale it a little bit bigger. We sociologize ourselves out of sin. We live in an age where we have this reverse honor-shame culture to where now victims have more honor than anybody, and so there's this really almost this competitive way in which we keep a record of wrongs against people, because if we can accumulate enough on our side, we can be the ultimate victim and thereby have greater status than anybody else.
Speaker 1:I'm summarizing some literature on this. I'm not making this up myself. This is a keystone of our cultural moment here in the United States. So we sociologize ourselves out of our sin because it's not my fault, it's the structures, it's not my fault, I'm just the product of my environment. It's not my fault, I'm just oppressed. It's their fault, the people who are on that side of the oppressor-oppressed binary. Take a deep breath, it's okay, relax. The reason why this matters so much is that if we psychologize our sin, we forfeit forgiveness. I long for you to experience forgiveness. It's way better than denying your guilt, and so Jesus is after our freedom here.
Speaker 1:Let me tell you a story about a friend of mine named Andrew. Andrew works in prison ministry here in Central Florida and Andrew is ministering to people who are public sinners and I guarantee every one of those has plenty of reasons. Every one of those prisoners has plenty of reasons to psychologize their sin or to sociologize their sin. I promise you that. Reasons to psychologize their sin or to sociologize their sin. I promise you that. But one of the things Andrew has told me is he has the joy of seeing these men who are broken because they can't really deny their guilt anymore Not all of them. And Andrew said he does this ritual with them where he has them write down all the sin that they know of on a piece of paper that they can think of, and he's like it's long. And then they fold that up into this ball and then he's got a cross that he lays out in the prison on the floor and they throw their balls of paper on this cross. And what Andrew does is and when they do this they say Jesus, I confess to you these sins and they're yours to take, not mine anymore. And what Andrew does is he goes, he collects all of those, puts them in a bag, takes them home where he burns them Apparently, fire in a prison is not a good idea and he videos as he burns all of these papers with all of these men's debts on them, of these papers with all of these men's debts on them.
Speaker 1:He comes back the next day and he shows them the video of him burning their debts and saying that's how you're, that's the way Jesus looks at your sins now. And he says some men smile, some men weep. Some men come back the next day and they said I've never slept so well in my life. You see, jesus is after your freedom. That's why he doesn't want you to psychologize your sin or sociologize your sin, or rationalize your sin or any eyes to get rid of your sin. Bring it to him. He has plenty. He has enough to have you forgiven, full and free. And so Jesus calls us to pray forgive us our debts.
Speaker 1:Now, it's encouraging to me that, since we pray daily for our daily bread, I think Jesus expects us to pray daily for forgiveness of debts, which means the assumption is, between now and when you see him face to face, you will sin every single day. You'll have debts that occur every day. Every day you'll have reason to go back to him and say forgive us this day, our daily bread, forgive us our debts. You're never going to outgrow that in the Christian life, and so some of you in here are hearing me talk about this. And you have in your soul, in the basement of your soul, in the dark kind of dingy corner of the basement of your soul, you have a door and it's locked and padlocked and chain locked, and behind that is that area where you don't really believe that the grace of God, that the forgiveness of Jesus, that the redemption he has on offer. You don't really believe that it's there for you In that place, in that one spot, in that area, in that memory, and so you've relegated it to the dark, dingy corner of your heart and you've made it this place where there's no access. You might believe. You might say you know, pastor Ben said that there's enough to cover all my debts, even that one. But here's my question how does the truth feel true, even for that part of your life? Well, like the rest of this, it's important to notice. He says forgive us our debts.
Speaker 1:The way that I think we overcome those areas is by confessing them in community of transparent trust. That's why we center circles on transparent trust, as you, having three to four to five people that know the secrets, that know what's behind that locked door, so that you can confess those things, you can be vulnerable, you can be transparent, you can be open and honest about those things, because 1 John 1 says that if we walk in the light, as he is in light, we have fellowship with God. Not only with God, but with one another as well. You see, the only way that the light of God's forgiveness makes it all the way to those dark places of your heart is when you confess in community with transparent trust. Here's why Dietrich Bonhoeffer said it better than anybody I know in his classic book on community called Life Together. Read it, it's like 100 pages. It's amazing.
Speaker 1:In that book he says it like this. The word he says Christ in my own heart is weaker than Christ in the mouth of my brother. What does he mean by that? When you bring those places, those darknesses, those sins, those failures, when you bring that place of shame, when you bring that to a brother or a sister and you say these are the things I've done, these are the things that seem unforgivable, and that brother or sister looks back at you with the mercy of Christ in their eyes and the word of the gospel in their mouth and they speak to you If you confess your sins, he is faithful and just to forgive you of your sins and to cleanse you from all unrighteousness. In that moment the word of Christ in your brother or sister's mouth is stronger than the weakness of your own heart and they speak to that place. And so many of you don't know that the grace of God is enough for you because you're unwilling to walk in openness and transparent trust in relationship with other people. One of the reasons why, if we want to see this vision realized at New City, we want every single one of you to be in a circle where you have regular reps of coming clean together. The adage that's become a truism in the addiction world is that you're only as sick as your secrets Come out from underneath them. Unlock that door, open it to others.
Speaker 1:The fact that this horizontal dimension of forgiveness and not just the vertical dimension of us and God, but us and each other is such a big deal, and why I'm emphasizing it it's because Jesus emphasizes it. Look, he goes like this forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. Immediately, he goes from vertical to horizontal. Do you notice that? And so when I say that there's enough to cover all debts, it's not just yours, between you and God, it's between you and your brother or sister, it's those debts too. And let me just be real, of all the things that you could double click on in the Lord's Prayer, jesus, why would you double click on this line, as we also have forgiven our debtors? What I mean by that? If you look back at Matthew, chapter 6, you'll notice that right after the Lord's Prayer, right when he finishes it.
Speaker 1:He doesn't talk more about your kingdom come. He doesn't talk more about hallowed be your name. He doesn't talk more about any of those, except for this one in verse 14. He says for if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly father will also forgive you, but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your father forgive your trespasses. Do you feel that? Do you feel the confrontational nature of that? Why does he? It wouldn't be me, it wouldn't be the one I double click on. Why does he then?
Speaker 1:I think Jesus is after your freedom. He's after your freedom here and he knows that your response of forgiveness towards other people is the acid test of your receiving forgiveness from God. It says a lot about you if you harbor bitterness and resentment towards other people. It says a lot about you, according to Jesus here. Now, if Jesus wanted to make it seem like your forgiveness with God is contingent upon your forgiveness of other people, it can sound like that. If you're not careful, he would have said this forgive us our debts because we have forgiven our debtors. He doesn't say that. What he says is that forgiveness towards other people requires this level of humility. That's got to be the same level of humility required if you're going to receive forgiveness for your debts. That basic willingness, that openness, that poverty of spirit has to be there towards other people if you're going to be able to receive from the Father. Okay, so this is significant because I sit with people as a pastor and as a counselor and I hear stories through teary eyes that can only be described, naturally, as unforgivable. And so some of you are in this room you're like you don't know man and I don't know You're right. But I know enough. I've heard enough stories. I've heard enough that make my heart wrench and turn inside out to know what it feels like to have stories of debtors against you that feel absolutely unforgivable in a natural sense. But what Jesus is doing is he's after your freedom. He's trying to help you not live in a world of scarcity and merit, where you give to people based on their deservedness. He's trying to welcome you into the kingdom of abundance and mercy. He's teaching you a choreography of what it looks like to live in this world. And the reason why is because what you do here, with this move, it shapes everything about how you view the Christian life.
Speaker 1:Miroslav Volf, who has experienced and seen firsthand a significant amount of trauma and evil and wickedness that you could not even ever imagine. In some ways he calls our unforgiveness of other people. He calls it a double exclusion, and what he means by that is we exclude them from the community of humanity and we, essentially, we exclude them from dignity. Our offender, our debtor. But we also exclude ourselves from the community of sinners. We deny our own depravity, we deny their dignity. They're not in the community of humanity and we deny our depravity. We're not in the community of sinners. It's a double exclusion.
Speaker 1:So what's the answer? We look at the cross. We look at the cross of Jesus Christ because right there is where we see that God takes every debt very seriously. Every debt will be paid, either in the judgment on Jesus on the cross or in hell for an eternity. As soon as you lose the doctrine of hell, if you don't like the wrath of God, the judgment of God which makes a lot of us prickle, I get it.
Speaker 1:If you don't like it, you will probably not be a very I'm sorry. If you don't believe it and have confidence that this is true, you will not be a very forgiving person. Why? Because if you can say vengeance is yours, lord, I will not repay because you will repay. Now you're freed up to welcome them back into the community of humanity and treat them with the dignity that they deserve, because it's God's business to deal with.
Speaker 1:But if you can also look at the cross, and on the cross you see that Jesus, in great love for you, died in order to pay your debt, you are welcome to embrace the fact that you belong in the community of sinners. That's where you belong. Christ came to pay a debt he did not owe. Because you have a debt you could never pay. That's the centerpiece of the cross.
Speaker 1:And so what that does that truth that I just said what it does is it both humbles us and exalts us at the same time. It humbles us because we realize it took the death of the Son of God to set you free from your debt. That's how bad it is. It exalts us because it says and the Son of God was willing to pay your debt. That's how much love he has for you. And so when we look at the cross, it humbles us, it exalts us, it breaks down the dividing wall between the self and the offender, the debtor, so that we can finally say forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. So, as we close, to summarize that if you want an unconditional relationship with your father in heaven, you are called to have an unconditional relationship with your brother or sister on earth Every time, if it's true that heaven is the place where everyone is forgiven and hell is the place where no one is forgiven. Every time you forgive, you're pulling a little bit of heaven down to earth, and every time you refuse forgiveness, you're pulling a little bit of hell down to earth. And every time you refuse forgiveness, you're pulling a little bit of hell up to earth. You see, jesus is trying to set you free from living with the bitterness, the resentment and the ways in which it diminishes the cross of Christ when you refuse to forgive other people.
Speaker 1:Now I wish I had time for a whole sermon on unforgiveness and how to do it, all the things. This is the best thing I can tell you. Read Tim Keller's book. He's got a book called Forgive and he wrote it. It's the last book he ever wrote and I think there's a reason for that. Read the book. It's phenomenal because there's all these categories of how do I forgive this person. What does it mean for abusers? All the things I understand. There's complexity here and I don't have time for it in this sermon. So read the book or let's talk. But what I will say just in practice, what does this look like for us? It looks like a simple thing I learned when I came to know Jesus through crew Keep short accounts.
Speaker 1:Keep short accounts with God as soon as you are aware of your sin. Practice rapid repentance Turn back, father. I did it again. Help me. Practice rapid repentance, turn back, father. I did it again. Help me Confess this. I claim your blood, jesus, to cleanse me from my sin. Keep short accounts with your spouse, your children. Keep short accounts with your roommates, your friends, your family, people within this church.
Speaker 1:Few things would divide and destroy a new city quite like bitterness and resentment and unforgiveness. Keep short accounts and that phrase comes from the economic language. Clear your checks. Don't let them stack up with debts over time. Either that you're holding and keeping a record of wrongs against others, or that you have with the Father or with others, and so the basis of that is that in his forgiveness, others. And so the basis of that is that in his forgiveness.
Speaker 1:Jesus says go, you've been set free from the penalty, the debt that you deserve. But Jesus also says come. He says come, you are welcome to live in my Father's house and to learn a new song. Let's pray, spirit of God. We cannot do any of these things apart from you. I pray for the wisdom that comes from above, the wisdom that can enable us to know what does it look like for us to live independence on you and live receiving and offering forgiveness. Jesus, we look to you, we thank you for the cross, we thank you for the gospel, the good news that we are debt free and therefore can forgive freely. Help us, it's in your name we pray, amen.