Christ Centered Service

On the recent trip that I made to Europe, I took the opportunity to go through a number of different museums that were there in Hungary and Holland and Vienna. I saw each of the countries that I was in. They all had various forms of art, but two of them were major art museums. One in Amsterdam and one was in Vienna. It was the one in Vienna that kind of struck me as I was going through it. At the amount of art that was devoted to images of Christ and various scenes of his life and death and the passion, you would see very large paintings, especially in the museum in Vienna, that were dealing with some aspect. Most of them seemed like some aspect of Christ's suffering and death, which is a very major theme of artists, master artists for centuries, as they have tried to depict in art the life and particularly the death and suffering of Jesus Christ. Some of the paintings were quite dark, especially the ones that seemed to be done by some of the Dutch painters and some of the Spanish painters. They just seemed to have a kind of a dark, brooding background to them. The imagery of Christ was just something that you look at it and it was personally not appealing to me. It didn't augment my faith. It didn't help my feeling about God or certainly about Christ in any way. Obviously, I've grown up in the church with a whole different approach toward images of Jesus Christ that obviously we don't do that. You don't need that as a form of worship, as a violation of the commandment. But the art world, especially the Catholic Church and other churches that have depicted this in forms of art over the years, have done it in many different ways. I would have to say that as I was going through the museum in Vienna, I kept walking a little bit faster past a lot of these because they just were depressing and didn't really do all that much for me. There were a few other types of paintings that did catch my attention, but not those that dealt with trying to portray Jesus coming down off the cross or hanging on the cross or being beaten in some way. It just didn't do justice to the image of Jesus as no image can, as no human depiction of Christ, no matter whether it's something from the ancient world, from the medieval world, from great art, or from some modern depiction. Nothing really can do justice to the image and portrayal of Jesus Christ. It just isn't really possible when you study the Scriptures and study the life of Christ and you certainly understand the truth and you understand that God says, don't make any graven image or bow down to it, and we are not to do that. You understand that the image of Christ is something that is of a far different nature that we should understand than what can be presented on a canvas by any artist from any period of time in any particular way. In Colossians chapter 1, we have a statement by Paul that I think brings us to this image of Jesus as much or more than anything else, and really the only thing that matters. In Colossians chapter 1 and in verse 27, we'll jump right to this, he says, To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you the hope of glory. Christ in you the hope of glory.

And so Paul brings out that this idea of Christ in us is a very deep mystery of the ages hidden from the world, but it is a rich part of the mystery of God made known to the Gentiles Christ in us, the hope of glory. Now, we will talk and do always talk about this a great deal during the Passover and Unleavened Bread season in terms of imbibing of the bread of life and Christ's life being lived within us. But in reality, this is the prime image of Jesus Christ that is of utmost importance. And perhaps Paul has got it captured in this particular verse about as well as any other of his writings in that sense in terms of the image that matters, the image of Jesus Christ. Now, as we in the United Church of God move forward from our present time and the events of the past months, it is extremely important that we refocus on this matter of Christ's life within us and the image, if you will, of Jesus Christ as much as anything else. The theme of the recently completed ministerial conference looked to Christ and advanced the work, encapsulated where we are what we need to be doing. And it really did set the tone for a very positive meeting for the over 200 elders and wives, actually over 300 elders and wives who were in attendance at the meeting. In the one-day Council of Elders session that we had following the two-day meeting, we came to a conclusion on this idea that we all agree to is important for us to imbibe of and put within our culture if we are going to move ahead and learn from the past so that nothing like what we have lived through is ever repeated again in our lifetime and God help us if it is. We pray that it will not be. But I think all of us gathered, all of the ministry gathered there and all of us on the Council I know recognize that if we do not learn, then God help us. And we all agree that the key to the learning and the key to prevention of repetition of anything near what we have lived through is this very aspect of looking to Christ and yielding ourselves as we have never done before, which is why we named or came up with the concept that we want to move forward with of Christ-centered, Christ-like service. I hesitate on that because we have had, starts on this in the past, we have talked about Christ-centered service, we have talked about servant leadership, we have talked about godly leadership. We have identified this as a program, tried to codify it through a task force ten years ago. We see clearly from certain scriptures that we'll go over what it is that we need to do. We've had various names. And we centered on this concept of Christ-centered service, Christ-led service. I keep getting it, which shows you just how much I need to focus on it myself, Christ-led service. We're not talking about leadership because when you use that term, you tend to think, well, that's just for the leaders. It's not the case. It's for everybody. And it is becoming Christ-like.

It is for every one of us to learn and to understand. I'm being very careful in the choice of my words, even, so that I don't use the word program. Because it's not a program. It is something that must be in our spiritual DNA. Every one of us in the church. If it's not, then we are not living up to our scriptural teaching. We are not living up to it.

We are in our lives as we need to. It is not something that you can put into a book. You can't put it into a notebook. And I hope I never see a notebook with that title on it from us. Not that you couldn't put notes into a notebook, I suppose. But when you tend to try to bring something down to a notebook or to a program or to a seminar or this or to that, it doesn't really do it justice.

And on something like this, it is far more than that. It has to be lived, thought, grieved by every one of us. And I will admit my need in learning it, being better at bringing it out as well and teaching it. All of us, I think, in the ministry understand that. So what I'd like to do this afternoon is go through a summary of one of the presentations that brought this out at the recent conference and go through four critical reasons for this.

For all of us to focus on this and to talk about it. We could talk about six reasons or sixteen reasons in that sense. Four doesn't do it all justice, you don't want to be here until six o'clock listening to me in the sermon. But I think I can bring this out in such a way that we at least lay it out here and give you a sense for where we are, what we discussed in the ministry, and needing this and needing to talk about it and live it as we teach it and bring it about in our lives.

The first reason, the first point is that this understanding of being Christ-like in our service, in all aspects of our life, is important and critical for even being a part of the future kingdom of God. In fact, if we don't learn it, if we don't let it become a part of our character, there is a chance we won't be in the kingdom of God because Christ says this is what is at the heart of it. In Matthew 18, beginning in verse 1, at that time it says, the disciples came to Jesus saying, Who then is greatest in the kingdom of heaven?

Then Jesus called a little child to him, and he set him in the midst of them. And he said, Assuredly, I say to you, unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of heaven. We know this verse. We read it every year when we bless our children.

Therefore whoever humbles himself as this little child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Whoever receives one little child like this in my name receives me. To be like a child.

In other words, in this one sense we can realize that as a child continues to grow and to develop to maturity, so we have to have a sense and a feeling that we are always needing to change and to grow in our maturity and in our image and grow to the point where we come to the image of Jesus Christ.

And we come to a fullness of what that image really is in the way we speak, in the way we think, in the way we deal with each other, the way we portray ourselves to the world. That must be at the very heart of it and always being willing to be humbled when circumstances and events point out that we are not quite there and to take it personally in that sense. In chapter 20 of Matthew, in verse 25, when another time of dispute with the mother of Zebedee's sons came and asked him something of him and they wanted to sit on his right and left hand in the kingdom.

They wanted tenure. They wanted their position sealed. He said in verse 25, but Jesus called them to himself and said, you know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them and those who are great exercise authority over them. Yet it shall not be so among you, but whoever desires to become great among you, let him be your servant. And whoever desires to be first among you, let him be your slave, just as the son of man did not come to be served but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many.

This is the essence of Christ's life. The Gentiles lord it over each other and those who are great exercise authority over them. What we've just witnessed in Egypt with the overthrow of President Hosni Mubarak after less than three weeks of demonstrations in the streets of Cairo and Alexandria and other places there, and finally yesterday it appears that the military gave him the ultimatum that he had to go. One thing you should understand regardless of what you read or what else is said about the situation that's just occurred and come to this point, at least in Egypt, is it's the military that's calling the shots.

And they will determine what goes forward from here in terms of whatever elections, who will become the next ruler, whatever. And it's been that way since the early 50s when the military ousted the last king that they had, a fellow named King Farouk, who had been placed there by the British and himself was a despot. He abused his position, his power, money, and the army threw him out in 1951-52.

Well, the army's basically been the ones, the three rulers or presidents, Nasser, Sadat, and Nambu Barak, all were in top men in the army. That's how they became the top men in Egypt. The army calls the shots in Egypt. It is the strongest institution.

So they called this one yesterday, and when they pulled the plug on Barak, he was gone. They will, for the time being, they will determine, and they have the power to make it happen. If any other element seeks to take it beyond perhaps where it has gone now, there will probably be more bloodshed before something is settled. So it's still a very interesting developing story to watch. But the reason that it has happened is because of what Jesus talks about right here.

The Gentiles lord it over. Barak became president when Sadat was assassinated by a fundamentalist element because he made peace with Israel back in 1978. And he's ruled for nearly 30 years, it will be 30 years next year. And billions and billions of dollars of American aid have gone into Egypt. Over a billion dollars a year just goes to the military. And there are multiple millions more that go to the Egyptian government. We send the same amount to Israel. What I'm saying is we bought that peace. We've bought the peace between Egypt and Israel during these last three decades.

That's not necessarily bad in one sense, but Mubarak didn't let that money trickle down, let's say, throughout all aspects of Egyptian society and eventually they took to the streets.

It's a lesson of history. That when someone, when a leader does not rule righteously, there will be a revolution. People will rise up. It happened in Russia in 1917, it happened in France in 1789, it happened in America in 1776. Revolutions, except for ours, those others, took different turns. In France they started chopping everybody's heads off. And in Russia it led to the gulags of Lenin and Stalin. But what Christ said here is true.

When those things happen, when a leader does not rule righteously, no matter its politics, business-related organizationalism, churches, there will be changes. Sometimes there will be violent changes. Jesus was modeling and laying out the model that works. And it will be the model of the kingdom of God and anyone who will be in that kingdom. It is a model of service. It is a model that seeks the good for everyone else and does not take advantage of that. It seeks the path to greatness through service. This is the model that Christ laid out. And when we learn that lesson, we will be learning one of the greatest lessons of the kingdom.

And that's why we are talking about Christ-like service. And I will tell you in our best efforts to even try to put a name on what we are talking about. We are trying to convey the depth of meaning that we almost have and that it is not just for the ministry. It is for the youngest person in the audience. It is for the oldest member in attendance. It is for the pastor. It is for an elder. It is for a deacon. It is for a deaconess.

It is for you. And you do not have to be ordained, have hands laid upon you, designated, nominated, elected, have I covered everything, to do what Jesus says. You don't. That is one of the myths that I think we still labor with in the church. Because we have had a culture that in the past was authoritarian and still comes around to, in our thinking at times, to cloud these very scriptures and the meaning that we should take from them. I chuckle at myself. I have been a minister for 37 years.

I have been an ordained minister for 36 or 7 years in the ministry, a couple more than that. And I do not have the ability to do that. I have been very, very glad that this is what I have been able to do, spend my life doing. I chuckle at times when individuals feel that they must be ordained to an office, to be recognized, to be validated, to have authority, or to even fulfill a verse like this.

And that ambition becomes such a driving force that it clouds so many other fine Christian personal elements that should be there. At times when I have seen it, I thought to myself, well, if I could give mine to you, I would, and you can see what burden goes with it.

Because with the responsibility comes a burden. And in moments of my time over the years, I have wondered what it would have been like, what it would be like if I did not have that. I have never wondered to the point where I wanted to walk away from it, because I accept it as a calling, and that God has placed me in that responsibility and opportunity. But to want it, if it is not supposed to be, or to covet that, is something that I have come to learn with the years of experience, that I just kind of stand back when I see it, and someone I think, you don't know what you are asking for. You don't know what. What it is that it is all about. The point is, you don't have to have that to fulfill these point, these attitudes, and this service, this Christ-minded service, Christ-like service, that Jesus speaks to in these and many other verses. Every one of us has that imperative upon us, regardless of what we have designated or ordained to or given to us in the church.

You don't have to have that to serve and to have that heart and attitude that he is talking about here. He encourages us to discipline ourselves, and when he talks about sacrifice, he is talking to each one of us back in chapter 16. Matthew 16 and verse 24. Jesus said to his disciples, If anyone desires to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. And for whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. It is a life of self-sacrifice to which we are all called and have that responsibility. We must deny ourselves and discipline ourselves along this way of life and give our lives and sacrifice to God. That is what a servant does. Everyone who is a parent understands that. As parents, we have to sacrifice for the good of our children. How many times have you as a parent understood that and come to that moment of realization that when a child comes, when number two comes, or when number three comes, the amount of sacrifice that we as parents, mothers and fathers, must do in order to be a good parent and to provide the best environment, best example, the best teaching, the best for our child.

It is a life of sacrifice. And if we don't do that as a parent, then our child-rearing will suffer. If we're selfish, if we get to the point where we resent the responsibility and the time, the dedication that a child or children take, we all know where that can lead. To neglect, abuse, and some serious problems. Being a parent is a life of sacrifice.

Being a good mate, a husband or a wife, is also a sacrifice as we mutually submit to one another. That's a life of sacrifice as well. Our calling to God, to Christ, is a life of sacrifice as well. That is the whole nature of learning those major lessons in life that revolve around the family, marriage, children, and God, sacrifice or service. And it's in doing that that we really come to discover greatness. The greatness of God and His gift to us, and the greatness of what can come when a family, when individuals, two or four or six, or a whole group are working with that attitude and that spirit toward that same goal in the same manner. Marvelous things can be done. We will make a lot of mistakes along the way of the kingdom of God, but we should never make the big mistake of missing out on the kingdom of God. Christ gives us a very, very clear pathway toward that goal of the kingdom through service and sacrifice, that he talks about. The second point is that this is essential for having an effective growth-oriented congregation.

Again, imagine the power of us being on the same page and working together toward this goal. If all of us, set as our heart, mind, and soul the desire to be Christ-like in our service, wherever it comes to us, wherever we have that opportunity to be like Christ in that sense, who emptied Himself, thought nothing to do so, came down and took on the form of human flesh and willingly sacrificed Himself for our good. That is what He did.

That is the leadership that we look to. That is the image that we must model and come to. It's essential that we work together toward that. In 2 Corinthians 1, the Apostle Paul writes, of just what that entails. 2 Corinthians is something you read after 1 Corinthians, to fully appreciate some of the things that he says here, because if you remember in 1 Corinthians, he had to deal with the church and some issues and problems and take a very corrective stance, put someone out of the church for immorality.

He addressed heresy. Some didn't even believe in the resurrection there. There were major problems that they had to repent of. He had to bring it out, and it was some very forceful language. Then he turned around and wrote the second letter, we call 2 Corinthians.

He lays himself open on it. In chapter 1, verse 24, he says, just to break to this thought, not that we have dominion over your faith, but our fellow workers for your joy, for by faith you stand. Interesting comment. We're in the previous letter, he had had to make some tough decisions.

He says, we don't really have dominion over your faith. We're all fellow workers for your joy. And that's true. We have no dominion over each other. We are all here together in the church of God, in a congregation and we're all here as volunteers. When you stop and analyze it from that point of view, we take on a different cast. We're all volunteers. We are here voluntarily. We're not here by compulsion. We never have been. We willingly accepted God's calling. We yielded our lives to the truth. And you're here on a voluntary basis. You want to be here, but you're not here. You believe you should be here. But because of that, no elder, no pastor, no overseer has dominion over you in that sense.

That's what Paul says. We are fellow helpers. We are fellow workers for your joy, for by faith you stand. If we take that same approach toward one another and recognize that maybe we would speak very kindly, more patiently, with one another, and be tolerant of idiosyncrasies and shortcomings and whatever else that comes up, if we look at each other as volunteers, that's essentially what Paul is saying here.

One of the most successful volunteer agencies in the United States, and the world for that matter, is the Red Cross. The Red Cross works and functions largely because of volunteer labor. You pass one of their offices, and what they do out of those offices is with a small staff. The majority of people who work with the Red Cross are volunteers. They have an entire continual training program for their staff to work with those volunteers who come in during a disaster, work countless hours to help somebody who's had a flood or a fire or some other problem.

They recognize that their work gets done through volunteers, and you have to appreciate that within everyone. We have to appreciate that in and among ourselves as we serve one another with the mind of Christ, to be like Christ in that sense. In chapter 2 here, in verse 4, he says, For out of much affliction and anguish of heart I wrote to you with many tears, not that you should be grieved, but that you might know the love which I have so abundantly for you.

So even as he wrote what he had to, he wrote it with tears because it needed to be said, needed to be dealt with, but it was out of a great affliction of heart. As we go through our lives, we don't want to be ashamed of calling out to Christ, calling out to the Father, at times out of anguish of heart, and to submit ourselves and to treat each other with the proper amount of respect and love that is incumbent upon a fellow servant of God.

It's essential if we are going to have a future in the Church of God, any part of the Church of God, certainly in the United Church of God. If our form of governance that we have is to work, it will work because we all decide to become Christlike servants. When it has worked, and it has worked, it's because of that approach it has taken. Again, it's not coincidence, I believe, that Philippians chapter 2 was brought out so many times at our conference because we as ministers need to be focused on it. It's not the first time, but it is the heart and core of what needs to be done if we are to flourish.

It doesn't matter what you have written on a piece of paper to outline as bylaws or as a constitution how you will direct or govern yourselves. I still go back to the advice that our elder in Fort Wayne, John Robinson, gave me back 15 years ago after we had formed the United Church of God, ratified our bylaws and our constitution and set up this form of governing structure. John told me a piece of advice that was given to him by a lawyer that he had worked with in some other business dealing.

And in hammering out an agreement, the lawyer had said to him, the best agreement any two parties can ever come to is the one that they agree to and then put into a drawer, close the drawer, and they don't keep bringing it out. Every week, every month, three times a year. And it's a true principle. You agree to a bylaw, you agree to a contract, you agree to a set of principles in whatever arrangement you have, business, church, marriage, and then you put it away. And you don't bring it out and keep looking at it and saying, well, they're not doing this, or we need to change this, or whatever.

It'll fall apart. You agree to it, and then you submit yourselves to one another in faith, good faith, a good faith effort, certainly in the church, in faith, and that's the best form. Now you can revise and you could come up with a whole different form of governance. But if there's a way to do it, but if there is not the humility of mutual submission that Philippians 2 talks about, and these verses that we've been reading talk about, no form of agreement will produce unity.

These are the terms that we must all bring into anything that we humanly create and craft for ourselves. I believe that the governing structure that we have is based on biblical principles, and for it to work, those principles have to be lived by, by everyone.

That's what has to be done, and in this particular case, it is a Christ-like approach to service that we must have. It's not governance that's been our problems in the church, it's sin, that there's always been the perennial problem, whether among the ministry, within the churches as a whole, pride, ambition, self-centeredness, those are the problems. It's not a governance structure, but those are one of the lessons that Christ sometimes is always, I think, still looking among His people for them to learn.

A third point is that this is essential for building spiritual, healthy members and congregations.

Ephesians 4. Beginning in verse 1, Paul writes, I therefore the prisoner of the Lord beseech you to walk worthy of the calling with which you were called, with all lowliness and gentleness, with long suffering, bearing with one another in love, endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit just as you were called in one hope of your calling.

Whatever God has given us, whatever talents and gifts God has given to us should be used to serve the work and to serve each other. Down in verse 11, he talks about some of these talents and gifts, and he himself gave some to the apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ. Anyone who performs any of those responsibilities of verse 11 does so for the sole purpose of equipping the saints and the work of the ministry and the edifying or the building up of the body of Christ where they happen to be and in the part that they have to play for that. That's essential. That is what is important. He goes on in verse 13 to say, Till we all come, and this is done in a sense, until we all come to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. This will happen. Christ will bring His body ultimately to the unity of the faith and to the knowledge of the Son of God, to a perfect man, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ. Even when human beings fall out, even when human organizations fail, Christ will bring the spiritual body that He is building, that is being built up. And make no mistake, it is being built. The body of Christ, the spiritual body called the church, is being built according to these scriptures. Till we all come, will we be a part of it is the choice that we have to make. Having this service orientation is essential for a mature congregation, for a mature church, for a mature individual. I ask you this week in my letter to you, how spiritually mature are you? How spiritually mature are you? How do you measure that maturity? Is it by years in the church? Ten years? Twenty years? Forty years? Forty years in the church does not a mature person make? Nor does thirty, nor does twenty. It just doesn't by itself. You can repeat one year thirty times, but not grow in grace and knowledge. Not grow spiritually after forty years and be a mature Christian because you've just repeated one year's experience forty times. We all have to be very, very careful. It's not a matter of ticking off the years, attendance, how many feasts we've attended, how many jobs we've done, how many titles we've had, how many spokesmen's club diplomas we might have, or what we did. We're going to be doing a lot of work on that. Those are important tools, but by themselves they don't produce spiritual maturity unless other factors come into play. They're all well and have their part to play, but by themselves don't result in spiritual maturity. It's not measured by the time we put in or the wisdom. It's measured by wisdom. It's measured by sound judgment. It's measured by depth of thinking and many other factors. It's not just repetition. That explains why, you know, if people make the same mistake over and over again, never able to get out of a rut or find themselves ten years later at the same crossroads of decisions, why is that? This ties into emotional maturity, but that also hinges upon our spiritual maturity as well. It's the example and the model of Christ that we look to determine our growth.

God, the Father, has given us the perfect model in Christ, His only Son. And as to Him, we look as the full measure of spiritual perfection in the flesh. Paul's writing here in Ephesians that the Church is being built into a spiritual body of believers, so we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God to a perfect man. And the perfect man is Christ. It's not me. It's not you. So we know that, don't we? You know, someone told me the other day, good is not perfect.

And I said, that's right. You can be a good person you can be a good Christian, you can be a good minister, you can be a good pastor. But for some, it's not perfect. And therefore, it's not good enough. If we tend to think in a legalistic mindset and we start looking for perfection in human beings, we're missing the whole point. The perfect man is the one who has come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ.

That's the only standard of perfection any of us can hold ourselves up to. And if we look to any human being to fulfill that for us, we will be frustrated. We will even grow to hate. We won't call it hate, we'll call it something else. But when we look to the human being for this type of perfection, when it comes to the divine, the spiritual matters of faith, we have to be very, very careful. And I'm convinced that this is one of the markers of maturity for a Christian. When we look to individuals for a perfect example, we're treading on the ground of legalism because we're looking for someone to be perfect who can't be.

And we're holding a standard up that is impossible. And if that's what we have to have in a man or organization, we will be continually frustrated and continually looking, almost like a gypsy, on the move, looking for that perfection. And we will never find it. We will find it only in the example of Jesus Christ and the fullness that He represents of maturity, spiritual soundness and wisdom.

Again, how mature are you? Well, Paul goes on here in this chapter to show areas that present a continual challenge to spiritual maturity. In verse 14, he says that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro, carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men in the cunning, craftiness of deceitful plotting. Now, verse 14 says an awful lot. He said we should not be children tossed to and fro. But wait a minute, we just read in Christ's statements that we are to be like little children when we enter the kingdom of God, right?

Well, children in a sense of growing and maturing, children in a sense of trusting, not tainted by the hurts of life that jade us as adults, and not childish, not just as a child, but a child that we are able to be tossed about by these things and carried about with winds of doctrine or heresy. Here's a distinct warning. Don't let problems with doctrine trip you up. Be grounded. Be sound in your faith and the truth. I'm looking forward to going over to the Ambassador Bible Center here in a few days.

I have the opportunity to teach doctrines class. I'll teach ten doctrines. We have twenty, but Mr. Randy Stiver did the other ten during the first semester of this current round, and we divided the twenty fundamental beliefs that we have in the church. He did ten, and I'm going to do ten. So I'm feverishly putting them together in my lectures here in the next few days so I can sound halfway coherent talking about our fundamentals of belief. I've got nine class days to go through those ten that are assigned to me.

It's always encouraging, comforting, reassuring to delve into doctrine and the fundamentals that we hold as a church, belief, and to teach those to the church, to those young people at the Ambassador Bible Center, to help ground them in faith and truth so that they're not tossed to and fro, which we will do. I get to teach about Sabbath and the Holy Days, so I'm looking forward to going into that one and going through all of that again with them.

But he says, don't be tossed about. And then he also says, with the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful learning. So he brings in personalities and deceit and lies that can be a part of life.

Don't let those things be able to discern truth from error, deceitfulness. And some of this, he says, is cunning. It is very, very...deceit is deceptive in its very nature. One of the things that I learned in teaching the class that I did on early church history, to remind you, the reason I got into early church history 15 years ago is because of the heresies that did sweep through the church in the 90s. And I wanted to learn how did it happen back then, as we had lived through it on our own experience, so that we learned the lessons. And when you go into the story of the early church in the first couple of hundred years of church history as we know it, you see deception creeping in, watering down of the faith Christ put into the church. And you see the tricks, the arguments that were used then, how they're still alive and are used today. But you also see how deceptive deception is. And for me, it has been very, very instructive to be very, very wary of change, of watering down doctrine, faith, and our love for the truth, because it can be deceptive for any one of us. It was for people back then. One of the quotes that I ran across was a quote by an early church writer. And he was writing in late in the second century AD. And the church had already been, the true church had somehow been filtered through, sifted through. And this particular minister, whether he was a true minister of God or not, it's hard to determine, but he was writing about deception. And he said, deception does not wear a pretty dress. It doesn't waltz into a room in a bright, pretty dress, advertising itself as deception. It sneaks in. It just kind of subtly arrives.

It's not blatant. And that's a chilling thought. That's a chilling thought. Parasy, deception can get a toehold in any number of ways into the church, into a mind, an individual, and the truth be watered down. Paul is warning against this. He said, don't let lies become a part of life. Don't buy into lies. Don't get caught up in personalities. And certainly, he said, don't be tossed to and fro. But these are signs of spiritual immaturity. He says, speak the truth in love in verse 15. But speaking the truth in love may grow up in all things.

And to him who is the head, Christ, from whom the whole body joined and knit together by that which every joint supplies according to the effective working, by which every part does its share, causes growth in the body for the edifying of itself and love.

The last point in terms of why this is so important for us to have this Christ-led service approach. It is essential for healing the hurts of the past and of the present.

Philippians 3, verse 13, Paul says, brethren, I do not count myself to have apprehended. In other words, he didn't feel that he had it made. His goal hadn't been reached yet. The goal of eternal life, the goal of the kingdom. I do not count myself to have apprehended. But one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward Christ-led call of God in Christ Jesus. Therefore, let us as many as are mature have this mind, a mature mind. Paul did not dwell on the past. He had some pretty big problems that faced him that he had to grapple with and make decisions about and then decide to move on. He didn't harbor things from the past and he had a lot to deal with. I often wonder how he put aside and put behind him the fact that he was responsible for the death of members. Remember in the book of Acts how he was on his way to Damascus with warrants of arrest for Christians? He was there when Stephen was stoned. He was there when Stephen was stoned. He was hauling people out, followers of the true faith. He had blood on his hands and he was able to forget that. I marvel at that. There are some things that are hard for me to forget and move away from in my own life as well as you have as well. He was able to put that behind him as well as a number of other things, the issues of the church and personalities that he had to deal with, the hurts, the offenses, the charges against him a lot. He was in jail, remember, when he wrote this. He says, I don't count myself to have it made, but I pressed forward. He didn't dwell on that.

I learned something else on this recent trip I made. I learned how you can travel light for two weeks at a time. I was packing for myself and whatever. I took a medium-sized suitcase. We have small suitcases, a medium-sized suitcase, and then a big suitcase when we travel. I thought, the little ones that carry on, you can put on any plane over the overhead. I thought, I need more than that. I got the next size up. I only packed it about two-thirds full. I said, I'll probably buy some souvenirs and whatever. I didn't want to go over the weight limit because I just hate paying those extra baggage fees when I get on an airline.

I was well under and I didn't have to pay any extra, but I was lugging this around. I had a backpack with some books, my computer and things in it. I took off. That was still enough. As I got into the trip, I realized, you know what? I brought too many clothes. I brought too many clothes. I brought things I didn't actually wear. I realized I could have brought that small carry on. It would have been a little tighter, but I could have made do with that. It would have been a whole lot easier. I learned one lesson on the second weekend we were in Hungary. We were going to take the train on Friday to Vienna. I didn't want to haul everything. I didn't need to haul everything out of the dormitory room we were in at the University in Budapest. I had my backpack. I put my clothes on and I just put a change of everything into the backpack. I didn't want to go schlepping along with my big rolling suitcase on the train through the streets of Vienna to the hotel. I had to lug that around with everything I had. I got it all into a backpack for a four-day weekend to Vienna. I thought, you know, I'm getting into this. I could do this a whole lot better next time, a lot more efficient. You know, they say when you travel, take twice as much money in half the clothing. That's always the case. I could have used about twice the amount of money on this trip too, but I didn't have that. I had twice the clothing that I needed. You know, the less you carry on a journey, the better you travel.

We carry a lot of baggage, extra baggage around in our own life. Emotional baggage, don't we?

We all have a bag that we carry with us. Maybe it's a small bag. Maybe it's a big bag. I thought about bringing one in and just pulling a few things out here today. But you visualize in your own mind how big your bag is. We all have a bag, and we've got what we say is baggage, that causes us certain problems, heartaches. To the degree we can get rid of that baggage that we carry around, the better off we'll be. We'll have a lighter journey in life.

If we can get rid of the pride, if we can get rid of the envy, if we can get rid of feeling inferior, because somebody years ago put us down because of the family we were born into, the money we didn't have, or whatever we came out of high school with, the feeling of inferiority that maybe drives us to other types of behavior that isn't always productive. Maybe it's the ambition to be somebody. Maybe it's fear. Maybe it's being easily offended.

We all have baggage that we carry around with us, and sometimes it's a big bag.

It's time to get rid of that baggage. It's time to leave a few things, not even at home, just throw them away. You don't need them. I'm beginning to realize, and that was one of the lessons from this trip, I don't need to take as much with me on a trip, which means I really don't probably need as much hanging in my closet as I think I might do. I know I'm stepping on toes there with some of you, but I'll leave that one for you to sort out in your own heart and mind.

But I think as we get a little bit older, we realize we don't just need all that we think we have to have. I'm astounded at shoes. Shoes proliferate in a closet.

You only wear one at a time. But think about it emotionally.

What is it that we can get rid of? And you can't. Don't think you can't.

Don't think you can't. I thought that there were people that I'd never get along with.

And I realized, yes, you can. You can reconcile to anybody.

And in the process, prove there is a God.

You can do it. It is not an impossibility. Back in Ephesians 4, verse 31, He writes, Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice.

Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.

He's saying, get rid of that baggage. Get a smaller bag. Be more compact.

Life is short. The journey's hard enough. You don't need to carry any more than you need to. Pack light.

And enjoy the trip a whole lot more.

If we get rid of some of the baggage that we all tend to carry around with us.

We have to. It's essential to be able to move on and to do what Paul said here of pressing on toward the goal and developing the mind and the likeness of Jesus Christ.

Because in the end, that is the only image that really counts of Christ.

It's not the image that an artist might paint in a picture that is valued at hundreds of thousands of dollars and hung on a wall in a museum. Tourists and people, art lovers, walk by and comment about what the artist was trying to say and how they captured this essence of trying to capture something about the image of Jesus Christ. From their mind's eye, from their religious point of view, their cultural point of view, whatever it might be, they don't do it justice. It's not what God wants. It's a false image. Every which way you want to look at it. It doesn't tell you anything about the image of Jesus Christ. The only thing that does is again what Paul writes about here in Colossians chapter 1. Let's go back and read it again.

Verse 27, To them God willed to make known what are the riches of the glory of this mystery among the Gentiles, which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. If Christ is in us, if His glory is coming through in some detail of our life, maybe it's only a small sliver at this time, but that can be quite a bit when it comes to the image of Jesus Christ.

If our maturity can grow to the point where more of that glory comes through, then we're living up to the image of Christ. To where when we look into that mirror, we don't just see ourselves, but we see the image of Christ.

Somehow, looking back at us, in some aspect of growth, maturity, and change that we have made to be more Christ-like, because we have dedicated, in a sacrificial way, our lives to a life of service, to be like Christ and to take on the image of Christ and Christ in us. That's what it's all about.

God help us if we don't do it. Let's all pray that God will help us to get it done.