Love Without Sacrifice?

Oh, good afternoon! You have a beautiful setting up there, don't we? Wow.

Very appreciative for all the work that goes into comparing these things and having flowers and having sound and all the special needs that it's done. Well, I'd like to start out by asking you a question.

When was the last time you made a significant sacrifice for someone?

You know, really went out there, all out. You really sacrificed. Do something for somebody. What was it? What did you do? What was the situation?

As you're thinking about that question, I'd like to ask you to turn to Ephesians 5, in verse 1. Again, I'd like you to really think about when's the last time you really went out there and you sacrificed to help somebody. You made a personal sacrifice in some way to help somebody who needed help. That might be money, that might be time, that might have been doing something in active service. What was that? Be thinking about that because we're going to roll that through here during the sermon. Ephesians 5, verse 1, Therefore be followers of God, as dear children, and walk in love, as Christ also loved us and gave himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma.

Sometimes the sentence structure can get a little bit tricky because, you know, this is Greek and it's translated in English and you want to have a certain fidelity to the text and you want to read too much in and so forth. But I think sometimes the structure can get a little bit tough to follow. I'm going to read this from a more modern rendering in the J.B. Phillips translation.

J.B. Phillips translates this verse as such, As children copy their fathers, you, as God's children, are to copy him. Live your lives in love, the same sort of love which Christ gives us and which he perfectly expressed when he gave himself up for us in sacrifice to God.

What Paul is saying is that we, as God's children, are to follow our father's example of love, the same sort of love that Christ expressed toward us, which was expressed or evidenced through his sacrifice for us. God showed his love for us through sacrifice. And by extension, from this verse, we are to show our love through sacrifice. In fact, these two verses really raise the question of, can we really show love without sacrifice? That's kind of an implicit sort of question within here. Is it even possible to really show the kind of love that the Father showed for us, Christ showed for us, and that we are to imitate without sacrifice? And we've heard Romans 12 verse 1 before, because we are to be a living sacrifice. We know that that is a command. And at this time of the year, as we celebrate the first day of Unleavened Bread, we also know that First Corinthians 5 says that Christ is our Passover, and it was sacrificed for us. But what is sacrifice in a modern context? What does it mean for us to show love through sacrifice? Now, if I think about biblical wisdom, godly wisdom, we've been reading it here. And if I were to contrast that with what I would call worldly wisdom, there's kind of go-to people, I think, of worldly wisdom. One of those people is Tony Robbins. People know who Tony Robbins is. He's kind of like, if there's a picture of worldly wisdom, I think Tony Robbins. Tony Robbins says, if you think something is a sacrifice, you shouldn't do it.

That's Tony Robbins' view on sacrifice. If you think something's a sacrifice, don't do it. Don't even do it. And he'll go on, and you can see his sort of motivational videos on this, and he gives context to that and so forth. And a little bit later, I'll give you a little bit of that context, because I don't want to take him or put him out of context. But fundamentally, he's saying, if you think you're really going to sacrifice something, you're going to resent it later. So don't do it. Don't do that.

And some have argued that if we sacrifice something really only out of duty, then the gift is really meaningless, to some degree. And it would be better, perhaps, that we didn't even do it at all. So how can we understand the example of sacrifice here in Scripture and apply it to work, family, and our church communities? How can we express sacrifice one to another? And as we begin to eat unleavened bread after the renewing of our commitment through the Passover, I think it's important that we examine this question of sacrifice and what it means to imitate our Father in heaven and the example of his Son and our Savior, Jesus Christ. So the title of today's message is, There is No Love Without Sacrifice. And what we're going to talk about, there is no love without sacrifice. We're going to define our terms because we really need to define our terms here. What do we mean sacrifice? What do we mean love like that? We're going to see that, because we go through, that we really cannot express the kind of love that God desires here without sacrifice. And we're going to examine what I would call a trap of sacrifice. And that's kind of, that's why I put that little tiny Robin quote in there, because I think there's something there. And when we're done, I hope that you can take away a renewed focus on expressing your Christianity, our Christianity, through sacrifice. So let's start out by defining our terms, as we often do. The word sacrifice here in this scripture, Ephesians 5 verse 2, sacrifice to God. This is a Greek word, which is thesia, T-H-Y-S-I-A, thesia. And according to Helps word study, it's an offering. It's a, and they say properly, an offering, an official sacrifice prescribed by God, hence an offering the Lord accepts because it is offered on his terms. So it's, there's a certain formality to what is sort of implicit in this word. It's not opportunistic, it's not accident, oh that turned out well, didn't it? You know, it's not accidental.

It's premeditated, it's planned according to a certain prescribed way of doing something. For example, today, if you were here, you gave an offering, and that was prescribed. Mr. Melicia talked about sort of some of the prescriptions, you know, prescribed in Geronimo 16, three times in the season, during the days of the month, it's prescribed. And there's reasons behind it.

It's a type of sacrifice. You gave up spending power. You could have bought some shoes, you could have gone to dinner, you know, you could have done a lot of things, but you gave an offering, you gave a sacrifice of sorts. And you gave something away. You offered it up. And so an offering is fundamentally a gift. It's a gift, you're according to prescribed way. We also see in this, described a little bit further, we won't turn there, but in 2 Samuel 24, 24, you can note that, 2 Samuel 24, 24, there's a story of where David buys the land that is going to be where the temple of God is going to be built. And he's offered the land, literally, like, here, I want to, you know, I want to give you this land. He said, no, no, I'm not going to give something to God that I didn't pay for. He had to have, he had to have something, he had to have a responsibility for that. So he paid full price for that land. And then he gave that land for use for the temple. And so a sacrifice must be a gift, and it must have value to the giver. It has to have some value to the giver. If someone, for example, gave you an expensive bottle of wine, you know, they really, like, they really worked and they found this fantastic bottle of wine. And they can tell you all about it. But you didn't really like wine, you didn't really drink wine, that wasn't kind of your thing. And so you, in turn, gave that bottle to a friend. Well, you know, you, you know, that was a nice gift, but it really wasn't a sacrifice, because you didn't pay for it. And you don't drink wine anyway, so you don't really appreciate it. So, you know, that was, that's a gift, but it's not a sacrifice. You didn't make a sacrifice in that way, like the person who bought the bottle for you.

A sacrifice is also not something that you're going to do anyway.

And sometimes this happens in families, you know, a father, a dad, husband might say, I worked so hard for this family, you know, I sacrifice, go out there and put food on it, you know. But, you know, maybe that, that man would do that anyway, because that man wanted to have the recognition of his peers, or he wanted to have the, the salary that would come with it, or the title. And so he might say that he's sacrificing for his family, but he might have just done that anyway. So that's not really a sacrifice, that's just sort of a side benefit. So a sacrifice has to be something that, that we wouldn't do anyway. It's something that, that we're going out of our way to do.

And finally, even though there is always a purpose for a sacrifice, it's not a sacrifice if you expect some kind of immediate return, or you feel like you're now owed something in return. So let's go to Luke 21 42 on this. So 21 verse 42 to 44.

Did I say 42? Sorry.

I must have the right, it's verse 42, but I don't have the right, the right chapter there.

I'm sure you'll find it quicker than I will, I won't mention this, but it's a story about how how Jesus, and it's probably perhaps maybe the next verse here, let's see.

Yeah, there it is, sorry. Luke 22, I said Luke 21. Luke 22 verse 42. You know, this is a very difficult moment for Jesus. He is about to be crucified, and he goes and he prays to the Father, and he says, Father, if it is your will, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done. And an angel appeared to him from heaven, strengthening him, and being in agony, he prayed more earnestly, and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. This was not something that he really wanted to do. I mean, he wanted to do it in the sense that he made a commitment with the Father from the beginning that he would do it. He was honoring his word, he was honoring his commitment towards us, his commitment that he had made with the Father to do it, but humanly speaking, it is not something that he would have wanted to do. And he says, not my will, but your will be done. So a sacrifice is a gift.

It has value to the giver. It's given without any expectation of return. I mean, Jesus didn't have some expectation. He was dying for all humanity, and after he sacrificed himself, he's not in the second resurrection, and people are coming up, and they're making their choices, and he's not going to say, hey man, you owe me. I died for you. I'm sorry, you don't get a choice. You have to be part of my... He understands that people are going to make their choices, and in some cases, they're going to be appreciative of his sacrifice, and in other cases, they're going to scorn his sacrifice. And he's okay with that, because he's not doing it with some expectation that everybody is going to thank him. He recognizes that some people won't appreciate that. And that brings us to the second part of our discussion, which is that I think we'll see we really can't express the kind of love that God desires without sacrifice. But I'd ask you to turn to Mark 8, verse 35. Mark 8, 35. We're going to look at this passage here, which is really just... Maybe you'll find it easier to get your head around, and when you've read it, you can sort of, oh yeah, I get that. But it's the way that Christ juxtaposes these things. You really have to think deeply about what he's sharing here in Mark 8, verse 35, because it really gets to this question of, what does it mean to sacrifice? He says in Mark 8, verse 35, for whoever desires to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the Gospels will save it. Now, there's so much to unpack here, you know, just to kind of understand what he's really describing. Let's see if we can understand this. So first he says, whoever wants to be my disciple, go back up here. And when he had called the people to him in verse 34, with his disciples, he said, then whoever desires to come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.

For whoever desires to save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake and the Gospels will save it. So if we see, there's three things in verse 34 that kind of perceive that first we have to deny ourselves. Second, we have to take up our cross. And third, we have to follow people. And when we're done, again, I think we're going to see that sacrifice is implicit in all of this. So you think about some examples like Moses, for example. Moses rejected the lifestyle and opportunities in Egypt, and he chose to proceed into the desert with his family, Jacob's descendants. And, you know, that's a choice that he made. He denied himself a certain lifestyle and opportunity to do something that he felt that God had called him to do and that he should do. Paul counted everything he had as lost in his physical life as a gain for Christ. So to deny ourselves for a Christian means renouncing ourselves as the center of the universe. What we want is now less important than what God wants of us. For example, Jesus was struck down in the prime of life. He was praying. He was in verse 33. He was struck down in the prime of life. And he gave up his life. That's not our natural human inclination.

I shared with my wife that I would have enjoyed working for the FBI, solving white-collar problems. That seems so cool to me. You know, catch people cheating the system. You know, the FBI recruits CPAs to do this. It's, it's, it's, uh, they pay pretty well and pretty interesting work. But you know, to work for the FBI, you need to carry a gun. You need to be trained in how to use that gun in case you need to use it in the course of your work. And you have to be prepared to do what is necessary with that weapon if you are called upon to do that. That's part of the responsibility. And I personally don't think that is something that a Christian can do. I don't think that I can take on this role and say, yes, I'm going to kill somebody in the line of work, because they deserved it. Because that's what you would be doing. Now, obviously, it wouldn't be my intention to kill somebody, but you do what you have to do. That's a personal choice that I make. Some of you have made other choices like that. Years ago, I remember somebody in the church who desperately wanted to be an astronaut.

And I'm serious. I'm completely serious. This is exactly what the World Wide Church of God did. They were in training, and they had to make choices. And ultimately, they decided that they would rather be an astronaut than continue in this way of life, because they just had to do things. That was a choice that they made. We're making choices about what's important to us. And so, to make a sacrifice, we come to a point where we see that, you know what, this is not something that I think God would have to do. Denying ourselves means that we submit our plans, our goals, our intentions to what we read in His Word. We eat unleavened bread, not quite as tasty, certainly not as satisfying, and not leavened bread. Taking up our cross, now we see the next thing here, because He says, to be my disciples, you have to deny yourself and take up His cross.

Picking up our cross means that we accept that we will lose our lives as we wanted it to be when we follow this path. But even more so, that we will suffer greatly. I'm sorry, I don't think anybody here wants to do it. I mean, yeah, this is great. This is the job description. I'm going to suffer greatly. I'm going to lose kind of my life in the way that I wanted it to be. That doesn't sound very appealing from a natural human standpoint. Crucifixion was a public shaming. So it's not just about, I'm going to die and I'm going to suffer. It was a shaming. It was, look at that. Don't turn out like that person. Whatever you do, don't be like that.

You were fundamentally naked, hanging up there, being despised. It was a horrible way to die in so many ways. And Jesus says, take up your cross. I mean, how much more sacrificial can he make it?

And just as Christ was sacrificed, so he asks us to deny and sacrifice ourselves in the same way.

Because he says finally at the end, follow him.

Now, you know, at this point, maybe I should pause and, you know, half of you can walk out of the room. I don't know about this. I don't know about what I'm reading here. Hold on. I've got plan. I've got dreams. I've got hopes. I have aspirations. I'd like to do this. I'd like to do that. 1 Peter 2 verse 21, we read this over the Passover. Peter amplifies this message by telling us that he, Christ, set an example of suffering that we should follow over that. 1 Peter 2 verse 21. Just remind ourselves, I mean, this is just, you know, after a while, it's like, whoa, hold on. This is not what I signed up for. 1 Peter 2 verse 21, for to this you were called because Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example that you should follow in those steps. 2 Peter 2 verse 21. And on one level, you know, if you were to kind of come to this conclusion that, you know, wait a minute, I got a bucket list. Here's my bucket list. These are things I want to do.

And so far, this doesn't sound very good. You know, on what level you'd be correct?

You would be correct. This doesn't sound very good. So we go back to 8 Mark 8 verse 35. Let's turn back to everything.

This is why he follows it up with this phrase.

You want to be my disciple? And this is what you, uh, oh, I'm in Matthew. This is what you have to do? Well, guess what? If you do this, you are going to lose your life.

For whoever desires to save his life will lose it. That is to say, if you're like, no, no, I got a bucket list. I got plans. I got hopes. I got dreams. And that's, that's where I'm going. He who desires to save his life is going to lose it. For the person who says, I'm going to submit my bucket list, my hope and my dream and all those things. And I'm going to take up this cross, and I'm going to deny myself, and I'm going to do this. You're going to lose your life, but you're going to save it. But whoever loses his life, for my sake, and the gospel will save it. Wow! I mean, just wrap your brain around that. That is such, that is such a paradox. That is a true paradox, something that is not intuitive. And the more we pursue our own agenda and ignore what God is leading us to, the more we lose a connection to what is most important in life. And the more we want in Jesus' footsteps, the more we connect the meaning that we live.

Let's be more specific about what we're talking about here. So the more we deny ourselves our pride, our anger, our bad habits, our addictions, our desires to get where we want, even if it hurts others, our own stubbornness, all these types of things, the more we will live. And ultimately, receive eternal life. Basically, Christ is saying to deny ourselves the works of the flesh so that we can truly live not only here in the physical life, but to receive eternal life in the end. What we're talking about fundamentally is meaning. We're talking about meaning. There is a meaning that comes with life that you are not worried about losing for Christ's sake. That is a meaning. That is a higher meaning, a higher purpose, a higher calling.

The cross we bear is a fight against our human nature, which for all human beings is pretty much you know dictates our lives. But see, it's a trap because we tend to think that we are the captain of our own ship. I've shared this during the Jewish important before. We think, oh, we're going to tell ourselves to do this, and then we just go do it. But that's really a lie because we really don't have that kind of control. We're subjected to our emotions and our feelings, and we want to do this, but then we don't, and this gets in the way. Then pretty soon we realize, what did I really do? Christ knows that. He knows that left on our own, yeah, I got all these things and so forth. I'm going to do all these things. Oh, really? Will you? Really? Now, a lot of times we're just deceiving ourselves, and Christ knows that. And he says, you know, don't worry about all that stuff. I'll help take care of you. And then suddenly, meeting comes. And Mark relates three supports to what Jesus is saying here. Verse 6, for what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? How many stories have you heard? This is the stuff of movies and books. I think it was his famous story of one of the main people who founded Wal-Mart. And he's literally in the hospital, and he's going to die the next day. And he's giving orders to his managers about how to run the business. And people are like, what is up with this, Scott? He's, you know, this is going to be meaningless so quickly. And yet, that's all his life is about. Somebody realizes that they left a relationship behind. They alienated the people that really mattered because they had some other goal. That's now we're beginning to touch on what Tony Robbins was talking about, right? They made serious sacrifices, which ultimately were very, very choices. Verse 37, or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? And whatever, and for whoever is ashamed of me in my words in this adulterous and central generation of him, the Son of Man also will be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels. Jesus is saying, where's your meaning? Where are you deriving meaning? Because if you're deriving meaning from something other than me, then I'm not going to basically pay much attention to you, because if you ignore me, I'm going to ignore you. And if you're ashamed of me, I'm going to be ashamed of you. It's interesting how he describes that.

To be a follower of Jesus Christ and to walk in love means to sacrifice.

And like I said, when I read Mar-a-y-ag, I question whether it's even possible to express that outgoing love that Agape loves without sacrifice. And I think this is the kind of thing that we approach this understanding. I don't think it's like, oh, I got it. I think we're always kind of approaching this understanding in reality. And when we do, as we begin to approach this, the upset, the annoyance that we might feel towards another person fades, because we're not really worried about that. We're not really worried about that offense. We've got some sort of higher meaning here. And when we see bad behavior directed towards us, it doesn't trigger a like-minded counterattack. Because typically that counterattack is because we've been offended in some way, been hurt. You know, kind of something that was important to us was, you know, sort of put out there and hurt in some way. We read a passage in Passover, I won't turn there, but it says in John 14.30, the ruler of this world is coming, and he has nothing in me. There's nothing that Satan can do against us. Because there's this higher meaning, this higher purpose.

We have a why of life, and the why of life becomes clearer and clearer. A very famous philosopher, Frederick Nietzsche, said, he who has a why to live can bear almost any how.

See, the why is what's important. What Jesus is offering us is a why, a very meaningful why, the ultimate meaning of life. And that is about peace, because when we have the why, then the how becomes less stressful, because we know what the why is. And this brings us to kind of the final point that I wanted to share here, which is as we begin to understand the why, the meaning, and as we approach this understanding, there's a trap. There's a trap. And the trap is when the love we show through sacrifice takes on its own significance, and we lose the ultimate purpose and meaning of that sacrifice.

And it's a trap that the Pharisees fell into.

And again, if you go back to Tony Robbins, you know, if it's a sacrifice, who wouldn't do it? It's a logical extension of that sacrifice, because what's happening is we're focusing so much on the sacrifice that we forget what that sacrifice was full. Turn with me to Matthew 9, verse 9. We can see where the Pharisees got trapped in this and where Jesus called them out. Matthew 9, verse 9. Because what we're talking about is so hard to do. It's so contrary to everything we are, and yet for God's Spirit, we are able to do these things. Matthew 9, verse 9.

Then as Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax office, and he said to him, follow me. He rose and followed him. Matthew records his own calling. And it's interesting if you do some study on this, if you look how Luke describes the calling of Matthew and how Mark describes the calling of Matthew. It's a little different. Could you imagine if you were describing your own calling in a book? What would you say about yourself?

This is what Matthew was describing about himself. He just says, follow me. But in actual fact, Matthew is a despised figure within Jewish society because he's a tax collector. Then it skips forward here, verse 10. It says, Jesus sat at the table in the house. You have to get the context. Basically, he is now hanging out with tax collectors. Matthew very likely has invited him into his home. Matthew is fairly wealthy from the ill-gotten gain. He invites him into his home. He's with many tax collectors and sinners. They came and sat down with him and his disciples. I think there's a country song that says, if I was a bar, I'd be a dive. This is not a good place to hang out.

If you found me hanging out in some bar, they're open. What are you doing in that bar? I mean, you know, Jesus was not in a ball. But from the Pharisee standpoint, he might as well have been in a ball. This was not a place where people of a certain type, the Pharisees, or how they would consider a rabbi, or in that way, would be hanging out. When the Pharisees saw it, they said to his disciples, why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners? But when Jesus heard that, he said to them, those who are well have no need of a position, but those who are sick. But go and learn what this means. I desire mercy and not sacrifice. For I did not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. So he says, go and learn. Now, this is this quotation comes from Hosea 6 verse 6. You can probably see it in your margin there if you've got a note there. He says, go and learn. Now, that's a pretty direct quote. He's speaking to experts in the law. So that's pretty offensive. You know, they're like, yeah, we know what Hosea 6 verse 6 means and says, and you're telling us to go study it some more. So he's speaking directly to them to go study that. So let's turn over to Hosea 6 verse 6, and let's see if we can understand the this trap that they might have fallen in. I remember right, Hosea is right after Daniel, right? Let's see. There we go. I got it. So you can find Daniel, Hosea is right after Daniel. Hosea 6, and let's pick up the story in verse 4. Let's see if we can follow what Jesus is teaching you. Hosea 6 verse 4. O Ephraim, what shall I do to you? O Judah, what shall I do to you? For your faithfulness is like a morning cloud, and like the early dew, it goes away. You're not faithful. It just evaporates. It was there, it was gone. Oh, and then that's gone. Therefore, I have hewn them by the prophets. I have slain them by the word of my mouth, and your judgments are like light that goes forth. The NIV translates this, that the judgments that I say upon you, I have sent the prophets to warn you and to tell you, you're not getting it. You're not understanding what I'm trying to tell you. Verse 6. For I desire mercy and not sacrifice, and the knowledge of God more than burnt offering. God was pronouncing judgment on his people because of their lack of faithfulness. They had this fleeting faithfulness. And from the context of the book of Hosea, we see that what they were doing is they were maintaining a certain ritual form of sacrifice. They were going through all the processes that they should do, but fundamentally there was nothing behind it. It was just a ritual, just a form. There was no substance. The meaning had been lost. And the word mercy here can be translated as faithfulness or loyalty. And then it's followed up with the knowledge of God. So God desired that his people understand the intent of sacrifice, which was a sign of faithfulness and loyalty. And the expositor's Bible commentary shares that this Hebrew word has said, if you studied Micah 6-8, it's used there as well. This word has said, is very close in meeting to covenant love. It's a covenant form of love. It's a love, it's an agreement that somebody's entered to. It's the same word in Micah 6-8. What does God desire of you? To do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with regard.

So Jesus was talking with experts in the law, and he was telling them that they had missed the larger picture of their sacrifice, of the way of life they were living. They were criticizing him for fellowshiping with people they considered to be undesirable, or behaving, people who were going against what God would say. But Jesus was there encouraging them, showing his example, and yes, he was likely teaching them. They'd lost the point that God has mercy, and he wants to share his law, he wants to share his way of life with these people, he wants to treat them with respect, he wants to recognize that they are on a walk just like anybody else, and that they should not be looked down upon. They were looking down on these people. They were getting into, frankly, the sort of racism of the first century, or the biases of the first century. Jews couldn't eat with non-Jews, and tax collectors were the sort of pariah of the society. And basically, their sacrifices, that is their strict way of life that they lived, if it was accompanied by this kind of judgmental and condescending attitude, was missing the larger point. It wasn't that they should not have sacrificed, but they had missed the larger meaning of their sacrifice. If they had understood the larger meaning, then they would not have resented Jesus spending time with these people. They would not have carried their religion around like a great weight. And when we see the greater meaning, and we encourage, we engage with that greater meaning, then what comes from us is a sedge, that mercy, that covenant love, that faithfulness, that loyalty. It's not a weight or a burden. For the Pharisees heaped up burdens for the people. Didn't they? Oh, you've got to do it this way and that way and the other way.

And from this perspective, the sacrifice then becomes about mercy. It becomes about love, and it's no longer a burden. Paul writes that men should love their wives.

I mean, you know, if I walk around like, man, such a burden to love my wife, oh, I don't think race would appreciate that. How are you doing? Oh, such a burden to love my wife.

Right? That's not sacrificial love. That's a sacrifice. That's a burden.

And, you know, it shouldn't be a burden if you have joy.

You know, men take the lead in relationships. You know, it says husbands love your wives. And men take a certain lead in a relationship. And, you know, you have to put yourself out there. You have to take risks. You know, hey, what do you think about this? That's terrible. Okay. And you have to be willing to do that because if you're afraid to do that, you're not willing to take that risk and not willing to sacrifice maybe a little bit of your pride or ego, then there's no leadership.

There's no love. So, you know, men have to take that responsibility to step out and say, okay, let's try this. And, you know, it says that we love, we should love God by keeping His commandments. We've heard that verse, right? Let's turn there and let's read 1 John 5 verse 3 together and think about it from this context because most of us, I think, only remember the first half of this verse and not the second half. And this is what Jesus was getting to with His comments.

1 John 5 verse 3 says, For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments, period, and His commandments are not burdensome. If we're walking around like, oh, God, you're a tough God, I don't think that's a burden. The man that had the one talent versus the person that had the other, you know, more talent, what did he say when he buried his talents?

He said, I knew you were a hard man. I knew you were a hard man, you know, basically taking from people and so forth. That sermon who had the one talent had an impression of God and was living a life of burden. And if what we do is a burden, then we're missing the point. We're missing the point of what it means to love God, just like a husband would be missing the point of what it means to love his wife if he was walking around burdened by that all the time.

So who wants to listen to advice? I mean, you know, who likes to listen to advice? Somebody walks up and says, oh, here, you know, I'd like to give you some advice about this sermon. Okay, you know, you've raised yourself, right? Because, you know, it's hard to necessarily hear that advice. Well, the person who wants to be successful listens to advice. That's the answer. Who wants to listen to advice? The person who wants to be successful.

If you don't want to be successful, don't listen to any advice. Try and do it all on your own. And the advice from God is to love or sacrifice for him. And we shouldn't feel a burden by that. Look back at Matthew 12, verse 1, because Jesus didn't just say this once to the Pharisees. He said it twice. He said it again in Matthew 12. Matthew 12 is all about Jesus being Lord of the Sabbath. And I won't go through the story for the sake of time. I'm going to keep this reference up.

But he says it again after the Pharisees criticized him and his disciples for walking and taking grain on the Sabbath. He says here in verse 7, Matthew 12, verse 7, but if you had known what this means, quote, I desire mercy and not sacrifice, you would not have condemned the guiltless.

The Pharisees had made the Sabbath a burden for people. They had lost the meaning of the Sabbath and what it really meant. And he had to set them straight. You know, I could share a story for sake of time. I won't, but I'm sure many of you can share stories of things that you did where you would have maybe done something differently if the Sabbath hadn't been there.

Maybe you would have kept working on the Sabbath, or maybe you would have chosen to do something, but you know, you honored the Sabbath and it wasn't a burden. And you realized at the end, and again, I can share lots of stories at the end, God just worked it all out for me.

He just took care of all of us. The sacrifice of keeping the Sabbath, for me, has been a blessing. Sometimes it wasn't always didn't feel that way at the moment, but then later it goes, wow, what a blessing! It turned out that I honored the Sabbath and it wasn't a burden.

Let me go back to my introduction. When was the last time you made a significant sacrifice for someone? Maybe you're kind of going around the head. Maybe you have something in mind because it was such a burden to you, you might say, oh yeah, let me tell you, I gave a lot for that person. And perhaps it was a sacrifice, but it hurt, and that's why you remember it. And this can be the case when someone receiving your love, for example, doesn't appreciate what you did. That's probably one of the hardest things. And that may be what comes to your mind. You remember you did so much for this person, and they just didn't even appreciate it.

Maybe they even threw it back in your face. They misunderstood what you were trying to do. They took it the wrong way, and then it was a big blowout. That happened. Or maybe the thing you remember is that perhaps there was more work to do, and you just didn't have the heart to do it anymore because you just kind of gave up. Well, if that's the case, then maybe there's a little more unleavened bread in your life, if you need, because a sacrifice doesn't have an immediate reward. And it doesn't, it's not supposed to be a burden. And it's something that you give unconditionally, regardless of how the other person takes it. Or maybe you couldn't think of a recent sacrifice, if you're thinking about a recent sacrifice, because the sacrifice that you did didn't feel like a sacrifice. Perhaps you were caring for someone, and maybe others sought a sacrifice, but you didn't. It felt very meaningful to do. And so you didn't feel burdensome. And that's a beautiful thing if that comes to mind. Or maybe it doesn't come to mind because you're like, oh, I guess so. Yeah, maybe I thought about that way. And when we're in this position, then we are not thinking about ourselves. We're thinking about the other person. Or maybe you can't think of a recent sacrifice you made, because maybe you just haven't made a sacrifice for somebody. See, it's a very complex position actually.

Maybe you did it, but it wasn't for the right reason. Maybe you're doing it, but it's okay, because you don't feel a sacrifice. Maybe you're not sacrificing. And that's a problem, because you're just not putting yourself out there. You're not taking those risks.

In conclusion, I'd like to turn to John 4, verse 24. And I think this is a bit of a tie-in with the sermon Ed, because in John 4, verse 24, Jesus talks about truth. And of course, we're here on the days of unleavened bread. And this is odd, by most people's standards. We put leaven out of our homes. We're not eating leavened bread this week. And that's a bit odd. And it's something that you try to explain. Well, you see in Exodus 12, and in 1 Corinthians 5, oh yeah, yeah, yeah. That's nice. I respect it. So this past Friday night was 35 Passover's from me, like 35th Passover. And I've observed in the Church of God that what we often differentiate ourselves by are things like unleavened bread. How do we define? Well, we keep the Sabbath and we keep the Holy Days. And we have tithes and we use that tithe and we go to the verse 24. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in Spirit and in truth. And I've gone to this scripture over and over again because I have very good friends who are not part of the Church of God. And they serve and they do a lot of things. And you know, frankly, you know, it's a tree of knowledge to go to the evil. There's some, you know, just some wonderful people who really serve. But, you know, they may not be serving in truth. And so, you know, I go to that and realize, you know, there's truth here. Truth matters. The truth of God matters. And we in the Church, we honor truth. We look into the Bible and we honor what it says. And if it says to put leaven out of our home, we put leaven out of our home. So, odd as that might be, we do that. We are a church that honors truth. That's what we heard about in Terminate. But let it be said first, as it says in this Scripture, that God's people worship in spirit. We worship God, which means we adore, we love, and we follow our Father's example by sacrifice for others. And unless we understand the higher intent, the great meaning, the true spirit of what God intends for us in terms of how we live by that word, then we too could become the Pharisees. We desire sacrifice more than mercy. We can become so wrapped up in truth that we forget the higher purpose. We eat unleavened bread, we clean our home, but for a greater meaning and purpose. Jesus did not say, a new commandment I give to you that you read commentaries, watch YouTube videos, and become experts in the law, as I am an expert in the law, and by this all men shall know that you are my disciple. Right? We know what he said. He said, you shall have love one for another. And that love, as we read in Ephesians 5, was evidenced by Christ's sacrifice, and we are to follow that example. Let it be said about God's church that we lay down our lives one for another as Christ did for us. Let it be said about God's church that we sacrifice one for another as Christ did for us. Let it be said about God's church that being part of the body means a life of service as Christ washed our feet so we wash others' feet. God's law is the rock upon which is built the house of sacrifice, the temple of God within us. That's the house built on the rock. Let's build that house on that rock, and let's focus on building and be prepared to sacrifice one for another.