Sinat Chinam (Part 3)

Well, thank you, Mr. Krester. Good afternoon once again, everyone. As I stated before, it is an absolute pleasure to be gathered here with you all today, especially to be gathered here in person.

Again, I want to thank all of you for your patience over the past several months. This has been a trial quite like none other, as we've experienced in recent years, as we've kind of tried to figure out the best way to proceed forward. But I am very thankful that we have had the opportunity to be here today, kind of have a chance to evaluate this particular hall as to whether it's going to be something that works for us going forward until our regular hall is available.

Or maybe we decide we like this one. I don't know. We'll see. But the biggest unknown at the moment, and those of you that are home in webcast land, you're going to be able to tell us whether it worked or not. But again, the biggest unknown at the moment is whether our webcast will function in this space or not. And to be perfectly frank, if it doesn't, this hall is not going to work for us. Because we do have enough people both in the Eugene and the Roseburg area, as well as who are at home at this time, who do need to be able to access that particular webcast.

So it may be that we need to keep looking. I don't know. We'll find out. We'll have that conversation after we get done here today and into this week. This hall, some of you may go, you know, this looks kind of familiar. I don't know how many of you noticed that on the way in. This hall has some special memories, I would imagine, for a number of you who've been in this area for some time. 25 years ago, after Worldwide Church of God broke up and the United Church of God formed, it was this hall in which the first service was held post-Worldwide Church of God for the United Church of God.

You know, it's kind of interesting that here we are again after having been gone for as long as we have and being away for as long as we have. But for me personally, it's been six months since I had the chance to stand in front of you and give a message. You know, yeah, we've had shutdowns for the past five, but I was gone the three weeks prior to that in Africa. So, you know, the last time I had a chance to speak to you guys was February 22nd of 2020.

Following week, I flew out to Africa. The outbreak began. We saw Washington, little blips all over the map in Washington and California. Three weeks later, I came home and the whole world had changed. You know, many of you, as you know, Mr. Miller mentioned as well, can say many of the same things in that, you know, it's caught us by surprise. This was something we didn't anticipate, didn't expect, but we have been very thankful.

I know I have been very thankful that we have been able to connect with the technology that we are able to connect with. Obviously, we're having some sound issues with regards to our speaker at this point, so we are kind of taking a look at that and trying to figure it out. It seems to be on some kind of a self-timer, so if it stops and just goes, I'm just going to keep going. I'm not going to stop because those at home are on a completely different feed.

These guys are on this different microphone, so those on the webcast, I'm just going to kind of power through. You'll hear me. I'm loud. I used to teach. I can get to the back of the room for sure. Well, today, brother, we're going to wrap up a series of messages that we started and have been working on the past few Sabbaths with regards to the concept of the Hebrew concept, Sennachinam.

And in the first message that I gave on the series, we talked a little bit about that concept. We talked about the Jewish relationship to that concept. We talked about the ninth of Av and how the various national tragedies to the Jewish people on that day have caused that to be a national day of fasting and mourning.

We talked about how on that day the Jewish people reflect and they consider their lives. They consider the Sennachinam that is present in each of them.

They reflect on its role in the destruction of the Second Temple. In the second message, the one that I gave this past week, we examine the story of the man and Varkamsa, the story that is related on the ninth of Av. It's told on the ninth of Av to provide some background and some backdrop, I should say, into what the conditions on the ground were like in first century Judea. During that message as well, we looked at the various sects, S-E-C-T-S, that had developed as a result of the diversity of thought, the diversity of ideology, that was present at that time. And we examined how among those sects there was a general distrust of one another. And that kind of went along those ideological and or philosophical and or in some cases political boundaries. But what that did was that created a very, very strong us versus them mentality. Those who were not like them, those who thought or lived differently than they did, were treated differently than those who were not like them. And as time went on, as we see throughout time from Christ's ministry on into the time of Paul and some of the other later writers, you know 30-40 years down the road, those groups became more galvanized. They became more polarized as a result of the differences that they had. We talked about this in the last message that the zealots hated the Sadducees. The Sadducees hated the Pharisees. The Essenes hated everybody. In fact, so much that they went and lived in a little monastery out in the middle of Qumran to get away from the corruption and the taint of the world. The scribes, they were kind of opportunists. You know, they were experts in the law and they allied with various groups as it suited them, such as when it came time for all of them to unite, to betray, and to have Jesus Christ executed. He, His presence, His teachings, posed such a threat to their way of life, to their power and their influence over the people, that He was the greater threat than the different groups that were there at that time. You may have heard the phrase, the enemy of my enemy is my what?

My friend. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. And so it was with the zealots, with the Sadducees, with the Pharisees, with the Essenes, with the scribes. And through all the friction from these various groups, Jesus Christ's ministry went out to the people. Through the three and a half years that He taught in the land of Judea, He preached the gospel of the kingdom of God. He taught the masses in parables. He worked incredible miracles. Often, when doing these things, He was at odds with the same groups that we've just mentioned. But throughout that time, He called people to Him.

God the Father called them to come to Jesus Christ. And the men whom He called to Him were to be different. They were to become something new. They were to be called out of their individual group cultures, out of their individual ideologies and philosophies, and to become something different all together. Let's turn over to the book of Philippians to begin today. The book of Philippians.

We're going to go ahead and turn over to... we'll start in Philippians 3. You know, throughout the...

the New Testament, a number of Jewish people converted to Christianity. They were baptized. They accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Savior. They received the Holy Spirit. And we know that term Christian, quote-unquote, wasn't used until the believers began using it at Antioch. But for sake of clarity, we're going to use that term today. Okay, for sake of clarity. When the Gentiles began to be called, they didn't become Jews. They became Christians. They didn't become Jews. They became Christians. Now, we talk about spiritual Israel. Talk about the Israel of God. That was very much in force at that time. These people were becoming part of the Israel of God. But when these individuals acknowledged Jesus Christ as their Savior, and they were baptized for the repentance of their sins, and they received God's Holy Spirit, they became, for all intents and purposes, Christians. Now, Paul understood this. The Apostle Paul understood this. He understood, when he was converted along the road to Damascus, that everything changed. Everything changed. And imagine, put yourself in Paul's place for a moment. Minding your own business, you know, heading down the road, when you're all of a sudden struck blind.

And you wonder, what's just happened? You know, this isn't something I was expecting. What is this?

Everything changed. He was no longer a quote-unquote Pharisee, even though there were times, as we saw last message, that he did use that to his, you know, benefit. You know, especially when he was in the midst of the Sanhedrin there, and decided to pick and kind of put them against each other.

But he had become a Christian. Philippians 3 and verse 2, and one of the things, I'm going to read this from my notes, so I'm going to try to provide you the time to turn there in your Bibles. I'm going to read this from my notes, because I printed it gigantic, so I don't have to put my glasses on. Because one thing with these masks is that if I go, oh, my glasses go, and then I can't see anything. So I went ahead and printed this out nice and big, so I could see it with my naked eye. So Philippians 3 and verse 2 is where we're going to begin. Paul writes, beware of dogs, beware of evil workers, beware of the mutilation. For we are the circumcision, who worship God in the Spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh. Though he says, I also might have confidence in the flesh. If anyone else thinks he may have confidence in the flesh, he says, I more so. Verse 5, circumcised the eighth day of the stock of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, concerning the law of Pharisee, concerning zeal, persecuting the church, concerning the righteousness which is in the law, blameless. So he said, not only was I a Pharisee, I was a good Pharisee. I was a Hebrew of the Hebrews, a model Pharisee. He goes on in verse 7, he says, but what things were gained to me, the things that I would think of as being the feathers in my cap, so to speak? These I have counted loss for Christ. Says yet indeed, verse 8, I also count all things loss for the excellence of the knowledge of Christ Jesus, my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish that I might gain Christ, and be found in him, not having my own righteousness which is from the law, not like the Pharisees, not having my own righteousness which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith, that I may know him, and the power of the resurrection, or power of his resurrection, I guess my eyes aren't that good, power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings being conformed to his death. Verse 11, if by any means I may attain to the resurrection from the dead. According to the Cultural Background Study Bible, if you don't have a copy of the Cultural Background Study Bible, it's a good one to pick up. You might look at it for feast this year. It provides some incredible cultural backdrop to the scriptures. It's keyed off of the New International Version, which is a little bit kind of frustrating, but that's what they keyed it off of. So you'll want to have a New International Version to be able to kind of look and see the wording that they're using. But according to that particular study Bible, the Jewish community in Philippi was small. It's not likely that he was referring to the individuals that resided that were Jewish in Philippi. It's in fact more likely that Paul's referencing traveling Jewish teachers that kind of circulated through Asia Minor, kind of went from city to city in Asia Minor, and ultimately were advocating circumcision to the believers. Coming in and going, oh, well, you already keep the Sabbath. You know, you already, you know, you're, you eat clean foods. You're pretty much all the way there! Advocating this for those believers. He makes the point, he makes the point that we are the circumcision. And he goes on to qualify that by saying, who worshiped God in the Spirit, rejoice in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh. He's making the point in this letter that circumcision is to be of the heart.

It's to be in here. It's to be of the heart, not a cutting of the flesh. And in this case, the word that he uses is a Greek word katataman, which actually references a cutting into pieces or a mutilation. He makes the point that when it comes to having confidence in the flesh, that he has even more so, even more confidence. He was circumcised the eighth day. He was born into Israel. He was of the tribe of Benjamin. Again, a model Hebrew, a Pharisee, zealous, observant, and exacting in his keeping of Torah, just as all the other Pharisees were. Verse 7, what does he say? But what things were gained to me? What things were gained to me? In other words, all these things that were a feather in my cap, the things that were gained to me, he says, I counted loss for Christ. He even goes as far as saying that he counts all things lost for the excellent of the knowledge of Christ, losing all these things and counting them as rubbish in comparison. And the word rubbish there is actually a pretty strong word. It's actually a pretty strong word. It can mean refuse. It can mean garbage, but it's also frequently translated dung and excrement.

He's saying he's not counting his own righteousness from the law. He's saying that that righteousness should come through faith in Christ. Paul recognized at the end of the day all of those things that he put up as points of pride, all those things that separated him from the average two, didn't matter one iota when it was put into the crucible.

His nationality, his affiliation with the Pharisees, his circumcision, none of it mattered.

What mattered was his faith in Christ Jesus and the righteousness that came from God through his faith. Now, as we see throughout Scripture, I want to make sure that we make a caveat here. This faith that Paul is talking about is not a passive faith. It's not a faith where it's enough to say, I believe, and that's it. This faith requires follow-through. It requires obedience. It requires action on the part of the believer. So I want to be clear. Paul's not saying here that it's a simple belief in Christ and nothing more. He's advocating for the extreme changing of one's life, now living that life in accordance with the teachings of Jesus Christ.

You know, the disciples of Christ weren't zealots. They weren't Pharisees. They weren't Sadducees. They weren't Essenes. They weren't scribes. They were Christians.

Now, some of his disciples began their spiritual journey as zealots. Simon was a zealot. Paul was Pharisee. But as time went on and these men became more and more converted and they yielded themselves to God's Spirit, they became something more.

They became like Christ. They became more like Jesus Christ. And as that message spread and as it went through the area of Judea, people were convicted. People were convicted of that message because it was new. It was different. It was correct. You know, it wasn't like what they were hearing from some of these other groups. And as that message spread and as people were convicted, it was like all these various threads that are out there. The Jews, the Gentiles, the Pharisees, the Hellenists, the zealots, the Romans, the Sadducees, the Essenes, and we'll say Joseph Six-Pack. Just your average dude. All of these threads, these people that were separated by birth, by culture, by philosophy, by ideology, when they came to Christ, those individual threads became one. Became one strand of those individual threads wrapped together in one. And, brethren, what has Satan tried to do ever since?

He has tried to pick that rope apart strand by strand. He has tried to get us to focus on our differences instead of our similarities. And I hate giving him credit, but he's good at what he does. But he has crafted an us versus them mentality in humanity. And sadly, it's a broadcast frequency that we tune into all too frequently. Brethren, there will be no need for external persecution against God's church if we are willing to tear ourselves apart from within.

There will be no need. We keep waiting and we keep looking for this outside persecution.

I want to have a quick show of hands. I'm curious. Quick show of hands here, okay? The next part, no hands. Okay? You'll see why. How many of you believe in the existence of God the Father? How many believe Jesus Christ is the Messiah? The Port of God is the revelation to humanity. Humanity has been given an incredible opportunity to be partakers of the divine nature.

God's law is spiritual. It's perfect. It's holy. Okay? Transgression of that law is sin.

Okay? Jesus Christ died for you. He was resurrected and is now sitting at the right hand of God.

Okay? That His kingdom is coming to this earth. Okay? I could keep going, but I think you get the point. Now, again, I don't want to show of hands for this next one. Okay? I just want you to consider for a moment the various things that have come up among us, many of which have come up in the past five months. Once again, no hands, please. How many of you believe that these mask requirements are a complete sham? That we should fight back against governmental overreach and the public tyranny that we're experiencing at this time? How many are not okay with vaccinations? How many are okay with vaccinations in some instances, but not others? How many are okay with all vaccinations?

How many are okay with your kids being in public school? How about homeschool? How many support Donald Trump? How many don't support Donald Trump? How many believe that Black lives matter?

How about blue lives? How about all lives?

You might be listening to these things in your head that I've just listed and going, but, but, but, but, but, but, respectfully. Please tell that part of your brain to be quiet for a moment. Okay, please. We as humans frequently listen to respond. We don't listen to understand. I'd like you to listen to understand. Do any of those things that I just listed rise to the level of our common belief in God the Father. Christ is the Messiah. That we're, as humans, given opportunity to be part of the divine nature. That Christ died for you or died for me.

No, they don't. And why? Why don't they? Because they're part of this world.

And these things and this world are passing away.

These things are not of our world.

Now, does that mean that they're not important? Of course they're important. Of course they are. Or else we wouldn't be talking about them all the time. Right?

Oppression and injustice is against the nature of God no matter what form it takes. Whether it's against people of color or if it's against the police.

Injustice is injustice. Oppression is oppression. It's not okay.

As parents, you have a God-given responsibility to decide what's right for your children.

But that parental right ends where your child stops, ultimately.

But yet, because we are convinced, kind of along the lines of what Mr. Miller was talking about this morning, because we're convinced, and let's be honest, sometimes pridefully convinced, that our interpretation is right, we feel compelled to convince everyone else to see it the way that we do. And we're shocked sometimes when others do not.

Our differences divide us. Our common beliefs unite us. And it is those common beliefs that bring us into the body of Christ. It's those common beliefs that caused all of those separate threads in the first century to come together into what must have been the craziest-looking congregations. Have you ever thought about that? What a congregation must have looked like in the first century? You've got converted Jews. You've got converted Hellenists. You've got random Gentiles. You've got Romans, sometimes Centurions. You've got free men, and you've got slaves.

And they've all come out of these backdrops in these cultural places to come together into this just absolute melting pot of a congregation.

All their differences with time being burned away.

Like dross, when you refine metal. And at the end, they become the kind of metal that God could see His reflection in. You know, we're not much different than the congregations of the first century.

Many threads into one. You know, I don't know if you've thought about that before, but we never would have met outside of church, many of us. Completely different life stages, completely different backdrops, completely different locations. But it's this faith and this truth that God has revealed to us that has brought us together.

Many threads into one, we become stronger together than when we are apart.

So are we going to pick at that strand?

Are we going to divide ourselves up into these little groups based on our ideologies and our philosophies? For example, and I'm not saying this is happening, I'm saying just as an example, are we going to allow ourselves, if we're part of the homeschool crowd, to look down on those that are public school or vice versa? Those that are public school, looking down on those that are homeschooled? If we're a part of that vaccination crowd, are we going to look at the ones that are non-vaccinated and think, ugh, uneducated? Or vice versa? If we're part of the non-vaccination crowd, are we going to look at those that choose to vaccinate their kids and say, ugh, uneducated?

What about maskers versus non-maskers? Well, that's a tough one. Trumpers versus non-Trumpers? I couldn't think of what you'd call them. I didn't know. But looking at one another and thinking to ourselves, I can't believe they think like that. So uninformed. I mean, I can't believe they don't see it. It's so obvious. What do you mean you don't support XYZ? Can't you see what XYZ is doing? It's clear. I can't believe you don't see it. And Sennachhanam reigns.

Sennachhanam reigns. Let's turn over to the book of John.

Book of John. John wrote this particular book much later than the rest. It's believed that it was written around the time of his epistles, which were written in the late 80s, early 90s A.D. And by and large, this gospel was kind of designed to fill in the details to kind of provide another eyewitness to some of the things that were not addressed by the other gospel writers in order to really give a more complete picture, I guess is the right term here, the more complete picture of Christ's time on earth by someone who was there. Particularly by the 90s A.D., there were a number of individuals that have been creeping in, teaching various falsehoods, and some individuals began to follow those teachers out the door, so to speak. And so, you know, they were teaching things like Jesus Christ never came in the flesh, you know, Jesus Christ only seemed to have appeared as a docetists. And John was like, no, he was there. I touched him, I handled him, you know, I talked to him face to face. He was there, guaranteed. And so he wrote his gospel to fill in some of those holes, in addition to those epistles of John that we've been studying in the Bible study. But John set out with his gospel to set the record straight, and he's the only writer actually out of all of the gospel writers to capture the full words of Christ after that Passover meal. The rest of them kind of pick right up with the Garden of Gethsemane and his prayer in the garden, and then Christ before his arrest. But John records a number of passages, a number of chapters of Christ's conversation with them, likely as they walked from the place where they kept the Passover that night to the Garden of Gethsemane. Interestingly, that walk from the area of Jerusalem where they likely were, it was likely that they were in the upper part of the city, that walk would have taken them right past the temple. And it's kind of interesting. There's a on the gates of the temple, there's these intricate, or there were, I should say, intricate carvings of these golden vines, you know, these golden vines in that section. And some of the various people theorize that when Christ is talking of the vines in the vine dresser in chapter 15, that it's as they walked along that and saw it. Because Christ taught extemporaneously so frequently, you know, you'd see various things go, oh, well, it's like a sower that's sowing seed, look at this guy in the field. Or it's like a vine in a vine dresser. So they think that that may have been the point in time where they were crossing in front of the gates of the temple at that point. Anyway, interesting, but we get to John 18. Okay, John 18 is where we want to be. John 18. And we'll see the prayer that Jesus Christ had for the men whom he discipled and those who ultimately he would bring to the fold through their efforts. John 18 and verse 20, and again breaking into the context of the prayer here, John 18 verse 20, he says, I do not pray for these alone, these men who I worked with here, he says, but also for those who will believe in me through their word, that they all, both those who were with him and those who would believe through their word, that they all may be one, as you, Father, are in me and I in you, that they also may be one in us, that the world may believe that you sent me, and the glory which you gave me I have given them, that they may be one just as we are one, I in them and you in me, that they may be made perfect in one, and that the world may know that you have sent me and have loved them as you have loved me.

Notice Christ's words. He says very specifically that they might be one as we are one, that they might be one, us included, those who have heard through their words throughout time, not just the disciples, but us too, that they might be one in Christ and the Father, and that through that unity, the world will believe that Christ was sent. We see, by and large, the first century church going forward did this. In fact, you take a look at the latter sections of Acts 2. It is clear the unity that they had in the latter sections of Acts 2. It talks about how they were all of one mind. They shared property, they shared meals, they shared fellowship, and sometimes you'll see people critique, oh that's communism! No, it wasn't. It was not. They had all things in common.

They shared their property, they shared their meals, their fellowship, and we see so much more as we kind of see it recorded in those latter verses of Acts 2. But they were one because of God the Father and Christ dwelling in them. It was that shared connection through God's Holy Spirit that allowed them to remain unified. But as time went on, as we go through the history of the early church, as time went on, unfortunately things changed. Issues crept up. There were doctrinal heresies, there were matters of conscience, there was Judaizing, like we said with the circulating, you know, Jewish teachers that were coming through as there were certain men who would stand up in the congregation and proclaim their personal understanding and then believers followed them out the door. I want to be very clear. There are differences, big difference, between having a personal difference of opinion and proclaiming that personal difference of opinion. A big difference.

Scripture allows for differences of opinion. It allows for differences of thought on any number of things. But when a person stands, proclaims that opinion in hopes of swaying others, it becomes something else entirely. It becomes division. It becomes drawing lines. It becomes creating us versus them. We're familiar with the words written in James 4. Let's go ahead and turn there. We're going to be in the book of James here. James 4. James 4, we'll pick it up in verse 1. James 4 in verse 1 says, Where do wars and fights or disputes, quarrels, come from among you?

Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members?

You lust, you do not have, you murder and covet and cannot obtain, you says fight and war, yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive because you ask amiss that you may spend it on your pleasures. It says, adulterers and adultresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or, says, do you think the scripture says in vain, the spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously? Verse 6, but he gives more grace. Therefore, he says, God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. So, where do wars and disputes come from in the body? Come from our desire for pleasure. Come from our desire, our unwillingness to yield to God's spirit in our lives. We lust, we don't have, we murder, we covet, we can't obtain. Verse 6 says, God resists the proud and gives grace to the humble. Going back to what we talked about in the last message, why did the Pharisees begin? Why did they get their start? Pharisees believed that Israel could be saved through exacting observance of Torah. They believed that if they kept the law in perfection, and frankly more than just the law because they built, again, the fence around the Torah that enabled them not even to come close to breaking those laws, they believed that if they were able to do those things that Israel would be spared what happened to them when Babylon conquered in the 580s BC. But they also believed that every person had every right to be as holy as the priesthood. They felt that if all of those individuals maintained that exacting standard of purity, again above and beyond even that of the law of God, that they'd be righteous by their works.

We know the Pharisees loved the greetings in this marketplace. They loved the best seats in the synagogue. They had kind of a certain swagger to them that we see Christ address in Scripture, and a degree of hypocrisy that was rooted in pride. And Christ pointed that out in his interactions with them. The Sadducees, on the other hand, were the priestly class. They'd been born into that role. They were the descendants of Zadok. They had the right to serve the people in the temple. The Pharisees weren't priests, you know, not in the classic sense of the term.

Yet they had this populist movement through the synagogues. They were teachers in the synagogues.

The Sadducees likely felt that the Pharisees took too much upon themselves in that capacity. The Pharisee movement was growing. The Sadducees were dwindling. Perhaps there's some envy of that fact as the Sadducees began to drop in numbers. Scribes themselves were seen as teachers of the law. They were experts in the law of God. They drafted certificates of divorce and mortgages and legal documents. There's a sense of pride in their knowledge of the law. They knew it better than anyone. They were teachers of it. Lawyers, you know, they would sit and think about how to interpret this particular thing based upon kind of what was there. Talked about the Essenes. The Essenes were disgusted by the Pharisees and the Sadducees, and they isolated themselves because they believed that they were the separated Holy Ones. Of course, so did the Pharisees. Of course, so did the Sadducees. The Essenes, though, believed they were the only ones that would see the Kingdom of God because they had it right. Their personal code of ethics was better than that of the Pharisees and the scribes. They were holier. They lived in the desert of Qumran away from the rest of the world to avoid its corruption and the taint which came from it. Lastly, the zealots desired to overthrow Rome. They believed the Jews were more powerful than the Roman Empire and that all it would take was a national uprising and God would throw his support behind it to run the occupiers out. In the zealots, there was a sense of nationalistic pride, and that pride ultimately caused these groups to separate themselves, to draw lines around one another in a sort of lack of better description, kind of a collective narcissism, really. A self-love of their group that didn't extend to those around them, many of whom they saw as beneath them. Let's go a chapter back from where we are in James 4. Let's go to James 3. James 3 kind of gets overlooked sometimes in the book of James. We end up going to James 4. We don't always end up in James 3. James 3, we're going to read verses 13 through 18. Again, we're going to break into the context here, and I want you to, as we read these things, I want you to think about these various groups at the time of Christ. I want you to think about the kinds of lines we draw around ourselves, even today, and the attitudes that we have when we deal with others who don't see it the same as we do. Verse 13 of James 3 says, Who is wise and understanding among you? Let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. But if you have bitter envy and self-seeking in your hearts, do not boast and lie against the truth. This wisdom does not descend from above, but is earthly sensual, demonic. Verse 16, For where envy and self-seeking exist, confusion and every evil thing are there. Verse 17, But the wisdom that is from above is first pure. It's pure. It's like that metal that you can see your reflection in. There's not impurities in it. There's not all that dross that still needs to be burned off. It's pure.

Then it's peaceable. It's gentle. It's willing to yield. It's full of mercy and good fruits.

Without partiality and without hypocrisy. Now, the fruit of righteousness, it says, is sown in peace by those who make peace.

Brethren, this is something that all of us are working on. I don't want you to think this message is a you, you, you, you, you. It is very much a we. We all have room to grow in these things, myself included. But, brethren, the wisdom that comes from above is peaceable. It doesn't go out looking for a fight. It doesn't go out looking for a quarrel. It's peaceable. It looks for common ground. It looks for ways to make peace. It's gentle. It's kind. It operates with love and with understanding. As Mr. Miller brought out this morning, it doesn't mock. It doesn't scoff. It's kind. It's gentle. The wisdom that comes from above is willing to yield. It's not rebellious. It's not stubborn. It doesn't otherwise refuse the authority of God. It's full of mercy. And with mercy, forgiveness. Along with it comes forgiveness. And a belief in best intentions. It's full of good fruits. Notice, too, it's without partiality. It doesn't only give peace and gentleness and a willingness to yield and mercy and forgiveness and good fruits to those who look like them and talk like them and think like them. No. It extends those things without partiality and hypocrisy.

James finishes in verse 18. It says, now the fruit of righteousness, the product of this righteousness, or of righteousness, is sown in peace by those who make peace. And then he jumps into the statement that we just read earlier, James 4. Again, no chapter breaks in the original text. He just, boom, right into the next section. James makes the point that the wisdom from above, from God, and through His Spirit, provides these characteristics. It provides gentleness. It provides gentleness. It provides peace. It provides a lack of partiality. It provides, you know, all of these aspects and fruits of God's Spirit. But he does say the wisdom of this earth, this sensual, demonic wisdom, is self-seeking. It's envious. It's prideful, we might add. And it is this wisdom that all of us have to strive to avoid. Well, how will we know if we're operating off of one or off of the other? Well, by our conduct. That's what it says. By the way that we present ourselves, what we say, what we do, we might say, by our works. Right? That's what it says. James 3. Let's go back and look at that again real quick. James 3. Whose wise and understanding among you, let him show by good conduct that his works are done in the meekness of wisdom. Obviously, not the earthly wisdom, but the godly wisdom that he then goes on to describe.

So we'll know if we're operating off of one or the other based on our conduct, based on how we act, what we say, what we do, who we interact with, and how we interact with them.

Let's go ahead and turn over to John 13. John 13.

John 13. And we're going to go ahead and pick it up in verse 34 of John 13.

I'm really glad I printed these in my notes. I can't see a word on my page in my Bible. It's just one big blur. So apparently I need glasses worse than I thought I did. Who knew?

John 13. We'll pick it up in verse 34. John 13.34 says, A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I have loved you, that you also love one another. He says, verse 35, By this all will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another.

So Christ tells them to love one another. But notice not just love one another, but to love one another as he has loved them. Stop and consider that for a moment.

How has God loved you? Think about that for a minute. How has God loved you? You know, you might think of the various blessings that he's given us, the truth that he's revealed to us, the incredible mercy that he's provided us, not treating us according to our sins, instead forgiving us and giving us the opportunity for eternal life as a result of his death and his blood on our behalf. Romans 5 verse 8, you can jot it in your notes, says, While we were still sinners, while we were enemies of God, Christ died for our sins.

Brethren, it's that love with which God loved us. And it is that love that we are called to love one another with. Now, why was that something that was to be a mark of his disciples at that point in time? Think first century Judea. Why would that be a mark of people who followed him?

Because it wasn't being done. It wasn't being done.

These other groups that were existing at the time of Jesus Christ within Judea, Christ said, you'll be known based on the love that you show. You'll be known that you are the disciples of the man who gave his life for his brothers. If you turn around and you give your life for your brother, and we can think of that physically, we can think of it figuratively.

But this selfless love that is rooted in humility and that thinks of others over themselves is the love with which God desires us to show and to use with our other brethren. This selfless love is what God desires of us. So now for the hard question. What about us? What about us? Do we love our brothers and our sisters with this kind of love? Is this a metric that we personally are known by? I'm not naive enough to pretend we don't have differences. I mean, let's be honest, I'm not naive enough to pretend we don't have differences. Despite the fact that we all read the same source material, I know I have differences of belief and opinion than you do. We're human, and frankly, that is to be expected. So I'm not advocating here for a putting of one's head into the sand and pretending that nobody has anything different than anybody else, because that's not realistic.

But what I am advocating for, brethren, is that when you see your brother or your sister, either in person or online, you don't see a label first. You don't see an anti-vaxxer or a vaxxer or a BLM supporter or a Blue Lives Matter supporter or a Trump or a Never-Trump or a masker or an anti-masker or whatever the flavor of the month is going forward from this point in time. What I'm advocating for today is that when you see your brother or your sister, you don't see the side there on. You see your brother or your sister. That's what I'm advocating for today. You don't see an enemy.

You don't see somebody who thinks differently than you, who talks or looks or reacts differently than you. Sinachanam is a hatred that exists in our lives in a variety of ways, and it's something that as we've talked, as we've developed these messages, it's present in obvious forms of hatred, such as murder, racism, partiality, oppression. I mean, it's obvious in those things, but it's subtle as well, and it can be present when we're operating from a position of pride, as we consider others, again, who are not like us or who do not think like us. Sinachanam is senseless hatred. Hatred with no reason, a response that maybe doesn't match the offense, but you know, it can manifest itself in other ways as well, very subtly. Assumptions, gossip, biases and prejudices, spreading misinformation, smearing other people, not providing the benefit of the doubt, or at times even a development of cliques and groups that don't let other people in. So, brethren, how do you combat senseless hatred? Well, you combat it with achavat chanam, achavat chanam, which is a-h-a-v-a-t, a-h-a-v-a-t-c-h-i-n-a-m, a-v-a-t-ch-n-a-m, senseless love. You combat senseless hatred with senseless love. You know, it doesn't make sense to our human reasoning to give the life of your only child for the redemption of your enemy. The fact is, I think about that in my own human reasoning, that makes no sense at all. To buy back my enemy's life with the blood of my child makes no sense. In human reasoning, it makes no sense at all. That individual did the things that they did. They're deserving of death. Their actions have consequences, right? But instead, God showed all of us mercy. And while we were still sinners, while we were enemies of God, Christ died for us to give us the opportunity to be reconciled to the Father. And it's with that same love, as it said in John 13, that we are expected to love our brothers, our sisters, and our enemies. Dr. Martin Luther King once said that darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that. Senseless hatred, sennach ha-nam, can't be driven out by more hatred.

But senseless love, the very love of God, will absolutely banish senseless hatred.