Where's the Beef?

Well, thank you to the Vocal Quartet, and once again, good afternoon, everyone.

Quick question to get started today. How many of you remember the Where's the Beef? ad campaign in the mid-1980s? Right? Most every hand. I should have warned you before I asked you to raise your hands. That was 35 years ago, by the way, this month. Now that you've admitted, you know, the remembering that far back on some of these things. But, you know, it was a campaign that was kind of hard to forget, honestly. For those that aren't aware, those in the younger crowd, the ad consisted of a trio of older women who had entered this unknown fast food chain that there was a sign in the back that was the home of the Big Bun. It was the ad. It was the home of the Big Bun. No names or anything on the restaurant itself. They step up to the counter, you know, kind of Indiana Jones-like. It's this, you know, burger on a big plate, basically, in the front, and they kind of slowly walk up to it, and they're looking at it. And the bun's enormous. You know, it's this massive, massive burger, and all three are just admiring this massive burger on this big fluffy bun when one of them reaches out and pulls the top of the hamburger bun off to reveal this pathetically small hamburger patty, this sad little pickle on top and a little bit of ketchup and mustard. And the thing that, you know, the burger patty itself takes up about the size of a half dollar on this gigantic fluffy bun. Bun to burger ratio, if I had to estimate it, about 4 to 1.

Bun to burger, you know, and this thing is just itty-bitty on here. And the trio of older ladies, they're just crestfallen. You know, they just, you can see them visibly get disappointed. There's no.

And then, at that point, Clara Peller, who was an 84-year-old, 4'10 actress from Chicago, Illinois, in this raspy voice, the now famous line, where's the beef? Where's the beef? And then the announcer goes on to tell everybody how Wendy's, their burgers, have more beef. They have more meat than McDonald's and Burger King. The commercials became, you might remember, wildly popular.

And honestly, it kind of took on a little bit of a life of its own. They filmed three follow-up ads with Clara and her now famous tagline. There was merchandise in galore. They was on t-shirts. They were bumper stickers, board games, frisbees. Peller made appearances on S&L on what was then WWF, now known as WWE. She sat ringside at WrestleMania just to stand up and say, where's the beef in the microphone. She recorded a novelty single with a Nashville disc jockey entitled, where's the beef? And Walter Mondale, you might even remember this, Walter Mondale used the phrase during a debate with Senator Gary Hart during his 1984 presidential run. This thing got around. You know, this catchphrase and this tagline got around. And as a result of the ads, Wendy's, which actually a fast food chain centered in Columbus, Ohio, saw an increase in revenue of 31 percent. 31 percent increase in revenue following this ad campaign, which is unreal.

I mean, following this very clever turn of phrase, where's the beef? Over the years in the United Church of God, or in the Church of God as a whole, people have expressed their appreciation for and their dissatisfaction with the spiritual diet that they've been served in these kind of terms, using the terms like meat. And not in as many words. People haven't said, where's the beef?

But they've kind of made comment, and you hear things sometimes, about meat and milk and the basic principle involved. Let's turn over to Hebrews today. Let's start there. We're going to pick it up in Hebrews 5 to begin. And we're going to take a look at this. We're going to kind of use this concept to build our point today as we go forward. Hebrews 5, we'll go ahead and pick the account up there. The wording and terminology of that concept, this concept of milk and meat, comes from this passage. It comes from Hebrews 5, but not just specifically Hebrews 5. It comes from Hebrews 5's rendering in the King James Version. Now, the new King James Version, you'll notice, says, solid food, milk and solid food. The King James Version reads as follows. Hebrews 5 verse 12, and we'll go ahead and read it through verse 14. You can follow along with whatever translation you happen to have. It says, But for when, for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again, which be the first principles of the oracles of God, and are become such as have need of milk, and not strong meat. For every one, and that strong meat is where you'll see in your probably your translation, solid food or something along those lines. For every one that useth milk is unskillful in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe.

But strong meat belongeth to them that are of full age or of maturity, spiritually mature, even those who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

So this is where we see this terminology come into play. It's found in this passage in the King James, the word milk and strong meat, or just meat, became a part of our church speak. It became kind of a part of our church lexicon, so to speak. And it was used to discuss the spiritual diet that individuals experienced in their congregations. And what's interesting is frequently, and I mean at least historically, often some... and before I even bring this up, I want you to think for a second. What do you define in your head as meat? What is meat in your mind? Because what's fascinating about this is I've talked to a lot of people and everybody's definition is different.

I don't know that I've come across two or three people that agree on the same thing of what meat really is. So frequently, I mean at least historically, what we've considered meat to be is sometimes some new idea or concept, something that was kind of scintillating to hear or scintillating to consider. Maybe we looked at like a fresh interpretation of prophecy as being really meaty. Or some new truth that tended to be thought of more meaty than maybe, say, other topics. There was a perception, and I think to an extent there still is in some cases, that those kind of messages tend to be stronger. They tend to be stronger meat, more spiritually mature somehow, while messages that deal with living this way of life on the day-to-day, overcoming sin, developing godly character, things that we might term Christian living, were generally considered to be less meaty and more the milk of the word. We said, as I talk to people, that seems to kind of be what I can gather, at least, as I've talked. But what I said before, it's interesting. Talk to different people. You get different answers. You get different answers and different responses as to what people would consider meat. It's different from person to person. For some, it seems to be anything prophecy-related. Give a message on prophecy, and they will tell you afterwards, that was meaty. That was meaty. Thank you.

Some have said that, you know, messages that reference 15 to 20 scriptures and just boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, rapid succession. That's meaty. You know, that's meaty.

Or, for others, it's meaty if it's something they haven't heard before. Others, again, have definitions all over the place as to what constitutes strong meat. So, as a whole, our definitions are all over the place, with regards to what we would consider. But yet, what's interesting is that there are messages that don't fit into our definition. We might scratch our heads, and like that trio of older ladies in front of the big fluffy bun, ask the question, yeah, but where's the beef? Where's the meat? Right? Sometimes we can even reach a point, I think, where we question whether we're being fed at all.

And from that point, we can sometimes breed greater dissatisfaction. We can build a big old root of bitterness that springs up and creates all manner of havoc in our lives. In case you hadn't already guessed it, the title of the second split sermon today is, Where's the Beef?

And you admit it, you'd be disappointed if it wasn't. So, the title today is, Where's the Beef?

And so, because all of our definitions are kind of all over the place, honestly, we need to allow God to define what God considers meat to be. And thankfully, He does. He defines what milk and meat is in the same passage that we just looked at. So, let's take a look at Hebrews 5 again, only let's start this time in verse 11. So, Hebrews 5 and verse 11, and we're going to, I'm going to read through this now in the New King James. We've established the vocabulary. We realized that the King James has the concept of strong meat. That's where that comes from.

But I'm going to read it in the New King James for readability's sake, because I personally have a hard time sometimes with all the yis and the ets and everything that goes along with that.

So, from a readability standpoint, beginning in Hebrews 5, just a quick kind of contextual piece, who's the book of Hebrews written to? Not a trick question. Right? Jewish audience. It's written to a Jewish audience to those Jews that have converted to Christianity. And the writer of Hebrews is encouraging them to go forward, to go on to perfection, to go on to what we might say, spiritual maturity, to go on to spiritual maturity. And what he spends time in this book doing is connecting things that they had done for hundreds and thousands of years to Christ.

You know, explaining to them the purpose behind atonement, explaining to them, you know, the identity of Melchizedek, explaining all these things and connecting Jesus Christ into all of it.

So, in Hebrews 5, he writes to them the following beginning in verse 11, again, of Hebrews 5. And he says, of whom, we kind of break into it here, he's speaking at this point of Christ, of whom we have much to say and hard to explain since you have become dull of hearing. So, the writer of Hebrews is, you know, honestly not being particularly complimentary to his audience here that he's writing to. He's making the statement that he has many things to say to them regarding Christ that they don't understand. And they don't understand because they're dull of hearing, they're lazy of hearing. And his point was, look, I should be able to, with everything you guys understand, I should be able to drop that final puzzle piece, which is Jesus Christ, into this puzzle. And you should all go, oh, that makes perfect sense. It all makes perfect sense. And he goes, but you don't, you don't hear it. You don't hear it. You don't understand it, he says.

So he goes on, he's mentioning here in verse 11 that they're dull and they're lazy of hearing.

And then he goes on to say what we read earlier in verse 12, for though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. So we see him equate this dullness of hearing to the point that, again, they should be in a place where they could be teachers, that they could tell other people these things, and that they should understand these things in such a way that they could explain it to others. Now, these first principles, these oracles, he equates to milk.

See how he's written this? For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the first principles of the oracles of God, and you have come to need milk and not solid food. So we look at these principles, these fundamentals, so to speak, and these are the things which he kind of equates as milk, not solid food, as it's kind of described. So he's essentially, in this letter, the writer of Hebrews, which, you know, a lot of people think is the Apostle Paul, not 100% sure, but the writer of Hebrews here is writing to the individuals and essentially saying, look, you're still infants.

You haven't been weaned yet. You're still on milk, is kind of what he's saying here. Not eating solid food, they're spiritually immature, they still need milk, they're still nursing, we might say. He goes on in verse 13 of this, again, as he's writing to this Hebrew audience, verse 13, for everyone who partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, for he is a babe.

So the way that he's writing this, he's saying there needs to be something more, you know, there needs to be a progression from this point to this point. Verse 14, but solid food, he's getting at now, but solid food belongs to those who are of full age, who are spiritually mature. That is those who by reason of use, have their senses exercised to discern both good and evil.

Now verses 13 and 14 connect several threads and ideas together. It says that an individual that partakes only of milk is unskilled in the word, and that word there is logos, word, or message of righteousness. There's someone who, we might say in our vernacular today, is just, it's green, they're green.

You know, they could be new, they could be old, but they're green. They're inexperienced in that regard. Someone who maybe hasn't advanced down that road towards godly character as they work towards this measure of the fullness of Christ. Now, it's not milk, the milk's not bad, it's not a bad thing. Milk is important, right? It's the beginning of the process. As new parents, you know, if you had your kids in hospitals and, you know, they bring you out and they buckle the kid in and they make sure that everything's good, how many of your doctors and nutritionists said, well, when you get home, you don't want to cook that kid up a nice juicy T-bone, let him just gnaw on it.

No one said that, right? Because babies drink milk at the beginning of their lives. They progress to that point where they can then have solid food. We don't, you know, hand the kid a T-bone day one and just say, well, here you go, have fun. They have to start on milk, and as they grow and they mature, you know, as parents, we want to make sure that we're weaning them from that so that they can introduce solid food because if we don't, they won't grow properly.

Spiritually, it's the same. We want to move into the meat of the Word. We want to move into spiritual maturity with time. And so verse 13 is continuing in connecting this idea of righteousness, this idea of building godly character to spiritual maturity and the exercise of discernment and the exercise of discernment, that we build godly character. We learn what it is that God desires of us through discerning good and evil, that we take spiritual principles, we take spiritual concepts, and we navigate our lives based on those spiritual concepts, and that when we go through and we discern a situation in which direction we go, we build character in that process.

We build character. We are put into positions at times in our lives where we have to take what we understand from Scripture and make a decision about how best to proceed based on the principle that is contained within. Now, those situations often are situations where we have to yield our self-righteousness, where we have to yield our selfishness, where we have to yield our own wants, our own desires, to God's Spirit dwelling in us and responding accordingly to the prompts of His Spirit.

Then and only then do we grow in spiritual maturity. Each one of those decisions builds us a little more, and we grow a little more.

You'll continue on going past Hebrews 5 here in verse 14. We'll jump into Hebrews 6.

And keep in mind, you know, there's no chapter in verse breaks in the original documents.

So Hebrews 6 was defined by someone back in the, you know, middle ages and has been that way since.

But in the original text, this would have just continued after Hebrews 5. You know, would have gone through and just continued on past this. In fact, there's another clue there, that word therefore. You see that word therefore again, saying, look, because of all these things that were written before, now understand these things. So we read verse 1 of Hebrews 6, therefore again, because of all these things that the writer just said, leaving the discussion of the elementary principles of Christ, let us go on to perfection. Let us go on to spiritual maturity. Let us go on to holiness. Not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works. So we see one thing listed in a faith toward God, of the doctrine of baptisms, of laying on of hands, of resurrection of the dead, and of eternal judgment. And this we will do. It says, if God permits. So the writer says, look, therefore, because of what I just said, leaving the discussion of these elementary principles, let us go on toward maturity. Let us go on and not lay again the basic things. Again, looking at kind of these core doctrines that we've identified here in Hebrews 6, repentance, baptism, laying on of hands, resurrection, eternal judgment. So, you know, if you look at the disciples and how they went out and taught, these were the things that they started with. This was kind of the beginning.

You know, message was, look, you need to repent. You need to change. That was like step one, right?

You need to repent. And so that was the first thing. And then they went and they built off of that. And that's how they continued to build and continued to mature as time goes on. These were, kind of at the time, the fundamental doctrines of the church. These were the basics, quote, unquote, and it's not that it's inappropriate to discuss these things, these fundamentals. We have to have a solid understanding of these things. It's just that that study of those things should inform our actions. It should inform our actions. It should, at our core, change how we look at the world around us. It should change the decisions that we make when we yield ourselves to God in our lives. We should, as time goes on, become more spiritually mature and more able to discern good and evil as we navigate forward in our lives. So what is God's definition of meat as we see it written out here in Hebrews 5? God defines, more or less, meat as the place in our life where the rubber meets the road, the actions of our choices based upon spiritual principles, us taking what we read in Scripture, taking the prompting of God's Holy Spirit, yielding ourselves to those things and deciding appropriately what to do based upon them, becoming skilled, we might say, in righteousness, becoming skilled in using God's Spirit to discern and to choose between right and wrong, which means, in a somewhat ironic thing, that those Christian living topics, the ones that help us better live this way of life, are spiritual meat because they're teaching us how to live this way of life. They are messages that reinforce God's value. They're messages that help us live more righteously. They are meat, which is interesting because it's the exact opposite of what we've defined as meat over the years. It's not necessarily more scriptures crammed into a sermon. It's how those scriptures are expounded on and what sort of application we take away from those scriptures in our life to now go out and live it. That's the meat, going out and living it based on what we see. It's not necessarily that new thing that tickles our ears and encourages us to question everything we've been taught. It's not necessarily messages on prophecy.

I'll be the first one. I love prophecy. I do. I love prophecy. It is fascinating to me. I love looking at geopolitics. I think looking at what's going on in England with Brexit and looking at the European Union, all that stuff is fascinating to me. Sometimes you try to connect it with current events, and sometimes it's complete and total speculation, but it's interesting nonetheless.

But I have to ask myself sometimes, does prophecy in and of itself prepare me spiritually?

Does prophecy in and of itself help me to mature personally to become more skilled in righteousness, better skilled in yielding myself to God's will and his promptings in my life? Honestly, the answer is no, not really. Not really. Now, it doesn't mean it's not important. A huge chunk of the Bible is prophecy. It's obviously important. It can provide me with a sense of urgency. It can provide me with an understanding of the Bible. It can give me an idea of where we are in the timeline.

Historically, I think we can all think back. Prophecy was pretty good at putting people in the seats, but what it didn't do was cause a person in those seats to become more converted in and of itself. Where's the beef? Where's the meat? That's the meat.

Finding ways for us to measure and find it. That's kind of the metric we're looking at here, is finding the things that make us better Christians in the long run, that make us better followers of Jesus Christ. That's the metric. Those are the things that we encourage for us to apply Scripture in our daily lives in order to live the way that God has called us to live.

So, when we think about things like that, there's a couple of questions, two basic questions that I would like to spend the rest of the time we have today kind of looking at. Two basic questions that we should ask ourselves whenever we're consuming something spiritually. I like to take the rest of our time today to take a look at these two questions, because if we can identify these two things in everything that we take in spiritually, if we can do it, whether it's a sermon, whether it's an article, a Bible study, or you know, even a conversation with somebody, if we can ask these two questions and answer these two questions, you will have found the beef.

You will have found the meat in that conversation, in that sermon, in that article, in that Bible study, whatever it might be. These two questions are as follows, and they're closely related. The first one, how can this, whatever this may be, how can this help me become a stronger Christian? How can whatever I'm hearing, listening to, reading, talking about, what can I take away from that that will help me become a stronger Christian? And the second question is, again, related. What specific lesson can I take away from this and apply in my life tomorrow? What can I take and what can I implement in my life to help me live this way of life better? So for the time that we have left, the rest of our time, I'd like to examine these two questions in the context of spiritual growth, because when we talk about spiritual growth, or we might say spiritual maturity, that's what we're talking about here. We're talking about growing as a Christian and trying to understand what it takes for us to increase in our understanding and our knowledge of what we see in Scripture. When we think about this, it's really worth noting Ephesians 4. Let's go ahead and turn over there. I know we go there a lot, and I don't know if you've ever looked at verse mapping, which is kind of this idea of how you connect various verses by little threads, so to speak. Ephesians 4 is just one of those places where a lot of threads come into, because there's so much in that section of Ephesians. So Ephesians 4, we'll go ahead and pick it up in verse 11. Again, we've been here recently, but we're going to go here again. Ephesians 4 and verse 11. Ephesians 4 verse 11 says, And he himself gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry. Now notice, those gifts, those were given for a specific purpose. They were given for the equipping of the saints for the work of ministry. They were not given for self-exaltation. They were given for the equipping of the saints to edify the body of Christ, to build up the church. Verse 13, 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. So again, this passage is talking about these gifts that are given to those in the body for the purpose of equipping the saints, for the edification or for the building up of the body of the church. Again, until we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God. That's describing kind of the pinnacle here. That's describing the end goal, the end result, so to speak, of that growth process is closer and closer and closer to that example that we've been given. Verse 14 of Ephesians 4 reads as follows. It says, That we should no longer be children.

Notice the reference. Notice the reference to children. That we should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine by the turquery of men in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting. Verse 15, But speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into him who is the head, Christ. Verse 16, From whom the whole body, joined in it together by whatever joint supplies, according to the effect of working by which every part does it share, causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself in love. And so we see kind of a connection here that spiritual maturity is contrasted with being tossed to and fro and carried about by winds of doctrine. These two things are contrasted. It says, like children, tossed to and fro. Spiritual maturity would be the opposite of children. So there's a contrast there. Spiritual maturity being contrasted with being tossed to and fro and carried about by winds of doctrine. Now this idea that, you know, if we don't know these principles well enough to know what's true and what is not, we can allow ourselves to be deceived by things. You know, we can allow ourselves to hear something that's just not quite there, but it sounds right. Sounds right. Still not quite there, but it sounds close. That's why Satan works. Satan operates in half truths. He operates in half deceptions. It's got enough truth in it to sound plausible. The ideal then would be that an individual knows things well enough to be able to hear something and be able to go, you know what, no, that's false, and here's why that's false. Obviously, in love, but no, that's false, and here's why that's false. Being able, again, to speak the truth in love to those in opposition.

When the individuals in the body grow stronger, the body grows spiritually, and it becomes stronger as a result, but that growth in the body and in those individuals can't happen until they've yielded their carnality and their self-righteousness and put on God's righteousness through his spirit in their life. Let's go over to 1 Corinthians 3. It's a place where the Apostle Paul makes this point to those in Corinth. 1 Corinthians 3. We'll pick it up in verse 2. Paul's making the point that there were things that he wanted to teach them in Corinth, and he couldn't, because they weren't ready. They weren't ready. They just were not prepared, not ready for it at all.

1 Corinthians 3 and verse 2. All right, verse 1. I'm sorry for those of you that write it down and then have to go back and rewrite it. I'm looking at you, Diana Bartsch. I'm sorry. Because Diana told me one time, you always do that. You say, this one, and then you go back, and you're not already written it in my Bible. We're already written it in my stuff. I'm sorry. 3 and verse 1. And I, brethren, could not speak to you as spiritual people, but as to carnal, noticed, as to babes in Christ.

As to carnal, as to babes in Christ. Verse 2. I fed you with milk and not with solid food. I don't have the King James in front of me here. It may say strong meat. I'm assuming it does, given the translation from where it is in Hebrews. But I fed you with milk and not with solid food, for until now you were not able to receive it. And even now, he said when he wrote this letter, you're still not able. Paul's point to those in Corinth was that because of their carnality, because of their infancy in the word of righteousness, if we want to borrow that terminology from Hebrews 5, because of their inability to receive solid food, that he fed them with milk. He fed them with milk. And why? Why did he feed them with milk? Verse 3. For you are still carnal. The reason he fed them with milk is because they were still carnal. For where there are envy, strife, and divisions among you, are you not carnal? And are you not behaving like mere men? For when one says, I'm of Paul, and another says, I'm of Apollos, are you not carnal? Verse 5. Who then is Paul?

Who is Apollos? But ministers through whom you've believed, as the Lord gave to each one. I planted, Paul says, Apollos watered, but God, God gave the increase. So then neither he who plants is anything, Paul speaking of himself, neither he who plants is anything, neither he nor are or he who waters, but God who gives the increase. Verse 8. Now he who plants and he who waters are one, and each one will receive his own reward according to his own labor. We recognize God gives the increase. He gives the growth collectively. He gives it individually as well. God provides that growth, and he provides it when a person yields themselves to him. When someone stops fighting, and when someone stops pushing back, and when someone finally drops that shield that they've been holding out in front of them, and lets God in, and lets him work, when they put aside their desires, when they put aside their wants, and they begin to start thinking about serving others, when they act towards others in love, yielding that carnality, setting aside envy, setting aside strife, division, then and only then are they ready for solid food. Then and only then. Because before that point, they're simply not ready because they haven't yielded. They're not ready because they haven't yielded. Brethren, what do you need to let go of in your life to allow you to grow into a stronger Christian? What's something that you personally have to yield? What's something you're being asked to give up? Is there strife? Is there envy? Is there anger? Is there a desire or a lust for something that you can't have? What are you being asked to release? What are you being asked to give up? You know, all of us have various things that weigh us down and kind of prevent us from moving forward. You know, it talks about it. You know, each of those weights that ensnare us that we're to toss off so that we can finish the race, right? What are those things in your life? What's preventing you from growth and how will you remove that barrier? How will you remove that barrier in your life? You know, John 13 and verse 35, we can go ahead and turn over there. John 13 and verse 35 is one of those memory scriptures. I'm going to read this out of the New King James.

John 13 and verse 35. You know, sometimes what gets in our way, again, is our own carnality, is our own our own issues, our own desires and wants. But this is a metric, John 13.35, is a metric of someone who is following Christ. It's a benchmark, so to speak, kind of, you know, one of those places where you look at it and you go, yep, this is a checkbox. Yes, no, you know, whatever.

But John 13 and verse 35 reads as follows. It says, by this all will know that you are my my disciples. I promised I've been speaking English for a number of years. You wouldn't know it, but by this all will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. If you have love for one another, that's the metric. That's the benchmark. That's the benchmark.

Love is a measure of spiritual maturity. It's a measure of spiritual maturity. And sometimes these barriers, these envy, these strife, these divisions, these issues exist because there's a lack of love for one another in our lives. There's a lack of love for one another. Let's go to 1 Corinthians 13. 1 Corinthians 13. We'll pick it up in verse one of the love chapter as we look at the importance of this particular topic. 1 Corinthians 13. We'll see that that love is a measure of spiritual maturity. 1 Corinthians 13 and verse 1 reads, Though I speak with the tongues of men and angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clinging cymbal.

And though I have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.

Paul writes, you know, look, a person can have all these spiritual gifts. The person can have all these things that we looked at in Ephesians. You know, we can have these are gifts that he was given personally. You know, these great understandings, these incredible things. And he says that we can have these, we can have this, this blessing to understand all mysteries, have all knowledge.

We can have all the faith in the world such that we could move mountains, but without love, it's wasted. It's wasted. Verse three continues on, And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, but have not love, it profits me nothing. He says, even if I'm martyred, my body's given to be burned. If I don't have love, it's nothing.

Love suffers long, beginning in verse four, and is kind. Love does not envy. Love does not parade itself, is not puffed up, does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil, does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Verse eight, love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail. Whether there are tongues, they will cease. And whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. You know, it makes the point, love doesn't fail. Prophecies can fail, tongues can cease, knowledge can vanish away, but love remains. And you can go down to Hobby Lobby, you can find that written on about a half a million different little things that you can hang in your house. You know, that particular passage is oft quoted, you know, we see it at weddings, we see it all over the place. But you know, I think sometimes we think of that very frequently from a standpoint of husband and wife, and we don't necessarily think about it from a standpoint of brother and sister in the family of God. Sometimes we don't go through that and think of it in that way. It's not just husband and wife. Love suffers long between brothers and sisters. It's kind, it doesn't envy, it doesn't parade itself, it's not puffed up between each other and one another in our congregations. It doesn't behave rudely, it doesn't seek its own, it's not provoked, it thinks no evil. It doesn't rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth.

It hears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

That's written as much about our brothers and sisters in Christ as it is our husbands and our wives. He goes on in verse 9, 13 of verse 9, for we know in part, and we prophesy in part, but when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away. We see this at this point, we see kind of this strange, this little strange concept that seems like a weird little ad in here, and I think that's one of the reasons I wanted to come here today, is because I'd like to address that. I think this passage in verse 11 is here because it connects this idea of spiritual maturity with love. So we see in verse 11 of 1 Corinthians 13, it says, when I was a child, I spoke as a child. I understood as a child. I thought as a child. In other words, when I was young, I said things that offended people. I didn't make right decisions sometimes, but as we spiritually mature, we put away those childish things and we learn how to interact with one another. That connects with this section. I put away childish things. For now, verse 12, we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know, just as I also am known. Verse 13, And now abide faith, hope, love, these three, but the greatest of these is love. I think that Paul's point to the brethren and Corinth is that love is a measure of spiritual maturity, that it is a benchmark of spiritual maturity, that our understanding at this time, our understanding at this time, is like seeing dimly in a mirror. You know, we understand in part, we know in part, and as we kind of look at that and we consider that, that a measure of spiritual growth, of that spiritual maturity, is the love that we show one another, a two-way street, so to speak, of mutual respect. As Paul points out in this passage, there's a lot of things that we don't know at this time because we do look through a glass darkly.

You know, there's things that, honestly, you know, we sometimes just have to throw up our hands and go, you know, at some point in time, God will reveal this to us. But we cannot pinpoint it in this life. But at times, unfortunately, those are the things that create strife among us.

There are points of prophecy, points of knowledge, and again, some of these things we simply have to recognize. We're going to have to eventually get answers for these things. We don't have them yet, but we need to be able to get answers. Kind of as Paul says, one day we'll see face to face and we'll know just as we are known. Yet today, at times, we're willing to stake our faith, willing to stake our brethren, and sometimes even our fellowship on these things of which we're so certain. Brethren, it is possible to be right and be completely wrong at the same time.

Those two things are not mutually exclusive. It is possible to be both of those things at the same time in how our attitude is put forth and in the way that we deal with these things.

What do you personally need in order to grow? What needs to be let go of in your life? What needs to change? What needs to be done in order for you to make more progress spiritually, to progress even further than where you are now? What's stopping you? How will you address it? What can we learn from it? You know, if we ask these sorts of questions of every message that we hear, of every article that we read, of every conversation that we have, we will find the beef every single time.

There's meat there. There's always meat there. We'll find the beef every single time. And when we start considering what we need to learn ourselves, I hope that we recognize that simply learning them is not enough. It requires application in our lives. For example, we talked about love. Love is an action word. Love is a verb, and so it's one of those things where we need to recognize there's an expectation of action in that. There's an expectation of action in that. And for us to be able to do that, for us to have that action, it requires us to know ourselves and to recognize our own limitations, which is so hard. It is so hard sometimes, you know, looking in that mirror and going, ugh! But recognizing that things need to be taken care of and things need to be fixed.

But to ask these sorts of questions and to really examine ourselves gives us opportunities to recognize where we can grow. I don't know, I'm sure you've all had this can't just be a bend thing, there's no way this is just a bend thing. But I found in my own life that God is really good at putting me into places where I have plenty of opportunities to practice things I need to grow in.

You know, one of the things that I struggle with at times, and I'll, you know, be perfectly transparent, I'm not a very patient person. And for me, patience is a struggle. And God gives me a lot of opportunities to work on patience, I found. He allows me plenty of opportunity to learn as we go. But in your life, if joy is a struggle, you're probably going to find a lot of opportunities to try to find joy in your life. If God has a way of allowing us to be put into a place that will help us grow, if, if, and this is the big part, if we recognize it as such, if we recognize that that opportunity is a chance for us to grow, that it's not the sky falling, but it's a chance for us to learn something. That is so essential. It's so essential. Let's go over to the book of James as we kind of close things up today. Book of James. I got a little nervous when Roger read out James 1 today in the beginning. I thought, oh no, don't go there. Don't take my last passage.

Please, no. James 1. We're going to be just a little north of where he was at. Actually, sorry, just a little bit south of where he was at. James 1, and we'll pick it up in verse 19.

James 1 in verse 19 says, So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to wrath. Kind of a nice reminder there of the kind of attitude that we should have when we interact with people. Swift to hear, able and willing to listen, slow to speak, as we saw with Job's friends in our reading. You know, seven days they sat and waited, and then slow to wrath. For the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God. And that's our goal, that we yield ourselves to God in our life and grow in righteousness. Kind of looking again at what we looked at earlier, anger, envy, bitterness, clamor, wrath, frustration, those don't produce the righteousness of God. Instead, yielding ourselves to God's Spirit, applying what we learn, helps us to kind of put on that righteousness of God. Verse 21, he goes on, Therefore, lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness, receive with humility, the implanted word which is able to save your souls. Verse 22, But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. Application is necessary. Application is absolutely essential.

Living it is necessary. Because again, meat is getting out there and discerning which path to take based upon spiritual principle, especially in places where it's not clearly defined, where it's not clearly defined, where we have to literally stand there and go, what does God want me to do based on his word? Based on his word, what do I do in this situation? And we got to be willing to go back to that word and not rely on our own understanding. We got to err on the side of God.

So if we're looking for in messages, if we're analyzing things and articles that we read, conversations that we have with that in mind, thinking again, what can I apply tomorrow that will help me to become stronger in my faith and stronger as a Christian, we're able to now think about and consider the application aspect. He goes on in verse 23, for if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror, for he observes himself, goes away and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. We've got to have that follow through. We've got to have that follow through. Verse 25, but he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does. You know, many ways James here is encouraging the brethren to get their hands dirty, to roll up their sleeves, so to speak, and get to work, to serve others, to kind of put the elbow grease to the relationships, so to speak, you know, really to show their faith in their service. You see in the next two passages that he defines this concept of pure and undefiled religion. He says, to visit the orphans and the widows, to serve them while keeping themselves unspotted from the world. Verse 26, if anyone among you thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this one's religion is useless. Verse 27, pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this, to visit orphans and widows in their trouble and to keep oneself unspotted from the world. What sorts of things do you need to apply in your life? What are some areas that need improvement on follow-through? You know, things that we know to be true but maybe haven't done so well on the follow-through side. What are some things that you know you should maybe be doing better but perhaps are not? Why is that? And how can you fix it? You know, when you consider a spiritual diet, what we take in spiritually, we have to be thinking daily. You can't just eat once every seven days. You'll starve. You've got to be eating every day. And when you think about the meals that you're taking in, when you're talking about sermons and you're talking about articles and you're talking about conversations and your own personal Bible study and, you know, friend Bible studies and whatever else, if you approach them with the two questions that we began with in mind, what can I learn from this interaction to make me a stronger Christian or help me to become a stronger Christian? And what specifically can I take from this and apply in my life? If we start to approach our spiritual diet from that aspect, we'll start to shift our mindset from, what do I get out of this? To what can I mine out of this? What can I find that I can, a little morsel, a little thing that I can just chew on the rest of this week? And once we've reached that point, once we've approached our faith in that way, we won't find ourselves asking, where's the beef?

Because we will have already found it.