Jeff Miller

June 29, 2025

The Heart of Religion

The Secret to Fasting

Jeff Miller

June 29, 2025

The Heart of Religion

Introduction:

What is fasting? – Abstaining from food (and/or other things) for measured periods of time in order to heighten my hunger for the things of God.

What Am I Really Hungry For? (Matthew 6:16–18)

Am I hungry for ATTENTION ... (Matt 6:16)
...or am I hungry for GOD? (Matt 6:17–18)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

00:50-00:50
Matthew chapter 6. Are you there?
00:52-00:53
Look at verse 1.
00:54-00:57
This is the greatest sermon ever preached.
00:58-01:01
And here Jesus is talking about the heart of religion.
01:02-01:05
And this is how this whole section starts.
01:06-01:13
Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them.
01:13-01:16
For then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.
01:18-01:25
Jesus says, beware of trying to impress people with your religious acts.
01:27-01:35
Beware of doing your church stuff in a way that you want people's attention.
01:37-01:42
And specifically, Jesus goes after three things here.
01:42-01:52
He goes after giving and praying and fasting.
01:57-02:05
And you know, anytime that I teach or preach about fasting, I always feel like I'm playing from behind.
02:08-02:21
What I mean is, you know, people recognize giving and praying as normal religious things that God's people do.
02:22-02:24
Those are kind of no brainers.
02:27-02:28
But fasting?
02:32-02:34
Well, look at verse 16.
02:36-02:42
Look at the first phrase, Jesus says, "And when you fast," stop there.
02:43-02:45
When you fast.
02:46-02:47
You know what that phrase tells me?
02:50-02:57
That phrase tells me that fasting is just as expected as giving.
02:59-03:04
Fasting is just as expected as praying.
03:07-03:08
Let's bow our heads.
03:08-03:21
I'm gonna ask that you would please pray for me to be faithful, to communicate a passage and a concept that's very simple and very hard at the same time.
03:21-03:27
Pray for me and I will pray for you that our hearts would be open to receive what God wants to tell us today.
03:34-03:36
Transform us, Father, by the power of Your Word.
03:37-03:40
We pray in Jesus' name, amen.
03:43-03:45
Let's talk about fasting, shall we?
03:48-03:52
Our culture is obsessed with food, have you noticed?
03:54-03:55
Turn on the TV.
03:57-04:03
If the commercial's not about a pharmaceutical, what's the commercial about?
04:04-04:05
Food, right?
04:07-04:09
Food, get on social media.
04:09-04:11
You'll find somebody took a picture of their hamburger.
04:14-04:15
Right? We're obsessed with it.
04:15-04:17
You know the thing that always fascinates me though?
04:18-04:19
These eating contests.
04:20-04:21
You ever seen those eating contests?
04:23-04:26
You know, the most famous one, like the hot dog eating contest.
04:27-04:29
How many people here, show of hands, have been in a hot dog eating contest?
04:31-04:31
Nobody.
04:33-04:36
You're like, well, Pastor Jeff, have you ever been in an eating contest?
04:36-04:39
Yeah, and I won.
04:40-04:48
It was eating a pie as fast as you can, hands-free, and I won.
04:49-04:51
I won a Shop-Vac.
04:52-04:54
That is a true story.
04:56-05:02
And I needed that Shop-Vac to clean up when I got sick after eating a pie that fast without my hands.
05:04-05:06
There's all kinds of eating contests.
05:07-05:09
A taco eating contest, I think I could win that too.
05:10-05:12
Wings, how about this one?
05:12-05:14
An oyster eating contest.
05:17-05:18
How many people would be up for that?
05:20-05:22
A couple of you would.
05:22-05:24
All right, Pastor Taylor, game on.
05:27-05:28
(laughing)
05:29-05:31
Or here's an eating contest.
05:32-05:34
I have no idea what this even is.
05:34-05:37
Slug burger, a slug burger eating contest.
05:38-05:39
Does anybody know what a slug burger is?
05:40-05:40
Anybody?
05:41-05:43
All right, we'll have to Google that one later.
05:43-05:45
Not now, later.
05:46-05:48
But I'm always fascinated by these eating contests.
05:48-05:49
This one caught my eye.
05:50-05:51
There was one eating contest.
05:51-05:55
It was eating a 72 ounce steak.
05:55-05:58
Do you know how much a 72 ounce steak is?
05:59-06:02
That's four and a half pounds of steak.
06:04-06:16
And I read of this woman, a 120 pound woman, ate the 72 ounce steak.
06:19-06:21
And then she ate another one.
06:24-06:31
And then she ate a third in 20 minutes.
06:34-06:54
And with that, she also ate three baked potatoes, three shrimp cocktails, three salads, and three buttered rolls in 20 minutes.
06:54-06:56
I read that.
06:56-06:58
I'm like, "You put butter on the rolls?
06:58-06:59
Does that seem excessive?
07:05-07:08
But there's TV shows all about food.
07:10-07:13
Like you see these shows, they have all these shows about cake.
07:14-07:15
You've seen this?
07:17-07:19
And it's not just like, what's the best tasting cake?
07:19-07:32
It's like, oh, I made a cake that looks like a football or whatever, like, And then there's these shows where they travel all over the world and they eat these exotic foods from all over the world.
07:33-07:36
And we're sitting at our TVs watching people eat.
07:38-07:50
And then you turn the channel and on the other channels, a show called "My 600-Pound Life." We're obsessed with food.
07:50-07:57
And we live in a culture where we are constantly, constantly taught that life is about consuming.
07:59-08:06
But how much talk is there really about refusing consumption?
08:10-08:18
So with that horrible backdrop, we're gonna talk about fasting because this is what the Word of God addresses.
08:19-08:20
So what is fasting?
08:20-08:21
We have a definition here.
08:22-08:23
What is fasting?
08:24-08:27
Fasting is abstaining from food and or other things.
08:28-08:29
We'll explain that in a minute.
08:30-08:38
Abstaining from food and or other things for measured periods of time in order to heighten my hunger for the things of God.
08:40-08:41
That's fasting.
08:45-09:03
Staining, measured periods of time in order to heighten my hunger for the things of God." You see, Jesus, when he talks about giving, praying, and fasting, it's really three categories of things.
09:03-09:07
Giving has to do with what you do with others.
09:08-09:12
And praying is what you do with God.
09:12-09:18
And fasting is what you do with yourself, right?
09:20-09:21
So there's different kinds of fasting.
09:21-09:25
There's a normal fast that's just no food, right?
09:25-09:31
There's a partial fast where you only have maybe vegetables and juice.
09:33-09:38
And there's an absolute fast where you have absolutely nothing.
09:40-09:48
But you can and should also fast from other things.
09:50-09:51
And we'll talk about that in a moment.
09:52-09:57
But primarily, primarily, biblically, fasting is about food.
09:59-10:06
Oh, speaking of biblically, fasting is mentioned more than 77 times in the Old Testament and the New Testament.
10:06-10:11
And it is almost always connected with prayer.
10:13-10:19
You see fasting throughout the Bible, different occasions, like for example, repentance.
10:20-10:23
I need to, I'm guilty of this sin.
10:23-10:25
I need to turn from this sin.
10:26-10:28
I'm going to fast and I'm going to pray in my repentance.
10:29-10:40
In the same line of thinking, fasting accompanies mourning over sin, my personal sin, the sins of our culture, our country.
10:40-10:47
We should be mourning and part of mourning is, is fasting and praying.
10:48-10:54
You see fasting in the Bible, at seeking God at critical times.
10:55-10:59
We need to fast because I really need to seek the Lord right now.
10:59-11:02
Think Jesus in the wilderness, right?
11:03-11:06
Think the early church in the book of Acts.
11:09-11:19
Now, when you're talking about fasting, you always have the person that comes along and says, "Well, you know, Pastor Jeff, Fasting isn't explicitly commanded in the New Testament.
11:20-11:22
And that's absolutely true.
11:25-11:33
But something we can't get around is this, Jesus obviously assumed that we would fast.
11:34-11:47
I mean, right here, you're going to see in this passage today, twice, he says, "When you fast." He says it again in Matthew 9, verse 15.
11:48-11:52
He's assuming that his people would fast.
11:52-11:57
Oh, and then, as I said, by the way, the early church did.
11:57-11:58
They fasted.
12:02-12:10
Fasting though, to clarify our definition here, we're going to make sure we understand what it's not.
12:12-12:13
Fasting is not self-punishment.
12:15-12:15
Okay?
12:16-12:17
It's not self-punishment.
12:18-12:20
Fasting isn't like, "I've sinned.
12:20-12:20
I've messed up.
12:21-12:21
You know what?
12:23-12:30
I'm not going to eat because I don't deserve to eat." And like you're sort of punishing yourself.
12:30-12:32
That's not what fasting is about.
12:33-12:33
It's not self-punishment.
12:34-12:37
But fasting also is not self-serving.
12:38-12:52
somebody could walk away from this service going, "Oh, you know, Pastor Jeff was talking about fasting "and I could stand to lose a couple of pounds, "so I'll fast." That's not what it's about.
12:56-12:58
Fasting also is not a bargaining chip.
12:59-13:01
Like I need something from God.
13:02-13:02
Oh, okay.
13:05-13:08
I'll fast and then God will have to give me what I want.
13:10-13:11
Talk more about that in a minute.
13:13-13:16
Fasting is not something that makes you holy.
13:18-13:18
All right?
13:19-13:24
Listen, fasting is not even about getting God's attention.
13:26-13:27
Understand that.
13:27-13:29
Fasting is not, "Look, look at me, God.
13:29-13:30
"I haven't eaten.
13:31-13:34
"Look at me, look at me." No, that's not what it's about.
13:34-13:37
Fasting isn't about me trying to get God's attention.
13:38-13:39
God noticed me.
13:39-13:44
Fasting is about me noticing God.
13:48-13:49
You see the difference?
13:53-13:55
Fasting doesn't make your prayer more powerful.
13:57-14:00
Fasting makes you more focused.
14:02-14:15
Fasting is what I do when I need my entire concentration, all of my being, every cell in my body focused on God.
14:19-14:29
That's what fasting is, because Christ follower, listen, I know, I know, you want to focus on God, you do.
14:31-14:37
But the problem is sometimes, if we're honest, and we should be, we wanna focus on God, but sometimes we want other things more.
14:42-14:51
You're like, what do I do when what I know I should want is not the thing that I'm going after?
14:51-14:52
What do I do?
14:54-14:55
You fast.
14:57-15:07
Fasting is stopping the feeding of ourselves with other things to focus only on our relationship with God.
15:08-15:09
'Cause here's the reality.
15:11-15:18
Every day, every day of your life, you have the capacity to only consume so much.
15:20-15:28
The capacity that you have to satisfy yourself is limited.
15:30-15:31
Here's what I mean.
15:33-15:38
Let's let this table here, this tabletop, let's let this represent you.
15:39-15:48
Okay? Let this table represent you, your heart, your spirit.
15:49-15:56
Do you realize every day of your life You are filling yourself up with stuff.
15:58-16:04
Obviously as we talk about fasting, one of the things that we fill up or we satisfy ourselves with is food, right?
16:07-16:09
This isn't just life.
16:10-16:12
This is mighty life. Cereal.
16:13-16:19
That's how we roll in our house. We fill ourselves up, right?
16:19-16:23
with food, this I need to tell here and we need to get more pretzels.
16:26-16:27
But we fill ourselves up, right?
16:28-16:32
We're filling ourselves up, but it's not even just food, right?
16:32-16:35
Think of how much stuff we fill ourselves with every day.
16:36-16:39
For some of us, it's maybe it's sports.
16:39-16:42
Like I'm on the church softball team, right?
16:42-16:46
That's one of the things that I'm filling myself up with.
16:46-16:48
I'm consuming myself with every day.
16:50-16:54
Maybe it's not even just eating the food, maybe it's preparing the food.
16:55-17:02
So we have our magazine with the latest recipes and we're filling ourselves up with this stuff.
17:03-17:07
And oh, maybe some of us, we like to grow our food, you know, in the garden.
17:07-17:10
So, you know, we have our seeds here, right?
17:10-17:13
So maybe we're filling ourselves up with that.
17:16-17:18
What else are we filling our hearts, our minds, our souls with?
17:18-17:23
For some of us, we're like, "Well, I gotta do my recreational reading, right?
17:24-17:30
So I gotta make sure I get that into me." And oh, here's more seeds.
17:32-17:42
And for some of us, it's like, "Well, I like to paint, so I gotta take time out." And that's something that I fill myself up with, a hobby that I do.
17:42-17:44
For some of us, it's exercise.
17:45-17:47
You gotta make sure you get your reps in, right?
17:48-17:49
Right, right, Dr. Andrew?
17:49-17:51
We gotta make sure that we get our exercise in.
17:52-17:53
That's something else.
17:53-17:57
This, this is 6.6 pounds.
17:59-18:01
That's why I'm, this is why I'm so ripped.
18:03-18:05
The first service laughed when I said that.
18:06-18:07
Can you believe those jerks?
18:09-18:12
For some of us, you're on the golf course, right?
18:13-18:16
That's something that we fill ourselves with, right?
18:16-18:24
For some of us, maybe you're a gamer, you spend time during the day playing your video games, it's something you're consuming.
18:24-18:29
I don't mean to show off, but this is a Pac-Man from PlayStation 2.
18:31-18:35
Not the old PlayStation, this is PlayStation 2.
18:35-18:36
That's cutting edge, right?
18:37-18:39
We fill ourselves up.
18:39-18:40
You see where we're going with this?
18:41-18:42
We're constantly filling ourselves.
18:43-18:47
Oh, and it's not even just that, because we gotta make sure, you know, we entertain ourselves, right?
18:49-18:50
With movies.
18:52-18:53
This is a DVD.
18:55-18:57
I had to explain to the first service what a DVD was.
18:58-19:05
Before streaming, this is a shiny circle that you stick in a machine that plays a movie.
19:06-19:08
This particular one was a gift.
19:09-19:14
It's called "The Masked Saint." It's about a pastor who becomes a pro wrestler.
19:15-19:17
I mean, have you ever heard of such a stupid thing?
19:19-19:23
But we gotta get our intake of entertainment, right?
19:23-19:25
Do you see how much stuff we're taking in?
19:25-19:26
Do you see all?
19:27-19:28
And that's not it.
19:28-19:30
I mean, how much time do we spend on our computers?
19:31-19:33
Right, we gotta get that in, don't we?
19:34-19:38
And am I forgetting anything?
19:38-19:39
Oh yeah.
19:43-19:44
How about this little guy?
19:46-19:53
How much time a day do we spend filling ourselves with content from this?
19:58-19:59
Do you see the point?
20:00-20:05
Over the course of a day, How much are you filling yourself with?
20:06-20:13
Your body, your mind, your belly, your spirit, you're constantly, constantly, constantly, constantly consuming.
20:14-20:21
Now, we're going to let this glass cross represent our walk with Jesus.
20:22-20:27
This represents your relationship with Jesus Christ, your personal walk with Him.
20:28-20:29
Now, do you see a problem?
20:30-20:42
We have to, well, that's, you see a problem?
20:45-20:55
Now we're so full of stuff that we don't have any room left for the thing that really matters.
20:55-20:57
And that's our walk with the Lord.
20:59-21:02
So do you see the purpose of fasting?
21:03-21:04
You know what fasting does?
21:05-21:27
Fasting, just, fasting takes everything off the table and says, the only thing that I'm going to focus on is my walk with Christ.
21:31-21:39
The only thing that my heart, my mind, my attention is getting is my personal walk with the Lord.
21:41-21:43
That's the purpose of fasting.
21:46-21:49
So on your outline, I want you to jot a couple things down here.
21:52-21:54
The question is, what am I really hungry for?
21:56-21:58
What am I really hungry for?
22:01-22:05
Number one, am I hungry for attention?
22:09-22:10
Am I hungry for attention?
22:11-22:24
Look at verse 16, Jesus says, "And when you fast, do not look gloomy like the hypocrites, for they disfigure their faces that their fasting may be seen by others.
22:24-22:50
I say to you, they have received their reward. My hunger for attention. Jesus calls us the Pharisees. He says when they fast, they look gloomy. They disfigure their faces. You know the Pharisees and Jesus, they fasted twice a week. Like, why did they do that? Well, That wasn't commanded in the Old Testament.
22:52-22:53
Like, well, why did they do that?
22:54-22:55
Jesus tells us why they did that.
22:57-22:58
They were putting on a show.
23:00-23:00
That's why.
23:01-23:04
He tells us that they may be seen by others.
23:06-23:18
Actually, the Pharisees and Jesus, they would literally put ashes over their eyes because they were all in on the performance.
23:19-23:23
They wanted to make sure that people knew.
23:25-23:31
And when people knew that they were fasting, they'd be like, "Oh, you don't look so good.
23:31-23:33
What's going on?" "Well, I'm fasting." "You're fasting?
23:34-23:34
Wow.
23:36-23:41
Wow, you are really, you're a really devoted believer.
23:41-23:42
You're a really religious person.
23:43-23:43
Wow.
23:45-23:45
Wow.
23:47-23:58
And that little pat on the back there, that little, as Pastor Taylor calls it, the attaboy, that little thing, Jesus goes, "There's your reward.
24:00-24:06
Have fun with that." It's like giving, and it's like praying.
24:10-24:17
We can become tempted to fast with the wrong motive.
24:20-24:26
See, the fasting is supposed to be about seeking God, not human applause.
24:31-24:33
And look, let's just be real.
24:34-24:35
We love the attention.
24:36-24:44
There is something deep down in every one of us that loves the attention, and that's the problem with hypocrisy.
24:45-24:49
The problem with hypocrisy is it works.
24:55-24:56
I mean, we've all been there.
24:59-25:02
Someone makes a comment about how devoted we are.
25:06-25:13
Someone sees how religious we must be, and we start to feel pretty good about ourselves.
25:19-25:25
Jesus says, "Beware, beware." What about corporate fasting?
25:27-25:30
I mean, others have to know about that, right?
25:32-25:37
Oh yeah, there's New Testament examples of corporate fasting, Acts 13, Acts 14.
25:39-25:42
Now look, here's the thing with that.
25:43-25:47
It's not about whether or not other people know.
25:50-25:53
It's about whether or not you want them to know.
25:56-25:57
See the difference?
25:58-26:07
There's a difference between being seen fasting and fasting in order to be seen.
26:10-26:12
That's how it is with corporate fasting.
26:12-26:13
That's how it is with private fasting.
26:15-26:16
When I fast, I tell Erin.
26:17-26:17
Why?
26:20-26:25
Not because I want her applause, but because she feeds us, right?
26:25-26:32
Oh, and by the way, it'd be a pretty impossible thing for me to hide from her, right?
26:34-26:36
She's going to notice if I go days without eating.
26:40-26:42
But the point Jesus is driving us to is the motives.
26:42-26:44
The motives, it's a heart issue.
26:45-26:48
And it's the same as giving, and it's the same as praying.
26:50-26:51
It's the same point.
26:51-26:57
If you're looking for praises from man, don't look for anything from God.
26:59-27:01
So what am I really hungry for?
27:04-27:10
Am I hungry for attention or am I hungry for God?
27:12-27:14
Look at verses 17 and 18.
27:19-27:51
Jesus said, "But when you fast, "Anoint your head and wash your face, that your fasting may not be seen by others, but by your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees in secret will reward you." So here Jesus is saying, look, on the other hand, instead of making yourself look like you're dying, anoint your head and wash your face.
27:52-27:54
Oh, by the way, it goes without saying, right?
27:58-28:02
You don't make that a show, right?
28:02-28:09
Like I shouldn't come to church and like catch you in the men's room at the sink, washing your face.
28:10-28:12
Like, Joe, why are you washing your face?
28:12-28:16
Oh, I'm fasting and being obedient to our Lord.
28:17-28:20
Like you could make that a show.
28:24-28:26
Obvious point, right?
28:26-28:29
Jesus says don't leave any physical clues that you're fasting.
28:30-28:36
It's like giving, it's like praying, make it a secret, make it between you and God.
28:40-28:45
And he sees, and he rewards according to Jesus.
28:49-29:22
rewards. Listen, reward does not mean that God owes you one now. Like, "Look, God, I starved myself for you. I sacrificed eating for you, God. Now you have to do what I want." So, God never works like that.
29:24-29:31
Do you realize anything at all that we have from God is grace?
29:33-29:34
It's all grace.
29:34-29:47
Your salvation in Christ, believing that Jesus died for your sins, believing he rose to give you eternal life, if you've received him, if you are saved, It is only by the grace of God that you are saved.
29:49-29:56
The gift of the Holy Spirit, God indwelling His people, it's a gift, it's grace.
29:56-30:03
You know, God does not run a swap meet to say you do for me, then I do for you.
30:03-30:04
That's not how it works.
30:04-30:06
And that's not how it works with fasting.
30:08-30:09
So like, what is the reward?
30:11-30:13
The reward is connecting with God.
30:15-30:20
You're worth connecting with God because you're seeking Him in a very deliberate way.
30:20-30:31
You have taken off anything else that could distract you because you want to focus solely on your relationship with Him.
30:36-30:39
And someone would say, "Okay, okay, okay, okay, okay, time out.
30:40-31:04
You're telling me that if I choose not to eat or I choose to abstain from other things and instead use that appetite and use that time to seek the Lord, you're telling me that if I do that, that something spiritual will happen?
31:07-31:13
Yeah, yeah that's exactly what I'm telling you.
31:16-31:26
Look, I know I could never fully explain it.
31:31-31:40
And it's hard to understand, but you will understand it if you do it.
31:45-31:47
If you do it for the right reason.
31:49-31:51
I just want to encourage you.
31:53-31:58
I'm sure there are people here that have never fasted for spiritual reasons in their lives.
31:58-32:00
I want to encourage you, try it.
32:03-32:14
Can you just as a simple act of obedience, as a simple, "God, this is what your word said, so I want to respond in obedience." Can you do that?
32:16-32:19
And look, you can modify.
32:21-32:29
Like maybe you say, "You know what? I've never done this before, "But this week, I'm gonna take a few days "and I'm gonna skip lunch.
32:29-32:38
"And instead of eating at lunchtime, "I'm gonna spend that time reading "a passage from God's word and praying to God.
32:38-32:40
"I'm gonna do that instead this week.
32:40-32:42
"Can you do that?" You can do that.
32:46-32:48
Or maybe you say, "You know what?
32:48-32:50
"I've never had an extended fast, "but you know what?
32:51-32:53
"This week I'm going to spend one day.
32:53-32:59
I'm going to spend just two days with nothing but water.
32:59-33:03
And instead I'm going to seek the Lord over something very specific.
33:08-33:09
You can do that.
33:12-33:19
Because look, if you're sitting here going, "Oh, I hear what he's saying, but you know what?
33:19-33:24
I don't know if I could skip a meal." Like, "I don't know.
33:25-33:37
I don't know if I could go without eating." Well, that might be a commentary on which appetite really controls you.
33:41-33:54
Are you hungry enough for God that you're willing to forego consuming food and/or other things to focus solely on seeking Him?
33:58-35:11
Because if you're finding that focusing on your walk with Christ has been difficult, if you're finding that lately you really haven't had much of an appetite for prayer that you know you should. If you're finding like, you know, in this chapter of my life right now, this season of my life that I'm in, I haven't really been seeking the Lord as I know He calls me to. If any of these describe you, I want to encourage you to use this gift that God has given and redirect your appetite. This is the heart of religion. God wants your And true religion comes from a heart that wants God.
35:14-35:28
I'm sure some of you have picked up on this, but you realize for the last three weeks between Pastor Taylor and I, we've basically preached the exact same sermon three times.
35:34-35:34
Why?
35:36-35:49
because our goal is to represent the text and really it's the exact same formula and all three things that the Lord calls us to. It's the same sermon.
35:50-36:02
Here it is. If you give, pray, or fast in order to be seen by others you're going to miss God's reward.
36:05-36:16
But if you do them in secret, God sees in secret and he will reward you.
36:19-36:30
There are rewards for a faith that says, I'm not looking for man's applause.
36:32-36:37
All I'm looking for is God's reward.
36:40-36:44
And with fasting, God is the reward.
36:46-36:47
Let's pray.
36:50-37:02
Father in heaven, we confess before you as a church that we don't seek you as we should too often.
37:03-37:18
But Father, we've allowed other things to crowd our hearts and our minds and our bellies and we very diligently distract ourselves from what's most important.
37:23-37:32
So Father, I pray that we would be hit with, for some of us it's an old concept that we need renewed.
37:34-37:56
And for some, I'm sure this is a brand new concept, but Father, let us take a serious and honest and hard look at Your Word, and that we would fast as our Lord assumed that we would, but with motives that honor You.
37:58-38:00
Father, put it in our hearts and minds.
38:04-38:09
Make us feel how desperately we need You.
38:12-38:18
Let us match that desperation with how hard we seek after You.
38:19-38:22
We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 6:16-18

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
What is the purpose of fasting? Why do you think that fasting isn’t more common in the American church?
How would you describe the spiritual benefit of fasting to a believer who has never done it?
How would you respond to someone who says “Due to my health issues, not eating is impossible for me.”?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Jeff Miller

June 22, 2025

The Heart of Religion

The Secret to Praying

Jeff Miller

June 22, 2025

The Heart of Religion

Introduction:

Four Marks of Real Prayer (Matthew 6:5–15)

PRIVATE. (Matt 6:5–6)
PERSONAL. (Matt 6:7–8)
PROPORTIONED. (Matt 6:9–13)

Three Ingredients of Prayer:
1. PRAISE. (Matt 6:9)
2. PURPOSE. (Matt 6:10)
3. PROVISION. (Matt 6:11–13)
PRACTICAL. (Matt 6:14–15)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

00:59-01:05
Matthew chapter 6. Let's turn to God's Word together.
01:06-01:10
I'm going to ask that you would please pray for me to be faithful to communicate it clearly.
01:10-01:15
I will pray for you to have a heart open to receive it.
01:19-01:39
Father in heaven, we humble ourselves before you and ask that you would make us the people that you've called us to be so that you may accomplish the purposes you want to accomplish through us.
01:45-01:53
Thank you ahead of time, the transformation that comes when we come under the authority of your word.
01:55-01:57
We pray in Jesus' name.
01:58-02:05
And all of God's people said, "Amen." Matthew chapter 6, are you there?
02:06-02:13
While I was going to college in Ohio, I was working at Walmart, among many other places I was working.
02:13-02:18
But at Walmart, I worked with this man named George.
02:20-02:36
And I was trying to think of how I could describe George to you, but I think the only phrase that really encapsulates who he was, was a phrase they use in the South, bless his heart.
02:38-02:39
You know what I mean?
02:40-02:40
Okay, enough said.
02:41-02:49
But George, when I would go to work and we were on the same shift, George would always say, I'm awfully tired today.
02:50-02:54
He said I drove, he drove truck, that was his other job.
02:54-02:58
He goes, I drove the rig down to Alabama and back last night.
02:59-03:02
Like you went to Alabama and back in one night?
03:03-03:03
He's like, yeah.
03:05-03:07
So I'm trying to calculate, I'm like, is that possible?
03:07-03:09
Are you driving a jet?
03:09-03:13
Like can you make it to Alabama and back from Ohio in one night?
03:13-03:15
I don't know about that.
03:16-03:32
I said, "Well, you must be tired then." He goes, "Yeah." He goes, "My other job driving truck, they got me working 200 hours a week." And he was not being hyperbolic, by the way.
03:32-03:39
I said, "You work 200 hours a week driving truck?" He goes, "Yeah." So how many hours you working here?
03:41-03:55
He goes, "40." I said, "You worked 240 hours last week?" He goes, "Yeah." And bless his heart, I just, I couldn't tell him.
03:55-03:57
I just didn't have it in me to tell him.
03:57-04:00
But he was always telling me this story.
04:01-04:06
But I'm somewhat of a armchair psychologist, I guess.
04:08-04:14
But I wonder what was it in him that made him want to tell me that story every time we work together?
04:15-04:16
'Cause I heard it a lot.
04:19-04:21
What would possess a guy to say something like that?
04:24-04:26
And there really is only one answer, right?
04:27-04:29
He wanted to impress me, right?
04:30-04:37
He wanted me to be like, wow, George, you're such a hard worker, you work more hours than there are in a week.
04:38-04:40
Like, that's what he wanted from me.
04:40-04:42
He wanted my attention.
04:45-04:51
And church, what is it in us that we want the attention from other people?
04:52-04:54
Why are we like that?
04:58-05:28
Then we bring that mindset into the church where we encounter the words of our Lord when he says in Matthew chapter six, Verse one, "Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you have no reward from your Father who is in heaven." Jesus very clearly warned us, look, we are to do religious acts.
05:28-05:29
I mean, that's a given.
05:29-05:30
He talks about prayer.
05:31-05:34
He talks about giving and he talks about fasting.
05:34-05:40
And you're going to see Jesus just assumed that his people would do those things, right?
05:42-05:52
But the caution he gives is trying to do these things in a way to get attention from other people, to try to impress other people.
05:54-06:13
So the question Pastor Taylor addressed last week, we'll look at this week and spoiler alert next week too, Because it's the same question for all of these things, giving, praying, fasting, whose attention do you want?
06:15-06:16
Do you want God's attention?
06:18-06:20
Or do you want other people's attention?
06:24-06:29
Excuse me, today, we're going to talk about prayer.
06:34-06:37
Why is prayer so hard?
06:45-06:53
In the Christian life and discipline, why is prayer the hardest thing?
07:00-07:11
Preparing for this message, that was the question that was just like constantly running through my mind this past week.
07:11-07:12
Why is it so hard?
07:15-07:19
I think there's three overlapping reasons the prayer's hard.
07:19-07:22
One is we are bored with it.
07:23-07:30
As one author put it, "We're bored with prayer because we pray the same old things about the same old things." True.
07:31-07:35
Boring, we're bored with it.
07:38-07:39
That's why it's so hard.
07:41-07:58
Number two, second overlapping reason why prayer is the hardest thing, is we don't see God moving in our lives, or we don't trust that He will.
07:59-08:02
I mean, who wants to set themselves up for disappointment, right?
08:02-08:06
We're on our face, we're crying out for something, and He doesn't do it.
08:08-08:09
How fun is that?
08:13-08:18
Third reason is we don't really know what to pray about.
08:19-08:20
Again, these all overlap.
08:20-08:21
We just don't know what to pray about.
08:23-08:25
Somebody's got a health issue, somebody's got a relationship problem.
08:26-08:40
We're like, "What exactly do I say about that?" Why is, excuse me, why is prayer so difficult?
08:47-08:52
I mean, here Jesus is talking about the religious acts that his people do, right?
08:53-08:54
Giving to the needy.
08:54-08:56
Pastor Taylor talked about last week.
08:59-09:02
Come on, pagans do that, right?
09:04-09:16
People that have never opened a Bible in their lives will contribute when they see someone of need, right? Or next week we're going to talk about fasting. Let's talk about self-discipline.
09:17-09:41
I know non-Christians that have much better self-discipline than me in like diet and exercise and time management. Non-Christians. And then I thought about like preaching a sermon. There church that can do that.
09:41-09:47
I'm like the sixth or seventh best preacher in this church, in this church.
09:49-09:51
Or whether it's preaching or like leading a Bible study.
09:53-09:54
Many people do that.
09:55-10:03
But you know, the question that really hits us is why is talking to God harder than talking about God?
10:07-10:09
God wants your heart.
10:12-10:15
And this is a tough pill to swallow, but swallow it we shall.
10:17-10:22
Prayer is the test where your heart really is with the Lord.
10:27-10:28
Do you get alone with God?
10:28-10:35
I mean, do you really spend time alone with God?
10:38-10:48
When you do, if you do, do you have something to say to God?
10:51-11:19
Well, prayer is the screw that always needs tightened, Christians, true or false. And idealized prayer, and we talk about prayer, but let's be people that actually pray.
11:20-11:21
How about that?
11:22-11:24
So on your outline, four marks of real prayer.
11:26-11:33
And if you, like me, are an alliteration nerd, boy, are you in for a treat.
11:36-11:38
Where marks of real prayer, number one.
11:38-11:40
Real prayer is private.
11:42-11:44
Real prayer is private.
11:44-11:45
Look at verse five.
11:47-12:08
Jesus said, "And when you pray, you must not be like the hypocrites, for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues the street corners that they may be seen by others." What looks like prayer often is not prayer.
12:11-12:12
It's performance.
12:15-12:25
See, Jesus was calling out the religious people of His day, "Praying on the street corner." And the picture here is, "I just couldn't wait to get to the temple to pray.
12:25-12:36
I just, my heart was so bursting with wanting to pray, I couldn't wait, so I'm just praying right here and look how holy I am, everybody, and it's...
12:38-12:44
It's performance, and you're like, I'd never do that.
12:50-12:50
Really?
12:53-12:57
Let me ask you this, have you ever been praying in a group?
12:58-13:06
Like you're in a Bible study, you're in your small group, or you're in one of your little prayer groups at one of our prayer services?
13:07-13:20
Have you ever been praying in a group of people and in your prayer, you know you're about to, you're about to come up to a phrase in your prayer that's gonna sound so good?
13:22-13:27
So good in fact that you're planning for a little pause because you just know people are gonna amen that.
13:27-13:31
You know I'm talking about and you're praying and here comes the phrase,
13:31-13:32
(snorting)
13:32-13:35
we're gonna ratchet it up, wait for amen.
13:36-13:37
Okay, and then we keep going.
13:37-13:38
Have you ever done that?
13:40-13:41
Or how about this?
13:42-13:44
Have you ever complimented a person in your prayer?
13:45-13:46
Have you ever done that?
13:48-13:49
Oh, come on, you know what I mean.
13:50-14:06
Like we're praying and I'm like, Father in heaven, I wanna pray for my brother Chuck because Chuck is, he's so handsome and God, he's such a great dad and he's such a devoted husband and God, I just, I love Chuck so much and I just thank you.
14:07-14:10
God, he's a fine figure of a man, Lord.
14:10-14:13
Like, who is that for?
14:17-14:18
But don't we do that sometimes?
14:23-14:25
Have you ever given somebody a subtle rebuke in a prayer?
14:31-14:32
Getting warm in here, isn't it?
14:37-14:39
Partly the temperature of the room and partly conviction.
14:40-14:42
Have you ever rebuked somebody in a prayer?
14:43-14:54
that you're praying and you're like, you know, Father in heaven, Betsy asked for prayer for this relationship she's entering into, but Lord, I pray that you would teach her patience.
14:57-14:59
Like shot blocking people in their prayer.
15:02-15:04
Have you ever made a need known in your prayer?
15:07-15:08
You ever done that?
15:09-15:23
You're praying and you're like, "Oh Lord, I'm just praying you provide me $1,100 to fix my '94 Honda Civic." And then you're looking around, seeing who's reaching for their wallet.
15:27-15:30
Have you ever tried to turn prayer into teaching time?
15:32-15:35
Like, I'm about to lay out some doctrine in this prayer.
15:39-15:40
As if the Lord doesn't know.
15:42-15:44
as if the Lord's like, wait, let me write this down.
15:44-15:45
This is fantastic.
15:48-15:49
All right, here's the point.
15:50-16:01
If you have ever said something in a prayer for the benefit of the other people around you, then you're performing.
16:04-16:07
And Jesus said, you have received your reward.
16:08-16:11
After the prayer, they're like, wow, that was such a great prayer.
16:11-16:13
That was, wow, that was a powerful prayer.
16:14-16:20
You know, that little, you know, half a second of warm fuzzies you get from that, there's your reward.
16:23-16:23
Enjoy.
16:27-16:29
But look at verse six.
16:30-16:43
Jesus says, "But when you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your father who is in secret.
16:46-16:48
Go to your room, shut the door.
16:49-16:52
Private, the secret to prayer, you know what the secret to prayer is?
16:53-16:53
Praying in secret.
16:57-17:02
It's private, it's shutting out other people.
17:03-17:07
Now listen, this is not an excuse to skip prayer service.
17:08-17:11
We're having one tomorrow night at the property.
17:11-17:13
Talk about that in a few minutes.
17:14-17:18
But you don't like no show me, and I'm like, hey, didn't see it's a prayer service.
17:19-17:22
Well, you know, prayer's supposed to be private.
17:24-17:30
Now, there are many examples of people praying in groups, the church praying together in God's word.
17:33-17:35
There's power in praying with your small group.
17:36-17:41
There's power and the elders coming together to pray before elder meetings, all right?
17:43-17:59
But all that said, Jesus here is specifically and clearly addressing private prayer because your secret prayer life is your real prayer life.
18:05-18:29
I mean, you can say what you want about prayer, and you can get on Twitters or X or whatever it's called and tweet your pithy little sayings about prayer, or you can get on the Facebooks and post a picture of a pretty sunset and a duck and some verse about prayer.
18:33-19:22
Here's the truth, my friends, what you really believe about prayer is proven when you pray privately. Because that's when prayer is real business. Because then it's just you and God, and no one knows what you are saying to God except God. And there's no one around to be impressed by your prayers applaud your prayers. It's just you and God. And that is when prayer is pure, because that is when you are proving by faith that you really believe that you're talking to God.
19:24-19:29
Your secret prayer life is your real prayer life.
19:30-19:41
Jesus said, verse six, "And your father who sees in secret will reward you." Like giving, you have a choice.
19:41-19:43
Do you want rewarded by man?
19:44-19:45
Or do you want rewarded by God?
19:49-19:53
I could guess most of us here would probably say, I want rewarded by God.
19:53-19:55
So the question is, well, what is God's reward?
19:55-19:58
What do you think the reward is?
19:59-20:02
What do you think is the reward that God gives?
20:06-20:07
I think it's answered prayer.
20:09-20:11
That's the reward.
20:12-20:18
You see, for some of you, the reason you haven't seen answered prayer is you haven't really been praying.
20:22-20:30
When's the last time in your life you can point specifically to say, I was praying specifically for this thing.
20:30-20:31
Nobody knew about it.
20:31-20:33
I was praying specifically for this thing.
20:33-20:37
And then I saw God answered the prayer very specifically.
20:37-20:39
When's the last time that's happened to you?
20:42-20:46
Because if you're a follower of Christ, that should be happening on a regular basis.
20:51-20:55
Some of you haven't seen prayer answered because you haven't really been praying.
20:56-20:57
You haven't prayed in secret.
20:58-21:02
Your father hasn't seen in secret, so he hasn't rewarded you.
21:05-21:15
Because it is the rewarded prayer who has faith-fueled private conversations with God.
21:16-21:22
It is that person that sees prayer answered, and you're like, "God, we were just talking about that.
21:23-21:27
"God, I specifically was talking to you "about this very thing, "and I see what you did.
21:30-21:36
"Thank you." You wanna see God move in your life like that?
21:40-21:41
Then you're gonna get with God privately.
21:43-21:44
And you'll see how he rewards.
21:47-21:48
Like, well, how do I do that?
21:50-21:56
I have to remind you again that the most important things in life are intentional, right?
21:58-21:58
You gotta be intentional.
22:01-22:03
You can't hope that it accidentally happens.
22:03-22:05
That doesn't work with anything else in life, does it?
22:06-22:17
You don't roll out of bed and say, "Well, I hope I exercise today." If you don't intentionally try to make that happen, it's not gonna happen.
22:17-22:19
You're not gonna accidentally exercise.
22:21-22:25
You can't get up and say, "You know what, I hope I stick to my diet today.
22:27-22:42
"Hope that Oreos and Funyuns don't find their way "into my mouth today." If you're not intentional, it's not gonna happen.
22:44-22:54
Parents, you can't say, "Oh boy, I sure hope I spend time with my kids today." It's not going to happen by accident.
22:55-22:59
The most important things in life are done intentionally.
23:01-23:02
Same with prayer.
23:02-23:13
Carve out a time, get alone with God, and by the way, turn off all the electronic distractions and pray privately.
23:15-23:16
That's real prayer.
23:17-23:21
Number two, four marks of real prayer, it's personal.
23:23-23:24
It's personal.
23:24-23:25
Look at verse seven.
23:26-23:31
Jesus says, "When you pray, do you not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do?
23:31-23:43
For they think that they will be heard for their many words." Jesus here isn't talking about this need that's on your heart that you keep bringing before the Lord sincerely crying out.
23:43-23:46
Jesus is talking about mindless repetition.
23:48-23:56
That's why verse eight, he says, "Do not be like them." Don't be like them.
23:56-23:58
In some churches, that is the thing.
23:59-24:00
Canned prayers.
24:01-24:02
Oh, you've sinned?
24:02-24:08
Well, what you need to do is recite this prayer 10 times.
24:09-24:20
And I've talked to people in those churches, and what they do is they go out They just spit out the words as fast as they can, not thinking about what the words even mean.
24:21-24:23
That's exactly what Jesus is talking about here.
24:24-24:25
Empty phrases.
24:27-24:28
Like, yeah, that church, right?
24:28-24:29
Know what I mean?
24:29-24:30
How about this church?
24:31-24:36
You know, sometimes we teach our kids to recite canned prayers.
24:38-24:40
You know the first prayer I remember learning?
24:42-24:43
Now I lay me down to sleep.
24:43-24:45
How many people knew that one?
24:45-24:47
Raise your hand if you're familiar with it.
24:47-24:48
Now I lay me down to sleep, okay.
24:51-24:52
Then you get to that.
24:52-24:54
I'll tell you how young I was.
24:54-24:57
I learned the words to that before I knew what the words meant.
24:57-25:05
Because I remember at a point in my childhood when I was saying that, like if I should die before I wake, I was like, what?
25:07-25:08
Like that can happen?
25:10-25:12
Seriously, I was freaked out.
25:12-25:14
My parents had to come to my bedside.
25:14-25:15
I was like freaked out.
25:15-25:20
I'm like, "What if I die before I wake?" I had no idea what was going on.
25:21-25:21
Canned prayers.
25:22-25:23
Here's another canned prayer that we teach.
25:25-25:27
Before dinner, you know that one?
25:27-25:30
God is great, God is good.
25:31-25:31
You know the rest of that?
25:31-25:32
How many know that one?
25:33-25:34
Okay, all, okay.
25:35-25:39
Let us thank him for our food, amen.
25:40-25:43
We always had to find out what mom was making before we thank God for it.
25:46-25:47
I'm not so thankful for this one.
25:52-25:54
That's what Jesus talked about, empty phrases.
25:54-26:12
I mean, if you had an appointment with the Lord, if it was like in the spirit of the Zacchaeus event, that the Lord was like, "I'm coming to your house for dinner." And Jesus is sitting at your table, How would you talk to him?
26:13-26:21
If Jesus sat down and said, "What would you like to talk about?" Would you go, "Now I lay me down to sleep.
26:21-26:22
I pray to the Lord my soul to keep.
26:22-26:30
If I should die before I wait." You wouldn't just go into some empty poem thing that you heard as a kid.
26:31-26:33
Wouldn't you just want to talk to him?
26:37-26:38
That's what prayer is, it's conversation.
26:39-26:40
It's conversation.
26:41-26:42
God wants your heart, have you heard?
26:43-26:48
And private prayer is to be a very personal thing.
26:49-27:01
Look, verse eight, he says, "Do not be like them "for your father knows what you need before you ask him." It's personal with God, he knows and he cares.
27:02-27:04
Prayer is personal to him and you gotta make it personal to you.
27:05-27:14
But this part of the verse is troubling for a lot of people because your father knows what you need before you ask him.
27:16-27:17
So why ask him?
27:22-27:24
Luke chapter 18, you don't have to turn there now.
27:24-27:27
I'm gonna paraphrase it for you for the sake of time.
27:28-27:29
But you can look this up later.
27:29-28:02
But to paraphrase, Luke chapter 18, Jesus is walking and there's a group of people following him and there's this blind guy on the side of the road and he hears all the commotion. He's like, "What's going on?" They're like, "Well, Jesus is coming and there's a lot of crowd with him." And the blind guy's like, "Jesus, son of David, have mercy on me." And people with him were like, "Shut up." And he's like, "No, Jesus, son of David, "Have mercy on me." And Jesus stopped.
28:04-28:11
He goes, "Bring that guy here." So they brought the guy to Jesus, the blind man.
28:11-28:14
They brought the blind man to the Son of God.
28:16-28:20
And Jesus asks him the strangest question.
28:23-28:40
Jesus says to him, "What do you want me to do for you?" Now, I got to confess to you, I'm not proud of this, but I got to confess, there's a little smart-alecky side of me that imagines the blind man going, "A pizza, that's what I want from you.
28:40-28:42
A pizza, do you have any?
28:43-28:44
What do I want from you?
28:44-28:46
I want the Pirates to win the World Series.
28:46-28:48
Can you make that happen?" Like, what do you want?
28:49-29:21
"Look, I'm not the son of God, but I think even I, in 10 guesses or less, could probably guess what a blind man would want from God." He said to Jesus, "I want to see, I want my sight." I have to ask you, church, do you think Jesus knew that?
29:29-29:37
I would suggest to you that Jesus saying, "What do you want me to do for you?" is not such a crazy question.
29:37-29:39
I think it is infinitely profound.
29:43-29:49
Because, you see, what Jesus was saying is you need to be specific.
29:52-29:53
But Jesus already knows.
29:55-30:00
Oh, yes, that stirs up the question, "Well, why do we pray if He already knows?" Right?
30:01-30:01
Why pray?
30:01-30:02
God knows, right?
30:02-30:03
So why pray?
30:06-30:06
Here's why.
30:08-30:14
Like the blind man praying specifically, praying specifically is an act of faith.
30:17-30:19
Praying specifically is an act of faith.
30:22-30:23
Let's be honest, church.
30:24-30:24
Can we be honest today?
30:26-30:27
Can we be honest?
30:31-30:32
I'm not sure you want to answer that one.
30:33-30:34
Can we be honest?
30:35-30:36
Don't we pray vague?
30:39-30:39
Don't we pray vague?
30:43-30:44
This guy prayed vague.
30:44-30:46
Have mercy on me.
30:48-30:48
What does that mean?
30:50-30:59
Church, we do the same thing when we do things like, "God bless Grandma." "Bless Grandma how?
31:00-31:09
What am I asking for for Grandma?" The other one we do is we say, "I pray for." I caught myself doing that.
31:10-31:17
I'm like correcting myself when I pray sometimes because I'm like, "No, God knows I'm praying for him." But we're like that, we're like, "I pray for Pastor Rich.
31:17-31:18
"I pray for Bethany.
31:19-31:27
"You know, I pray for Lord." Like, "Yes, you're praying for them." It's almost like the Lord's like, "I could tell you were praying for them.
31:28-31:32
"You were on your face and they're on your prayer list." Praying what?
31:35-31:36
You know, I think we do that.
31:40-31:42
I think sometimes we don't have enough faith to pray specifically.
31:44-31:50
I mean, if we say, God bless grandma, anything that happens to grandma, we can just say that was the blessing I prayed for.
31:51-31:53
Grandma won bingo, her gout went away, whatever.
31:57-31:57
I prayed for her.
31:59-32:00
I think we're afraid.
32:01-32:04
I think we lack the faith to pray specifically.
32:07-32:15
Maybe you don't see answered prayer because you haven't received a specific answer because you haven't prayed specifically.
32:18-32:19
Four marks of real prayer.
32:21-32:23
Number three, write this down, proportioned.
32:26-32:29
In this section the Lord gives us what we call the Lord's Prayer.
32:30-32:32
Look, this is a pattern prayer.
32:32-32:36
are principles that show us the right balance in how to pray.
32:36-32:44
I'm going to go through this quickly because, truth be told, I could preach 10,000 sermons on this passage in 10,000 different ways.
32:46-32:50
But I don't want us to be so caught up in the individual trees that we miss the forest here.
32:52-32:57
When you pray, our Lord is showing us your prayer should be proportioned.
32:58-32:58
There should be balance.
33:00-33:04
There should be three things in your prayer, three ingredients in your prayer.
33:06-33:08
So take your prayer time, divide it up into thirds.
33:09-33:11
These are the three things you should be going after.
33:12-33:23
The first one is praise, letter A. Look at verse 9, "Pray then like this, 'Our Father in heaven, Hallowed be Your name.'" Hallowed, that's holy, that's praise.
33:24-33:29
that's first, you're worshiping God for who He is.
33:30-33:36
That's why I encourage you, we're teaching the youth group this, praying God's word back to Him, praying concepts.
33:36-33:40
God, you said this in your word, therefore I'm praying that back to you.
33:40-33:48
When you do that, especially like in the Psalms, you will find yourself worshiping God with concepts that you don't even normally think about.
33:50-33:52
But your prayer time should start with praise.
33:52-33:55
Secondly, purpose, verse 10.
33:57-34:06
"Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven." We should be praying for purpose.
34:07-34:08
Whose purpose?
34:08-34:12
His and therefore ours.
34:14-34:21
May your kingdom advance, use me however you wanna use me to advance your kingdom.
34:22-34:23
gospel purposes.
34:27-34:30
Letter C, third ingredient of prayer is provision.
34:31-34:48
Provision, verses 11 through 13, give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
34:50-34:54
Provision, and there's balance in provision, right?
34:55-34:56
Balance in provision.
34:58-35:00
Physical, right?
35:00-35:00
Bread.
35:01-35:04
Relational, forgiveness.
35:05-35:10
Spiritual, lead us not into temptation.
35:11-35:12
See the balance in that?
35:14-35:21
Most of our prayer requests have to do with so-and-so sick, pray for them.
35:22-35:29
And I'm not saying we shouldn't pray for them, but I'm saying it's concerning to me when that seems to be all that we pray for.
35:30-35:31
Where's the praise?
35:32-35:32
Where's the purpose?
35:33-35:35
Where's the other provision things?
35:36-35:44
Because usually when we pray, between praise, purpose, and provision, provision gets the most attention, true or false.
35:47-35:57
Sometimes it's the first thing we pray, and embarrassingly, sometimes it's the only thing we pray.
35:58-36:03
God, I need, God, please provide, God, help me.
36:06-36:10
Look, prayer is about communion with God.
36:11-36:14
Prayer's not about getting things.
36:16-36:21
I think too often in the church, we treat God like mall Santa Claus.
36:22-36:27
We show up, we tell him what we want, and then we leave and hope he cashes in.
36:30-36:31
That's not prayer.
36:34-36:43
Look, if you're bored, if you're bored with prayer, maybe it's because you've been lopsided in the way you pray.
36:45-36:50
Take these ingredients that the Lord has given us, incorporate these into your prayer life.
36:50-36:53
Our prayers should be proportioned.
36:54-36:54
One more.
36:57-37:01
One more, finally, mark of real prayers, it's practical.
37:01-37:02
It's practical.
37:04-37:06
Look at our last two verses for today, 14 and 15.
37:07-37:13
It says, "For if you forgive others their trespasses, "your heavenly Father will also forgive you.
37:13-37:21
but if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
37:23-37:27
Again, we don't wanna get too deep into weeds on the subject.
37:27-37:29
I want you to see the overall point.
37:30-37:38
Jesus is showing us that there is to be a connection between our prayers and our everyday lives.
37:42-37:55
You see, too often we pray holy sounding words that have nothing to do with life, at work, at home, at school, wherever.
37:56-37:58
We pray things like this.
38:00-38:17
Heavenly Father, I beseech Thee hithertofore to bestow on Thine servants a bountiful hedge of protection What? What are you even saying?
38:20-38:43
Prayer isn't detached from real life. Jesus is showing us that prayer directly connects to real life. Prayer should be practical. For example, the example that the Lord gives us. Verse 12, you pray for forgiveness and you pray to be a person who forgives others.
38:45-39:03
Jesus is showing us that when you do that business with God, now you're motivated and empowered to forgive others. Jesus was not saying that the basis of salvation is forgiving.
39:06-39:16
Forgiving others isn't a plan of salvation, it's the proof of salvation. Salvation comes through God's grace alone.
39:19-39:24
And that topic is a whole other sermon series, but here's the point Jesus is making right here.
39:24-39:31
What happens in the prayer closet directly affects what happens outside of it.
39:36-39:37
Are you having trouble forgiving someone?
39:42-39:44
How much time have you prayed about that?
39:47-39:48
Maybe for someone else it's your temper.
39:50-39:52
Like, "Yeah, I just have a temper, man.
39:52-39:56
It's just something I struggled with for a long time." How much have you talked to God about that?
40:01-40:02
Maybe for somebody else it's anxiety.
40:04-40:06
Like, "Oh, you know what, Pastor Jeff?
40:06-40:16
I'm just like so nervous and anxious, and I just, I know I shouldn't, but I just, have you really talked to God about that?
40:17-40:22
Like really spent time in the presence of the Lord talking about this?
40:23-40:31
For some it's lust, like I just can't, I just can't seem to, you know, figure out the self-control thing, Pastor Jeff.
40:33-40:35
How much have you really prayed about?
40:36-40:45
Because my guess is if you're still struggling in a particular area, you probably haven't been praying too much about it at all.
40:47-40:53
Because Jesus says what happens in the prayer closet affects what happens to you outside of it.
40:56-41:00
Our worship team would make their way back up front.
41:04-41:09
Prayer is the screw that always needs tightened.
41:11-41:12
That's true for me.
41:15-41:17
And I imagine that's true for a lot of you.
41:22-41:27
Look, over the years, I have read so many books about prayer, so many.
41:28-41:33
I've read so many blogs from so many amazing preachers about prayer.
41:35-41:40
I have listened to so many sermons about prayer, podcasts.
41:40-41:45
I've been to conferences where they've talked about prayer and taught on prayer.
41:48-41:49
But you know what I've learned?
41:50-41:57
There's just really only one way to grow as a person who's sincerely praised.
41:57-41:58
Do you know what that is?
41:58-41:59
Do you know what that one way is?
42:06-42:28
Today I just want to encourage you to take a few pointers from the One who did it best, Jesus Christ, who told us, "Pray privately, make it personal, keep it proportioned, and make it practical." Let's pray now.
42:29-42:40
Father in heaven, as we come to this teaching of your Word, I know it really hits me between the eyes.
42:40-42:47
And I imagine there's a lot of people in this room, in the first service, and they'll be listening to this later, it hits us all.
42:51-42:58
I'm just asking, Father, that we would be a people who would, in a fresh way, be renewed in our prayer lives.
43:01-43:05
Maybe we've been filling our time with lesser things.
43:05-43:08
Maybe we've been discouraged or despondent.
43:10-43:12
Father, bring a fresh conviction.
43:12-43:14
Bring a fresh enthusiasm.
43:14-43:26
Bring just a fresh excitement in all of us to privately and sincerely come before You.
43:29-43:32
Father, I know you're going to reward when we do that.
43:34-43:36
Let all glory and honor and praise be unto your name.
43:36-43:39
We pray in Jesus' name, Amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 6:5-15

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
“Prayer is the screw that almost always needs to be tightened for the Christian.” Why do you think this is true? Why do you think prayer is so difficult for many Christians?
Explain Jesus' teaching in verse 6 in your own words. Why is secret prayer so important?
What are the 3 ingredients of prayer in “The Lord’s Prayer”? Which one do you need to work on the most right now? Why?

Breakout
How is your prayer life these days? What have we learned from this passage that we will apply to grow as pray-ers?

Taylor Brown

June 15, 2025

The Heart of Religion

The Secret to Giving

Taylor Brown

June 15, 2025

The Heart of Religion

Introduction:

Watch Out... (Matthew 6:1–4)

Because your MOTIVES MATTER. (Matt 6:1a)
1. Wrong Motive – TO GLORIFY YOURSELF.
2. Right Motive – TO GLORIFY GOD.
Matthew 5:16 – In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.

1 Corinthians 10:31 – So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.
Because your REWARD IS AT RISK. (Matt 6:1b–4)
1. Worldly Reward – THE RECOGNITION OF OTHERS.
  
  James 1:27 – Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction…
  
  James 2:15–16 – If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?
  
  2 Corinthians 9:6–7 – The point is this: whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give as he has decided in his heart...
2. Eternal Reward – THE RECOGNITION OF GOD.
  
  Matthew 25:23 – “Well done, good and faithful servant. You have been faithful over a little; I will set you over much. Enter into the joy of your master.”

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

00:54-00:58
Open your Bibles to Matthew chapter six, verses one through four.
00:59-01:02
Matthew chapter six, verses one through four.
01:03-01:09
You know, 12 years ago, my friends and I took a road trip down to the middle of nowhere, Tennessee.
01:10-01:19
My one friend promised us a free stay in a spacious cabin that his dad built right next to a scenic lake.
01:20-01:22
Only one of those guarantees end up being true.
01:23-01:27
The stay was free, but it was free for a reason.
01:27-01:29
It was not a spacious cabin.
01:29-01:30
It was a glorified shack.
01:31-01:33
It turns out we weren't even allowed to sleep in the beds.
01:33-01:37
We had to sleep on the floor because his dad didn't want us to mess up the beds.
01:38-01:40
We were also not right next to the lake.
01:40-01:42
It was a mile walk through hilly woods.
01:43-01:48
And once you got to the beach, this is the site that greeted you.
01:50-01:52
Warning, dangerous water.
01:53-02:02
Because nothing says, come on in, the water is fine, like a do not swim here sign in the foreground and a nuclear power plant in the background.
02:02-02:10
You can't really see it, but there was a fenced off area where dozens and dozens of people were swimming and splish-splashing around without a care in the world.
02:10-02:13
I kept thinking to myself, what are you people doing?
02:13-02:14
Don't you see the sign?
02:14-02:16
I mean, can you even miss this sign?
02:16-02:17
Is that even possible?
02:17-02:19
It is unmissable.
02:19-02:42
dismissible I Guess people saw this sign, but they just didn't care They thought it was a harmless joke and not a serious warning You know how you respond to warnings Says a lot about who you are as a person The waitress brings you your food and says hey be careful. The plate is hot What do you do in that moment?
02:43-02:47
Do you believe your nice waitress or do you touch it to see if she's telling the truth?
02:47-02:56
I don't know what's in it for her to lie to you about the hot plate or you pass by a wet paint sign And you think to yourself is this this actually wet?
02:57-03:18
I do decide to touch it right or here's a new one. I learned this week Did you know in bold letters on the q-tip box? It says do not insert into ear canal. I Was blown away I've been doing it wrong for all these years Now that you know, are you gonna keep exploring your ear like it's a cave or are you gonna stop doing it?
03:20-03:24
Or you come to a red light, at the top of the red light it says no turn on red.
03:25-03:29
But you look both ways and there's no one coming so you go anyway.
03:32-03:36
Let's move beyond these somewhat funny examples to something much more important.
03:37-03:46
God's word is filled with hundreds and hundreds of warnings you can either ignore or take very seriously.
03:47-03:53
This is the first week in a new section of our study of the Sermon on the Mount, the heart of religion.
03:54-04:07
In Matthew chapter six, Jesus gives a three-part warning of how you should and should not approach the spiritual disciplines of giving, praying, and fasting.
04:08-04:14
According to Jesus, these disciplines are not just external things that you can check off your to-do list.
04:14-04:21
They are internal indicators of who you really are and who you are really worshiping.
04:22-04:25
Because Jesus cares how you give.
04:26-04:29
Jesus cares how you pray.
04:29-04:32
Jesus cares how you fast.
04:34-04:45
The how of these disciplines reveal if you are a religious phony or a religious follower of Christ who is faithful from the heart.
04:47-04:59
So this morning we're gonna dig into Matthew chapter six, verses one through four, and focus on the warning of our Lord when it comes to giving of our time, talents, and treasures.
05:00-05:07
And before we get started, I want to plead with you to not ignore this warning from Christ.
05:08-05:10
Take it very seriously.
05:10-05:11
Be on guard.
05:11-05:15
Watch out for what he is cautioning you against.
05:16-05:19
Do not close your eyes to your own sin.
05:20-05:29
Do not think you have it all figured out because Jesus has a not so secret secret to share with you this morning that you often lose sight of.
05:30-05:34
The secret to giving is giving in secret.
05:35-05:38
So before we continue any further, let's go to the Lord and ask for his help.
05:39-05:41
Please pray for me and I will pray for you.
05:45-05:51
Father, we come to, once again, a very challenging and convicting passage in your word.
05:53-05:57
Where once again, we are being exposed, not just on the outside, but on the inside.
05:59-06:09
I pray for every single person in this room, including myself, Lord, may we truly listen to what your word has to say and take this warning with the utmost seriousness.
06:10-06:16
We thank you in advance what you are going to do and we ask all these things in the name of your son, Jesus Christ, amen.
06:18-06:19
All right, so watch out.
06:20-06:22
Number one, because your motives matter.
06:23-06:27
Watch out because your motives matter.
06:32-06:35
Let's read the first half of chapter six, verse one.
06:36-06:55
Jesus says, "Beware, watch out "of practicing your righteousness before other people "in order to be seen by them." It's important to note that Jesus doesn't say it's bad for other people to notice you practicing your righteousness or doing the right thing in public.
06:55-06:56
What does he say?
06:56-07:04
Watch out for practicing your righteousness and doing the right thing in public in order to be seen by others.
07:05-07:11
In the original Greek, that phrase, in order to be seen, it comes from the word for theater.
07:13-07:14
You're putting on a show.
07:16-07:20
You're pretending to be someone that you are not.
07:20-07:24
You are putting on an insincere performance.
07:24-07:28
So once again, Jesus zeros in on the internal.
07:30-07:33
He focuses on your heart's greatest desire.
07:34-07:36
It's all about your motive.
07:38-07:40
So let's check out the wrong motive first.
07:40-07:41
So what is the wrong motive?
07:42-07:44
To glorify yourself.
07:45-07:48
To glorify yourself.
07:51-08:00
I'm not proud of this, but in the past, I've done chores around the house in the hopes that my wife will notice my hard work.
08:01-08:03
Is anyone else guilty of this kind of behavior?
08:04-08:06
Jonathan Trent, thank you so much, I am so appreciative.
08:06-08:07
It's just you and me, buddy.
08:08-08:14
To be fair, all the guys should have their hands raised as high as humanly possible whenever asked that kind of question.
08:15-08:29
This is so lame to admit, but I've done the dishes, taken out the garbage, laid down mulch, cut the grass, done long past due house projects, hoping that my wife will see it and award me husband points.
08:30-08:38
And husband points are a form of currency in marriage that aren't worth as much as you would hope and go as bad as quickly as unrefrigerated fish.
08:41-08:43
All the husbands in the room know exactly what I'm talking about.
08:44-08:56
In those moments, my motive was not to honor my wife, but to glorify myself, to show off how great of a husband I am.
08:57-09:02
And when Kate didn't notice what I had done, I began to pout and feel disappointed.
09:04-09:08
But I only felt that way because I had a bad motive.
09:08-09:16
I wouldn't have felt that way if I had the right motive, which is to be a loving husband who took responsibility for his own home.
09:18-09:20
And this proves an important principle.
09:20-09:26
Self-interest and self-glory always lead to self-deception and self-defeat.
09:28-09:35
Without fail, the most miserable person in every room is the most selfish person in that room.
09:37-09:43
The more you make life about you, the more unhappy you will find yourself.
09:45-09:49
Maybe that is why you feel so depressed this morning.
09:50-09:54
Maybe that is why you feel so empty right now.
09:56-10:03
You want to be the sun at the center of your solar system, but the problem is nobody else cares about your desired position.
10:03-10:07
No one wants to orbit around your preferences.
10:09-10:15
And you may be wondering, how can I tell if I am this kind of self-glorifying person or not?
10:16-10:21
Well, first of all, you are this kind of person to some degree, and so am I.
10:23-10:27
This problem does exist within your heart at some level.
10:29-10:32
You have to figure out how serious and far-reaching the problem actually is.
10:34-10:36
Here are some things to be on watch for.
10:37-10:40
Do you check out what other people share about their problems?
10:43-10:49
Do you have a hard time being happy for someone else when they achieve a goal that you've always wanted to accomplish?
10:50-10:54
Do you ever receive a blessing that you've always wanted?
10:55-10:59
Do you always try to one up people and have a better story than someone else?
11:01-11:10
Do you always bring the topic of conversation back to you, what you've done in the past, what you're doing right now, and what you plan to do in the future?
11:12-11:16
Do you get annoyed and even sulky when you don't get your way?
11:19-11:24
You push away opportunities to serve and help if you don't see what's in it for you.
11:27-11:35
Even though there are telltale signs, it can be extremely difficult to spot your own narcissism because you are often blind to it.
11:36-11:38
But other people around you are not.
11:39-11:54
It would be a good exercise to check in with your family and your friends after church today Ask if they see any of these tendencies in how you speak, in how you talk, in how you act.
11:55-12:00
And if you ask that question, please shut your mouth and open your ears.
12:01-12:04
Stop inserting your opinion, stop justifying yourself.
12:05-12:11
You will not grow if you are more interested in defending yourself than dying to yourself.
12:13-12:17
Start dealing with your problem because I guarantee you that you do have a problem.
12:19-12:24
Stop glorifying yourself because you are not worthy of this act of self-worship.
12:26-12:28
So that's the wrong motive, to glorify yourself.
12:29-12:30
What's the right motive?
12:31-12:32
To glorify God.
12:33-12:34
To glorify God.
12:38-12:43
So Jesus provides the right motive for doing the right thing earlier in the Sermon on the Mount.
12:44-12:46
Listen to what he has to say in Matthew 5, 16.
12:47-12:58
"Let your light shine before others "that they may see your good works "and give glory to your Father who is in heaven." Compare that to chapter six, verse one.
12:58-13:05
"Beware of practicing your righteousness "before other people in order to be seen by them." Do you see the difference?
13:06-13:15
Instead of shining the spotlight onto yourself, you shine onto the only one who's actually worthy of it, the Lord and Him alone.
13:16-13:19
Because this is the reason for which you were created.
13:19-13:26
You exist to honor God and show a watching world how awesome He truly is.
13:27-13:29
This must be the goal of your marriage.
13:30-13:32
This must be the goal of your parenting.
13:32-13:35
This must be the goal of your job.
13:35-13:38
This must be the goal of everything that you do.
13:41-13:58
1 Corinthians 10 31, Paul says this, "So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, "do all to the glory of God." Because any worldly glory that you collect for yourself will be snuffed out when you pass on from this life.
13:58-14:04
But the glory of God is an unending fire that can never ever be put out.
14:06-14:10
In 100 or 200 years from now, you're gonna be long forgotten.
14:11-14:13
No one is gonna be thinking about you.
14:14-14:18
But the name of Jesus Christ will stand the test of time.
14:18-14:21
His name will be forever high and lifted up.
14:23-14:34
I'm not a betting man, but I can guarantee with 100% certainty that you will be rewarded for throwing your chips in with the victory of God's name and reputation.
14:35-14:39
That is the only motivation that will truly fuel you.
14:40-14:45
That is the only motivation that will get you across the finish line of life.
14:47-14:50
So watch out because your motives matter.
14:52-14:55
Secondly, watch out because your reward is at risk.
14:56-14:58
Because your reward is at risk.
15:05-15:11
Jesus lays out the consequence for doing the right thing for the wrong reason at the end of verse one.
15:12-15:23
Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.
15:25-15:35
If you are dominated by the desire to rob God of his glory as you do good deeds, you will receive a loud and clear message from God.
15:36-15:43
It is the same message that Willy Wonka gave to Charlie and his grandpa at the end of the Chocolate Factory tour.
15:43-15:46
You get nothing, you lose, good day, sir.
15:49-15:51
That may seem extreme, but it's what the text says.
15:52-15:56
That may seem harsh, but it's even better than what you deserve.
15:58-16:01
With that in mind, Jesus continues on with his warning in verse two.
16:02-16:07
By revealing the emptiness of the worldly reward that you often settle for.
16:08-16:21
Thus, when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and the streets, that they may be praised by others, truly I say to you, they have received their reward.
16:23-16:28
The worldly reward that is most tempting to seek after is the recognition of others.
16:30-16:32
The recognition of others.
16:35-16:41
And notice that Jesus doesn't say if you give to the needy, he says when you give the needy.
16:41-16:51
And he says that again in verse three, which means that you are expected to help those in need with your time, with your talents, and your treasures.
16:51-16:56
You are expected by God to care for the orphan and the widow.
16:58-17:05
James 1:27, "Religion that is pure and undefiled "before God is this, to visit orphans and widows in their affliction.
17:06-17:12
You are expected by God to not ignore the poor, especially those within the body of Christ.
17:13-17:16
Once again, let's read what James has to say, James 2, 15 through 16.
17:16-17:28
If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, "Go in peace, be warmed and filled," without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?
17:28-17:30
It is worthless.
17:32-17:39
You're expected by God to be generous with the money in your account, not hoard it for yourself.
17:40-17:47
Second Corinthians nine, verses six through seven, the point is this, whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly.
17:48-17:51
And whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
17:51-18:00
Each one must give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.
18:02-18:06
Harvest, you are expected to make these kinds of sacrifices.
18:08-18:20
But as you make these expected sacrifices, you are also expected to not sound a trumpet before you like the scribes and Pharisees did 2,000 years ago.
18:21-18:24
Now they didn't literally sound a physical trumpet.
18:24-18:30
They didn't pull a Miles Davis and blast a physical trumpet did a nice thing or made a donation.
18:31-18:36
Jesus is using an over-the-top and funny illustration to prove a simple point.
18:37-18:43
Do not be an obnoxious jerk who draws attention to himself or herself whenever you do the right thing.
18:45-18:55
You know, while you were doing whatever you were doing over the past week, I was racking my brain to think of a modern-day example of sounding a trumpet before you.
18:57-18:57
and I came up short.
18:59-19:03
So I'm gonna ask you guys to silently brainstorm because I actually have something I need to do in the meantime, okay?
19:04-19:06
So just be using your brain to think about an example.
19:09-19:10
Alright.
19:11-19:12
Don't mind me, guys.
19:16-19:17
(audience laughing)
19:20-19:21
Oh, you know what?
19:22-19:25
I don't want to interrupt your brainstorming time, but you know what?
19:25-19:26
This sermon's going really well.
19:27-19:30
You guys are all just laughing at my stories.
19:31-19:34
I guess really tell me, you're dialed into my spot on teaching.
19:34-19:36
I really think Facebook needs to know about this.
19:38-19:41
Oh, by the way, have you guys had any luck with your brainstorming?
19:44-19:44
Wait a minute.
19:46-19:50
Maybe I did stumble upon the 21st century version of sounding a trumpet before you.
19:50-19:51
What do you guys think?
19:52-19:53
All right, I guess I'll put this away then.
19:56-20:03
You know, seeking after the affirmation and praise of others is the heartbeat of the virtual world.
20:03-20:07
People put on a manufactured version of themselves.
20:07-20:09
They put their best foot forward.
20:10-20:16
You can post about your best day to accumulate the affirmation and adulation of others.
20:17-20:30
Maybe you post a status on Facebook, a picture on Instagram or a reel on the TikToks as Pastor Jeff calls it, that highlights a mission strip, a service project or a charitable event that you took part in.
20:31-20:41
Now you can certainly do this in a godly way with godly intentions, but you can also do it in an ungodly way with ungodly intentions.
20:42-20:50
You just bask in the glory of the likes and the comments and the heart emojis as human praise begins to pour in.
20:52-20:55
You make a sizable contribution to a GoFundMe page.
20:56-21:01
And instead of remaining anonymous, you put your name right next to the amount that you donated.
21:02-21:06
And you don't do that to show support, you do it to show off.
21:07-21:11
You want others to be amazed by your big-hearted generosity.
21:12-21:17
Some of you are feeling pretty safe and sound right now because you don't leave much of a digital footprint.
21:18-21:20
You don't post anything anywhere.
21:21-21:25
Well, let's move beyond the bounds of social media because I don't want to leave you out of all the fun.
21:26-21:35
Maybe you conceal a prideful remark of something kind you did as a praise at a prayer service or at small group.
21:36-21:50
Maybe you accidentally slip in a reference something nice you did while in conversation with someone else and you inwardly hope that they'll take the bait, they'll ask a follow-up question so you can get to add a boy or add a girl that you are so desperate for.
21:52-21:57
Maybe you like to brag about your family's accomplishments in the yearly Christmas letter.
21:58-21:59
That's right, I went there.
22:01-22:02
'Cause some of you may do that.
22:03-22:11
You say that you wanna keep everyone informed about your life, but you actually wanna keep everyone impressed with your life.
22:12-22:19
All of these examples are sounding a trumpet, pulling out the selfie stick, so that everyone will notice you.
22:21-22:24
'Cause you wanna be the recipient of admiration.
22:26-22:44
You know, whenever I was a full-time youth pastor for eight years, I went to a countless number of musicals, track meets, games, graduation ceremonies, graduation parties, and before, during, or after the event, I would track down my student and their parents and let them know that I was there.
22:44-22:50
Because how could I bless them with my presence if they were totally unaware of my presence?
22:50-22:57
It's kind of weird to admit, but if I didn't make myself known or receive credit, it didn't really seem to count.
22:57-22:58
Does that make sense?
22:59-22:59
Does that seem reasonable?
23:02-23:09
But you often feel a very similar way when it comes to your acts of good works, to your acts of service.
23:10-23:15
If others don't recognize what you did, it doesn't really seem to count, right?
23:16-23:23
It may even seem like a complete waste of time if you do not receive immediate praise.
23:25-23:31
Jesus says you can blow that trumpet, you can pull out that selfie stick if you want to, knock yourself out.
23:32-23:38
If you do, you will receive the reward of human praise, but that's all you'll get and nothing more.
23:38-23:41
you will get nothing from your Father in heaven.
23:42-23:42
Because you know what?
23:43-23:45
You don't really care about what he has to give you.
23:46-23:50
What other mere human beings have to offer seems much more appealing.
23:53-23:55
But that is so short-sighted.
23:56-24:02
Because compliments, thank yous, and awards feel good for about 15 minutes.
24:03-24:05
And then you're just jonesing for the next dose, right?
24:07-24:10
leaves almost as quickly as it arrives.
24:11-24:17
And you so quickly forget how little it satisfied you the next time you desire it.
24:19-24:24
In verses three through four, Jesus warns you to long for that which truly lasts.
24:25-24:34
He cautions you to walk the path of delayed gratification so that you can receive the eternal reward of the recognition of God himself.
24:35-24:39
That is the eternal reward, the recognition of God.
24:41-24:42
Let's read verses three through four.
24:43-24:59
But when you give to the needy, there it is again, not if, when, when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret, and your Father who sees you in secret will reward you.
25:02-25:06
As I said earlier, the secret to giving is giving in secret.
25:07-25:14
Jesus says, "Not even let your left hand "know what your right hand is doing." I just wanna give a warning up front.
25:14-25:18
I don't wanna offend all the left-handed people in the room with this explanation of the illustration.
25:18-25:21
I love all of you just as much as the normal people in the room, okay?
25:21-25:39
So don't be offended. (congregation laughing) Moving on, about 90% of Americans are right-handed, not left-handed.
25:39-25:41
Again, don't hate me, it's just the facts.
25:41-25:47
Which means that the majority of people use their right hand way more than their left hand.
25:48-25:51
So just go with this over-the-top funny illustration from Jesus.
25:52-25:55
Imagine that your hands can actually speak to each other.
25:57-26:05
In that scenario, your right hand shouldn't constantly brag about all the things that it was used to do over the course of the day to the left hand.
26:05-26:07
Instead, it should be quiet.
26:08-26:14
It should be satisfied that it was used instead of broadcasting how it was used.
26:16-26:21
Jesus is calling us to a very serious type of self-denial here.
26:21-26:27
He is saying, serve me, serve others, and then do your best to forget all about it.
26:28-26:29
Don't keep track.
26:29-26:31
Don't keep score.
26:31-26:34
Don't manage your own personal scoreboard.
26:35-26:43
Don't comb through your mental file of successes and think, yeah, I'm doing pretty good compared to most people at church, compared to most people in my small group.
26:43-26:47
That is a complete waste of time and energy.
26:49-26:55
It is not your job to keep score because you cannot accurately evaluate yourself.
26:56-26:58
Only God can do that.
27:00-27:04
But this kind of self-forgetfulness is so counterintuitive to us.
27:05-27:12
Because we all live in a culture that tries to ram self-worth down our throats every single chance that it gets.
27:12-27:15
Oh, your self-esteem matters more than anything else.
27:16-27:18
If you don't put yourself first, other people will put you last.
27:19-27:21
Don't forget to love yourself.
27:22-27:24
Give yourself pep talks and tell yourself how awesome you are.
27:27-27:27
Is any of that biblical?
27:29-27:31
Why do we often fall for it?
27:33-27:36
The Bible doesn't teach you to have high self-esteem.
27:37-27:41
The Bible also doesn't teach you to have low self-esteem either.
27:41-27:48
The Bible says to have no esteem, which means that you're not focused on your self-image.
27:48-27:52
You're not obsessed with what other people think and say about you.
27:52-28:01
Instead, you focus on what God thinks and says about you because his authoritative opinion matters the most.
28:03-28:09
Listen, it does not matter if other people recognize and acknowledge your faithfulness.
28:11-28:13
Let me say that again because I really need to hear it.
28:13-28:20
It does not matter if other people recognize and acknowledge your faithfulness.
28:21-28:26
What matters is you hear these words from the Lord when you stand before him one day.
28:27-28:30
Well done, good and faithful servant.
28:30-28:33
Enter into the joy of your master.
28:35-28:39
That is the reward you should long and live for.
28:42-28:48
Jesus says that if you give in secret, your Father who sees in secret will reward you.
28:50-28:55
Jesus isn't saying that you can earn right standing before God or work your way to heaven.
28:55-28:56
That's not possible.
28:57-29:02
Salvation is found in the person and work of Jesus Christ and nowhere else.
29:02-29:10
Forgiveness of sin and eternal life are gifts to be received by faith, not earned by works.
29:10-29:12
Scripture is so clear on that.
29:14-29:21
But scripture is equally clear that rewards in heaven are diligently earned, not automatically received.
29:23-29:26
If you honor God in this life, he will honor you in eternity.
29:27-29:37
If you reject temporary rewards that you cannot take out of this world, you will be given eternal rewards that can never be stolen away from you in heaven.
29:38-29:39
What a promise.
29:41-29:45
That is a heavenly check that will never bounce, and it will clear every single time.
29:47-29:50
So let God keep score because he will reward you.
29:52-29:54
What are these heavenly rewards?
29:54-29:58
I wish I could tell you, but the Bible doesn't give us specific details.
29:59-30:07
But I can tell you this, God has never given you a lame gift in the past, and he will not give you a lame gift in the future.
30:07-30:12
If God promises it, trust me, you want it and you will love it.
30:15-30:21
Right now you may be thinking, okay, what do I do when someone else does praise me?
30:22-30:23
Is this gonna happen at some point?
30:25-30:28
Do you just shut them down and say, "Whoa, whoa, I didn't do this to be praised by you.
30:28-30:30
"You're gonna make me lose my eternal reward.
30:30-30:33
"La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la." Is that what you should do?
30:35-30:38
That'd be super weird and awkward with the other person, so please don't do that.
30:39-30:50
You should humbly accept this person's compliment and then redirect their praise to the source and supply of your good works, the love of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit.
30:53-30:56
Point the complimenter to God himself.
30:57-31:02
And this kind of redirect will not lead to a forfeiture of heavenly reward.
31:02-31:14
If anything, it will lead to even greater reward because you have rightly handled praise and you have put it in the place where it truly belongs, which is the hands of Almighty God.
31:17-31:25
If you compare to some of the weighty topics we've covered during the Sermon on the Mount, this passage may seem kind of light and inconsequential to you.
31:26-31:34
But I can assure you that it's not because your giving and serving in public speaks volumes of who you are in private.
31:35-31:37
This is serious business.
31:38-31:42
You have received a personal warning from Jesus himself.
31:45-31:50
He just warns you to watch out for the motive of glorifying yourself.
31:51-31:57
To watch out for the worldly desire to receive worldly rewards.
31:59-32:01
And there are only two responses to this kind of warning.
32:03-32:05
Indifference or humility.
32:06-32:10
Maybe you don't see any problem with your motives right now.
32:11-32:17
You don't see any issue for the reward you're living for, You just wanna move on with your day.
32:19-32:23
Well, you're free to make that choice if you want to, but it is the wrong choice.
32:24-32:32
Because until the day you die and are in the presence of Christ, your motives will always be tinged with selfishness.
32:33-32:37
Even as I stand before you to preach this sermon, there is selfishness in my heart.
32:39-32:45
Your motives will never be 100% pure, you will desire the wrong reward.
32:46-32:51
So please do not choose ignorance because too much is at stake.
32:52-32:58
And maybe you do see major problems with your motives and the reward you are living for.
32:59-33:04
You know that you have to make a change but you don't know how to make that change.
33:05-33:07
Well I have good news and bad news for you.
33:08-33:09
Let's start with the bad news.
33:10-33:13
You cannot change your motives and desires.
33:15-33:17
Are you ready for the good news?
33:17-33:21
God can change your motives and desires.
33:22-33:35
But this will only happen if you humble yourself before him, admit that you need his help, submit to the master motivator and the richest rewarder in the entire universe.
33:36-33:39
Go to the Lord in prayer and do that right now.
33:40-33:41
Let's take some time in prayer.
33:46-33:50
Father, we come to you to lay our motives before you.
33:52-33:55
To lay down the worldly rewards that we are living for.
33:58-34:03
Lord, help us to remember the only thing that will truly last is your glory and your name.
34:05-34:09
Lord, help us to live these rewards that last forever.
34:10-34:13
and not these worldly rewards that fade away so quickly.
34:16-34:33
And Lord, if there's anyone in this room who is not a follower of you and is just stuck in this cycle of glorifying themselves and living for themselves, may they for the first time submit to Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior so that they can fulfill the purpose for which you've given them, which is to make much of you.
34:35-34:38
And for the rest of us, Lord, help us to remember that biblical goal.
34:39-34:45
to remember who we are living for, to remember why we exist.
34:46-34:49
And we ask all these things in Jesus' name, amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 6:1-4

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
Why do your motives matter so much to the Lord?
In what ways do you see yourself struggling with self-glorification? How can you fight against this sinful trend?
Why isn’t the worldly reward of human praise worth pursuing after?
Why does the Lord want you to be motivated by eternal rewards? Explain why this motivation isn’t legalistic or self-centered.

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Jeff Miller

June 8, 2025

The Heart of the Law

Love Like God

Jeff Miller

June 8, 2025

The Heart of the Law

Introduction:

Leviticus 19:18 – You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge against the sons of your own people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the LORD.

Leviticus 19:34 – You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God.

I Love My Enemies... (Matthew 5:43–48)

...because of WHO I AM. (Matt 5:45a)
...by WHAT I DO. (Matt 5:45b)
...because I Am CALLED TO BE DIFFERENT. (Matt 5:46–47)

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

00:00-00:03
Open up those Bibles to Matthew chapter five.
00:06-00:20
As we go through our series, the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew chapter five, verse 43, Jesus said, "You have heard that it was said." Stop there for a second.
00:21-00:30
This whole section that we're in right now, if you've been following this series at all, I'm sure you've noticed that that has come up.
00:30-00:32
What is it, like six total times, pastor?
00:32-00:48
Like you have heard that it was said, but I say to you, what Jesus is dealing with here is correcting some garbage beliefs.
00:50-00:57
And I've shared with you before, that's my biggest concern for this church, is the area of discernment.
00:59-01:09
We live in a day that there is so much bad teaching out there, and thanks to the internet, we have access, right?
01:09-01:20
And look, I'm not saying it's all bad, but I'm saying probably for every good teaching you can find online, you can probably find 10 other garbage teaching online.
01:20-01:25
And my concern for the church is people not knowing the difference.
01:27-01:31
And it gets back to what did Jesus actually say?
01:31-01:35
It's the issue that he was dealing with in his day, lack of discernment.
01:40-02:09
Last week we saw Jesus said, "You've heard that it was said, "an eye for an eye and Jesus, no, no, no, no, no, no." Jesus, I say to you, I'm paraphrasing, He goes, "Do not retaliate." And you can walk away from last week's message and say, "Got it, don't retaliate." So, I'm just gonna ignore the people that I can't stand.
02:12-02:13
Well, let's keep reading.
02:16-02:21
Verse 43, "You have heard that it was said, "You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.
02:22-02:38
"But I say to you, "love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." Oh no, no, don't ignore your enemies.
02:39-02:43
You have to look for ways to be good to them.
02:45-02:47
You're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
02:48-02:57
You're saying that I not only don't get to get even with them, but I have to proactively love them?
03:00-03:02
Yeah, that's what he said.
03:04-03:05
All right, it's a hard word.
03:06-03:09
So I think we should just stop and pray right now, shouldn't we?
03:09-03:22
I'm gonna ask that you would pray for me to be faithful to communicate God's Word accurately and clearly, and I will pray for you to have a heart open to receive what our Lord is teaching us in this part of his sermon.
03:22-03:24
All right, so let's pray.
03:32-03:52
Father in heaven, as we go through This sermon from our Lord, it's just wave after wave of things that really confront our selfish, sinful, fleshly tendencies.
03:52-03:56
And I don't know of one that's bigger than this one.
03:57-04:20
I'm asking, please God, please by the power of your word, Father, by the power of your spirit, that you would change our minds today, Father, change our hearts and that we wouldn't just leave here knowing some things, but we leave here deeply convicted and moved to do some things.
04:22-04:26
For your glory and honor, Father, we pray in Jesus' name.
04:27-04:33
And all of God's people said, "Amen." All right, let's break this down here.
04:33-04:43
Jesus says, verse 43, "You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.'" You have heard, you have heard.
04:44-04:45
That's what we've seen in this series.
04:45-04:49
The scribes and the Pharisees in Jesus' day did what's still happening today.
04:50-04:56
They twist verses in the word of God to justify whatever it is they wanna justify.
04:57-04:59
For them, Jesus called them out.
04:59-05:01
They were justifying their lust.
05:02-05:04
They were justifying their hatred.
05:05-05:07
They were justifying their getting even with people.
05:11-05:12
Calls them out again.
05:13-05:17
You've heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.
05:20-05:23
That's what the scribes and the Pharisees said.
05:25-05:27
And you're like, well, is that in the Old Testament?
05:31-05:36
Well, the first part was, kinda.
05:38-05:39
Here's what I mean.
05:39-05:41
Here's what's actually in the scripture.
05:42-05:43
Leviticus 19, 18.
05:44-05:44
Look at this.
05:44-05:52
"You shall not take vengeance or bear a grudge "against the sons of your own people, "but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.
05:52-06:01
"I am the Lord." So you see, with the way that they sort of restated that, They ran into four problems.
06:03-06:04
Four problems.
06:04-06:08
The first problem is, the scribes and the Pharisees left out the as yourself part.
06:08-06:09
Did you notice that?
06:11-06:17
Well, I love my neighbor, but as myself, that's a bit too much.
06:19-06:20
Let's keep it vague.
06:21-06:25
Because if we keep love vague, then whatever we do, we can just say it was love, right?
06:25-06:27
So keep it vague.
06:27-06:28
God never kept it vague.
06:29-06:30
That was their first problem.
06:30-06:34
Second problem is the scribes and the Pharisees redefined neighbor.
06:36-06:40
And their definition of neighbor was, those I choose to love.
06:41-06:42
That was their definition.
06:43-06:46
So do you realize, the reason I'm laughing is, do you realize what that made the command?
06:47-06:51
God's command is, love those you choose to love.
06:53-06:54
That's convenient.
06:56-07:01
Third problem, the scribes and the Pharisees Totally added the hate your enemy part, right?
07:02-07:03
Totally added that.
07:03-07:05
You're not gonna find that anywhere in the Old Testament.
07:06-07:09
My vague love is for my Jewish neighbors.
07:10-07:12
What about the foreigners?
07:13-07:14
Hate 'em.
07:15-07:18
And that leads us actually to the fourth problem.
07:19-07:40
Because that whole love your neighbor as yourself, that was in Leviticus 19, 18, But if you go down a few verses to verse 34, it says, "You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall," dun-dun-da-da, "love him as yourself.
07:41-07:42
For you are strangers in the land of Egypt.
07:43-07:57
I am the Lord your God." See, the scribes and the Pharisees, They thought that they were honoring God by hating foreigners.
08:00-08:02
And we get asked this question a lot.
08:02-08:03
Well, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
08:03-08:10
In the Old Testament, didn't God tell the Israelites to exterminate the nations that were living in the promised land?
08:11-08:13
And don't we have all these imprecatory Psalms?
08:14-08:15
Like, what's up with that, huh?
08:15-08:15
Huh?
08:17-08:17
Well.
08:20-08:24
It's like the eye for an eye thing that we talked about last week.
08:26-08:34
The scribes and the Pharisees took a thing that was designed for Israel as a nation and they turned it into a personal thing.
08:36-08:40
So the whole exterminate the enemies in the promised land, yeah, absolutely.
08:41-08:44
Israel's wars weren't personal vendettas.
08:44-08:51
They were commanded by God to wipe out those nations, because those nations did horrible things.
08:52-08:55
And God says, "You are not going to pollute "my nation Israel.
08:56-09:13
"So Israel, you're gonna wipe them out." And if you have a hard time with that, I would just like to lovingly remind you that God is allowed to make those calls, because vengeance belongs to Him.
09:14-09:15
Okay?
09:16-09:23
And God's whole purpose in that was to protect Israel as a nation in that land.
09:23-09:30
That's why when you turn to your New Testaments, you don't see any imprecatory language in the New Testament.
09:31-09:32
It's for Israel.
09:33-09:42
But individually, and we're talking about personally now, what about the people that hate me?
09:43-09:46
What about the people that are my enemies?
09:49-09:50
Love them.
09:51-09:51
Love them.
09:51-09:52
Look at verse 44.
09:52-09:57
Jesus says, "But I say to you," pretty clear, isn't it?
09:58-10:25
"Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." You see, the whole loving your neighbor command includes everyone around you, including your enemy. I'm breaking this down when he talks about enemy, he's talking about your personal enemy. Okay? It's not this collective group idea. It's somebody who personally hates me.
10:27-10:39
And Jesus says our response is to love them. That's the word agape. That is the highest form of love. That's self-sacrificing love. That's the kind of love that we should have for our enemy.
10:40-10:42
And the verb tense here is constant.
10:43-10:44
It's continually.
10:44-10:49
You need to continually love your enemies.
10:51-10:53
And you're like, well, who is my enemy?
10:56-10:58
Who is it that hates you?
11:00-11:06
Who is it that you know that if you tried to call them, they wouldn't answer the phone?
11:08-11:14
"If you sent them a text, they wouldn't reply." Or vice versa.
11:17-11:41
"Who is it that has been slandering you, "making accusations against you?" Jesus says, "We not only love our enemies," but you notice he ratchets it up even more when he says, "Pray for those who persecute you." Those who persecute you, those are your worst enemies.
11:42-11:47
Here Jesus is speaking about your enemies who they don't just hate you.
11:50-11:52
They actively hate you.
11:52-11:59
They, these are the people that make an effort to show you how much they hate you.
12:02-12:12
And as we've been going through the Sermon on the Mount, We see that a true believer in Jesus Christ is someone who is defined by the Beatitudes.
12:12-12:17
And if you were here for the Beatitudes series, you remember what the last one was?
12:18-12:25
The highest rung on the ladder of following Jesus Christ is when we're persecuted.
12:28-12:33
And here's the part where we stop and ask, "Are we persecuted?
12:37-12:42
Are we really persecuted?" Because here's the thing.
12:43-12:53
I think for a lot of us, our knee-jerk reaction to that would be, "I'm not persecuted." But the reality is you probably are, but you just haven't realized it.
12:53-12:54
Here's what I mean by that.
12:54-12:55
Here's what I mean.
12:56-13:13
doesn't just mean somebody physically attacks you, somebody murders you, somebody gets you arrested, thrown in jail, those, yes, that is persecution, but those are the most graphic manifestations of persecution.
13:13-13:18
The word persecute literally means to pursue.
13:18-13:19
That's what it means.
13:19-13:20
And listen, listen to this.
13:23-13:57
Persecute means somebody is chasing after you constantly criticize and condemn you. So I imagine most of you are being persecuted right now according to the true definition of persecution. Think about it this way. Was Jesus persecuted? If you're like, "Oh yeah, when he was crucified, of course!" But no, he was persecuted his entire ministry because what were they constantly doing?
13:58-14:06
The proper definition, they were constantly, read the gospels, they were constantly pursuing Jesus.
14:06-14:08
They were, how would we say it?
14:08-14:09
They were out to get him.
14:10-14:11
That's what persecution means.
14:12-14:14
I mean, read your gospels.
14:14-14:19
They were constantly looking to criticize Jesus, insulting Jesus, accusing Jesus.
14:19-14:27
Yeah, you're just on the Sabbath and you shouldn't be doing healing this way and your disciples didn't wash your hands and what's up with the fasting?
14:27-14:31
They were constantly, constantly, constantly after him.
14:31-14:32
That's what persecution means.
14:36-14:44
And if you really follow Jesus, you have people pursuing you in that way too.
14:49-15:07
Don't shout out any names, But do you have somebody at your workplace, for example, that's always watching you, always looking to get their little remarks in, get their little digs in, always looking to criticize anything you say or anything you do.
15:08-15:10
That's persecution according to the proper definition.
15:12-15:14
They're pursuing you.
15:15-15:22
Maybe you have that family member Never approves of a thing you do.
15:24-15:26
The bum just can't do anything right.
15:26-15:32
And they're always vocal about it, getting their little shots in, their little passive aggressive comments.
15:33-15:35
They're always out to get you.
15:36-15:37
That's persecution.
15:40-15:41
Maybe it's on social media.
15:41-15:48
You know, anything you post, you know that person's gonna show up with their snarky little comment.
15:49-15:51
That's pursuing, that's persecution.
15:56-16:00
Jesus says we need to pray for the people that do that to us, the people that are out to get ya.
16:01-16:02
Jesus said pray for them.
16:05-16:08
So, when was the last time you did that?
16:12-16:20
I don't know about you, but I have a list of people that I regularly pray for.
16:24-16:31
When was the last time that you loved your enemy?
16:34-16:41
And you're like, why in the world would I do that?
16:43-16:44
Well, let's keep reading.
16:45-16:59
Jesus says in verse 45, "So that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven." Why would you love your enemy?
17:00-17:03
Why would you pray for people that are constantly out to get you?
17:06-17:08
It's not because of who they are.
17:10-17:11
It's because of who you are.
17:19-17:22
That's the sermon that our Lord gives.
17:24-17:28
That you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven.
17:28-17:30
It's not because of who they are.
17:32-17:33
It's because of who you are.
17:38-17:51
Can we just confess that so much of our lives, our attitudes, our moods are determined by other people?
17:53-17:54
Good or bad?
17:57-18:01
People have a way of just like governing our lives.
18:02-18:03
Here's what I mean.
18:05-18:14
After service, you go over to Giant Eagle into an old friend that you haven't seen in years, "Oh, that puts you in a good mood.
18:15-18:18
Oh, it was so great catching up." That's going to put you in a good mood for the rest of the day, right?
18:21-18:34
Or, somebody makes a really jerky comment to you at work, intentionally wanting to get under your skin.
18:35-18:38
Doesn't that just like wreck your day?
18:39-18:46
And you're in a bad mood for days over one jerky comment.
18:50-19:25
And I would bet if you had a bad day last week, if you could point to a day last week and you're like, "That was a bad day." I would be willing to bet that it had something to do with people. You're laughing because it's true. And Jesus here is saying, "My people don't react to people. My people act according to the Word of God." So let's unpack this for a few moments, shall we? On your outline, I want you to jot some things down.
19:25-19:26
I love my enemies.
19:28-19:28
Can you say that?
19:29-19:30
You're like, not now.
19:30-19:31
You will in a few minutes.
19:32-19:34
I love my enemies, number one.
19:36-19:37
We already touched on this.
19:37-19:39
We're gonna drill a little deeper here.
19:39-19:42
Number one, I love my enemies because of who I am.
19:43-19:44
Look at this again.
19:44-19:47
This is Jesus' whole rationale.
19:47-19:49
Why would I love my enemies, Jesus?
19:49-20:03
Lord, Lord, why would I pray for the people that are constantly out to get me, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven." This is where Jesus starts your identity.
20:04-20:08
You love your enemies, not because of who they are, but because of who you are.
20:11-20:20
Jesus is, in essence, saying, "You love your enemies because it's a family tradition in our family." You got family traditions.
20:22-20:23
Do you have family tradition?
20:23-20:24
You know what I mean.
20:24-20:30
Every family has on-brand things that they do, right?
20:32-20:35
Like some families, they're like, "We're campers, we go camping.
20:36-20:39
Yes, we have a house, but for a while, we like to pretend that we don't.
20:39-20:41
That's just what we do in our family.
20:42-20:49
We live in a canvas enclosure in the wildlife." Okay.
20:50-20:52
But that's your family thing.
20:53-20:56
For some families, it's like we're beach people, we love the beach, our family loves the beach.
20:57-20:59
We love the beach, that's our family thing, right?
21:00-21:10
Some families are sports families, like oh, we're baseball, we're a baseball family, we love the box and we're on the church softball team, and we're like, we love baseball.
21:11-21:13
Every family's got their thing, right?
21:15-21:19
I mean, I remember growing up, our family, our family had our thing.
21:19-21:25
I remember when we were teenagers, Erin actually came over to our house for Thanksgiving.
21:27-21:32
And they had the stuffing out and the turkey and all the dressing and all that stuff.
21:33-21:39
And I just remember our family was passing around the table a bag of Funyuns.
21:41-21:45
And I just remember Erin sitting there going, she looked like she saw a ghost.
21:45-21:49
I'm like, "What's the matter?" She goes, "Why are you passing around a bag of Funyuns?
21:50-21:55
"It's Thanksgiving." And I'm just like, "What's Thanksgiving without Funyuns?"
21:56-21:57
(congregation laughing)
21:59-22:01
Like, we're not the weird ones here.
22:02-22:03
(congregation laughing)
22:04-22:06
And then I got older and realized that we were.
22:09-22:11
Every family's got their thing.
22:12-22:13
That's what Jesus is saying here.
22:14-22:18
Like, hey, hey, hey, we're in God's family.
22:19-22:21
So do you know what we do in God's family?
22:21-22:21
Do you know what we do?
22:22-22:23
We love like God.
22:25-22:29
And God, God loves his enemies.
22:31-22:35
You're like, well, like, who are God's enemies?
22:40-22:40
Everyone.
22:42-22:43
Do you realize that?
22:46-22:55
Literally, every single person on the planet is an enemy of God until they are reconciled to God in Jesus Christ.
22:56-22:59
That's what Paul said in Romans 5, right?
23:00-23:13
"For if while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son." See that's the glorious reality of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
23:13-23:28
When you receive Jesus Christ by faith, when you believe that He died to take away your sin, when you believe that He rose from the dead to give you eternal life, when you turn from your sin and receive Him, God changes you from an enemy of God to a child of God.
23:30-23:38
And now we are a child still living among enemies of God.
23:40-23:41
Child of God.
23:43-24:01
You know, Ephesians 4, spilling over to Ephesians 5, says, "Be kind to one another, "tenderhearted, forgiving one another "as God and Christ forgave you.
24:06-24:15
"Therefore, be imitators of God as beloved children." This is what we do in our family.
24:16-24:17
We love like God.
24:20-24:24
And as his children, we imitate our dad.
24:26-24:27
Do you ever notice that kids love to imitate?
24:28-24:29
Do you ever notice that?
24:30-24:32
Kids love to imitate adults.
24:32-24:36
It was made painfully aware to me, oh, many, many years ago.
24:36-24:39
A couple decades ago at this point, we had foster kids.
24:41-24:43
Before we had any of our own kids, we had foster kids.
24:44-24:52
And I remember one little boy, he was five years old, his name was Walter, and we'd be playing the PlayStation, and we're sitting there, you know, playing the PlayStation.
24:53-25:02
And look, I was a perfect gamer back in the day, but sometimes the stupid game would glitch or something and my guy would get killed.
25:03-25:21
And when that happened, I remember I'd put the controller down and I'd be like, "Oh, for Pete's sake." Well, Walter would be playing video games with me and I remember he'd be playing a video game and he'd just randomly throw his controller down and go, "Your pee stinks."
25:21-25:24
(congregation laughing)
25:28-25:30
Like, no, no, no, no, no.
25:32-25:36
No, it's for Pete's sake.
25:39-25:42
But he was, it never clicked with him.
25:42-25:47
He was constantly commenting on the smell of urine.
25:50-25:51
Your pee stinks.
25:53-25:54
Why did he do that?
25:56-25:57
He was just imitating me.
25:58-25:59
Right, kids love to do that.
26:01-26:12
And as a child of God, we naturally, we supernaturally want to imitate him.
26:15-26:25
So when that guy at work is constantly out to get ya, and you love him, and you repay his nastiness with kindness.
26:26-26:29
And then somebody else comes in and says, "Whoa, whoa, what are you doing?
26:29-26:31
"You love that guy?
26:31-26:41
"That guy's a real jerk to you." And your response is, "Yeah, I get that from my dad." You see, I see people as dad sees them.
26:45-26:50
Lost, blind, slaves to sin, heading to hell.
26:50-26:50
hell.
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You know what my heavenly dad taught me?
26:55-27:01
He taught me that I don't need to retaliate.
27:02-27:05
And my heavenly father taught me I don't need to ignore them.
27:05-27:09
My heavenly father taught me that people like that need compassion.
27:14-27:17
And I know right now somebody's thinking, "Yeah, I love your enemies.
27:18-27:19
I see it, I hear it.
27:21-27:25
Pastor Jeff, you don't know what this person said to me.
27:27-27:29
You don't know the horrible things that they said to my face.
27:29-27:31
You don't know the horrible things they said behind my back.
27:33-27:39
Pastor Jeff, you don't know, this person for years has been just out to get me.
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Look, you're right.
27:48-27:49
They don't deserve it.
27:51-27:51
You're right.
27:53-27:54
They've been miserable.
27:56-27:58
But you, you love them.
27:59-28:04
Not because of who they are, but because of who you are.
28:05-28:06
You're a child of God.
28:07-28:11
And your heavenly Father, He loves His enemies.
28:12-28:12
All right?
28:12-28:14
So I love my enemies because of who I am.
28:15-28:17
Secondly, number two, write this one down.
28:17-28:20
I love my enemies by what I do.
28:23-28:24
I love my enemies by what I do.
28:31-28:35
And you might be sitting here going, ah yeah, this love your enemy thing, I ain't feeling it.
28:36-28:37
I ain't feeling it.
28:38-28:39
And I would say that's okay.
28:41-28:42
You don't have to feel it.
28:44-28:45
But you do have to do it.
28:47-28:56
Because look, when the Bible talks about love, agape love, it's not an emotion.
28:59-29:06
Listen, you don't have to like them, but you do have to love them.
29:08-29:10
And biblically, love is an action.
29:13-29:14
Here's what I mean.
29:15-29:16
Love is an action.
29:16-29:22
1 John 5, 3 says, "For this is the love of God, "that we keep his commandments." Jesus said the same thing.
29:22-29:23
What is it?
29:24-29:40
John 14, 15, Jesus said, "If you love me, "you will keep my commandments." John 15, Jesus said, "Abiding in him "is keeping his commandments." Notice the Bible never calls us to stir up some kind of emotion.
29:43-29:49
Loving God is a choice. And yes, we worship God with our emotions in song and worship.
29:50-29:56
Yes, but that is the fruit of a choice to love God.
29:59-30:03
The proof that you love God isn't based on your feelings.
30:04-30:10
The proof that you love God, according to our Lord, is based on your actions.
30:11-30:16
And listen, church, love works the same way with your enemies.
30:16-30:20
You are not called to love your enemies by conjuring up gushy feelings.
30:25-30:27
You're called to love them by your actions.
30:29-30:32
You're called to love them by actively blessing them.
30:33-30:34
Why?
30:36-30:37
Because that's what God does.
30:39-30:41
Look at verse 45, the rest of it.
30:44-31:06
He says, "For he makes his son rise on the evil "and on the good and sends rain on the just "and on the unjust." God is so kind to sinners.
31:07-31:09
Did you ever stop and think about that?
31:14-31:23
Have you ever stopped to just marvel at the glorious truth that somebody can live their entire life and completely ignore God?
31:26-31:28
And they can still have a pretty good life on the earth.
31:30-31:31
Isn't that astounding?
31:33-31:42
Isn't it amazing that somebody can live their entire life hating God, speaking against God, speaking against God's people, speaking against God's truth.
31:42-31:47
They can live their whole life and do that, and they can still have a good life on the earth.
31:50-32:01
In God's kindness, He still lets them have sun and rain and a million other good things.
32:04-32:13
You can hate God and still have food, and friends, and laughter, and family, and health.
32:14-32:27
And yeah, the hard-hearted may refuse to be thankful or acknowledge this, but regardless, God does it anyways.
32:31-32:35
God's kindness says little about them, but it says much about Him.
32:38-32:43
And Jesus says, "Take note, children of God.
32:45-32:48
You show love for your enemies by what you do for them.
32:50-33:02
You show love for enemies by actively seeking their good." Like, "Well, what does that look like, Pastor Jeff?
33:02-33:08
What does that look like?" Okay, so you've got a nasty older family member who's always hated you.
33:12-33:13
Go do her yard work.
33:17-33:23
You got a jerk co-worker always looking to get their little shots in on you?
33:26-33:29
Look for ways to sincerely and genuinely compliment their work.
33:34-33:35
You got a nasty neighbor.
33:39-33:42
Find out what they like and treat them.
33:44-33:52
"Hey, I saw your garden, and the other day I was at the store and I saw that there was this magazine about gardening, and I picked it up for you.
33:52-33:55
I thought you might be interested." I don't know.
33:58-34:05
Just get on your face and ask God to show you how you can show kindness to your enemy.
34:09-34:17
Romans 12 20, Paul quotes from Proverbs 25, he says, "If your enemy is hungry, feed him.
34:19-34:39
"If he is thirsty, give him something to drink, "for by so doing, you will heap burning coals on his head." When I was a young Christian, when I read this, I had this idea that if you do good to people that aren't good to you, like if you meet their needs, they're going to have this like mini Sodom and Gomorrah experience on their head.
34:39-34:43
Like, I'm gonna be nice to you and it's gonna rain lava on your head.
34:44-34:45
Ah, I'm burning!
34:45-34:47
Like, that'll show them.
34:50-34:53
And then I learned that that's not what that means at all.
34:56-34:58
It was actually an Egyptian symbol.
35:00-35:05
That they would put hot coals in an insulated pot and carry it around on their head.
35:07-35:09
it was a sign of repentance.
35:10-35:12
See, Israel had the sackcloth and ashes.
35:13-35:16
Israel had the pot of coals on their head.
35:19-35:22
And that's what God's word is driving us to.
35:25-35:28
Because no one's ever been one to Jesus.
35:30-35:32
Because a Christian matched their pettiness.
35:35-35:39
No one's ever been one to Jesus because a Christian just flat out ignored them.
35:42-35:45
It's kindness that leads to repentance, according to Romans 2.4.
35:48-35:48
Show love to them.
35:53-35:57
Actively show love to them.
35:59-36:00
Why would I do that?
36:03-36:06
Because it's not about who they are.
36:07-36:08
It's about who you are.
36:10-36:10
And one more.
36:13-36:16
I love my enemies because of who I am by what I do.
36:17-36:19
Three, we get to another because.
36:20-36:24
I love my enemies because I'm called to be different.
36:27-36:29
Look at verses 46 and 47.
36:30-36:37
Jesus says, "For if you love those who love you, "what reward do you have?
36:38-36:40
"Do not even the tax collectors do the same?
36:43-36:48
"And if you greet only your brothers, "what more are you doing than others?
36:49-36:54
"Do not even the Gentiles do the same?" Stop there.
36:57-36:59
You know, if you're like, "You know what?
37:01-37:03
I love the people that I like.
37:04-37:16
I love the people that I like." Well, then you do what people who don't even know Jesus do.
37:18-37:31
And our Lord here is saying, "What's so special about that?" "Oh, so you think you're great because you do what's normal.
37:32-37:33
Well, hang on a second.
37:33-37:44
Let me shine up your participation trophy." Why is it that we want applause for doing what's expected?
37:47-37:48
Here's an example.
37:49-37:52
Erin and I, we always look at each other and kind of laugh.
37:52-38:01
When we hear a dad say, "Yeah, I had to babysit my kids last Monday." Did you ever hear somebody say that?
38:02-38:03
You're not gonna say it anymore.
38:06-38:11
"I had to babysit my kids last Monday." I believe that's called being a father.
38:13-38:14
You didn't babysit your own kids.
38:15-38:17
Did your wife pay you $10 an hour?
38:20-38:25
Like, look, I'm not giving you a cookie because you did what was expected.
38:27-38:28
That's what our Lord is saying here.
38:33-38:42
You're expected to be different because Christians have something that no one else in the world has.
38:42-38:43
Do you know what that is?
38:44-38:46
It's like the Bible, not everybody has that.
38:48-38:51
Like compassion, no, a lot of people have that.
38:51-38:53
Christians have something that nobody else in the world has.
38:53-38:54
You know what that is?
38:56-38:57
God living in them.
39:00-39:02
In other words, you should be different.
39:06-39:08
I mean, anybody can go one mile.
39:10-39:11
That was the law, that's expected.
39:12-39:16
Anyone can give up a shirt that they lost legally in a lawsuit.
39:16-39:17
That's expected.
39:19-39:24
And here our Lord is saying, "Anybody can say hi to their friends." That's expected.
39:26-39:37
But God expects and empowers us to do more, to be like Him.
39:39-39:46
So do you do what the world expects, or do you do what God expects?
39:46-39:48
Because God's called you to be different than the world.
39:51-39:52
Do you have a heart like God?
39:55-39:55
We'll find out.
39:57-40:04
We'll find out because it's revealed not in how you treat your friends, it's revealed in how you treat your enemies.
40:06-40:14
We love them, not because of who they are, but because of who you are.
40:16-40:17
Oh yeah, there's one more verse.
40:23-40:27
One of the most deeply convicting and challenging verses in the whole Bible.
40:28-40:35
Jesus says, "You therefore must be perfect, "as your heavenly Father is perfect."
40:37-40:38
(exhaling)
40:41-40:46
In the context of this teaching, obviously, he's talking about the way we love, right?
40:47-40:51
You must love perfectly the way your heavenly Father loves perfectly.
40:52-40:53
That's what Jesus is saying here.
40:54-41:03
And look, you and I, we look at that verse, and we say, I failed.
41:06-41:07
I've failed.
41:09-41:09
We all have.
41:11-41:17
And actually, remembering the Beatitudes, step one and two of the Beatitudes was recognizing that you failed.
41:19-41:21
And you're like, man, I'll never be perfect.
41:23-41:25
But God says you must be perfect.
41:28-41:29
Do you know what that means?
41:32-41:33
It means I always have room to grow.
41:37-41:39
And today we're talking about loving your enemies.
41:40-41:43
And maybe right now you're saying, you know, I knew that.
41:44-41:49
I knew that, but today I'm encountered by this calling in a fresh way.
41:49-41:52
And I realize now I need to grow.
41:52-41:54
I want to grow in this area.
41:57-41:58
It's grace.
42:01-42:01
It's grace.
42:02-42:07
God has made us perfectly righteous in Jesus Christ.
42:08-42:14
God has adopted us as his children, and he is constantly changing us.
42:18-42:27
We don't deserve anything, but God has given us everything, even though we were his enemies.
42:30-42:30
It's grace.
42:33-42:34
Do you get that?
42:36-42:41
Then, like your Father, give it.
42:44-42:47
In just a moment, we're going to be gathering around the Lord's table as a church.
42:51-42:58
And it is the Lord's table that reminds us that we are grace people.
43:01-43:21
Because in essence, what we are remembering, what we are celebrating, what we are declaring when we take the Lord's Supper together is the Lord is saying, "I saved you." Not because of who you are, because of who I am.

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:43-48

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
What does it mean to be persecuted? When Jesus said we must pray for those who persecute us, what / how exactly should we pray?
Can you genuinely love your enemy if you don’t really feel like it? Why or why not?
Explain Romans 12:20. How exactly does loving your enemy lead him to repentance? See also Romans 2:4.
What did Jesus mean in verse 48 when He said we “must be perfect”?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

Jeff Miller

June 1, 2025

The Heart of the Law

Thou Shalt Not Resist

Jeff Miller

June 1, 2025

The Heart of the Law

Introduction:

How Do You React... (Matthew 5:38–42)

...When you are INSULTED? “Eye for an Eye” or REFUSE RETALIATION? (Matt 5:39b)

1 Peter 2:23 – When he was reviled, he did not revile in return; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly.
...when people are HEARTLESS? “Eye for an Eye” or GRATUITOUS GRACE? (Matt 5:40)

Romans 12:21 – Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
...when forced to OBEY? “Eye for an Eye” or DOUBLE Your DUTY? (Matt 5:41)

1 Peter 2:16 – Live as people who are free, not using your freedom as a cover-up for evil, but living as servants of God.
...when someone wants your STUFF? “Eye for an Eye” or RELEASE Your RESOURCES? (Matt 5:42)

1 John 3:17 – But if anyone has the world’s goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God’s love abide in him?

Philippians 2:5–7a – Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant...

Sermon Notes (PDF): BLANK
Hint: Highlight blanks above for answers!

00:01-00:06
And before we dig into God's Word together, let's just pause.
00:06-00:13
I'm going to ask you to just take a moment and please pray for me to be faithful to clearly communicate God's Word.
00:13-00:21
And I will pray for you to have your heart open to receive what it is that the Lord wants to teach us today. Let's pray.
00:25-00:31
Father in heaven, Your Word challenges us and convicts us, and we thank You for that.
00:32-00:36
We didn't come in here today looking for a stamp of affirmation on how we already are.
00:39-00:46
We've come in here to encounter You and allow Your Spirit and Your Word to conform us into the image of Your Son.
00:47-00:48
That's why we're here.
00:49-00:51
So, Father, I pray to that end You would open our hearts.
00:54-01:01
Your Spirit would speak to every heart the wisdom that You have recorded in Your Word.
01:03-01:09
That we walk out of here different people than how we were when we walked in.
01:10-01:14
Thank You, Father, for the promise of Your Word.
01:15-01:17
We pray in Jesus' name.
01:18-01:30
And all of God's people said, "Amen." I have a nonverbal son, as many of you know.
01:31-01:55
But years ago, I was with a group of pastors and one pastor was commenting on the fact that I had a nonverbal son, and he said, very compassionately, he said, "It must be very difficult for you to not have a conversation with your son." And I said, "It is." But the way I look at it, we'll have all of eternity to catch up.
01:58-02:16
And a different pastor said, if he's elect, and I said, I feel like you're predestined to take a whooping.
02:18-02:19
(congregation laughing)
02:21-03:38
and I was a prophet that day. Okay, I made that last part up. But I still think about that. I still think about retaliation, getting even. Why are we like that? Why are we like that people? That there's something in all of us that makes us demand respect. Hey, you can't talk to me that way, all right? Do you know I am? You can't treat me like that. There's something in us that we demand our rights. You know, we say things like, "I don't get mad, I get even," right? And "You're not going to get away with this. You're going to pay for what you did." Our hearts are naturally, sinfully retaliatory.
03:41-03:45
I was listening to a sermon about a month or so ago from one of my favorite preachers, Ron Dunn.
03:45-03:46
It was a sermon on meekness.
03:47-03:51
And he reminded me of something that I loved when I was a kid, comic books.
03:52-03:58
But he talked about, do you remember the Charles Atlas ads in the old comic books?
03:58-03:59
Do you remember those?
03:59-04:02
It was a little one page, those little comic strip in the book.
04:03-04:10
Well, in this little comic strip, there was this little weakling, like a little skinny guy, like on the beach.
04:10-04:13
And this bully was like kicking sand in his face.
04:13-04:21
And all the girls were like, "Tee hee hee hee." And the kid takes Charles Atlas' course, the skinny kid.
04:21-04:26
And in 90 days, he was kicking sand in the other guy's face.
04:27-04:32
And there's something in us that we're like, "Yes, yeah, we love that stuff, don't we?
04:34-04:35
"Don't we love that revenge stuff?
04:36-04:37
"Oh, come on.
04:39-04:40
"Don't you lead me up here.
04:41-04:42
"Don't we love that revenge stuff?
04:42-04:43
"The getting even stuff?
04:43-04:44
"Yes, you do.
04:45-04:46
"Yes, you do.
04:47-04:56
"What are many of the plot lines of movies, "like, and your soap operas, and your Westerns, "and your superhero movies?
04:57-04:58
"I was thinking about this this week.
04:58-04:59
It's everywhere.
05:00-05:01
That's what Popeye is.
05:01-05:04
Popeye is nothing but a cartoon about a guy that gets even.
05:06-05:08
We love that stuff.
05:09-05:12
We love the guy that is not gonna take it.
05:14-05:15
Payback.
05:15-05:16
We love that guy.
05:17-05:24
Because the guy that gets the sand kicked in his face and belittled and humiliated, and he just takes it.
05:26-05:28
Well, that guy's a coward, right?
05:29-05:29
Weak.
05:32-05:35
It's like, dude, punch that bully in the trot.
05:36-05:37
Don't take it.
05:40-05:40
Right?
05:41-05:43
There's biblical precedence for this, isn't there?
05:44-05:46
An eye for an eye, right?
05:47-05:48
An eye for an eye.
05:49-05:52
Oh, I like that, because that's in the Bible.
05:54-05:55
You know what that is?
05:55-05:56
Eye for an eye?
05:59-06:03
That is biblical permission to get even.
06:04-06:05
No, no, no, no, no, I'm sorry.
06:06-06:10
That's a biblical command to get even, isn't it?
06:12-06:12
Isn't it?
06:14-06:19
Well, the scribes and the Pharisees thought so.
06:20-06:37
And many people sitting here even and watching this and listening to this podcast later still believe that an eye for an eye is our biblical mandates to get revenge.
06:41-06:45
Well, let's see, shall we?
06:45-06:46
Look at verse 30.
06:47-06:48
What did we say, verse 38?
06:48-07:07
Yes, Jesus continuing the Sermon on the Mount, he said, "You have heard that it was said, "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." Yeah, that's a real Old Testament quote.
07:17-07:18
Yes, 100%.
07:20-07:22
and misused verses in the entire Bible.
07:24-07:32
Because the scribes and the Pharisees and we take this verse way out of context.
07:34-07:38
Is an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, is that our charge to get even?
07:39-07:42
No. It's not.
07:44-07:51
You're like, "All right, then what does it mean?" I'm so glad you asked.
07:53-07:54
Let's get biblical, shall we?
07:54-07:59
An eye for an eye shows up three times in the Old Testament, three times.
07:59-08:04
It's in Exodus 21, it's in Leviticus 24, and it's in Deuteronomy 19.
08:05-08:22
Don't look now, but you look later, and you're going to see in every one of those passages, every single one of them, the context of that verse are, it's God's instructions for Israel's courts and judges.
08:25-08:33
Eye for an eye, that was for Israel's courts, not for personal vendetta.
08:34-08:39
An eye for an eye was a guideline for Israel's judges.
08:40-08:43
not for Batman, okay?
08:47-08:48
So what's the purpose?
08:50-08:51
Eye for an eye.
08:51-08:53
What does eye for an eye mean?
08:53-08:54
Eye for an eye, tooth for tooth.
08:55-08:55
What does that mean?
08:56-09:02
It just simply means this, the punishment should fit the crime.
09:03-09:08
In court, justice demands being fair.
09:09-09:22
So judges in courts, God's instruction for Israel, when you punish someone, the measure of punishment should fit the measure of the crime.
09:23-09:24
That's what eye for an eye means.
09:28-09:32
And God is saying an eye for an eye must be determined by the courts.
09:32-09:33
The courts determine that.
09:33-09:34
Why?
09:34-09:36
Why did God leave that up to the courts?
09:36-09:36
Why?
09:37-09:37
I'll tell you why.
09:38-09:47
because when we're wronged, we by nature want to retaliate way beyond the level of the offense.
09:49-09:50
Here's what I mean.
09:52-09:54
Our mindset is this.
09:55-10:02
You dinged my '93 Toyota, you owe me a new car.
10:06-10:06
Fair is fair.
10:08-10:08
(congregation laughing)
10:12-10:14
We take it way too far.
10:15-10:25
We say things like, hey, we were messing around, we were playing basketball and you accidentally elbowed me in the mouth and broke my tooth.
10:27-10:28
You owe me a set of grills.
10:30-10:32
Justin, do the kids still wear grills?
10:33-10:34
They still wear, that's still a thing?
10:35-10:42
The cool one, (laughs) the cool one's, "You are right.
10:43-10:48
"You could not be righter." But that's the point.
10:48-10:49
We take it too far.
10:51-10:57
"You owe me way more than you should have to pay." So God's like, "No, no, no, no.
10:58-11:01
"Leave that to the courts." So here it is, here it is.
11:01-11:10
If a crime has been committed against me, If I've been wronged in any way, I'm not going to take the law into my own hands.
11:10-11:19
I'm going to trust the courts to be fair in the way God commanded the courts to be fair, which is an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.
11:21-11:21
Be fair.
11:23-11:37
So in Jesus' day, the scribes and the Pharisees, and again, us, we take this way out of context and we take it out of the courts and we take it as our command, our personal responsibility to get even.
11:39-11:40
But look at verse 39.
11:42-11:43
You probably saw this coming.
11:45-11:55
Jesus says, "But I say to you, do not resist the one who is evil." Do not resist, what does that mean?
11:55-11:57
It literally means this.
11:59-12:19
When someone wrongs you, When someone offends you, when someone is against you, Jesus says, "Do not set yourself against him." Now, let's be clear.
12:21-12:26
Jesus is not saying, He is not saying, "Do not protect yourself.
12:27-12:31
"Do not protect your own." He's not saying that.
12:31-12:37
If you break into my home, my dog will shoot you and my wife will bite you.
12:38-12:41
Wait, no, no, that's right.
12:43-12:45
He's not saying don't protect yourself.
12:45-12:47
He's not saying don't protect your church.
12:47-12:49
Jesus isn't preaching passivity here.
12:50-12:52
Like, okay, go ahead, go ahead.
12:52-12:55
You can sin and you can abuse me all you want.
12:55-12:58
I don't care because Jesus said not to resist.
12:58-12:59
That's not what he's saying.
13:00-13:08
He's also not saying, "Don't confront sin." He's not saying that, because the Bible's clear that sin must be confronted.
13:08-13:10
It must be addressed and dealt with in the church.
13:11-13:19
Here's what Jesus is saying by this statement, and it's going to be crystal clear because Jesus actually illustrates what he's teaching here.
13:20-13:21
But here's what Jesus is saying.
13:22-13:25
He's saying, "Don't start a feud.
13:26-13:29
Don't try to get even.
13:34-13:40
If you think that your rights were violated, you don't need to fight about it.
13:41-13:42
That's what Jesus is saying.
13:45-13:51
We are not to be a people whose knee-jerk reaction is to be retaliatory.
13:52-13:53
That's what Jesus is saying.
13:55-13:58
In the Sermon on the Mount, we've seen it over and over.
13:59-14:01
Jesus is saying, "My people are different.
14:03-14:04
My people are different in how they act.
14:04-14:06
They're merciful, they hunger and thirst for righteousness.
14:06-14:08
They're salt and light, they're influencers.
14:08-14:10
They reconcile with broken relationships.
14:10-14:14
They cut off lust and they take marriage seriously and they keep their word.
14:14-14:27
My people act differently." Because when Jesus Christ enters us, when you receive Christ, when you turn from your sin and believe that he died for your sin and he rose from the dead to give you eternal life.
14:27-14:33
When you believe that, the Bible says, God's Holy Spirit lives within you.
14:33-14:37
And when God's Spirit lives within you, you are called to something greater.
14:39-14:44
And you demonstrate that you belong to Christ by how you act.
14:47-14:53
God wants your heart, and your heart is revealed by how you act.
14:54-15:05
But, perhaps more so, your heart is revealed by how you react.
15:10-15:22
You can show me what a man is made of by how he acts, and I can show you what a man is made of by how he reacts.
15:27-15:31
So, let me ask you, how do you react?
15:32-15:35
How do you react when you have been personally offended?
15:38-15:40
How do you react when you've been insulted?
15:43-15:48
How do you react when you've been disrespected?
15:51-15:53
Do you react in kind?
15:55-15:58
Is your mindset immediately, "Ah, ah, ah, ah, no, no, no, no, no.
16:00-16:08
You're not getting away with this. I'm getting even." Is your mindset an eye for an eye?
16:09-16:13
wrongly interpreting it like the Pharisees.
16:18-16:22
Or, do you not resist?
16:23-16:30
As our Lord said, do you refuse to emotionally react and retaliate in the flesh?
16:32-16:37
And I'm sure there's somebody here, self-deluded, That's like, "Oh, I'm a pastor, Jeff.
16:37-16:39
I get along with everybody.
16:41-16:45
I never respond negatively when I'm offended.
16:45-17:07
I just bake them muffins." Okay, but I think there's something here for the rest of us because Jesus elaborates on how his followers should react to difficult people and difficult situations by giving four scenarios.
17:09-17:13
So that's what we're going to ask ourselves today, a little self-examination.
17:14-17:16
We're gonna ask ourselves, how do you react?
17:17-17:18
How do you react?
17:19-17:22
Number one, how do you react when you are insulted?
17:24-17:26
When you are insulted, how do you react?
17:26-17:27
Eye for an eye?
17:29-17:30
Or do you refuse retaliation?
17:33-17:34
Look at verse 39.
17:38-17:48
Jesus says, "But if anyone slaps you on the right cheek, "turn to him the other also." Stop there.
17:48-17:56
To the Jews, this was the absolute most insulting thing, to be slapped.
17:56-18:06
In fact, I read this past week that a slave in those days, A slave would rather be whipped than slapped because a slap was utterly humiliating.
18:07-18:11
And you know the worst was the backhand slap.
18:11-18:13
That's why Jesus said right cheek.
18:15-18:16
Sorry about that.
18:16-18:22
That's why Jesus said right cheek because when you get a backhand with a right hand, it's going to hit you in the right cheek.
18:25-18:28
That was the worst insult in their mind.
18:29-18:31
And we get it, right?
18:31-18:32
Nothing's really changed there, right?
18:32-18:32
We get it.
18:33-18:34
Like if somebody walks up to you and just,
18:35-18:35
(imitates gun firing)
18:36-18:38
that's just like total disdain.
18:38-18:42
It's like, you're nothing to me.
18:42-18:45
You're not even worth arguing with because you're nothing.
18:46-18:49
It's just a complete, complete insult.
18:52-18:57
And oh, the moment I'm insulted, I wanna retaliate.
19:00-19:01
Eye for an eye, right?
19:03-19:05
Oh, okay, now I get to slap you.
19:07-19:09
And I bet I can slap harder.
19:12-19:13
Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
19:13-19:14
What does Jesus say?
19:15-19:21
He says, "Turn to him the other also." You're like, "Aha, okay.
19:22-19:23
That's very gracious.
19:23-19:27
He gets two slaps in on me and then it's go time.
19:28-19:28
No.
19:30-19:35
If you're believing that, then you completely missed the point that Jesus was making.
19:36-19:40
Because here's the thing, it's not even about the slap.
19:42-19:43
It's about being insulted.
19:44-19:45
That's the point.
19:47-19:49
How do you respond when you're insulted?
19:51-20:01
Because look, unless you're Chris Rock getting smacked by Will Smith, you're probably not going to get a slap.
20:03-20:04
You probably are not.
20:07-20:10
But you're gonna be offended or insulted in other ways, aren't you?
20:11-20:11
Verbally?
20:13-20:15
Verbally, how about social media?
20:17-20:19
All these keyboard warriors out there.
20:21-20:24
Because they know they won't get slapped in the teeth.
20:25-20:29
They're real strong and brave throwing out their insults at you from behind their keyboard.
20:32-20:37
Or maybe that nasty text or email that you get, you're gonna be insulted.
20:37-20:41
And it's all the same application here from our Lord.
20:42-20:42
The same point.
20:43-20:46
Jesus says, "Turn to him the other." He's saying, "You're insulted?
20:46-20:56
"Have you been grossly insulted?" Jesus says, "Let them do it again." You.
20:59-21:01
You refuse to retaliate.
21:03-21:06
I shouldn't be insulted, don't you know who I am?
21:06-21:08
I should be respected.
21:09-21:12
Yeah, I agree.
21:13-21:17
You should be respected, but you won't be.
21:20-21:22
Someone is going to insult you.
21:24-21:26
So you can react the world's way.
21:27-21:28
Eye for an eye.
21:30-21:32
Like, oh, you're going to insult me?
21:34-21:36
I'm going to go full Don Rickles on you.
21:39-21:41
You have brought a knife to a gunfight, my friend.
21:43-21:44
That's eye for an eye.
21:44-21:51
Or you could respond the kingdom way, which is refusing to retaliate.
21:55-22:03
And right now somebody's sitting there going, oh, okay, so you're saying when people insult me, I should just take it.
22:08-22:10
Now you're thinking like Jesus.
22:12-22:21
Because 1 Peter 2.23 says, "When he was reviled, he did not revile in return.
22:22-22:31
When he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to him who judges justly." How do you react when you're insulted?
22:33-22:37
Number two, how do you react when people are heartless?
22:39-22:40
How do you react when people are heartless?
22:40-22:41
An eye for an eye?
22:42-22:44
or gratuitous grace.
22:46-23:00
Look at verse 40. Jesus said, "And if anyone would sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well." Okay, Jesus isn't saying everybody can sue me for everything.
23:02-23:09
Obviously, He's talking about being sued where there is some justification in the lawsuit.
23:13-23:19
that you went to court and legally you were sued and lost your tunic.
23:22-23:24
You're like, well, what's a tunic?
23:24-23:28
Well, in those days, the tunic was the long undergarment.
23:28-23:31
It was like a long, basically the shirt.
23:33-23:33
It was your shirt.
23:35-23:38
And look, they didn't have a closet full of them.
23:40-23:43
with a bag of them for the Goodwill sitting in the garage.
23:45-23:50
Most of them would have had one or three at the most.
23:55-23:57
And this was more than just your shirt.
23:58-24:00
It was also your blanket, right?
24:00-24:02
It's the thing that kept you warm at night.
24:05-24:15
So I think this is quite a shocking thing to say that someone would sue you for the shirt off your back.
24:17-24:27
And look, in court, if someone sues you for the shirt that's on your back that you're wearing, that's a little more than eye for an eye, isn't it?
24:29-24:30
That's pretty heartless.
24:32-24:38
The reality is people do sue heartlessly.
24:40-24:43
It's like suing a Christian school.
24:44-24:46
Like, why would you do that?
24:47-24:52
Unless there was a real egregious crime going on, but a lot of times it's just spite.
24:55-24:58
And I believe that's what Jesus is saying here.
24:58-25:08
perhaps Jesus was being hyperbolic, like saying, even if somebody sues you for the shirt that you're wearing, well, you could react the world's way, couldn't you?
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Like, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
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I'm not giving you the shirt that I'm wearing.
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That's unreasonable and it's unfair.
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And I will fight you all the way up to the Supreme Court over my shirt.
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Or you could react the kingdom way, which is, did you lose your shirt in a lawsuit?
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Well, show him you're really sorry for whatever the offense was, and give him your coat too.
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You know, it's an interesting way that Jesus worded this because in Jewish Old Testament law, you were not allowed to sue a man for his coat.
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That was illegal.
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Do you think Jesus is making a point?
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Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
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Okay, so you're saying it was illegal to sue a man for his coat.
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So if somebody sues you for your shirt and you give them your coat, that would be awfully gratuitous.
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Now you're thinking like Jesus.
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Romans 12, 21 says, "Do not be overcome by evil, "but overcome evil with good." Don't retaliate.
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Show them that you're willing to give even more than they asked for.
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So how do you react?
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How do you react, number three, when forced to obey?
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Eye for an eye or double your duty.
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Look at verse 41.
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Jesus, next illustration.
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He says, "And if anyone forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles." Now, the Romans had a law and that was actually a variation of an old Persian postal law.
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that here was the Roman law, an official could on the spot recruit a citizen for official duty to perform a task.
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You know, the most famous example of this is commissioning Simon of Cyrene to carry our Lord's cross.
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That was law.
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Specifically here, what Jesus is referring to was legally, legally a Roman soldier could recruit a citizen to carry his pack, his gear one mile and no further.
27:58-28:01
You think about it from a Jewish standpoint, that's...
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You mean my enemy, a Roman soldier is going to make me carry his stuff for a mile?
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For a Jew, that would have been very degrading and disgusting.
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I think here our Lord is speaking to man's natural resentment towards the demands of the government.
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Does anybody remember COVID?
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Well, you can react the world's way, right?
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You can react the world's way.
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Eye for an eye.
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What does eye for an eye look like here?
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Bitter and passive aggressive.
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You can react the world's way.
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You're commissioned, hey, by law, you have to carry my pack one mile, and you're like, all right.
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This is going to be the slowest walk in history.
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And I'm singing "Baby Shark" the entire way.
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Give me your stuff.
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♪ Baby shark do do do do do do ♪ ♪ Baby shark do do do do do do ♪ Nevermind, I'll carry it myself.
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That's the world's way.
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Or you can react to kingdom's way.
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What's according to our Lord is what?
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Go two miles.
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You should carry his stuff for a mile and you're like, "Hey, you know what?
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I'm just getting limber.
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I'm just getting warmed up.
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I'll go another mile." It's like giving the cloak, right?
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Same principle.
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Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
29:54-29:58
So you're saying, "I should give more than the law demands.
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"I should give double of what's required of me." Now you're thinking like Jesus.
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Because 1 Peter 2.16 says, "Citizens, "live as people who are free, "not using your freedom as a coverup for evil, "but living as servants of God." Don't just do what's demanded, go beyond.
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Force them to ask, why in the world is she acting like that?
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And then you have the opportunity to talk about grace.
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Number four, how do you react when someone wants your stuff?
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How do you react when someone wants your stuff?
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Eye for an eye, and you release your resources.
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Look at verse 42.
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Jesus says, "Give to the one who begs from you and do not refuse the one who would borrow from you." Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa.
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It just got real, didn't it?
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My money?
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My possessions, bless you.
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We get so, we get so possessive over things.
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You hear Jesus is saying if somebody begs or somebody wants to borrow, he's not talking about beggars along the side of the road.
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This implies a real need, a need that's known and a need that's verified.
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That's what Jesus is talking about.
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And again, we have the two options before us.
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We can react the world's way.
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Someone comes to you with a real need.
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Eye for an eye means, all right, look, look, look.
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I'm gonna give this to you, but you owe me, okay?
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And you're, listen, you're gonna pay me back every cent that I'm giving you.
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Do you understand me?
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I want it in writing.
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That's the world's way.
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And when we have that attitude, it just demonstrates that we care more about things than people, right?
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"Well, why are you entitled to my stuff?
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Go get your own stuff." Or you can react the kingdom way.
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Jesus, what's the kingdom way?
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He says, "Give to the one who begs and do not refuse to the one who would borrow." Kingdom way, self-sacrificing generosity.
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It's like, oh, you need something that I have?
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You know what, here, take it.
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You know what?
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I'll buy another one or I'll learn to live without it.
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No bigs, whatever, go ahead.
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Looks like you need this more than I do.
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If God thinks I need it, he'll make sure I get another one, all right?
33:17-33:17
That's the kingdom way.
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You're like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
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"So I should just give away everything that I have?" Now you're thinking like Jesus.
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1 John 3:17 says, "But if anyone has the world's goods, "sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, "how does the love of God abide in him?" It's just stuff, okay? It's just stuff. It's eventual garbage, right?
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Release your resources, bless people with it.
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But look, in Jesus' four scenarios here, in every case, your heart is revealed.
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Not in how you act, but in how you react.
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And you're like, man, man, how can I live like that?
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Right now, I guarantee you, every single person here is looking at us going, I agree that this is right, but I don't know if I can actually do it.
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I mean, to do this, I would have to not insist on my rights.
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I would have to deny myself and I'd have to act like a slave.
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Now you're thinking like Jesus.
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Because, oh, by the way, not insisting on your rights and denying yourself and acting like a slave, Philippians chapter two, "Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped." He didn't insist on his rights.
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"But emptied himself, denied himself by taking the form of a servant, He became a slave.
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When you leave here today, someone's going to offend you.
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Someone's going to insult you.
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And somebody's gonna stomp all over your rights.
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What you need to do right now is decide how you're going to react.
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Let's pray.
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Our Father in heaven, we thank You for Your Word because this is contrary to how we think.
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There's something in our hearts that demands retaliation, that would say getting even is the way to go.
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We teach our kids that.
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And your son very clearly taught us that we're to be a people that act opposite the way the world acts.
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Father, I pray right now that decisions are being made as we sit in the fellowship of the congregation, as we sit under your word, as we're sitting in a setting of worship.
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I pray right now, Father, that we are making decisions.
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When we walk out this door, we are not going to be people who retaliate.
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But instead, we're going to follow the example that your Son gave us.
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And we're gonna trust in the power of your Spirit, whom you put within us.
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To your glory and honor, Father, Grab our hearts and minds, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen.

Small Group Discussion
Read Matthew 5:38-42

What was your big take-away from this passage / message?
Tell of a time you were offended and retaliated. Why did you do what you did? What would you do differently if you had another chance?
Why do you think “eye for an eye” (revenge) is our natural default response?
Why do you think how you react is a good gauge of where your heart is?

Breakout
Pray for one another.

The Secret to Fasting

Introduction:

What Am I Really Hungry For? (Matthew 6:16–18)

The Secret to Praying

Introduction:

Four Marks of Real Prayer (Matthew 6:5–15)

The Secret to Giving

Introduction:

Watch Out... (Matthew 6:1–4)

Love Like God

Introduction:

I Love My Enemies... (Matthew 5:43–48)

Thou Shalt Not Resist

Introduction:

How Do You React... (Matthew 5:38–42)

Upcoming Small Group Questions CLICK HERE

How much of the Bible have we covered since 2011?

Introduction:

What Am I Really Hungry For? (Matthew 6:16–18)

AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

Introduction:

Four Marks of Real Prayer (Matthew 6:5–15)

AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

Introduction:

Watch Out... (Matthew 6:1–4)

AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

Introduction:

I Love My Enemies... (Matthew 5:43–48)

AUDIO TRANSCRIPT

Introduction:

How Do You React... (Matthew 5:38–42)

AUDIO TRANSCRIPT