Latest / Andy Stanley Sermons / Andy Stanley - This Human Race

Transcript

Andy Stanley - This Human Race · Andy Stanley Sermons

0:01
Speaker 1: Hi, everybody, Thanks for joining us today. We've hit pause
0:05
Speaker 1: on our regular format in light of the tragic events
0:08
Speaker 1: that have engulfed our nation. If you grew up in church,
0:12
Speaker 1: you may remember you may remember this story. One of
0:16
Speaker 1: the most perplexing narratives from the life of Jesus was
0:19
Speaker 1: his late arrival to the village of Bethany after hearing
0:22
Speaker 1: about the death of his friend Lazarus. You remember this.
0:25
Speaker 1: John tells us that when Jesus finally arrived, he asked
0:29
Speaker 1: to be taken to lazarus tomb, which was a cave,
0:32
Speaker 1: and when he got there, he paused and he wept,
0:40
Speaker 1: he stood in the pain of those around him before
0:44
Speaker 1: providing a solution. In fact, it was so emotional that
0:49
Speaker 1: the men and women who had come to mourn with
0:51
Speaker 1: Mary and Martha actually remarked on it. Here's what they said.
0:54
Speaker 1: They said, see how he loved him now. And in
1:00
Speaker 1: some ways, that's what this moment is for us. This
1:03
Speaker 1: is the moment to pause and the pain, the pain
1:06
Speaker 1: of the black community, the pain of the families directly
1:09
Speaker 1: impacted George Floyd's family, Ahmad Arbery's family, Rihanna Taylor's family.
1:15
Speaker 1: The list goes on and on the families whose lives
1:18
Speaker 1: have been upended by the looting. This is the moment
1:21
Speaker 1: to pause in the pain of our nation and to
1:23
Speaker 1: connect these current losses to the current of racism that
1:28
Speaker 1: has plagued our nation for so long. To pause and
1:32
Speaker 1: to feel it, and before we offer our solutions, to
1:36
Speaker 1: weep with those who weep, and to mourn with those
1:40
Speaker 1: who mourn. That's where empathy is born, and on occasion,
1:44
Speaker 1: that's actually where solutions are discovered. Now, I've heard people
1:50
Speaker 1: talk about how sad all of this makes them feel.
1:53
Speaker 1: But come on, sad is how we feel when something
1:55
Speaker 1: happens that doesn't really affect us personally, something that's far away.
2:00
Speaker 1: This sad is about somebody else. And I hope we
2:03
Speaker 1: can all agree that this is bigger than sadness. This
2:05
Speaker 1: affects all of us, and consequently all of us have
2:08
Speaker 1: a role to play. Now. I know some people are
2:11
Speaker 1: sometimes uncomfortable with people like me leveraging the words of
2:14
Speaker 1: doctor King, But come on, he said so much, and
2:16
Speaker 1: he said it so well, and he goes right to
2:18
Speaker 1: the epicenter of our point. The reason this has to
2:21
Speaker 1: become personal for me, and the reason this has to
2:23
Speaker 1: become personal for us. Is this injustice anywhere? You'll remember
2:27
Speaker 1: this quote. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
2:33
Speaker 1: So for us to move past what we're experiencing as
2:36
Speaker 1: a nation with nothing more than a bad case of
2:39
Speaker 1: sad is to miss the significance of this moment, and
2:43
Speaker 1: it's to miss the opportunity of this moment as well.
2:46
Speaker 1: He goes on and he writes this. He says, we
2:49
Speaker 1: are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in
2:55
Speaker 1: a single garment of destiny. Now this is true now
3:01
Speaker 1: more than ever. It's true now more than ever because
3:03
Speaker 1: what happened in South Georgia was seen by people in
3:05
Speaker 1: North Dakota, and what happened in Minneapolis has been seen
3:08
Speaker 1: by people well, people all over the world. And then
3:12
Speaker 1: he concludes with this, whatever affects, whatever affects one directly
3:17
Speaker 1: affects all indirectly. In other words, there's no them, there's
3:24
Speaker 1: just us. So sad isn't enough. And I certainly don't
3:29
Speaker 1: have to tell my black brothers and sisters that, right,
3:31
Speaker 1: you aren't sad, You're mad, and understandably so, you're scared.
3:36
Speaker 1: You're scared because well you didn't see a forty six
3:39
Speaker 1: year old stranger with a knee on his neck. You
3:42
Speaker 1: saw you, you saw your father, your brother. I have
3:47
Speaker 1: two African American friends who recently became fathers for the
3:50
Speaker 1: first time. They saw their sons. They saw the death
3:54
Speaker 1: of progress, they saw the death of hope, they saw
3:57
Speaker 1: the death of Well. Maybe my kids will grow up
3:59
Speaker 1: in a different kind of America, a better America. And
4:02
Speaker 1: if that doesn't affect me personally, if that doesn't make
4:06
Speaker 1: me more than a little sad, then I'm a hypocrite
4:09
Speaker 1: to even call them friends. Now, this topic is a
4:13
Speaker 1: mindfield for me, it's a mindfield for us. But that's
4:16
Speaker 1: not the case for every pastor or every church. And
4:19
Speaker 1: you know that if we were, if we lean far right,
4:21
Speaker 1: or if we lean far left, this was you would
4:24
Speaker 1: be the choir and I would be preaching to the choir.
4:26
Speaker 1: I would be preaching to the choir to a chorus
4:28
Speaker 1: of amens and applause. But we're not that kind of church.
4:31
Speaker 1: I've been to my share of far right leaning churches
4:35
Speaker 1: and churches that lean far left, and it's so much
4:38
Speaker 1: easier for those pastors. I mean, everybody pretty much agrees
4:41
Speaker 1: on everything, and everybody else, Well, everybody else is just
4:44
Speaker 1: going to hell, right, But that's not who you are,
4:48
Speaker 1: and that's not who we are. Besides, come on, the
4:52
Speaker 1: truth is rarely found in the extremes. You know that.
4:56
Speaker 1: It's found where the circles overlap, in the middle, the
5:00
Speaker 1: messy middle. Doctor King told us that as well. In fact,
5:03
Speaker 1: he modeled that he died in part because of that.
5:09
Speaker 1: The messy the messy, messy middle. That's where the brutal,
5:12
Speaker 1: uncomfortable facts all come together. But it's also where problems
5:16
Speaker 1: can be solved. But it is so uncomfortable, it's so
5:19
Speaker 1: much easier to retreat to the echo chamber of extremes,
5:22
Speaker 1: where everybody agrees, but nothing is ever accomplished. In the
5:27
Speaker 1: messy middle, we're confronted with uncomfortable facts. And by the way,
5:31
Speaker 1: facts aren't fair, but facts don't care. Here's an uncomfortable fact.
5:39
Speaker 1: White people fear black men. That's not fair, but it's true.
5:45
Speaker 1: What makes us even more unfair is that, in the
5:47
Speaker 1: vast majority of cases, our fear of black men is
5:51
Speaker 1: in no way connected to our personal experience. And if
5:54
Speaker 1: that wasn't unfair enough, study after study has shown you
5:57
Speaker 1: know this, that fear of black men. Doesn't even spring
5:59
Speaker 1: prime merely from racism. It's deeper than that, and that's
6:02
Speaker 1: not fair to black people or white people. Most black
6:06
Speaker 1: men have experienced what some people refer to as the
6:09
Speaker 1: fearful gaze, the fearful gaze of white men and women.
6:14
Speaker 1: Then on the other side of the equation, is this
6:16
Speaker 1: the majority of African Americans in our country. They don't
6:19
Speaker 1: trust the criminal justice system. Do you, I mean, you
6:22
Speaker 1: fear the police. That's not fair. Facts don't care. It's
6:26
Speaker 1: not fair to police officers with spotless records, who risk
6:28
Speaker 1: their lives every day for people they don't even know,
6:31
Speaker 1: for people who, in some instances, don't even like them.
6:34
Speaker 1: I was a journalism major in college and during the
6:37
Speaker 1: Murdered and Missing Children chapter of our city's history, some
6:41
Speaker 1: of you remember that, as part of an assignment, I
6:44
Speaker 1: had an opportunity to ride along with a black City
6:46
Speaker 1: of Atlanta police officer on the eleven PM to seven
6:49
Speaker 1: am shifts. So we were together all night, and honestly,
6:52
Speaker 1: I was pretty much scared the entire night, not of him,
6:55
Speaker 1: but we went from one domestic violence case to another
6:58
Speaker 1: all night long. I saw firsthand, just a little bit
7:02
Speaker 1: I saw firsthand the challenge of trying to play by
7:04
Speaker 1: the rules when confronting people who don't even know there
7:07
Speaker 1: are rules. So white people fear black men. The majority
7:11
Speaker 1: of black people don't trust the police. Most police handle
7:14
Speaker 1: themselves professionally. And then there's this, whereas our fear of
7:18
Speaker 1: black men is rarely, if ever, connected to personal experience.
7:22
Speaker 1: If you're an African American, you know this. Your mistrust
7:24
Speaker 1: of the criminal justice system is connected to personal experience.
7:28
Speaker 1: Us white folks, we fear what might happen. You fear
7:31
Speaker 1: what has happened. And then, as bad as all of
7:35
Speaker 1: that is, that's not even the worst of it. The
7:37
Speaker 1: really bad news is this, statistics, data, sermons, protests. None
7:43
Speaker 1: of that will ever change any of those cultural realities.
7:46
Speaker 1: Telling the black community how many times the criminal justice
7:49
Speaker 1: system has worked in their favor, has worked in your favor,
7:53
Speaker 1: that does nothing to diminish your mistrust, as it underscoring
7:56
Speaker 1: how quickly a police officer was fired and then arrested.
7:59
Speaker 1: That doesn't address your fear. For the same reason that
8:02
Speaker 1: reminding white folks how many more times they've been hurt
8:05
Speaker 1: by ripped off, by deceived by white people than black people.
8:10
Speaker 1: That doesn't erase our fear of black men. If you're
8:13
Speaker 1: afraid of flying, you get this, come on, data, statistics, lectures.
8:18
Speaker 1: None of that helps, does it. I mean being told
8:21
Speaker 1: that statistically you are safer in the air than you
8:24
Speaker 1: are on two eighty five. That doesn't erase your fear
8:27
Speaker 1: of flying. And here's why. Because facts and data rarely
8:33
Speaker 1: replaces fear, and facts don't build trust. The only thing
8:39
Speaker 1: that has the potential to replace deep seated fear and
8:42
Speaker 1: distrust is experience. We can't talk our way, we can't
8:49
Speaker 1: law our way. We can't talk our way or law
8:52
Speaker 1: our way out of this mess. We can't pie chart
8:54
Speaker 1: and g you know, bar chart our way out of
8:57
Speaker 1: this The only way forward is we have to experience
9:01
Speaker 1: something different. We have to experience our way forward. My
9:05
Speaker 1: friend John Blake, who is a journalist in Atlanta, recently
9:09
Speaker 1: wrote an article, and this is the title of the article.
9:11
Speaker 1: The title was, there's one epidemic we may never find
9:14
Speaker 1: a vaccine for fear of black men in public spaces.
9:17
Speaker 1: Now that's not a sentence in the article. That's actually
9:19
Speaker 1: the title of the article. But in the article he
9:21
Speaker 1: writes this, he says, I believe another way to fight
9:25
Speaker 1: fear of black men is through exposure or our word experience.
9:30
Speaker 1: Then he says this, until more white people actually live
9:33
Speaker 1: among and befriend black people, this fear will persist. So
9:40
Speaker 1: you know this may be from personal experience. The white
9:42
Speaker 1: people who have all but silenced their fear of black
9:45
Speaker 1: men are the white people who have befriended black men
9:48
Speaker 1: or have been befriended by black men and their families.
9:51
Speaker 1: Sure Enough, in communities where police departments create opportunities for
9:55
Speaker 1: people to interact with and to come to see police
9:58
Speaker 1: officers as fathers and mothers and neighbors, trust is built,
10:02
Speaker 1: fear is diminished. I mean, come on, watching the police
10:05
Speaker 1: and the National Guard lock arms with protesters this week
10:08
Speaker 1: was powerful, wasn't it. It was their way of saying,
10:10
Speaker 1: we agree that a grave injustice has been done. We
10:13
Speaker 1: fail to police ourselves. We have more in common than not.
10:18
Speaker 1: They were saying that what breaks your heart is broken hours.
10:24
Speaker 1: We are more than sad. Your anger is justified. Your
10:28
Speaker 1: voice has been heard. So with all of that as
10:33
Speaker 1: a backdrop, I want to ask you a question. Here's
10:37
Speaker 1: the question I want us to wrestle with, and here's
10:40
Speaker 1: the question that I want us to wrestle with, not
10:42
Speaker 1: just today but every day. If experience, if experience, if
10:48
Speaker 1: our personal experience is the way forward as it relates
10:51
Speaker 1: to the variables that you have control over, how do
10:54
Speaker 1: people who don't look like you experience you? If experience
10:59
Speaker 1: is the way forward, and it is, how do people
11:01
Speaker 1: When it comes to the things that you can control,
11:03
Speaker 1: how do people who don't look like you experience you? Not?
11:08
Speaker 1: What do you think about people who don't look like you? Not?
11:11
Speaker 1: How do you feel about people who don't look like you?
11:13
Speaker 1: And not? What do you believe about people who don't
11:15
Speaker 1: look like you? Again, when it comes to the variables
11:18
Speaker 1: that you have control over, how do people who look
11:21
Speaker 1: don't look like you experience you? And then, more to
11:25
Speaker 1: the point of what I want to talk about for
11:26
Speaker 1: the next few minutes, how should people who don't look
11:31
Speaker 1: like you experience you? Now, if you're not a Jesus follower,
11:37
Speaker 1: that's about as far as I can take you. But
11:40
Speaker 1: that's a lot to chew on, because you do have
11:42
Speaker 1: some control over how people who don't look like you
11:44
Speaker 1: experience you. But if you are a Jesus follower, there's
11:49
Speaker 1: a lot more. Because Jesus told us Jesus told us
11:54
Speaker 1: how people who don't look like us should experience us.
11:58
Speaker 1: And this is not new. We we talk about this
12:01
Speaker 1: all the time around here. This is core to who
12:03
Speaker 1: we are. This is core in terms of what we
12:06
Speaker 1: teach and how we want to be experienced individually and
12:09
Speaker 1: as a group of churches. As Jesus followers, we are accountable.
12:13
Speaker 1: As Jesus followers, we are accountable to the Law of Christ,
12:18
Speaker 1: not the Ten Commandments or what most Christians refer to
12:21
Speaker 1: as the Ten Commandments. Come on, you can keep all
12:25
Speaker 1: ten of the ten Commandments all day and still be
12:28
Speaker 1: the chief among racists. It's true if you don't believe me,
12:31
Speaker 1: asked the apostle Paul, who kept the law perfectly while
12:35
Speaker 1: despising gentiles and torturing Christians. And then he met Jesus
12:41
Speaker 1: and everything changed, and Paul went from a violence leveraging
12:46
Speaker 1: law keeping Pharisee to the greatest of these is love
12:51
Speaker 1: Jesus followers in a day, because he better than anyone,
12:54
Speaker 1: understood the stark contrast between what had come before and
12:58
Speaker 1: the Kingdom Jesus to introduce Jesus, who, on his final
13:03
Speaker 1: pre crucifixion night, replaced all ten commandments with one commandment,
13:07
Speaker 1: a better commandment, a new commandment. He reduced all of life.
13:13
Speaker 1: This isn't an exaggeration. He reduced all of life to
13:16
Speaker 1: one transgenerationally relevant, unchangeable command that has the potential to
13:22
Speaker 1: change everything in spite of how things change. A new commandment,
13:26
Speaker 1: he said, a new commandment, I give you love one another.
13:31
Speaker 1: Of course that wasn't new, But of course he wasn't through.
13:36
Speaker 1: He defined it for us as I have loved you.
13:41
Speaker 1: This is his definition, as I have loved you, so
13:44
Speaker 1: you must love one another. This was a new command
13:51
Speaker 1: Jesus followers. This was not a new suggestion, but it
13:55
Speaker 1: was so central. He said this, you remember this. By
13:58
Speaker 1: this one thing, not ten things, not six things. By
14:00
Speaker 1: this one thing, By this one thing, you will know.
14:03
Speaker 1: People will know that you are my disciples. If you
14:06
Speaker 1: love one another as I have loved you, so, how
14:13
Speaker 1: should people who don't look like you experience you like that?
14:20
Speaker 1: How should people who don't look like me experience me
14:26
Speaker 1: like that? Then the apostle Paul comes along and he
14:28
Speaker 1: elaborates on the one another part of this. He says,
14:32
Speaker 1: you want to look you know? You know? If do
14:33
Speaker 1: you want to know what it looks like to love
14:35
Speaker 1: people who don't look like you do. You want to
14:36
Speaker 1: know what it looks like to take Jesus' new new
14:40
Speaker 1: covenant commands seriously, He says, here's what it looks like.
14:43
Speaker 1: Here's a good place to begin. Carrie carrie one another's burdens.
14:49
Speaker 1: That's what Christ did for you. That's what the Jesus
14:52
Speaker 1: brand of love looks like. When you do this, Paul says,
14:55
Speaker 1: when you do this in this way, you will actually
14:59
Speaker 1: fulfill the law of Christ. When we choose to carry
15:03
Speaker 1: someone's burdens. Think about this, When we choose to carry
15:06
Speaker 1: another person's burdens, what divides us diminishes, and what unites
15:10
Speaker 1: us surfaces. Because when you choose to carry my burden,
15:17
Speaker 1: you'll have a better understanding of where I sit and
15:19
Speaker 1: consequently why I stand where I do, And I'll gain
15:23
Speaker 1: a better understanding of you as well. Carry someone's burdens
15:26
Speaker 1: and you will, you will fear less, you'll understand more,
15:29
Speaker 1: you'll mistrust less, you'll trust more. And when the concerns
15:32
Speaker 1: of others concern you and you act, you are fulfilling
15:37
Speaker 1: the law of Christ. When the concerns of others become
15:40
Speaker 1: my concerns, and I act on those concerns. I am
15:43
Speaker 1: fulfilling the law of Christ. And when the law of
15:46
Speaker 1: Christ informs our collective conscience, or imagine this, when the
15:50
Speaker 1: law of Christ informs our national conscience, we will find
15:55
Speaker 1: common ground even when we don't share common culture or
15:59
Speaker 1: a common experienarience. And here's the thing. You'll know you're
16:04
Speaker 1: getting this right when white culture and black culture become
16:08
Speaker 1: secondary to the one another culture introduced by Jesus. See,
16:12
Speaker 1: here's the thing. When a slice of my culture gets
16:15
Speaker 1: in the way of loving and valuing another human being,
16:18
Speaker 1: that slice of my culture must be temporarily or even
16:21
Speaker 1: perhaps permanently retired. Otherwise I'll just be content with sad.
16:26
Speaker 1: Otherwise I'll never step over the line to carry your burden.
16:30
Speaker 1: So I want to get awkwardly practical for just a minute,
16:35
Speaker 1: because in the messy middle, when the circles come together,
16:38
Speaker 1: when the facts come together, it's always going to be
16:41
Speaker 1: a little bit awkward. So what does the Jesus brand
16:45
Speaker 1: of love look like in our current context? How should
16:48
Speaker 1: it shape how people who don't look like you experience you?
16:51
Speaker 1: How should it shape how people who don't look like
16:53
Speaker 1: us experience us two things first, and this is certainly
16:57
Speaker 1: not original with me. It is not enough. It is
17:02
Speaker 1: not enough not to be a racist. It is not
17:06
Speaker 1: enough not to be a racist. Non racist is not
17:11
Speaker 1: the goal. Being non racist does nothing to address racism.
17:16
Speaker 1: Practically speaking, it amounts to indifference toward racism. If you're
17:20
Speaker 1: a Jesus follower. If you're a Jesus follower, you must
17:23
Speaker 1: be We must be anti racism, just like your anti
17:27
Speaker 1: child abuse. Think about it. You wouldn't walk by somebody
17:31
Speaker 1: abusing a child and think to yourself, I'm not a
17:34
Speaker 1: child abuser. You wouldn't walk by and think to yourself,
17:36
Speaker 1: I'm not a child abuser and say nothing or do nothing.
17:39
Speaker 1: We must be anti racism, like we're anti bullying, like
17:43
Speaker 1: we're anti voter fraud, like or anti whatever it is
17:46
Speaker 1: gets you worked up. I mean, think about it this way.
17:48
Speaker 1: If your parent, as a parent, I wasn't content to
17:51
Speaker 1: simply be non liar. I was anti lie. I did
17:55
Speaker 1: not put up with it in my children and our
17:57
Speaker 1: family right. I wasn't content with being non disrespectful to Sandra.
18:03
Speaker 1: I was anti disrespect to Sandra. There was zero tolerance
18:07
Speaker 1: for disrespecting Sandra in our household. When you are anti something,
18:11
Speaker 1: you address it when you see it, You speak up
18:14
Speaker 1: when you hear it. To carry somebody's burdens, come on.
18:16
Speaker 1: To carry somebody's burdens is to get up underneath the
18:19
Speaker 1: weight of their burden. And when we decide to carry
18:21
Speaker 1: the burden of anyone who has been discriminated against for
18:24
Speaker 1: any reason, we won't be silent because now it's our burden.
18:31
Speaker 1: But I gotta warn you, speaking from personal experience, I'll
18:36
Speaker 1: own this. Whether you're white or brown or black. When
18:39
Speaker 1: you shift from non racist to anti racist, you may
18:45
Speaker 1: discover something disturbing about you. You may discover a racist
18:52
Speaker 1: in the mirror. You may discover subtle versions of racism
18:56
Speaker 1: that have been hiding, even masquerading as virtues. Bear reading
19:00
Speaker 1: the recesses of your heart. Racism, racism you were completely
19:06
Speaker 1: unaware of until you decided to say something, correct something,
19:10
Speaker 1: or apologize for something. For some of us, the truth is,
19:15
Speaker 1: when it comes to our hearts, racism will never be
19:19
Speaker 1: rooted out until we are willing to speak out. And honestly,
19:25
Speaker 1: there's probably a little bit of racism in all of us,
19:29
Speaker 1: and who knows, perhaps it will never be completely a
19:31
Speaker 1: RaSE from our hearts, but it must certainly be a
19:34
Speaker 1: RaSE from how people experience. So that's the first thing.
19:38
Speaker 1: Number two, Proximity is not friendship. Proximity is not friendship.
19:46
Speaker 1: Knowing the names of people who don't look like you
19:49
Speaker 1: is not the same as having a friend who doesn't
19:52
Speaker 1: look like you. This is a big part of a solution.
19:55
Speaker 1: Author James Clear, who's written several really amazing books, he
19:58
Speaker 1: says this. He says, fact don't change our minds, friendship does.
20:03
Speaker 1: Isn't this true? Facts, That's what we said earlier. Facts
20:06
Speaker 1: don't change our minds. Friendships change our minds. So, as
20:09
Speaker 1: I've urged you in the past, pursue relationships. Pursue friendships
20:13
Speaker 1: with people who don't look like you, engage in their reality.
20:17
Speaker 1: Perhaps this is so overlooked. Perhaps perhaps nothing characterized the
20:21
Speaker 1: life of Jesus more than his intentional pursuit of people
20:24
Speaker 1: whose lives and lifestyles were nothing like his. Jesus gets
20:28
Speaker 1: a lot of press for being a friend to the
20:30
Speaker 1: poor and the downtrodden, but that is not the whole story.
20:33
Speaker 1: The men he invited to be his closest companions were
20:36
Speaker 1: from a variety of social contexts, his circle of friendships
20:39
Speaker 1: included the rich people, poor people, working class, religious leaders,
20:44
Speaker 1: a tax gatherer, scribes, women, and ultimately pharisees. In fact,
20:49
Speaker 1: in the same conversation where he announced his new command,
20:52
Speaker 1: he looks around the room at this collection of day laborers,
20:55
Speaker 1: a zella, and a tax gatherer and even a trader,
20:58
Speaker 1: and he says this. He says, I have called you friends.
21:05
Speaker 1: Imagine this your savior, the savior of the world, your lord,
21:10
Speaker 1: your master, calling you friend. He's nothing like you, but
21:15
Speaker 1: he likes you. And then he said this, guys, you
21:19
Speaker 1: did not choose me. I pursued you. I chose you.
21:25
Speaker 1: That's how we loved. That's how Jesus followers love, not
21:30
Speaker 1: from a distance, not in our hearts, with our hands
21:33
Speaker 1: and with our feet, with invitations, with time, with meals.
21:37
Speaker 1: Here's the thing. If we don't know people, if we
21:41
Speaker 1: fail to listen to people who don't experience the world
21:43
Speaker 1: the way we do, we will never bear their burden.
21:47
Speaker 1: We will not fulfill the law of Christ. We will
21:51
Speaker 1: be content with sad, and we will be content with mad.
21:55
Speaker 1: And we may wear the badge and the label Christian,
21:58
Speaker 1: but we dare not call all ourselves Jesus followers. That's
22:02
Speaker 1: why I'm constantly urging you to be a student first
22:06
Speaker 1: and save your criticism for later. The reason you don't understand,
22:09
Speaker 1: come on, the reason you don't understand how white people
22:12
Speaker 1: could I don't understand how black white black people are.
22:15
Speaker 1: Always it's because you don't understand. That's on you, that's
22:19
Speaker 1: on me, that's on us. But that must end. As
22:24
Speaker 1: long as we're content, come on, as long as we're
22:26
Speaker 1: content with proximity rather than friendship, we will always we
22:30
Speaker 1: will always discount everything that doesn't fit perfectly into our
22:34
Speaker 1: own flawed world view. So when it comes to the
22:43
Speaker 1: variables you have control over, how do people who don't
22:48
Speaker 1: look like you experience you? And will you? Would you,
22:54
Speaker 1: regardless of the color of your skin, decide not to
22:57
Speaker 1: be content with merely being a non racist? Will you
23:00
Speaker 1: decide to make the shift to anti racism anti discrimination?
23:04
Speaker 1: Will you stop? And I'm sorry to push so hard,
23:06
Speaker 1: but would you please stop with all the but I
23:09
Speaker 1: love everybody, And would you go out and love somebody
23:12
Speaker 1: who doesn't look like you, who doesn't experience the world
23:15
Speaker 1: the way that you do? In other words, will you
23:19
Speaker 1: follow Jesus? He was so clear. You have heard it said,
23:23
Speaker 1: and we've all heard it said. Right. You have heard
23:25
Speaker 1: it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. But
23:28
Speaker 1: I tell you that's not the way it works in
23:30
Speaker 1: my kingdom. You love your enemy, and you pray for
23:32
Speaker 1: those who persecute you. And if you do, he says,
23:37
Speaker 1: you'll be children of your father and heaven, because that's
23:40
Speaker 1: what he does. If you love those who love you,
23:42
Speaker 1: what reward will you get for that? Tax collectors do that,
23:45
Speaker 1: And if you only greet your own people, everybody does that.
23:49
Speaker 1: Idle worshipers do that. And then he said, this be perfect,
23:55
Speaker 1: because this is what perfection looks like from the vantage
23:59
Speaker 1: point of our heavenly be perfect, as your heavenly father
24:02
Speaker 1: is perfect. We're like, wait, what perfect? Yeah? Because when
24:06
Speaker 1: you read the Gospels, nothing could be clearer than this.
24:09
Speaker 1: Jesus taught that our love for God is demonstrated and
24:14
Speaker 1: authenticated how by how we treat other people, not how
24:17
Speaker 1: we treat God. God's fine, but not just the people
24:20
Speaker 1: that are like us, people who are nothing like us,
24:24
Speaker 1: people who may not even like us. I've told you
24:28
Speaker 1: this before, and maybe this won't be very reassuring coming
24:32
Speaker 1: from me, but I'm like you, I don't always know
24:34
Speaker 1: what to believe. I mean, my views on a variety
24:37
Speaker 1: of topics have morphed and evolved and completely changed through
24:40
Speaker 1: the years. In fact, one of the humbling things about
24:43
Speaker 1: being a preacher is that my views on just about
24:45
Speaker 1: everything are documented somewhere on a hard drive. I mean,
24:49
Speaker 1: every preacher I know wishes that could go back and
24:51
Speaker 1: repreach or unpreach some things, delete some old message. I mean,
24:54
Speaker 1: we met well, but then life happened, kids happened, tragedy struck,
25:00
Speaker 1: We grew, we matured, we began to see the world differently.
25:04
Speaker 1: God didn't change, we changed, But those old sermons that
25:09
Speaker 1: are going to live on forever somewhere. And here's the thing.
25:11
Speaker 1: I certainly hope my views and believes have matured. I
25:15
Speaker 1: hope they accurately reflect the reality of our father's world.
25:20
Speaker 1: But there's no finish line. My worldview, my perspective, is
25:24
Speaker 1: a work in progress. And so it's yours. What we believe,
25:28
Speaker 1: we believe, But come on, our beliefs are limited by
25:31
Speaker 1: what we know, what we see, what we've experienced. But
25:35
Speaker 1: here's the thing. While our knowledge and understanding are constantly
25:38
Speaker 1: influxed one thing is not. There is one thing Jesus
25:42
Speaker 1: was so clear about this, There is one thing that
25:44
Speaker 1: transcends our limited knowledge, our limited insight, our limited experience,
25:50
Speaker 1: and that's love. It fills the gaps. It reduces the
25:56
Speaker 1: friction created by our limited insight and knowledge and judgment
26:00
Speaker 1: inhibiting experiences. There's so much I don't know. There are
26:05
Speaker 1: things I'll never understand. But my ignorance, my limited insight,
26:11
Speaker 1: does not impede my ability to put others first. That
26:17
Speaker 1: has nothing to do with intellect or insight. It has
26:20
Speaker 1: everything to do with my will. So like you, well,
26:25
Speaker 1: I'm not always sure what to believe. I almost always
26:29
Speaker 1: know what love requires of me, And so do you. You
26:35
Speaker 1: you are somebody's experience. How do people who don't look
26:41
Speaker 1: like you experience you? How should they? Jesus made that
26:46
Speaker 1: uncomfortably clear. And then from the pages of the Gospels,
26:51
Speaker 1: he turns, and he imagined he looks over his shoulder
26:54
Speaker 1: at me, and he looks over his shoulder at you,
26:56
Speaker 1: and he looks over his shoulder at people who don't
26:59
Speaker 1: look anything like you, and he says, follow me, follow me,
27:03
Speaker 1: and I'll show you what love requires of you. And
27:06
Speaker 1: if we accept that simple invitation. Perhaps in time we'll
27:11
Speaker 1: all lose our fear of flying, Perhaps we will silence
27:15
Speaker 1: our irrational fear of black men. Perhaps we'll see men
27:19
Speaker 1: and women, fathers and mothers, instead of just uniforms and badges.
27:24
Speaker 1: Perhaps in the chaos of the blue lights and the sirens,
27:27
Speaker 1: we'll see somebody's son, we'll see somebody's little girl. And
27:32
Speaker 1: perhaps someday it'll finally dawn on all of us that
27:38
Speaker 1: whatever affects one of us directly affects all of us indirectly,
27:43
Speaker 1: because we are all made in the image of God,
27:46
Speaker 1: and we are all part of the human race.