If I can just get through this stage, this phase, this season, then it will be ok. But what if the “then” never comes? Because the moment one thing finishes, another takes its place. It’s not that we don’t want to rest, it’s that we feel like we can’t. What makes this hard for us isn’t theology, it’s reality.

Our lives are so busy, with so many things to do. And it’s not just the responsibilities and activities that keep us from rest, because most of us get a vacation. But even when we do stop, we don’t actually rest. Our bodies might slow down, but our minds don’t. Our souls don’t.

This goes deeper than having busy schedules because the issue isn’t just that we have a lot to do, it’s that we don’t know how to stop anymore. We are a society of driven people, and there is something good in that. But we just keep going. Not because we have to but because something inside of us tells us we can’t stop yet.

Eventually, you have to ask, “Where’s that coming from?”

When Israel came out of Egypt, they were physically free, but internally, they still thought like slaves. We are similar. Even though no one is standing over us with a whip, a lot of us still live as if everything depends on us. We are terrified that if we stop, everything will fall apart.

Sabbath confronts this. Sabbath confronts the belief that value comes from output, the need to control everything, and the fear that everything depends on you.

Because slaves can’t stop. This is because when Scripture talks about rest, it’s not talking about finally collapsing because you got everything done.

This is why Sabbath is so hard. There’s always more you could do. If rest only comes when everything is finished, then none of us will ever rest. But the Sabbath is God’s invitation into a different way of living.

Sabbath Gives Life
At the end of Exodus 16, God is speaking to the people, and He’s not coming up with something new, He’s calling back something that’s been there from the beginning.

Genesis 2
2 By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. 3 Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.

God rests, not because He’s tired, but because He’s setting a rhythm. When God does something, there’s always a why. He blessed it and made it holy. Is there anything else in the creation story that God blessed?

Genesis 1
22 God blessed them and said, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the water in the seas, and let the birds increase on the earth.”
28 God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”

When God creates life, He blesses it. The interesting thing here is that God blesses something that isn’t a thing – it’s not an animal or a person, it’s a day. God blesses time. That means there’s a part of your week that God has designed to be blessed or set apart – holy. It’s not like the others. It’s different. How? It’s meant to give life.

Sabbath is Trust in Action
In Exodus 16, God gives a command to the children of Israel.

Exodus 16
21 Each morning everyone gathered as much as they needed, and when the sun grew hot, it melted away. 22 On the sixth day, they gathered twice as much—two omers for each person—and the leaders of the community came and reported this to Moses. 23 He said to them, “This is what the Lord commanded: ‘Tomorrow is to be a day of sabbath rest, a holy sabbath to the Lord. So bake what you want to bake and boil what you want to boil. Save whatever is left and keep it until morning.’”

On the sixth day, they are to get twice as much.

Why?

Because on the seventh day, there won’t be any manna. No gathering. Just rest. This is how God works. He provided for them before He commanded them to trust Him. He’s made provision for the command because He’s given them double. Now they need to live it out.

It’s our trust in God put into action. Sometimes there’s a gap between what we say we believe and what we actually believe. And you can figure out how wide that gap is by how you live, the risk you’re willing to take, and the control you’re willing to surrender.

But faith is always an invitation to live out what we say we believe, and Sabbath highlights this painfully well. God has provided, but now life feels like a constant equation: “Do I have enough time, money, security to actually stop?”

God’s your provider? Great – prove it. You’re not overworking because you’re chasing success. You’re working because you’re trying to survive. Sabbath is not God saying to drop everything and hope for the best. That’s not faith, that’s chaos.

Sabbath is about having a reoriented heart. A heart that recognizes that God has given you everything you need, and so, we put that belief into action by taking time to stop, set a day apart as holy, and rest. It’s a practice in trusting God.

This is exactly where Israel is. God already provided, and now they have to decide if what He’s given them is enough. If what you have isn’t enough, you’ll keep going.

Sabbath is Remembrance
And it’s something we need to be reminded of again and again. But then in Deuteronomy, the context has changed.

Deuteronomy 5
12 “Observe the Sabbath day by keeping it holy, as the Lord your God has commanded you. 13 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 14 but the seventh day is a sabbath to the Lord your God. On it you shall not do any work, neither you, nor your son or daughter, nor your male or female servant, nor your ox, your donkey or any of your animals, nor any foreigner residing in your towns, so that your male and female servants may rest, as you do. 15 Remember that you were slaves in Egypt and that the Lord your God brought you out of there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. Therefore the Lord your God has commanded you to observe the Sabbath day.

Because back in Exodus, Sabbath was rooted in creation. Here in Deuteronomy, Sabbath is rooted in liberation. God says, “Remember who you are and remember what I did.” You were slaves! And now? You’re not that anymore.

Slavery doesn’t look like chains anymore.

Societally, exhaustion almost becomes a badge of honor. Even when we’re technically free, internally, we’re still slaves to something.

• Achievement
• Expectations
• Comparison
• Anxiety
• Pressure

That’s why Sabbath mattered so much to God. Every time Israel stopped working, they were declaring that Pharaoh didn’t own them anymore, their worth was not based on output, and they trusted God enough to stop.

The Sabbath was never just about physical rest. It was about remembering that we are no longer slaves. You don’t just rest because God created, you rest because God rescued.

What is driving your life right now? Maybe the reason Sabbath feels so uncomfortable is because stopping exposes what’s actually controlling us.

God is inviting us into freedom, which means that somewhere in our lives, we need a rhythm that physically declares, “I’m not a slave anymore.”

Start small, intentional, and don’t overcomplicate this. Pick a block of time, and during that time of Sabbath rest and remember.

Sabbath is Resting & Remembering
Stop working, stop producing, stop trying to get ahead. Not because everything is done, but because you’re trusting God with what isn’t. You don’t need a perfect Sabbath formula. You need a moment where your soul relearns.

Remember that God is the provider, not you. God is sustaining your life, not just your effort. God rescued you, and it is enough.

The worst thing we could do with a message like this is turn Sabbath into another achievement, another thing to master, or another thing to do. That misses the point entirely. Sabbath becomes a declaration that you belong to God now and you’re not a slave anymore.

And because you are free, you can stop.

We live in a world where we’re trained to think ahead. Whether it’s retirement planning, kids’ futures, career trajectory, or financial security, we live in a “next” world. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing because trying to be ready is responsible and wise, but it’s one thing to think about what’s next and another thing to live there.

A lot of us don’t just plan for the future, we live in the future. So, we don’t just live today, we drag tomorrow into it. We’re constantly trying to make sense and control what’s next so that nothing catches us off guard.

It’s a subtle shift. We go from being responsible and prepared to restless and controlling. Our tendency in life is to rely on the “controlled” in life, and this isn’t because we’re bad people, but because we’re human and we don’t like the feeling of not knowing if we’ll be okay.

We don’t mind trusting God when we can also see how it’s going to work. And for many of us, that doesn’t feel spiritual, it feels irresponsible because we all want to trust God, but it’s hard to trust what we can’t see.

But what if you could see it?

What if trusting God means something different?

Editing The Past
Have you ever talked with someone who finally left a job they hated as they started their new one? They might have a hard time adjusting to the new position, making them long for the old, reliable one they had, even if they were unhappy.

We don’t miss what was good… we miss what was known.

This is where Israel is in Exodus 16. They’re free but complaining.

Exodus 16
3 The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died by the Lord’s hand in Egypt! There we sat around pots of meat and ate all the food we wanted, but you have brought us out into this desert to starve this entire assembly to death.”

They’re remembering Egypt like it was a buffet!

They selectively remember the food, whips, oppression, and the desperate cries to God for deliverance. And before we look down on the Israelites, we have a version of this, too. Slavery always looks better in hindsight when freedom feels hard.

It’s how we look back at scary times of “slavery” in our lives. Times that God brought us out of that we don’t recall as clearly because living in freedom is difficult. Why do we do this? Because freedom comes with uncertainty. We’d rather have predictable bondage than uncertain freedom.

We would rather stay with what is known and prepared than confront the fact that to be free means we’re not in control.

We don’t just need God to change our situation, we need Him to change our thinking about it. If we focus on always wanting things to be easy, we will revert to a time when things were more secure, when things get confusing or challenging.

Enough for Today
Exodus 16
4 Then the Lord said to Moses, “I will rain down bread from heaven for you. The people are to go out each day and gather enough for that day. In this way I will test them and see whether they will follow my instructions. 5 On the sixth day they are to prepare what they bring in, and that is to be twice as much as they gather on the other days.”

6 So Moses and Aaron said to all the Israelites, “In the evening you will know that it was the Lord who brought you out of Egypt,

God could’ve given them a week’s supply, a month, or a stocked warehouse in the wilderness. He doesn’t. Instead, He is retaining them to live a completely different way. Not by control, but by trust.

God doesn’t promise us tomorrow’s clarity, He promises to meet our needs today. He’s not telling us to stop planning, working, or using our brains, he’s telling us He will provide. It’s about seeing Him as our source.

Trust
Why does God only give us enough for today?

Trust is not built in one big moment. It’s built in a thousand small ones. This is what God is doing with Israel and us. He’s inviting us into a relationship where we experience His goodness, faithfulness, and provision over and over again.

He’s not just meeting your needs, He’s developing a daily rhythm, a practice that sees not just what He gives, but who He is.

Exodus 16
“In the evening you will know that it was the Lord who brought you out of Egypt,

God isn’t just giving them bread, He’s giving them evidence. It’s not just, “God fed us.” It’s, “God is here. God is leading us. God is the one who brought us out.”

If God gave them everything up front, they might enjoy the provision, but they would miss the Provider.

We need to be people who can see and sense God's presence. We need to develop a daily practice of dependence and desperation on God, and on God alone, to supply our needs. It all comes from and is sustained through God.

Have you ever had just enough show up right when you needed it? That wasn’t luck, that was God. We need to recognize when things come from the Lord.

If everything we have comes from our achievement, striving, or control, we will never become  people who can see God’s movement in the world and our lives. That’s what God is saying to His people.

This isn’t just about bread. This is about belief. Because those two things are always connected.

• Grumbling… and knowing.
• Anxiety… and trust.
• Provision… and identity.
  
  

When we live as if we don’t have, it reveals that we’ve forgotten who God is, because if we truly knew Him, we wouldn’t live as if everything depended on us.

This doesn’t mean life is easy. It doesn’t mean there aren’t real needs, fears, or uncertainty, but it does mean that your response reveals your trust in God.

Hoarding For Tomorrow
Exodus 16
16 This is what the Lord has commanded: ‘Everyone is to gather as much as they need. Take an omer for each person you have in your tent.’”
19 Then Moses said to them, “No one is to keep any of it until morning.”
20 However, some of them paid no attention to Moses; they kept part of it until morning, but it was full of maggots and began to smell. So Moses was angry with them.

They are told to take what they need for the day and not store it. And what happens? They hoard it or try to stock up. They doubt God’s provision, and it rots. Why? Because tomorrow’s provision only comes from tomorrow. You can’t stockpile what God will give you tomorrow today.

What if we became the kind of people who didn’t live in constant anxiety about what’s next, but actually trusted God enough to live fully present today? Not because life is easier, but because our trust is deeper, if that were available to you, would you want it?

This isn’t just a prayer, it’s a reorientation. It’s choosing trust over control and dependence over self-sufficiency. And what you might start to realize is that God is already providing more than you realized. You just haven’t been looking for it.

Have you ever moved to a new place? You don’t know where anything is or how to function efficiently on the onset. It can be overwhelming, possibly off-putting, and frustrating. We see some of that in the Book of Exodus. It’s about the Hebrew people leaving slavery in Egypt, wandering in the wilderness for 40 years, and finally getting to the land God promised them.

It’s quite the journey, and quite the story – one that movies are made of. But most of the book is not just about the Hebrew people becoming a new people; it’s about a people trying to figure out how to live in a new place and reality. They try to find their way around, from slavery to freedom.

As much as that difference between getting to a new place and then learning to live in that place was for them, it’s also for us. Now, most of us don’t feel enslaved. Most of us would say we’re free. But what is freedom?

The world around us thinks that freedom is the absence of boundaries, but that doesn’t bring peace, it brings chaos. It creates consumption and ultimately destruction. Think about what the world would be without restraint, laws, norms, moral expectations, or consequences. Yikes!

We don’t want to be ruled or tied to something, but we’re trading what we think will bring us freedom back and forth all the time. Think about when you get a job. You’re trading your time for something else you think will give you options, freedom, money, or resources.

So, none of us is actually truly free in the sense of having no limits. But what if the way we often live our lives in an effort to find it actually leads us in the opposite direction?

God offers it to us, but we not only need to step into it, but we also need to stay there. We need to learn to live there.

The Hebrew people had been slaves in Egypt for around 400 years. God raised up Moses, confronted Pharaoh, there were the 10 plagues, Passover, the consecration of the firstborn, and then the release from captivity. They’re headed out, and God does a strange thing. He tells them to turn back and set up camp at Pi Hahiroth. A place on the edge of the sea, but still in Egypt.

This is the first clue that God’s freedom might not work the way we expect. What seems like confusion to us is actually where God does the mightiest work. What if confusion to God wasn’t the ending point, but rather the starting point?

So, the Israelites pack up and leave. Pharaoh lets them go but then has second thoughts. So, he goes after them with his army.

Exodus 14
…What have we done? We have let the Israelites go and have lost their services! 6 So he had his chariot made ready and took his army with him.

When you start trying to live in the freedom God leads you to, captivity will come calling with knives out. But you didn’t set yourself free, God did. He’s leading them out, He’ll lead you out, He’ll stay with you, and because of that, you can stand firm.

But the Israelites don’t do that. They see Pharaoh, his chariots, and his army coming. They immediately forget everything they’ve seen. The provision, the miracles, gone.

Exodus 14
10 As Pharaoh approached, the Israelites looked up, and there were the Egyptians, marching after them. They were terrified and cried out to the Lord.11 They said to Moses, “Was it because there were no graves in Egypt that you brought us to the desert to die? What have you done to us by bringing us out of Egypt? 12 Didn’t we say to you in Egypt, ‘Leave us alone; let us serve the Egyptians’? It would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in the desert!”

It’s part of the human condition that we have very short memories when it comes to God's faithfulness, especially when we’re given what looks like an overwhelming obstacle. This is why we sing about God’s faithfulness, remind each other, remind ourselves, ground ourselves in the truth of God’s word.

When you begin to walk in freedom, there will be things that terrify you and cause you to forget what you’ve already experienced from God. The miracle doesn’t automatically change you. We might think that if we see or experience the big thing, we would be changed forever. But then something else comes and changes you. However, God forms you by standing and staying.

Exodus 14
“Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today. The Egyptians you see today you will never see again. 14 The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.”

When you feel holes emerge in your life, with that sense of tension and anxiety rising because of what you think you don’t have, stand firm. Trust that God will fill those gaps. Stand with Him, stay with Him. He’s there, He never left.

He’ll do the miracle, but maybe not in the way you ever expected. And that’s where we can cling to the good news.

Exodus 14
14 The Lord will fight for you; you need only to be still.
15 Then the Lord said to Moses, “Why are you crying out to me? Tell the Israelites to move on.
 
Move on. Keep moving. Step out. Keep becoming. Keep going.

Sometimes we think that if we see the miracle, we’ll move, but sometimes it’s more about listening to God call you to move and then seeing the miracle. In Exodus, they move on, God moves with them, and then they see the waters part.

And this isn’t just about Christian faith; it’s about faith in something you don’t yet see. Where do you need to stand firm or stand up? Where might God be calling to you to stay?

Have you ever seen a son or daughter run into the arms of their parent? They run, sometimes almost catapulting into their arms, because they are confident in the response they will be met with. The parent will pick them up every time they are able.

It changes how a child approaches their parent. They don’t approach strangers or even other familiar people the same way because a child knows who their parent is, what the relationship is, how the parent will respond, and that the love is there. It changes everything because the child is secure.

Whether we feel secure is something we love out of. It plays into how we see other people, ourselves, and even God. And what that looks like shapes everything.

When you know where you stand, you have confidence. When you have confidence, you find security.

The problem is that our natural inclination is to view our relationship with God mostly in terms of how it affects us.

Our search for security ends up being a destination rather than a foundation.

Are we secure?
There’s this idea in the American church that Jesus our personal savior, helping us personally. Similar to a therapist, stylist, or personal trainer. The historical church did not use this language. Subtly, our goal becomes getting and maintaining the relationship, rather than where that relationship takes us. But what if that personal relationship is a starting place that takes us somewhere, and not a destination?

The only way it does is if we’re secure.

1 John 5
11 And this is the testimony: God has given us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. 12 Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life. 13 I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life.

There’s the relationship, it’s how you know if you’re secure or not.

1 John 5
14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.

Televangelists use this verse to communicate their brand of Christianity and what benefits them. It turns God into a cosmic genie or vending machine in the sky.

But it’s not about that.

Have you ever traveled with someone who had platinum status with an airline? You end up in some fancy-named lounge prior to take off with more comfy accommodations than if your traveling partner didn’t rack up a certain amount of miles.

You have elite access to God because of His status and your relationship. Both need to exist for anything to happen.

When we have confidence in our relationship with God, we can address God and the relationship boldly. If you don’t have confidence in your relationship with God just yet, God hears and wants to answer the prayers of His children, according to His will.

What is God’s will?
Matthew 6
33 Seek the Kingdom of God above all else, and live righteously, and he will give you everything you need.

Follow God’s way of seeing, living, loving, and responding, especially to people. Then live it out. You will discover you have everything you need to do that. Insecurity always pulls us inward. We’ll only move outward when we know we’re secure.

We make approaching God and discerning His will about us and our needs or wants. John gives us a different application.

1 John 5
16 If you see any brother or sister commit a sin that does not lead to death, you should pray and God will give them life.

What’s God really passionate about? Saving people, but also restoring them.

When you know where you stand, you have confidence.
When you have confidence, you find security.
But when you have security, you pray for different things than you did.

Security is not about your relationship or position anymore, it’s about where you go from there.

Confidence always leads us outward to other people.

1 John 5
18 We know that anyone born of God does not continue to sin; the One who was born of God keeps them safe, and the evil one cannot harm them. 19 We know that we are children of God, and that the whole world is under the control of the evil one. 20 We know also that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, so that we may know him who is true. And we are in him who is true by being in his Son Jesus Christ. He is the true God and eternal life. 21 Dear children, keep yourselves from idols.

We don’t really think about idols in our modern age. An idol isn’t believing in no God, it’s about believing in the wrong god or in the wrong conception of God. God isn’t a genie in a bottle. Idols end up overwhelmingly being about our sense of security.

So, how do you know the right God? John says it. You stay close to Jesus.

Remind yourself of the relationship you have – who God is and the access you have as His child. Whatever is true, stay close to that, but then go stand in the gap for people. A confident church is an interceding church.

When you don’t feel secure, you ask for protection. But when you’re confident, you ask for opportunity.

You’re not coming to prayer just for you. You’re coming on behalf of others. When we pray, it should move outward, and those are the kinds of prayers God answers.

Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night because you heard a noise? The something-is-definitely-wrong-in-my-house noise that ends up being nothing. There’s no real issue, nothing actually happened, but the fear you feel is incredibly real.

It’s strange how something can be completely safe yet still feel completely unsafe. It’s not a moment of panic or crisis, rather a low-grade hum underneath everything. It’s comparable to when your phone is at 12%, you’re not in danger, but you’re not at peace.

For many of us, that hum doesn’t just stay in moments like that, it follows us and leads us to ask:

• Am I okay?
• Am I secure?
• Am I enough?

Now, not all fear is bad. Some fear is actually good, even necessary. Fear can protect you and teach you.

Proverbs 9
10The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,
and knowledge of the Holy One is understanding.

But that’s not the kind of fear John is talking about in 1 John 4. He’s talking about a deeper fear. Not the kind that protects, but rather the kind that positions you against people. The kind that pulls back, withholds, distances, protects, or hardens.

We’re living in a moment where this kind of fear is everywhere. It’s not just “out there,” it shows up in the church, too. Fear doesn’t just make you anxious, it makes you guarded.

Why does fear make us guarded?
Genesis 3 is a great example, through Adam and Eve. What happened when they did something wrong? They hid. Why? They’re not sure where they stand with God anymore. And from that moment on, humanity has been asking the same question, “Where do I stand with Him?”

Fear isn’t just emotional, it’s theological.

At the deepest level, fear is telling you what you believe is true about God, and what you believe is true about you. Because underneath all of it is the quiet belief that when we stand before God, we aren’t enough.

Our minds don’t stop there, they go on:

• If I’m not enough, then I’m accountable.
• If I’m accountable, then something is owed.
• If something is owed, then there’s a penalty.

And if there’s a penalty, then judgment is coming. If that question is not settled, fear doesn’t leave, it moves into every space and area in your life. As a result, fear starts to shape And if there’s a penalty, then judgment is coming. If that question isn't settled, fear doesn’t leave, it moves into every space and area of your life. As a result, fear starts to shape everything.

Without realizing it, we start relating to God from a place of uncertainty and insecurity. We believe in Him, we sing to Him, we love Him, but we’re not fully convinced we’re secure in Him.

What does Jesus say about all this?
Jesus didn’t come to help us manage fear, He came to remove it.

Have you ever been driving, minding your own business, when you saw a police car? Your mind and body react like you might be in trouble, even if you’re not. So essentially, you’re acting like you’re afraid of getting a ticket or being arrested for going 3 MPH over the speed limit.

Fear isn’t just about what’s happening, it’s about what we think is coming next. Our fear is connected to something… punishment.

Fear has to do with punishment.

In Greek, punishment means penalty. A debt that must be paid. This is courtroom language. Before a holy God, something is owed because of our sin. And John says that’s what fear is tied to – punishment. Not just what’s happening now, but what you believe is coming later.

1 John 4
17 This is how love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment: In this world we are like Jesus.

Even though we have a debt to pay, we can stand before a Holy God in confidence. How? Because Jesus paid the penalty in full.

Romans 5
Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand.

Paul says we’ve been justified. Declared right. Dept paid. Case closed.

Where does our confidence come from?
Our confidence is rooted in the finished work of Jesus Christ on the Cross.

1 John 4:16
16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.

Confidence in God comes from relying, not trying.

But finding that confidence is still hard. Why? Because we rely on our effort, not His love. Hebrews tells us that His blood speaks a better word – it speaks the final word on the penalty we deserve, and because of that, we can stand in confidence before Him.

“In this world, we are like Jesus.”

This means we stand before the Father the way Jesus does – fully accepted, connected, and secure.

We now share His Spirit. His life is in us. His standing before the Father has become our standing. It we can stand justified before a Holy God, we don’t have to live like we’re on trial anymore.

What does that mean?

You’re free.

You don’t need approval, control, or to secure your own future. You’re free to give, serve, and move toward people without needing something in return, needing recognition, or calculating the cost.

1 John 4
18 There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

If fear is rooted in punishment, then the only way to remove fear is to settle punishment.

If love moves in, fear moves out.

Not because you forced it out by trying harder, but because something better took its place.

Love kicks fear out of the house. John tells us that when the love of God moves into your life, fear doesn’t get to stay. It doesn’t belong there. Again, not every day, normal fear, but the fear of punishment before God.

Presence changes things.

When His love becomes real to you, present to you, or something you’re actually relying on, it starts to change what lives inside of you.

The one who fears is not made perfect in love.

We might read that and think it means if you’re a Christian and you’re afraid, you haven’t been made perfect yet. That’s not what John means. He means that someone who fears punishment hasn’t yet encountered the love of God in Jesus.

1 John 4
19 We love because he first loved us. 20 Whoever claims to love God yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen, cannot love God, whom they have not seen. 21 And he has given us this command: Anyone who loves God must also love their brother and sister.

Why does John make the connection between the love of God and us loving people? Because if fear is still ruling your heart, you won’t move toward people, you will protect yourself from people. You will create distance, you will dehumanize, you will dismiss.

When you know deep down that your debt is paid, that doesn’t just remove fear vertically, it removes it horizontally. It doesn’t just give us confidence before God, it gives us love for those around us.

The clearest evidence that you’re actually experiencing the love of God is not what you sing, say, or post, it’s how you love the person right in front of you.

Have you ever listened to someone else’s story? What happens when the story becomes personal? Once you see yourself in the story, it changes you. Now, there’s a difference between it being personal and important. Do you drive a little slower or more carefully after having kids than before? You always knew safety was important, but then it became personal.

One of the most complicated things with Easter is that the story is an account. As Christians, we believe Easter is a documentation of what actually happened. But even with that, it’s a story. It’s a great, inspiring, hopeful, and true story, but it’s very easy for it to stay just that. A story.

We can all recognize that this is an extremely important story, but for most, it’s not personal. It’s hard for it to truly become our story, unless we need it to.

A World of Stories
We live in a world where there are many stories, good and not-so-good. We take them and make them personal more often than we realize.

• There’s a story about how people are that has become your story.
• There’s a story about what will make you happy and bring you peace.
• There’s a story of what it will take for you to find and feel love.
• There’s the story you tell yourself about you, or the one someone else has attempted to write about you.
  
  

There’s so much power in a story, more than we realize. Stories move us. Stories drive us. And when we look at the worst parts of the world, there’s a story that’s behind them, too. Racism, hate, and horrible things done in the name of religion. Oppression, wars, and nations against nations. They all start with one story that people made their story. They made it personal.

What if the same old Easter story could become your story in a powerful way?

Luke 24
On the first day of the week, very early in the morning, the women took the spices they had prepared and went to the tomb. 2 They found the stone rolled away from the tomb, 3 but when they entered, they did not find the body of the Lord Jesus. 4 While they were wondering about this, suddenly two men in clothes that gleamed like lightning stood beside them.

The women showed up not because they were expecting anything other than a dead body. They had come to finish a burial because Jesus had been hastily buried by some men before the Sabbath.

Wonder
The women wondered, and the people wondered. This is more than them just experiencing the events. Jesus had told them beforehand that they were going to happen. He told them the story at least 4 separate times – that He would be arrested, crucified, die, and rise on the third day.

Why?

Because they had so many assumptions about Jesus – who He was, what He would do – a religious sage, a rabbi, a political leader who would overthrow the way things were. They didn’t connect the dots, and it’s difficult for us, too. We all know this story is important, but is it important AND personal?

We have some of those assumptions too. From outside the story, we look in and make some assumptions. It feels strange when they’re challenged. We wonder what’s really going on because we don’t like not knowing or not understanding. It’s so easy to see wondering as a deficiency or a dead end, but it’s actually the beginning of a new journey.

Confusion
The contradiction we experience in wondering actually disrupts the assumptions we had, the story we’ve been working with.

Luke 24
5 In their fright the women bowed down with their faces to the ground, but the men said to them, “Why do you look for the living among the dead? 6 He is not here; he has risen! Remember how he told you, while he was still with you in Galilee: 7 ‘The Son of Man must be delivered over to the hands of sinners, be crucified and on the third day be raised again.’

The angels say things about looking for the living among the dead. That’s an interesting thing to say. These women and disciples are not looking for living among the dead but rather looking for the dead above the dead.

The angels are saying, “Everything you thought you were going to encounter is being turned on its head.”

And they’re not even condemned by the angels (or Jesus) for not believing, for wondering, or even for the fact that they’d thrown in the towel on the whole thing. As the angels did with them, they do with us. Why are we looking among the dead?

They challenge our assumptions, and we challenge our assumptions by going back to what Jesus said about himself.

Luke 24
8 Then they remembered his words.

Jesus said things like, “I am the resurrection and the life,” “I am the way, the truth, and the life.”
 
Suddenly, the story was becoming their story.

These disciples and women loved Jesus. They followed Jesus. They believed in Jesus, and they still came to bury Jesus. Which means you can love Jesus and still live as if resurrection isn’t real.

The empty tomb shows that it was never your circumstances, past, or the powerful stories, people, and forces they animate. It was sin and death. And they are now defeated.

Everything you thought had the final word in your life doesn’t.

That’s where the story can become uniquely personal. It can change us. It contradicts us, and comforts us in our stories, along with the ones we’ve embraced and believed.

That’s the Easter story. The important part is that Jesus, the son of God, came, was crucified, died, was buried, but then rose again.

And not just as a spectacle, but to do something for you that you couldn’t do for yourself. To forgive your sin, to give you hope, to remove the specter of death (large or small) from your life.

This has to go from being just important to becoming something personal for you if Jesus’ words are going to snap into focus. Something you need. But if it becomes personal and important, it’s what you always needed.

We are all very confident about what we think we need. Not what we want, what we need. We say things like:

• I need this to work out.
• I need that person to change.
• I need the door to open.

The problem is that we actually don’t know what we need. We think we do, but we rarely get it right. And when what we think we need doesn’t happen the way we think it should, we get disappointed or disoriented.

We don’t just bring requests to God, we bring solutions. These aren’t prayers as much as demands. But what if we’re wrong about what we need?

If, Then Statements
We all have a story about what would finally make our lives okay.

• If this changes, then I’ll have peace.
• If this changes, then I’ll finally be able to breathe.
• If I can get around this turn, then things will get better.

And until that happens, we just hold our breath. With if, then statements, our peace, joy, and security in life are connected to something that’s outside our control.

Now, things on your list aren’t bad, but somewhere along the way, those things become functional saviors. Those outcomes are what will save us. We don’t just want salvation, we want a specific version of salvation.

That’s the fallen condition.

We often only come to God for what we think we need. But what if that’s not what we really need?

It’s possible to be passionate about Jesus and still miss the real Jesus.

We want the benefits of the Kingdom without the king of King He actually is.

Nothing in the Bible is accidental. There are no throwaway details, no filtered moments, no random travel choices. Every movement, object, or word is revealing something about who God is and what He is doing. The Bible is not just telling us what happened, it shows us what it means. So, when Jesus makes His entrance into Jerusalem, He is not just getting from point A to point B. He is preaching.

Luke 19
30 “Go to the village ahead of you, and as you enter it, you will find a colt tied there, which no one has ever ridden. Untie it and bring it here. 31 If anyone asks you, ‘Why are you untying it?’ say, ‘The Lord needs it.’” 32 Those who were sent ahead went and found it just as he had told them. 33 As they were untying the colt, its owners asked them, “Why are you untying the colt?” 34 They replied, “The Lord needs it.”
35 They brought it to Jesus, threw their cloaks on the colt and put Jesus on it.36 As he went along, people spread their cloaks on the road.

Why the Donkey?
If you were the long-awaited Messiah coming to liberate your people with a crowd ready to crown you, you don’t ride in on a donkey. You ride in on a warhorse. That’s what conquering kings did. That’s what power and victory looked like. What you rode in on spoke volumes.

Jesus chooses to ride in on a donkey. He did it on purpose. He did it in public. Why? Because He was coming to meet their actual need and not their perceived need. Before His mouth even opened, He already confronted their expectations.

If Jesus came the way they wanted, He wouldn’t have come the way they needed.

The version of Jesus we ask for naturally is usually the one that makes our lives work best for us.

We ask Jesus to fix our situations, but He comes to fix our separation.

• We ask for relief, God wants to bring resurrection.
• We ask for control, God wants to develop surrender.
• We ask for situations, God wants to change our hearts.

If He gave them what they were shouting for, they would’ve gone back to their homes, still in their sin, still separated from God, and still in need of a savior.

That’s one of the greatest threats to our faith. Not that God says, “no” to our prayers, but that we reduce Him to answering the small things we ask for and miss who He actually is.

Luke 19
37 When he came near the place where the road goes down the Mount of Olives,the whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen:
38 “Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!”
39 Some of the Pharisees in the crowd said to Jesus, “Teacher, rebuke your disciples!”
40 “I tell you,” he replied, “if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out.”

All of Creation is moving towards this moment of praising the King. So, their worship, joy, and expectation are real. They’re quoting Scripture, declaring truth, and recognizing Him as the promised King. And yet, they still don’t understand the type of salvation He’s bringing.

You can say the right things about Jesus for the wrong reasons.

It’s easy for us to sing the right songs, quote the right verses, and say the right things about Jesus, yet underneath it all, we’re quietly hoping He’ll just solve all the problems we’ve decided are most important to us.

So, how do we know when we’re doing that?

• If you ask Jesus to fix your circumstances but resist when He starts working on your character.
• You ask Him to remove the hardship, but He keeps forming perseverance.
• We want clarity about the future, but He keeps inviting us into trust.

Are we worshipping Jesus for who He truly is or for who we hope He will be for us?

That’s why the same crowd that shouted “Hosanna!” on Sunday would shout “Crucify Him!” by Friday. Not because Jesus failed. But because He refused to become the kind of Savior they wanted.

Luke 19
41 As he approached Jerusalem and saw the city, he wept over it 42 and said, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes. 43 The days will come upon you when your enemies will build an embankment against you and encircle you and hem you in on every side.44 They will dash you to the ground, you and the children within your walls. They will not leave one stone on another, because you did not recognize the time of God’s coming to you.”

Jesus weeps over the city. Not because they rejected Him, but because they missed it. He says, “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace – but now it’s hidden from your eyes.” Throughout Luke’s Gospel, this idea of peace shows up:

• At Jesus’ birth: “Peace on earth” (Luke 2:14)
• When someone is forgiven: “Go in peace” (Luke 7:50)
• Salvation brings us peace with God.

He literally came riding in on a donkey, and that’s a fulfillment of a prophecy in the Book of Zechariah.

Zechariah 9:9
Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion!
Shout, Daughter Jerusalem!
See, your king comes to you,
righteous and victorious,
lowly and riding on a donkey,
on a colt, the foal of a donkey.

A donkey is a symbol of peace. They missed it!

We all have our own idea of what peace looks like.

• The right schools.
• The right career trajectory.
• The right financial stability.
• The right person in office.
• Our plans working.  
  
  

But Jesus rides into moments like that and quietly says, “The peace you are chasing out there is not the peace you actually need.”

You can actually have all those other things and still not have peace with God. We think peace is when life becomes manageable. Jesus says peace is when your soul is reconciled to God.

Do you see Jesus for who He truly is?

Each day comes with our own Costco cart of needs. Things we’re convinced will finally bring us peace. But what we should do instead is bring those things to our King and let Him decide what salvation looks like.

Bring your list to Jesus, but let Him decide what stays on it.

The more we allow Jesus to be the King of our lives, the more we will see Him for who He truly is and what He’s really doing.

We can all pick out a certain voice. Our spouse’s, our child’s, our parent’s, and that’s because we’ve spent years with them, we value them.

There are so many things and so many people trying to get your ear. They are trying to get you to listen, then respond, and then follow. Some of these are innocent enough, others appeal to the broken parts of us, even the worst parts of us.

Sometimes the voices we respond to sound similar to God’s, but because we haven’t taken the time or placed a specific value on God’s voice, we mistake them for God's.

Whose voice we listen to and respond to in life has profound implications.

In 1 John, Chapter 4, we are in this early church. There were few written Scripture texts available, especially those that would become the New Testament, so the early church depended heavily on apostles, prophets, and teachers. Some of these had begun to spread false teachings that denied the true nature of Jesus in an attempt to “improve” on the simple, old truth of the Gospel.

1 John 4
Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.2 This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3 but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God.

What is testing the Spirits?
You can have a spiritual experience that’s not based in Jesus Christ. These spiritual experiences, new teachings, new discoveries, or “improvements” can feel so compelling and appeal to something within us.

We often mistake compelling for true.

Whenever anyone says, “God says,” or “The Lord told me,” it should be tested. But how do you test it? By the Word of God. By who Jesus was, what Jesus did, and how Jesus did. This is why it’s so important to be rooted in Scripture. It allows us to see, taste, smell, or hear when something is off.

It’s a guarantee that there are other voices trying to position themselves as authority in our lives. They’re even using bits and pieces of Christianity and Scripture to do it. This is exactly what was happening in the early church.

Just because someone is quoting the scriptures publicly doesn’t mean they are honoring Jesus.

How do you test the Spirits?
They will always tell the truth about Jesus, and if they don’t, they aren’t. They’re not just a little off, they’re opposed. But if you hold onto the truth of Jesus, the firm foundation built in His word, there’s another promise you can claim or push back.

1 John 4
4 You, dear children, are from God and have overcome them, because “the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world.”
5 They are from the world and therefore speak from the viewpoint of the world, and the world listens to them. 6 We are from God, and whoever knows God listens to us; but whoever is not from God does not listen to us. This is how we recognize the Spirit of truth and the spirit of falsehood.

If you embrace the voice that IS God, believe that Jesus IS God – fully God and fully human – it has undeniable implications in our lives, and our lives in others’ lives.

We listen to the voice of God and speak the truth of God into the world, but we go further than that. John has already challenged us not to love just with words, but with actions.

1 John 4
7 Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. 9 This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. 10 This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. 

Have you ever had a crush? What happens when they make the first move? It changes everything. So, when we listen to God, He always calls us to something.  

God’s love always makes the first move.

God made the first move to you. He pursued you and loved you. Even when you weren’t necessarily looking for Him. Loving like God means us making the first move, even in places where it’s not our responsibility to make it.

Your story would be a lot different if someone didn’t make a move or did. But the good news is that God did! And when it came to your relationship with God, someone else did too. Our lives would be so different had God not initiated and pursued us.

Imagine what the story in the world around us could be if we took the initiative as a response to what God did for us.

1 John 4
11 Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. 12 No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

Think of the wind vs. the wind’s effects. We’ve seen what the wind can do, but do we live our lives professing that we don’t believe in the wind because we haven’t seen it?

This means that the world experiences God through His people. When His people learn to hear, then listen, then respond, and then do.

• Listen to hear
• Listen to process
• Respond
• Do

Most of the time, we don’t hear God in the burning bushes or voices from the sky, but rather when God’s people do to others what God first did to them – love, take the initiative, make the first move.

God shows up in the world when we show up in the world with God.

People see God through how they see us, and specifically through how we love.

Many Christians are fascinated with the supernatural – angels, demons, or power encounters – as a means of acquiring knowledge or gaining a higher plane of understanding. This isn’t about who knows the most, it’s about who knows God’s voice the best and then does something about it.

The world around us is fascinated by Jesus, but often not by the true Jesus. Who’s going to show them the true Jesus?

1 John 4
13 This is how we know that we live in him and he in us: He has given us of his Spirit. 14 And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. 15 If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God. 16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.

When you make the first move, when you love, it takes energy and effort. It requires investment and involves risk. Where you’re drawing from when you do this is absolutely critical. It’s like drawing water from a well.

What well are you drawing from? Yours? God’s? Someone else’s? Something else’s? Are you digging the right well deeper?

It’s easy to try to do God’s work while drawing from your own well, but at some point, your well runs dry.

How do we avoid this? By being deeply rooted and reliant first.

1 John 4
16 And so we KNOW and RELY on the love God has for us.

How do we KNOW and RELY?

• Know – Having an intimate relationship with something, like a marriage of many years. The voice you can’t mistake. This isn’t a big emotional or spiritual high, it’s something built consistently, humbly, and faithfully over time.
• Rely – Depending on, literally, to be saved by. This is saving faith, but also “stake your life on it” faith. For example, when you get on an airplane, you’re trusting it and can’t get off. You have to see it through.

You have to stake (build) your life on it. How much of your life would be different if your faith was removed from it?

What if we were the people who weren’t just casual about this, but prioritized it? What if we staked our lives there?

Lavish and abundance. We all like the idea. If it’s season tickets, all-you-can-eat buffets, or even that unlimited carwash card. Some of us try to accumulate enough money, things, relationships, or followers to try to feel this way. But it never holds up because there’s something hard-wired into our broken, fallen human condition that upends it. It’s called scarcity thinking.

Here’s what this looks like:

1. There’s a limited amount of love, goodness, money, talent, or opportunity, and I need to grab mine or someone else will.
2. I need to grab mine from someone else by taking from them, outperforming them, or cutting them down.
3. If I feel like I have “mine,” I need to protect it by being defensive, stingy, or insecure, or preemptively attacking others.
4. A sense of scarcity dramatically increases the price we are willing to pay (our lives, relationships, or health).

Scarcity isn’t an amount so much as it’s a mindset. Scarcity quickly goes from a feeling or an experience to an identity.

Some of us struggle with the idea that if we could get enough, achieve enough, be loved enough, accepted enough, have this opportunity, be recognized by those people, be in that relationship, then we wouldn’t feel scarcity anymore.

That’s not how it works.

The target always moves, and the mindset doesn’t disappear on its own.

When we believe in a god of scarcity, that god will never be enough. So, we are constantly seeking out others to make up the difference. That not only changes how we view God, but also how we view God’s love, other people, and why and how we love them.

Lavished
1 John 3
See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are! 

Love always involves a relationship. And that relationship has effects beyond itself.

The relationship you have upward directly impacts the relationships you live outward.

There’s a huge contrast between how we should do it and how the world around us does it.

1 John 3
The reason the world does not know us is that it did not know him. 2 Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known.

The manner in which we live should be something the world just doesn’t get. Not because we’re weird or hard to understand, but because we’re not playing from the same book as they are.

1 John 3
But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is. 3 All who have this hope in him purify themselves, just as he is pure.

A life of faith is having hope, moving in the direction of that which we do not yet see, but it’s not an aspirational hope, like hoping to lose weight or win the lottery; it’s more like a journey you take with a destination. You pack for the trip.

If we know how things end, it changes how we travel.

When you know something can’t run out, you’re much freer with how you give it away.

So, what does it look like to live that way? There’s a catch.

Laid Down
1 John 3
16 This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth.

And this is where many of us get stuck. The idea of love, even the feeling of love, is compelling, attractive, and strong; however, there’s a price tag.

Love is faith with consequences.

1. To your sense of morality
2. Lifestyle and priorities
3. Time and resources
4. Reputation

Jesus Christ laid down His life for us. We lay down our lives for others by following His example. If your faith doesn’t result in action, especially when it comes to love, was it really faith at all?

The truth that we’re loved completely, Jesus is who made that possible.

James 2
17 In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

If there aren’t enough people who “believe” the right things, our world is drastically affected. In the absence of the people who believe in the right things and actually do something about them, our world becomes a race to the bottom, where the loudest, most forceful, and brutal voices win out.

As Christ followers, if we don’t like what we see in the world, God has placed His Spirit, power, and presence in us to change the temperature. And He’s done that for a purpose. So why don’t we do this?

Fear.

But if we have a limitless supply and we know how it ends, what is there to be afraid of?

Confident
1 John 3
19 This is how we know that we belong to the truth and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence: 20 If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. 21 Dear friends, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have confidence before God 22 and receive from him anything we ask, because we keep his commands and do what pleases him. 23 And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.

We’re always subtly asking, “What’s in it for me?” That’s why we appropriate this verse to get what we want, and that’s actually worshiping the god of scarcity. But our God is different. God’s abundance is lavished on us. His love laid down. That’s what makes it possible to have confidence in asking.

Confidence in God gives you the right perspective to ask for the right things for the right purpose.

It’s about His abundance and our alignment. Not for our own walks, but for what we need in any situation to do His will. To walk the way Jesus walked, love the way Jesus loved, pour it out into our broken world, because His love will never run out, and there’s no situation that overwhelms it.

Be confident that God will give you all you need, and as you see need in our broken world, you can ask and ask with confidence.

Movies and moments within movies can be inspiring. Luke Skywalker declaring he will forever be a Jedi, Rocky yelling, “Yo, Adrian,” or learning that life is like a box of chocolates are all examples of this, and the message is clear: never forget who you are and don’t settle for less.

Now, movies have a knack for the dramatics, making it pretty easy to see what’s good and evil, but our lives are rarely that clear-cut. There’s a lot more subtlety in real life.

The world around us is always trying to get us to accept a false version of who we should be (Saul’s armor). This isn’t just true for Christians; it’s true for everyone. But for Christians, Satan will attempt to paint the picture of a weaker version of who we actually are in Christ.

It’s not that he’s trying to turn us to the dark side, because that would be easy to spot. He’s trying to get us to give up the high calling of who we are in Christ. He wants us to settle for less, to play small, to forget, or to stay caught up in fear and apathy, to get entangled in the issues and rabbit trails of the world around, and to live and act like everyone else.

We Need to Remember
This is exactly what was happening in the churches John was writing to, and this is what happens to us.

1 John 2
12 I am writing to you, dear children,
because your sins have been forgiven on account of his name.
13 I am writing to you, fathers,
because you know him who is from the beginning.
I am writing to you, young men,
because you have overcome the evil one.
14 I write to you, dear children,
because you know the Father.
I write to you, fathers,
because you know him who is from the beginning.
I write to you, young men,
because you are strong,
and the word of God lives in you,
and you have overcome the evil one.

In our Bibles, these words look different than the ones around them – like a song or poem. Think about any romantic movie, when you really want to win that other person over or drive the point home, you write a song or a poem.

John starts by telling us to remember. Remember who we are, what we’ve seen. Remember what God has already done and do not settle for less. Then, he sets up the contrast.

1 John 2
15 Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, love for the Father (the Father’s love) is not in them. 16 For everything in the world—the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life—comes not from the Father but from the world. 17 The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.

This is why all of us live up to our calling. We don’t want to live below it, but why do we? There’s something that the world and its way of living offer us that seems incredibly appealing. It pulls us in.

• Love – to have inner fellowship with (to give your heart to).
• The World – the things that perish and pass – the things and people that pull you in the opposite direction of God.

But there’s another word that takes over the passage – Lust.

Fire can be very good when lit in the right places. In the wrong place, it threatens to burn down an entire house. It takes over.

• Lust of the flesh – I feel something I need that I need to satisfy.
• Lust of the eyes – I see something I want to get. You don’t know it’s missing until you see it.
• Pride of life – There’s something I believe I deserve. Greatness, recognition, privilege, power, position, justice, payback, vindication, a relationship, way of life, or standard of living.

How do you get attached to something like this? You keep it in front of you, meditate on it, create and cultivate a space in your life that you believe it is supposed to fill.

When you feed your desires, they don’t go away, they grow.

Now, this sounds almost religious, like worship.

1 John 2
18 Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. This is how we know it is the last hour. 19 They went out from us, but they did not really belong to us. For if they had belonged to us, they would have remained with us; but their going showed that none of them belonged to us. 20 But you have an anointing from the Holy One, and all of you know the truth. 21 I do not write to you because you do not know the truth, but because you do know it and because no lie comes from the truth. 22 Who is the liar? It is whoever denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a person is the antichrist—denying the Father and the Son. 23 No one who denies the Son has the Father; whoever acknowledges the Son has the Father also.

John is talking cryptically here. He’s setting up a standard of comparison – Christ vs. antichrist. When some of us hear that word, it brings to mind the end of times or an apocalypse. But the meaning is simpler, and far more mundane. It means "in place of" or "counter to" Christ. John says that there are a lot of them, not just one. And that’s true.

There are many other places and things we can worship, where we think we put them next to Christ, but they always take the place of Christ. It starts out subtle, but when given the driver’s seat, it will have us embracing a way of living that seeks to substitute all sorts of other things for Jesus as our Savior and our Lord.

We are all wired for worship, it’s just a matter of what, where, who, and when.

The lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life never satisfy or even last. We’re always going to be on the hunt for another one.

1 John 2
17 The world and its desires pass away, but whoever does the will of God lives forever.

So, how do we deal with something that’s as wrapped up in our identity as our desires?

We Need to Remain
1 John 2
28 And now, dear children, continue in him, so that when he appears we may be confident and unashamed before him at his coming. 29 If you know that he is righteous, you know that everyone who does what is right has been born of him.

We start with remember and end with remain. Remember who you are, who God’s called you to be, and don’t live beneath that. But once you remember your position in Christ, remain. John says it 6 times in this passage. Don’t move on, don’t move past, don’t give up, and don’t graduate to something you think is better.

When the world pulls you, when you’re tired, when you don’t see results, when you’re tempted not to trust and to look around at other Jesuses – remain.

Sometimes we are asked to reset passwords. So, we make a new one, immediately forget it, and then live in a perpetual state of being locked out of our own accounts. What if that’s how people experience their relationship with God? Seeing access to God as fragile, like one mistake logs them out.

When you’re not sure if you’re in, your mind starts to wander, and you start to wonder.

• Am I still accepted?
• Am I forgiven?
• Have I gone too far?
  
  

That tension, anxiousness, and doubt is where John begins in Chapter 2 of 1 John. As Christians, we struggle with doubt – not doubt about Jesus but doubt about the relationship with Jesus.

And in a world where we don’t know who to trust, where everything feels unstable, where things are changing really fast, it’s easy to start living like our standing with God is fragile. The problem becomes when we think that our relationship with God is fragile. This leads to Christians who know how to do things for God but don’t actually know Him.

We need to know who we are and whose we are.

When most of us leave the house, we leave prepared. We don’t pack things hoping for a problem, we pack because we understand the reality.

1 John 2
My dear children, I write this to you so that you will not sin. But if anybody does sin, we have an advocate with the Father—Jesus Christ, the Righteous One. 2 He is the atoning sacrifice for our sins, and not only for ours but also for the sins of the whole world.

John is not saying, “Don’t sin, but if you do, it’s okay.” He’s saying, “When you sin, not if, you have an advocate.”

Jesus doesn’t argue your innocence; He presents His righteousness.

If our hope is built on proving our innocence, we all lose. Instead, Scripture says we have an advocate. And our advocate doesn’t argue the quality of our record, He presents the sufficiency of Himself.

And He doesn’t say, “They’re innocent.” He says, “I have paid!” Our assurance with God isn’t grounded in how well our week went, whether our repentance felt sincere, or whether we’ve managed to keep our spiritual streak alive. It’s not about anything we do.

Our assurance is in Jesus alone!

John’s saying the atoning work of Christ isn’t just for people like you. The atoning sacrifice of Jesus doesn’t just rescue people we relate to; it reaches toward people we struggle to understand.

This doesn’t mean everyone automatically receives salvation, but it is saying that the provision of Christ is not limited by our categories. It’s a level playing ground at the foot of the cross, and His love is for all people, despite what we may think.

1 John 2
3 We know that we have come to know him if we keep his commands. 4 Whoever says, “I know him,” but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in that person. 5 But if anyone obeys his word, love for God is truly made complete in them. This is how we know we are in him: 6 Whoever claims to live in him must live as Jesus did.

7 Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. 8 Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and in you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.

The Word of God tells us that assurance in our relationship with God comes from doing what He commands. It comes from a life that bends towards obedience daily. Because if anyone says they know God and are a follower of Jesus but don’t do what He says, what does the Word of God call that person? A liar.

If you’re going to claim it, you need to live it.

There has to be action in your life that proves it. We all want to know we’re loved and accepted by God. We want maximum assurance that we are saved, but we want that assurance with minimal surrender on our part.

And John’s saying you can’t have one without the other. You’ll know that you are following God if you’re obeying God’s Word. Not perfectly or flawlessly, but genuinely, progressively, and willingly.

Obedience isn’t how we earn salvation; obedience is the evidence of salvation.

Ok, so how did Jesus live? What does that look like?

1 John 2
7 Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. 8 Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and in you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining.

To live as Jesus did means to embody the Love that God has for us.

John 13
34 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. 35 By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another.”

Assurance doesn’t come from checking a spiritual checklist; it comes from asking, “Is my life increasingly reflecting the love, humility, and surrender of Jesus?” That’s how we know we’re walking in Him.

1 John 2
9 Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness. 10 Anyone who loves their brother and sister lives in the light, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble. 11 But anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness. They do not know where they are going, because the darkness has blinded them.

John takes something we tend to keep abstract (love) and grounds it in relationship. Most of us don’t think we hate anyone. We define hatred in extreme categories and instinctively assume it doesn’t apply.

Hatred is more subtle and present.

• Dismissal – someone’s point of view isn’t worth your time
• Contempt – reducing someone to a stereotype so you don’t have to see them as human
• Indifference – deciding someone else’s pain isn’t convenient for you
• Dehumanizing language – it’s speaking about people as problems, enemies, and categories instead of image bearers of God who Jesus died for

Our version of hatred is often quiet, respectable, and aligns with whoever is in power. It’s a settled decision in our heart that other people aren’t our problem. That is NOT our call.

Hatred isn’t violence – it’s love withdrawn.

When we regularly live in ways that refuse love towards people we live in proximity to, we’re not being neutral. We are making an active, relational decision. We are engaging in hate.

Love looks like Jesus. It’s sacrificial, initiating, costly, patient, truthful, cross-shaped, and it doesn’t have an excuse. Scripture and Jesus don’t give us that permission.

When you notice it – nurture it.

When you notice someone God has placed in proximity – someone overlooked, frustrating, inconvenient, different, hurting, or hard to love – don’t drift past them. Nurture it. Love doesn’t grow accidentally. Love grows when we respond to what God places in front of us.

When reading the Bible, one of the most important things to do is start by asking a few questions. Why was the author writing this? To whom is the author writing? What was going on at this time? What prompted the author to pick up a pen?

The Bible wasn’t written to us; it was written for us. Throughout generations, across cultures and times, there is incredible consistency. We tend to think the world around us is progressing. There’s more information at our fingertips and more advancement, so it’s easy to think we’ve become more enlightened. But then, and always, human nature rears its ugly head.

In First John, John was writing a letter to THE church, all of the local outposts, not a specific congregation. And by way of history rhyming, and human nature not changing, he’s writing to us.

What John is Addressing

• Gnosticism – This was seen as a more enlightened, progressive moral and religious understanding and path.
• God’s Existence – God existed but couldn’t be known. Jesus wasn’t the son of God, but merely human with a divine spirit. He was a good, moral teacher who did some cool things, but he wasn’t God.
• Jesus Couldn’t Save – He wasn’t God, and by extension, we didn’t need saving. We could save ourselves by keeping the law and doing good works.
• Materialism and Pleasure – This age was coming where life would be all about materialism and pleasure, throwing off all moral restraints.

We have our own version of this in our time.

In every age, there’s a dominant cultural philosophy that needs to be pushed back against by the people of God.

The catch is that most of us can point to what we think this is, and it’s not us; it’s other people, but it’s part of all of us. Jesus spoke to this in the Gospels, where He said, You have a fine way of seeing aside the commands of God in order to observe your own traditions! (Mark 7:9)

1 John 1
That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. 2 The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. 3 We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. 4 We write this to make our joy complete.

John starts right out saying this isn’t a new teaching, but an old one. John was one of Jesus’ disciples; he walked with Him, had seen Him perform miracles, and heal the sick. But most importantly, he saw Him die on the cross and be raised to life.

1 John 1
5 This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light; in him there is no darkness at all. 6 If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth.

He repeats the message that Jesus gave us. John is going to set up many contrasts throughout this letter, contrasting the way of the world and the way of Jesus. We need to do the same and recognize just how much the world around us can subtly shape us.

• God is Perfect – God is pure, He is light. Light shows things for what they truly are, what is real, what is true. It’s not possible to claim to know Jesus and refuse to acknowledge the reality of who God is, not what we make Him out to be.
• We are broken – We don’t like to hear this because this requires us to embrace the truth that we really are broken. Learning about the truth might ruin some of our favorite restaurants or foods. It’s a lot nicer thinking our favorite ice cream sundae is 0 calories instead of the 600+ it might be. We’d rather go about our lives without knowing, but we can’t live that way and follow Jesus. We have to embrace the light.

1 John 1
6 If we claim to have fellowship with him and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not live out the truth.

But there’s something good, not bad, that happens if we walk in the light, even if being seen as we really are is something we don’t want to do.

1 John 1
7 But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin. 8 If we claim to be without sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. 

The light shows us for what we are – sinners, broken, in need of a savior. Remember that John is writing to church people. He’s not contrasting Christians and non-Christians; instead, he’s contrasting the church people who have fallen for this new teaching rather than staying anchored to Jesus.

Christians have this odd thing we do when we don’t want to be confronted over and over again with our sinfulness, even when Jesus has offered salvation. We try to shift the spotlight. It’s one of the best ways to hide from our own sin or shortcomings and shift the spotlight to what “those people over there are doing.” But we remain broken, sinners in need of a savior.

This is precisely the reason you hear stories of Christian leaders who confront “sin” or “the world” who are outed for some scandal later in life.

1 John 1
9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we claim we have not sinned, we make him out to be a liar and his word is not in us.

• Jesus built the bridge – Jesus came to build the bridge between the truth of a perfect God and the reality of a broken people (you and I). But we have to live in some truth when it comes to this bridge, and that’s how Jesus is the son of God, righteous, died for our sins, and the sins of the world.

We all know that we’re not perfect, we’re flawed, fallen, and maybe even sinful. But we often act like the majority of the sin is “over there, not here.” John (and Jesus) is saying that the moment you begin that journey, you begin to make God out to be a liar, and the truth does not live in you.

You can tell the true followers of Jesus by their high view of God, awareness of their own sin, and humble embrace of Jesus.

God is perfect, you are broken, Jesus came to build the bridge.

What if our hope came not from your own good works, a higher plane of knowledge, a more sophisticated faith, or your ability to distract by pointing the spotlight in another direction, but a confidence? What if it was something certain, something strong? A humble confidence that, even as we stand in the light of God’s perfection, and our sinfulness is fully in view, Jesus came to build a bridge?

John goes on a few verses after this, reminding us that even if (and when) we do sin, Jesus stands beside us, as an advocate. We can have confidence.

The truth about God + the truth about you + the transformation that Jesus brings = a radical change in how you live and how you love.

How we live and love shows the transformation Jesus has brought, and what we believe is true about us and about God. How would the people around you answer those questions and solve that equation?

As a person whose heart beats strongly for those who have no access, no scripture, no hope, or no “good news”, Pastor Dan Hutton, who is a former missionary, was the perfect person to kick off our Beyond Our Walls Missions Conference, starting in the Book of Acts.

Acts 9
Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest 2 and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. 3 As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. 4 He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
5 “Who are you, Lord?” Saul asked.
“I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. 6 “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
7 The men traveling with Saul stood there speechless; they heard the sound but did not see anyone. 8 Saul got up from the ground, but when he opened his eyes he could see nothing. So they led him by the hand into Damascus. 9 For three days he was blind, and did not eat or drink anything.

Saul the Persecutor
What is Saul doing? He’s breathing, operating systematically, and is being indiscriminate. Up to this point, Saul thinks he is pleasing God. He looks at this holistically – breath, system, action. Saul is not seeking Jesus, he’s persecuting Jesus. He is blind to what God is doing, which is ironic considering he ends up blind.

Jesus Interrupts Saul
Conversion begins with 3 things:

• Jesus’ initiative
• Jesus’ authority
• Jesus’ grace

In your story, have you seen all of these? Which do you still need to identify? Which do you still need to experience?

It’s a constant battle we all deal with. We want the grace without the initiative or authority of Jesus. Grace is nice because we treat it like a get-out-of-jail-free card. But the strangest thing happens: Jesus brings someone else into the story. Which is actually more common than not if you read scripture.

Acts 9
10 In Damascus there was a disciple named Ananias. The Lord called to him in a vision, “Ananias!”
“Yes, Lord,” he answered.
11 The Lord told him, “Go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and ask for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying. 12 In a vision he has seen a man named Ananias come and place his hands on him to restore his sight.”
13 “Lord,” Ananias answered, “I have heard many reports about this man and all the harm he has done to your holy people in Jerusalem. 14 And he has come here with authority from the chief priests to arrest all who call on your name.”
15 But the Lord said to Ananias, “Go! This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel. 16 I will show him how much he must suffer for my name.”
17 Then Ananias went to the house and entered it. Placing his hands on Saul, he said, “Brother Saul, the Lord—Jesus, who appeared to you on the road as you were coming here—has sent me so that you may see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” 18 Immediately, something like scales fell from Saul’s eyes, and he could see again. He got up and was baptized, 19 and after taking some food, he regained his strength.

Saul spent several days with the disciples in Damascus.

A Random Disciple
Ananias – name means, God is gracious (from Hebrew Hananayah). In this case, there’s a level of grace to Saul, but also to Ananias. Listen to the instructions:

• Go to “the straight way/path”
• Go to the house of Judas

Ananias balks – “God, are you sure? Do you know this guy?” God knows the risk and the opportunity. He sees what Ananias can’t yet. Ananias knows God changed his life, but he had a sense of hesitation in this situation.

Saul is not Paul yet, but still a brother. He receives sight, receives the Holy Spirit, is baptized, and spends days with the disciples.

Maybe we need some of what Ananias offers because God is still gracious. Do you need family, touch, sight, the Holy Spirit, Baptism, or Community? That’s what Transforming the World Beyond Our Walls is all about.

The story of Paul and Ananias is the story of different callings but the same faithfulness. Ananias set the paradigm for all that God would do in and through Paul.

Saul will travel the Roman world, plant churches, and write half of the New Testament. Ananias will walk across town, enter one house, and lay hands on one man.

The church needs both, and Jesus honors both.

Ordinary disciples in familiar places take faithful steps and change the world.

The truth is that you can’t change something for everybody, but through the Gospel, you can change everything for somebody.

When most of us hear the word “reset,” we immediately think restart, but sometimes the problem isn’t that something is broken, it’s that you’re looking at it from the wrong angle. We assume something is wrong because we feel stuck, restless, or unfulfilled, so we restart. But nothing actually changes because we never stop to reimagine why we’re doing what we’re doing in the first place.

Reset doesn’t always mean doing your life differently. Sometimes it means seeing your life differently.

Looking again at who you are, where you are, what you’ve been given, who’s right in front of you, and realizing that purpose might not be something you’re missing, but misunderstanding.

We all want our lives to mean something, to have purpose. Most of us don’t struggle with laziness. We struggle with misalignment. We want our lives to matter, but we’re not always sure how.

We look for purpose as something to be achieved rather than something to be received and stewarded.

We don’t need more potential because there’s always potential. It’s a matter of what happens with it.

Reimagining Our Purpose
Paul reframes everything in Ephesians 2. He starts with honesty, “You were dead in your transgressions and sins…” But then God did something about this that we couldn’t do.

Ephesians 2
4 But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5 made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. 6 And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7 in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace…

God didn’t wait for us to try to find purpose. He made us alive for a purpose.

How? By giving us a list of things to accomplish.

Ephesians 2
8 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9 not by works, so that no one can boast.

This is the HOW. But what about the WHAT?

Ephesians 2
10  “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”

Good work is not the point, it’s the product. Many people can read verse 10 and assume that our purpose is to do good in the world. The challenge with that is that before Paul wrote verse 10, he wrote verses 8-9.

There’s a progression here: grace, identity, works. Not works, acceptance, identity.

We’re not doing good things so that God loves us. God loves us, therefore, we aim to impact the world based on the love that we’ve been given by God. These good works have been prepared for us, they’re not something we manifest ourselves.

Recognizing God’s Handiwork
A masterpiece may have intrinsic value, but its ultimate and lasting impact is actually the impact on others, especially over time. You may not see yourself as a masterpiece, but God does! However, you need to have faith that God sees you differently than you see yourself.

There’s a reason we struggle to let our light shine or our purpose be seen in the right places in the world – it’s because it’s an incredible risk. Think of any musician who wrote their first song or author who wrote their first book. Taking that chance is one of the most terrifying things.

But God sees you and goes with you! He sees what happens when you start walking in purpose before you ever do because He created it.

Purpose doesn’t start with what you do – it starts with what God has already done.

It’s something we find or discover, it’s something we’ve been given. Now, God has done something, yes, salvation, but also wiring. He’s given us more than just salvation, but unique gifting and placement.

• Passion – What gets your heart stirred? Injustice. Connecting people. Solving problems.Passion is like fire – with boundaries, it brings warmth and life, without boundaries, it destroys everything.
  
  Passion rebels against discipline – but it needs it.
  
  Without discipline, it has little impact. Directed, channeled.
  
  
• Position – Everyone has roles. Great failures of our time are people who don’t show up to their positions, people who use their positions for themselves, or people who look at their current positions as a limitation, not an opportunity.  
  
  God places us where He has a purpose, not by accident.

• Proficiency – What are you good at? Where do things get better when you show up?
  
  Are you neglecting the gifts you have while wishing for the ones you don’t?
  
  Proficiencies aren’t just abilities, they’re also resources.God doesn’t ask what you don’t have, He asks how you’re using what you do have.

•  People – What relationships are you taking for granted, avoiding, or phoning in? Who have you already placed in proximity where your life could make a real difference, but you don’t see it or don’t want to see it?
  
  

So, how do we apply this? Ask yourself some simple questions.

• What excites you? (Passion)
• Where am I? (Position)
• What am I good at? (Proficiency)
• Who can I impact? (People)

Pastor Michael Hoddy sits down with Pastor Joey Monteleone to break down how we practically do this in our own lives.

When we come into a new year, it doesn’t automatically change the person we are going into that new year as. Much of the reset we reach for is triggered by something in our lives that isn’t working, or that we’ve come to realize needs to work better. This can be a good place to begin, and God brings those things into our lives to get us to reflect, consider, and change.

However, it also subtly pulls us into a way of thinking that reset is primarily about our lives. How we move, what we have to change, and what we reap from all of it. Basically, how it all works better for us. It’s easy for us to see it as some manner of self-improvement or life improvement because that’s how the world around us sees it. But reset is much more than that.

Those who devote themselves to themselves will ultimately have nothing to show for themselves but themselves.
~ Andy Stanley

Reset Involves Repentance
Reset is about realigning with God’s purpose, not just making your life better.

The irony is that it actually does make your life better, but there’s a catch. You can’t just reset in the “usual” way, you have to reset in God’s way.

Repentance produces realignment. Realignment returns us to God’s purpose for our lives. And when we reset, return, and repent, it returns us to our purpose.

Reset Requires Realignment
True purpose is a means to an end that is not you.
 
We come into this world wanting to be the end, and some adults don’t grow out of this mindset. Some believe their resources are about them being the end, their relationships are about them being the end, and even their religion is about them being the end.

In subtle or not-so-subtle ways, they are the center of their own universe. Our culture even reinforces this. But God sees reset differently. It’s about making your life, all the parts of it, a means rather than an end.

However, if this were easy, we’d all do it. Following Jesus will expose all of your insecurities and might even wound your pride. And both of those are shining a spotlight on some of the places where you’ve made your life an end unto you.

So, how does your life become a means to an end?

Anytime you take something that seems like an end in your life and make it a means to something great, you embrace purpose.

Pastor Michael Hoddy explains how it’s important to keep praying the prayers, but it also might be time to pay the price.

As we begin a new year, the calendar resets, and with it, we attempt to reset. That looks different for everyone, whether it’s a resolution or goal to hit, something to bring to an end or to begin – it’s making space for good things.

But what does reset REALLY mean? We try to drive our resets on willpower and vibes alone, without ever addressing what lies beneath.

A new year doesn’t automatically change the person you’re going into that new year as.

There’s this part of the human condition where we all try to find something to anchor ourselves to, identify ourselves by, or navigate our lives by. There’s nothing wrong with that because it’s normal to have a reference point, whether big or small.

Our lives are completely shaped by a series of reference points – some good, some not, some accurate, some not, some that have a grip on us, or some we’ve been avoiding.

Reference points are completely normal, but the problem comes when we try to reset without moving our reference point.

And sometimes we try to reset without clearly defining our reference points. They become driven by the world around us, telling us what we should be referencing, or we draw them up based on past trauma or circumstances. The problem is that all of these things eventually tap out.

Wouldn’t it be great to build your life on something greater now, rather than when all of those other things have tapped themselves out? As we reset as a community of faith, how can we address that?

It’s All About Jesus

Such a simple phrase, but harder than it seems. For people beginning a new year, and for a church, it’s important to ask: Are our lives really all about Jesus?
What are the implications of it really being all about Jesus?

• Why should I care?
• Why should I make Jesus my reference point?
• Why should Jesus be my reset?

John 14
5 Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”

Thomas is focused on where Jesus is going. He’s looking for something to do, rather than someone to encounter. Thomas has been following Jesus for a while, yet he’s still missing the point.

We can follow Jesus and still miss Jesus.

Look how Jesus answers the question – the way is not a path, it’s a person.

John 14
6 Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. 7 If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”
Jesus is the whole ballgame. He’s the only way to God, and if you know Jesus, you know God. That’s why it’s all about Jesus.

1. Jesus is the Way

Any path leads you to something and away from other things. You can’t take two paths, you can only take one. Jesus famously said, “You can’t serve two masters, you’ll love the one, and hate the other.”

2. Jesus is the Truth
What do you do with a reference point? You refer to it. You check your direction, path, and progress in relation to it. Different markers or maps might move or get changed; Jesus doesn’t. That’s why it’s so important to be intentional about coming back to Jesus.

3. Jesus is the Life
What energizes you? What makes you alive?

There’s the path you take, the way of following Jesus, there’s the truth of who you’re following, and then there’s the spirit, or life, which animates the truth. All three work together like the legs of a stool. If one is missing, the stool falls over.

In Luke 9, after Jesus sent the disciples out and after they saw the miracles, some people weren’t nice to them. “Do you want us to call down fire from heaven?” These are people who have followed Jesus, literally, but have missed the spirit of Jesus with devastating potential impact.

So, what does it look like if you’re on the path of Jesus?

You encounter Jesus. Jesus encounters you.

Jesus wants to intersect with every aspect of your life and transform it from death to life. Where is Jesus encountering you right now?

Things begin to change.

This isn’t just a spiritual experience, it’s a whole-life one. Not one-and-done, but ongoing. Maybe not your circumstances, but how you go through them.

• Jesus came to be Savior and Lord of all of us – priorities, emotions, pain, relationships, ambitions.
• What area of your life is on the table right now? We think transformation is this positive thing, and it is, but getting there can be painful.
• This is ongoing. Maybe that struggle, blind spot, that place you keep rationalizing and trying to avoid is where transformation needs to happen. It’s where you need a reset.

Join Jesus in His mission.

Mark 10:45
45 For even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”

We need to pour what Jesus has done for us out into the lives of others because, in doing so, they encounter Christ. Ask yourself, where am I being poured out right now? Maybe it’s your family or friends, but Jesus calls us to more. It should be your neighbors, people you’re serving, or faith-filled risks you’re taking. Maybe it’s the resources that God has given you – the time, talents, or treasure.

If you can clearly point to that in your life, maybe, as someone who wants to follow Jesus, you need a reset.

Pastor Michael Hoddy explains what our world could begin to look like if we took this reset seriously.

Nothing transforms a human being faster than the announcement of unexpected company, unless you are someone whose house is always ready for visitors.

Whether it’s last minute or something you’ve been expecting for a while, you live differently when someone is coming. And it’s not just company, because Jesus is coming back too, whether we are ready or not.

We love predicting, not preparing. We love solving mysteries. We love predicting the end times, unlocking timelines, or cracking prophetic codes. Why is this? Because when the world feels chaotic, uncertain, and loud, prediction feels like clarity.

Wars. Elections. Economies. Cultural Shifts. Moral confusion. Everything feels like it’s moving faster than we can process. And when life feels like that, we don’t want just hope, we want explanations.

• This is why this is happening.
• This fits here on the timeline.
• This means that prophecy is being fulfilled.

It’s then that the chaos feels manageable, but not because it’s gone, but because it’s organized. The problem is that you can correctly interpret the moment and still miss the calling.

Prediction takes us out of the moment, preparation plants us in it.

Prediction lets us stand outside the moment and analyze it, requires us to live inside the moment faithfully, and makes us commentators or even disciples.

Jesus doesn’t just want us informed about the times – He wants us formed by trust in the middle of them.

If we’re going to follow the Way of Jesus and the Word of God, we have to remember that Jesus never tells us to figure out His return, but He does call us to faithful living in the time we live in.

When prediction replaces preparation, we don’t become ready people, we become extremely people.

Living faithfully in the present is hard. We tend to drift one of two ways.

1. We ignore His return.
2. We obsess over His return.

Both extremes keep us from faithful, present obedience, avoiding the fact that if Jesus is really coming back and that how we live right now matters.

So, what does Scripture actually say about Jesus’ return?

God is a God of promises
John 14
27 Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled; do not be afraid.
28 You heard Me say, ‘I am going away, and I am coming back to you.’

We serve a God who always keeps His promises. It’s the same God and the same Jesus that made us the promise of His return.

• Jesus will literally return.
• He will personally return.
• His return is imminent – could occur at any time.

And we acknowledge that there are multiple views on how and when He will return. But there is unity about the fact that He is coming back.

So, what does Jesus say?

Matthew 24
36 “But about that day or hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father.

Jesus doesn’t know when He’s coming back. So, if Jesus didn’t give a date… why do we need one? If the Son didn’t have the date, maybe the Father wasn’t asking us to figure it out. Maybe he was asking us to trust Him without it.

Dates create deadlines, but trust creates dependence.

Deadlines aren’t bad, they’re useful, but they create the illusion that something can be postponed. They tell us that things can be deferred. And deadlines can do the same thing spiritually. Deadlines quietly teach us that obedience, faithfulness, staying awake – it’s all something we can deal with later instead of something we do right now.

That’s not the kind of thing Jesus is after.

Matthew 24
37 As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark; 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 40 Two men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. 41 Two women will be grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left.

“The days of Noah.” Jesus isn’t commenting on the sinfulness of the time or emphasizing how sinful people were, but how ordinary life felt right up until something imminent happened. The passage here isn’t to display wicked excess, it’s showing unconcerned normalcy. People were so absorbed in daily life that they ignored God’s warning through Noah.

Jesus tells us to be alert, and not because we don’t have the information, but because we ignore it. We need to be alert!

Matthew 24
42 “Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. 43 But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. 44 So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.

The word alert doesn’t mean anxious, paranoid, scanning headlines, or decoding dates.

Alertness looks like daily faithfulness, not dramatic moments.

This is so that when Jesus returns, whenever that is and in whatever time, He finds His people doing what He’s asked us to do, not because we know when He’s coming but because we know WHO is coming. And when He does, He won’t find His people staring at the sky, He’ll find us living like He’s already King.

How would you live in 2026 if you truly expected Jesus to return?

Pastor Joey explains that being alert isn’t proven in what we say or believe, it’s revealed in this.

The season of Advent is historically a season of waiting. So much of Christmas is about expectancy and expectation. It’s preparing, getting ready, decorating, and buying gifts, but it’s waiting. Some of us love this, some of us are kind of cynical about it, but there’s this thing that never gets old, and that’s when the calendar flips to December.

While we expect some kinds of waiting, we also hate to wait. No one enjoys mall parking lots, traffic, checkout lines, or lines to see Santa. It triggers something within us, messes with our plans, and threatens our sense of control. It’s frustrating.

And where it gets really complicated is when it comes to God. We have this expectant waiting that God can do BIG things. He provides, answers prayers, and makes a way when there isn’t one, but there’s the frustrating kind of waiting too.

• Why won’t God do something?
• Why isn’t He coming through?
• I need Him to do something now!
• I thought He promised, did He forget?

Why Should We Wait?
Whether we are waiting for clarity, healing, provision, a relationship to mend, doors to open, kids to come home, or prayers to break through.

We don’t hate waiting because it’s long, we hate it because we can’t see how it works out.

Waiting is a reminder that we’re not in control. There’s a tension we feel between expectancy and frustration when it comes to waiting. We think, “If God isn’t moving fast enough, maybe I can speed this up. Maybe I can help Him out, it sure seems like He needs some help here!”

We start to question if God is in control, or if He even cares or sees what’s happening. That’s when our expectancy turns to frustration. And if we struggle with God without understanding how God works in the waiting, we miss God, we misunderstand what’s happening, and we begin to go down the path of cynicism, doubt, or even worse.

Why Should We Rush?
The problem isn’t that God is slow, it’s that we’re rushing. None of us is alone in this, we all do it. And the good news is not that we are always faithful in our waiting, but that God is always faithful in His coming.

Genesis 12
The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.
2 “I will make you into a great nation,
and I will bless you;
I will make your name great,
and you will be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you,
and whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will be blessed through you.” 
4 So Abram went, as the Lord had told him; and Lot went with him. Abram was seventy-five years old when he set out from Harran. 5 He took his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated and the people they had acquired in Harran, and they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there.
6 Abram traveled through the land as far as the site of the great tree of Moreh at Shechem. At that time the Canaanites were in the land. 7 The Lord appeared to Abram and said, “To your offspring I will give this land.” So he built an altar there to the Lord, who had appeared to him.
8 From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with Bethel on the west and Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord.

God makes a promise to Abraham, and it’s the kind of promise we like. Everything is up and to the right. It has a powerful and lasting impact, but when we draw back the lens, we see much more.

1. Abraham is wealthy, established, living with family, and well-resourced.
2. Abraham and his wife Sarah have no Children. Sarah is barren, and they are both old – Abraham in his 70s, Sarah in her 60s. Not exactly “childbearing age.”
3. In the call to Abraham in verse 1, God promises a destination but hasn’t shown it yet. God is asking Abraham to abandon his home for an unseen promise, but this isn’t like moving to a new state, it’s like moving to a new country without knowing exactly where you’ll end up.
4. God promises Abraham many descendants in verse 2, but he is an old man with a barren wife.
5. Abraham takes the big step of faith and actually does it! But the story isn’t over.

Because then, the waiting begins.

As the years pass, Abraham and Sarah both keep getting older, and the frustration sets in because, very often, it takes more faith to wait than to go. But 25 years later, finally, a son was born to the old man and his barren wife. Promised fulfilled!

But even that seems to fall short when he dies. However, the waiting doesn’t just stretch across Abraham’s life, it stretches far beyond that. It stretches across generations.

Why Should We Trust?
God’s original promise wasn’t just about political or physical greatness, it was becoming a people through whom God would bring blessings to all of humanity, a promise ultimately fulfilled through Jesus Christ.

Matthew, in his gospel, begins to lay out the genealogy and the story of Jesus, ending with this:

Matthew 1
17 Thus there were fourteen generations in all from Abraham to David, fourteen from David to the exile to Babylon, and fourteen from the exile to the Messiah.

So, it’s all connected, and the waiting is worth it, but this isn’t a 5-minute wait at a red light, it is 42 generations worth of waiting.

And Abraham doesn’t know the connection. Some of us don’t see the connection to God’s promises in your life and how they are the slow work of salvation in your life – and that’s okay. Obey anyway.

Between Abraham and Jesus were centuries of waiting, often in silence, but Advent tells us that slow is not the same as absent. Before God fulfills a promise, He forms a person. God intentionally makes us wait on purpose.

What God does in us as we wait is as important as the thing we are waiting for.

There’s something that develops in us in faithful waiting that doesn’t grow any other way. When we wait there’s a space where something can grow. Cynicism, doubt, bitterness, endurance, or faith? What’s growing in you?

We need to have a faith where we believe that the promise we’re waiting for means something much bigger than we can comprehend, and what God is doing in us in the meantime might matter even more.

Pastor Michael explains that Christmas is the proof that God always keeps His promises even when the waiting is long.

One of the most magical parts of Christmas is Christmas lights. Have you ever attempted to put up Christmas lights with another family member, probably your child, only to be met by a somewhat forced, “looks great,” upon completion? Or have you ever been the one trying to encourage the person putting up the lights with a “looks great?” The promise of lights is really a promise of being together.

The love for the creator or the observer isn’t based on whether the act was performed well or on how magical the house looked. The love stems from the relationship between the two.

The same can be said about our relationship with God. It’s not dependent on how well we perform.

We all have moments where we try so hard to get it right, and when things don’t go the way we hoped, we start hearing this voice in our heads.

• “You should be doing better.”
• “You’re letting people down.”
• “God must be tired of this by now.”
• “You messed up the moment – and now you’ve messed up the promise.”

It’s moments like this that something starts to creep into our hearts and build inside of us. It’s fear. We fear that our behavior disqualifies us, and our worst days define us. We fear that our failures somehow separate us from God’s promise. So, we walk through life afraid that what we’ve done has changed the terms of God.

God’s promises do not crack under the weight of our failure.

This is why Genesis 3 hits so hard. It’s not just a story about Adam and Eve, it’s a story about us.

Genesis 3
1 Now the serpent was more crafty than any of the wild animals the Lord God had made. He said to the woman, “Did God really say, ‘You must not eat from any tree in the garden’?”
2 The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, ‘You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.’”
4 “You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”
6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they realized they were naked; so they sewed fig leaves together and made coverings for themselves.
8 Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 But the Lord God called to the man, “Where are you?”
10 He answered, “I heard you in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid.”
11 And he said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree that I commanded you not to eat from?”
12 The man said, “The woman you put here with me—she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.”
13 Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”
The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
14 So the Lord God said to the serpent, “Because you have done this,
“Cursed are you above all livestock
and all wild animals!
You will crawl on your belly
and you will eat dust
all the days of your life.
15 And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;
he will crush your head,
and you will strike his heel.”

This might be the darkest chapter in the Bible, but it contains the first spark of the Christmas story.

Verses 1-5
The serpent comes and presents the first false gospel, but it’s not a political battle or some epic supernatural showdown. The very first time Scripture records an attack from the enemy, it’s an attack of insecurity.

The most insecure areas of your life are where the enemy will hit you the hardest.

When fighting an enemy, you go for the weak spot. The enemy doesn’t fight fair, and we need to stop expecting him to. One of the weakest spots of all humanity is:

• Am I still loved?
• Am I still accepted?
• Have my failures separated me from God?

Because the enemy knows the truth, he can poison your belief about God’s character; he doesn’t need to mess with anything else.

This is our wakeup call!

We scan the world for evil in politics, culture, headlines, and institutions. Still, meanwhile, our thoughts about God – our beliefs about His goodness, His nearness, His promises, His love – are left completely unguarded and unchecked.

If he can get you to doubt who God is, he can get you to doubt who you are and who you are to God. If he can shake your confidence in God’s promise, he can unravel your confidence in God’s presence.

This is why Genesis 3 matters.

Verses 9-13
Here’s the moment they get caught.

Think of when a child disobeys. Usually, the first question asked by an adult is, “What did you do?” And we ask this because we’re allowing the disobeyer to confess.

But that’s not what God asks.

The very first sentence after sin enters the world is not, “Do you know what you’ve done?” “Why did you do this?” “Look at the mess you’ve made.”

Instead, God says, “Where are you?”

He doesn’t ask because He lacks information. He’s not confused. He’s asking because He’s inviting relationship. He’s seeking His children and pursuing what’s lost – not interrogating. He wants them to know that even in their shame, hiding, or fear, He’s still drawing near.

God doesn’t run from sinners; He runs toward them.

Matthew 1
22 All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet: 23 “The virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel” (which means “God with us”).

In Genesis, God asks, “Where are you?” In Bethlehem, He answers His own question, “I am with you.”

The question of Eden becomes the declaration of Advent. The real story of Scripture is God relentlessly coming toward us.

God always comes looking for us – always.

Not because we deserve it. Not because we apologized. Not because we wanted Him first. Not because of anything we could do. God comes looking for His people because of who God is. He doesn’t come looking for us after we’ve changed. He seeks us while we are still sinners.

Advent is not about humanity climbing back to God; it is about God coming down to us. The manger is proof that God doesn’t wait for the world to be ready for Him – He enters a world that will NEVER be ready apart from Him moving in our direction.

Verses 14-15
Because sin has entered the world, God has to judge it. But notice who the judgment and curse are directed at first. It’s not Adam or Eve. It’s the serpent.

• Now, YOU are cursed.
• Now, YOU are going to crawl on your belly.
• Now, YOU will eat dust.

God is talking to the serpent, a real animal used in the temptation. But He’s also talking to Satan, the evil behind the serpent, the enemy of our souls. The pronouncement is also of Satan’s humiliation and defeat.

Before God ever announces our redemption, He announces evil’s defeat.

That order matters. It tells us that God isn’t improvising in response to sin. He’s not scrambling to rescue humanity. He’s sovereign, aware, and entirely in command. Redemption is not God reacting to evil; it’s God overthrowing it.

Genesis reminds us that the battle didn’t start with us, and it doesn’t end with us. God stepped into the conflict first, confronting the enemy before comforting His people. The Christian life is not fought for victory – it’s fought from victory.

Imagine taking a final exam, knowing your grade is already secured. That’s the Christian life. We’re not trying to pass the test. In Christ, the outcome is settled. Victory is secured. God declared evil’s defeat before He declared salvation’s plan.

We fear the things we’ve done disqualify us from God’s love and promises. We fear we’ve blown it, gone too far, or that God is looking to punish us, not rescue us. But Genesis 3 disproves that.

If God declares that the enemy is defeated, then nothing about your past, behavior, or brokenness can stop Him from loving you, coming for you, or saving you.

Genesis 3
15 And I will put enmity
between you and the woman,
and between your offspring and hers;

Enmity means deep hostility, active opposition, or intense conflict between two parties. God’s declaring a lifelong, multigenerational conflict between the serpent (evil) and humanity – a spiritual battle that runs through Scripture until…

Genesis 3
he will crush your head,
and you will strike his heel.”

This is a birth announcement – the first Christmas prophecy. Someone is coming.

• He will be born of a woman – God Himself will enter our world through the very humanity that fell.
• He will be wounded but victorious. The cross will cost him, but the wound won’t define Him – the victory will.
• His victory will be final and complete. Crushing the serpent’s head means total, irreversible defeat.

So right there in Genesis 3, before Adam and Eve even step out of the garden, God says, “Someone is coming – Someone who will put everything back together.”

And here’s what’s so personal about it – God isn’t just making a theological point; He’s making a family promise. He’s telling His children, “I know you’re hiding. I know you’re afraid. I know you think you’ve ruined everything. But I’m not leaving you this way. Someone is coming… for you.”

That’s Advent.

Not just a manger scene, but a promise fulfilled. Advent is God telling us He hasn’t given up on us and that Jesus is already on His way.

Pastor Joey explains that even in our failure, fear, or even when we deserved judgment and condemnation, God promised anyway.

In 1 Timothy 6, Paul is speaking to Timothy, who is the leader of a local church. So, indirectly, he’s talking to both church leaders and church goers, Christians, about drifting. These are the people who started with Jesus but began to drift back into other directions, or they never allowed Jesus to be the Lord of this area of their lives to start with.

1 Timothy 6
3 If anyone teaches otherwise and does not agree to the sound instruction of our Lord Jesus Christ and to godly teaching, 4 they are conceited and understand nothing. They have an unhealthy interest in controversies and quarrels about words that result in envy, strife, malicious talk, evil suspicions 5 and constant friction between people of corrupt mind, who have been robbed of the truth and who think that godliness is a means to financial gain.

This is a declaration. What you’ve heard and what you’re about to hear is the way (the instructions) of Jesus. If you don’t receive it, you’re either distracted, or arrogant and foolish – strong words.

Then, this contrast happens.

Contentment
1 Timothy 6
6 But godliness with contentment is great gain. 7 For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. 

There’s a deception we believe around this.

First of all, our world is primed to try to make us discontent. Newer, bigger, better. We don’t get to take any of it with us. Someone else will one day have to filter through the objects of our accumulation.

Secondly, we are tempted to exchange the blessings that have come into our lives for things that are supposed to bring us contentment. And maybe we are for a moment. However, the problem is that we’re never content for very long. There’s always something more.

Things that God has brought into our lives to bless others often end up being things we consume in an attempt to bless ourselves.

The irony is that this drags us away from experiencing a blessed life, a life that makes an impact. It doesn’t bring us closer to a blessed, impactful life.

Now, God has brought things into this world for us to enjoy. We’re not to reject them. But they are not to become our purpose. We’re not to worship at the altar of the relentless, unrestrained pursuit of more.

And that actually does something worse than distract us, it leads us into a trap.

Temptation
1 Timothy 6
9 Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil. Some people, eager for money, have wandered from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

Paul is talking about money.

Money isn’t evil, but the love of it – the unrestrained pursuit of it – is.
 
Your money leads you somewhere and tells a story about your life. It’s not inherently evil, but it’s not inherently good either. And money definitely isn’t the only measure of this in someone’s life, but it’s the leading indicator.

And that pursuit or love doesn’t just give you an out-of-balance life, it actually leads you into a trap that you didn’t see coming. It separates you from God and ultimately leads you to a life pierced by grief.
Command

1 Timothy 3
11 But you, man of God, flee from all this, and pursue righteousness, godliness, faith, love, endurance and gentleness.
 
Don’t play around with it. Don’t try to flirt on the edges of it. Don’t get in that cage with the lion. Don’t poke the snake. FLEE.

Flee from this and pursue something better.

If we are to be the Jesus followers who live differently from the world and are a witness to the people around us, it’s a command.

1 Timothy 3
17 Command those who are rich in this present world not to be arrogant nor to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. 18 Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. 19 In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life.

These words are spoken by Paul and by God because God has a purpose for His people.

God doesn’t want something from you, He wants something for you.

Sacrificial generosity hurts, but it brings us something better in return. We’re called to generosity, and a lack of it isn’t about having a money problem, it’s about having a generosity problem, and because of that, a spiritual problem.

Pastor Michael Hoddy shares how we can all step out in faith and then see what God can do.

From cover to cover, the Bible is all about relationships. Relationships with God, with others in this new family of Jesus, and with the people and world around us. And the church – the community of faith – is also ALL about relationships. It’s not about sermons, songs, or how good the service was.

The Bible makes it clear that these relationships can’t be separated, they’re intertwined. For example, Jesus was asked by religious leaders what the greatest commandment was. They were attempting to trap Him by forcing Him to make a choice. Instead, he responds in the Gospel of Matthew.

Matthew 22
37Jesus replied “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

The phrase “is like it” is used frequently in the Bible, particularly in relation to Jesus’ parables. It’s when Jesus is telling a story to illustrate a principle. So, here, He’s saying, “the second one illustrated, clarifies, makes real, the first one.” We can believe many other things, but if we don’t get this one right, we miss it.

Your relationships with other people show them what God is like.

However, there’s a problem we encounter. We begin to believe that we can separate these relationships and live them differently. We think we can have a relationship with God that’s separate from our relationship with a local church, which in turn is separate from our relationship with the world around us.

EMBRACING the Way of Jesus & the Word of God
LIVING it out in ourselves and our families
TRANSFORMING the world Beyond our Walls

If we’re going to take the Word of God and the Way of Jesus seriously, live it out here, and then beyond our walls, we can’t separate these things. And it all starts with how we can, and why.

The passage in 1 Timothy 5 can be challenging for us to understand because it addresses a specific set of situations within a particular early church. Still, there’s a principle behind it that applies to us.

“Methods are many, principles are few, methods always change, principles never do.”

The people and world around us may constantly change (the methods), but the way we interact with them never should. When we get it right, it clearly paints the right picture of our relationship with God and God’s relationship with people in a way people understand (the principle).

The Why and How of Caring

Most people have a sense of care for others, but a gap often emerges between the feelings we have about caring and the reality of our actions. Some of that is due to our sinful nature – self-centeredness – but a lot actually is because we have feelings without a plan.

Truly caring for others is not accidental, it’s intentional. Care is putting in the effort.

Caring about other people is more than having feelings, it’s having a plan.

You are intentionally creating margin, figuring out the why, and you are doing it preemptively before you actually need it.

So, how do we put this into practice?
1. Caring for others is taking responsibility for yourself and those you have responsibility for first. Responsibility is neither created nor destroyed, it’s simply passed around.

1 Timothy 5
3 Give proper recognition to those widows who are really in need. 4 But if a widow has children or grandchildren, these should learn first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents, for this is pleasing to God. 5 The widow who is really in need and left all alone puts her hope in God and continues night and day to pray and to ask God for help. 6 But the widow who lives for pleasure is dead even while she lives. 7 Give the people these instructions, too, so that no one may be open to blame. 8 If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.

2. Caring is for the good of the person, even when they can’t always see it yet. Sometimes care is grace, but sometimes it’s truth to keep them from sin. Loving, not enabling.

1 Timothy 5
9 No widow may be put on the list of widows unless she is over sixty, has been faithful to her husband, 10 and is well known for her good deeds, such as bringing up children, showing hospitality, washing the feet of the saints, helping those in trouble and devoting herself to all kinds of good deeds. 11 As for younger widows, do not put them on such a list. For when their sensual desires overcome their dedication to Christ, they want to marry. 12 Thus they bring judgment on themselves, because they have broken their first pledge. 13 Besides, they get into the habit of being idle and going about from house to house. And not only do they become idlers, but also gossips and busybodies, saying things they ought not to. 14 So I counsel younger widows to marry, to have children, to manage their homes and to give the enemy no opportunity for slander. 15 Some have in fact already turned away to follow Satan.

3. Caring shows honor to others, regardless of their status or your feelings about it. Be clear-headed, careful, but intentional.

1 Timothy 5

1 Do not rebuke an older man harshly, but exhort him as if he were your father. Treat younger men as brothers, 2 older women as mothers, and younger women as sisters, with absolute purity.

17 The elders who direct the affairs of the church well are worthy of double honor, especially those whose work is preaching and teaching. 

4. Caring keeps people connected to the new family of Jesus. It does not create stumbling blocks that disconnect them.

1 Timothy 5
23 Stop drinking only water, and use a little wine because of your stomach and your frequent illnesses.

Now, some people love the sound of this verse, but the challenge here is what we see with the results of overindulgence, of going beyond God’s boundaries. Our world is a chaotic mess of consumption and excess.

The Where and When of Consumption

We live in a society that celebrates consumption. We ought not to be like that, but the way we avoid being like that is not to retreat from the good things and blessings that God has given us, but to receive them, recognize their source, and be thankful with them. This needs to be done with humility and limits, not allowing those things to become our rulers.

If what you’re doing damages your witness to those around you and to the watching world, stop.

You’re not showing care, you’re making it hard for people to see Jesus. That’s a big part of this letter to Timothy. A lot of times, when people say, “is it a sin if…?” What they’re really asking is, “How close can I get to the edge?” We shouldn’t live our lives asking how close we can get to the edge.

Maybe because of what you’ve been through or the current company you keep, you’ve chosen that abstaining from certain things is a better choice. And that should be celebrated because you’re submitting to a greater purpose. You are caring.

You’re honoring the other person and, in doing so, honoring God. You are not being ruled. However, this is about caring well and not about scoring brownie points with God.

On the other side, if you need it so bad, whatever “it” is – alcohol, food, pleasure, leisure, even a relationship, then it’s ruling you. And only God should do that. So, how do we assess?

• Put a price tag on your well-intentioned feelings. Don’t just feel something, do something.
• Focus your care on the people and places where you can actually make a meaningful difference.
• Reflect.
  
  

1 Timothy 5
24 The sins of some men are obvious, reaching the place of judgment ahead of them; the sins of others trail behind them. 25 In the same way, good deeds are obvious, and even those that are not cannot be hidden.

Either way, there’s consequence, positively or negatively. We think we can separate our relationships, but we can’t. Why wouldn’t we want a legacy worth leaving?

Your relationships with other people show them what God is like, so show them a clear picture that’s unmistakable and unmissable, because you care.

Pastor Michael Hoddy delves deeper into why you should care.

There are things we are good at because we’ve done them consistently over an extended period, having trained for them. Whether it’s our fitness, careers, or relationships, if we don’t work on it over time, we won’t progress from where we are to where we want to be.

There’s a training aspect to almost everything in life we want to excel at, including following the Way of Jesus. It’s not something that happens overnight.

We understand the principle of training, which is that it requires investment. We invest ourselves, our time, and our energy into all sorts of things, and none of those investments are wrong, they simply reveal that we already believe training matters. The question isn’t whether we are training, the question is, “What are we training for?”

There are things we train for, and there are things that train us.

We are constantly being trained by something. Screens train our attention, apps train our impulses, and purchases train our desires. We think we’re consuming content, but the content is really consuming us.

The reality is that formation is happening in our lives constantly, whether we are aware of it or not. The question isn’t, “Am I being trained?” The question is, “Who or what is training me?”

Training matters because without it, we drift. We don’t drift because we choose rebellion, we drift because we are born with leaky hearts. Spiritual formation is not a one-and-done event. It’s a lifelong training reality. The problem is that we don’t drift toward spiritual health.

If we are not actively being formed by Christ, we are being formed by something else.

If we don’t come back to being trained by the Way of Jesus and the Word of God, something else will fill that space and begin to form who you are. Paul speaks to this human tendency, not shaming the drift, but also acknowledging it, focusing on a rhythm of returning.

Training and Deception
1 Timothy 4
1 The Spirit clearly says that in later times some will abandon the faith and follow deceiving spirits and things taught by demons.

Paul isn’t trying to create a sense of fear, he’s trying to explain the world we live in so we don’t misinterpret what we see. Paul is not introducing a new idea because Jesus said the same thing in Matthew 24:10-13. This reveals a fundamental aspect of God’s sovereignty.

God is not reacting. God is ruling.

God is not watching history unfold with surprise, God knows the landscape of the world with perfect clarity. Whenever Scripture describes the condition of humanity in the last days, it isn’t intended to spark panic, rather, it serves as a reminder that God is fully aware and engaged. God Himself is speaking and preparing His people.

Deceiving spirit and things taught by demons mean that behind the teaching is a spiritual deception. This is strong language because these teachings are rooted in spiritual deception. The intention is to distort the truth of the Gospel.

A deceiving spirit and things taught by demons are anything that has most of the Gospel with just a little bit of a lie added in.

• “God wants you to be happy.”
  Truth: God does give joy. Lie: God is solely focused on your comfort.
• “Truth is personal; it’s my truth.”
  Truth: Jesus said I am the truth. Lie: I have the final word and authority on what is true.

These ideas are not outrageous. They blend in. This is why training matters – because every day, something is trying to disciple us.

1 Timothy 4
3 They forbid people to marry and order them to abstain from certain foods, which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and who know the truth. 4 For everything God created is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving, 5 because it is consecrated by the word of God and prayer.

Here, Paul exposes one of the specific deceptions spreading in the church, asceticism. This is a teaching that holiness comes from rejecting good things that God made, such as marriage and certain foods. Paul is saying that God created these things to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth, and others say that good things from God are bad and should be avoided.

Confusing? Sure, but do you want to know what’s from God and what’s not?

Read your Bible.

How easy do you think it will be to fall for deceiving spirits and things taught by demons when we aren’t training ourselves, our kids, our churches to pray and read the word of God? Paul says to know the truth, you need to train in truth.

Training and Godliness
1 Timothy 4
6 If you point these things out to the brothers and sisters, you will be a good minister of Christ Jesus, nourished on the truths of the faith and of the good teaching that you have followed. 7 Have nothing to do with godless myths and old wives’ tales; rather, train yourself to be godly. 8 For physical training is of some value, but godliness has value for all things, holding promise for both the present life and the life to come. 9 This is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance.

Godliness is an inner devotion that permeates our outer practices. We’re focusing on becoming a church and a people that is practice-based. It’s to help develop an inner devotion to God that works its way outward.

The outside can be performed, but the inside must be transformed.

You can fake a lot of things today, but you can’t fake a transformation that never took place. The same holds true in our spiritual lives. It’s incredibly easy to come to church, lift your hands, sing the lyrics, nod your head, smile at the right people, and say the right phrases, but when the storm comes and your faith is tested, the spiritual well you need to drink from is dry.

1 Timothy 4
11 Command and teach these things. 12 Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity. 13 Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching. 14 Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through prophecy when the body of elders laid their hands on you.

15 Be diligent in these matters; give yourself wholly to them, so that everyone may see your progress. 16 Watch your life and doctrine closely. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers.

Godliness can’t be faked, it must be trained. It doesn’t matter how old you are if you’re training in Godliness. You might’ve heard this passage as a kid, but one day you turn around and realize that you’re the adult in the room.

There comes a moment where our examples become memories, and we become examples.

The Gospel is something that begins within and works its way outward. When we take the truth of this book and the way of Jesus, and devote ourselves to Godliness, it has the power to transform both us and those around us. Age doesn’t matter.

This is why Paul is telling us to watch our lives and doctrine closely. Pay attention to this because it’s for you, but bigger than you. It’s the greater “why.”

Pastor Joey reminds us that the “why” that someone else could come to faith in Jesus should make this powerful enough to do it. 

Have you ever met someone in person who didn’t live up to the expectations you had envisioned? For example, the picture on their dating profile was a bit of a misrepresentation, or their resume was supreme, but their personality was subpar.

Things start out well, but over time, cracks appear. And this doesn’t just refer to other people, it’s us too.

We live in a world that rewards visibility over virtue. If you can post it, market it, or say it loud enough, you can get attention. If you make yourself appear impressive, you can get what you want, where you want.

But does it produce fruit that lasts or a legacy worth leaving?

Character
We’ve all been on the other side of something or someone that looked good but isn’t good. It feels like a bait-and-switch, a betrayal of trust. No one likes to be on the other side of that.

But we ALL are like that in some ways. We all have areas of our public life that differ from how we are in our private lives. We say one thing and think another. We act or talk one way around some people, but differently around others. We aspire to one thing but find ourselves falling short. So, it begs the question…

Am I the same person outside as I am inside?

This comes down to character. This is important for all of us, but especially for the places where other people look to us —where we have influence and leadership.

Our level of character starts with us, but it NEVER just affects us.

Desire is only the first step, there’s so much more. There are many forms of church leadership, and several terms are used to describe them (overseer, elder, deacon, bishop).

But that’s not the most important thing to figure out. It’s easy to make this about the org chart and miss the point. The most important thing isn’t the structure, it’s the character. It’s easy to try to turn to structure, update it, and change it when there are problems, but the root issue is character.

1 Timothy 3
Here is a trustworthy saying: Whoever aspires to be an overseer desires a noble task. 2 Now the overseer is to be above reproach, faithful to his wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach, 3 not given to drunkenness, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. 4 He must manage his own family well and see that his children obey him, and he must do so in a manner worthy of full respect. 5 (If anyone does not know how to manage his own family, how can he take care of God’s church?) 6 He must not be a recent convert, or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil. 7 He must also have a good reputation with outsiders, so that he will not fall into disgrace and into the devil’s trap.6 Not a novice, lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil.
7 Moreover he must have a good report of them which are without; lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.

Integrity
We would start with skills, talents, abilities, or qualifications, but Paul’s list doesn’t.

• Blameless – Integrity – Truth and time walk hand in hand.
  This should cause us to reflect on ourselves. We can’t outrun or outperform the truth. It will always come out.
• Husband of one wife (“one woman man”) – what else, not just who else, are you married to?
• Able to teach – everything I do communicates. Taste your words before you spit them out.
• Temperate, sober-minded. What are you ruled by? Am I master of myself so I can be a servant to many?
• Not violent – not trying to control and manipulate others – not infringing on their personal “territory.” (Violent = quarrelsome, overbearing, looking for a fight or argument) Are you trying to win or project something?
• Manage his own family well – this leader leads at home FIRST. There’s a reason for this beyond it being a good thing to do. It establishes a precedent. The way you love and lead others starts with those closest to you.
• Not a recent convert – Pride will always kill what God plants.
• Paul says DON’T RUSH IT – TEST THEM.
  
  

We don’t get to qualify ourselves, someone else qualifies us.

Who do we trust with this kind of access?

When we read these verses, leadership among God’s people seems to have relatively little to do with giftedness, or even authority. It has everything to do with character. In the world around us, we seem to have become more and more content with trading character in our leaders away for expedience. Character then becomes more like a roadblock than a qualification.

But God seems to look at things differently than we often do.

1 Samuel 16:7
The Lord does not look at the things people look at. People look at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.”

One of the great crises in the world, and especially in the church, is that we often allow people’s talent to outrun their character in leadership. There are a whole host of well-intentioned, but ultimately misguided, things that lead us to this – pressure, urgency, fear, and even hope.

But when we allow ourselves to be driven by those things, or even to put our hope in the wrong things, and the wrong people, we end up deeply in the wrong place. This results in scandals.

This may be what the world around us does, but it ought never to be what the people of God do because we are part of an order that God is at the top of. We don’t need the talents and gifts of our leaders to save us, we need God to save us.

We need a character and consistency that points to God and echoes who He is. And if you think you’re not a leader and that this doesn’t apply to you, hold that thought.

You always have someone who is looking to you, whether you realize it or not.

And what you’re showing them, modeling to them, or leading them to will stick. They’ll carry it. We need to live our lives under the assumption that others are watching, and that what we think is private will be made public. Truth and time walk hand in hand.

So, now what?

If we humble ourselves, become honest before ourselves and others about the gaps between our public and private lives, confess our sins and our need for a savior when it comes to us, that’s where God meets us.

With His presence and power, we don’t do this alone.

Pastor Michael reminds us which of our house rules builds the house.

All of us want some kind of order in our lives, but most of the time we want the order to come in the way we want it. We believe God is a God of order. All the things that make life good or keep life going, whether we see it or not, are incredibly intentional, and have order. We want order in our relationships, bodies, finances, families, country, and even in what we understand and believe about God.

What a Jesus community believes will shape how it behaves.

The problem is that we are good with order as long as it goes our way. When it doesn’t and we’re not at the top of the order, things get chaotic.

What happens when kids don’t get what they want? Chaos. The same can be said for some adults.

God is a God of order – in creations, in His own consistency and faithfulness to us, and in His sovereignty. He doesn’t change moods or waffle. He’s the same yesterday, today, and forever, and He calls His people to reflect His way, and to live that way before the watching world.

This is God’s desire, and ours too, but our struggle with exactly whose order this should be or who gets to decide what that looks like, gets in the way.

1 Timothy 2
I urge, then, first of all, that petitions, prayers, intercession and thanksgiving be made for all people— 2 for kings and all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness. 3 This is good, and pleases God our Savior, 4 who wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth. 5 For there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, 6 who gave himself as a ransom for all people. This has now been witnessed to at the proper time. 7 And for this purpose I was appointed a herald and an apostle—I am telling the truth, I am not lying—and a true and faithful teacher of the Gentiles.
8 Therefore I want the men everywhere to pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or disputing. 9 I also want the women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, adorning themselves, not with elaborate hairstyles or gold or pearls or expensive clothes, 10 but with good deeds, appropriate for women who profess to worship God.
11 A woman should learn in quietness and full submission. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to assume authority over a man; she must be quiet. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve. 14 And Adam was not the one deceived; it was the woman who was deceived and became a sinner. 15 But women will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith, love and holiness with propriety.

Some of us read this and think, “What in the world is going on here!?” Some might see this as unrealistic, old-fashioned, or even oppressive. The problem is that this passage has been used by men to oppress women, but that’s because we’re good with order as long as we’re at the top – if we’re trying to use order to push others down, we’re missing the Gospel, the Way of Jesus, and actually acting counter to Christ.

The Context
Paul is writing to Timothy about a specific set of situations in a specific local church at a moment in time. It could be very easy to use this as an excuse to say, “this was for them, not for us.” However, that misses the true intent and meaning, and why it was given to and written for us. There’s always a principle that transcends the context that extends to us in our situation. Sometimes it feels easier to avoid passages like this or choose our understanding of them so we get to stay at the top of the order.

We can’t pick and choose where we are going to be faithful followers of Jesus.

We are each called to look in the mirror, and there’s a lot more going on here than it seems.

• Petitions, prayers, intercession, and thanksgiving be made for all people, for kings and those in authority. (2:1-2) Thinking freedom means not answering to anyone, but the realization is that the lack of order isn’t freedom, it’s chaos.
• Men everywhere to pray without anger and disputing (2:8) Paul is telling the men to quiet themselves and remember that they’re worshipping God and are under authority not on top of the order.
• Women – don’t draw attention to yourselves with what you wear on the outside, but what you wear on the inside (2:9) There was this situation where women, who actually occupied a prominent place in Ephesian culture and religion, were flaunting their wealth and position (top of the order).
• Women should learn in quietness - Some think Paul was talking about a specific woman in the Ephesian church or a group of women. The principle here is that some of the women were using what they thought were their newfound freedoms to start meaningless arguments, be disruptive in public worship, and throw their weight around. It became a distraction in worship and to the witness of the Gospel.
• Adam/Eve - The whole idea here is that you shouldn’t get too impressed with yourself – we are all under authority. Men are. Women are. We didn’t create the order, God did. Our freedom in Christ doesn’t free us from order, but for a better one. One that brings life and peace.
  
  

The Authority
It’s about who is above us and who we think we’re above. None of us really like authority except when we get to be it. The Bible talks a lot about authority. It’s used 103 times in the New Testament. But in 1 Timothy 2, it’s a different Greek word that means to domineer or usurp.

Why? Because some of these believers were using what they thought was their freedom to claw their way to the top of the order.

So, if that’s not the way of Jesus, what IS the way of Jesus?

Ephesians 5

• 15 Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise,
• 21 Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.
• 22 Wives, submit yourselves to your own husbands as you do to the Lord. 
• 25 Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her

This is in stark contrast to the world – and the religions – around them. The rule of the world around us – and around them – is, “What do I get? How can I get higher in the order?”

But the rule of Jesus is, “What can I give? How can I get lower so others can be raised higher?”

Anytime we try to use the Bible to get more for ourselves, we miss the way of Jesus.

Any relationship, marriage, or community that starts with, “How much authority and power do I get” will be littered with problems.

Pastor Michael Hoddy encourages us to ask the question, “Where am I trying to get, that I really need to give?”