The Jesus Creed - Living the Jesus Creed

Today as we close out our series on the Jesus Creed I want us to consider what it will take for us to live out this creed for the rest of our lives.  This creed is not a list of rules and regulations that we follow each day.  Love for God and others can’t be boiled down to a check list of daily scripture reading, 15 minutes of prayer 3 times a day and an hour of service every week.  Those things are good and might be part of how we live out this creed, but the creed is so much more than rules to follow and items to check off.  The love we talk about in the Jesus Creed is a love that leads us deeper into a relationship with God. 

Last week we heard that Jesus told his followers to be perfect.  Let’s not think about perfection as doing everything the right way, but being in an ongoing relationship with the one who is perfect.  Jesus was perfect not because he did all the right things, he was perfect because he and God had an ongoing relationship.  They were one.  Jesus said, I am in the Father and the Father is in me, and it was because of this relationship that Jesus was perfect and we are called into this same relationship.  We are called to abide in Christ.  To be perfect it is not a call to do everything the right way but to be in an ongoing relationship with Jesus and it is this relationship that helps us live out this creed. 

We talk a lot about having a relationship with God through Jesus Christ, but just what does this mean?  How do we invite Jesus into our lives?  To help us understand what this looks like and how to do this, we are going to look at an interaction Jesus had with a very unlikely person.  Matthew 15:21-28.

Jesus and his disciples have gone away on a type of vacation.  After being followed by huge crowds of people all wanting something from Jesus and after having been challenged by the teachers of the law, Jesus and the disciples needed some time away.  When they reached Tyre and Sidon, which was a gentile area, a woman heard that Jesus was there so she found him and boldly asked for help. 
At first the disciples tried to send her away but she persisted and finally came and knelt before Jesus and asked him to heal her daughter.  At first Jesus said no, but then she asked again and Jesus responded, Woman, you have great faith!  Your request is granted. 

It is from this gentile woman that we begin to learn what it means to invite God into our lives and what an ongoing relationship with Jesus looks like.  The first thing we need to do is allow God to enter our minds.  This woman came to Jesus because she believed that Jesus could heal her daughter.  She had opened her mind to think about God and learn about Jesus and because of the knowledge she gained, she thought he could help.  Did she know everything about God and did she really know who Jesus was when she asked for help?  No – she probably knew very little because she was a Canaanite woman living in a gentile land.  Her understanding of God would have been limited but she believed enough that she asked Jesus to heal her daughter.  She invited God to enter her mind and this is where a relationship of faith begins.

When we ask God to enter our minds we begin to think about who God is.  We begin to believe that there is more to life than what we see and experience.  We begin to understand that God wants to be with us and that God loves us and all of this helps us turn to God and look for more.  When we invite God into our minds we investigate more and learn more and this is what it looks like to love God with all our mind and this is how we begin to form a relationship with God.  For this woman it all started with what she believed or what she knew about Jesus. 

But the invitation and relationship didn’t end there.  When this woman learned where Jesus and his disciples were staying she went to them and asked for help.  She acted on what she knew.  She walked to the place Jesus was staying, she boldly entered into the presence of these men and she asked for help.  This woman invited God to give direction to her feet and her decisions and her words.  Her actions backed up her beliefs.  In every aspect of her life she had invited God in to give her direction. 

Inviting God into our lives can’t just be asking God shape what we think and believe, we also have to ask God to shape our actions and decisions and words.  The Bible says that faith without works is dead.  If we don’t act on what we know and believe about God – our relationship with God is dead.  For this woman, if her faith had not been backed up with actions, he daughter would have been dead.  She put action to what she believed and because she did, she grew in her relationship with God.  She loved God and others more.

Every time we put action to what we believe about God – our relationship with God grows.  Every time we put action to our faith – our love for God grows.  Our love for God and others can’t just be something we think about it needs to shape what we do and how we live.  Our faith and love needs to give direction to our feet and where we go.  It needs to help us make bold decisions about the work of our hands and the words of our mouths.  Asking God into our bodies and lives to move us to where God wants us to be is risky, but it is a big part of faith. 

So this woman shows us that we need to invite God into our minds and lives, but she also shows us that we need to invite God into our hearts as well.  When this woman persisted and continued to ask Jesus for help, she was opening her heart to God.  She was making herself vulnerable to Jesus by revealing her deepest desires – that her daughter might be healed.  She risked rejection.  She risked being hurt and opening our heart to anyone comes with risk.  Asking God into our hearts makes us vulnerable because we expose to God our deepest desires and pain, but the risk is worth it because when we invite God into our hearts – He enters in with his love.  When this woman opened her heart to Jesus and continued to ask for help, she was honored, her faith was acknowledge and her daughter was healed. 

So when we talk about an ongoing relationship with God as a means of living out the Jesus Creed, we are talking about inviting God into our minds to shape our thinking, inviting God into our bodies to direct our words and actions and inviting God into our hearts to fill us with His love and compassion.  Each invitation takes us deeper with God and each invitation helps us love God and others more.  This is the journey of developing a strong and vital faith and this is how we live out the Jesus Creed. 

So we develop a relationship with God by inviting God into our minds and lives and hearts, but this is not a onetime act – it is a daily surrender, an ongoing relationship.  Look at Philippians 4:8. 

We invite God into our minds by intentionally thinking about things that are good and Godly.  We don’t do this once, we need to do this daily because every day we are assaulted by messages that try to shape what we think and believe and most of these messages are not of God.  Advertising, entertainment, social media, real news and fake news all try to shape what we think about the world and what we think about our lives and what we think about God and most of what we hear is not filled with truth and is not from God, so every day we need to invite God into our minds.  We do this by reading God’s word and allowing that word to speak to us.  We do this through times of prayer when we talk with God and allow time and silent space for God to talk back to us. 

Look at Romans 12:2.  We stand against the pattern of this world and the messages of this word by asking God to enter our minds and renew them, to make them new and this happens with the help of God’s power and love when we ask God in. 

Inviting God into our lives is also a daily event where we ask God to help us do all that he calls us to do.  Look at Philippians 4:9. 
What we learn about God in our minds, what we see in Jesus and in God’s word as the model for how are to live we need to put into practice.  Like the Canaanite woman, we need to act on what we learn about God and we need to do what we see Jesus doing.  Jesus showed us that we need to care for our families, attend to our spiritual growth and development, support others in the family of God and reach out to help those who are forgotten and neglected by society and care for them.  God’s word is pretty clear that we need to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, give water to the thirsty and love those who are hurting.  These are all things we need to do but acting on all these things is an ongoing process. 

We can’t do everything at once and we can’t do everything in every season of our lives.  For some, our focus now might be on our children and families and making sure we are leading them and nurturing them in faith.  For others, dedicated time to serve and help others is the focus of their lives.  In retirement my parents have made the choice to serve so whether they are in CT or spending the winter in Hilton Head, my parents help feed the hungry at food pantries and through meals on wheels. 

With every step we take in love, literally with every step we take to help our families or serve those around us, we grow deeper in our relationship with God.  In different seasons of our lives we find God leading us in different ways, the key is to make sure we are inviting God into the context of our lives today to give us direction on how to love God and others. 

And we invite God into our hearts by being persistent and taking risks to reach out to both God and others with compassion.  There is no growth in love without taking a risk.  There is no growth without being persistent.  Relationships require us to keep going and keep giving and to share more and more of who we are.  As we do this with God, God enters our hearts and helps us.   Asking God into our hearts is risky.  It exposes more of who we are – the good and the bad – but it is worth it because God always enters in with love.

So as we finish our look at the Jesus Creed and think about how to live this out for the rest of our lives, the key is not to come up with a list of rules of what it means to love God and others but to invite God into our minds, our lives and our hearts.  Loving God with all our heart and soul and mind and strength is a lifelong relationship with God where every day we surrender more of who we are to God’s love so that we can be filled with this love.  All relationships are messy, they come with highs and lows, victories and failures so the call to be perfect doesn’t mean to do everything the right way but to stay connected to the God who is perfect.  Let us close this series the way it began, by sharing in the creed together.  Would you say it with me:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength… love your neighbor as yourself. 


  
Next Steps
The Jesus Creed – Living the Jesus Creed

Living the Jesus Creed is not a set of rules to follow but a relationship to embrace.  We invite God into our lives as we surrender to him our minds, our bodies and our hearts.

Our Minds:  Read Philippians 4:8 and Romans 12:2
• Invite God into your mind.
• Spend time reading God’s word.
• Spend time listening for God’s voice in prayer.
• Learn more about God through personal and group study.
• Evaluate all your mind takes in, what needs to be filtered out? 

Our Lives: Read Philippians 4:9 and Romans 12:1
• Invite God into the fullness of your life – words and actions.
• What have you learned about God that needs to shape what you say, what you do and where you go?
• What activity do you see in the life of Jesus that you can do this week?
• What is God asking you to focus on in this season of your life?

Our Hearts:
• Invite God into your heart.
• Where do you need to persist in prayer and actions?
• What area of your life do you need to share with God?
• How can you take a risk in living out your faith this week? 

Identify three ways your love for God and others can shape your family’s celebration of Thanksgiving and Christmas?

The Jesus Creed – Failure and Forgiveness

One of the things you might have noticed with the Jesus Creed we have been studying is that Jesus sets the bar pretty high.  We are to love God with ALL our heart and with ALL our soul and with ALL our mind and with ALL our strength.  Everything we have and everything we do and everything we think and desire and plan for in our lives needs to be shaped by our understanding of what it means to love God.  To love our neighbor as ourselves also sets the bar high because when Jesus was asked who our neighbor is - his response was to say that everyone is our neighbor.  It’s not just those who live next door or down the street or in our community that we need to love, our neighbor is anyone and everyone who might be in need of love. 

So the standard in the creed is complete love and the teaching of Jesus spells this out.  Here are just a few of Jesus’ teachings that help define what it means for us to love God and others.

No one can serve two masters.  Either you will hate the one and love the other or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other.  You cannot serve both God and money. – Luke 16:13

Those of you who do not want to give up everything you have cannot be my disciple. - Luke 14:33

Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, “Lord how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me?  Up to seven times?”  Jesus answered, “I tell you, not seven times by seventy-seven times”.  – Matthew 18:21-22

Whoever does not carry their cross and follow me cannot be my disciple. – Luke 14:27

Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. – Matthew 5:48

Easy right?  Just be perfect, give up everything we have, forgive everyone and take up a cross and then we are living out the Jesus Creed.  No problem.  Actually – a big problem. 
When I get to the end of the day and the end of the week I realize how much I fall short in all of these areas.  There are times I knowingly and willfully fail to live out this creed and there are times I look back and realize I didn’t even know I was failing to love God and others, but I did.  My life echoes these words of Paul, Romans 7:21-24. 

Looking at the situation, we might think that there just isn’t any hope for us, but there is hope and we find it by looking at how Jesus interacted with one of his disciples – Peter.   Peter is an interesting person.  On one hand he is the lead disciple who is bold and courageous in living out his faith.  He was one of the first to follow Jesus.  He was the first to proclaim that Jesus was the Messiah.  He was the only one who got out of the boat and walked on water with Jesus and he made a bold claim to stand with Jesus no matter what. 

But on the other hand – Peter’s failures are also well documented.  Right after Peter proclaimed that Jesus was the Messiah he was giving Jesus direction on how he needed to be the Messiah.  To this, Jesus said to Peter, get behind me Satan.  While Peter was the one who got out of the boat to walk on the water with Jesus he quickly took his eyes off of Jesus and started to doubt and be afraid so sank – to which Jesus said, You of little faith. 

It was Peter who asked Jesus how many times he had to forgive his brothers and sisters, and I think Peter said this looking at the disciples and wondering when he could start holding a grudge against them.  Jesus made clear that Peter had to keep forgiving them.  And after Peter said he was willing to die with Jesus, it only took him a few hours before he was so filled with fear that he denied knowing Jesus, not once or twice, but three times. 

So while Peter followed Jesus and gave himself to living out this creed, he routinely failed.  It wasn’t just a few times he failed, it seemed to be every time and if the failure of Peter was the end of the story, we would all be in trouble and there would be no hope for us in living out this creed, but failure is not the end of the story.  For Peter, the end of the story didn’t come when the rooster crowed and he realized that he had failed Jesus three times, the end of the story – or maybe the beginning of the story – happened a few weeks later when he was forgiven.  John 21:15-19

Three times Peter had failed to stand with Jesus on the night he was arrested.  Three times Peter had an opportunity to deny himself, follow Jesus and carry a cross, and three times Peter had failed.  Three times Peter had been asked to love God with all his heart, soul, mind and strength and to love his neighbor as himself and three times he had failed and yet Jesus did not hold those failures against him – instead Jesus offered forgiveness.  To Peter’s routine failures Jesus offered robust forgiveness.  The forgiveness Jesus offered wasn’t just a casual, that’s ok don’t worry about it, it was a forgiveness that washed the slate clean and invited Peter to once again join Jesus in his mission and ministry.  It was a forgiveness that covered over sin and restored a relationship, even a partnership. 

Look at what Jesus said to Peter after Peter was able to express his love.  Feed my lambs.  Take care of my sheep.  Feed my sheep.  Jesus was not only restoring Peter as a disciple, he was inviting Peter to join him once again in the work that Jesus was doing – being a shepherd.  Jesus came to be a shepherd of God’s people and here is Jesus inviting Peter to join him in that work.  Robust forgiveness to Peter’s routine failure.  Not only is Peter forgiven and given a second chance but he is restored into a relationship with Jesus that invites him into partnership with God.  So instead of Peter’s failure being the end of the story, in many ways it was the beginning. 

So there is hope for us.  Our routine failures are not the end of our story when it comes to living out the Jesus Creed, our failures can lead to forgiveness and new beginnings and we learn from Peter how to make this happen.  Let’s go back and look at the interaction between Jesus and Peter and learn what a robust forgiveness looks like. 

The first thing we see is that forgiveness requires us to be honest about our failures.  That Jesus asked Peter three times if he loved him was no coincidence.  Jesus was taking Peter back to those failures so he could be honest about his life.  Jesus doesn’t throw the failures in his face, he doesn’t even mention them specifically, but the three questions does force Peter to remember his three failures. 

Honest reflection on our lives is important.  We need to be clear about the ways we have failed to love God so we can address it seriously and find ways to overcome it.  Confessing our sin is important.  While God is always willing to forgive us and the debt was fully paid by Jesus on the cross, it is important for us to be honest about our lives and confess the ways that we routinely fail in our love for God and others.  Confession humbles us so we can remember how completely dependent we are upon God. 

Confession needs to be followed by repentance.  The word repent means to turn and what we need to do is turn back to God to receive God’s love and mercy.  While the Jesus Creed is a statement on how we want to live our lives, we need to always remember that the love that makes this possible isn’t ours but God’s.  It is because God first loved us that we were then able to turn to love God.  It is because God is gracious and faithful in loving us that we are able to turn to him and be forgiven. 

In the OT, the people of God routinely failed to love God with all their heart, soul, mind and strength.  Time and time again they worshiped idols and trusted in their own wisdom and strength.  They trusted in the power they could find in this world instead of trusting in the power of God.  The people also routinely failed to love others as themselves.  They cheated those around them and often put their own lives above the lives of others.  They failed and their failure led to disaster as a nation – they were overthrown by the nation of Babylon and most of the people of Israel were led away as captives.  But in the midst of this failure and defeat, we hear this. 

Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.  They are new every morning, great is your faithfulness.  I say to myself, the Lord is my portion therefore I will wait for him.  The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him.  Lamentations 3:22-25. 

This is the same love that Jesus offered Peter.  What could have been a devastating moment for Peter was redeemed by God’s love and grace and each time we turn to God we are reminded that this same love and grace is extended to us.  The reality is that God’s forgiveness and love is offered to us long before we turn to God.  In the cross, God forgave us and that love and grace is there each and every day.  New every morning is God’s mercy and when we turn to this love we are forgiven and this forgiveness is not just a covering over of our sin, it is a restoration of a relationship.

God’s forgiveness then brings a courage and power to commit ourselves once again to loving God and others.  Every time we turn to God and receive his love we are filled with God’s spirit which brings with it the purpose and plan that God has for our lives, which is to love God and love others.  Peter is able to move forward in the mission and ministry God has for him because he confronts his failures, returns to the love God has for him and commits himself again to loving God and others by saying, Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.  Every time we say this, every time we make a commitment to the Jesus Creed, God partners with us in new ways. 

So while the Jesus Creed points out routine failure, it also reminds us of the robust forgiveness God offers.  It is God’s forgiveness and grace that sets us on our feet and sends us out to go deeper into this creed of love. 

Let us commit ourselves once again to this Jesus Creed.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength… love your neighbor as yourself.  


Next Steps
The Jesus Creed – Failure and Forgiveness

Failure
1. Identify the times this past week when you have failed to love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength.  What do you learn about yourself and your faith when you consider these moments?

2.  Identify the times you failed to love your neighbor as yourself.  Why did you make these choices you did? 

3.  Confess these failures to God in a time of quiet prayer.

Forgiveness
1.  Read these Psalms which remind us of God’s love and forgiveness. 
• Psalm 25:11,  Psalm 65:3, Psalm 79:8-9,  
• Psalm 86:5  Psalm 103:1-4,  Psalm 130:1-4

2.  Turn toward God with open hands to receive this gift of grace.

3.  Forgiving others
• From whom do you need to ask for forgiveness? 
• Who is God asking you to forgive? 
• What would it look like for you to reach out to this person in love? 

Moving Forward
1.  What mission does God have for your life? 

2.  How can you take a step forward in this mission this week? 

The Jesus Creed - A Jesus Creed Community

So far we have focused on how the Jesus Creed shapes and forms our own personal lives. We have talked about how the creed leads us to a new calling and purpose and how it opens the door for us to be more compassionate and giving, but this creed does more than change our own personal lives, it also forms a community.  It is clear by reading the gospels that Jesus’ mission wasn’t just to change individual hearts and lives.  He did that, but when Jesus invited people to love God and love others in their own personal lives he often did that with these two words, follow me.  Jesus invited people to walk with him and as they literally followed him a family was formed, a team was established and a community was created.  The Jesus Creed formed a new community and this community had a purpose.  This community was to be what God always wants his people to be, a witness to God’s goodness and will for all the world.  God’s people have always been called to be a light to the nations. 

When God first called Abraham he said, 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.  I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse, and all people on earth will be blessed through you. Genesis 12:2-3.  So God’s purpose in calling Abraham and working through his family was to form a nation or a community that God could use to bless the world.  Later through the prophet Isaiah, God said, I will also make you a light for the Gentiles; that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth.  Isaiah 49:6b 

God always wanted his people to not only be blessed personally but to be a community that would be a blessing.  God wanted his people to be a light that would transform the world and bring people to an understanding of who God is and what God’s plan for people truly was.  God asked Israel to be this light by doing two things, love God and love others.  This love was the foundation of all the law God gave them and if people followed the law, the world would see the light and love of God and people’s lives would change and our world would be transformed.   
This was also the plan of Jesus.  Jesus didn’t just come to forgive us of sin and restore us into a relationship with God, it wasn’t just for our own personal well-being that Jesus came, it was also for the larger society.  Jesus came to help create a community that would begin to show the world who God was and the way Jesus called us to do this was to follow him in living out this creed.  Would you say it with me? 

Love the Lord your God with all your hear, with all your soul, with all your mind and with all your strength… love your neighbor as yourself.  

Following this creed creates a community because it unites us in our values, in our commitments and priorities, and in our actions.  Jesus showed us the values of this community every time he gathered people together.  Look at Luke 5:27-31.

One of the values of the community Jesus created was that everyone was welcomed.  The community was really for everyone.  While tax collectors would not have been welcomed in most good religious circles because they were seen as enemies of God’s people, Jesus not only welcomed them but he went out of his way and specifically invited a tax collector to be one of his disciples.  It was often the least likely people that Jesus called to be part of his community, if for no other reason than to make that point that everyone was welcomed to know and love God.  The kingdom of God isn’t restricted in any way, it is open to anyone who wants to love God and love others.  It was open to tax collectors and fishermen.  It was open to prostitutes and children and lepers and all those that the larger community considered to be outcast. 

There is a reason God opens the community to all people, it’s because God loves all people.  Jesus said, for God so love the world, everyone.  God wants everyone to know they are loved and welcomed into his family, so Jesus made sure he invited and welcomed all people.  So a value of the community Jesus formed was that all were welcome because all were loved, and one of the priorities Jesus established was that all were to be forgiven.  If the Jesus creed was going to shape a community then forgiveness had to be at the foundation.  We see this in Luke 7:36-50.

What’s interesting to see here is that Jesus didn’t just eat with tax collectors and those on the outside of the religious community, he also ate and drank with Pharisees and religious leaders.  We often make a lot out of Jesus welcoming the outcast and then forget he also welcomed insiders and leaders but every time Jesus got together he stressed the important role of love. 

Here Jesus is in this religious leader’s home when a woman, well-known in the community for being a sinner, comes in and anoints Jesus feet with her tears and perfume.  The custom in the day was that when guests came to your home you would wash their feet.  This was an act of hospitality that showed your love and care for others, but the Pharisee had not lowered himself to do this job and he didn’t ask anyone else to tend to Jesus, but this woman did.  She showed her love for Jesus and served him with gratitude. 

Jesus used this opportunity to talk about the priority of forgiveness and he teaches us that forgiveness of sin, of all sin, is part of the new community that he is forming.  Not only do we find God’s forgiveness in the company of Jesus but we are to forgive others as well.  This is all part of what it means to love God and love others in community.  If we are going to love God with all that we have and all that we are then we have to embrace God’s values of love and love others enough to welcome and forgive them when needed. 

Whether it is in the community of the church, or at work, or at school, or with our neighbors, forgiveness is difficult.  In a society that pushes us to be perpetually offended, it is hard to be constantly forgiving, but that is what we are called to do.  Jesus showed us that to follow him means to forgive.  If we struggle to forgive others then we need to remember just how much God has forgiven us. 

Two things happen when we welcome and forgive others; first, a community is formed – we are brought together in relationship and begin to commit ourselves to one another.  The second thing that happens is that we make a statement to the world.  When our love forms a community of true grace and peace that is open to everyone, and when we freely forgive, people notice and it draws them in and points everyone to God. 

Perhaps the best biblical image of the Jesus Creed community is found in the book of Acts.  Acts 2:42-47. 

Here is a group of people who love God and love others.  We know they love God because it says they devoted themselves to a life of worship and prayer and learning, but they also loved one another.  The early church was committed to making sure that there was no needy person among them and they shared all that they had with those in need.  They welcomed everyone, forgave people and committed themselves to one another in love.  This is the Jesus Creed community in action and they were a light to the nations; they drew people to God.  It says that because of their clear love for God and others – the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.  The love seen in this community of people who followed Jesus was so strong that it drew people in.  Their light was shining bright in the darkness and like a moth to flame, it attracted people. 

So what is it that makes us part of this community?  It is simply this, making the commitment to love God and others.  When we accept this principle we are accepting Jesus invitation to follow him in this way of life and as we follow Jesus we become part of a larger community of people who are also committed to this way of life.  What created the early church was people turning toward God.  Peter preached about Jesus and at the end of his message it says that 3,000 people accepted the invitation to turn to Jesus and they were baptized and starting follow Jesus’ way of life and love. 

Turning to Jesus and choosing to love God and others is what brings us into this new community and what sustains us in this life of faith is living in community.  Fellowship and our relationship with other followers of Jesus is what helps encourage us and keep us going in living out this creed.  I am not sure we can live the Jesus Creed alone, I do know that we were not meant to.  Jesus never gave us this creed and said good luck – go out do this on your own.  God’s plan was never to have us live out our relationship with him in isolation.  We were created for one another and for us to succeed in truly living out the Jesus Creed – we need to be in community with one another.  Loving God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength in a world that tells us to love ourselves first isn’t easy and on our own we will fail, we need the encouragement of others telling us to keep going.  We need the accountability and assistance that friends can bring to us when things get difficult. 

The Bible tells us to spur one another on toward love and good deeds, not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another.  Hebrews 10:24-25.  So it is meeting together, it is being in fellowship and in community with one another that helps us move on in love and good deeds – loving God and loving others.  We cannot neglect this community. 

Living in community with other followers of Jesus can take on many different expressions.  I hope and pray that the local church can be a powerful expression of this and I hope that our worship, learning and serving together spurs us on in our faith and shows our community the power and love of God.  I pray that we are a place where all feel welcomed, where all experience grace and forgiveness and where all are encouraged to love God completely and love others fully. 

There are other ways we can be this Jesus Creed community.  I experienced this kind of community when I was in college through Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship.  There are groups and organizations that walk alongside the local church that are communities of love and they can be this Jesus Creed community that changes our lives.  It was through a group of students meeting on the campus of MSU that taught me a lot about loving God and others and it was through them that I really accepted for myself the invitation to follow Jesus and be part of this new community.   

This new community can also be formed in a family and among a group of friends.  Anytime people come together to love God and others – a community is formed and this community can transform lives and the world.  A Sunday School at my church in Altoona went out for a Christmas Dinner to a local restaurant and their love and laughter was so profound that the wait staff asked where we were from because they wanted to join whatever group we were part of.  That was a Jesus Creed community – a group of people committed to loving God and each other and reaching out in love to those around them. 

Serving with a group of people can also be a Jesus Creed community.  When we go with a group of friends to serve a meal at the soup kitchen or to assist at the food bank or volunteer in the community we are creating a Jesus Creed community that can change our own hearts and be light to the world.  The first time I served at a soup kitchen I was with a group of friends who just volunteered to help.  We weren’t a church, or I should say we weren’t all from a church, we were just a group of people who wanted to put our love for God into action by loving others. 

The new community Jesus formed should be the local church – but we are just one expression of it.  This Jesus Creed community is found wherever people come together to love God and others and it is important for us to be part of it because it is in community that our faith is nurtured and it is in community that we are given the strength and courage to follow this creed and it is through the Jesus Creed community that the light of God shines into the darkness and changes our world. 
 
Next Steps
The Jesus Creed – A Jesus Creed Community


1.  Those who followed Jesus and lived by this creed began to create a new community.  See an example of this community in action in the early church – Acts 2:42-47 and Acts 4:32-35.


2.  Jesus set the tone for this kind of community when he gathered with people during his life.  Identify the values of a Jesus Creed community in Luke 5:27-31 and Luke 7:36-50.


3.  How do these values differ from what we see in the world?  What other values should be part of a new community centered on the Jesus Creed? 


4.  In what ways are you part of a community committed to loving God and loving others?  Are you part of a
• Worshipping community?
• Learning community? (a small group or class for spiritual growth and faith development)
• Ministry team in the life of the church helping others love God?
• Serving team in the larger community loving others?
• Group of family and friends walking in the Jesus Creed together?


5.  How can you can you become a more active and vital member of a Jesus Creed community so that you can love God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength and love your neighbor as yourself? 

The Jesus Creed - A Life of Compassion

Columbine, Sandy Hook, Fort Hood, Charleston, Orlando, Vegas.  In the wake of these tragedies we are left asking ourselves what we can do.  What is the answer?  Where do we even turn to find an answer?  Some people turn to the media and listen to the pundits on one side or the other talk about solutions.  Some people turn to Washington DC and look for answers in legislation.  Some people turn to the schools and social services and say we need a better way to teach tolerance and understanding.  A friend of mine said that we need to look at what the psalms say.
I lift my eyes to the mountains, 
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD, 
the maker of heaven and earth.  
Psalm 121:1-2

Our help comes from the Lord.  God has given us all we need to address this problem and it starts right where we have been these past few weeks, with the same creed that Jesus used to guide his life.  The same creed Jesus gave his followers.  It is the Jesus Creed that can help us in times like this and it is the Jesus Creed that will help our world become a better place so I want to invite you to once again say it with me.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength… and love your neighbor as yourself.  

In the face of evil there is only one answer and that is compassion and that was how most people responded when the shots started on Sunday night.  It was compassion that moved people to shield those around them from the bullets.  It was compassion that moved a man to cover his wife and save her from death.  It was compassion for strangers that moved people to stop running and lift up those being trampled by the crowds.  It was compassion that moved people to offer their vehicles to be used as ambulances.  It was compassion that moved people to stand in line for hours on Monday in order to donate blood for those in need.  It was compassion that moved people to give money and businesses to offer goods and services to the victims and their families.  It was compassion and love for others that immediately come to light in the midst of the darkness and it is compassion that reminds us that evil will never win. 

In the face of anther shooting, a lot of people are asking what we need to do to begin to turn things around and if we look to Jesus, there is only one answer.  It is to love.  In the face of injustice and oppression and violence – Jesus offered love and grace and compassion and he did it in all the daily routines of his life.  There is a story of Jesus offering compassion that provides a framework for how we can grow in our own compassion.    Luke 7:11-15.

It was an ordinary day.  Jesus was walking into a small town when he and the disciples came upon a funeral procession leaving town.  Obviously Jesus saw what was going on, he saw the procession and the mother out in the front leading the way, but we know Jesus did more than look at the mourners, he took the time to listen and learn about what was going on.  We know that Jesus asked some questions because he found out that the young man who died was the only son of his mother who was herself a widow. 

So the first thing Jesus does here is look and listen and learn and this is the first step in compassion.  There is no compassion for others unless we take the time to look around and see what the needs are, and then we need to stop and listen to people share about their situation and it is only in listening that we learn how to help.  Acts of compassion don’t come out of thin air, they come because we have be willing to look and listen and learn. 

Have we really taken the time to look around our own community?  What needs do we see?  Who are our neighbors in need?  Have we asked God to open our eyes so we can see where and who to help?  Many people have commented on the role of prayer in the wake of mass shootings and maybe the prayer we need to pray is for God to open our eyes to the needs and problems of our own community so we can offer compassion right here. 

When was the last time we stopped to look around or listen to our neighbors or learn about the needs in our own community?  We will listen and learn all about what is going in Vegas 2500 miles away but then we forget to look in our own community. 
Do you know our foodbank is in need?  We serve 800+ people a month and money is scarce and we are heading into the holiday season when more will be needed.  Do we take the time to learn about how the food bank helps and how we can be part of that?  Have we listened to what kinds of food is most needed? 

Have we taken the time to listen and learn about what the CROP Walk supports?  How much money goes overseas and what stays here to support our own community?  The first step in compassion is to look around to see the needs and then take the time listen and learn so we know how to best respond. 

Jesus took the time to learn about this woman and her son.  He learned that the woman previously lost her husband so she was already in a difficult situation and the son who died was her only son which meant that she now had no one to care for her, no one to provide for her.  The death of her son left her alone and destitute.  It is because of all that Jesus learned that he had compassion for her. 

While Jesus loved all people, I wonder if he was moved in a special way here because this situation hit so close to home.  Jesus’ own mother was a widow.  Joseph died at some point so Jesus knew first hand that life for a widow was difficult.  Jesus often spoke of the need to care for widows and orphans and I wonder if that compassion came from his own experience.  Had Jesus personally seen both the need for compassion and the blessing those acts of love could be.  Sometimes the place God can use us the most is in the places where we have personal experience.  It is often where we have seen or received help that God calls us to help others. 

Either way Jesus is moved with compassion or as it says, his heart went out to her, but it wasn’t just his heart – it was his hand too.  Jesus heart went to the widow and his hand went touch the funeral bier so that the dead man could be raised to life.  Jesus takes his heart filled with compassion and turns into an action.  He reaches out his hand to help another.  jesus links up with someone to do something.

Beyond our need to look, listen and learn we have to be willing to link up with others and do something to make a difference.  Loving others with thoughts and feelings just does not cut it – we have to be willing to get our hands dirty.  Love for those effected by hurricanes is nice but it is the hands bringing in supplies and hands putting together buckets and hands cleaning up debris and hands rebuilding homes that make a difference.  It is hands being willing to link up with others in our community that will provide food for the hungry and offer support to the lonely and those in despair.  It is hands coming together to do something that lifts up a community. 

Jesus reached out his hands and touched the funeral bier, and when he did he got them dirty.  I don’t mean the soot or dirt from the boards, he became unclean because he touched something that carried the dead.  Jesus was constantly getting his hands dirty in this way.  He touched lepers and laid his hands on children and lifted up defiled women and touched the sick and dead.  Jesus hands were constantly in motion touching those in need and offering not just help and assistance but love and that love made a difference.

There is so much more than assistance that takes place when we reach out to others.  We are offering relationship and love.  We welcome people and show them they have value and worth.  When we are willing to touch and help others we are lifting them up in so many ways and it is those acts of compassion that can help lift people out of darkness.  It is this face of goodness in the presence of evil that can begin to soften hearts.  Think of all the hands that were touching others and helping those in need on Sunday.  Those hands got dirty and bloody and took risks and sacrificed and those hands linked up with others and together they helped bring light into the darkness and showed the world that good always overcomes evil.  The work of those hands is making a difference today and showing us the answer.  The answer is love. 

As we face another tragedy in our nation, another senseless act of violence, we are left asking, what can we do?  What is the answer?   The answer will not come from our government or the media or any institution around us, the answer is us.  Are we willing to love God and love others?  Are we willing to reach out to help others?   Our acts of love can be a witness to those seeking to bring about violence.  We can be the light in their darkness or the hope that lifts them from despair.  Who knows how the testimony of a community coming together to care for one another can be the force of love and goodness that maybe turns someone from evil plans.  While the world may laugh at us, our help and the help our world needs comes from God who told us what the answer is, it is to love God and to love others.  If will look and listen and learn and then link up with those in need we will begin to change the hearts of people which will begin to change the world.

So where do we start?  The needs are so great, the world is so dark and there are so many problems that seem too great for us to solve.  So where do we start, well we start right here.  We start local.  It was the local Las Vegas community that linked together to help.  It was the people at the concert venue, locally right there that laid their lives down and lifted others up and so we start local. 

What can we do right here and right now to help others?  What act of compassion can we do this week that will help our family, friends and neighbors?  There is someone in need right now that we know, God has put this person in our life and God is asking us to reach out and help them.  There is an organization God is asking us to link arms with.  There is an opportunity, a ministry, a mission God is asking us to serve with so that together we can be part of the solution to the violence we see in our world. 

God is not asking us to change the world, God is asking us to change our world – right where we are and if we will all change our world then God will change the world.  Thousands of people in Las Vegas changed their world and they are a beacon of light that shines in the darkness and they proclaim the truth that goodness and sacrifice and service and love will overcome evil.  They started something local that is spreading and catching on and changing the conversation and providing answers and hope for our world.   

As part of the creed for his life Jesus told us to love others because it would be this love that would bring in God’s kingdom.  It is our love put into action that changes our hearts and lives and families and community.  These acts of compassion are things we can learn to do, we can grow in our love for others by being willing to take the time to look and listen and learn about the needs we see around us.  When we link up our hearts and hands with others in service and start local our world will begin to change so that God can then change the world.

It’s time that we as followers of Jesus stop looking to our government, our media, our schools and our society to bring about change and start looking to God because he has shown us the way.  It is the way of Jesus who lived out this creed: 

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all you mind and with all your strength… and love your neighbor as yourself.  


Next Steps
The Jesus Creed – Compassion

Read Luke 7 & 8 and identify all the acts of Compassion seen in the daily routines of Jesus’ life. 


The five steps to developing a heart and life of compassion. 

1. Look.  Take time this week to look at our community and ask God to help you see with new eyes.
• Who do you see lonely?  Hurting?  In need?

2. Listen.  Take the time to really listen to others this week. 
• What do you hear at home?  At school?  At work? 

3. Learn.  Learn about different needs in our community. 
• Learn about the current needs at our local food bank
• Learn more about what the CROPWALK supports

4. Link.  Do something this week to serve others. 
• Write out an act of compassion on the post-it note and at the end of worship place it in the “hand” at the front of the sanctuary.

5. Local.  Don’t become overwhelmed by the needs of the world, focus on one need in the local church or community. 
• How is God calling you to make a difference in your world?   

Memorize this verse and repeat it each morning.
I lift my eyes to the mountains,
where does my help come from?
My help comes from the LORD,
the maker of heaven and earth. 
Psalm 121:1-2

The Jesus Creed - God's Calling

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength… love your neighbor as yourself.  

This is the creed that Jesus lived by and it was formed by two passages from in the Old Testament.  The first part of the creed comes from what is known as the Shema and is found in the book of Deuteronomy.  The second part comes from the book of Leviticus.  When Jesus was asked how we need to prioritize and shape our lives in this world, he turned to these two scriptures and said, we are to love God and love others.  Jesus not only found this creed by looking to God’s word, he also saw it lived out in the lives of the people around him, specifically his parents.  Both Mary and Joseph lived out this creed in their lives and because they did God gave them a new calling. 

As we continue to allow this creed to shape our lives and as we give ourselves to loving God completely and loving others fully, God will give us new opportunities to put this love into practice.  When we talk about this new calling we aren’t talking about a new job or moving to a new location, we are talking about an awakening in our hearts and lives to the deeper purpose God has for us.  It is often in loving God and others that we begin to find what it is we were created for and how we can live with a deeper sense of meaning and purpose.  We see this in Mary and Joseph.

Joseph gave himself to loving God and loving others his entire life.  The Bible tells us that Joseph was a righteous man which meant that he knew God’s word.  Joseph would have learned it as a child and then continued to recite it as an adult.  Joseph probably had much of the Torah memorized as many good Jews did, so he certainly knew the verses that make up this creed, but for Joseph loving God meant obeying every rule and regulation found there.  Obedience to the law was the focus for those who were said to be righteous which meant that Joseph did his best to follow every one of 600+ laws found in the Old Testament. 

Being righteous also meant that Joseph had a certain reputation to keep up.  He worked hard to make sure everything he did was above reproach and that he always looked good to God and others.  So when Mary told him that she was pregnant and he knew that the baby was not his, it only left Joseph a few options.  The law said that women like this should be put to death for their immorality, so to love God through obedience and to keep his reputation intact this is what Joseph should have done.  But here is where we see Joseph’s love for others come into play.  Because he loved Mary, he couldn’t bring himself to have her killed so he chose the only other option available to him and that was to divorce her quietly. 

While we might think Joseph was being harsh and unkind in divorcing Mary, this was really an act of mercy.  He was doing the best he could to balance his love for God and his love for Mary.  Joseph was trying to be faithful to God’s law and yet love his neighbor as himself, so we see him following this creed and it was because he was that God called him to deeper levels of love and to a new identity.  Matthew1:18-25.

No longer was Joseph just being called to obey the law he was being called to love God with all his heart, soul, mind. strength and reputation and he was being called to love Mary enough to take her as his wife.  Joseph is being called to love deeper and embrace a new identity.  No longer was Joseph just going to be known as a righteous man, he was going to the father of the Messiah but to do all this he was going to have set aside what people think about him.  Joseph’s love for God and Mary meant that he had to let go of the life he had been striving for and his good name and reputation in order to embrace the life God had for him.  It was a new calling. 

Every time God calls us to something new we have to be willing to let go of something old.  Sometimes we have to let go of our reputation and what others think of us in order to give ourselves more fully to God and others.  In our culture, to love God more than anything and to truly love others as ourselves doesn’t always make sense and it is not always understood by those around us. 
For many people, going to church isn’t cool because when they look at the church they only see hypocrites, so if we tell them we go to church it can ruin our reputation.  For many people, believing in God and following Jesus isn’t seen as being very smart because they see Christians as narrow minded bigots whose thinking is stuck in the last century and believe in fairy tales.  While none of this is true, it is what many people think so we have to be willing to let go of what others think if we want to love God more.   

I met Jim Kilmartin at the first Impact Youth retreat when we were both asked to share our faith stories.  I talked about being a misfit in high school.  I was overweight, completely non-athletic and was more of a band geek than anything else.  I talked about how coming to faith and following Jesus helped me find a deep sense of who God had created me to be and how much purpose and meaning I had found in life because of Jesus.  Then Jim stood to share his story and this is how he started.  “When I was in high school, I was the star of the football team and used beat up kids like Andy.”

I have to say, I was a little taken back by Jim’s comment, but then I heard the rest of his story.  Jim had a reputation at the Tyrone HS for being the big man on campus.  He was the star quarterback, he was very good looking and he was very popular.  But then God started working in Jim’s heart and life and invited Jim to turn from loving himself and his reputation to loving God and others.  There was a new calling in his life and one of the things Jim had to let go of was his reputation. 

A few months after Jim was baptized, he was asked by his church to help start a new youth ministry and travel to churches sharing his faith with other youth.  Jim agreed to go, but it meant leaving the football team behind.  Jim had to let go of his reputation and all that he had given himself to in order to continue in his faith.  He had to set aside what other people thought of him in order to love God completely and love others fully.  Jim embrace that calling and has never looked back.  He let go of what others thought of him and started loving God with all he had and truly reached out to others. 
When we start loving God and loving others it will lead us to a new calling because the Jesus creed shifts our thinking.  The more we love God and others the less we think about and focus on ourselves.  That is what happened to Joseph.  The creed led him to love God more than his reputation and led him to love Mary enough to give up the idea of divorce and take her as his wife.  God called Joseph to a new identity, to be the father of the Messiah.  With every new calling we have to leave something behind and for many of us it starts with our reputation.  We have to stop worrying about what others think of us and step into that new life God has for us. 

Mary was also being called to step into a new life and take on a new identity.  Like Joseph, Mary was living this creed when God called her.  Mary was seeking to love God and others which is why God said she had found “favor” with him.  God could see that Mary was doing her best to love in every way, which is why God asked her to be the mother of the Messiah.   This child, however, was going to come about through the work of the Holy Spirit and not her soon to be husband and this meant that Mary was also going to have to let go of her reputation, but Mary was also being called to a much greater purpose.  Mary was being called to shape the heart and life of God’s son.  God was asking Mary not just to be the mother of a child but to raise and nurture God’s son.  This was now her purpose and Mary gave herself to the task completely. 

We know Mary gave herself to this new purpose because we can see her heart and life in the heart and life of Jesus.  When God called Mary, she praised God in a song.  The song not only reveals Mary’s heart but we see it lived out in Jesus which means it was Mary who helped shape Jesus.

Luke 1:46-48.  So we see Mary’s love for God here, she praises God and says, holy is His name.  It was this heart of love that shaped Jesus and we know this because when Jesus prayed he said, Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.  Holy is His name.  Mary helped shape the heart of Jesus. 

Luke 1:49-52.  Mary’s prayer was that the proud would be humbled and that the humble would be lifted up.  It was this heart that shaped the heart of Jesus who taught us that the first shall be last and the last shall be first. 

Luke 1:53.  Mary asked that the hungry would be filled and it was this vision that moved Jesus to feed the hungry and to say, blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness for they shall be filled.   

Luke 1:54-55.  Mary talked about mercy being extended to Israel and Jesus was the fullness of God’s mercy.  At every turn Jesus extended mercy to all the children of God. 

From this song we see how the heart and life of Mary helped shaped the heart and life of Jesus.  Mary lived into the new calling God had for her and that new call came about because Mary gave herself to loving God with all her heart, soul, mind and strength and she loved her neighbor as herself.   Both Mary and Joseph loved God and others and it was living out this creed that led them to a new calling and a new purpose.  As we allow the Jesus Creed to shape our hearts and lives there will be moments when God will call us to something new.  This isn’t a new job.  Joseph’s job as a carpenter didn’t change and Mary’s job as a mother didn’t change, but their purpose in life was redefined.  The Jesus creed can change our purpose in life.  It might not change our job but the opportunities God gives us to love and serve can fundamentally change our identity. 

Every one of us has been called to ministry in some way.  Loving God with all our heart and soul and mind and strength will lead us into new ways of serving God in and through the life of the church. Loving God will mean that some of us will be called to lead our children and youth in faith.  Loving God will call us to open our homes to a small group or visit those who are sick and shut in.  Loving God will mean giving ourselves to the worship life of the church and helping greet people and open doors and park cars or sing in the choir or serve in the nursery.  Loving God completely will mean for each of us a call to turn that love into action in some way among the people of God and in the life of the church

And if we make the creed of our lives a commitment to loving our neighbor as ourselves then in time God will show what this love for others looks like.  We will talk more about this next week, but let me tell you right now, God will call us to new ways of giving and serving that will push and challenge us.  We will be moved to do things we never thought we would do. 

How is God calling you to go deeper in your love for him and others and how can you love and serve God through the life of the church?  Every week I am blessed to be able to see so many people serve God and others through the church and I see the difference it makes.  I hear the testimonies of how your commitment and faith inspires and helps and heals people and I hear from so many volunteers what joy they find in serving.  I have seen so many people find their purpose and the new calling God has for their lives because they were willing to love God more and step out to serve.  I would invite you to keep saying and praying the Jesus creed and simply see where it takes you.  When you sense God calling you to something new or when you hear God speak, like Mary and Joseph, say yes and move and allow God to use you in new ways. 

As we commit ourselves to loving God and others the opportunities will be there.  We don’t have to go looking for them we just have to be willing to step out in faith.  Maybe we need to let go of our reputation and what people will think about us.  Maybe we need to let go of our fear and stop thinking that we might not be good enough or know enough to love and serve God.  Mary and Joseph had step into the great unknown and say, here I am Lord.  Use me.  Are we willing to say that?   Are we willing to step out in love and simply give ourselves to loving God and others in new ways? 

If you are committing yourself to this creed, if you are saying it and praying it and giving yourself to it – God will call you to new ways of living and loving.  Please step out in faith to love God with all your heart and soul and minds strength and please step out to love your neighbor as yourself and just watch what God will do in you and through you.  God will use us for his purpose.  God will use us to bring salvation and life and light into the darkness of this world.  Please, step into the new calling the Jesus Creed will bring to your life. 

Next Steps
The Jesus Creed ~ A New Calling

1. God called Mary and Joseph to deeper levels of love:
• Read Mary’s story: Luke 1:26-56 & 2:1-52
• Read Joseph’s story: Matthew1:18-25
• What new identity were each of them given?
• What did they have to let go of in order to love?

2. Consider how God can use the S.H.A.P.E. of your life to love in new ways?  (See A Purpose Driven Life, Rick Warren)

Spiritual Gifts:  What spiritual gifts has God given you?
• See Romans 12:1-21 and 1 Corinthians 12:4-11
• What gifts have you already used in your life?
• What new gifts do you sense God wanting you to use?
• What opportunities to love is God giving you today?

Heart: Where is God awakening a deeper sense of passion?
• What interests, hopes and dreams do you have? 
• How might God be calling you to love in these areas? 
• What need do you see today that breaks your heart? 
• How can you love more in this specific area? 

Abilities: What skills and abilities has God given to you?
• How can you use these skills for God’s work in the church? 
• How can your abilities help love and serve others? 

Personality: How can God use your specific personality for His specific purpose? 

Experience:  What unique experience do you have that can be used to help others? 
• How have your past experiences prepared you for God’s new calling?