Can Success Exist Without Sacrificing Others?

Summary

Central to the sermon is Jesus’s teaching that the greatest commandments are to love God and one’s neighbor. Jonathan points out that love for the neighbor is the practical measure of love for God. This teaching often put Jesus at odds with societal power structures, as he emphasized that true success lies not in power or influence but in love and service to others.

Transcript

Good morning, everyone. My name is Jonathan. I get to be a pastor here at Journey. And today is an exciting day for us. And as we get into it this morning, I just want to say thank you all for being here. Whether you realize it or not, you being here is a gift that you have given those around you and to this community. And so we thank you for your presence and for your time this morning.

We know that on a Sunday morning, there are a variety of things that you could do, but the fact that you made time to be here is significant. And we just want to acknowledge that today. Whether you're here in person and for some of those who are gathered online with us, welcome to you all. There are two interesting stories here. The Tower of Babel in the Old Testament and the Day of Pentecost in the New Testament. Compared to one another, you have a scattering. Humans have the tendency to devour themselves when they are in charge.

And we see that played out all throughout history. And so the scattering happens. But then on the Day of Pentecost, which we'll talk about more in some detail here in a moment, they come together and there's all of these things that are different that God puts together. And it's a beautiful testimony of loving God and loving neighbor. And it's a glorious day to remember. But today for us here at Journey is a super exciting day. If you did not know, today is Kids Sunday.

And so we want to give a shout out to all of our kids and our campers from this week. We had such an amazing week together and had so much fun exploring creativity and being together with each other. So it's a fun day because it is Kids Sunday. It is also a special day in the life of the church because it is the day that we celebrate the story of Pentecost. It is known as Pentecost Sunday. And if you don't know what that word means, that's fine. We'll put some detail on that here in just a little bit.

But essentially, it is the birthday of the church. It is the moment where God's spirit filled the first followers of Jesus and they scattered all over the earth to be his witnesses. With all of that in mind, let's pray simply. Jesus, we pray that you would fill us with joy and with your spirit and lead us in your ways. Amen. So during camp this last week, we talked about the importance of relationships. Every single one of us, no matter how big or how small, we all are wired for relationships.

The modern, ego-centered, sort of self-centered way of life is really a detriment not only to ourselves but to those around us. And so we understand that we are created for relationships. And in relationships, there are things that we can do to be kind and love our neighbor. And there are things that we can do that are the opposite of that. So we talked this week about the ways in which we can be kind and love our neighbor and be generous to our neighbors. And then we talked about our superpowers. All right, raise your hand if you have a superpower.

Yeah, I see some adults that need to be raising their hand, too, because we all have superpowers. We talked specifically about two superpowers. The superpower of pause, not like cat pause, but pause like the slash with two dots, a dot on top and a dot on bottom.

Pause like stop. And we talked about pausing between impulse and action. We have these impulses, and if we can develop a discipline of pausing, then we can seek to treat our neighbors with love. And then we talked about the superpower of being responsive, of being people who notice what's going on in the world around us and then act in ways that are kind and loving and generous. And so all of that helps us understand what is essentially just being a good human being, being a person who is concerned about their neighbor. If you are a follower of Jesus, this is the baseline of what does it mean to live in the kingdom of heaven. And as we think about Jesus's teaching, it is this command that he gives to us that actually puts him at odds with those around him, with the power brokers around him, whether they are social power brokers, religious, business people or political power.

This command that Jesus gives to love one another is what puts him at odds with all of them. So Jesus was asked in his teaching to give what is the greatest commandment. He's asked to respond to that question. What is the greatest commandment? And Jesus began by saying what you would expect from a religious leader, particularly a Jewish religious leader in the first century. He said what is the oldest tenet in the Jewish faith, love the Lord your God with your heart, soul, and mind. That is the greatest commandment.

And at that point, right, with everyone around him, he's great, right? His teaching is perfect.

It lines up exactly. The problem, though, is that it is really hard without context to measure how much someone loves God. And in that instance, you can really pile on whatever you want to on top of that. You can leave a wake of bodies in your pursuit of God and not even think twice about it because there is no qualification. And so Jesus continues and he says the second command is like it. Love your neighbor as yourself. Then he says all of the laws can be summed up into these.

So for Jesus, loving neighbor is the qualifier for love of God. And that is important for us today and important for people all around the world because oftentimes in our pursuit of power or influence or success, we can have people in our wake who we overlook, who we move past, who we exploit. We can get ahead at others' expenses. That's often where power comes from. And whether we're talking about ancient people or modern people, we all face this problem that we treat our neighbors with the opposite of kindness and love. And joy and peace. When Jesus is talking about what is the most important command, he is talking is changing the way in which people pursue the ideas of success and influence.

And when you think about it, we have an analogy that we call the ladder of success. Has anybody ever heard that analogy before? The ladder of success. One of my favorite quotes comes from a writer by the name of Thomas Merton and he says this. He says people may spend their whole lives climbing the ladder of success only to find that once they reach the top, the ladder is leaning against the wrong wall. And so as we think about the ladder of success, typically those who have the power and the influence and the resources are at the top and those who are at the bottom have limited powers and resources and then there are those who aren't even on the ladder at all. And Jesus from the very beginning turns that upside down and he says actually the ones at the top are at the bottom and the ones at the bottom are at the top.

And this is a really radical thing for him to speak because he's not just putting down people who have power and influence. He's saying that the pursuit of power and influence is not all there is to life. There is a much greater pursuit and that is loving our neighbor. There is nothing wrong with success. Jesus is not against successful people. The problem though is that for many people success comes at the expense of others and Jesus states that success that comes at the expense of others does not belong and is not suitable for a person who is in sync with the kingdom of God. So when we act in ways that harm others, that are greedy and jealous and judgmental towards others, we are not living in sync with the teachings of Jesus.

So as we consider that, we know that none of us are perfect. We all have moments of weakness. We all have moments when we struggle and that is why we need the grace of God and the community of one another to help us. But on the day of Pentecost, what Jesus promised became reality. Jesus promised that for his followers that obeyed his teaching again, how can his teaching be summed up? Love the Lord your God and love your neighbor as yourself. People who obey that way of life, that they will be filled with his spirit and his presence would be in them.

And so you don't think that I am putting words in Jesus' mouth. We'll just read exactly what he said from John chapter 14 beginning in verse 15. Here is the words of Jesus. If you love me, keep my commands and I will ask the Father and he will give you another advocate to help you and to be with you forever. The spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him for he lives with you and will be in you.

All of this, Jesus says, I have spoken while with you, but the advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you. Peace I leave with you. My peace I give you. I do not give you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid. So Jesus is saying a lot there about what is to come. Jesus is really getting at here.

He is talking about the difference who are followers, who are committed to his way, who are seeking to live their lives in a way that loves God and loves their neighbor as themselves. And they recognize the spirit. You can have Christian belief and still not be in sync with the spirit. Jesus also said that what is going to happen is that when he goes away, his spirit will dwell in his followers and will give them peace. This is very interesting for those of us who call ourselves Christians because one of the byproducts of God's work in our lives is peace. And that's not always how the church operates. The church is not always known for love and not always known for peace.

And so according to what Jesus is teaching, if you trust him as an authority, he is saying that when we are in sync with his kingdom, when we are filled with his spirit, then his teaching, again, the summation of which can be described as loving God and loving neighbor as self will flow out of you. The opposite of that is also true. If we live in ways that are unloving and unkind, we can deduce that the spirit of Jesus is not in us. Those who habitually, and I highlighted that word habitually, because again, we all have weaknesses, right? We all have our moments. But those who habitually act in selfish, greedy, non-loving ways, they might believe Christian beliefs, but they aren't filled with the spirit. And that's important for us to understand today.

Walter Brueggemann, who unfortunately passed away this past week, he's a great theologian and writer. He wrote a lot in the prophetic tradition about helping people see what is real and true and good. He wrote this, in a world where jingles replace doxology. Now, Walter Brueggemann is also a very educated and smart individual. And so he talks in ways that sometimes you have to put a little context on. So what he's talking about here is sort of a shallow faith.

People who have a self-centered faith. We all know people whose faith is focused on themselves and on what rewards they might get. But because of that, God is not free and people know no justice or compassion. When people who claim to follow God act in ways that are not just and are not compassionate, we understand that they are living out of sync with the ways of Jesus. Jesus said, my followers will be known by their love for one another. Now, all of us have the ability to get this right. And we also have the ability to fail at it.

And again, the importance of this community, of us coming together, is to encourage one another, to value one another, to spur one another on, to receive God's grace together collectively. And also on the day of Pentecost, what becomes true is to be filled with the Holy Spirit. And Jesus says, when you are filled with the Holy Spirit, you will receive power. We talked about superpowers. You will receive power and you will be faithful witnesses of Jesus. That comes from Acts 1, chapter 8. What is impossible for us becomes possible because of the Spirit.

Here at Journey, the thing that we try to focus on the most is to simply be good neighbors. We want to take Jesus at his word, to trust him when he says that you should love God and love your neighbor as yourself. There are all kinds of people in the time of Jesus that want some exceptions made in this statement that Jesus makes. They come to Jesus with questions like, who is my neighbor? Has anybody ever read the book, Who is My Mother? Anybody ever read that book? I love that book.

I used to read that to my kids. The end of the story, a baby bird thinks that what he calls a snort, which is actually a backhoe tractor, is his mother. But of course, his mother comes in at the end. But people come to Jesus and they say, Jesus, who is my neighbor? They want to qualify this because it is very easy for us to look around and to see differences that are between us, to see people who we like and people who we dislike. Oftentimes, we treat them in ways that are sourced in greed, or sourced in jealousy, or sourced in envy, or sourced in brokenness.

We have to be very careful about that. But Jesus made it very clear that anyone who is to your left and to your right, anyone who is in front of you, anyone who is behind you, anyone who is anywhere around you, no matter what they look like, what they believe, how they operate in the world, anyone who is around you is your neighbor, and you therefore should love them. And so that is what we seek to do here at Journey, to be filled with the Holy Spirit, to love our neighbor as our self. And that is a good way to live. That is the ladder of the kingdom of heaven, not success and power and influence, but to live a life of love, loving our neighbor as ourselves. As we wrap up our time together this morning, I want to invite us to again acknowledge that we have moments in our lives where things are a bit askew. Jesus, in his teaching, also told us that when we pray, that we would pray for forgiveness, both in the things that we have done, and then both in things that others have done to us.

And so when we confess, two things are happening. First of all, we receive forgiveness of whatever it is that is occupying our attention that does not belong. And also, we are filled with God's forgiveness to forgive our neighbors. It's not just about us and God, it's also about us and our neighbor. And so we join in with the prayer that Jesus taught us to pray. We also join in with the historical church that throughout the history of the church has prayed a prayer of confession. Also, we recognize that there is brokenness all around us, that there is frustration and bitterness and greed and envy that consumes our world. And so we cry out to God in that we join in the tradition of lament or the tradition of the Psalms and cry out for the brokenness which doesn't belong.

And so we're going to invite everyone as we prepare for communion today to pray this prayer of confession together. And the words will be up here on the screen for us. Almighty God, our Heavenly Father, we have sinned against you and our neighbor through our own fault and thought and word and deed and what we have done and what we have left undone. We humbly repent for our sins and the sins of the world. For the sake of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, forgive us all our offenses and grant that we may serve you in the newness of life to the glory of your name. Amen. God is faithful and will forgive us but also give us the ability to forgive one another.

And with that in mind, we celebrate the God who was and is and is to come. And so we proclaim what is called the mystery of faith, that Christ has risen, Christ has died, and Christ will come again.