Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Welcome to the Karma Church podcast.
[00:00:06] Jesus said a new commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I have loved you, that you also love one another. By this, all will know that you are my disciples. If you have love one for another.
[00:00:27] Why?
[00:00:29] Why does Jesus say that?
[00:00:32] I think because the Father is love and the only true representation of him by his kids is how we love one another.
[00:00:46] But sometimes that's difficult, right?
[00:00:52] You liars.
[00:00:56] It's hard sometimes to love people because they're not very lovely, okay? And so when Jesus says that to us, we go, really?
[00:01:10] Okay. We've been going through Acts, so find Acts 15 in your, your Bibles. We're going to read a few verses. This is the word of God. So why don't you stand if you're not used to being around here? We're up, down, up, down. It goes on all the time. So this is Acts 15:36.
[00:01:34] Then some days. Sorry. Then after some days, Paul and Barnabas said, let us go back and visit the Brethren in every city where we have preached the word of the Lord and see how they're doing. Now Barnabas was determined to take with him. John called Mark, but Paul insisted that they should not take him with them, the one who had departed from them in Pamphylia and had not gone with them to the work.
[00:02:03] Then the contention became so sharp that they parted from one another. And so Barnabas took Mark and sailed to Cyprus. But Paul chose Silas and departed, being commended by the Brethren to the grace of God. And he went through Syria Cilicia, strengthening the churches. Amen. Take a seat.
[00:02:29] So this week it is not all sweetness and roses in the Antioch camp and in the Antioch Church.
[00:02:38] And this is what I love about the Bible. You get real life. You get the good, the bad, and sometimes the ugly. It's real. This is real life. So what has happened while they were in Pamphylia? Mark has returned to Jerusalem as Paul and Barnabas head on to Antioch. Pisidia, that's a different Antioch. Okay? Remember, there were two Antiochs. And Luke, who writes the story of Acts, doesn't tell us why, but what we do know is they're going deeper into uncharted territory.
[00:03:23] We know there is going to be a real battle over the Gospel as the good news of Jesus is preached. And the temperature, I don't know whether it's cooling or heating. Okay. There is unrest happening as the Gospel is preached. So Mark feels like he's called back to Jerusalem, so he goes to Jerusalem, which has apparently irritated Paul. So Paul is a bit cross. Now, in Mark's defense, the next thing that happens to Paul is he is stoned and left for dead outside the city. Okay, so Mark was picking some stuff up, okay? And what I want to say to you is not everyone is ready to die today.
[00:04:11] Not everyone is ready to die. Not everyone is ready to pay the whole price of following Jesus Christ today. Our faith is a journey. We're journeying with God. Remember I was talking about the baggage last week and the things that will sometimes pull us back. And Jesus is always pulling us into his light, into his presence, into his holiness. But there's things we carry that will pull us back.
[00:04:41] And for those of you on fire, the ones that are just smouldering can be irritating.
[00:04:48] Okay, why don't you get it? Why don't you see it? But the danger is if we put petrol on those that are smouldering too quickly, they'll blow up.
[00:05:01] And so Barney.
[00:05:04] So Mark is now back on the scene, and Barney wants to take Mark with him on their next trip, but Paul won't give him another chance. Okay, you blow it with Paul, you're finished, or not quite as we're going to see. And what I would say to you is I've never seen it as my job to motivate anyone. That's his job. The Holy Spirit motivates us. I just work with the motivated. I spend my time with the people who the Holy Spirit is working on. That's why Jesus said, I only do what I see my Father doing.
[00:05:41] That's where I put all my energy and effort.
[00:05:45] And the true. When people are on fire, the true fire is this burning of the Holy Spirit in our lives who ignites us and ignites our passion and this inward transformation that starts to happen when we come to Jesus Christ.
[00:06:03] And for all of us, the seed of the gospel is settling in our hearts. As we hear the Word, as we read the Scriptures, as we experience more of God, the seed of the Word is settling on our hearts. And it's not yet clear what the crop is going to be in all of our lives.
[00:06:24] We have to give the Word of God time to take root in our lives and grow. And people move and grow at different paces.
[00:06:36] So what we see here is the unthinkable happens. Paul and Barney fall out. And in fact, Luke says the contention became so sharp that they parted from one another.
[00:06:49] So Barney takes Mark and they go to Cyprus, which is Barney's hometown. And Paul takes Silas, who's the new guy who joined Last week to Syria.
[00:07:04] There will be difficulties in church. Anyone been in church where there are difficulties? Come on, own up, own up.
[00:07:14] Have you noticed people do people stuff?
[00:07:18] People fall out, leaders sin. And in the process, people can get confused, they can get disappointed, they can even get hurt. The thing is, our faith is not in people.
[00:07:35] Our faith is in the Lord Jesus Christ.
[00:07:38] Put your hands up. So if you've been in a contention in a church, just put your hands up. Go on, go on. No, put your hands up. Okay. What I want you to notice is you're still here.
[00:07:49] You made it.
[00:07:52] And even though it was a difficult season, you're still here.
[00:07:57] So when things go wrong in church, and they will, it's not always all bad. And what we see here is we get multiplication.
[00:08:09] Okay? Now it was just Paul and Barnabas going out and preaching the gospel. Now it's Barnabas and Mark and Paul and Silas. The gospel is multiplying now.
[00:08:20] And so the shaking that's going on, God is using to multiply. And sometimes when brothers part, it's because both must grow.
[00:08:31] You see, the anointing of the Spirit hasn't left either of them.
[00:08:35] And my observation in church, and you know, some of you are young, but I've been knocking around the church for a while. Is that often churches have and trouble making room for multiple expressions of the kingdom?
[00:08:50] Look, if everything's the same, we call it a plane of glass.
[00:08:55] When you have multiple facets, we call it a diamond.
[00:08:58] The church is a diamond. The church is beautiful, reflecting and refracting the wonderful light of heaven.
[00:09:12] So when things go wrong and there's a little bit of a mess, sometimes people are scattered around.
[00:09:24] Somebody posted this online.
[00:09:26] Anybody who knows me knows I'm not online. Somebody actually texted it to me, so I'm not really on text. But anyway, this worked. I got this and it said, getting mad at your past and starting a church in your house is not a launch. It's a tantrum that just really. So you know, if you get mad with me, you'll go start one in your house. All I'm saying is that wherever there are people, there's trouble.
[00:09:56] There just is. If there weren't people, we would have no mess whatsoever. My life would be easy. I just have to work on Sundays, which is what I thought the job was originally.
[00:10:11] But where there are difficulties. Keep to your notes, Steve. We don't know the end of the story. Now, I want you to hear this. God doesn't cause people to fall out, all right? But he redeems every situation.
[00:10:26] So if we let him, he will turn the trouble or the contention round for his good and work a miracle.
[00:10:41] So when Paul is coming to the end of his life, he's been deserted by so many, so many people have let him down, have not run the course. He writes to a man called Timothy, who's going to come into the story in the next chapter. And this is what he writes. He says, only Luke is with me.
[00:11:02] Get Mark and bring him with you, for he's useful to me for ministry.
[00:11:10] Why is this important? Because the young deserter that Barney wouldn't give up on will end up writing Mark's Gospel.
[00:11:20] And he will not love his life, even unto death.
[00:11:25] According to tradition, St. Mark was arrested on Easter Day while celebrating Mass in Alexandria.
[00:11:33] A noose was put around his neck and then he was dragged through the city until his body was shredded. The only thing that stopped the abuse was a thunderstorm hit, which enabled his followers to be able to get his broken body, retrieve it and bury it.
[00:11:53] And so, just like the apostle Paul, Mark can say, for I'm already being poured out as a drink offering, and the time for my departure is now. And I have fought the good fight. I finished the race. I have kept the faith. Finally there is laid up for me the crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will give to me on that day.
[00:12:17] And not only them to me, but all who have loved his appearing.
[00:12:22] And I think Mark might have added another sentence. Even if I've had some stumbles along the way, Jesus is still able to present me.
[00:12:33] And you may have some stumbles on your way, and there may be some difficulties, but Jesus is still able to present us.
[00:12:42] So let's not fall out. But if we do, let's honor and love each other. Let's show some respect.
[00:12:51] Let's start to believe that the Holy Spirit knows what he's doing. Our brother is never the enemy. The devil is the enemy. All right.
[00:13:03] But you might say to me, but Steve, you don't understand. They've sinned against me.
[00:13:09] They've done so much evil to me. Peter asked Jesus, he says, how many times do I have to forgive him? 7 70. 7 times 70.
[00:13:22] Have you heard of a thing called cancel culture?
[00:13:26] It's in the news all the time.
[00:13:29] The great news is I can't be cancelled because I died. I died at the cross. When I came to Jesus, my life was cancelled.
[00:13:40] And if you cancel me on social media, I will never know or care.
[00:13:52] You see, now I live for Christ and I Just want to say, if you write off everyone who lets you down, offends you, or even sins against you, you might as well tear Mark's Gospel out of your Bible. And since he was the source for Luke and Matthew, you might as well tear those ones out of the Bible as well.
[00:14:15] This book is the story of God's amazing grace, how he redeems broken, sinful, pitiful people and he turns their lives into something beautiful. This is the Gospel. This is the good news.
[00:14:38] One of the encounter years asked me this week we were doing with the encounter years. They said, how do you deal with offence? And I said to them, I'm going to say the same thing. Can I be honest? I'm going to say to you, is it all right if I'm honest how I deal with offence? You're not going to judge me or cancel me? All right. How do I deal with offense?
[00:14:59] Well, the first thing we all do is we call fire down from heaven and pray that the Lord would devour them.
[00:15:08] And I always do that just in case he says yes.
[00:15:14] That's my response. My heart gets offended at her and I go, lord, get them.
[00:15:20] You know, I'm just.
[00:15:22] Because one day I said I was going to be honest. I'm going to be really honest, all right?
[00:15:30] You see, the thing is, offense is my problem, not theirs, because my heart has taken offense.
[00:15:39] It's my heart that's damaged, it's not theirs. And if you take offense, it's your heart. Therefore, I have to bring my heart to Jesus.
[00:15:49] There was someone who caused me great harm, great pain. And so I had to go through the process of forgiveness. Remember I said, your brother is never the enemy, even when he looks like the enemy.
[00:16:04] All right, the devil is the enemy and sometimes he uses our brother. But this is what Jesus says. I say to you, love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who spitefully use you and persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven. Four things Jesus says to do, love them.
[00:16:26] And when I was in my pain, Jesus said, come and walk with me.
[00:16:33] And remember, as we walk with Jesus, as we're in his presence, we're in close proximity to him, which pulls us away from the sin and the brokenness because we're in his wonderful light. And when we're in pain like this, it's at these times that Jesus works closely with us.
[00:16:57] And you see, when you're in the presence of God, it's really hard to hate Your brother, or to take offense.
[00:17:05] But I want you to know my heart was still leaning the wrong way, all right? I'm walking with Jesus, but my heart is still this way. So if he won't send fire down from heaven, I wondered if maybe he would just open up the earth and swallow them.
[00:17:23] Remember Korah? And he comes against Moses, and he says, moses, who do you think you are? You the only Holy One? You're just building your own empire. You're just. You know, look, there hasn't.
[00:17:35] Aren't they all these God's people?
[00:17:37] You're doing your own thing, Moses.
[00:17:40] And the ground opens up and swallows them.
[00:17:45] Number 16. Great story. So if fire doesn't work, I always give that option as well, all right? Because I'm loving them. But if the Lord wants to take them home, he can take them home.
[00:17:58] I told you I was going to be honest with you, all right? Because it's no good me telling you that the presence of God just comes on us and we just love them. I did love them, and I'm walking with him, but then, you know, I'm in Tesco's and everyone's upsetting me, and I don't love anyone.
[00:18:15] Next thing, Jesus says, bless them. All right? We must bless them. You have to speak out loud. Look, God knows your thoughts. I don't believe the devil knows our thoughts. And people definitely don't know our thoughts.
[00:18:28] And so in order to bless, you have to speak out loud. Because when you bless, your words release heaven. So heaven starts to bless them.
[00:18:45] See, that's just not fair, because Jesus tells you to bless them, and heaven does it. So they start to be blessed. When I haven't done anything wrong. I'm in pain, I'm hurt. They are now getting blessed because Jesus says, bless them. And I'm releasing the blessing of heaven over their lives.
[00:19:10] And I often said, lord, it's just not fair. And so many times the Lord said, do you want fair?
[00:19:16] Do you want fair? And then I remember what fair is. I go, no, no, no, Lord. Forget it.
[00:19:22] I don't want fair.
[00:19:24] But Jesus also said, the measure you use will be the measure that's measured against you.
[00:19:30] So when you bless them, it releases the blessing of heaven upon them. But more comes to you because it comes back at you because you speak the blessing and the measure of blessing you release to them. The Lord says, I'm going to release it to you now.
[00:19:53] Then Jesus says, do good to them.
[00:19:58] I was at a wedding, and this person walked up to me, and I want you to know that my heart turned black.
[00:20:08] It was fine loving them at a distance, in the presence of God. It was fine. Praying, blessing. But when I came face to face, my heart turned black. I didn't want to be in the same room. I didn't want to be anywhere near them.
[00:20:26] And that night, Juliet, she'd forgotten she did this. She called a family conference.
[00:20:33] So, Juliet, Emma, Joel, Ameen, she said, we're going to pray over Dad's heart, and dad is going to confess his sin.
[00:20:41] I haven't sinned.
[00:20:43] I'm perfect.
[00:20:47] This is true. And it was. I felt humiliated. The kids got their hands on me. Oh, God, we prayed for dad. We prayed for dad. His heart's so bad. I'm going, oh, no.
[00:20:57] And then the Lord spoke. He spoke to me and he said, I want you to go and meet them for coffee, and I want you to take a bottle of wine and give them a bottle of wine. I like the occasional glass of red wine. And I have this rack of wine, and I got the cheap ones at the bottom and the really good ones at the top. So I just picked up a cheap one.
[00:21:22] This is all true. I know everyone's going to leave the church. I won't be canceled. They're going to go, who is this guy leading this church? But this is just.
[00:21:31] So I picked up. And I don't know what it's like with you, but when Jesus is displeased, it's not like he tells me off. It's just he goes silent. I can almost. Sometimes I can picture him. It's like this, you know, all the times of the disciples where Jesus is like this. You know, I'm not talking about bread.
[00:21:50] You know, we left the bread, and so I put the bottom one down, and I'm halfway up the shelf, and my arm is shaking, and it's not the Holy Spirit.
[00:22:02] And it's like he's going up, up, up, up. And I go, oh, Lord, come on. Until I'm on my top shelf of my really nice wine that I saved for the best thing ever.
[00:22:15] I used to go and give it to him.
[00:22:19] So anyway, we arrange a meeting a few weeks later. I was hoping the Lord had forgotten, but he hadn't.
[00:22:25] And honestly, I'm driving to the meeting, praying, lord, if he breaks down, it'd be fine. We can arrange it another time.
[00:22:33] All these tussles in my. Because my heart is hurt.
[00:22:38] And I get there and we chat. He's not even sorry.
[00:22:47] I don't know if you even knew it was A good bottle of wine, which makes it even worse. I wanted to say, you know, this is expensive, right? But I didn't. I know that much about the Lord.
[00:22:59] And, you know, I. I came back and Judas said, how'd it go? I went, I know I'm a bottle of wine low.
[00:23:09] And then Jesus says, there's one more thing you have to do. You have to pray for them, because that's how you posture your heart.
[00:23:22] Don't delight in their fall, but pray. Pray for the blessing.
[00:23:27] Pray that they will succeed. Pray that they'll do well. Pray that the God that has saved and rescued me will rescue them. And he says, then you will be a son or a daughter of your Father in heaven.
[00:23:43] That's how you become a son or daughter.
[00:23:46] That's all I want. I want to be a son of my Father in heaven. You know, in him there is no darkness. He is so beautiful, so full of light, so forgiving, so embracing.
[00:24:00] And he saw each one of us in the pit of sin and adultery and pornography and lying and cheating and murdering. And the Father that knew no sin sent his only son to die on the cross. For me.
[00:24:18] I don't know about you. You got to figure that out. But for me, he gave his life for me. He took it all. I don't deserve this.
[00:24:28] And then he lifts me up into the heavenly realms, into his glory.
[00:24:36] He says, come walk with me.
[00:24:41] I'm telling you this because leaders will let you down.
[00:24:45] Don't cancel them. Family will disappoint you. Don't sell them to Egypt.
[00:24:51] Your spouse might even desert you. You know, when Jesus hung on the cross, do you know, I've often thought about this.
[00:25:00] What was the. I mean, it was all difficult for Jesus, but I don't think the whipping and the crucifixion was. You know, that was a.
[00:25:10] A thing that he momentarily endured and carried for us. Do you know the most stunning thing of the cross is when Jesus is hanging on the cross, says, my God, my God, where are you?
[00:25:25] Because of the first time in the whole of eternity, the Father and the Son were separated as the sin of the world was born of Jesus. The Father hadn't left Jesus. He was standing right there at the cross. But Jesus said, where are you?
[00:25:38] I'm on my own.
[00:25:40] The Son, who had never, ever known what it was to be because of the love of the Godhead, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit loving one another, was suddenly on the cross with our sin, not even knowing where the Father was. And at the cross, he Says it is finished and he gave his life and he died for us.
[00:26:10] You see, leaders, family, spouse, friends, none of them can stop Jesus drawing you into his light and into his beauty. The only thing that can stop Jesus working in your life, I said last week, was unbelief I want who had another one. Unforgiveness.
[00:26:29] Those are the only two things that can stop Jesus work in your life. We don't believe him and we won't forgive.
[00:26:36] Now, please hear me. You know, I choose not to stay in abuse. I'm not saying stay in abuse, but I'm also saying I don't stay in offense because I'm not a victim.
[00:26:49] I'm a redeemed child of God.
[00:26:51] And no weapon forged against me will prevail. And I will refute every tongue that accuses me. And that is the heritage of the servants of the Lord. I'm going to say this again to you. I choose not to stay in abuse, but also don't stay in offense, because I am not a victim. I am redeemed. I belong to Jesus Christ.
[00:27:15] And no weapon forged against me will prevail. And I will refute every tongue that accuses me, because this is the heritage of the servants of the Lord. Isaiah 54.
[00:27:29] You are not a victim. You are a conqueror. You must move from disappointment to expectancy. You are no longer an orphan, but you are now a son or a daughter of the king. And the reason I love Barnabas so much is that he believed in John Mark. He knew his story wasn't finished. And our story is never finished until we stand before him and actually. Then the great adventure actually starts. You see? Yeah. You should be pleased.
[00:28:01] You see, whenever we are hurt, let down, disappointed, we have a choice what to do with our hearts. We can carry the bitterness, or we can reflect, refuse to believe that their story is finished.
[00:28:22] You see, I believe that the grace that saved me is able to save the people that hurt me and offend me.
[00:28:31] And my prayer is, God, just as you rescued me, rescue them.
[00:28:38] Then we become like the fig tree that is crammed with fruit, delicious to taste. Do you remember what Jesus was looking for? He was looking for figs. And he comes to the fig tree and there's no fruit on it. He was looking for a fig tree full of figs.
[00:28:57] And when he looks at his church, he's looking for a church that's full of fruit and figs. That isn't taking offense, that's loving one another, that's walking in his glorious light, in the power of His Holy Spirit.
[00:29:12] And that's why Jesus said a new commandment I give every single one of you that you love one another as I have loved you.
[00:29:22] By this all will know that you are my disciples. If you have loved one for another, love them, bless them, do good to them, and pray for them, and you will be a Son and Daughter of Heaven. Thanks for listening to the Cromer Church Podcast. If you enjoyed this message, you can like and subscribe. You can also join us in person or online every Sunday at Cromer Church. For more information about us, including our ministries, events, worship, and how to donate, visit our website at Cromer Church.
