Marcel Hall: We're gonna continue in the sermon series called The Lord's Favor,
and we have a theme scripture that's guiding in the basis for our series.
It's Luke chapter four, in Jesus, he unroll the scrolls.
He's in the synagogue.
He's in his worship service, and he reveals that he is the Messiah, that he
is the one who's bringing God's favor.
And it says in Luke four, verse 18, he quotes a verse in Isaiah.
And it says, the spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for
the blind, to set the oppressed free to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.
And again, Jesus embodies and brings this to the world.
And, and last week, uh, Daniel did a great job of preaching and
reminding us we need to first have a reset in our relationship with God.
Today we're gonna be talking about a relational reset as we need to have
a re a reset with people as well.
Let's go to God in prayer.
Father, thank you so much for your word.
I'm excited about what your word has been teaching me.
I'm excited about the season that we are in and all the
opportunities we had to grow closer to you, but to join you in your.
Good work.
God, we pray right now that your word speaks clearly that you articulate your
message that you have for us collectively, but also we can receive the message
that you have for us individually.
We pray in Jesus name, amen.
First thing we need to remember is that God is relational.
Our God is a relational God.
That means Christianity is relational.
Because Christianity is about a relationship with God and
a relationship with others.
And we get reminded of this in Matthew 22, in verse 36, where
Jesus is asked a question and they're asking him a question.
What is the greatest commandment in the law?
What's the number one thing that God Almighty wants from his creation?
And let's read it here in Matthew 22, verse 36.
Church, are you still with me here?
Alright, don't get quiet on me.
Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law.
Jesus replied, love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all
your soul and with all your mind.
This is the first and greatest commandment.
And the second is like it.
Love your neighbor as yourself.
All the law and the prophets, hang on these two commandments.
Jesus says, Hey, this whole thing is about relationships.
A relationship with the father and a relationship with those around you.
And love implies relationship.
And he says it's interesting because they just ask him for number one, but he
says, I'm gonna drop some more knowledge on you so that you don't get it twisted.
Yes, you are called to love God, but you're also called to love human
beings because some of us wanna be like, I can do the God thing, I just
don't wanna do the people thing.
I love God, but I can't stand people.
And Jesus said, no, no, no, no, no, no.
This thing is connected.
It's not separate.
You can't separate the two.
It's kind of like my glasses here.
And so these glasses, loving God is the lens and loving people is the F frame.
They go together.
If I'm missing one, then it's incomplete and my sight is off and
I can't tell who's in front of me.
And so we need to love God and love people.
They are together.
They're not separate.
It's a relationship with the father in heaven, and it's a
relationship with those around us.
And so after a reset with God, as we talked about last week, we
must have a reset with people.
We must have a reset in our relationships again.
'cause God wants our relationships with people to be aligned
to his will and his design.
And so a relational reset.
Means seeing people as God sees them and then loving them as God calls us to, if
we're gonna have a reset, a relational reset, it means we need to start seeing
people the way God sees them, and then start loving them the way God calls us to.
And a reset, a relational reset starts with perspective.
I appreciate Kenny.
Earlier he talked about what his perspective about himself.
When his perspective is off, it leads down a bad path.
But when God enters his hearts and his faith, it changes his what
His perspective, which changes his feelings, which changes his behavior.
And I appreciate my wife because many years we were just talking
and she says, you know, it's all about perspective, and it's so true.
Our perspective about people is vital.
So let me ask you this question, take a second and answer
this question for yourself.
How do you view people?
Some of you're like, it depends which people, how do you view people or people?
Something that you have to deal with.
Gotta deal with people or.
I get a chance to engage with, are people an object that serve you or is
it an opportunity for mutual blessing?
Are people for here for your enjoyments or are they here so you can enjoy life with?
How do you view people?
See, this is so important because here's the thing, your view of people
determines your treatment of people.
Your view of people determines your treatment of people.
Think about this.
If you view somebody as special, how do you treat that person special?
If you view somebody as, Hmm, I can't stand that person.
What are you tempted to do?
Do something that you shouldn't be doing, right?
So your view of people determines how you treat people.
So we have to ask ourselves if I'm gonna love God and I'm gonna love people, I
gotta understand how do I view people?
'cause I can't love people if I don't have the right view of people.
Brother and sisters, are you with me here?
And so we need to see people and here's the opportunity that God, God is so cool,
but God shows us how he views us, and then he calls us to have the same view.
So let's go real old school.
Okay, we're gonna go to Genesis chapter one.
We're gonna go to where it all started here real quickly.
And I usually like to look at one passage and go through it, but we're
gonna look at several passages here, so make sure you have your notes out
so you can take uh, uh, notes here.
But in Genesis chapter one, we are reminded that every
creation is an image bearer.
Every creation, every person, every human being is an image bearer of God.
What do we mean?
Genesis chapter one, verse 27.
This is the creation story.
It says, so God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God.
He created them, male and female.
He created them.
God created us in his image.
The Apostle James, who, uh, was a a was the brother of Jesus.
He's actually talking about in his letter to the churches, he
starts talking about this idea.
We gotta watch our language, but he says something really cool that
ties in and reminds all of us of how we should treat people, because we
have to have the right view of them.
And he says this in James chapter three, verse nine, with the tongue,
we praise our Lord and Father.
And with it, we curse human beings.
Who have been made in God's likeness.
How in the world can we praise God, but yet curse human beings
when they're made in God's image?
So there's a reminder here for you and for me, that we are made in the
image of God, and to be made in God's image means we are reflections of God.
So every human being is a reflection of God Almighty.
And so I have here, uh, where, where do they go?
Here?
I'm old school for today, but I got a coin.
You remember these things.
Remember we used to actually use this.
Sometimes you could actually buy something back in the day.
I used to get some candy with a quarter, you know what I'm saying?
A quarter.
They looking at me like, where's the other dollar?
I'm like, man, this Wrigley's gum.
What happened?
You know?
So anyhow, sorry.
All right, so here's a coin.
It's uh, George Washington.
I got a 25 cents.
It's a coin on there.
Whose image on there?
It is George Washington.
We know who it belongs to.
Now here's the thing, in the same way, just like this coin, people
have God's image stamped on them.
Meaning that we all belong to God.
We all are image bearers.
Every person bears God's image, which means that every person is
worthy of dignity and of value.
Every person is of value and of dignity to God Almighty because they
have God's image stamped on them.
They are reflection of God.
So whether it's the nice guy.
Or the mean woman, or the nice woman and the mean guy, the the right winger
or the left winger, the black, white, Hispanic, Asian, everything in between
are all made in the image of God.
And so every one of us has dignity and self-worth because
we're worthy and valuable to God.
But do we view each other like this?
Now, many of us we know this, we know.
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
Ms.
Bear, I maybe don't use that phrase that often, but we know this.
But here's the thing.
Many times we need what a reset in our view and say, here's
what's really cool in Christ.
'cause again, in Christ, we have every day, every opportunity to have a spiritual
reset in our life and in our faith.
And so we take it up as Second Corinthians chapter five.
I wanna read a verse here real quickly.
And he starts off by saying, we don't have a chance to read it all.
But he starts off by saying, Hey, you know, Christ's love his, his death,
his sacrifice, his resurrection, you know, that compels us to give our
lives completely and holy to God.
We don't live for ourselves anymore.
We live for God.
And right after he makes that statement, he says this to the Church of Corinth.
So from now on, we regard no one from a worldly point of view.
Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come.
The old is gone and the new is here.
And so he reveals that a relationship with God leads to a reset in how we see people.
Before I knew God, I could view people in a very worldly way, but once I
enter into a relationship with God, he now resets my view, not only of
him, not only of myself, but of his creation, and I'll look at them as
objects for my self.
Fulfillment, but they're images of God, image bearers of the all mighty.
You see, God can and wants to lead us to see people not as enemies, not
as rivals, not as annoyances, not as objects for our use, but as image bearers
and potential brothers and sisters.
God doesn't want us to see people as objects for our enjoyment,
but image bearers who can mutually bless one another, this
isn't what you can do for me.
This is, man, we get the opportunity to be a blessing to each other.
Image bearers.
Imagine if our whole world had this view of people, our society.
California, orange County, the world.
If everybody in the world, all 8 billion of us, if we all viewed people as image
bearers of God, what would that be like?
She always said, heaven on earth, it'd be slightly different than
what we got going on right now.
Right?
The news would be a whole lot different.
It probably would be boring.
You'd be like, man, there ain't much to watch anymore except for
this good deed or this good deed.
You're like, all right, man.
Here we go.
Isn't that what our world needs right now?
Don't we need a reset in our view, how we view each other?
Because again, how we view each other determines how we treat each other.
You guys with me, brothers and sisters?
Now let's talk about this view here.
Let's stay in this lane.
Let's talk about how we view each other in this room.
How do we view the church?
Let me ask you this.
How do you view people?
How do you view those in the rows right now?
How do you view those that are sitting next to you, those down the road from you?
How do you view those in your ministry, your small group?
Oh, that's good one said awesome.
Give her an hour and she might say something else.
How do you view your brothers and sisters?
Let me ask you this.
Are they church friends?
Are they people from my church?
Are they strangers?
Stranger Danger.
That's why we have some empty seats in between.
I don't, can't sit next to you.
Oh, maybe y'all took it negative.
That's okay.
Or do we view each other as family?
How do you view the church?
I know most of you know the right answer.
We know the right answer.
Is the answer congruent with our hearts, our faith, and our lives?
You see, here's the great thing again, Jesus, he gives us an opportunity
to reset our view, not only of the masses, not only of God's complete
creation, but of God's people.
We're gonna look here at a quick verse from Jesus, and he's, uh,
he's running in his ministry.
He's, he's teaching, he's preaching, he's doing these great things,
and his family comes to visit him.
They wanna talk to him.
They wanna bring him outside and they want to talk to him.
And we learned something really interesting here.
Matthew 1246 Church, are you still with me here?
Well, Jesus was still talking to the crowd.
His mother and brother stood outside wanting to speak to him.
Someone told him, your mother and brothers are standing outside
wanting to speak with you.
He replied to him, who is my mother and who are my brothers?
Pointing to his disciples.
He said, here are my mother and my brothers.
For whoever does the will of my father in heaven is my
brother and sister and mother.
Jesus doesn't say, here are my church friends.
Here are my fellow church goers.
Here's my congregation.
He says, here are my brothers and sisters.
That was radical.
They're like, what?
Your mama's outside.
I'm not your mama.
He's like, yes, you are.
If you do God's will.
He says, this is my family.
And that was radical because at that time your family nuclear unit was huge.
And it wasn't just brothers and sisters as cousins and, and so that was a
radical statement for him to make.
Who with people who really weren't technically related to him.
And it's still a radical statement today that spiritually you
or my brother and my sister.
Jesus' view was family and not friends from church.
He was reframing for them, and he's reframing for us now how we are to
see each other not as strangers, not even just as friends, but as brothers
and sisters and Gods households.
That's how we are to view each other.
Jesus.
This is interesting because you can just see this and think,
oh, okay, uh, that's his people.
But again, he's talking to a crowd here.
So this wasn't just his disciples and Jesus didn't wait
until they earned this title.
Jesus didn't wait until they all felt so close to each other.
He called 'em family immediately.
Think about that for a second.
If you begin to do the will of the father, you are my brother and sister immediately.
I don't even have to know your last name.
We're family.
This is the view that God has of his people.
Now, if this is the view that Jesus had, what should his followers have?
Should be the same view, shouldn't it?
We should have the same view that Jesus has.
And so let me ask you this, and this again is a good question.
Write this question down for yourself.
Do I have the same view that Jesus has toward the church?
And
maybe for some of us, the question is, do I still have the same view?
We maybe had it at one time, but maybe we've lost it.
It's easy to lose.
Let's keep it 100 up in here.
Okay.
It's easy to lose.
I remember when I first became a Christian, I got baptized in Washington,
DC and, and, and, and I was like, wow.
Everybody is, this is my family.
This is cool.
And that was my first year.
And then I, I went to New York.
I was part of New York Church for several months, for the summer.
Then I went to LA and I was like, man, all these new faces, this is new family.
It was great.
And then after about year two, I'm like, yeah, this is my family.
Year three.
Yeah.
What's up homie?
Alright, you.
You know what I'm saying?
Some of the all left and that's natural.
That's not evil, that's not bad.
I didn't have a bad heart.
But what I needed is a reset because we could lose our
appreciation for the fellowship.
We can lose our all of what God is doing in the church.
And sometimes, and me and Karina were talking about this yesterday,
sometimes we can just have fatigue.
Man, I've seen you about, man, 25 years.
Every Wednesday and Sunday,
brother.
I'll catch it later.
You know what I'm saying?
Right.
Are we, are we being honest or we're not being honest?
That can happen.
Right?
And so what do we need when that happens?
We need a resets.
If we view our siblings, our kids, our parents, our spouses like that,
we're on the road of destruction.
And so we need to have a reset.
I need to view you as an image bearer of God.
You reflect God Almighty, and you know what?
You are my brother.
You are my sister.
We riding together.
We gonna be an eternity together.
So these last 30 years, there's nothing.
And for some of us, maybe this reset, as Daniel mentioned,
maybe it's a simple reboot.
Or maybe for some of us it's a factory reset and we need
have a complete change of mind.
And maybe it starts with, you know what, I'm just gonna be present.
I'm gonna show up.
We have a meeting of the body.
I'm gonna show up, I'm gonna be there.
I'm just gonna start there.
'cause I'll be honest with you, I lead like, uh, a hundred percent
of our midweeks and I can tell you that percentage of desiring
and being so excited to be there is not a hundred percent.
There are many drives on my way where I'm like, Lord, give me the strength.
I do not feel like going.
And then I get there and I'm struggling.
Then the first person walks in and they see me and I'm working.
I'm like, yeah, I need to smile.
Okay.
Alright.
Second person comes in and it starts to change, and by the end of the
night, I'm usually praying on my way, thanking, God, thank you that I came.
Thank you for my brothers and sisters.
I'm like, please forgive me.
I'm so sorry I had a bad attitude earlier, but I'm grateful.
So maybe for some of us, I'm just gonna decide.
I'm gonna be presents, I'm gonna be there.
I'm gonna show up.
Maybe for some of us it's perhaps resetting our priorities.
Man, you know, time is gone and we have a lot of things going on and man, in
Orange County and, and life in general, there's a lot you can do, isn't there?
And we have priorities that man, now I have, you know, baby girl, my oldest, uh,
she, she's in, she's a high school and so now she's doing high school sports.
So she was doing, you know, youth sports.
Now she's doing high school sports.
Number one, I didn't know they were gonna charge me for these high school sports.
I am so upset.
Corina's, like it's gonna cost a couple hundred.
I said, couple hundred dollars for what?
I thought we ended that.
Sorry, I'm again, I gotta get this stuff out.
Okay, I gotta get this stuff.
But now she's got all these things and she's got sports and Dominique
just started football again and desire Ray has this, and I'm
like, man, this is getting crazy.
I said, we gotta figure something out.
I said, we can't do all this.
We're gonna have to cut back.
We're gonna have to limit this because we gotta prioritize what's most important.
We're having to make some decisions to prioritize, and I believe for some
of us, we need to sit down and think, maybe I need to reset my priorities.
Maybe I need to sit down.
Maybe I need to slow down so that I can focus in on what's truly valuable,
what's eternal, and according to God, it's a relationship with him
and a relationship with people.
Especially those who believe.
Let me ask you this, what are the possibilities if a group
of true Christians viewed each other the way Jesus views us?
What are the opportunities?
What are the possibilities if a group of true Christians viewed
each other the way Jesus views us?
There would be acceptance, there would be supports, there would be belonging,
there would be sacrifice, there would be joy, there would be needs being met.
There would be love.
But isn't that what all of us crave?
Don't we all crave that?
Don't we all wanna be in a place of where we belong?
What's that old cheer song, right?
All my old school heads know that.
Remember Norm, right?
Go where people go.
You wanna go where everybody knows?
There you go.
All the young people are like, what is this old man talking about?
We all wanna belong.
We all wanna be accepted for who we are and not putting up a front.
We all want supports.
We all wanna be loved, but guess what?
We all want that for everybody else as well.
That's what you want, not only for you, but that's what you want for your family.
That's what you want for your neighbors, for your coworkers.
This is what we all want.
And we have the opportunity when we have a reset and our view of people.
'cause again, when we view each other.
It's going to change the way we treat one another.
Man, time is going.
I've gotta, I gotta blaze through this last part here.
Okay.
All right.
So, sorry Chad, I know you don't like it when I talk fast.
I'm gonna talk fast here real quickly.
Okay.
Alright.
So here's the response here.
So if we, if we have a different view, then we have to go ahead and have love.
We have to love people.
And again, it's not have to, it's we get the opportunity to.
The apostle Paul wrote to the church that met in the city of Rome, and he
says this, we're gonna read it real quickly here, and it talks about this
love and love we have to understand isn't a feeling primarily it's a feeling
that leads to action and this word love.
Many times in the, in the Bible, it's written in Greek, and so the word is
agape and it's agape includes feeling, but it's really about doing what's
in the best interest of the other.
So when Jesus says, love your enemy, he's not talking about have warm,
fuzzy feelings for your enemy.
He's talking about do what's best for your enemy.
It's a verb.
It's something that we do, not something necessarily that we just possess.
You guys with me here?
So let's read an understanding that the love must be sincere.
Verse nine, hate what is evil.
Clinging to what is good.
Be devoted to one another in love.
Honor one another above yourselves.
Never be lacking in ze.
But keep your spiritual fervor serving the Lord.
Be joyful and hope patient and affliction faithful in prayer.
Share with the Lord's people who are in need.
Practice hospitality.
Bless those who persecute you.
Bless and do not curse.
Rejoice with those who rejoice, mourn with those who mourn.
Live in harmony with one another.
Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position.
Do not be conceited.
Do not repay anyone evil for evil.
Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everyone.
If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.
Verse 19, do not take revenge, my dear friends, but leave room for
God's wrath where it is written.
It is mine to avenge.
I will repay, says the Lord.
On the contrary, if your enemy is hungry, feed him.
If he is thirsty, give him something to drink.
In doing this, you will heat burning coals on his head.
Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.
Let's stop right there.
Here's God's vision for our relationships and our character.
It's God's vision that this is what describe our and, uh,
uh, uh, it would describe our relationships and our character.
See when there's a reset, it begins with our view, but it
leads to what we just read.
It leads to sincere love and action.
There's devotion, there's honor to one another.
There's sharing, there's generosity, ity, hospitality, for those you know
and those you don't know, supportive in the good and the tough times.
Living at peace instead of hostility and animosity.
Showing mercy and even, and even blessing enemies.
You see, this is who we are.
This is what we do and this is the type of relationships we are to have.
This right here is love and action.
We have a reset.
It leads to action where there's true love being exemp, uh, exhibited.
We have the Lord's favor and we get a chance to bring
the Lord's favor to people.
You get a chance to bring it to you.
You get a chance to bring it to somebody else.
'cause we receive it, we experience it, and then we join
God in bringing that to others.
We join God in blessing our communities and blessing each
other and making situations better.
When the Christians come into the building, the situation should get better.
It shouldn't go from good to bad.
We come in, it should go from bad to good, from good to
better, and from better to best.
You guys with me here because we're bringing the Lord's favor into the table.
This is who we are.
This is what we do, and these are the relationships that we have.
But again, this is what we all desire and this is what we all want to do.
And it starts with the reset with God That leads to a reset with people.
Let's get real, uh, uh, practical here.
So here's some action steps just for the week here.
Alright?
Now you can continue this going forward, but I wanna, I wanna encourage you
and ask you and challenge you to do this for the next seven days here.
Okay?
So here's number one.
Pray each day this week, this type of prayer, God help me see and treat people
as you do every day before you get on the car, you get on the five or the
4 0 5 and 91 before you go to class.
And you have to take face that, that, that professor before you
go to school, whatever it is.
Pray every day this week.
God help me see and treat people as you do.
And then second, choose a go-to verse that shapes how you view others.
Find if you don't have one, have a go-to verse that helps you
to reframe your view of people.
'cause sometimes I get some calls and I'm like, they are made in the image of you.
They are my brother and sister.
Okay, let's do this with me here.
So from now on we regard no one from a worldly point of view.
Though we once regarded Christ in this way, we do so no longer.
Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, that's you and me.
The new creation has come.
The old is gone.
The new is here.
May God lead us to a reset in our relationships and may we
experience more of God's favor.
Amen.