"The Greatest Commandments" - Part 1

Well, good morning. Are there by doing alright? Well this morning we are starting a new sermon series called the Great it. Now I'm not promising, it will be the greatest sermon series ever but what I'm saying is, we're going to be looking at the greatest Commandments in the greatest challenges that Jesus has given us. So, I want to start with a little audience participation, you guys up for that. Oh, one person is. Let me try that again. Are you guys up for a little audience participation? There we go. Okay, so when we talk about the greatest, I need you to help me with an acronym here, when you hear the word goat, what comes to mind? Greatest of all-time, right? And all of us in here have different opinions of the greatest of all time, depending what that is, what category that is going to do a little test here. Okay, we talk about the greatest here. I'm going to say category and you got a shout-out, do it is. Alright, first basketball.

I heard Michael Jordan. Is there anybody else? He buys basketball. Okay, sorry, I'll get it just for you, Chris soccer.

About boxing. Muhammad Ali.

Rocky. Yeah, I'm here. Yeah, we got to put Rocky. I mean, I know it's not real but I'd say Rocky 2 Alright, let's see. What about the greatest movie of all time.

Hey to you, that might be the greatest.

Are the ten commandments of Princess Bride? That's a great movie Casablanca, okay? See the problem is when we throw these out I mean it it depends on your opinion, right? What your likes are? What your dislikes are instead of special like when it came to a movie, I mean, there's folks that, you know, they like the, the old movies, right? That that just cap so much personality that captures. You like the olden days, right? And then you've got like something like The Princess Bride great family movie, right? And then there's some of us who might like, Marvel movies, and we have our opinion of the greatest Marvel movie, but we all have our opinions of who the goat is, as well in each of these individual sports and the categories. Go on, and on and on, they are all opinion-based. But here's the problem. When we start this series, The Greatest, we're looking at the greatest Commandment that Jesus has given this morning, that is not opinion-based. And that's where we're going here this morning. So Val your heads with me as we begin. Heavenly Father we again thank you Lord for being who you are. We thank you for your Saving Grace. We thank you God that you have gathered us and you've gathered other believers around the world together this morning to praise and worship and exalt you. And God, I pray. Lord through the reading of your word. Do the message this morning that I would be able to convey what your love means, and how we are to love one another. I'm just thankful to serve a God Like You in Jesus name, I pray. Amen. This morning, we're going to begin in Matthew chapter 22. So if you have your Bibles, let's go ahead and get there. And we're going to be looking at vs 34 through 40 and we're just going to jump right into this. So I give you a second to turn there. If you got your Bibles, it will be on the screen as well behind me.

I like your in those pages turn.

All right, here we go. Verse 34, chapter 22. When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they came together and one of them an expert in the law. As a question to test him teacher. What's the man in? The law is the greatest and he said to him, love the Lord, your God with all your heart, with all your soul. And with all your mind, this is the greatest and most important command. And the second is like, it. Love your neighbor as yourself for all the law and the prophets depend on these two commands. A second here because what we are finding as we look at. This passage is Jesus, is in a very interesting situation. In fact, he's run off a bunch of Sadducees who try to trick him with the question about the resurrection, of course, the Sadducees don't believe in the resurrection, which is why they're sad. You see, sorry, I had to do that. Dad joke. But this is basically what is happening here, right? Jesus is putting them in their place. And so now there's like an opening here for the Pharisees to descend Upon Jesus, and they want to try to trick him by giving him a question and catching him in a wrong answer. This is what I call got your style journalism for Century Edition discrediting. Your opponent is much older than the political races, we see today. It goes way on back and so they asked Jesus, which command in the law is the greatest. Well, my guess is that they were expecting Jesus to go to the Ten Commandments and say something like you shall have no other gods. Before me, I mean, that that has been a great place to start right? But no matter what commandment Jesus would have stated their, it would have been wrong in their eyes and they would have had 39 reasons why it was wrong. Jesus. Being Jesus pulls the Pharisees here and instead, he quotes Deuteronomy, and I'm not talking The Ten Commandments here, but he actually gives the instructions that God gives to the nation. Israel on how they are the live. You probably heard these versus before, but they're found in Deuteronomy chapter, 6, Verses 4 through 5 and it says listen Israel. The Lord your God is one Lord. Our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord, your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your strength and I know what this is called. The shamal. And so this is what they were taught in Jewish families. In the household staff passed on from generation to generation, so lazy. It at the feet of the Pharisees who basically, you know, they know everything there is there. The know-it-alls when it comes to all of this, that Jesus was going to say. The second is like it. Love your neighbor as yourself to Jesus has. Turn the tables once again on the Pharisees and then he's going to go on to ask them questions which we will deal with another time for the next two weeks. We are going to be looking at what it means to love God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength, and we're going to be looking at what it means to love your neighbor as yourself and see how they are very much connected to each other. But first things first, we got to ask a question here before we move on. And the question is, what does loving God mean? What does loving God mean for the righteous Jews? During this time, Living God meant, keeping the Commandments. And I and this time I'm talking about the Ten Commandments and here they are. What's think back? First and foremost, when we look at the Ten Commandments, you shall have no other gods before me, you shall make. No Idols before me, you should not take the Lord God's name in vain You should remember the Sabbath day by keeping it, holy. You shall honor your mother and your father, you shall not kill others. You shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal. You shall not bear false. Witness, you shall not commit the things up your neighbor. That's a good list, doesn't it? I mean, think about, if we're doing all of those things, we're on the right track and this is what righteous Jewish, folks. Believed this is how I show my love to God by obeying his very commitment that you probably saw that video a little while ago, that the first four Commandments dealt with our relationship with God. While the next six Commandments dealt with our relationship with others. It's a Jesus sums it up. Here's my talking about loving God, and loving our neighbors that so far. I haven't said anything that you probably have, not heard, but here's where I'm about to begin this morning because the Moses day and in Jesus's day, they had a very different view of what love meant within the community, is he in our 21st century individualize world. When we hear love God and love your neighbor, Chances are we probably think of that love like the warm fuzzies. We get right. Imagine you just started dating someone. He get those warm fuzzies that you that that you love them, right? And this is what a lot of people think. Before example, you know, I'm supposed to have this warm feeling in my heart, if I love someone and then I'm I'm supposed to be with a group of like-minded folks and maybe we're all supposed to get together, make a circle, start a campfire and sing Kumbaya sounds like love, right? But as you can imagine, this is not what the biblical writers had in mind. Say, they don't think of love as a subjective. Emotional response. They so love is a verb, not a noun, is he love means action movement live in a certain way. So way that distinguish God's people from all other people, loving God, meant worshipping. The one true God, not hedging, your bet by making Idols to the sun, god in the moon, God in the god of the Harvest. And then worshipping those, in addition to the one true God. It's a loving God throwing everything. You had your tire lot in with the one true God, the god of Abraham, the god of Isaac, the god of Jacob, that's what loving God meant. But we got also meant honoring God's name. Not speaking of it lightly, not speaking of it profanely or invoking, it's to bring down, curses upon someone or something. I mean, think about how we even as Believers today, sometimes take God's name in vain without even realizing it because the bottom line is maybe we don't take God's name seriously. it's a loving God meant respecting who God is and what God has done and speaking his name carefully, But we got also met resting on one day to commemorate God's good creation. What God has done to take time out of the Endless difficulty of eking out a living to acknowledge that God is Sovereign over creation and he deserves our worship, he deserves our love Loving God also met that you love your neighbor which meant anyone around to see Jesus clarified that with the story of the Good Samaritan Home, which will be talking about next week. And so you love God by loving your neighbor, think about it, you honor your parents, that's loving God, you don't kill people. I don't want seems like an easy one, right? At least for the majority of the population, you know. But sadly, it had to be put in there. Because when we think about what was going on in the Old Testament, there was a lot of brutal things going on and then we can start with Cain and Abel. And so we shouldn't literally have to say that, but we do have to say that God had to say that. Back then the world was a brutal place. I'm at the brutal place now, but it was a brutal place. You see Power was Supreme in those days, life was cheap and scores were settled by, who lived and who died. But the analyzes idea of not killing other people into the Arcane arguments about capital punishment and in war and so, on, completely misses the point here because the point he's making, is that life is sacred your neighbor, so life is sacred human life is sacred. And so, God wants you to extend that love to the person sitting next to you because he or she is made in the image of God. Amen. Oh my God. Also met. I shouldn't steal from my neighbor. Should lie about my neighbor. I shouldn't cheat on my wife. I shouldn't want the things that my neighbor has them. All you got to do is think back to the story of David and Bathsheba I mean what do we see there? We see a guy come at something. We see a guy steal something. We see him murder. We see all of these things and you see how all of these are connected to loving your neighbor. See David, there was suffering from great sin. He committed those sense. Right in front of God.

It's a loving. God is an action. And I love for God, gets Express in the ways that we honor God with our lives and we honor those who are also made in God's image. You see this right here when he says those greatest commandment is, the greatest thing that Jesus ever said. Love God, love your neighbor because Jesus thought this idea was so important. Listen, how he finished there. He says all the lawn profits depend on these two command. Don't you to think back a little bit. Everything, you know about the Bible, going back to the Old Testament thinking about the Ten Commandments. Speaking about everything, the prophet said it's coming from the mouth of God, all of them. Depend on these two commands of the New Testament. Here is echoing of the love for God and the love for our neighbor. And that if that isn't enough to make you sit up and take notice, Jesus even does a lot of things here to show us what this type of love means. I don't, let's think through the New Testament to the woman caught in adultery. At the well. Who gets what, he could extended wrath to her. But what he did, he extended love, and he said, neither do I condemn, you go and sin. No more to those wanted to know where the draw the line on who my neighbor is think about it. Like this. Jesus tells the story of the Good Samaritan which erases all rational, all ethnic cultural and all spiritual boundaries to our neighbors. To those who think their neighbors, aren't The Afflicted. I want you to think about the things that Jesus did. Jesus touch the leper? Jesus made lame legs walk. Again, Jesus made blind eyes. See again? And if you still don't understand what it means to love, Jesus, would foreshadow his own Sacrifice by saying greater love? Has no, man than this that a man lay down his life for his friends. John even picks up the refrain connecting, loving God and loving others and 1st, John 3:14. When he says, we know that we have passed from Death to life because we love one another and whoever does not love abides in death method. Loving God, loving people. But we really need to know what this means. We talk about what love means, but what does it mean to love God? And love people will it means that we as followers of God show, love to others in ways that they get it, if they get it, that they know that we love them. I mean, think about it, if you love someone and you never tell them what's the point? You say, if a person doesn't know about your love for them than your love is not having the intended effect. We know how this works in romantic love, right, Chrissy. And I were dating, we started at about twenty-seven years ago about to have her 25th anniversary. And so we've dated about 27 years ago, but I can think of ways that we said we loved each other besides just the verbal. I love you. We wrote something called letters. I know that's like it was likely some of y'all get it, but writing a letter to each other that we remember. Like, when we are at school and let you know, there's a little note, check the box. Do you like me? Yes or no but it was more than that. In fact, if we were to look back at him we would probably laugh at each other right now because I'm sure they were very happy, very you know like this is friends. But back then that was a way. We there's so much unexpressed love in the world today and unexpressed love is unreal. Eyes Love and I told you, I imagine you had a crush back in the day and you never told them what happened to that Crush? Hopefully, your life turned out exactly like you want. But maybe that unreal Lies Love. Still kind of. Bothers you a little bit. But you see this extends to churches to us like ours, who want to show love to our community and people within the community, we have to do it in tangible ways. James wrote about this and he was actually criticizing those Christians who were going to tell the hungry and the cold. Go be warm and well-fed and they didn't lift a finger to feed them or give them something to where you say, love expresses itself in ways that are understandable to see if someone is starving and needs food, you don't tell them where to go to get it, you give them food. If someone is cold and making you don't tell them where to go warm themselves and get some clothes. You closed them. You don't tell somebody you love them and then neglect them during their life. You move heaven and you move Earth to show real love. See, that's what I don't love. Jesus is talking about. Yesterday, Christy and I were at Cheddar's and we're getting something and we have noticed this homeless man who is out front and he was on crutches. He had a neck brace, I just didn't look in good condition and so we thought he was leaving while we were going in it. So evidently he was like hanging out out front for for whatever reason and all of a sudden like we see him over in the corner and he's kind of shouting across the restaurant saying, thank you for the food. I so appreciate it, I really appreciate it and he was talking to a couple in the middle of the room. Do it. Evidently crossed his path on the way in and basically said, can we get you something to eat?

It's a tangible way to show love. It's a tangible way to meet a need there. It again, that's the kind of love that Jesus talks about. You see that's the kind of love Deuteronomy expressed and encourage that is the kind of love that acts in the best interest of those who are loved in ways that they know they're loved. I'll just what I want to share a story with you. And this story goes way back with the story, is actually originally told by Mr. Berry slime of Louisville Kentucky. And it's a fantastic story of love in action here. And it goes as follows. It was a fundraising dinner for a school that served learning, disabled, children, and the father of one of these young students would deliver a speech to everyone that evening, that would never be forgotten by all who attended it. So the man gets up in front of everyone. And at this point he just thinks the school, he thinks the faculty for everything, they have done for his son and all of the other kids. Then he offered a question. And the question he offered to everyone there was everything. God does is done with perfection and yet my son shake and not learn things as other children. Do my son shake and not understand things. As other kids do where is God's plan reflected in my son. The audience was shocked, obviously. The father continued and he said, I believe that when God brings a childlike Shay into the world, but an opportunity to realize the divine plan presents itself and it comes in the way that people treat that child and he goes on and he begins to tell a story that happened to him just a few weeks ago. But him and Shay, there were walking home one day and then walk by a baseball park and say saw some of his friends out of that baseball park and he turns to his dad and his dad, can I go play baseball with them? That was Dad, pause for a moment because he knew that most likely these boys probably would not want to play with Shay, but he also knew on the other hand, that if they did allow him to play, he would have a sense of belonging within this community group. So we took it upon himself to go to one of the young kids playing and he said, hey would you mind if shape played with you guys? Kyle looked around kind of trying to get the approval of the rest of the group. No one said anything. And so the young man took it upon himself and he said, yeah, that's fine. I'll put them on my team. But listen, we're in the eighth inning. So there's not much time to play, but I'll do my best to get him a job at some point. Well, is the bottom of the eighth inning Jason was down. Six runs wasn't a very close game, but then his team got three runs made a little closer and the top of the ninth game, ninth inning starts and Shay is giving a glove and told to go play right field. He is so excited. You see he never got the chance to play on the field so he goes out there and listen no balls ever got to him. No balls, came close to him, but he was simply ecstatic for being on that team and he said they're jumping up and down while he was out there waving to his dad. He was loving every minute of it or the bottom of the night starts, the team Claus back and gets a couple runs and now they're only down one run and there are two outs bottom of the ninth, inning and guess whose turn it is the bat Shay. Is that sitting over there wondering? I wonder if they're actually going to let him back cuz I mean they're going to blow the game if they do. And sure enough, the young man who allowed him to play whenever they're put a bat in his hand and said we'll get them so she walked up there and got to understand something about. She didn't know how to swing a bat whatsoever. He's like kind of clumsily trying to figure out how to hold the bat are the catchers trying to get him to the right spot and the picture season and the picture literally takes two big steps toward Shea. He's going to try to do whatever you can get this kid, a hit and so he softly loves the ball to him or Shay swings and he clumsily misses the first pitch. So the ball comes back to him in this business. When the catcher take Shay to decide shows him how to hold the back correctly and put them back in the right place. And now the picture takes, another big step towards home plate and he tosses the ball real softly to Shea. And it's at this point, she actually connect back to ball and the ball is a soft grounder to the picture. The picture grabs the ball. While the whole crowd is screaming. Run shape. Run the first she takes off and he's running as fast as his legs will carry him. If he Shay has never gotten a hit in his life, he's never visited first base. The picture, grabs the ball. You could have ended the game, right then. And there just a nice soft toss the first game over, but instead he takes the ball and he throws a high-arcing ball way over. The first baseman said, it's at this point. She touches first base and the first baseman looks at him and says keep going, keep going. And so now Shay is rounding. First heading towards 2nd and the outfielder gets the ball and he realizes what the pictures intentions are and so now he takes the ball and instead of throwing it to second base he throws it will over the third baseman's head. At this point, he's rounding second. The second baseman Grafton Point him in the direction of 3rd and says go go go. The crowd is going insane here. He runs as fast as he can, and he gets the third base and they're still tripping over the ball in the Outfield. And so it's at this point he runs to home base. He steps on home plate,

And they have won the game. Thanks to Shay. Eight grand slam to win the game in the bottom of the ninth inning. And he was deemed a hero at that moment. Both team surrounded him, they jumped up and down and they put him on their shoulders and carried him off. You say? Followed going to say that day, the boys from both teams helped bring a piece of the divine plan into the world. You say I said, love is a verb and love is not a feeling these boys. Understood what love was

They looked out for Shay.

We Luv Che and they wanted him to feel that love. To the bottom line today, it's simple. I know this command seems to be an impossible for man to always love God, with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, with all your strength. I know that seems to be an impossible command because let's be honest in the natural state of man, it is an impossible command. I mean, there is no greater evidence of the inability of man is to obey God's laws in this one commands here. No human. Being with a fallen nature. Can possibly love God with all his heart, soul mind, and strength, and love their neighbor. It's in humanly possible, but to disobey any command of God is sin. We know this therefore even without considering the sins that we have committed today, We are all condemned of our inability to fulfill this one command and this is the reason Jesus continually remind of the Pharisees and reminded the Sadducees of their inability to keep the law of God. He was trying to get them to see their spiritual bankruptcy and their need for a savior. And without the cleansing of sin that only Jesus provides and the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit living in the hearts of those who have been redeemed. Loving God, to any degree is impossible. But as Christians we know, we have been cleansed from our sins and we have the Holy Spirit living in and through us. So now how do we begin to love God? The way that we should? I go back to Mark. 9:24, might remember the man who asked God to help him with his unbelief. We too. Can I ask God to help us with the areas that we are not loving him? Like we should? I know that sometimes seems, It's like, wow, help me with my unbelief. Help me with? No, loving God. With my, my mind, help me with loving God with all my strength with My Soul. Let's be honest. We all struggle. I look at my life the times I've walked by somebody who had a need and got put it right there in front of me and I ignored it that is my sin to carry How many of us do that on a daily basis when there is a need right in front of us and we ignore it. My prayers for you. This morning is that we would all become aware. Will become aware of our surroundings. We would become aware of those things that end in. This is going to be a hard thing to communicate to you guys. Monday morning. Noah Chris, Mitch Jenny Miley Hannah Christy myself to others.

We buried a 21 year old

It's a good friend. My son's group and he came to our youth, every now and then, he loved to play basketball. He took his own life. Nobody saw it coming.

Nobody was aware that. It was that bad.

I grabbed These Guys Corbin was with us as well. if the guys, You watch out for each other.

You guys look out for each other. You guys make sure that this doesn't happen. Again, juicy red flags. You say something You guys be Watchmen?

Nobody wants to bury a friend.

And it was hard. So many people showed up at this memorial service, there was a standing room in the lobby. People circled around the building

We wish Marcin would have known all the people that his life of fected, if he would have had that awareness, if we would have had the awareness, to do a better job as a friend.

But God is going to use marsden's like though. Marston, thankfully was a believer in Christ. And God is going to use him for every single person that attended that service for all of his friends for all of his family.

Nobody likes. A friend of one likes being a family member but God is going to use this for good. I promise.

This goes back to how are we loving people? Are we showing that love? How are we being aware? How are we meeting needs?

The very essence of loving, God, and loving our neighbor. Comes down to our willingness to actually do it and ask God for the help to do it.

So we're going to turn to a timer for this morning. and I know that some of us have our struggles

Maybe we need to do our business with God right now.

I'll be down in front. How Pastor Chris come down front as well. If you just need to pray with any of us need to come to the Altar and take a knee, you need to sit in your seat and pray funes, stand and worship God. You do whatever you need to do in this moment for your relationship with God. A Sprite.