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Series: Jesus First
Speaker: Drew Zuehlke
Hope Community Church - Heights
For more resources or to learn more about Hope Heights, visit hopecc.com/heights.
A weekly message of Hope Community Church: Heights, located in Columbia Heights, MN.
Wonderful. Good morning, everybody. My name is Drew. I'm the pastor here at Hope Heights. Thrilled to see you. Missed all y'all last week. I was at camp.
Fun to see some new faces.
Fun to see little Hazel. Look at that little face. Oh my goodness. Tiny face.
It's so good to be here with all of you today and really excited. for someâ to get in the word here with you.
I am wildly distracted.
So if any of you ever hang out with me, you maybe are aware of that.
People are probably the way I get distracted. We learned a lot with our kids as they went through school and learning like as they struggled with some things in school. And we got to meet with people and read books. My mom always said, you read way more about your kids than any of us ever did. And so I think just generationally, maybe we did more of that than my mom, my parents did. But we learned so much about how distracted our kids were by different things in different ways in school, how we just kind of get off track in it. And so I actually have aâ this is one of the ways this happens to me just in real life.
This isn't work or school.
But this place draws me. It's like a black hole for me at a place where I get sucked in and I completely lose track of the actual task at hand of what actually should be happening. This is a zoo gift shop. You guys ever been to a zoo gift shop? It's the coolest place ever. They have super overpriced stuffed animals and books. There's like all, like every kind of animal in stuffed version and keychains and things you can't find anywhere else. There's nowhere else in the world that you could find Lots of the things in here. My kids also get quite distracted by this. We have many times been at an aquarium or a zoo and spent a large portion of our time there in the zoo. I remember though when our kids were very little, one of the coolest things when we first adopted our daughters, a group of friends gave us a zoo pass for the zoo here in Minnesota.
At that point we lived in South Minneapolis, so it wasn't quite as long to get to the zoo in Apple Valley.
But we would go all of the time, if nothing else, just to walk around because they were exhausted when they were done at the zoo. But one of the first times we ever went to the zoo, one of the first things our kids saw was the gift shop there.
We ran into the gift shop and we're standing in the gift shop, we're walking around, we're looking at animals, and all of usâ well, I'd say me and my 2 daughters were justâ
loved these stuffed animals.
They're so cute.
And so we ran up to Kelly, my wife, and we're like, look at how awesome these are. Look at how cool these penguins are. Look at how cool these tigers are. And she said, that is really cool. You want to see real ones?
That might have been directed towards me more than our kids.
It's such a real experience. I think there's an element of like, I'm standing in this gift shop. And I could be out seeing the real thing. I could be experiencing the smells of the penguin area and the roars of the lions and the real beauty of this zoo. And instead I find myself here.
How many other places do I find myself sort of in the store version of reality of the real thing? This is the heart of really what we're thinking about for the next few weeks here. at Hope.
As the fall gets kicked off here, we're doing just a short series. All the locations of Hopeâ we have 4 locations of Hope Community Church that meet around the Twin Citiesâ all of us are doing in our own way a series that we're calling Jesus First, but a series just reminding us that we still are doing the same thing we've always done, but reminding us of this importance of not getting stuck in the gift shop, but remembering where we start, right?
Remembering how incredible the zoo is, and that might then lead us to want to go in the gift shop and like take a penguin home essentially to remind me of how cool real penguins are.
But the, the importance of starting with the first thing, making first things first. It's, it's a phrase that's used actually in lots of contexts, but a phrase that C.S. Lewis uses when actually talking in his time about Europe, and he's arguing in an essay about things that are getting lost culturally in Europe. And he's arguing how important it is actually to get back essentially to the gospel, that a lot of the great values, a lot of the great things that are in the culture of caring for people and charity, hospitality, actually come out of originally the gospel coming to that area, to that place.
And so he actually writes in this essay, First and Second Things, about this idea of first and second things. So let me read you just this little part of this. This is Mr. Lewis. Every preference of a small good to great, or a partial good to a total good, involves the loss of the small or partial good for which the sacrifice is made.
You can't get second things by putting them first.
You get second things only by putting first things first. That might be a little confusing. He writes in a way that's better than how we talk today.
But what he's saying essentially is that sometimes we just take things that should be in second place, in the second place, and we try to just push them or force them into the first thing. This is the most important thing, hoping that then it just becomes the most important thing. It actually loses in the process. it kind of loses all of its place. And so thisâ I, I've seen this in my own life when my thing I want to find is like, let's just say a basic thing like happiness.
The goal is happiness.
And so all I do is spend my time, how can I be happy? How can I be happy?
This thing didn't, didn't bring happy, and so I can't do this thing.
Forgetting that actually the things that bring happy, the first things that actually happiness might flow out of, or actually like a healthy relationship or a healthy lifestyle or a purpose or a thing like that. But I pursue a thing hoping I want a thing and forgetting that it actually comes out of something else.
There's actually a first thing that comes out of it. I think of this in my marriage is that if I just want to, if I just think have a good marriage, be happy, be fulfilled, and then somehow I pursue just being fulfilled, in my marriage, I actually will lose it and not find it. Actually, the pursuit in my marriage often is how do I serve and love my wife well in that? And then out of that actually comes a great satisfaction and a happiness.
And then he's contesting in this essay how the European civilization flourished because of the Christian perspective that was brought there.
And that if they lose that, they actually will lose some of the great things about their culture. And so saying we should get rid of Christianity in our culture because it's actually ruining it, he's actually saying, actually, that's the first thing that caused these things to happen.
Now, we might feel this or see this.
If you're thinking, how do we see this around us? I mean, the first thing you might feel this is just politically, right? Or in the way people talk about it, or division or polarization that we see. Culturally around us.
There's a couple great books that recently were recommended to me by Pastor Brian, who was just here.
If you were here the week Pastor Brian was here, who was our pastor at our St. Paul location, Lowertown St. Paul location, he's currently working on his doctorate, and this is some of the stuff he's looking into, is how we engage our culture.
And so he's been reading a lot about how we engage politics. And so he's been passing on a lot of great books to us. So part of what I want to share is a few of these things just to give us a taste.
I think this will give words to a lot of things we all have experienced or felt. Also just want to recommend these are great resources to just read, just to think more and process more how this is working in our culture and in the church.
This is from this book, Faithful Politics.
And she says, Miranda says, a 2022 study by the Barna Group found that more than half of pastors who had considered leaving cited the same underlying cause: Christians are more loyal to their political view than to their faith.
So that would be a second thing becomingâ
trying to become a first thing. See how that works in there? So instead of first being maybe a foundation in a faith in Christ and the gospel, and then out of that flowing a political view, first they're trying to kind of manhandle a political view as the ultimate, as the first.
Thing.
Another book by Amy E.
Black and Douglas Koopman says something similar.
Researchers have defined our current political movement as affective polarization, which is the habit of political parties to not engage in civil disagreement over any given topic, but rather to sow hatred and distrust among opposing views and those who hold them. The call for the church to occupy a moderate Heretic middle space between the warring factions can seem not only reasonable but also prophetic. They're trying to encourage in this book, what does it look like to be a follower of Jesus and not feel like you have to make necessarily picking a political party at making becoming your first, right? But what does that look like? And that it actually can be a really valuable thing. I'm actually going to quote Brian here. I don't often get to just quote a friend. But Brian has been writing papers for his doctorate, and he was writing about this. He read a lot and wrote a very long paper about all he read, which was nice because I didn't have to read all the stuff he read. But I think he sums it up really well. I'm really encouraged by his words, so I wanted to share them with you.
So Pastor Brian here shares, the church in America did not arrive at this moment by accident.
The partisan capture the congregational fracturing, the slow erosion of theological identity beneath the rising tide of political identity have all been the predictable consequences of a long process of second things gradually being elevated to first things. It's going to be a lot of things, not even just politics, but things that should be second come out of our first thing becoming second things.
The remedy to our cultural problems is not a better political strategy. It's not a third way that splits the difference between the two failing options.
It's not like just figure out how to be a good moderate, right? It is a return to deliberate, costly, and countercultural first things, things of first importance to Jesus, to the conviction that the risen, reigning, and returning Lord of all things is more sufficient for the movement the church finds itself in than any other law or policy. Amen. So we have decided for a few weeks here we're going to just stop and just remind ourselves of this. It might feel like, yeah, we know, but I think every day I need to be reminded of this, to keep first things first and out of those flow the second and third and fourth things in our life.
And so we want to even encourage us in why we do that and that we are still doing that at Hope, and that as we even look in the next months of moving our building. We're still doing that.
I just had someone else this week ask meâ
I got to come here yesterday.
There was a 100th anniversary celebration in the building. You might have seen a little bit of remnants or seen in the display cases. The school is celebrating their 100 years.
I saw someone and they said, hey, I heard you guys are moving out of the school. And they asked me 2 questions.
What happened?
What'sâ you guys, are you fighting?
And I was like, no, thanks for assuming that's the reason. No, we're not at all. We love the school. And then they said, nice, and a nice opportunity to change things up, to do something different.
And I was like, we're not planning to do anything different. We're doing the same thing we've always done, which for us at Hope Heights, we like to say it as the gospel and community on mission. We're still going to follow Jesus together for great joy in our city. We're just going to happen to meet in a different space in a different way. And so that's our hope here in the next few weeks is just to remind ourselves of this gospel that's in the community. It's a community mission.
So this week we're going to look at the gospel, this first thing. If Jesus is first, if we go to him first and out of him flows things, we first look at the gospel and how we engage. So one of the pictures that I think of here as I think about the gospel and community missionâ
I think I've shared this before, I love this, summertime brings this upâ is RVs.
I love thinking about being in an RV, driving an RV, camping in an RV.
I love thinking about all the fun little things you get to bring with you.
I don't really do that, but I like thinking about it. I like watching a lot of videos about it. I like Google it and then see how much those are.
And I'm like, that doesn't sound very fun either.
But I love the idea of it.
I have days where I'm driving home and I'm like, this is the day we're going to sell our house and we're just going to live in an RV.
I don't know if any of you have RV days might be what I call those at my house. I like to think of an RV though, as I'm thinking about RV. This is what essentially a picture of what we are. We're a group of people, right? There's this thing, an RV, where there's the gospel, which is this RV, this beautiful, wonderfully crafted thing that we can enter into and live in.
It contains all of our needs. You can You can eat in there, you can sleep in there, you can hang out in there. It's your living room and your kitchen and even your bathroom, right?
They're all in there, right?
Some of them are like multiple rooms. They're like apartments.
This beautiful thing. And then there's community. There's actually people in there together. So it's this gospel and there's people in there together. But an RV doesn't just sit. It's different than a house. It actually is on the move. It can move to new places. It can pick more people up. So I love to I like to think of kind of the church and our mission as people who get to get into this thing, this gospel, and we do it together. And we get to kind of messiness of being in this thing.
It's kind of cramped sometimes.
Maybe it's like a little messy sometimes.
Maybe you have to like undo theâ you have to undo like a kitchen table and turn it into a bed.
But it's still like we're still in there together. And that we're not just stagnant and still, we're actually kind of on the move together.
And so this week, we're going to look at the part of this, the gospel, this thingâ what is this thing that we climb into? What's the thing that we find ourselves in that protects us and provides for us, that feeds us, that is where our community happens? Brian's language and our language for this comes out of 1 Corinthians. I'm going to read this passage. Take a minute to look at this. This explains the gospel to us. And explains why this Jesus is first.
Now I would remind you, this is first a letter written to the Corinthians, a church that was really struggling to figure out what it looked like to follow Jesus. They had turned to lots of other things as really becoming their first, or really whether it was idolatry, things they really were worshiping, or just twisting the things that God had given them.
To satisfy themselves and not be an opportunity to look to Jesus. And so Paul is reminding the Corinthians of a lot of things, but by the time we get to 15 here, he's going to remind them in 15 of this centrality of the resurrection and really the centrality of if there's nothing else, this is what we all believe.
Now I'd remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received.
Something came to you and you took it, you received it.
In which you stand. It's something you not just took, but you now stand on.
It's foundational to you. It's a thing that holds you so you're not wobbly anymore, and by which you're being saved. And it's the thing that has rescued you, has brought salvation. If you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believe in vain.
For I delivered to you as of first importance What I also received. He's actually saying, "I also had the same thing happen to me.
This thing came to me, and I got to receive it and stand on it and be saved by it." And here's what it is.
Here's the first importance of all the things he says. If nothing else, we we have to start here.
First importance: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, just like like God told us it was going to happen in scriptures.
That he was buried.
And that he rose, was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas and the twelve. Cephas is Peter, and then he goes on, and then to hundreds more people, many, many more people. He's going to explain the resurrection.
It's pretty simple in that he says, "What's really important? It's that Christ, I came to the the thing that we we have to hold on to." That Christ, our God himself, the Messiah, comes to earth. He actually dies. He's actually buried. He actually raises from the dead.
We can't forget this, friends.
It's what changes everything. He didn't just come and teach us and is like a nice guy. He didn't just come to tell us more things like prophets had said. He actually came and took care of the sin.
and the death that was due us because of our sin. And he actually took all that for us, buried it, and then rose from the dead. He resurrected, defeated death, and resurrected. It'sâ it'sâ we hear this a lot right here at Hope. You might go, yep, we know, we hear that every week. Somehow you talk about this every week. Because it's of first importance.
It's the thing we can't forget. The thing that Christ died and he was buried and rose.
You think, I know.
It's maybe not the whole gospel as in like it's filled out, but at the bones of it, right? The thing we have to know. It's this phrase actually, Christ died for our sins, was buried, and rose, is considered one of the oldest, if not the original creed in the church. There's actually evidence of this within a year or two of Christ's rising, that people gathered in the first churches ever. Jesus rose from the dead and the Holy Spirit came and people started gathering in Jerusalem and then to the ends of the earth. And one of the first things that we see in churches as they would gather is that they would come together and they would recite a liturgy.
They'd start their service essentially And they would say together, we gather in the name of Christ who died and was buried and rose. So Paul here is actually reciting, they think, just essentially the creed, essentially kind of the thing we all believe is true.
He's saying, remember, we've all been saying this for a while in the church. It wasn't like we mightâ
you may have heard later people started going, oh, like, 100 years later, people went, oh, that Jesus guy, he was a good teacher.
He actuallyâ
people now are saying he rose from the dead. But early on, no one thought that.
This is a phrase that was used right away in the early church before even we have actual, like, gospels in the New Testament being written.
Churches are gathering to say this phrase: Christ died and he was buried and he rose. Because it changes everything. Because this is what we would call gospel. This is the good news.
People have been waiting. How do we rescue? How do we get out of this sin issue? How do we get out of this cycle of sin? How do we get out of this death problem? How do we get this problem of having a broken relationship with God? How do we get out of this cycle of like not being able to figure out how to deal with this behavior I have or this broken relationship I have?
And then the gospel comes, this good news comes in. There's actually something outside of you, a God who loves you dearly, who's willing to come and die and be buried and rise from the dead. It's incredible. It's a thing that we've been saying since the beginning in the church, and we still say today when we gather. It's the gospel. It's the good news. It's the thing that should change us.
It should restore us.
It's been called a balm to our souls.
Amen.
called many, many things. It's really good news.
The bigger story of it maybe is helpful to even understand so we know why this moment in the story is so good. It's this abbreviated version that really says something about a lot bigger story. It can be summed upâ sometimes we use kind of 4 different words to do it.
Sometimes we use the words like creation and fall and Redemption, restoration. I've been liking these words lately. A friend's been using either kind of like this: our origin, the problem, the solution, and the future.
This is actually a phrase just used even in storytelling.
What's kind of the origin of the story? You think of like a great story you have, you loveâa Lord of the Rings, Indiana Jones, right? You think of a story, we hear the origins of it. My daughter just watched the newest Spider-Man, and I was going to go watch it with her, and she.
banned me from watching it with her because I hadn't seen the other Spider-Mans. And if I don't see those, then I'll never understand what's going on in the new one. Which I don't thinkâ I think I could probably figure out what's going on. There's a guy who shoots webs and he fights bad guys. But, um, so I watched the first 3 to make sure I didn't miss everything in the last one. Those are these stories. It's like an origin story. How did he come about? What's the problem? There's these bad guys.
The solution is send Spider-Man and he fixes it.
And then there's this great future we have because now we have Spider-Man. Each one is the same thing, right? There's a problem and then there's a solution to it.
And there's this great, glorious future that we have.
This is the story that the gospel is.
The broader story than just in 1 Corinthians is a story that we all find ourselves in. It's really a story of Scripture, right? It's the same story. It's the good news story. It's a story of creation and then the fall and redemption and restoration. There's an origin. In the beginning, God creates the heavens and the earth. He creates man and woman in his image. So such important things to know that we're created in God's image.
God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was really good. In the beginning, the origin of our story is that God creates things and it's really good. And he says, your job is to worship me and follow me and be with me. And then there's this problem that happens right away in Genesis 3. The serpent comes and a lie comes. He says to the woman, did you actâ did God actually sayâ
and he says, oh, you'll surely not die just by turning from God and being disobedient and not following the ways that God has set out, you can turn away from him. You can actually be your own god. You could know what he knows. In Romans 5, we hear it explained. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man and death through sin, so death spread to all men because all sinned. And so there's beginning this problemâ seems like not even a strong enough word, right? This curse, this kind of poison comes into the world because there's a beginning of disobedience A walking away from God is saying, like, I don't know if I need God. I think I got this. It's still the same problem, right? And then we inherit that same problem. It's in us. And as we're born, we, we have this thing. And over and over and over for many, many, many, many years, we have the same problem.
So we're stuck in that problem. So they're stuck in that problem. What are we going to do? And then God himself comes to save them. The God they turned away from comes. What an incredible story. The solution is not get back on track, start following the rules, tell the snake to stay in his lane and figure it out, because it doesn't work. We keep finding ourselves turning away.
And so the solution is, but God shows his love for us in that while we are still sinners, he dies for us. He actually comes to dwell with us. For our sake, he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. God himself comes, becomes human, and actually takes on this sin, this brokenness, this curse, the curse that turned us away from him. He goes, I'll take it. It's like he grabsâ it's like we're a kid who's about to get hurt, and he jumps in front of us and holds on to us, and he takes all of the The attack. So we don't have to. The solution isn't us.
It's actuallyâ
the gospel is a story of God creating us and us turning away, and God then coming to be the solution and saving us. And this future, this glorious future we have, is that we today still get to live thinking of this day when God will still come and make all things right. He's going to take care of evil that is so terrible to live with. And he's going to make all things right. There's one passage here in Revelation. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. Behold, I am making all things new.
We have a God who the future tells us is going to make all things new. Incredible story.
That's a real story that we really are a part of that we would call the gospel, which is just a word that means good news.
The good news that we get to hold on to that becomes our first thing because we gather around Jesus is this incredible story, this really good news that doesn't involve us being the solution, but instead a God who we can cling to. It's actually summed up everywhere, right? But Colossians, as I was reading recently, I'm like, wow, this is like the whole story, right? In Colossians 1, we hear this: He's the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
For by him all things were created in heaven and earth, visible and invisible.
As we get a story of the origins of the earth, the creation, we get a story of the dwelling of God, the incarnation, God actually coming here, becoming visible, becoming human.
And God, therefore, thrones and dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for him.
We get the first things. He is the thing who Creates all things and holds all things together.
I think he gets the place as the first thing.
And he's before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he's the head of the body, the church. He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything he might be preeminent.
For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.
Another way to explain the gospel: our God, who holds all things together, who creates all things, who all thrones and dominions and rulers and authoritiesâeverything is under. He's first.
Everything's under himâis willing to come down in all his fullness and dwell amongst us, and even make peace for us by his own blood on the cross. It's it's all over the place, right? We hear this call. to making Jesus our first. And if this gospel is true, then it changes us. These are the stories we get to hear in the gospels. In the gospel. We call them the gospels, the first 4 books of the New Testament, because they're the good news of Jesus. So the story of Jesus and the things he's doing. We see the story of so many people's lives change as they interact with him. That they go from people that are not trying to solve the problem and be the solution or look to something else, a secondary thing to be the solution, but look to the actual Creator and our Savior in it. So it creates this way of living that's different, right? It createsâ we might use the word a religion versus a gospel.
So religion is a, I'm going to do things in work ways and and try to appease God and work myself into this solution, this salvation.
And the gospel is God has already done the work and is offering youâ it's Paul's language in 1 Corinthiansâ he's offered it to us and we get to receive it. He goes, I've done this work, now you get to receive it.
And so there's a difference in our day, a difference in our day-to-day, as we say. Each day I get to preach the gospel to myself.
This is why religion would say just our motivation in general, our motivation for religion would be I obey and therefore I'm accepted.
I do stuff and then God loves me. I'm a kid who's like, I gotta get good grades because then Dad will say, good job, bud.
And if I don't get good grades, Dad says, get better grades and talk to me when you have.
Right? The gospel says I'm accepted, thereforeâ
but the gospel says I have a dad who says, come over here, love you, bud. That doesn't change whatever your grade is. I want to help you getâ I want to help you getâ not fail math, right?
And so then I now go, I wantâ
I want to do well because I love my dad and I love being able toâ for him to enjoy this. I love that I get to be with him. So we get accepted and then out of that we obey rather than obey to accept it. Our identity changes.
We're not built on performance. We don't spend our day going, I got to do these things because that's what defines who I am.
Instead, they're built on Christ and his finished work.
We have a week where we're called names, maybe by short people in our house or maybe by tall people at work, and it doesn't rock us. We don't go home and go like, I don't know if I can Do this, it actually hits us and we go like, "Wow, that's not true because I already know who I am. The gospel's already given me an identity. I don't have to work towards my identity." When we fail, it doesn't lead to guilt and self-loathing or excuse making. The gospel actually then allows us to be able to repent and not have despair. We're able to say, "Yeah." I messed up. I disobeyed the Lord, or I hurt you.
That's okay.
It doesn't change my identity. I'm still loved by the Lord. I'm still accepted by the Lord. I'm still rescued by God.
And I don't fall into maybe even a spiral of despair. I am terrible. Who am I? What am I doing? But instead, the gospel says, even in the midst of your sin, I came and rescued you.
Amen.
And then in our success, we don't find ourselves going, I'm so awesome. It doesn't just lead to pride and superiority. Man, I am a better person. We are a better people than those people. The gospel destroys that in us, and it leads to humility and gratitude, leads us to be people who go like, how could I, as another image bearer, love these people well? It changes us when we see a person in distress. Or maybe a person's sinning, it changes how we react to that person. This is one that I think we see historically in places where when you see the gospel come through and change like a community, and all of a sudden you see pride move out and you see humility move in and you see people groups connecting who weren't connecting before. You see unity amongst groups who before thought they were superior over other groups. And you see the gospel actually change a people to go, we see them as image bearers and we are with them, rather than we have believed we're better. Because the gospel changes. We saw this, like I had said, throughout the gospels.
The stories that come to mind for me, some of my favorites, are the story of Zacchaeus, a man who was stealing money, a tax collector, unloved, would be considered an unlovable guy in the community. People didn't like him. When Jesus comes to town, he goes to this man who's up in a tree.
Remember, Zacchaeus is a wee little man.
He comes to him, goes to his house, and essentially he gets delivered the good news. Zacchaeus, I want to be in your house with you.
I love you dearly. I want to see change.
And Zacchaeus becomes part of the household of the Lord, and his change goes from, I need to gather all of this money, essentially, this was my first thing, right?
If I just get enough of this wealth, this money, I get power. I'm even willing to set aside like relationships and reputation. This moneyâ That now becomes not at all his first thing, but Jesus becomes his first thing. And now he, in that short story we hear, he gives back money, even more money. It's such a change in his heart. We hear about the woman who comes who's been bleeding, who's outcast from the community.
She just touches his cloak. She doesn't even know, can I even get close to him?
Should I even be in a crowd, in public? And Jesus stops to welcome her into the family of God, changes her life forever.
Meets a woman at the well who's at the well probably at a time when other people aren't there because same, cast out of culture. and loves her well, offers her living water, the gospel, and she receives it, changes her life, finds herself running back into town to tell more people about this good news. He literally raises his friend Lazarus from the dead, overpowers death.
I think we consider it life-changing for Lazarus and his family. This gospel changes us. So we, we start with Jesus being our starting point, which starts, then the gospel is our starting point. This good news is our starting point. This, uh, getting really practical, I have, uh, recently reread the book The Righteous Mind by Jonathan Haidt, um, which isâ he's not a Christian, but he writes a book about why people are divided over politics and religion. And really just, he writes a book about the motivation of people, and it's helpful, um, to think about.
It's been helpful for me because it helps me understand that it's not just a logicalâ
like when I'm frustrated with someone, a decision they make, I think like, that doesn't make sense. And it's helped me understand that there's thisâ one of the things that's helped me understand is that he describes these things, these moral foundations that we all have.
So from our own histories of what we've experienced, good and bad, from the households that we grew up in and from the cultures that we're in, We have a, like, a list of foundational things that shape how we think we should engage with the world and how the world should engage.
And then they're prioritized. So this is random, the order of these, but this is what he would say are kind of the 6 main moral foundations of a person. And then they're all in a different order for each one of us, and they have different level of like how strong they are. And so then out of these, he calls it intuitive reasoning. We often really make our decisions just out of these. We go, this is the most important thing. This is how we make decisions and what's most important in the world. And so out of those, you make a decision, not necessarily because you thought through it and all the, all the parts of something, because you go, this is the most important. So obviously this is an answer. And it's the same reason why you go, how in the world could they think that's okay? Because probably they have a very different order and maybe they have like a really high value in one of them.
This helpsâ
has helped me actually understand as I'm talking to a friend who like politically we're having a discussion and think, I don't, I'm not getting why this is, why you think this. They go, oh, you have a different order of like the valâ of what's the most important choice here, right?
I'll explain real quick how. So there's a care-harm moral foundation. This revolves around our ability to feel. We dislike suffering.
We want to show empathy and compassion and kindness. There's great virtues of kindness, gentleness, nurturing. This could be a very, very high value. There's a moral foundation of fairness, cheating.
It's concerned with justice. With rightness. Autonomyâ that it motivates us to ensure that fair treatment is happening, justice is happening, honesty is happening.
There's loyalty or betrayal.
This foundation focuses on the bonds and obligations that groups have to one another.
It encourages allegiance and loyalty. Self-sacrifice is important for this part. This can be connected to patriotism or self-sacrifice, loyalty.
There's authority or subversion.
This relates to respecting authority, maintaining social order. Sanctity, degradation. This has a foundation as concerns of purity, avoidance of contaminants, metaphorically or physically. This often can be tied to religious belief, piety, cleanliness.
And the last one is liberty or oppression.
This foundation centers on the feelings of resentment towards bullies or oppressors and a desire for freedom from domination over people. It drives people to want liberty, autonomy, a resistance to oppression. So even as I said those things, you might have went, oh, I can feel like some of those things are really a motivator for me. Some of those things are less of a motivator for me. Some of those things are the reason why I get so fired up. You could even think, I see why now some of those might, like, feel like they lean more into a certain political party or not, right? I think we all have all of these. We all value all of these, but there's like a different order. In fact, here's what I want to encourage us in. These become then our, our firsts. And so, so then they push out Jesus as our first, and then they actually lose their value. They become essentially idols that actually end up like we want to care and we end up not caring for some because we make care the number one rather than understanding that Jesus actually fulfills Every single one of these. So just really quickly, to make it clear, I put checks by all of them.
He fulfills all these. He didn't just teach us about compassion and care, but he himself actually comes, bears the shame of sinners. He's actually harmed himself, understands what it's like. He suffers as our high priest who has also suffered. He produces compassion for people across the board. The gospel is a story in the gospels.
In Mark, already what we've seen, we've only been partially through Mark, he has interacted with people from all economic levels, social levels, different parts geographically, religious, non-religious, Jews, non-Jews, all over the place. Showing compassion to all the people. Wow, seems like Jesus really has fulfilled this. Fairness and cheating.
He has absorbed the penalty for the justice that should come to guilty people.
That's not fair. If we're going to talk about fairness. He takes justice very seriously, our God, very seriously. Loyalty and betrayal. He knows betrayal. and knows loyalty to his people, the people he loves, and to his God. Do you remember the moment in the garden where he's, Lord, take this from me if it's your will, and it's not? There's a loyalty even to the cross for him. He builds a family defined not by our shared backgrounds or our tribes or our common enemies, but by himself, causing us to have great Great unity. Authority. He's a suffering servant who's also our great King.
It's allâ it's incredible. If you take some time to consider all these things that I want so badly, Jesus fulfills these things. He's made the unclean clean. Over and over through the Gospels, Jesus wants things to be made clean and right, from chaos to order.
Amen.
But through him. And not that those kept people out, but they actually drew Jesus close to them so he could make them right. He even surrenders his own freedom, is imprisoned, unjustly oppressed, killed, murdered, and raises from the dead. Gives up his own freedom. so that we could have life. Like, he understands these and is in the middle of them and has found a way to fulfill all these. This is why Jesus is so good, and he is our first. And out of him can come us fighting diligently for these things, but also knowing these cannot be our first things.
Augustine says this, which is Great. What are you scared about?
Just because earthly kingdoms perish or are unstable or feel chaotic or are unknown, that is the reason that a heavenly one has been provided, promised to you, that you won't perish with the earthly. A great reminder. What are you scared about? It feels at times like the kingdoms around us are going to perish. And they will.
And they're shaky and we're unsure, the move isn't to move harder towards them and try to make them the first so thatâ
and make them the best, but is to realize we're part of a different kingdom. And out of that kingdom, we get to move towards, from the gospel, these things. So back to our zoo gift shop here as we get towards the end here.
I miss out on the zoo.
I'm just a spectacular walker on the zoo, not just for me, but with some people I love, because I sit with stuffed animals, images of the things that I could be seeing. I think we miss out if we do not make the gospel our first importance. This is why at Hope we share the gospel a lot. This is why we have a I've referenced this before. We have an old Google review of Hope that said, "If you want to hear the gospel every week, go to this church." One star, best review still ever at Hope.
It's all we got because it's all we got. Because there's a lot of places you can get better music, better speakers, better talks, better food. I don't know better.
We have pretty good food here, but better.
Food, way cooler activities, way cooler kids' stuff.
I mean, across the board.
But this is the place we get the gospel.
The thing that has the power to save us, to heal us, the thing we can stand on that can restore us, that can repair us, that can resurrect us, comfort us, bring us joy, peace, patience, self-control. That is the presence of God.
Amen.
that reminds us of the great story that we're in. This is why at Hope there's things that we do and there's things that we don't do, because we're the place that we get to remind ourselves of the gospel. This is why on Sunday morning we remind ourselves of the gospel through preaching, through our songs as we sing, through communion every week that we take. Our kids right now in their own context get to be reminded of this good news. We get to gather together even in the way we pray for one another and care for one another. We get to experience the gospel. We do this in our small groups here.
Essentially, we gather to care for each other, live out the gospel, and remind each other of the gospel. We do this as we serve together and in our community.
We get to live out this good news. I get very practically to see this in a text from a friend, from one of you. Many of you, many times. Hey, sorry I didn't get back to you right away. Hey, no problem. Love you. I'm not going anywhere. A scripture passage to remind me of how good God is. Having a hard day? Your parenting doesn't define you. Right? I get to be reminded of the gospel over and over by one another. This is, this is why we have each other. Not necessarily to have the coolest stuff, but to remind us there's the one thing we get to do.
Amen.
The one place we get to do this. It's really good news, friends. So we want to hold tight to this, and this isâ this will not change at Hope. It's all we got.
I'm really excited. I want to invite up our friend Ben. He's going to share it for the next 3 weeks.
We want to invite people up each week from Hope just to share a little bit of howâ what God's doing in lives. So you get to hear that. And Ben, Harris, I don't know how to introduce you. Ben Harris is cool. We get coffee and he's a neighbor.
And really quick, Ben and I have been neighbors for a while, didn't know it.
Yeah. And Ben came to church and I was like, you look familiar.
And I was like, Kel, this is the guy who walks his dog around our house.
And now we've gotten to know each other in a lot better way than just walking dogs. Mary Julia's houses. But Ben was going to share. I'd just love for you to share a little bit of how the gospel has been impacting you, what God's been doing in your life before we move to a time of singing. Yeah, absolutely.
Thanks for the opportunity to do that. And thanks for this message today. Drew asked me to speak and then he delivers this message, which actually really kind of affected me. And so now here I am, a little emotional in front of you delivering this. For those of you that don't know me, my name is Ben. I'm probably one of the newest members here at Hope. And the reason that I started coming at the beginning of this year is because I was touched by the Holy Spirit last Christmas. Over that amount of time, I've gotten to be friends with Drew and these coffees that we have. He looked at this anchor tattoo that's on my hand and he says, hey, man, tell me the story about that. What is the story behind the anchor tattoo? Are you like super into tugboats or something? Or like, what's going on? And I had to stop and pause because, because I really am super into tugboats. But that's not exactly the reason that I got the tattoo. I stopped and paused because the meaning of that tattoo has changed for me over time. Now, I got that anchor on my finger about 10 years ago, and the reason that I got that tattoo is because I felt proud that I was able to show up in other people's lives as a ballast, as a source of strength, as some calm in the storm, an anchor for them when they needed me. And I delivered that. I always thought that that source of strength came from within me. There's a personal fortitude that was allowing me to be able to do that. There's a lot of life story in between there that I don't really have time to go into, but suffice it to say, my wife got very sick. I'll tell you all about all the different things, but what that left me with is feeling kind of like a shell of a person because I gave so much of myself that I really ground myself down to the bone. I gave more than I knew that I had to give. And so I stand up and I look around and I realize that I'm just a shell of what I was before. I get touched by the Holy Spirit. I get regenerated in Christ. And as I'm looking at this anchor that Drew's asking me about, I realize that there's a cross that's right in the middle of that anchor, that it never really was my personal strength that was getting me through that. That was Jesus. That's the strength that was there. And so now I've got this reframing, this mental reframing of what this means to me, that this isn't how I show up. This is how God shows up in my life for me so that I can be here for everybody else. Dead things come alive in the name of Jesus. Amen.
That's a mic drop. Thank you very much, man. All right, I should have just had you share and then we could have been done already.
Thank you so much.
I personally have thought of that anchor probably once a week since you shared that story with me of how much that could change this anchor, right, that we have.
The same place, Ben. I think how often I need to be the anchor.
And yeah, it's good. That's a good word. You should all get to know Ben. So fill his calendar and get to know him. He's an incredible guy. A couple things. I'm going to invite our worship team up so we can worship this good God we have, this good news we have. A couple things to consider as we move to a time to respond to the gospel. Just simply, right, is Jesus your first importance?
Maybe when do you find yourself in the gift shop?
Realize I am looking at stuffed penguins when I could be looking at the real thing?
And consider who reminds you of the gospel and, and what maybe steps you need to take to make sure you have people who do that in your life.
We'd love to talk to you aboutâ we got a lot of small groups that are kicking off, that are starting to roll again this fall, if you're interested in that or just want to help you find that.
We also love to respond in other ways. Our whole service moves towards a moment to take communion, and so That's something that Jesus himself commanded us to do. He got his disciples together and he said, when you gather, I want you to break bread, I want you to drink wine, and I want you to do that because this meal is going to remind you that my body was broken and my blood was shed. And that blood is the blood that brought you peace, and that broken body isâ
should have been your body, but instead was mine.
And so it's a reminder of this good news that Christ died and he went in the tomb and he rose from the dead.
We declare the thing that's been declared since moments after Jesus' resurrection in the church. We still declare it today through communion.
So encourage you to do that if you're a follower of Jesus.
You do that out in the hallways on both sides. Um, encourage you to do that with others too, even be able to pray together.
Also, we'll sing with our worship team.
You can always pray. There's people in the back of the room who'd love to pray for you. Um, we love seeing that. And you can always give as a response here to support the Ministry of Hope. You can do that, there's a box on the back table here, or you can do that online. Let me pray for us quick and we're going to continue worshiping together.
Lord, thank you that you died and you went in the ground, but you didn't stay in the ground, you rose from the dead.
Please, Lord, keep that on our hearts and our minds, that you would be first, and that would give us great peace and joy. That would change us, that would anchor us. Thanks, Lord, for these people in this place, and that we get to remind us each other of this every week together. Pray this in your good name. Amen. Amen.