October 4, 2009 Pastor Tim Pusey

Getting Beyond A Lone Ranger Faith
1 John 4: 7-12

The Lone Ranger was a Texas Ranger in the American Old West who galloped about righting injustices with the aid of his faithful and clever Indian sidekick named Tonto. He didn’t entrust his true identity to anyone—and never let down his mask. Most of the episodes would end with someone lamenting that they never learned the hero’s name—“Who was that masked man?” And someone would answer, “Why, he’s the Lone Ranger!” as the Lone Ranger and Tonto rode off on their horses.

It made for a great fictional hero, but we’d do well not to let such private individuality impact the realm of our faith. Our culture has embraced the notion that religion is best kept private—even though Christians should understand that this flies in the face of Scripture, ignoring the example of Jesus Christ and the teaching and practice of the New Testament Church. It’s become politically incorrect to talk about our faith in many circles—particularly if the faith expressed is faith and trust in Jesus Christ.

And how we’ve too often carried that out in the church across the years is that we’ve learned to put our masks on, gallop to church, guard ourselves from anyone getting too close, and then gallop off into the sunset at the close of the service, not to be heard or seen again until the next Sunday morning we’re able to fit worship into our busy schedules. But then who would know or care—for they don’t even know our true identity! We didn’t wear masks like the Lone Ranger’s, but we’d put on our Sunday best clothes and put a smile on our faces, even when our hearts were neither clean nor polished and even when we silently ached beneath the load of the cares of life. And I understand the merit in getting all dressed up on Sundays in an effort to offer our best to the Lord out of respect for Him—but I also have to acknowledge the validity of those who have concluded that they don’t need to get all dressed up to come to church because their search for authenticity in faith has helped them to see that God loves them just the way they are—with no pretenses.

And whether you come to church in coat and tie or in blue jeans and a tee-shirt, high heels or flip-flops, I do believe that there is a biblical model for how we are to relate to one another once we’re here and also throughout the rest of the week. And I don’t believe it gives much room for Lone Rangers and masked identities, because our relationships with one another need to go much deeper than such barriers allow us to go. Scripture tells us we are to love one another.

Let’s turn in our Bibles to a passage found in 1 John, chapter 4, beginning at verse 7. This is from the epistle, or letter, that the Apostle John wrote to the church during the early days of the Christian Church.

To sum it up, we might say that “to know God is to love one another.”

Let’s see if we can better understand the breadth of what our scripture is saying to us this morning. The Christian community—the broad collection of those who are following Jesus as Savior and Lord—are compelled by the great love of God to love others. Because God has loved us, we are to love one another.

This love we live out for one another is evidence of our being “born of God.” In other words, the kind of love we’re called to have for one another comes “from God.” It’s found in Him. He is the author and originator of such love. He is the Giver of such love. We are to love one another just as God has loved us!

It is not a virtue that is innate within us—nor is it something we can simply learn to do by changed behavior. It’s deeper and stronger than that. Whoever truly loves others is not only born of God, but Scripture says such a person truly “knows God.”

The person who refuses to love doesn’t know the first thing about God, because God is love—so you can’t know Him if you don’t love others! Whoever doesn’t love doesn’t know God at all, for God in His very nature is love. But if we love each other, God lives in us, and His love is brought to full expression in us. This love is defined in the New Testament by the Greek word “agape.” It’s a totally selfless love. The New Testament teaching on love brought new and deeper meaning to the concept of love, with richer meaning to the word than had been expressed in pre-biblical Greek.

I might clarify here that while Scripture is proclaiming that “God is love,” we can’t switch those words around and proclaim that “love is God.” John is not teaching that our theory about love is divine, nor that our conception of love defines God. Rather, God is the One who gives to us the meaning of love. He is the Source of love. Love does not define Him. God is love.

And to better understand this kind of love, we only need to look at how God demonstrated His love for us—He did so by sending His only Son to die for us. It is God’s love for us that defines what true love requires—which is the commitment to sacrifice one’s most beloved possessions for another’s gain. God shows us the depths of love and the selflessness of love and the sacrificial element in love.

God’s love for us also demonstrates that it is an active love—it is seen in concrete acts. God’s love for us was seen and experienced in the sacrificial death of Jesus on the Cross for us. The kind of love we’re talking about is not just about intangible feelings—as might be reflected in sentimental words which proclaim, “I love you.” Love is lived out in action. In one respect, words are cheap. The sentiments of a gushy Hallmark card still just cost a few dollars—even when you “care enough to send the very best.” The kind of love we are to have for one another goes much deeper—and it will by nature be selfless and sacrificial.

Love in the New Testament is not an ideal; it is a relationship. And relationships are dynamic—and, truth be told, relationships are messy. Anything that involves imperfect human beings is going to be messy! Relationships demand something of us.

We’re working our way through Valley Shepherd’s Long Range Plan, and I’ve been sharing with you the various components of what we believe we’re called to do and to be. We’ve embraced the mission for our church to be:

PASSION FOR GOD

COMPASSION FOR PEOPLE

Our passion for God calls us to keep Christ at the center of all we do—in other words, Worship is central to everything we do, and we are committed to keeping the Lord central and allowing everything else to flow from that center core truth. We’ve talked about our Passion for God lived out within the church family, and we see that in terms of Discipling, as we teach, train and model for growth in Christlikeness. And when we apply our passion for God outside the relationships within the church family, we see ourselves called to Evangelizing—helping others recognize their need for God and what He alone can do for them.

Our Compassion for People lived out within the church family calls us to CARING. And as we consider the biblical model for love and support among followers of Jesus Christ, we are determined to cultivate and nurture that New Testament love for one another and the richness of fellowship defined by the New Testament Greek word “koinonia.”

We’ve got to figure out what it means to truly love and care for one another, friends—and we’ve got to learn to live that out! There are ways we can try to “program” for this and certainly ways in which we can nurture and encourage it—but all those will become nothing more than humanitarian efforts if we fail to get to the heart of the matter. We need people who are willing to assume responsibility for the love and care of others within the church family, but, again, without the heart of God’s love stirring such actions, that kind of love will fall short of the God-kind-of-love to which we are called!

Can I say this about this matter of caring for one another? It will be challenging and it will be messy and it will be the most rewarding thing in all the world! Why would I say that? Because the people we’re called to love aren’t perfect people! We’d really prefer to love perfect people—but that’s not who’s out there! That’s not even who’s sitting on the pew next to you! That’s not even who’s sitting where you are!

Cindy and I have entered a different stage of life in recent years, and it has its unique challenges—even in this matter of learning to love like Jesus loved. By next January our family of 5 will have doubled to 10—by marriages and grandchildren! It’s a wonderful thing—and we love each one of them. But we’ve also discovered that this matter of loving young adult kids has new dimensions to it—because they’re living on their own now and they’re making adult kinds of decisions! Life may have seem complicated back when our kids were babies, but at least we could put them in their cribs and know that they’d remain there!

I’ve had some intense conversations within the past week with other parents our age who are struggling to know how to best live out their love for kids who aren’t always making the best of choices or at least whose actions or decisions aren’t something that we can easily understand or appreciate. It’s hard to love even when our hearts get stepped on, isn’t it?! Even when our feelings get hurt! Even when we can see where some of their choices are going to take them! Even when we’re angry at what they may be doing to others or when our hearts ache so much throughout the long hours of the night!

But I’ve been reminded that the most powerful thing we can do for our family members is to love them—not condemn them or criticize them or scrutinize their every movement…just love them. And that’s costly, isn’t it? Of course it is! We have to learn to put ourselves aside—including our feelings and our opinions—and simply choose to love. Putting ourselves aside sometimes means that we learn to bite our tongues—and keep our mouths shut when we’re just dying to let them know what we’re really thinking!

And the love we endeavor to carry out with one another within the body of believers called the Church is going to be no less messy!—in part because we’re dealing with imperfect people like ourselves! So you put all these imperfect people together and mix us all up and we can either have a lot of confusion and conflict or we can choose to pour on the love and let it be the glue that bonds us with one another. And that’s what Scripture calls us to do!—Love one another!

I remember that the Early Church had such a powerful impact on their world because people noted, “Behold how they love one another!” And I think people today are drawn to genuine love—and they have an uncanny way of sensing when it’s real and when it isn’t.

It will certainly cost each one of us something when we choose to love one another—but then, doesn’t anything of value cost us? Within the church family, we’ll constantly need to learn to step out of our comfort zones—and even go beyond our close circle of friends, opening our hearts and our lives to others. We’ll need to pry open our friendship circles and be willing to welcome others. I know that can be hard—but do you realize how important it is?

I talked with someone just this week who is new to our church who said that he’d stood in the foyer a few times just to see if anyone would come and talk with him—and “we” seldom did. With good spirit, he noted the groups in lively conversations and thought to himself, “They must really love one another”—all the while feeling very much alone and ignored. I think the hardest thing is when people are indifferent to you—like they don’t even notice that you’re there! Please don’t feel beat up when I share such things with you, my dear church family, but be aware and alert and be willing to let the Lord stretch you to establish new relationships of love and care for others. How in the world are we supposed to care for one another if we don’t even know one another?!

Maybe you feel like you’re already giving more than you’ve received in terms of relationships. That may be true—but then I’d suggest that that’s the very essence of Christlike love. On the other hand, you might be honest enough to acknowledge that you’ve gained far more than you’ve given as you have experienced the love and care of others. I think that’s where I am.

It all calls for a lot of love and grace, doesn’t it? But then, haven’t we all received plenty of love and grace ourselves from our Heavenly Father? Of course we have! And day by day He keeps pouring it upon us—and we’re called to in turn pour it out upon others.

I also wanted to note for you that I believe that such love spans the generations. Many of us believe that one of our greatest assets as a congregation at Valley Shepherd is the presence of multiple generations. It’s a matter of personal dismay to me that many churches have so centered their efforts on one generation that they have ignored other generations. And while I can’t pretend that we’ve got this all figured out ourselves, I do believe that the more biblical model of the church is that of all generations coming together to worship the Lord and to learn from one another and to love one another—and to love one another so deeply that we hold loosely to those things which are dear to us but not essentials to our faith…things like traditions and music and other preferences. The reason we do some of the things we do around here is because we value being a multiple-generation church and I believe there’s a tremendous blessing in that! But with that in mind, I want to challenge each of you to look beyond your own age group and look for ways to build loving relationships with those who are significantly younger or older than you.

Most of you know that I was in Ohio last week to speak at the Circleville Church of the Nazarene’s 80^th anniversary as a congregation. It’s a church of 500-600 now, but when my grandfather, Rev. A.E. Pusey, became their first pastor they were just meeting in someone’s home. Not only do I have that connection with that church, but it’s the church I was part of during four of my teen years—when my father went to Viet Nam as a chaplain in the Army and our family moved to be near my grandparents (who returned to Circleville for retirement) and an aunt and uncle who became like second parents to us.

In preparing for my message last Sunday, I was reflecting on not only my own rich and wonderful family heritage but also some of the people of that church who had so impacted my life during my relatively few years there. It was interesting the names and faces that came to me—names and faces that are dear to me now. And it wasn’t so much the specific roles they carried out in terms of ministry—but the fact that how they responded to me week by week revealed a love and care for me that I have never forgotten!

I was a cocky young kid during my years there, and I always talked too much, and surely had to drive some of them nuts now and then! But I thought of ol’ Bill Lutz, who greeted me at the door every Sunday morning. He’d also tease me about something and make me laugh, but I came to believe that the old guy really cared. I remembered Teresa Allen—who was sitting in the crowd last Sunday—who led the opening session of Sunday School for the junior department. She greeted us by name every Sunday as we’d step into that classroom with such a warm and caring smile that we could not ignore the genuine love. Phil Manson became my good buddy and his parents and aunts and uncles and grandmother accepted me like part of their family. I remembered others by name who must have gone out of their way week by week to speak to me and encourage me because in the collage of faces in my memory, they stood out and I’m still drawn to them because I somehow knew that they really loved me.

May I remind you, my dear church family, that someone needs you—they need your love and your care. And, interestingly enough, you need them too. In fact, we all need one another. We’re better together than we are apart—even though relationships get messy because we somehow seem to bring our humanness to the table. The kind of love to which we’re called is not an ideal—it’s a relationship. It’ll be dynamic and it will cost each of us something…but it will be worth it! And God blesses us when we learn to truly love and care for one another—when we see beyond ourselves and recognize the needs of others, when we put Christlike love into action, when we’re somehow stirred by Christ’s unmerited love for us and allow Him to cultivate such love in our hearts for others.

This morning, we have the privilege of being reminded again of God’s great love for us as we share together in the Lord’s Supper. It’s right that we do it together—symbolically gathering around the same table as a family might do for a meal. And as we take the elements that remind us in a very sacred way of the body of Christ broken for our redemption and the blood of Jesus poured out for our forgiveness, may the Lord stir within each of us a fresh determination to pour out such love and grace and care upon one another. I might encourage you to look across “the table” as you prepare to receive these elements, and allow God to open your eyes and your heart to those who need your love and care today…