When (& When Not To) Talk Politics | Don’t Panic: Week 4

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Welcome to Crossroads.

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My name is Lena Schuler.

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And you may have heard from a friend or seen recently

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that Crossroads was part of freeing

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over 45,000 families from medical debt

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totaling $46 million in medical debt around our country.

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And if you are part of the church and you are a generous giver,

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you did that.

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And I experienced great joy in seeing

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what the news had to say about this.

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Check this out.

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- Crossroads Church locations in Kentucky, Tennessee,

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Ohio and Indiana raised money to take care

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of other people's burden of medical debt.

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- It's millions of dollars we're talking about debt just erased.

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- $46.5 million of medical debt just completely erased.

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- Oh, my gosh, this is real.

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It's the yellow, that like, it's not a hoax.

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- We're here to bless people.

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We're not here to have huge meetings.

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We're here to have an impact in our local communities.

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- That is what we're all about.

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You know, I actually believe that I've experienced freedom

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through relationship with Jesus.

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And I want other people to be freed.

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I want other people to experience freedom.

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And that might mean freedom from medical debt like that.

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And so as a church, we put our money where our mouth is.

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We're not just about sitting around

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and having a good church service

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or creating some good content,

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but we want to be a blessing to people

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and cities in which the church resides.

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And so whether that means that we are helping to eliminate poverty,

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we are freeing people from medical debt

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or rescuing girls out of sex slavery in India,

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all of that is true about our church,

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because we're a church who wants to be like Jesus

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and we want to offer freedom.

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And this could be your church,

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whether you join us right here online

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or at a location near you.

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Today, we're in this series called Don't Panic, Take Heart, 2020.

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Because in the midst of this election year,

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we want you to have hope and we want you to take heart

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regardless of where you are in the political spectrum.

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And so we're gonna hear from my friend Ali,

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who has some things to say about how Jesus equips us

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to have healthy conversations

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- It's a black van.

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I have vaccinated baby pigs, and that's awful.

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Well Mike looks like Putin.

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- You have no idea how many mean tweets

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I've heard over the last week or so

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as I was getting ready for this weekend.

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It's great to be with you here on the last week

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of our series called Take Heart 2020.

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That's what we're about today.

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And as we finish up the series today,

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I just want to tell you, we've taken

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a little bit of heat over the series.

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We've taken some criticism as a community

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because I think some people have the impression

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that what's been being said here is that we should

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all clump up in the middle of the political spectrum

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or give up interest in politics

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or just not hold strong political opinions whatsoever.

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That is not what I personally want.

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What I want is to be a part of a community

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that has allegiance first to a King and a Kingdom

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and then uses that influence very well

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wherever we can in this world.

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And as we go about that, I just want to --

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You're gonna get this on your way out.

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What we have tried to do, you will be the judge

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of whether we have accomplished that.

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What we've tried to do is really embody

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some of the things that you'll find on this chart.

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You've probably seen this used throughout the series

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about what it might look like to be first connected

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to a King in a Kingdom

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and refuse the kind of polarized political spectrum

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that we're being presented in our country.

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And yet we all have influence that I hope the series

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will help us to use very, very well

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as we continue the rest of 2020.

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And today, I believe that we are going to talk about

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the key to using that influence well.

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Wherever you are, whatever your convictions are,

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this applies to you and me always and forever

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in the use of our words.

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We're going to talk about what that means

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and how our words influence people.

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And we are first going to find out the exact myth

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that we are going to bust today about words.

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Now, if you're just joining us,

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you don't know what I mean by that.

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This over here is our,

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I'm going to call it a slot machine like situation

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where we're going to find out what is the myth

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that we're about to bust here today.

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Let's see who believes I'm pulling this handle

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and making things move on the screen.

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Is it giraffe's are so tall they can smell the moon?

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No. No.

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Let's do it again.

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Starbucks is worth the price, another myth.

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But we're not going to spend time on that today.

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And one more time.

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The myth we're gonna bust today is that

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you should never discuss politics or religion in public.

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But Lord help us, literally,

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we're about to do that right now.

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So let me pray for us.

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Father, I just welcome You here with me

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and in this place in a special way,

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we really want to hear Your words.

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And I pray that my words, as many of them as possible,

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would be reflective of Your heart

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and would be Your very words themselves.

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And I pray that that is what would stick,

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Your words and the influence that we know

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that they have to bring life.

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And so be here with us.

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And it's in Jesus's name that I pray.

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Amen.

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Well, why this myth?

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Maybe you've heard this before, this idea

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that those two things are just a bad idea

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They're just combustible.

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It seems like there's just a lot of potential

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for explosion when these two topics come up.

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And so we've we've devised this kind of old adage

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that's what I would call that.

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It's sort of an old adage that it's just not a good idea.

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Let's just stay away from this entirely.

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You never do it.

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And I think anytime I hear the word neνer

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or the word always, I just kind of want to come after it

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because it tells me that we just want to make this easy.

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Let's just sweep all this messy gray stuff under the rug.

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Let's just make this easy.

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And I think that that's really what that myth is doing.

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Just don't do it.

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It's too hard.

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It's too messy.

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We're not sure how, just don't do it.

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And I think we can do better than that today.

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And I know we need to dump this because our culture

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is already starting to react against it.

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We have three different ways, I think,

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that we kind of handle this idea

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that we should never talk politics or religion in public.

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The first is we want to fight against it.

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I'm sure there's none of those people,

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none of those types in here, no mean tweeters,

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no highly aggressive types that just want

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all of their stuff out there.

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But I think that's one of the reactions against

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this idea that we should never talk about these things.

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I think some of us have just gone

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the complete opposite direction

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and we kind of fight against that idea.

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And we just say whatever we want to say

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whenever we want to say it, because we can.

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And I think being online is probably made this worse,

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maybe more inflamed, because we feel

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the anonymity of being behind a screen,

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being on a keyboard.

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And we forget that there are actual humans

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that we're talking to that also have keyboards

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and screens and we're interacting with them.

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We're using our words in a way

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that just kind of fights that.

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And the second way I probably have most --

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most I see probably more in my groups of friends

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and family is the passive-aggressive type.

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We don't want to kind of walk totally away from that,

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that myth, because there's something interesting about it,

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like we do like to avoid the messiness.

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But we have something we want to say,

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so we just enter conversations.

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We just -- I'm just going to drop in a comment,

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I got to go to the bathroom.

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Or we online, we might do things like this.

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We might just re-post an article with no comments attached.

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I'm just going to leave this right here for you guys

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just in case you were interested.

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That's what I would call the passive-aggressive type.

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Kind of wants to toe the line,

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maintain some deniability,

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doesn't really want to come right out

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and have messy conversations.

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And then there's the last type,

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which is far more like me,

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who has just abided by this myth all together.

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Just taken it, gone with it, believed it.

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That's what I've done most of my adult life.

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I just don't want --

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I don't want to talk about politics

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and throw some God in there and you know it's gonna explode.

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It just seems like a really bad idea.

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And so I don't.

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I think I could best characterize my approach

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to politics by telling you I really like a quote

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from a movie, I've used this with my kids before.

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And yes, it is a British period drama.

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I like those.

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I say, "If you don't have anything pleasant to say,

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you will kindly restrict your remarks to the weather."

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That's pretty much where I've been politically.

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I might have said that to my kids a time or two.

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They could probably repeat that back to you.

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"Kindly restrict your remarks to the weather."

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I mean, I literally engage the weather,

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rather than join a political conversation

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that happened between my husband and my father-in-law

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at Christmas this last year.

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I mean, I was all up in the blinds looking at it rain.

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I just kind of back away.

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That really has been how I have approached politics.

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But it's really -- it's probably from my past.

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All of us have some political context in our past.

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Mine, just so you know, kind of where I'm coming from,

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is I grew up in a family with a strong culture of politeness.

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So first of all, if it was going to cause trouble.

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better just not to say it.

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As a matter of fact, better that we just maintain

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the appearance of peace and unity,

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not the actual thing.

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But we can just get out alive, that would be fine.

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Let's just all be polite.

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So part of it comes from that.

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And the other part of it comes from

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I really logit grew up in a home where my mom and dad,

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they weren't tense about politics.

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As a matter of fact, they would go and vote.

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They were always like good citizen and they would go vote

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and they would come home on election day

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wearing their stickers.

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And at dinner we would talk about who they voted for

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or what issues they voted for or against.

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They almost universally picked the opposite of one another.

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And so -- but they weren't tense about it.

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They would actually laugh at this discovery

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because it happened almost every time they would vote.

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They would go, "Well. I thought about this

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and I voted like that."

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And the other one would just laugh and go,

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"I guess we completely canceled each other out

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like neither one of us needed to even bother."

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And so it wasn't a source of tension

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to have differences of opinion.

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So I just kind of -- I just kind of grew up in that way.

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And as I've come into adulthood, I've found myself

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kind of abiding by this myth of just don't do it,

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for some of those reasons.

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But there is there's a major upside to that.

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One of the upsides to that I have personally experienced,

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which is people never get mad at you

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about your political views

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when you never tell them what they are.

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I'm going to tell you what one of mine is.

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I'm just going to confess this to you right now.

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I think it's one of my more unpopular political viewpoints.

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I miss my plastic straws.

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I'm just going to tell you that right now.

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I miss them. I care about the turtles.

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In my mind, I don't think that having a plastic straw

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is worth the life of these beautiful animals.

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Also, I really hate it when I take a drink

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and my ice hits me in the face

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and then it like goes down my shirt.

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And more than that, I hate my alternatives.

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I brought these with me today

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because and I feel strongly about this.

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I'm sure I'm going to get some emails.

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I can handle it.

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Now, this is one of my alternatives.

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This is a paper straw.

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Blech.

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That's all I'm saying right now is I get these

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and I put it in my mouth.

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And I really have a weird thing in my past

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about wet toilet paper.

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I just can't handle it.

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And this becomes wet toilet paper in about 30 seconds.

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So I'm like, no.

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Back to the ice on my face.

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Now, someone got me this.

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This is my other alternative.

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This is lovely, actually.

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Love drinking out of this.

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This is like a metal, like it's a metal straw.

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But here's how I'm supposed to clean it.

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Really? Are you serious?

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This is what you want me to do?

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I'm so committed to this straw

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that that's how you want me to clean it?

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No. Again, mom of four kids.

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Absolutely not.

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Not gonna happen.

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So I miss my plastic straws.

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Now, I don't ever have to tell people that.

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So I don't look like the jerk

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that just doesn't want to save the turtles.

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That's the upside of taking my political point of view.

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There's a downside also.

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When you take the passive route, like I have taken

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for most of my life, you also you forfeit

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some of those things that just burn in you

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that you would actually like to talk about.

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And I've so conditioned myself to not comment

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on things to avoid explosions

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that I actually bypass opportunities,

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maybe even some influence to talk about things

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that I do care about.

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And I would regularly bypass that.

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I would regularly give that up.

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For instance, I care about the opportunities

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and the voices of women in our country.

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And I don't think our work is done there.

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And I care about those issues.

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I care about how our leaders talk about women.

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I care about the women that get elected.

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I care about the voices that we haven't had

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in how to run the country.

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I care about that.

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And I'm only one generation from my mom who was told,

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"If you leave this house and go to college,

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don't ever come back.

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Because women don't belong in college."

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That was one generation ago.

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That was my mom.

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I care about those issues.

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I would love to talk about them, some of them burn in me.

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Yet I've just taken the stance that I just don't do this.

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I just bypass it.

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I don't want the messiness.

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I don't want the the potential explosion,

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the potential impact on relationships.

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And I think we can do better.

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Whether you're a fighter,

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whether you're the passive-aggressive type,

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whether you're a lot more like me,

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I think we can do better.

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I think there's a different goal

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that we could have for our influence and for our words.

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In the rest of the season, all the way through this year,

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maybe even we could adopt this for the rest of our life.

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I think our goal cannot be to forego our influence.

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I don't think our goal can be to fight against

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everything that's out there that we need to care about

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and have opinions about and be heard about.

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Instead, I think our goal should be to speak life.

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No matter where we are on the political spectrum

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or what issue or person more engaging,

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we all have access to this goal

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to speak life into that place.

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And I want to make a case today that I think

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that should be your goal with your words

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both in this political season and maybe forever more.

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And that would be to speak life, because words,

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they are a powerful, powerful tool that God has given us

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and He's allowed us to share in their power.

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And I want to read you this Proverb

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from the Book of Proverbs 18 it says this:

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Death and life are in the power of the tongue.

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Our words have the power to both create and destroy.

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They have the power to give life and to kill things.

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And God Himself uses this power.

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As a matter of fact, all the way back in Genesis 1,

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we learned that when God created the world,

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He actually spoke it into existence.

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It says, "And God said, 'Let there be light.'"

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And God said this.

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In the book of Isaiah, the prophet Isaiah says

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that God's word does not return to Him empty,

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that it actually accomplishes what He sent it for.

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It creates what God wanted it to create

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when He speaks His words, whether that's through Him

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or through somebody here on earth, His words create things.

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When Jesus came to this earth as God,

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He was called the logos, the Word made flesh.

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And He came on a mission to bring life.

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I believe that God's motive to use His words

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everywhere is to bring life.

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And I don't mean to be nice.

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I do think we could be a little nicer,

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to be honest with you,

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but I'll just leave that aside for a second.

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I already told you I come from a family that's nice.

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And so I do, I think there are a thousand ways

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that your words could actually bring life

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and create and build up that aren't always flowery.

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It could be that you're giving empathy,

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that you're giving comfort,

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that you're giving correction or conviction.

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You could be giving encouragement or honor.

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There's all kinds of ways that we can use our words

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that aren't about saying them nicer,

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they're about bringing life.

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And God allows us to share in that power.

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But the thing is, there's also the flip side.

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It says death and life are in the power of the tongue.

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And we also have the ability to destroy things.

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I know that you can -- You're probably like me.

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You can think of both of these things in your life.

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You can think of somebody who created something

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for you with their words.

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And you can think of somebody who tore something out

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of your life with a word that they spoke,

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who you destroyed something in you

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with a word that they spoke to you.

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My positive example, somebody who built something

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into my life with her words was my junior year

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in high school American history teacher Mrs.

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Watkins.

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Teresa Watkins was her name.

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She was amazing.

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And she said to me, I've replayed this so many times.

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I know this is a direct quote,

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but I've lost the whole context.

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I don't know why we were talking about this.

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It has nothing to do with American history.

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I don't know why she said this to me, because

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I can't reconstruct the rest of the conversation,

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but I will never forget her words.

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She said, "Alli. I think that one day

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you would be a very loving leader in a church."

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I was 17.

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I thought she was crazy.

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I was like, what? And I moved on.

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And guess what? Couple of decades later,

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God starts to get a hold of my life

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and do some very interesting things.

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And all of a sudden, Mrs.

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Watkins' words

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starts circling around in my heart and in my mind.

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I thought that created space for something in my life.

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And I can also think, like you can,

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of the people who with a word,

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you spend the next decade trying to shake that off.

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The old sticks and stones can break your bones,

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but names will never hurt me.

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That is a load of crap.

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That is an absolute load of crap.

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Words can tear down and destroying.

00:20:14

Guess what?

00:20:15

It's actually, without God, our natural way because

00:20:20

we live in a fallen world,

00:20:22

which is another sermon for another time.

00:20:24

There's sin and we're born into this environment.

00:20:27

Right? And so without God,

00:20:29

we will always use our words to destroy.

00:20:32

Listen to what Romans 3 says:

00:20:58

Paul, the writer of that passage, he was describing

00:21:02

our condition without God because without God,

00:21:05

we have no hope of speaking life.

00:21:09

Absolutely none.

00:21:10

I would say at best our words could be functional,

00:21:13

but worthless to Him.

00:21:15

But with Him, we have the capability

00:21:19

to bring things to life.

00:21:22

However, at worst, we could spend our lives

00:21:25

thinking we were right, expressing ourselves well,

00:21:29

and doing nothing but tearing things down

00:21:32

or killing things around us.

00:21:36

Politics 2020 is going to be our torture test.

00:21:38

It is.

00:21:39

Because someone is going to annoy you.

00:21:42

You're gonna be right about things.

00:21:44

You're gonna be convinced you are right about things

00:21:46

you're wrong about.

00:21:47

Where this is going to be a torture test

00:21:49

for how we're going to talk to each other,

00:21:51

how we're going to engage each other.

00:21:53

And if we will adopt the goal of speaking life,

00:21:57

then two things we're gonna have to be true

00:21:59

about every time we open our mouths.

00:22:03

The first thing that has to be true is

00:22:05

our words have to come from a good place.

00:22:08

And the second thing is that they have to be

00:22:10

for the good of someone else.

00:22:12

What God is asking of us is He's telling us

00:22:15

that we need to do good with our words.

00:22:19

We need to build up and not tear down.

00:22:21

And there's some very specific direction

00:22:23

around these two truths about our words.

00:22:25

That first, they have to be from a good place.

00:22:28

Jesus explained this in Luke 6.

00:22:30

He explained that our words are actually coming

00:22:33

from a place that we might not immediately be aware of.

00:22:38

Luke 6 says this:

00:23:05

I love that last line.

00:23:06

It's actually been one of my favorite verses

00:23:09

for a long, long time because it kind of stops me cold.

00:23:12

I want to read that one more time.

00:23:18

That means that our words are overflowing from our heart.

00:23:22

They're not originating on our tongue.

00:23:24

They're not even originating in our mind.

00:23:26

They're originating from what in Hebrew thought

00:23:28

the heart was the center of our being.

00:23:31

It was what brought everything together.

00:23:34

It's the thing that actually makes the decisions

00:23:37

because it's underneath everything that drives us

00:23:40

to do or say what we do and say.

00:23:43

The heart was the seat, the essence of who you are.

00:23:47

And Jesus is saying here,

00:23:48

that's where your words are actually coming from.

00:23:52

And if it's good, they'll be good.

00:23:55

And if it's bad, they will be bad

00:23:59

because words are giving us away all the time.

00:24:03

I have a friend who calls this the cup principal.

00:24:07

She says that when you knock over a cup of coffee,

00:24:10

it's coffee that gets spilled out.

00:24:13

When you knock over a cup of coffee.

00:24:14

It isn't milk that spills out, it's coffee.

00:24:19

Politics are going to -- we're going to bump each other.

00:24:22

We are. I mean, that's inevitable, right?

00:24:24

It's why I don't want to talk about things,

00:24:26

because we're going to bump each other

00:24:27

and it's gonna get messy and we're all gonna think

00:24:29

and feel different things

00:24:30

and we're gonna bump up against each other.

00:24:32

And guess what? When we get bumped,

00:24:34

whatever is in here is gonna come out here.

00:24:39

That's what Jesus is saying.

00:24:40

And so sometimes we're talking from places

00:24:43

in our hearts that just aren't His.

00:24:46

And I always feel like we're all in this process,

00:24:48

any of us that want to follow Jesus,

00:24:50

any of us that are actually seeking God,

00:24:52

we're all in this process of more and more

00:24:55

of our heart being His.

00:24:56

Right?

00:24:57

And so it's possible that you could be able

00:24:59

to talk about something today

00:25:01

that you couldn't four years ago

00:25:03

if you're following Jesus,

00:25:04

because more and more of our heart is becoming His.

00:25:08

It's those places where we want our words to come out of.

00:25:11

And if they're not, they're going to bring death.

00:25:15

They're not going to bring life because

00:25:17

out of the good, good words come,

00:25:21

words that bring life.

00:25:22

I decided to kind of put myself under the microscope.

00:25:26

I decided to ask a couple of my friends and my kids,

00:25:30

because kids are awesome at this.

00:25:31

My kids are like 8 to 14,

00:25:33

so they've got a lot to say about me.

00:25:35

So I decided to ask them,

00:25:38

"What are some things that I say a lot?

00:25:40

Like if you just close your eyes,

00:25:41

what do you hear ringing in your head?"

00:25:43

You know, because we can learn a lot about this.

00:25:45

Right? Our words today about about politics

00:25:48

and everything else, they're already giving away

00:25:50

the state of our heart.

00:25:52

So I thought, I wonder what they're going to tell me.

00:25:54

So the first one I got back was from a friend

00:25:56

and she said, she was laughing.

00:25:58

And she goes, "I just hear you saying this:

00:26:01

Oh, come on."

00:26:03

I thought, "What a weird thing to have played back to me."

00:26:07

I can hear myself saying that.

00:26:09

What's underneath that?

00:26:10

I'm irritated?

00:26:11

I think you're all idiots?

00:26:13

There's something underneath that

00:26:15

that my friend can hear my voice saying, "Oh, come on."

00:26:20

I got two back that I thought were kind of similar.

00:26:23

One was somebody said I talk about personal space.

00:26:26

And the other person said that I say,

00:26:30

"Just stop with the noise."

00:26:33

Maybe you could chalk that up to being a mom

00:26:35

with four kids in the house.

00:26:37

But also, maybe there's something about my heart.

00:26:40

Maybe am I pushing people out?

00:26:43

Do I not want -- do I want to isolate a little bit?

00:26:46

Do I want to be by myself?

00:26:48

At least it's worth asking God a question about, right?

00:26:53

I would encourage you to do this.

00:26:54

I would encourage you to do the same.

00:26:56

You want to text somebody today and say,

00:26:57

"When you think of me,

00:26:59

what are the phrases that come to mind?

00:27:00

What's the tone of voice that comes to mind?

00:27:02

What stories do I tell a lot?"

00:27:05

One of my daughters did make me smile.

00:27:06

She said, "Mommy, you always tell me the same thing.

00:27:09

You always say, 'I love you with all of my heart.'"

00:27:14

I was like, now that, that was worth the whole exercise.

00:27:17

Now my husband, he didn't quite --

00:27:20

He got it as a busy text at work.

00:27:22

He didn't quite grasp exactly what I was driving for.

00:27:25

He thought I meant just the isolated vocabulary words

00:27:28

that I probably repeat more than others,

00:27:30

just pure repetition.

00:27:33

He said the two words that I probably use

00:27:35

at the top of my vocabulary list are Bible and wine.

00:27:41

I was like, " He might not be wrong."

00:27:45

After I explained what I was really driving for,

00:27:48

he's like, " I'm going to let my answer stand."

00:27:50

So anyway, we had a lot of fun with it.

00:27:53

But what I learned is your words,

00:27:55

they are putting your heart on display.

00:27:57

They are.

00:27:58

And whether you want to hear it or not,

00:28:00

they're coming out of whatever is already inside of us.

00:28:05

If we want to use our influence well,

00:28:07

then we want to speak from places in our heart '

00:28:09

that are good because they're God's.

00:28:13

Our words don't just need to come from a good place,

00:28:16

they need to be aimed at going to a good place.

00:28:19

This is the most interesting part to me as I studied.

00:28:23

I hope we're getting to know each other well enough

00:28:25

to know that you know that I'm not going to talk

00:28:26

to you about something unless I've read

00:28:28

pretty much all the things that the Bible has to say about it.

00:28:31

And one of the most fascinating things

00:28:34

that I consistently saw in different ways

00:28:37

and places in scripture is that our words actually

00:28:40

should be aimed entirely at the good of the hearer.

00:28:46

Entirely at the good of the listener.

00:28:50

That is so simple, but it's a mind blowingly different way

00:28:55

to handle words than I think we used today.

00:28:58

I think generally speaking, I think most of us

00:29:01

we say what we say because we want to say it

00:29:04

and we have something to say and so we're gonna say it.

00:29:07

Somewhere mixed in there on the list

00:29:08

is that we think you need to hear it.

00:29:10

You know?

00:29:11

It's not nowhere, but it's certainly not the aim

00:29:14

of most of what we choose to communicate.

00:29:17

And the Bible actually says the entirety

00:29:20

of what comes out of our mouth should be

00:29:22

about the good of the person on the other end of those words.

00:29:28

I had to just sit and think about that for a while.

00:29:30

I really did, because I think it is

00:29:32

that radical a concept for how to use our words.

00:29:35

We know when we hear the opposite, right?

00:29:38

We absolutely know it.

00:29:39

Let's put that in the political spectrum.

00:29:41

You know, when somebody talks to you about politics

00:29:44

and it doesn't even matter if you're in the room.

00:29:46

Right?

00:29:47

They're going to say what they want to say

00:29:48

in the way they want to say it

00:29:49

with the emotion that they have,

00:29:51

getting to the conclusion they've already drawn

00:29:53

and they're just going for it.

00:29:55

It really doesn't matter if you get up and walk away,

00:29:58

they're still gonna have their rant.

00:30:00

Maybe we each have a rant.

00:30:01

You know?

00:30:02

Maybe that's a good question to ask when you text your friends.

00:30:04

Do I have a political rant?

00:30:06

That would be a great question to ask.

00:30:08

Because sometimes it doesn't even matter

00:30:10

if there's a listener, we are literally talking

00:30:13

entirely for our own benefit,

00:30:15

entirely for our own satisfaction.

00:30:18

And just to get things, quote, off our chests,

00:30:21

that is the opposite of what the Bible says

00:30:23

that we should do with our words.

00:30:25

I want you to listen.

00:30:26

You know, I must point out just for a second

00:30:28

that me, the one that won't say anything,

00:30:31

that is no more life-giving, right,

00:30:34

than somebody who just rants about all the things

00:30:37

they want you to hear.

00:30:38

I'm on the other end of the spectrum.

00:30:40

No matter where you are.

00:30:41

Whether I have something good or encouraging

00:30:43

or helpful or potentially sharpening to say,

00:30:46

I'm just not going to say it?

00:30:47

That amounts to the same thing.

00:30:49

It absolutely doesn't bring life

00:30:51

no matter which end of the spectrum we're on.

00:30:55

And instead, Philippians 2 kind of encapsulates

00:30:59

this idea that I found all throughout Scripture.

00:31:03

Philippians 2 says this:

00:31:17

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit.

00:31:20

I think, a vain conceit as just

00:31:23

an entirely self-focused attitude.

00:31:26

I am completely turned around looking at myself.

00:31:29

And it says:

00:31:30

Do nothing out of that spirit,

00:31:32

only do what is best and in the interests of others.

00:31:36

I think a lot of times, especially when it comes to politics,

00:31:39

we truly believe, so many of us do hold opinions

00:31:43

that maybe they are very well thought,

00:31:45

they could even be well researched.

00:31:47

They certainly are impassioned.

00:31:49

And we believe, "I know what's good for you.

00:31:52

It's to hear my immigration policy.

00:31:54

That is what's good for you.

00:31:56

So I'm just going to tell you that because there is

00:31:58

no circumstance under which that would not be good for you."

00:32:02

And so we want to go on like that, because

00:32:04

we truly do believe in many of the things

00:32:07

that we become impassioned about.

00:32:09

And I want to add the next part of that chapter.

00:32:13

Philippians 2 goes on to say this:

00:32:44

It says we're to have that mindset

00:32:46

in our relationships with one another

00:32:48

that are just like that.

00:32:49

Now, what is the "that"?

00:32:52

Jesus was God.

00:32:55

He showed up here as God.

00:32:58

That means everything He thought was right.

00:33:01

Everything He said would have been justified.

00:33:05

Had He wanted to say all the things,

00:33:07

He would have had every right to do that.

00:33:09

Hhe could have exercised any power,

00:33:12

any right that He had, anything.

00:33:14

And instead, what He did is

00:33:16

He actually confined himself to humanity.

00:33:19

He actually held Himself back in a bunch of ways

00:33:23

to show up here on a mission to bring life.

00:33:26

That is what those versus are telling us.

00:33:29

Be so focused on the person that you are talking to,

00:33:33

the person that you are relating with,

00:33:35

that you are willing to constrict yourself

00:33:38

to bring them life if necessary.

00:33:40

And not only was He doing that, he restricted himself

00:33:45

to the whims of humanity to the point

00:33:48

that He actually died on a cross.

00:33:50

And this is what makes Him far, far greater

00:33:53

than just our good example, because

00:33:56

it's really tempting sometimes to think of Jesus

00:33:59

And if we did that in this case, we'd be right to do that.

00:34:02

But we would still be where we are.

00:34:04

We would still have the same conversations.

00:34:07

We'd still have the same mixed up hearts

00:34:09

that's spew blah all over each other

00:34:11

when we talk about politics.

00:34:13

Instead, what He did was He became far more than a good example.

00:34:19

Let's go on and finish the rest of this passage

00:34:23

and find out how He did that.

00:34:27

After He died on the cross, this is what it says:

00:34:46

Jesus is not just a good example

00:34:48

of how we're supposed to treat each other.

00:34:49

He is the means by which

00:34:51

we will ever have any hope of doing that.

00:34:54

He is not just the example

00:34:56

of how to talk to each other better or being nicer

00:34:59

or have the right opinions.

00:35:00

He is the only hope that we have

00:35:04

to ever turn around our self-focus

00:35:06

and be concerned about the welfare of another person.

00:35:09

He's the only hope I have in ever wanting to open my mouth

00:35:13

when maybe somebody is going to explode out the other end.

00:35:16

He's the only hope we have that our hearts will ever

00:35:19

become truly good so that good words come out of us,

00:35:24

because where our hearts are not His, our words will never be.

00:35:30

I want us so much to embrace this goal of speaking life,

00:35:35

not just in the kind of dark political thing

00:35:37

that we're facing in 2020, but everywhere we go.

00:35:41

We have this crazy advantage as people

00:35:44

who want to follow Jesus

00:35:45

or at least are open to considering that.

00:35:47

We have this unbelievable thing at our fingertips

00:35:51

where we could speak the very words of God

00:35:54

and actually impact something around us,

00:35:56

actually bring life to somebody who's down

00:35:59

or doesn't have it.

00:36:00

Actually sharpen and communicate things

00:36:03

that would bring life into political spaces even

00:36:06

that are only and ever filled with darkness right now.

00:36:10

I don't want us to forfeit that right.

00:36:12

I just don't want us to play the game the world plays.

00:36:15

I want us to instead adopt the goal of speaking life.

00:36:22

And for that to be true, we have got to keep asking

00:36:25

ourselves these two questions, right?

00:36:27

You're going to get engaged in political conversation.

00:36:29

Someone's going to tag you online.

00:36:31

They're going to talk to you at lunch,

00:36:32

at work, or whatever.

00:36:34

My husband walked up on two people at the gym.

00:36:36

They were actually having a fight about because

00:36:38

the news was on in the locker room.

00:36:40

And he walks up on them at the gym

00:36:41

and they're like fighting.

00:36:42

And he kind of backs up and picks another locker.

00:36:45

But one of them, one of them yelled,

00:36:47

"You're just like my ex-wife.

00:36:48

You just say what you want and then you walk away."

00:36:52

That is not a helpful way to engage.

00:36:54

That is never going to bring life.

00:36:57

Instead, we have to constantly be asking ourselves

00:36:59

these two questions.

00:37:01

One, are my words really coming from a place

00:37:06

in my heart that is good?

00:37:07

Are they coming from a good place?

00:37:09

And number two, can I really honestly tell myself

00:37:12

I am speaking for the good of the person that is with me?

00:37:18

If the answer to one of those questions is no,

00:37:20

what do you do, right? Because here's gonna be no's.

00:37:22

There's gonna be times where your heart

00:37:24

is not in a good place.

00:37:25

It's just not there.

00:37:27

Or you you could talk about that subject,

00:37:29

but just not with that person.

00:37:33

And you really can't honestly say that

00:37:34

you have there good in mind to have this conversation.

00:37:37

And I'm just saying, not out of passivity,

00:37:39

out of integrity we need to be the kind of people

00:37:42

who are strong enough to say,

00:37:44

"This is not the right conversation for us to have."

00:37:47

Because God takes our words that seriously.

00:37:50

That is the answer to one of those is no,

00:37:52

that we would be people of integrity who would say,

00:37:54

"I'm not even going to have this conversation

00:37:57

because I cannot speak life.

00:37:59

I can't."

00:38:00

And I don't believe that's being passive.

00:38:02

I believe that's showing integrity and honor

00:38:04

to what God believes our words should really be about.

00:38:08

But what if it's yes?

00:38:10

I mean, what if it's yes?

00:38:12

If you can engage in a way that is helpful,

00:38:17

in a way that really prioritizes the other person,

00:38:20

in a way that really can speak life,

00:38:22

my goodness, engage.

00:38:26

Let's not walk by the opportunities

00:38:28

that are right there in front of us.

00:38:30

And I want to tell you, here's what I do,

00:38:31

because you know I've had to get better at this.

00:38:33

This is not this is not my wheelhouse.

00:38:36

I have discovered a very helpful principle

00:38:38

that I want to give to you.

00:38:39

And I call it the two way conversation.

00:38:41

I've got two conversations going when I engage

00:38:45

in kind of these tense conversations with people.

00:38:47

And one of the conversations is, of course,

00:38:49

between me and whoever I'm talking to.

00:38:52

And the other conversation is between me and God.

00:38:55

One's going this way and one's going this way.

00:38:57

Because, and only because, I try now to have

00:39:01

the intention to speak life, I'm asking God,

00:39:05

can you show me something about this person?

00:39:07

Would you tell me what's really going on here?

00:39:09

Would you give me the right question to ask?

00:39:11

Would you help me to listen?

00:39:12

Would you help me to hear what's underneath this?

00:39:14

Would you tell me what's at the foundation at the bottom?

00:39:18

And friends, it's incredible how many times

00:39:21

something amazing will just pop out

00:39:24

in the middle of a tense conversation

00:39:26

where you have the ability to insert life.

00:39:31

This is a skill, this doesn't happen just overnight.

00:39:33

It's easy, much easier to either say never

00:39:36

or just say whatever the heck you want to say.

00:39:38

But I think we have to be in the messy in-between

00:39:41

where we're willing to engage God in those spaces

00:39:44

where we think we might actually be able to do this okay

00:39:48

and try to speak life.

00:39:53

I want to invite the band to come back out because

00:39:56

I think there's a way that we should end this series,

00:39:59

this whole series, what we've really been trying

00:40:01

is to drive to the bottom.

00:40:04

Instead of talking about how you're going to vote,

00:40:06

what we have been trying to do is get behind that

00:40:10

and talk about what does it look like

00:40:11

to have your first allegiance

00:40:13

and all your decision making run through

00:40:16

a Kingdom with a good King?

00:40:20

And so we're gonna have a moment together right now

00:40:22

where I want to invite you to declare

00:40:24

your allegiance to that King in a very special way.

00:40:27

I thought about the fact that my my kids,

00:40:29

they say the Pledge of Allegiance still at school.

00:40:32

I know some of us have mixed feelings about

00:40:34

whether that's a good thing or a bad thing.

00:40:35

In this particular case,

00:40:36

I'm just gonna borrow the concept to say

00:40:38

it's a good thing when your heart is fully engaged

00:40:42

and pointed at God to stand up and declare

00:40:45

your allegiance to Him above any policy,

00:40:49

party or person that we might engage in our political year.

00:40:54

And so I want to invite you to do that right now.

00:40:57

And let's declare our allegiance.

00:40:59

You can stand up with me and Justin's going to lead us.

00:52:37

I hope right where you are at this moment,

00:52:40

you can hear the truth of that.

00:52:41

Hs love endures forever.

00:52:43

No matter what changes come, His love endures forever.

00:52:48

No matter how far you've gone,

00:52:50

His love endures forever.

00:52:52

and sing this together. Come on.

00:55:25

- When we sing together like that, we call it worship

00:55:28

because we're ascribing worth to God,

00:55:29

whether we believe those words with our whole hearts

00:55:32

or we want to believe them a little bit deeper

00:55:35

when we sing those songs it orients our day,

00:55:37

our week, our life towards God in a new way.

00:55:40

So thanks for joining us for that.

00:55:42

You know, we have a team of people

00:55:43

that would love to pray for you.

00:55:45

Maybe you have something heavy on your heart

00:55:47

or that you can't stop thinking about

00:55:49

or something big coming up this week.

00:55:51

We would love to pray for you specifically for that thing.

00:55:55

So you could text us at 513-731-7400

00:56:00

or chat with us on the Crossroads Web site.

00:56:02

And we have a volunteer that would love to pray for you.

00:56:04

And if you've got questions about

00:56:06

how to get deeper connected into the church,

00:56:08

maybe find a group or a location near you,

00:56:12

you could also ask that person over chat

00:56:15

about how to do that

00:56:16

and the best ways for you to personally connect.

00:56:19

You know, I'm a giver to the church because

00:56:22

I want to be about giving other people freedom

00:56:25

that I've experienced.

00:56:26

And I never have to question if my life has impact

00:56:30

when I get to fuel financially people's lives being changed

00:56:34

and finding physical and emotional and spiritual

00:56:38

and financial freedom through the church.

00:56:40

And so if you want to do that,

00:56:41

you could become a giver today

00:56:43

by heading to Crossroads.net/give.

00:56:46

Next week you're gonna get a full taste

00:56:48

of who we are as a church

00:56:50

because your adventure starts here.

00:56:52

We're going to hear from our senior pastor, Brian Tome.

00:56:55

You don't want to miss it.

00:56:56

Check us out right here online

00:56:58

or at a location near you.

00:56:59

Have a great week.

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