Welcome back to our winter conversation called ‘Real Faith Disrupts.’  We are walking you through 12 essential questions about our faith and have hit some critical topics so far.  We want you to see that we aren’t just talking about what these things are; the focus has been on what they mean to you personally and how they impact your life.  Why is that important?  Well, it’s because real faith leads to life change.  When God is the priority in our lives, and Jesus is both Savior and The Lord leading our lives, it leads to Real Faith, which disrupts what was in our lives so we can experience this elusive new life that we want and tell people about.  It disrupts how we view things, which changes how we treat things and leads us to experience our best lives possible, which is that life that Christianity advertises that so many deeply desire but just aren’t experiencing.  And do you know what is fun?  Today, I get to give you the answer to every struggle and challenge you have in your faith.  Today, I get to show you how to experience that life that Christianity advertises that we can get so frustrated searching for and not experiencing.  But before we do that and jump into a Bible study today, I want to talk about something Jesus said that may be one of the most important things He ever told us to do.  It’s also something that most Christians have read and know about, but if we are honest, it is rare to see it come out in our lives.  Let’s read it and talk…

Mattew 16:24 Then Jesus said to his disciples, "If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me. 25 If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. NLT

Jesus says that to be His followers, we must turn from our selfish ways, take up our cross, and follow Him. Then He says if we try to hang on to our lives, we will lose them…but if we give up our lives, we will be saved.  In The Message version, verse 25 reads in a way that challenges the culture we live in today…

Mattew 16:25 Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. MSG

Jesus is giving us the way to find our true selves and our best lives possible here.  The irony is that finding our truest selves and living our best lives is what we want and what so many of us are searching for, but there aren’t many people embracing this teaching and living this way.  And it does seem to be a challenge.  How could letting go of my life lead me to my life?  Jesus makes many statements like this, which can be challenging for us to accept and understand, like this one in Matthew 10…

Matthew 10:38 "If you don't go all the way with me, through thick and thin, you don't deserve me. 39 If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you'll find both yourself and me. MSG

This is another very popular teaching from Jesus that is so important because He is trying to give us the key to experiencing all we want in life and being our true selves. But it doesn’t seem to make sense.  How could I find myself by forgetting myself and simply looking to Him, which leads to me finding Him and me?  This is so interesting because these two statements are just some of the places in Scripture where Jesus is giving us the answer to everything we want in life. Yet, for us humans, it’s hard to understand because it seems the opposite of what we should do to find our best lives.  The statements seem to contradict: if you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it…shouldn’t I hold onto my life to keep it?  Self-sacrifice is the way, not self-help, to help myself.  Shouldn’t self-help be the way to help myself? The way to find yourself is to stop looking for yourself and look for Jesus, and you will find yourself. Shouldn’t I have to look for what I’m trying to find?  These are popular teachings of Jesus, who is trying to help us experience the thing that we struggle to experience in life, that most of us quietly wonder why we don’t experience because Christianity seems to tell us we will experience this abundant life, our best lives…yet it doesn’t seem to happen.  What Jesus is saying sounds great; we have read and heard it before, but I don’t think we grasp these teachings because they ask us to do the opposite of what makes sense to us.  We just don’t see the way to everything we want and need in life as Jesus does through self-sacrifice, through letting go of ourselves and allowing Him to lead. We view it through self-help and holding on to ourselves.  We have been learning that how we view things is so powerful that we can’t hear or accept or even give a test run to what Jesus says will give us everything we want in life, and I’m hoping we can work through this today and see the key to everything in life. 

So, I hope I have you thinking. By now, I would normally have told you our question of the day, but I want to hold onto that and keep talking because I made a statement at the beginning of this talk that I want to return to and build on.  I told you that today, I get to give you the answer to every struggle and challenge you have in your faith.  I get to show you how to experience that life that Christianity advertises that we can get so frustrated searching for and not experiencing in our lives, and that wasn’t an exaggeration or something I just said to get you excited, it is the truth.  Today, we discuss the key to every challenge and issue in our faith.  If you are struggling with your heart condition, this is the answer, and it will soften the hardest heart.  If you are struggling to find Spiritual Growth and discipleship, this is the answer because it is the greatest form of discipleship and will allow you to grow Spiritually more than any other way we can offer.  If you are struggling in relationships and with community, this will immediately place you in meaningful connections with people and fix those struggles in your life.  If you struggle to find your purpose, this is how you find it.  If you are struggling to find joy, energy, motivation, peace, love for others, love for God…all of it, I’m about to give you the answer, and it’s something you can start experiencing today.  But I have to warn you, as excited as we are to share this with you, is as disappointed as most are when they hear it because their faith hasn’t disrupted how they view things.  Are you ready?  Here is the key to every challenge in your life, the answer to every issue you have in your faith, and the way to experience your best life…

SERVE.

While you take that in, I will ask you our question of the day: 

Has your faith disrupted how you view serving?  

I am trying to give you a moment here. I built this up very intentionally because this is one of those areas of life that most have a set view of…and even as I point to Jesus’ teachings on this as the key to all we want in life, we struggle to see it that way… the lens we view and interpret life through starts to tell us what the church is up to in these moments when they point to serving but we will get into that.  For now, I want you to relax and try to be open to this concept if you want to come alive spiritually and experience your best life, SERVE.

I want to take you through a Bible study before we try to open up about our challenges in serving. When studying Scripture, I like to point out that when Scripture repeats itself, it is a big deal, and we need to pay attention.  Anytime God’s Word repeats itself, it tells you how big a deal it is, and today, I want to take you to Mark’s Gospel and show you something that happens in three consecutive chapters.  In Mark 8, 9, and 10, Jesus will tell His disciples He is going to die.  Three times, He talks about His ultimate act of service, laying down his life for us all, and as clear as He is, we see the Disciples struggle with it, and more glaring to me is what they talk about right after he does it…all three times.  Let’s start in Mark 8, where Jesus heals a blind man, then asks Peter who people say He is and who Peter thinks He is, to which Peter says you are The Messiah.  Good answer, then Jesus tells them all what He came to do.

Mark 8:31 Then Jesus began to tell them that the Son of Man must suffer many terrible things and be rejected by the elders, the leading priests, and the teachers of religious law. He would be killed, but three days later he would rise from the dead. 32 As he talked about this openly with his disciples, Peter took him aside and began to reprimand him for saying such things. 33 Jesus turned around and looked at his disciples, then reprimanded Peter. "Get away from me, Satan!" he said. "You are seeing things merely from a human point of view, not from God's."

So, Peter just acknowledged to Jesus that He is the Messiah. Jesus explains what must happen and how He will lay down His life, and Peter can’t see it, so he pulls Jesus aside and scolds Him!  This is where we get that tough moment where Jesus calls Peter Satan which is not good, but what does Jesus say and point to?  How Peter views things!  He isn’t able to see things through that God lens yet!  Then Jesus pulls everyone back together and teaches them to serve. 

34 Then, calling the crowd to join his disciples, he said, "If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me. 35 If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake and for the sake of the Good News, you will save it. NLT

If we want to follow Jesus, we must turn away from our selfish ways, take up our cross, and follow Him.  The way to lose your life is to try to hang on to it; we must let it go and focus on Him, and we find everything we are looking for.  Let’s move forward a chapter to Mark 9…

Mark 9:30 Leaving that region, they traveled through Galilee. Jesus didn't want anyone to know he was there, 31 for he wanted to spend more time with his disciples and teach them. He said to them, "The Son of Man is going to be betrayed into the hands of his enemies. He will be killed, but three days later he will rise from the dead." 32 They didn't understand what he was saying, however, and they were afraid to ask him what he meant. NLT

Once again, Jesus tells them about his ultimate act of serving, laying down his life for us all, and they can’t see or understand it. And look at what they discuss after, while walking on to Capernaum.

33 After they arrived at Capernaum and settled in a house, Jesus asked his disciples, "What were you discussing out on the road?" 34 But they didn't answer, because they had been arguing about which of them was the greatest. 35 He sat down, called the twelve disciples over to him, and said, "Whoever wants to be first must take last place and be the servant of everyone else." NLT

So, for the second time, Jesus says He will lay down His life for us all; they still don’t get it, and they start trying to figure out who amongst the team is the most important.  WOW!  Jesus has explained that He was there to serve, not be served, and to give His life away while they nod and continue to try to figure out which of them matters more!  And Jesus once again tries to give them the key to life.  Whoever wants to be first must take last place and be a servant!  Another statement that is so opposite of what we humans think, isn’t it?  Let’s look at chapter 10 because it happens again. Jesus is going to tell them what is going to happen, and this time, he is very descriptive. They are on their way to Jerusalem, so the time is near for Jesus to head to The Cross.

Mark 10:32 …Taking the twelve disciples aside, Jesus once more began to describe everything that was about to happen to him. 33 "Listen," he said, "we're going up to Jerusalem, where the Son of Man will be betrayed to the leading priests and the teachers of religious law. They will sentence him to die and hand him over to the Romans. 34 They will mock him, spit on him, flog him with a whip, and kill him, but after three days he will rise again." NLT

Jesus does this for a third time here, and this time, in detail!  How do they respond?

Mark 10:35 Then James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came over and spoke to him. "Teacher," they said, "we want you to do us a favor." 36 "What is your request?" he asked. 37 They replied, "When you sit on your glorious throne, we want to sit in places of honor next to you, one on your right and the other on your left." NLT

This is amazing. Jesus just explained that He is going to lay down His life and die the most horrific death possible, and James and John are listening and nodding and say, “Hey, that is cool and all, but when you go to Heaven, can you make sure we get the best seats in the house?”  Which infuriates the other disciples, not because they are diminishing Jesus’ teaching but because they are pushing out ahead of them!  Three times, Jesus brings up the ultimate act of serving, explaining the way to greatness isn’t posturing, positioning, competing, or pushing for spots but to lay down your life, saying I’m about to do this for you to save your lives and all three times it’s “blah, blah, blah yeah, but what is in it for me?” That is a reaction that so many Christians have as we learn that the way to our best life is to lay down our lives and serve.  We hear this a lot.  That’s great that the mission of Christ is for the lost or that our Spiritual Family is not about us it’s about others, and we know it is probably right, and we proudly tell others we are part of a church that focuses on serving, while all the while wondering much like the disciples, well, then what is in it for me?  So, for the third time, after telling them He is going to die, they respond by trying to figure out what is in it for them. Jesus once again gives them the key to life.

Mark 10:42 So Jesus called them together and said, "You know that the rulers in this world lord it over their people, and officials flaunt their authority over those under them. 43 But among you it will be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be your servant, 44 and whoever wants to be first among you must be the slave of everyone else. 45 For even the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve others and to give his life as a ransom for many."  NLT

Scripture is on repeat.  Jesus is on repeat. In three straight chapters, we see this play out.  And while Jesus understands how hard it is for us to see, He keeps pointing us to it.  The key to everything we want and everything in our faith is letting go of our selfish ways and serving.  The disciples hear this from Him repeatedly; it goes in one ear out the other, and they continue to focus on themselves just like we do today.  We want our best lives.  We want to thrive as Christians and experience all that we hear Jesus came to provide for us, we know these famous teachings from Jesus, but we continue to live for ourselves, frustrated and wondering why our faith isn’t working or if God isn’t with us, or if the churches just make this stuff up to get us to come to church, while we never engage the very thing that Jesus says would allow us to experience everything we so desperately want and can’t seem to find. 

Jesus says, If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self.  If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you'll find both yourself and me.  Matthew 16:24-25 & 10:38-39

It isn’t unclear, but we do struggle to understand it. Maybe it’s not understanding; maybe it’s the simple fact that living this way means we have to stop living our way and live His way now!  Now, we would never say that we don’t want to live for Jesus, but if we are honest, there are some real challenges here, especially living in a world filling our lives up with things of today that consume us and make the things of this world feel very important.  We never say this out loud because we know Jesus is to be first in our lives and that He matters more than this world, but we struggle to live this way.  Here are a few of the reasons we struggle to serve today.

I’m too busy and tired. This is the number one reason we struggle to serve: We have no time for it because our lives are filled with things to do. But if we slow down and think about it, we always have time for the things that matter to us. If something is a priority, you have the time because it matters to you. It’s the same with our energy levels. Our lives are busy, filled up, and tiresome, but if you notice, just like with your time, you always have the energy for things that are a priority; if it matters to us, we have the time and energy for it.  Jesus always had time for people, even on his way to the Cross.

It’s too complicated to serve.  This comes up a lot and is a great way to block the need to do things. We make it so complicated that we could never do something like serve.  But Jesus says we can serve by just giving a drink of water to someone who is thirsty.  That isn’t all that hard, is it?  When we choose to be a servant, it’s simple and easy.  We serve people with our lives, choices, talents, skills, gifts, and the words we speak.  Serving doesn’t have to be complex and complicated, and it isn’t for someone with a servant's heart. They know that their life actions and simple acts of love are building into those around them.  We have watched this for over 23 years around here.  Serving is so fun and easy for someone who wants to, and it is so complicated and complex for those who don’t want that disruption in their lives and the more complicated I make things, the less I have to do.

It's all about the spot I’m serving in.  Many are open to serving in a role that makes them feel important, but they may see some things as unattractive or beneath them.  Here’s what I mean: if it’s public and I get a microphone, maybe some credit or status I’m in…but it needs some sizzle for me to serve.  This is so interesting because Jesus taught and modeled the opposite.  He had equal status with God and put that aside.  He washed the disciple's feet, and he talked and loved on lepers, blind people, tax collectors, foreigners, and sinners.  He didn’t live in luxury or carry himself with prideful status. He lived simply and loved and served.  He is God, yet no act of serving was beneath him.  A servant’s heart doesn’t see serving that way, and like Jesus, no act of serving or role is beneath a true servant.    

I’m not spiritual or healthy enough to serve. For so many, we think we aren’t at the right level to serve.  Someday, when I’m not the mess I am today, I will be ready to serve.  Well, I want to tell you from personal experience this couldn’t be further from the truth.  Some of you know my story, but I struggled early on in my life, and in the middle of that struggle, I had an opportunity to get involved with Habitat for Humanity.  My brother bumped into the person in charge of that area’s Habitat for Humanity and found they needed help.  He reached out to me, and I said I could give them a hand.  I was working in residential construction at the time, and they needed some people to do some work, and my brother and I went.  Now, at that time, I was far from God, struggling with depression, and stuck in a cycle of bad decisions, drugs, and alcohol.  And there I am working side by side with a young family who would be moving into this home.  They thanked me over and over again for the work I was doing.  When he would, it just hit my heart how much it mattered to them. The man cried as I installed things in his home.  He couldn’t believe I would help him, and I was there at a brutal time in my life, struggling, feeling like less than nothing, and struggling to accept someone thanking me.  It melted my heart.  It brought me to life.  It pulled me out of the hole I was in and allowed me to see life, love, hope, and my value again.  It was the turning point in my life and how I found my way back to Jesus and health.  It came through serving, and it’s why I am so passionate about inviting you to serve. Serving is the key to unlocking your best life.

So, let me ask you the question of the day again.  

Has your faith disrupted how you view serving? 

Not sure?  Well, let’s start here.  How did you feel when I told you I would give you the key to everything you want in your Faith today?  Were you excited or just thinking, welp, here goes Sam again.  Were you still excited when I told you the key to experiencing your best life is found in serving, or was it disappointing? How about this question: if you do serve, is it something you are excited to do, or is it exhausting? Is it easy and fun, or hard and in the way of all the other things you would rather be doing? When we encourage or invite you to serve, how does it hit your heart and mind?  These are essential things to think about because Jesus not only came to give us life and life to the full but tells us over and over again that the way to experience all we want in life and find our true selves is to follow His lead, lay down our desires, and serve!  It is amazing, but most Christians are searching for the key, the missing thing that isn’t allowing them to experience their best lives.  We want more from our Faith than what we are experiencing, and we are frustrated that we aren’t experiencing all that we know we could.  We accept Jesus into our lives, read our Bibles, love God, attend church, pray, and try to be good people!  We can even quote these words from Jesus that we are looking at today, but we aren’t willing, able, or open to doing what Jesus keeps telling us we need to do to experience all we want and need in life.

Jesus says, If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self.  If your first concern is to look after yourself, you'll never find yourself. But if you forget about yourself and look to me, you'll find both yourself and me.  Matthew 16:24-25 & 10:38-39

This is the key to every challenge in your life, the answer to every issue you have in your faith, and the way to experience your best life….SERVE.  And we love you enough to invite you into it.