Trending - Week 5 - The CORE - Pastor Mike Novotny
Trending
Week 5 - The CORE
Pastor Mike Novotny
Happy Sunday, everyone. Welcome back to trending week number five, who's here for the first time in the series? Anyone. Yeah. A bunch of us. Yeah. This has been a really great series for our church. So if you're interested in topics, like is signs for real. How do I know God is speaking? To me is Love, Actually love, should we be ourselves? We've covered those for trending phrases. You can find Facebook or website YouTube as we kind of catch up on this great series called “Trending”, but we're here today, for week, number five. There's a big question. I need to ask myself.
Who am I to judge?
And heard that before. Who am I to judge? Who are you to judge? Who are we to judge? I mean, I'm the kind of person. I'm don't know if you know me very well who has What's a little bit of stuff to work on? When we have that kind of quiet moment of silence in the beginning of church, when we're supposed to have his personal time with God and confess our sins. The one thing I have not done in all my years here at this church is kind of look around at all of you saying.
Slackers. It's really wasted as if I have nothing to confess to God. I'm never like looking up at Heaven saying, nailed it. Yeah, we got it. Last seven days were perfect. I mean, I can be proud and I can be boastful, and I can be Thoughtless, and I can be impatience, and I can be arrogant. And I can think too much of myself and too little of people thousand things in my life, that I still need to work on to love my neighbor as myself and love God, with my whole heart and soul.
I mean, the light of that, there's so much that I need to work on. Why would I, why would I be critiquing? Your spiritual yard when there's a thousand weeds growing in my own? Who am I to judge? And, No offense, who are you to judge? I may not know you and your lifestyle perfectly, but I can say this pretty confidently that you got stuff to work on. Patience, compassion. Forgiveness, self-control alcohol. Were, you know, whatever it is. I don't know what it is. But I know it's something. And so if that's true that you have more than enough stuff to keep you busy. And I have more than a stuff to keep me busy. Why would any of us look at another human being and and judge them? Tell them to change or to repent or you're in trouble, you need to work on things. When there's so much if we stand in front of the mirror that we need to work on first.
I think people in modern culture of kind of picked up on that a bit. And maybe that's why one of the most quoted passages of modern times is what Jesus said. In Matthew chapter 7 of you heard these words. He said, do not. Judge. Just don't do it. You got enough to work on, bro. So let's just worry about you for a little bit and stop pointing fingers. And typing in the comment section. Do not judge.
Amen. Grab some coffee on the way out. It's right that I mean, it seems like such a simple obvious thing. We're all sinners who have so far to go, but for the past few weeks. We've been trying to take these trending statements in American culture and just think about them at a little bit more deeper level. Is that true? Is that you think would make life better? If I didn't judge you and you didn't judge me and none of us, judge, anyone else. Would that create a better culture, a better world?
Let me give you some examples. Imagine if every mom and every dad would only focus on their own behavior.
And never judge their own children.
Moms, dads, what you think about that. Your little Billy smacking, Little Johnny in the face. And Mom says, the Dad, should we judge him? And dad says, who are we? To judge, literally half the siblings in the world would be dead if the parents didn't step in and say, no, stop it. If you want judge between our yeah, we know that parents need to educate. Imagine if like, someone is trying to rob you and you ran past a policeman sitting there with the weapons to defend you and you said he's trying to rob me and the cop said, who am I to judge?
Like no, no, no. You want the people in authority to say some things are good. Some things are bad. Some things are right. Some things are wrong. And even though we're very imperfect people. We need to step up and we need to judge. I mean, imagine if you went to a church and like my job was never to say anything direct to you and you were not allowed to say anything critical of me.
Some of, you know, we have heartbreaking documentaries of things that people like me were doing stealing money and hurting children. Imagine. If no one cared about that, or said anything about that or directly judge that.
Doesn't work. So it sounds kind of nice when you say it's we're all humans were all sinners. Do not judge right? Just like Jesus said, but when you think it through a little bit more deeply it just doesn't work. It doesn't work. In culture, doesn't work in the church. It doesn't work in families or marriages. So what are we supposed to do with this whole thing of judgment? That's what I want to tackle with you today, and I want to start just basic level defining what the word judge means. So if you're at home taking notes, or you have a Bullet in Your Hands, write this down the word judge literally. According to the dictionary, it means: “To form an opinion about something. “
So, if you have an opinion. You are a judgmental person. If you think that preschool teachers are saints. And that people who assault other humans are sinners. You are being judgmental. And I applaud you for it. In fact, this not on me every time you pick an emoji. You are being judgey.
Thumbs up, is your opinion about something comes down. That's also an opinion. The smiley bright yellow face. That's a judgment. The scowling angry red face. That is also a judgment. You can't get around it. Every time you say, good, bad, right? Wrong. Love it, hate it. Keep doing that. Stop doing that. You are. There's no way for any human being not to be judgmental all of the time. I said do not judge. Might sound like, oh, yeah, you shouldn't do that, but you can't get away from it happened to me. My daughter the other day. I was talking my youngest daughter into bed, and I just had something going. Well. Your room is really messy today, and she said Dad. This is a judgment free zone. Twitch. I said to her. Then why are you judging me? She said, I'm not judging you. Well, you're saying that my comments that your room is bad is bad. So you have an opinion about my comment that makes you judgmental and she said, stop it. I said you're doing it again. You're being judgmental. There's no way around it. If I say that your lifestyle is sinful. I am being judgmental. And if you say to me, you shouldn't say that you are also being judged. But there's no way to not have an opinion about all of the things. And so, when people use this phrase, their kind of dodging, the real question, Because we all have opinions. We all think that some things are good. That some things are bad that some people should keep going and other people should change. The question is, how do we do this the way that Jesus wants?
Because you have enough experience with life to realize that judgment can go very, very, very wrong. Right, if we don't judge enough, if we turned a blind eye, or if we sweep things under the rug. That's not good. But if we judge with no terms or conditions and everyone's just accusing and criticizing and telling everyone else to change. Well, that's not good.
If you grew up in a home, where your dad was, always, always saying what you did wrong, and he was never owning the stuff that he did wrong. Well, that's not good. If you grew up around people who say they loved you, but they never had the courage to confront you and let you go down a dangerous path. Well, that's not good. If you come to church and all I'm doing is like pound in this pulpit and blasting those sinners out there. Well, that's one way to judge, but
Exactly sound like the good news that the Bible is full of. And so there's all these, there's all these exit ramps off the highway of judgment that lead to very dark, very destructive places.
Which is why today I want to help you.
Actually had a chance to study in the Bible. The words judge judged judging judgment, judgmental, they show up a total of 366 times. So there's one judgment for everyday of your next leap year. In fact, there's a whole book of the Bible called. Judges, yeah. Alright. So the Bible has a lot to say about this and what it says is so helpful in doing this. The right way. I think a good summary is what Jesus said in John chapter 7. Have you heard these words?
Jesus, once said his followers, stop judging by mere appearances. But instead judge, correctly.
This is a bad way to judge. Jesus says stop that. And his answer isn't. Well, then don't judge, his answer is but here's what I want for you to do: judge correctly, make distinctions, form opinions in a way. That is good in the eyes of God. I so I'm gonna give you a crash course on what the Bible teaches about judgment. There's four parts to it. And I'm gonna give you the four parts right up front. So write these down. And according to the Bible, these 366 passages the right way to judge, judging Jesus. Way starts with God.
Then you. Then us. And finally, Grace. God. You us, Grace. God. You us Grace. That's how you judge correctly According To Jesus.
So part one God. What does that mean? Here's what it means. You can write this down. God means to judge by God's opinion. Instead of a human opinion.
If you're going to say to someone, the way you're living is beautiful, or the way you're living is sinful. Just make sure that your opinion comes out of God's heart, and I just your own heart. If you know much about the life of Jesus, this is what the religious leaders of Jesus day. Got wrong all the time. Right? The Pharisees that was a primary group. They were often very fair as c.e.o. Towards Jesus. There's this one time where they watch Jesus friends and they're not, apparently following the right tradition and the right way to wash your hands and they go off on Jesus. Why don't your followers? Follow the traditions, the rules the way that we do things, they're bad.
You're bad. And here's why I said that Matthew chapter 15. Jesus said, they worship me in vain. Their teachings are merely human rules. Like, well, why are you getting this all bad? Because you're not following God's rules. You're following human. Rules. Well, where in the Bible, does it say, you have to wash your hands a particular way. It doesn't. So stop judging like that. You Pharisees yell at me because I heal someone on a Saturday where the Bible does it say, you can't love someone on a Saturday.
It doesn't you're getting your judgment all wrong because it's coming out of tradition and custom and human opinion. And not from the book that God gave us. So what does it mean to start with God, it basically means to make sure you have one of these in your hands or on your lips. Not just well, this is the way my culture does it, or this is what I really feel about it. It's really really important. If you're going to judge someone to open up the book and let God speak.
So if God says it hold on to a judge according to it, and if God doesn't say it will then hold that human opinion in a very loose and open hand. I gotta play this in all sorts of ways. But let me let me Focus. My application on this part 2 right here in church.
I've ever met someone who has an opinion about what makes a good church.
And is their opinion about what makes a good church, a good church or bad Church. A bad Church based on that book? Or just on their own heart. How about this? Some people think that when you come to church to worship Jesus, you should dress up.
If Jesus is the King of Kings and the Lord, if you had a chance to meet the president, would you wear sweatpants? Right, if you're going to a family wedding, you rock the sandals, the flip-flop like know you would dress up and if we're here to worship the King of Kings and the Lord of lords, you should dress up to and other people would say, well no because you don't have to impress. God you can wear whatever you can wear sweatpants. God doesn't care. He's a good Father who loves and based on like the kind of fabric, that's covering your legs. So dress up, not dress up. What's the right thing?
And God says, I don't care.
There's no passage about denim, belts, suits, sweats. I looked at the Hebrew and the Greek. There's nothing got God, says nothing of. He says, doesn't take. I think he means wear pants like I'm gonna make sure you're properly dressed. But how you dress? He simply doesn't care, but you know, what? He does care about. The heart that's beneath your shirt. Right, if you're rocking stretchy pants, but your heart is sincerely here to follow God.
And if you're the best dressed in the place, but you're looking around judging people, instead of thinking about Jesus.
Let's not get distracted on the things that God says nothing about its let's focus our attention on the things that God says a lot about. Or how about the size of a church? Some people think that really big mega churches are too big. You’re just a stadium full of people Pastor, doesn't mean that that's bad and other people say they're really, really small churches are too small, you know, everyone knows everyone else's business. That's bad. You know what the Bible says about the size of a good church?
Nothing.
God doesn't say. Oh, I know you're in the too small zone and this is the too big zones. Here's the Goldilocks zone for God. He doesn't care if there's five of you or 5,000 of you. What does He care about? The way the people who join a church treat, one another Right, are we closed with compassion and kindness and hospitality and forgiveness? It doesn't matter the number. It matters. The character don't get distracted. By the things that God has a speak about focus on the things that he does or to make it more personal. Some of you I've heard this, some of you think that I should preach longer when I'm in church.
You drive a long way to hear the word of God. You don't want to short. You think I should preach longer and others of you. Agree.
But I'm not kidding about this one. Humans tend to Value their own opinions too much. Let's make sure we're going to judge that we start with God.
Which brings us to part 2? You. What does that mean? I'll write this down according to Jesus in the Bible. This means that you should judge yourself first.
Sexy, the context of that famous passage. Do not judge. If you would keep reading. You would find out that Jesus is saying, don't don't go off judging them before you start with you. Prove it, same chapter Matthew chapter 7. Jesus said this in his conclusion first, take the plank out of your own eye like this big sin that's in your head. First. Take the plank out of your own eye and then You will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.
According to Jesus, should you be picking specs out of your brother's eye. Yes. You just don't do it first. First you he says and then them. Jesus saying don't do eyes delicate. Eye surgery. If you're not wearing your contacts. Right. First think about yourself, apply this book and then you can apply it to them. In other words, if part one is making sure that this book is open. Then part 2 means I should just hand you the book. Instead. I'm going to open it to the right page. I'm going to take its words, the heart. I'm going to confess what I need to confess change, what? I need to change, repentance, what I need to repent of, and then once I've done that, then I have the right to show you the same book. That's consistent. That's Biblical, that's judging in Jesus' way. And man, is it so powerful when we do that? Have you ever been but just an argument with your mom or your dad or your boyfriend or your wife? And after the argument, they come to, you know, things were said, since have happened and they come to you in the first thing they want to do is apologize.
Okay, and I know things got heated. I've been praying. And what I, when I said this, was not loving.
And I just jumped on this, but that was not kind and I just need to ask for your forgiveness. I've already asked it of God because I sinned against you.
What happens? 99% of the time when people start with themselves?
Forgiveness. Reconciliation unit. It is so hard to hate. Someone. Who is that? Humble? Jesus knows. When we start with ourselves like things, get better, people get closer. But do you know what happens when people don't do that? It's like a round two. Oh, yeah, there's this one other thing. I didn't say and you shouldn't have said that to me. You should be doing this. It.
What happens when people do that?
So, here's a big question for you. I want you to think about the kind of voices that shape you during the week.
Friends, you hang out with podcast, you listen to the radio stations, the cable news. Just think what those voices are.
And then ask yourself the question. Do they do what Jesus said?
When that cable news show comes on whatever side of the aisle its on are the first 10 minutes. Honest confession about what we Republicans or we Democrats have done wrong. And you wonder why the country is like this. Right? When your friends get together and you talk about marriage or relationships, your family, or your parents is the part one of that conversation. Like, here's, here's what I really need to own that. I didn't do Jesus way.
I think so much of the disunity in the world today is because we're skipping this part. There are valid things to critique and judge but we jump right to it. As if we've never done anything wrong and Jesus knows anything is going to happen. If you give a two-by-four sticking out of your face and you're trying to pick out the speck. People get hurt. So, start with God. And then take a long, long, long time to stand in front of a mirror and think about you.
I love the story of GK Chesterton. I've heard it but 100 years ago, when the world wars are blowing up. The world a newspaper asked its readers. What's wrong? What's wrong with the world? People are at each other's throats. People are dropping bombs and GK Chesterton. This famous Christian writer. He responded with a brilliant answer. That only took him eight words. What's wrong? His answer. Dear sirs.
I am.
Sincerely, yours. GK. Chesterton.
What's the biggest problem this Christian said? Is me.
And if you take that to heart, you will be judgmental in just the right way. Start with God, moved yourself. Which brings us to part three? Us. What is this mean? It means that according to the Bible, Christians are supposed to judge fellow Christians.
So we might not agree with the way people live out in the world. People over their neighbors, family members, government's right. That there's a right and wrong that they're committing. The, that's not our Focus. That's not really our business. Instead. We turn inwards and we think about us, There's a passage to prove it first Corinthians chapter 5. The Apostle Paul is writing to the Corinthians whose culture was all jacked up. And he said, what business is it of mine to judge those outside the church.
Are you not to judge those inside? God, will judge those outside. Here's what you should do. Expel the wicked person from among you.
It kind of makes sense. Doesn't it? If someone doesn't claim to be a follower of Jesus. Should you be shocked when they're not following Jesus? All these pop stars writing songs about whatever, they don't claim to be followers of Jesus. Why wouldn't the day? The culture doesn't share our values. Of course. It doesn't, it doesn't value the blood of Jesus Christ. Like let's not be shocked or surprised or gone. Another rant about those people. Instead. The Bible says, let's turn our attention to people who say that. They love God. Who claimed to be representatives of the name of Jesus Christ. Let's focus. Their, let's focus on us.
Jesus himself actually modeled this. And I'll be impressed and if you history Buffs know, who the Roman Emperor was when Jesus was preaching and teaching.
His name was Tiberias. He was a classic Roman who worshiped many, many, many different Roman gods and he wasn't just like way, way far away over in Rome. And Jesus is here in Israel. When Jesus was doing his ministry on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. Do you know the biggest city just to the south of him was named? Tiberius. In fact, the whole Sea of Galilee had a nickname that you can find in the Bible. It was also called The Sea of Tiberius. But despite the name of the Sea and the name of the city. Do you know, the one guy that Jesus never went off on in his preaching?
Tiberius. Not because Jesus agreed with him.
Instead what do we find time and time and time and time again in the teaching of Jesus? The church, the temple. The religious leaders, his own followers. You would think Jesus would have had more material for a guy who's worshipping, many pagan gods, breaking the first commandment every morning, noon and night, but instead of focusing on that Jesus focused on his friends on his church, and those who claim to follow the god of Israel.
And it's really important to me and YouTube.
Jesus wants our time to be focused on us. If you see someone here, who claims to follow Jesus and doing something great judge them. That's great. Share your Biblical opinion that what they're doing is good and godly and if they're not if they're drifting and if they're sinning and they're not taking that seriously. Judge them. Tell them know if you're going to be a follower of Jesus. You kind of got to follow Jesus.
It's going to call him your king and your savior. You you can't live however you want. So whether it's good or it's bad weather, we're applauding or critiquing. What Jesus wants us to do is have the kind of church where we judge each other often.
Did one of our pastors tell you that your new member meeting? Welcome to a judgment filled Zone. And I know that sounds kind of threatening, but it's actually, it's beautiful. When you think of it.
It means that whenever we see sin here, but we're not going to pounce on it. Right? We give people space to repent and confess, but sin is festering like a cancer. We believe it is our job to judge it. If someone who calls themselves a Christian is hurting you with their words or actions, we believe it's our job to defend you.
If we see you walking away from Jesus, may be about to lose the most precious thing in the world. Your soul. We think it's our job to love you and to say something.
And you're trying as hard as you can and you're seeing good changes in your life. We think it is our job to say, Amen. Well, Don. Keep at it. That is a judgment filled church, and it's exactly what all of us need.
So, I want to challenge you in the next month to judge a fellow Christian.
Grab your Bible, open it up. If you see a woman respecting, her husband with her tone, with her words, pull her aside and say that it was so biblical and so beautiful. Well done.
That's judging. If you see a guy who puts away his phone, so he can be a glimpse of God, the Father to his little kid. If you see a man, taking a kid, change a diaper. Run around in the baseball field, like investing his full attention. Say that is that, it's just like God. And if you have to correct someone from a distance, you just see like they're taking sin lightly and yet you have to with humility and respect. Say I struggle with this too. But what you're doing is not okay.
That's why God gave us the book. The answer is not to send me an email and say Pastor get them. You're gonna judge him. I don't want to now when you do life with people close together. And if and when our church gets bigger and bigger, I can't do this. We need you to do. You see people's good works and sins up close. So I have the courage to do what God calls you to do rebuke. Correct. Forgive with an open Bible.
Let's judge. Just like Jesus wants.
You, I should say, God, you us, which brings us to our last point. It's called Grace.
I've saved the best for last. Here's what that means. It means in the Bible, God's judgment is always pointing towards Grace.
The end goal and the hope of God's judgment and our own. Is Grace the opinion that we want to share before? We say. Amen, is word of Grace? Whether we're encouraging you or confronting you, our hope is always to get back to the undeserved, love that we call Grace.
A couple of dozen of you in church that I have been in a life group with me. And if you've sat around that table with an Open Bible, you know that I love love, love to be judgmental. What happens? Someone because we try to create a culture of honesty and confessions. Someone will say something very vulnerable and very transparent. They messed something up and it's difficult to say.
And there's those moments of, I've had hundreds of them where it gets really quiet in the room. And we're trying to think of what to say to someone's really honest confession. And you know what? I say, right? I say, hey. You know that God loves you, right?
#YouGotJudged
Here is what God says. He has an opinion about those who honestly confess their sins in his opinion is love. He has something to say with all authority to people who come to him in Repentance and what he says is forgiveness.
Like it might be a train wreck. Your life, might be a mess, your sin might be embarrassing. But when you come to God, the opinion that you and I get to share is the same opinion that God shares with us in his word. Grace, love, forgiveness, salvation. What we have in Christianity is something the world does not have. I mean, if you confess your mess out there, what would they tell you? Try harder. I still like you. What do we get to say as Christians? You know that God loves you, right? You know that Jesus died for that one too, right? You know that as far as the East is from the West so far, has God removed that from you, right? You know, The God, who loved you yesterday? Before you did this in is the same God who loves you today, right? You might call that preaching, you might call that teaching what the Bible calls, it is Grace. And friends, this is exactly what Jesus lived and died and rose to give you 2000 years ago. On that cross. Jesus was judged. So that your judgment would be different. On that cross. Jesus was called all kinds of ugly names so that God could look at every Christian and call them beautiful names. On the cross. Jesus was accused of a thousand things. He did not do. So that our heavenly father would not accuse you of 1000 things, you did. On the cross. Jesus was treated like a sinner. So that now God could judge every Christian as a saint and across that the skies grew dark and God turned his face away. So that now if you are a Christian, the Skies part in God's face is beaming on you shining upon you with love and affection, everyone ignored and insulted Jesus on the cross, but because of Jesus, God does not ignore you and he does not insult you instead. He smiles and says, yes.
I have an opinion about you. I like you. I love you. You, you're my kid. My son, my daughter, my friend, my treasure, my people. My precious one Grace makes judgment. So, so, so great. And that is why I cannot wait for the Judgment Day.
You ever hear people freaking out about the end times?
I am freaking out. The Judgement Day. Jesus returns to judge the living and the dead. And I'm thinking, yes, he's coming back. And he has an opinion about me. And about everyone, who believes in his opinion, is so good. No one has ever liked you. As much as Jesus likes you. No one has ever cared as much about you as he cares about you, you can't see it yet, but on the Judgment that you will. Jesus himself, put it in the Gospel of Luke. He said this at that time. They will see the son of man. That's Jesus coming in a cloud with power and great Glory when these things begin to take place. Here's what you do. Stand up, lift up your heads. Because your Redemption is Drawing Near. The run and hide from the Judgment don't cower and bury your face in your hands. You stand up. You lift up your head. You get as close as you can to the one who's about to judge you. Because he has an opinion about you and that opinion is love.
God, you us, Grace. God, ,us, Grace. Can you say it with me? God, you us, Grace one more time. God, you, us, Grace. That's how you judge, right? It's how you judge, Jesus' way. That's how you judge beautifully. That's right.
Let’s pray.
Oh God.
I can't wait to be judged. This world judges us so poorly, so often. Our own Hearts and Thoughts can condemn us. When we're not condemned. You are the only one who judges correctly constantly. And so I can't wait for you to come. You're going to make all things right. You're going to come with Justice and evil will not Prevail, but those who come to you humbly will. Father, we live in a confused culture. No one wants to be judged, but we know we need judgment.
People are constantly pointing fingers, but they have an allergic reaction when the finger is pointed at them. We really need you to make this, right? And we want you to start right here. God give us the humility to trust your word and open this book. Give us even more humility to take its words seriously and personally. Creighton us, the gift of repentance that we would feel sorrow over our sin, more sorrow for that. Then the frustration we have with other people's sins. God, give us courage and lips to speak words. When we see things good and bad happening in our church.
I got never never, never let us end with the law. But instead with the gospel of your Amazing, Grace. Church is a beautiful place not because it's easy or comfortable. But because Grace always gets the final word. So God fill us with joy and give us peace as we think about your judgement of us and help us to rightly, as Jesus says, biblically judge one, another. We probably things to you God because we need you and we know that you're going to answer is beautifully because we have Jesus is in his name that we pray and all God's people said, Amen.
