Pastor Pat McFall
June 12, 2016 - W1624

You know, when it comes to issues of life, I think we can all agree that life matters and we value life at a high level. But we sometimes question how valuable a life is.

Recently a small boy had fallen into the gorilla exhibit. Now in order to protect the little boy's life, the zookeepers shot the gorilla, killing it. Was the boy's life more important than that gorilla's life?  Some thought that they shouldn't have killed that gorilla. What is this telling us?  It's telling us that when it comes to life, this stuff really matters to us.  And we don't always have the right answer for every situation. 

What we do know is that as people of faith, our story of the beginning of life must be held at such a high value that it changes the way that we engage in dialogue, and it changes the way that we live it out. We don't start the conversation of life from a secular world view apart from God.  People of faith that believe in the God who created the universe, Jesus, the son of God who was sent to take our sins, stepped into human history. 

As I speak to day, I do not to make assumptions about your story that I probably know nothing about; what I want us to do is anchor into a value of life rooted in scripture that changes everything about how we engage. We have to move from a place where we are anchored in a moral position of truth so that that position of truth challenges us towards moral participation. We don't have the luxury of simply believing something and not allowing it to affect how we live and what we do. Belief affects action. 

That 18-inch journey from your head to your heart can be difficult. Sometimes it's hard to navigate from what we know is true to making it affect how we live, what we believe, what we say, think, and do. But we have to move in a way that will cost us something.

And I think the story that best illustrates this point can be found in the story of the Good Samaritan.

One day an expert of the religious order ?? he was a lawyer ?? came up to Jesus, and he said, "Teacher, what do I need to do to inherit internal life?" And Jesus throws a question back at him, "Well, what does the law say?"  And he says, "Well, love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and then love your neighbor as yourself."  Jesus replies, "Great answer. Do this and you'll live."

But the man wanted to justify his actions. So then he said, 

"Well, then who is my neighbor?" And that's a decent question, actually.  Who is my neighbor?  Is my neighbor the guy that lives across the street from me whose dogs bark at all hours of the night? Or is my neighbor the guy who has like 50 annoyingly loud wind chimes all around his home? 

So he asks, "Who is my neighbor?" Then Jesus tells a story:  There was a man who was traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho, and along that road He gets attacked.  He's left naked dying on the road.  A priest and a Levite simply walk past the man without offering help. But a lowly Samaritan does help the man.

Now, here's the deal. I have a hard time with this story because I always want to be the Samaritan.  Don't you want to be the Samaritan?  But I got to be honest.  Most of the time I'm the Levite or the priest.  I got other stuff to do. I'm rarely ever the Samaritan.

In Luke 10:36-37 it says:

"Now which of these three would you say was a neighbor to the man who was attacked by bandits?" Jesus asked. The man replied, "The one who showed him mercy."  Then Jesus said, "Yes, now go and do the same."

Big Idea: Our Moral Position must challenge us towards Moral Participation.

1.      God often uses the unlikely in order to accomplish the unbelievable.

People paid attention to the story because Jesus chose the lowly and unlikely Samaritan as the hero. Jesus uses unlikely people in order to accomplish unbelievable things.

Have you seen that true in your own life? Have you seen Him use an unlikely partnership in order to bring breakthrough?  Have you seen Him use an unlikely situation in order to help you understand what you were going through?  God will often use the unlikely in order to bring you into the unbelievable life that is His kingdom. 

APPLY: How is my life with Jesus different than my life without Him?

Creation can reflect God's creativity, His personality, His beauty, but only you and I can reflect His very nature and His mission. You won't get salvation from looking at the waterfall, although it is beautiful.  You get salvation when you look at the author of the waterfall. 

And it's that uniqueness breathed into our very DNA. We have a better view of Jesus when we are together rather than when we are apart.

As sin entered the world, brokenness now would plague humanity for generations, but God's plan was redemption through Jesus.

And we exist as a reflection of God's image which carries both transformative love and incredible responsibility. Why?  It's because Jesus didn't just create a product.  He wanted partnership.  He didn't just want to create things.  He wanted interaction and relationship.  He wanted us to value it.  He values life.  That's what creation teaches us, particularly human life.

And as a people of God, we have to value life in the same way that Jesus valued life, that we would hold it at such a high value, that we would allow it to inconvenience us.

He uses the unlikely like you and me to protect life, to sustain it, to release it. When we love God with everything we have, we are releasing life, and when we love others, we're doing the same. 

But we have to take that knowledge and that strong sense of understanding from the Biblical value of life, and we have to allow it to move us towards participation and a solution. We don't have the luxury of conveniently standing in truth without letting us affect how we live. 

There were three men in the story of the Good Samaritan. Two of them appealed to the right answer in their head, but only one appealed to the correct answer in his heart. 

Two men had a right answer. One man had the right practice.  It's why at this moment we can't politicize this issue.  It's why at this moment as a distinct people of God, rooted in Biblical truth, that we have to value life so much higher than we're often comfortable with.  And it's challenging because it will test us at the very core of who we are. That's why we can't spend time posturing.

2.      We have to move from political posturing or positioning to passionate participation.

APPLY: What will participation cost me? (Time, money, presence, prayer, etc.)

We have to participate in God's plan for life and restoration. We cannot criticize a brokenness that we might see as in abortion and reserve the right to stay far from engaging in a solution.  We can't just post on Facebook and think that this will solve the issue.  We have to ask God:  How, then, do I reconcile in my own conscience and in the way I live out my faith and my life?  And that's why these hot topics are so important because they will test us, and it's good that they do.

It's interesting that on the verge of huge Biblical breakthroughs, often there was a massive attack on the lives of the innocent. During Moses’ and Jesus’ times, there was massive infanticide.

I wonder if we as a nation are not on the verge of what could be an incredible breakthrough in our country spiritually, morally. I wonder if we're not on the verge of some type of revival, if we would just but pray and humble ourselves as the lives of more than 50 million innocents have been taken by now.

I was working in Tacoma with a nonprofit that helped kids in poverty get education and help them get into college. A lot of them would be the first in their family ever to go to college or some kind of an educational institution after high school.  And when we were working in that area of poverty, what we had to recognize is that most of our students were very well aware of the services offered by Planned Parenthood.  What we were able to do was through relationship ?? because we couldn't openly proselytize.  This wasn't a faith?based organization.  So we partnered with an organization that went in and came and counseled young women. They would show them a sonogram, the signs of life.  They were able to tell a different story about what the options were.  Even if a girl came in having already had an abortion or two, they offered her counseling, and they walked them through the process of healing. 

There was some criticism of a friend of mine as one of his donors asked, “How come so many of your kids are still getting pregnant?” He was working primarily with high schoolers and young adults.  And my friend had to admit that was true but added that those same girls are now not aborting them.

Can we put ourselves there? Because the minute we start asking questions like, “Why don't they just do it this way?” or “Why don't they just act this way?” we begin to put ourselves as the moral template by which people should act.  There are a thousand stories that I know nothing about, but would I stand as Jesus stood with me in a broken situation and watch Him redeem it? 

I think if we could do that, I think we'll see more life being released than broken. But participation costs, and the question is what will participation cost me?  Well, in the story of the Good Samaritan, it cost him time, money, inconvenience, his safety, and not staying pure or undefiled.  It will cost us.

There's more compassion that I must be tapped into. There has to be more willingness for me to step in.  I am faced with the reality as I look at statistics that tell me that for every three churches in America, if one church and one family from that one church would adopt a baby, that would eliminate orphans in the United States of America.  They would all have a home. 

It was in 165 A.D. that there was an epidemic spreading throughout the Roman Empire, and Rome was completely ill?prepared to deal with this. The basic response of the Pagans was to run.  What they didn't know was that many of them had already been exposed, and so by running, they were spreading it all over the country. 

But there was a group of people who, instead of giving in to the hopelessness of the Pagans, said that life matters, and it was Christians, and they stayed.

It was in places like Antioch and Syria where they established food programs and they rescued people out of slavery. It was in places like Alexandria where Christians would do the simplest act of just cleaning the wounds of people suffering with Plague often at great cost to themselves, often giving their own lives. 

At one point the Roman government tried to emulate the system of the Christians, but it failed miserably because the Christians weren't moved by duty. They were moved by devotion because they had encountered love from the God that gave His life for them, so they were willing to give their lives for someone else. 

This is our spiritual legacy. This is the cloth from which we were cut.  You could be heard in the streets, documented for all of history to read.  Look at how they love each other.  Let it be said of the church today.  Yes, look at how the church loves each other.  Let it be said of New Hope today, look how New Hope loves each other.  Look how they reach out.  Look how they care for their community.  Look at how they love at great cost to themselves, at great cost to their convenience, to their individual rights.  Look how they lay it down, and look how they stand shoulder to shoulder with the broken and hurting.  And look how God is healing people.  Amen?  Let us be a church that is known for how we love one another.

Questions:

1. Why is the 18 inch journey hard to travel?

2. How does Jesus describe who is your neighbor?

3. How is my life with Jesus different than my life without Him?

4. What will participation cost me?

5. Why should we try to be like the Good Samaritan?