What's Love Got To Do With It // Jamie House
Mark chapter number 12 verse 28 through 31. One of the teachers of the law came and heard them debating, noticed that Jesus had given them a good answer. He asked him, of all the commandments, which is the most important? Verse 29, the most important one answered Jesus is this, hear oh Israel, the lord our god. Amen.
Speaker 1:The lord is one. Verse 30, he says, love the lord your god with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength. Verse 31, he says, the second is this, love your neighbor as yourself. There is no commandment greater than these. There was a question that was made famous in 1984, the song was released and it asked the question, what's love got to do with it?
Speaker 1:Look at your person that's next to you and ask them, what's love? Got to do with it. Now, look at the other person on the other side and answer it and tell them love starts here. You may be seated in the presence the lord. What's love got to do with it?
Speaker 1:I want to take a moment to acknowledge the deep pain and loss that has been felt by so many people due to the recent tragic plane crash that happened in our country. Our hearts are heavy. We are grieving alongside the families and the loved ones of those that are affected by this tragedy. We pray for their comfort and their strength and their peace in this unimaginable situation. Yeah.
Speaker 1:We do not ascribe to the idea that this was some type of prophetic sign from god. The god that we serve is a god of love. Right. Who said, I wish that no one. No one.
Speaker 1:Perish. Brothers and sisters, as I begin to think about the tragic events that we have seen this week and begin to reflect on this message, I couldn't help but to think the many times that we have been so fortunate to board an airplane, to travel on an airplane. That our heart has to go out to those whose hearts are heavy this morning. I begin to reflect on those things and the the uncomfortable moments of sitting on a plane and for me, the most uncomfortable part is not the takeoff and it's not the turbulence but it is when the flight attendant steps up and starts going through the safety instructions. Now, most of us don't even pay attention to what they're saying.
Speaker 1:We're trying to get settled and trying to make sure we're comfortable but one day, it caught my attention what they were saying. They said, in the event of a loss of cabin pressure, oxygen mask will drop down and if you are traveling with the child, secure your own mask first before assisting them. When I thought about it, I said, well, wait a minute, hold on because when you think about that, those instructions seem kind of odd and quite honestly, they can seem to be quite selfish and it appeared that it could be self centered to leave a child without oxygen while you hook yourself up first. Because on the surface, it sounds wrong. It sounds low key selfish.
Speaker 1:It seems like the first thing that you would do is secure the child. It seems that you would first make sure that they get some oxygen. The infant or the small child who is not as strong and lungs are not as developed but smaller than yours but know the airline knows something that we need to know. That we need to apply in every area of our lives. Yes.
Speaker 1:Yes. But when you properly understand what is being said, there is a major principle and premise and thought of life that is theologically wrapped in those instructions. That you have to put the mask on yourself first because you cannot take care of another person if you don't first take care of yourself. You have to put yourself in order first in order to be good for somebody else. In other words, you can't help somebody else if you're not breathing yourself.
Speaker 1:You can't pour love out when your own heart is empty. You you you can't lift somebody else up when you are suffocating under of your own wounds. This is exactly what Jesus was talking about in this text this morning because he is having a discussion. He's having a dialogue. He's having a discourse with one of the Jewish scribes, the temple.
Speaker 1:Jesus has been going back and forth with these religious leaders and they they aren't innocent conversations but they are hostile interrogations. Jesus prior to this had had three different encounters, rigorous conversations with some of the leaders of the temple who had ought with him because of his refusal to conform to some of the rules that had been set. Because people who don't like change always seek to destroy the change that makes them uncomfortable. And so they spend all of their time in an attempt trying to trap him and trying to twist his word and trying to discredit his ministry. In the midst of all of this dysfunction, there is one scholar who sees that Jesus has answered every question that they have asked him, that he has answered the questions ments, which is the most important?
Speaker 1:Jesus does not hesitate but he gives an answer that isn't just theologically rich but it is life changing for those that can hear it. He says, first, love the lord your god with all your heart, your soul, your mind, and your strength. Secondly, love your neighbor as yourself. The implication is very powerful here brothers and sisters because what it means is to be authentically Christian means that I have to know how to love me before I can know how to love you. And then I I know this line of thinking is is hard for us to wrap our heads around because it sounds a little bit different than what we have taught and what we teach because we have learned that you have to when you put yourself first, it's being selfish and more often than not, it absolutely is but please understand me here.
Speaker 1:If you are going to walk in love, if you are going to walk in god honoring relationships and with Christians and have functional relationships with anybody, you have got to put yourself first to love you before you can love anybody else. Notice something family, Jesus to love yourself if you are going to love somebody else because the way that you love yourself is a direct reflection on how you love other people. And what this means is that sometimes when we struggle with loving others, the real issue might not be with them but the real issue might be with us. That I have to love myself first in order for me to love you best. That I gotta love know how to love me in order to for me to love you.
Speaker 1:Now, some people's religious minds are still thinking, pastor, wait a minute because I believe that we are supposed to put others before ourselves. Yes, but not at the expense of your own well-being because a loving others without loving yourself leads to resentment and burnout and broken relationships. Let me put it another way. Behavior that diminishes my worth and if I don't take care of myself, I will keep bleeding on people who did not cut me because the way I treat you is a dead giveaway on how I feel about myself. Oh, y'all going to get with me in a second because if I constantly gossip about people, that means I really don't like myself.
Speaker 1:If I'm always jealous of other people, that means I don't value my own lane. If I'm always critical and negative, it's because I don't have no peace in my own soul. If I'm always finding a reason to be nasty and mean and condes condescending and skeptical and cynical and judgmental or just plain hateful towards other people. It says something about how I feel about me. And church, this is a major word because we need to preach this in the body of Christ because we know more about how to hurt each other than how to love one another.
Speaker 1:We hurt one another when we gossip and spread rumors about one another. We hurt each other when we fail to forgive one another. We hurt one another when we don't do the work to make peace with one another. We hurt one another when we seek to divide one another instead of coming to one another with the fault or a mistake seeking help to help the person so they don't make the mistake again. We'd rather destroy them and then laugh about it on the back end.
Speaker 1:We need to understand how to love ourselves. And this is the reason why the enemy wants to keep us bound in dysfunction. He doesn't just want to stop us from loving god but what he wants to do is stop us from loving ourselves because he understands that broke people break people. Imma say that again. Broken people will break other people.
Speaker 1:If I have brokenness on the inside of me, I'm a automatically want to break you down. Oh, come on. But I came to serve the devil notice this morning and I'm declaring over everybody that will listen and receive it. You going to love you the way god wants you to love you. You going to love yourself the way that god wants you to love yourself.
Speaker 1:I dare somebody to declare it. I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. Yeah, you gotta do it better than that. Say, I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. I often come in contact with people.
Speaker 1:Yes, sir. And I'm sure you probably do as well who are not a part of any church. Frankly, they don't want anything to do with church. All because of what they claim as those religious hypocrites. In other words, they have experienced great pain and they blame the church because they say the church or institution has hurt me.
Speaker 1:But I submit to you, it is not possible for an institution to hurt you. Institutions are made up of people. People hurt people. It's not the institution that has hurt you. It was somebody in the institution that hurts you.
Speaker 1:However, I find it very interesting that many people get hurt by the people on your job. But they never stop going to work. People have lost money in the mall but they don't stop going to the mall. Right. In fact, the last time you went, you left there broke and saying, I shouldn't have spent what I spent.
Speaker 1:One of the reasons the enemy tries to keep church from turning into a community is because he knows that if two or three gathered in the name of Jesus Christ, they get together, they can establish anything. Can you imagine what would happen if 15 or 50 or 500 people touch and agreed on a thing? What would happen if people start touching and agreeing on something, cancer would have to straighten up. Demons would have to take flight. Depression would have to flee.
Speaker 1:The spirit of god would have its way in our midst. Issues would be resolved and hope would be strengthened. Hear me and this is the reason why the enemy spends all of his time trying to get the church from becoming a community, a body of oneness, and to keep us locked in dysfunction. By instigating power struggles, opinions, clicks, division, Imma preach it anyway. Lying and nitpicking, dissension because he knows that if the people of god ever figure out the power of love, what does love have to do with it?
Speaker 1:If we ever figure out that harmony and forgiveness and unity has everything to do with it. The glory of god would fall in our midst and that will be the beginning of revival. The Holy Spirit would rain down with power and anointing on the church. And the enemy would not be able to stand against the church. John thirteen and thirty four says, you got to love your neighbor like you love yourself.
Speaker 1:Can I tell you, you do not love yourself just because you know how to dress yourself up? Alright. Because sometimes dressing yourself up is not because you love or like yourself. Sometimes dressing yourself up, you don't really love you but you trying to feel better about yourself to see who you can get to respond, give you likes, and give you heart, changing everything about you every single week. Gotta change your hair color.
Speaker 1:Gotta change your eye. This week, you're on the California diet. Next week, you're on the grape seed diet because you are trying to feel better about yourself but when you love yourself, you can have natural hair, no makeup, and still like who you are. I know who I am. Somebody declare it.
Speaker 1:I know who I am. Oh, you don't you ain't convinced me. Say it again. I know who I am. Watch it.
Speaker 1:If we were to look at the way we treat each other. If how we treat each other is a dead giveaway for how I love me, then we would have to conclude deaconess that for some of us, there is a little bit of self hatred masquerading as self confidence. That just because I look like I love myself. It's the way that I treat you that really is an indication. Of how I feel about me.
Speaker 1:So what does it take to love myself? The first thing that the text teaches us is that you've got to treasure relationship more than religion. Now, watch this because the the the there is a warning that is given in the text because religion without relationship is dangerous. Verse 28 says, if this guy comes to Jesus and says, now Jesus, which of all the commandments is the most important? You have to understand the gravity and the gist of what he is asking here because he is asking a question based upon the 613 commandments that are in their system.
Speaker 1:Now, if you've ever gone to Sunday school or you studied your Bible, you should be asking yourself the question, where did 613 commandments come from? Because I only thought there were 10 commandments. There are only 10 commandments. However, 603 of the commandments were not from god. But they were from the Jewish leaders who had an opinion on how Jewish religion ought to be run.
Speaker 1:Right. In other words, they had their likes and their dislikes about what should and should not be allowed. And they treated their opinion as if it were god's opinion on how the religion should be run. Hear me one of the worst things that can happen in a church is when we seek to impose our opinion based on what we like and our preferences and what makes us comfortable and then turn around and act like this is what god has said. This is the type of church we have here.
Speaker 1:We don't we don't do that around here. But where do you find that in the Bible? Yeah. The Bible says, if you are saved, then you're supposed to wear this to church. Where do you find that in the Bible?
Speaker 1:It is a dangerous thing when your rules become so important Your rules are more important than extending love and grace to people who don't have a relationship with god yet. Just because they come in and don't look like you and don't talk like you and don't act like you have acted for the last forty years. You cannot just be so caught up in your rules. The scribes were so caught up on the rules which made up their religion that they had fallen short on how to have a relationship. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Jesus said, love the lord your god with all your heart. Your soul, your mind, your strength, and your neighbor as yourself. In other words, you can't divorce one from the other. In other words, you can't be religious but not know how to love other people. One validates the other.
Speaker 1:Right. And Jesus shows up and he basically says, listen, you guys are making this way too complicated. You you you're doing too much. Because at the end of the day, god is not impressed with your rules. God is impressed with your relationship.
Speaker 1:That you gotta have the right relationship. You cannot claim to love god but do not know how to properly deal with people. Right. And some of us need to hear this because you can't claim you love god. Yeah.
Speaker 1:But refuse to speak to your brother and sister. You can't worship on Sunday but tear people down on Monday. You cannot pray for revival but be a part of the division. That's right John 13, Jesus says, they will know you are my disciples by your love. And we gotta get this right in the church because the world isn't rejecting Jesus.
Speaker 1:They are rejecting the hypocrisy of people who claim his name but do not carry his heart. I cannot say that I'm a Christian if I don't have the heart of god. And the evidence of how you love god is not how big your Bible is. It's not how loud you speak in tongues. It's not how somebody falls out because you pray over them.
Speaker 1:You know whether or not you love god because you treat people the way god treats people. Matter of fact, I read somewhere in the scripture where it says, how can you claim to love me whom you've never seen? But not love your brother who you see every single day. The evidence that you love god is when you know how to walk right with people. Somebody say, I hear you.
Speaker 1:I hear you. And I and I and I hear I hear the spirit. I hear the spirit. Pastor, there is no way Imma treat them right. You you don't know what they did to me.
Speaker 1:I I'm going to get them because they deserve what they get for what they did to me. And that may be true but can I ask you a question? What if god allowed you to get everything you deserved for everything that you did? Right. How would you feel if god decided to pull the sheets back on some stuff that he covered in your life?
Speaker 1:How would you like if god exposed you and treated you the way you treat other people? Oh, y'all can sit on me if you want to. I'm so glad that there were times that god sent somebody in love that was aware of our mistakes but stood with us and prayed for us and covered us in the time that we needed it most in the time when other people would have destroyed us but god sent somebody. If you're thankful that god sent somebody to cover you when you need it most, throw your hands up and say, lord, I thank you. Lord, I thank you.
Speaker 1:I'm thankful. I'm thankful to god. I, that's why I can't be deep. That's why I can't walk up with my nose tooted up at anybody because I know where god brought me from. I know what god did in my life and when you have a remembrance of what god did in your life, you'll remember when you was out in the world.
Speaker 1:You'll remember what you did and somebody had to pray for you and you'll pray for other people instead of condemning them. There is an old Jewish saying in Proverbs that says, what is hateful you, do not do to your neighbor. If you don't like to be lied on, then don't lie. If you don't want to be talked about, then don't gossip. That's right.
Speaker 1:That's right. If you want to be treated respectfully, then respect other people. If you want other people to speak to you, learn how to speak to other people. Somebody shout love starts here. Number two, you have to speak the truth about yourself even if you know the facts about yourself.
Speaker 1:In other words, we have to understand the reality of fact versus truth. Yes. Now, here's where it gets deep because Jesus says, love your neighbor as yourself. But he does not tell us how to love ourselves. Why?
Speaker 1:Jesus understands that the real battle isn't how to love but the real battle is about what we believe about ourselves. Some of us have spent years defining ourselves by the facts instead of the truth. Yeah. Please understand that sometimes we as believers don't live by the truth. Facts are things that we see.
Speaker 1:Things that we go through. Things that we experience. But we are supposed to live by the truth. The truth is the word. He says thy word is truth.
Speaker 1:Yes. And even though we have learned how to confess truth based on the trust that we have in god and the promises of god, so many times that truth can be different from the facts. As it's implicated in the text here, Jesus infers that you have to love yourself before you can love anybody else. But Jesus never tells the man how to love himself. Because the man never asked.
Speaker 1:So, I decided to ask. Y'all can thank me later. So, here's what I believe that the Holy Spirit is saying. That the facts of your life can become so powerful that you empower them to speak on your behalf about who you are. And you begin to a assign to yourself value based on the facts that you see.
Speaker 1:And then the facts that you see, you give the power to define you which becomes your reality that you operate out of. In other words, you spend all of your time as a result of these facts and what they suggest about you, you spend all of your time trying to hide the facts that cannot be changed. What has to be the power in your life. What you think about yourself cannot be the facts of your life. But it has to be what the truth that God says about you.
Speaker 1:In other words, you have to reprogram. Somebody say reprogram. You have to reprogram what you think about yourself and you've got to program your mind with the thoughts of truth, not just the facts. Because all of us have some facts about our lives that can make us not like ourselves. Amen.
Speaker 1:And you can sit there and look deep all you want and act like that you don't have none. That's the first sign of dysfunction. The fact that you were a sinner but the truth is you've been forgiven. The fact is, we made some horrible mistakes but the truth over the fact is, god has made a way for us to be victorious in spite of our mistake. He is faithful and just to forgive us and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Speaker 1:The fact of the matter is, you might have grown up without much but the truth is, today, you blessed and highly favored. The fact is that you've been through some trauma in your life but the fact over the truth over the fact is that god has made you more than a conqueror. That I'm not living based on my facts. I'm living based on the truth of god's word. Fact is, some of us have gone through so much pressure, gone through so much trauma, so many things that even our family don't even know what we had to endure but god has given you the truth that greater is he that is in you than he that is within the world.
Speaker 1:Is there anybody other than me to that can declare I have some facts in my life that would make me not want to like myself but I got some truth that is over the fact. The lord is my light and my salvation. The lord is the strength of my he who dwells in the secret place of the most high. That's the truth that I'm living by. I don't know about you but I'm walking in truth.
Speaker 1:I don't know about you and you may remember some facts about my life and you may talk about the facts but I'm not living based on the facts. I'm walking in the truth. I dare you to shout and look at somebody and tell them, I'm walking in truth. I'm walking in truth. Family, listen to me.
Speaker 1:Listen to me. Don't let facts define you. Let the truth free you. Don't stop walking because of the facts that you experience. Yeah.
Speaker 1:You start walking because of the truth that god has given you. Somebody say it, I am who god says I am. I am who god I am. Am who god says I am. I am who god says that I am.
Speaker 1:You gotta look at yourself in the mirror and say, you are who god says you are. You can do what god says you can do. You can have what god says you can have. I can be who god says I can be. I am what god says.
Speaker 1:I am. Am. Doesn't matter where I came from. It doesn't matter where I've been. Doesn't matter what I went through.
Speaker 1:Let me finish. Number three, you gotta remember and learn that there is power in your presence. Somebody say there's power in my presence. There's power in my presence and I'm not talking about the power around you. I'm talking about the power in you.
Speaker 1:The power on the inside of you. Somebody put your hand on your chest and say, there's power in me. There's power. Say it again. There's power in me.
Speaker 1:There's power in me. You've gotta reach the point that when you walk in a room. Yeah. Have the ability with your presence. Yes.
Speaker 1:To change an atmosphere. Not because you're trying to be noticed or you're trying to be bougie and you're trying to be odd. It's because you know that there is power and presence on the inside of you. It's because you love you so much. Yeah.
Speaker 1:That when you enter the room, you know royalty just showed up. I'm not being arrogant. I'm not being stuck up. But you gotta know that you have so much power in your presence that if you are the only one in the room that does not have a $500 suit on, you still know that when you walk in the room, riches just showed up. Presence just showed up.
Speaker 1:Ability just showed up. Answers just showed up. You gotta know that there's something about you Yes sir. That when you show up. Yes sir.
Speaker 1:Yes lord. The world is better. Yes lord. Because you are in it. Yes.
Speaker 1:That you bring something to the table of the world. That just by you being there, god does not make mistakes. Yeah. And that you are not here by accident. You gotta love yourself that much.
Speaker 1:That you mirrored god's word back to him what he says about you. The truth of his word that if god allowed me to be born, if he allowed the happening of my birth, there had to be something that he birthed you for. You have to be at peace with who you are. Yeah. Because listen to me.
Speaker 1:Listen to me. Don't miss this. Because until you are at peace with who you are, you will never fully connect with anybody. Right. And consequently, you'll never really connect with god if you are not at peace with who you are because you cannot connect with a god who you think made you inferior or less than.
Speaker 1:Somebody put your hand on your chest and say, I have to know who I am. This is the risk of love because real love will always cost you something. Nudge your neighbor and say, but it's worth it. Jesus said in John fifteen and thirteen, he says, greater love has no one than this than to lay down one's life for one's friends. You can't tell me what it cost you, then it's not real love.
Speaker 1:Because love will cost you the risk of being vulnerable. Love will cost you the risk of being misunderstood. Love will cost you. Here it is. The risk of being hurt.
Speaker 1:When it's real love you're at risk. I think this is why so many of us have built walls instead of bridges. Because of the risk of love. But here's the problem, family. You cannot build walls to keep pain out without the understanding that I'm going to keep love out too.
Speaker 1:That if I build a wall because I don't want to be hurt and I don't want anybody to mistreat me and I don't want anything to happen to me. I have to understand that that same wall. Amen. Is going going to keep the love out that I so deserve. That I desire, that I want.
Speaker 1:It's a story of a man that was polishing his new car. His four year old son picked up a stone and began to scratch lines on the side of the car. In anger, the man took the child's hand and he began to hit it several times, not realizing that he was using a wrench to chastise the child. At the hospital, with eyes full of pain, Child lost all of his fingers due to multiple fractures. When he saw his father, he looked at his father and asked him the question, daddy, when will my my fingers grow back?
Speaker 1:My god. The man was so hurt and speechless. He went back to his car and he began to kick it several times. Devastated by his own actions. When he got to the side of the car, he realized his child had etched in the paint.
Speaker 1:Daddy, I love you. The next day, the man committed suicide. Wow. What is the moral of that story? The moral of that story is that anger and love has no limits.
Speaker 1:That's why you see people going to the extremes in our world and sadly, we've allowed that same spirit to creep into the church. Amen. You choose love Discover there is power in your presence. Even though it may be difficult, even though you might have had to forgive, you might have had to ask for forgiveness. You have said sorry.
Speaker 1:You want people. To be forgiven. Love anyway. Yeah. Risk it anyway.
Speaker 1:Trust god anyway. Listen to me. Things are to be used and people are to be loved. But the problem that we have in today's world, people are used. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And things are loved. We love things more than we love people. But in verse 33, Jesus says, the gift of you, the gift of your love is greater than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices that you can bring. The greatest gift that god has given everyone of us is not what is in our hand. But it's what's in our hearts.
Speaker 1:The greatest offering that you can ever bring to god is not a physical asset but it's your attitude. Somebody asked the question, what's love got to do with it? The greatest gift that you can offer to god is not what you drive but it's what drives you. It what's it's what motivates you. If it's just about you and just about your name and just about you being elevated above somebody else.
Speaker 1:He says, that's not what drives me. That's not what you can offer me. I need somebody to hear me today because it's time to love again. Love starts right here. It's time to let go of bitterness and and rebuild what was broken because until you love yourself.
Speaker 1:You will not be able to love. Anybody else. Stand with me all over this place. And when we get this right, we will truly understand what it means to love god, love others, and love ourselves. And when we get this, watch it.
Speaker 1:The church will be unstoppable. We have a climate in the body of Christ that we rejoice when people are falling. We rejoice when people are backbiting and this one is mad at that one and this one is saying something against that one and we spend our time sending messages around instead of falling on our knees and saying, god, help the body of Christ to love and look like you. The church will be unstoppable. The kingdom will advance.
Speaker 1:The glory of god will rain down in our midst and the enemy will have to remove himself. Because when the people of god understand what love has to do with it, depression will flee. Dysfunction has to break. Healing will manifest. Father, I pray today.
Speaker 1:Oh god. That we understand that love starts right here. Help us to step in the fullness of your love. You gave your only begotten son because scripture says, you so love this world you gave your son to die for us. Help us to prepare our hearts Cleanse us.
Speaker 1:Go. From the wickedness of this world. Help us to really love you with all of our heart, our soul, and our mind. Help us to love ourselves that we will be able to boldly say, I know who I am. I am loved.
Speaker 1:I am called. I am chosen. That I have been made in your image. Father, we thank you for it. In Jesus name, thank god and amen.
