What Does Jesus Say About Loving Others?

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- Hey, welcome to Crossroads, I'm Andy.

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Today you're joining us in a series all about hope.

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The fact that Jesus offers us hope in ways

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that we may not even fully believe right now.

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If you're new and you don't know what you believe

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about Jesus or church or God, hey,

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I just want you to know you are in the right place.

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We're so glad that you're here.

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At Crossroads we believe not just in

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about talking about things, but in actually doing it.

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We are people of action, and we want to actually

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be vessels of bringing hope to our neighborhoods,

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our cities, and to the world.

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We actually have something coming up this summer

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called City Serve Day, where we're going to have

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the opportunity to make a difference

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with our friends, our neighbors,

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and in our local communities by serving

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and making an impact right where we are.

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This makes me think of Mark and Carmina

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traveling to Carmona's hometown in Bolivia,

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where she grew up, to bring food

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and gifts to the children there,

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or another anywhere community member in Montana

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selling baked goods on Main Street

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to raise money for local nonprofits.

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We've got people serving in food pantries,

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building wheelchair ramps for disabled neighbors.

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It can be anything that makes a difference.

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If you sign up to help make a project happen,

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we'll help provide you with the necessary resources

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and support to make it a success right where you are.

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We'll be doing this as a church all together

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this year on June 15th.

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And you can find more information about

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how to identify and start a project

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at Crossroads.net/anywhere.

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Right now we're going to sing some songs,

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and these are simply prayers set to music

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that allow us to express things about life

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and about God, and about who He is

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and about who He is to us.

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You may not believe every word of these songs,

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and that's okay.

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We're just so glad that you're here.

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No matter what you think about God,

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I just encourage you lean in,

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listen to these songs, consider these words,

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and maybe even sing along as we do this together.

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- All right. If you're ready to worship,

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put your hands together like this. Come on.

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Sing it out.

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- This is our God, and we know that He loves us

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because He's shown us.

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He's shown His faithfulness throughout the years.

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That's why we sing, because we know He's good.

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He's more than a story.

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- Thank you for your faithfulness, Lord.

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Ways you show up for us, God.

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- Father, we sing to You.

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We just take this moment to give You space,

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so whatever You want to do, whatever You want to say.

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There's no more hopeful place to be

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than in Your presence. There isn't.

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So, God, I just take a moment to say thank You.

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Thank You for a pause in my day

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just to sing songs to You for 30 minutes,

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just to be reminded of who You are

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and Your character, how much You love us.

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That You've put all these plans in motion

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just to get us back in relationship with You.

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God, thank You. That's what Your Kingdom does.

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It's the power of Your work, so thank You, God.

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I'm forever grateful for what You've done for me,

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that You saved my life, how You've rescued me.

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How you're constantly showing Your faithfulness

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every day. God, thank You.

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And I'll forever sing to You. Amen.

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I love being in this space with you guys.

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Really, it's awesome to get to sing praises to God.

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He loves it. He loves it when we worship Him,

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when we're singing, and when we're giving.

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If you want to join me, me and my family

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give every month.

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If you want to give to this place,

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you can at Crossroads.net/give.

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It's an act of worship.

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Hey, if you're new around here

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or if you see somebody new,

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why don't you turn to them, introduce yourself

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as you head back to your seat if you're in the front.

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Turn to somebody. Say, hey, tell them your name.

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Tell them it's good to see you.

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- Kyle Ranson is a pastor of adults,

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not a Kids' Club volunteer.

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So, to explain biblical principles to kids,

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we asked a Kids' Club leader to help.

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- There's a story in the Bible called The Prodigal Son.

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It's a story that I resonate with a lot,

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maybe you do too.

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It's about a kid who goes away and messes up,

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by mess up, I mean, he's doing Red bull vodkas,

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he's doing ice lube shots.

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Maybe he's eating some edibles afterwards.

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He goes crazy, he blows his money.

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He's vested in crypto, all kinds of stuff

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that's a bad idea. It all goes to crap.

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And then his dad comes along at the moment

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when this kid is up to his elbow in [bleep]

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and he says, "I still love you."

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He runs after him and goes to him.

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That's exactly what God's like to us.

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- You remember the movie Finding Nemo,

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how Little Nemo wanted to go explore the big ocean.

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And so he left his dad and went to go explore.

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And then you remember how Nemo's dad

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chased after him and went to find him?

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Well, we're kind of like Little Nemo.

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We think we know exactly what we should do

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and where we should go.

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And God is like Nemo's father,

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who comes and chases after us because he loves us.

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- My favorite part of Kids' Club is that

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we get to learn about God, and it teaches us

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through fun activities and lessons.

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- And I get to play with my friends,

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and I get to be with my teachers,

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and I get to do lots of fun things.

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- Because you get to dance and worship God.

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- I love Kids' Club.

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- Prayer is pretty simple to understand.

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Ecumenically speaking, it's just about

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us talking with our intermediary, Emmanuel,

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which means God with us, who's omniscient,

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omnipresent, and omnipotent at all times,

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going to bat to God on our behalf.

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It's that simple.

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- Prayer is just a big word that means

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we can talk with God.

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We can talk with Him anytime.

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He wants to hear from us, anytime, anywhere.

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- It's fun because I get to be a kid again,

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still being an adult, still being a teacher.

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But yeah, having a little spark of fun

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kid energy every single Sunday.

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- There is no way to be more impactful

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than to teach kids about God,

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especially at a young age when they are

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so influenced by crazy things around them.

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If we can give them a safe place to kind of

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start their lives off with that knowledge

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of who God is, there's nothing better.

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- Jesus - loves - me - this - I - know

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- [mumbles] - [mumbles]

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- Hey Kids' Club real kids, real teaching.

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- Well. My name is Kyle if we've never met before.

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They don't let me back in Kids' Club.

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So now you know why I'm not a Kids' Club volunteer.

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But you know that every week at Crossroads,

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across all of our sites, there are more than

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4000 kids cared for

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by 1600 active Kids' Club volunteers.

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Is that amazing? [applause]

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In fact, if you're a volunteer in Kids' Club,

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would you stand up? We just want to say thank you.

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Honestly, stand up and clap for you

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and say thank you, thank you, thank you

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for caring for our kids so well.

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Thank you, thank you, thank you, I see you, thank you.

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The job you do is amazing.

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For Sarah and I, I remember, especially

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in those days when you're in the toddler throes of life

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and these little tiny human beings

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who are just this big, squish your brain into mush

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and you can't think anymore.

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We knew we could come to Crossroads

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and our kids would go to this place

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that's amazing and safe and would teach them

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about Jesus in a language they can understand,

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and we could get a break for an hour.

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It's amazing. So incredible, so amazing.

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So thankful for all of you in Kids' Club.

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Kids' Club is that, it is a place for kids

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to hear the message of Jesus, the gospel,

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in a language they can understand.

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And what we do inside this room is for adults.

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It's for us to hear the message of Jesus

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in a language that we can understand.

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In this series, we're calling the world's greatest Hope,

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we're examining the gospel through

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the six primary identities that Scripture lays out

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for us to understand the gospel,

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aka, World's Best Hope.

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Now, the six are entirely distinct,

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and yet they have something in common.

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See, they actually have two critical parts.

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Part one is the gospel of hope that God gives to us.

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It's our relationship with God, how He treats us.

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And part two is the gospel call

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to give away that hope to other people,

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to treat other people the way that we have been treated.

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Now see, each of the gospel identities

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has these two parts because the gospel has two parts.

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I don't know if you've ever considered this before.

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Do you know the gospel has two axes?

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It has like a vertical axis and it has a horizontal axis.

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Not by coincidence, the perfect way to picture it

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would be a cross: two axes.

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Now, a lot of us though, when we think about

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the gospel, when we hear the gospel,

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what we tend to think of is just the vertical axis,

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how God relates to us, the good news

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that God gives us hope.

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And that is part of the gospel.

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Entirely it's part of the gospel.

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It's an amazing part of the gospel.

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But if that's how you view the gospel,

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you're only seeing half of it. Just half.

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And James, the author of James, he said this:

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What good is it, my brothers,

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if someone says he has faith?

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Faith in God? How God gives me hope,

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but does not have works?

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See the vertical axis by itself,

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the just looking at how God relates to me

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results in what Scripture calls a dead faith.

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It's not the Cross, it's just a stick in the ground.

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On the other side, though, you can look at

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just the horizontal piece.

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Just doing the good works, just helping people.

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I just love serving people. I just love helping people.

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But maybe I leave out the faith part.

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That's what the Bible calls dead works.

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Same thing.

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If all I focus is on giving hope,

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then it's all about me. It's all on my power.

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Both of them are incomplete.

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If you want to understand the gospel,

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you have to understand that at all times,

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at all times, the gospel story

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is both horizontal and vertical.

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The hope that I get from God,

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and the hope that I give in His Name to other people.

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That's why at Crossroads we preach and we work.

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This is one of the most unique things

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about the church, it's what attracted me

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to Crossroads when I was 19, 20 years old,

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from 450 miles away.

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All the churches around me that I could see anyway,

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I'm sure there were some great ones

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doing some great stuff. I just didn't see them.

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All the ones that I could see

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love to preach about the gospel,

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love to talk about God,

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love to get the hope from God,

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but weren't super interested

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in giving any of it away and serving anybody.

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But then I heard about Crossroads,

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this crazy place where both things were happening

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and I said, "I have to be a part of that."

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Now, most of us, we have a natural bend

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to one of these or the other.

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Where we're naturally a horizontal person

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or a vertical person.

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That horizontal person, that's the person

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who just loves talking about faith,

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loves thinking about faith, loves thinking about

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how God loves us and loves receiving the hope,

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loves the worship. That's awesome.

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There's nothing at all wrong with that.

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Some of us, we just have a more natural bend

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to the horizontal gospel.

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Others of us maybe the worship and the God stuff,

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it's still just a little bit strange to us,

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but man, do we love serving. Man do we love it.

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We just feel a sense of purpose when we serve,

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a sense of responsibility,

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a sense that our life matters,

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that we're part of something bigger than ourselves.

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And that's great.

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But the point is, if you only have one of them,

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you have an incomplete picture of the gospel.

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It's like having half a car, you know,

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you can take a real nice picture of it from one angle,

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but it's not going to get you very far.

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Half a car, half the gospel, same exact thing.

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Now, this concept that's wrapped up

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in the most famous phrase from the entire Bible,

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the phrase is love your neighbor as yourself.

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It's a verse that Jesus quotes three times.

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Its original place, though, comes from

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the Old Testament, shows up in

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the middle of the law in the Old Testament,

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in the middle of Leviticus 19:18, God says:

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The I am the Lord, it's like if you watched

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The Mandalorian, you know the guy who's like,

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"I have spoken." It's like that.

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He's like that. I am the Lord. Boom! I've spoken.

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Jesus, He quotes this thing three times.

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The last time was just a couple of weeks

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before he was crucified.

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And this Pharisee walks up

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and he's a teacher of the law.

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And by the way, the law is big.

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The Old Testament law, there's 613 different laws

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in the Old Testament.

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And this guy walks up to Jesus and he says,

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"Hey, teacher, what do you think

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is the most important of all of the laws?"

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And Jesus doesn't hesitate. He jumps right into it.

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Says this in Matthew 22:

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It's right there, the horizontal: love God.

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Well, how do I love God?

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By receiving that He loves me

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and I reflect it back to Him.

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He says, Love God, do this part

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and do the horizontal, love other people,

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love your neighbor as yourself.

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That's the entire gospel.

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It's the picture of the Cross.

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Love your neighbor as yourself.

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You know, in part that means loving your neighbor

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as you yourself have been loved.

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Which begs the question, love my neighbor as myself?

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Well, who am I and how have I been loved?

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And the answer to that question

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are these six identities that we're looking at

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in this series. Now, all six of them matter.

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The six are: the sick, the poor, prisoners,

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orphans and widows, aka, the vulnerable,

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the lost, and the stranger.

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These show up again and again and again.

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There's these identities that God speaks to us about.

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Last week, Alli Patterson kicked off this series,

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talked about the sick. She did an amazing job.

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And we actually had people who

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we didn't just preach about the sick,

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but we had people who came up and they worked

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and prayed for other people to be healed.

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We had 1200 people come get prayed

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for last week at Crossroads. Amazing.

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Saw miracles happen in people,

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saw healings happen in people.

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But listen, the people who didn't think

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they were sick didn't get healed.

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There's a scene in Luke 5.

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Jesus is at this amazing party. It's incredible.

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It's like that Kids' Club party I was talking about.

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Amazing party. Crazy stuff is happening.

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He's not, like, supposed to be there

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as this respectable Jewish leader person exactly.

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And so one of the respectable Jewish leader people,

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one of the Pharisees, comes up

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and they start giving Him a hard time,

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"Hike, hey, Jesus, how can You be here?

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How can you associate with these kinds of people?

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What are you? What are you doing?

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These people are sick.

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This is -- what are you -- What are you doing?"

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And Jesus responds to him, He says,

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"Those who are well have no need of a physician,

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but those who are sick.

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I haven't come to call the righteous,

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but sinners to repentance."

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In other words, He says,

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the people who know they're sick,

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which is all these people, they know it.

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They totally know it. They're lost.

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They're trying to fill a hole.

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They know that they're sick.

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They're just trying to make themselves well,

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they're trying to self-medicate.

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That's what they're doing.

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But they know that they're sick

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and therefore I can heal them.

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On the other hand, the guy asking the question

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is equally as sick but unwilling to admit it

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and therefore would not receive healing.

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See, it all starts with how we view ourselves.

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What identity am I willing to take on?

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What am I willing to agree with God about

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about who I really am and how H

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e loves me? If I don't agree that I'm sick,

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I can't be made well.

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If I don't believe that I've been healed,

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why would I have a heart for the sick?

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Now, today we're going to step into

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week two of this series.

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We're talking about strangers,

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the world's best hope for strangers.

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Those of us who maybe in our life

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felt like an outsider, or like we don't belong,

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or like we're somewhere

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and we just really shouldn't be there.

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That's the stranger.

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Before we go any further, let's pray together.

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God, thank You for everybody who's here.

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Thank You for everybody who's watching online.

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I ask that all of us would get a clearer, bigger,

00:35:03

fuller picture of the hope of the gospel today. Amen.

00:35:08

The identity of the stranger.

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Now, one of my identities is

00:35:13

the godfather of millennials.

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That is a self proclaimed title.

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I am the oldest of the millennials

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is a title I hold very, very proudly.

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I think we're a great generation.

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Unfortunately, we cannot be the greatest.

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Another generation has already taken that name,

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but we're pretty good.

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We're going to go with that, pretty good generation.

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Now like every generation, though, we have

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our list of stuff to be afraid about in our top list.

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Every generation has this.

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For my parents', grandparents' generation,

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their list had things on it like the Germans,

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you know, which makes some sense,

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because one day the Germans basically woke up

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and they decided to fight the entire world, twice.

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That's what happened. Terrifying.

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Second on their list is probably the Russians.

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Make sense, again, imminent nuclear holocaust.

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You know, that's okay. That was their top fears.

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For millennials our list is similar.

00:36:01

It's got some similar obvious giant threats

00:36:03

that our top five things to be afraid of.

00:36:06

I think number five is Halloween candy

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with razor blades inside.

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I can't tell you how scary it was

00:36:13

as a kid every Halloween.

00:36:15

Just like getting the fun sized Snickers.

00:36:17

It felt like playing Russian roulette.

00:36:19

Like, "I don't know, might cut my tongue out.

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I'm not sure why. Razor blades inside is what I've heard."

00:36:24

Number four top things that we were afraid of

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is catching on fire. Very afraid of this.

00:36:30

We practiced stop, drop and roll all the time.

00:36:32

Still not entirely sure that would have helped,

00:36:34

you know, but we practice it.

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It must have worked.

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I never saw a kid catch on fire,

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so maybe it's a good tactic.

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Number three things we were afraid of, quicksand.

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You remember this?

00:36:46

I swear, every movie in the 90s,

00:36:50

somebody died from quicksand, swallowed whole.

00:36:53

I go hiking with buddies in the woods,

00:36:54

and it was like, "Man, we gotta watch out

00:36:56

for quicksand, it is everywhere. Have you seen the movies lately?

00:36:59

Like, people are dying left and right." You know?

00:37:01

Kid would be sick from school more than two days

00:37:03

and rumors start flying around.

00:37:05

Like, "Did you hear what happened to Jimmy?"

00:37:06

"No. What? What happened to Jimmy?"

00:37:09

"Oh, man. He got swallowed up in quicksand.

00:37:11

That's what I heard. He's gone. No more, Jimmy.

00:37:13

So just fight over his desk and his stuff, I guess."

00:37:15

Quicksand number three.

00:37:17

Number two, this might be a regional one,

00:37:19

but it was terrifying to me, at least was tornadoes.

00:37:22

Maybe might be a midwest thing.

00:37:23

We used to practice drills.

00:37:25

I'm still not sure how this would help either.

00:37:27

The drill was, you hid under

00:37:29

your 1940s government issued desk

00:37:32

made of grade F chipboard,

00:37:35

and somehow this is going to protect us

00:37:36

in 200 mile an hour winds.

00:37:38

Don't know. Don't know what happened there.

00:37:40

Terrifying. Afraid of tornadoes.

00:37:42

And by far, though, by far the number one thing

00:37:45

we learn to be afraid of as millennials

00:37:48

was strangers in white vans

00:37:51

passing out candy to kids.

00:37:53

It's like there's a special kind of stranger,

00:37:55

they have a white van and they know your Kryptonite,

00:37:57

candy, free candy.

00:37:59

They're going to come around.

00:38:00

They're going to slide that door open.

00:38:02

They're going to offer you candy.

00:38:03

Do not take it was just drilled into us

00:38:04

from the very beginning.

00:38:06

Still to this day, when I see a white van,

00:38:09

I have two competing thoughts in my head.

00:38:10

One is run, and the other is free candy.

00:38:13

I don't know, let's give it a shot, you know.

00:38:15

Strangers in white vans.

00:38:17

Stranger danger is what we call it, stranger danger.

00:38:20

We learned at an early age be afraid of strangers.

00:38:24

This makes some sense, by the way,

00:38:25

historically, strangers are bad.

00:38:27

They would show up as an invading force

00:38:29

on your borders and conquer your country.

00:38:31

Strangers are a threat. A total threat.

00:38:35

Now the Bible has words for stranger.

00:38:37

When you read the Bible, you see the word stranger,

00:38:39

foreigner, and alien use kind of interchangeably.

00:38:43

Those are the English words,

00:38:44

but the roots of them are actually four words,

00:38:47

two from the Old Testament that are Hebrew.

00:38:49

The original language of the Old Testament is Hebrew.

00:38:52

And the two words basically mean

00:38:54

a newcomer lacking inherited rights

00:38:56

and foreigners who are in Israel.

00:38:59

The idea of a Sojourner, the idea of a stranger.

00:39:02

That's the Old Testament.

00:39:03

And in the New Testament there's the Greek words,

00:39:06

two Greek words that sound very similar

00:39:08

from a definition standpoint.

00:39:10

A stranger, a foreigner, one who lives in a place

00:39:12

without the right of citizenship,

00:39:14

or one who comes from a foreign country

00:39:16

into a city or land reside there.

00:39:18

That's what it means.

00:39:20

Strangers are foreigners in the Bible.

00:39:25

In modern language we have a word for that.

00:39:27

We call them immigrants, which means that

00:39:30

at this point, you and I need to have

00:39:31

a conversation because this topic

00:39:34

is unlike the other six identities.

00:39:36

I don't know if you've noticed the political stuff

00:39:39

swirling around, but there's ads about immigration,

00:39:41

and it's one of the big divisive political issues.

00:39:44

I do not see the same thing for widows,

00:39:47

as a for instance, or orphans.

00:39:49

No one's making ads about that.

00:39:51

And because of that, this whole idea

00:39:53

has been co-opted into politics.

00:39:55

And so I just want to warn you,

00:39:57

if at any point in this message

00:39:59

you think I'm talking about politics, I'm not.

00:40:02

If your political alarm bells go off, silence them.

00:40:06

I do not care about your political opinions.

00:40:08

I'm not trying to influence your vote.

00:40:10

That's not what this is about.

00:40:11

This is not political. It is personal.

00:40:15

God has something personal for you.

00:40:18

And so elevate above all of the division

00:40:21

and all of the anger and all of the stuff,

00:40:23

and just ask God if He has something for you,

00:40:26

because I believe He does.

00:40:28

It's incredibly personal, this idea of being a stranger.

00:40:31

If you've ever felt alone,

00:40:33

you know what it's like to be a stranger.

00:40:35

If you've ever felt unwanted,

00:40:37

you know what it's like to be a stranger.

00:40:39

If you've ever felt like you're in a place

00:40:40

where everybody else belongs, but you just don't belong

00:40:43

and you just want to run away,

00:40:45

you know what it feels like.

00:40:46

All of us have these experiences in our lives.

00:40:49

Some of us go through life

00:40:50

and we feel this way all the time.

00:40:52

When I was in eighth and ninth grade,

00:40:54

I was a new kid at school three times in 13 months.

00:40:59

Three times I walked in the cafeteria

00:41:01

at a brand new school, knew nobody, sat by myself.

00:41:05

By the way, it doesn't happen on day one.

00:41:07

It happens on day two and week two and month two.

00:41:10

It takes a while.

00:41:11

All of us have these experiences that

00:41:13

communicate, "You're not wanted here."

00:41:15

This can explain, I think, how you feel.

00:41:18

It's personal. It's also very personal to me.

00:41:21

A number of years ago, I got invited

00:41:23

to go down to the border and see if

00:41:24

there was ways that believers like us

00:41:27

could be part of helping people,

00:41:28

not solving the government problems,

00:41:30

not anything like that, just helping the people

00:41:32

who were hurting down there.

00:41:34

And when I went down there, I spent time.

00:41:36

I talked to Border Patrol agents

00:41:37

and immigration officials and tons and tons

00:41:40

and tons and tons of actual immigrants.

00:41:44

And what I saw haunts me,

00:41:47

not because of who I saw was scary.

00:41:49

It's actually the opposite reason.

00:41:51

It's because who I saw was so incredibly just like me.

00:41:56

They were just normal.

00:41:58

I met a woman from Honduras, a working mom.

00:42:01

She was a pharmacist.

00:42:03

The cartel came in, took over her pharmacy,

00:42:05

threatened her life, threatened her kid's life.

00:42:07

And so she fled, just hoping to stay alive.

00:42:10

The only way to pay her way north was to sell her body.

00:42:12

She was wearing a prostitute's dress when I met her,

00:42:15

holding her eight year old daughter's hand.

00:42:17

Haunts me.

00:42:19

I met a father from Guatemala

00:42:20

who had his eight year old son with him.

00:42:22

The father had nothing.

00:42:24

Nothing for his son, nothing for himself.

00:42:26

His shoelaces had rotted and fallen away, they were gone.

00:42:29

He had straw wrappers to hold his shoes on.

00:42:33

Went back down in the fall with Brian

00:42:35

and some others and met many more people.

00:42:37

One was a family from Venezuela.

00:42:39

They had fled Venezuela.

00:42:41

The political persecution

00:42:43

and many, many other reasons.

00:42:45

They'd gone up through the jungles of Colombia and Panama.

00:42:48

Their daughter was taken by the cartel.

00:42:50

They were, when I met them, they were on US soil legally.

00:42:53

They were there awaiting their asylum case,

00:42:55

but they were on the street. They had no food.

00:42:57

The dad hadn't eaten in eight days.

00:42:59

The son was sick.

00:43:00

They had a two year old son in their arms, just sick.

00:43:03

And these memories of these people just haunted me.

00:43:07

They just got me because they were just normal.

00:43:09

I'm a dad with kids, and I just -- it just hit me.

00:43:14

And so I've done this deep dive over

00:43:16

the last couple of years just to understand,

00:43:18

God, what do You say about strangers?

00:43:21

What do You say about me?

00:43:23

Who am I if they're so like me?

00:43:26

And what do You want me to do about it?

00:43:30

Gospel of strangers is what this message is.

00:43:32

Gospel of strangers who are just like you

00:43:35

and just like me.

00:43:36

Now, when I dove into Scripture,

00:43:37

the first incredible discovery that I made

00:43:40

is that God actually calls His people strangers.

00:43:43

Did you know this?

00:43:45

That doesn't actually make any sense because

00:43:47

God, when He creates the earth,

00:43:49

puts humankind in charge of it and says, "Steward it."

00:43:54

It would make sense that He wouldn't want us

00:43:56

to think of ourselves as strangers who don't belong here,

00:43:59

but as citizens at least, and more logically,

00:44:02

like, super citizens, like owners of the whole thing.

00:44:05

And while I do believe that God wants us

00:44:07

to steward the earth, He very clearly

00:44:09

does not want us to identify as citizens of it.

00:44:14

From the beginning of the Bible story

00:44:16

with God's family, He bakes this in.

00:44:18

When He gives Abraham the promise,

00:44:19

Abraham is the father of Israel.

00:44:21

He goes to Abraham and He says, "Great news.

00:44:24

I'm gonna make you the father of many nations.

00:44:26

It's going to be awesome."

00:44:27

Caveat. Little asterisk, "By the way,

00:44:31

that great family, that great nation,

00:44:33

they're going to spend 400 years as foreigners

00:44:37

and exiles at the very beginning.

00:44:39

Just want you to know that."

00:44:41

That's what God says to Abraham in Genesis 15.

00:44:44

Then He said to Abraham:

00:44:54

That was the Israelites living in Egypt, by the way.

00:44:57

It didn't stop there.

00:44:58

You know, you might think, okay, well, that happened.

00:45:00

And then they they moved on to the Promised Land,

00:45:02

eventually Moses leads them out

00:45:04

and Joshua leads them across the Jordan River,

00:45:06

and they get into the Promised Land.

00:45:07

And King David establishes the capital city of Jerusalem.

00:45:10

And they leave that identity behind, right?

00:45:12

No, not at all, actually.

00:45:15

David writes this in 1 Chronicles 29. He says:

00:45:24

He writes that as a prayer to God,

00:45:26

in God's eyes we're still, present tense,

00:45:29

we are foreigners and strangers.

00:45:33

In fact, the identity of being a stranger

00:45:35

on the earth, it doesn't stop in the old covenant,

00:45:38

and actually goes forward into the New Covenant,

00:45:40

the New Testament.

00:45:41

We see this idea repeated by the apostles,

00:45:44

the disciples of Jesus.

00:45:45

One instance, Peter.

00:45:47

Peter says this in 1 Peter 2. He says:

00:46:05

See, the point is, according to God,

00:46:08

if you're one of God's people,

00:46:09

if you believe in Him, you are right now

00:46:13

as it relates to the earthly kingdom,

00:46:14

a stranger, a foreigner and in exile.

00:46:18

You're an alien on earth.

00:46:20

I wonder if you consider this

00:46:22

or if you ever feel this way.

00:46:24

I think many of us do, in a broad sense.

00:46:27

We might not put this language on it,

00:46:28

but we have these thoughts and we have these feelings.

00:46:31

Nearly every human being who's ever lived

00:46:34

has these kind of thoughts, things like,

00:46:36

"Man, that shouldn't have happened.

00:46:38

It just shouldn't be that way."

00:46:40

Kids should not die before their parents.

00:46:43

That should not happen.

00:46:44

Natural disasters, tsunamis,

00:46:46

hurricanes that wipe out thousands of people.

00:46:48

That should not happen.

00:46:51

People in power who use their power

00:46:53

to put people who don't have power down

00:46:55

and exploit them, that should not happen.

00:47:00

Well, if you try to look at life through

00:47:02

the atheistic lens of survival of the fittest alone,

00:47:06

that doesn't make any sense.

00:47:09

In the survival of the fittest,

00:47:10

if that were hard coded into us,

00:47:12

we would totally be fine with all those things.

00:47:15

Of course, survival of the fittest.

00:47:17

You're dumb. You built your house in the beach.

00:47:19

Sorry the tsunami got you. Too bad.

00:47:22

And some kids die. Too bad.

00:47:24

The people with power, yeah, that's literally

00:47:26

the definition of survival of the fittest, of course.

00:47:29

But we don't feel that way. We feel the opposite.

00:47:32

We feel like this shouldn't happen.

00:47:33

We feel like the world somehow, it's just not right.

00:47:36

It should be another way.

00:47:38

And the reason for that is because

00:47:40

we have hard coded, hardwired into our instincts

00:47:44

this like almost memory of a different kind of country,

00:47:48

of a different kind of kingdom,

00:47:50

one where that stuff doesn't happen,

00:47:52

one where there isn't pain,

00:47:53

one where there isn't violence,

00:47:55

one that's characterized by love.

00:48:00

The Bible says that all people of faith

00:48:02

through all times have considered themselves

00:48:05

to be strangers, foreigners and exiles

00:48:07

in this world and have instead looked for

00:48:10

what Hebrews calls a heavenly country.

00:48:13

Listen to this from Hebrews 11. It says:

00:48:20

Even in the Promised Land, isn't that interesting?

00:48:58

See, the truth of the Bible is that

00:49:00

there is a country just like that.

00:49:02

It's called the Kingdom of God.

00:49:03

There is a city, there is a country

00:49:05

whose architect and builder is God.

00:49:07

It's more real than this world,

00:49:09

it's more permanent, it's more lasting,

00:49:10

i's more beautiful, it's perfect.

00:49:12

There's no crying. There's no mourning.

00:49:14

There's no exploitation. Everything is right.

00:49:16

Everything is the way that it should be.

00:49:19

But we have a problem, so you and I have no way in.

00:49:23

We're on the outside.

00:49:24

See, when we show up to the borders of this,

00:49:27

of this kingdom, we don't have citizenship.

00:49:30

In fact, we're dangerous.

00:49:32

We're the guy in the white van.

00:49:34

They're like, "Whoa, watch out!"

00:49:37

We have track records

00:49:38

and innumerable convictions and offenses,

00:49:40

every single one of us, on our record.

00:49:42

We bring violence. We bring danger.

00:49:44

We bring no economic value,

00:49:45

bring nothing to the table, nothing at all.

00:49:49

So we can't get into the Kingdom of God.

00:49:52

It's hard to get in.

00:49:53

By the way. that makes it the opposite of Canada,

00:49:55

just in case you're wondering.

00:49:56

Very opposite of Canada.

00:49:57

One time when I was in college,

00:49:59

I went to Canada for lunch from Georgia.

00:50:01

I didn't pack a bag, just showed up

00:50:03

with some buddies at the border.

00:50:04

Lady at the window was like, "What are you doing here?

00:50:07

What's your business in Canada?"

00:50:08

I said, "We're getting lunch."

00:50:10

She goes, "You drove all the way

00:50:11

from Georgia to get lunch?"

00:50:13

I was like, "Yeah, that's exactly what we did."

00:50:15

And somehow that made sense to her.

00:50:17

And she's like, "Okay, come on in.

00:50:18

Welcome to Canada. Eh, have a great time.

00:50:20

Get some Tim Hortons."

00:50:22

That's Canada, very easy to enter.

00:50:25

Opposite of the Kingdom of God.

00:50:26

We have no rights, nothing that says we can get in.

00:50:31

Many of us, we feel this way with God right now.

00:50:34

We feel like we're on the outside looking in.

00:50:37

It mibht be there's an inner circle with Him,

00:50:39

but we don't quite know how to crack it.

00:50:41

We don't know how to step in.

00:50:42

We feel like we're we're still on the outside.

00:50:44

I felt this way for years, even after receiving,

00:50:48

believing in this kind of a gospel

00:50:50

for the very first time, I still felt that way.

00:50:53

I remember early on in my faith journey,

00:50:55

people would talk about, "You know,

00:50:56

one day Jesus is coming back.

00:50:57

It's going to be awesome.

00:50:59

He's going to come back, and we don't know when,

00:51:01

isn't that cool?"

00:51:03

And I was like, "That's not cool.

00:51:04

I would like a heads up.

00:51:06

That's what would be great."

00:51:07

Because if someone was like, "Jesus just showed up,

00:51:09

He's right out there.

00:51:11

He's walking in the door right now.

00:51:12

Everybody welcome Jesus,"

00:51:14

I'd be running for the door like, "Oh, my gosh,

00:51:16

He's going to find me here.

00:51:17

I'm sure He's going to kick me out.

00:51:19

I know that I don't belong."

00:51:21

This is how many of us feel,

00:51:22

you might be feeling this way right now.

00:51:24

Maybe you're back in church

00:51:25

for the first time in a very long time,

00:51:26

and you're wondering, "Am I in the right spot?"

00:51:28

I just want to say, yes, you are.

00:51:30

By the way, you are in the right spot.

00:51:32

This is the place for you.

00:51:35

This is how we feel, because there's good news.

00:51:38

Good news about strangers.

00:51:39

The gospel of strangers is that God loves strangers.

00:51:45

It's the great news of the whole thing.

00:51:47

His heart's for them.

00:51:48

I don't have time to go into all the different Bible verses.

00:51:50

They're everywhere. Dozens and dozens

00:51:52

and dozens of Bible verses about this.

00:51:54

I'll just read you a couple just to give you

00:51:56

an idea of God's heart for strangers.

00:51:58

It says this in Job 29:

00:52:08

Psalm 146:9:

00:52:16

He watches over. He loves us.

00:52:18

In fact, it turns out that when we show up

00:52:19

at the border of the Kingdom of Heaven,

00:52:21

when we're knocking, when we're trying to enter,

00:52:23

we have no rights and we have no ability to get in,

00:52:25

we don't have citizenship,

00:52:26

God sends Jesus to make a gate.

00:52:30

He's the gate. He says come on in

00:52:32

and He trades our earthly passport,

00:52:34

whatever's stamped on that thing for one that

00:52:36

has the Kingdom of Heaven stamped on the front.

00:52:38

And He gives us full rights.

00:52:40

He doesn't say come in as second class citizens.

00:52:42

He says come in as first class citizens.

00:52:44

And he says, "There's nothing you can ever do,

00:52:46

by the way, to lose this."

00:52:48

You know, in the US government, the 14th amendment

00:52:50

says that the government cannot revoke ever

00:52:54

the citizenship of anyone in the United States.

00:52:56

That was an amendment, the 14th one added.

00:52:59

The Kingdom of Heaven needs no amendments,

00:53:01

because that's always been the case.

00:53:02

When you're in, you're in.

00:53:04

That's the Kingdom and that's the gospel,

00:53:07

at least the first half of the gospel.

00:53:10

That's the vertical part.

00:53:12

The horizontal part is God's call then

00:53:14

to love strangers just like we have been loved.

00:53:19

It's clear intention as He led his family,

00:53:22

as He gave them these experiences,

00:53:23

as He tells us that we're strangers,

00:53:24

foreigners and exiles, is to create

00:53:26

some level of empathy in us

00:53:28

that we might identify as strangers

00:53:31

and therefore be compelled to help strangers.

00:53:35

Exodus 22 says:

00:53:42

Exodus 23:

00:53:50

See, God knows that we have a natural heart

00:53:53

for people just like us.

00:53:55

Me, I love people named Kyle.

00:53:57

Love them. They're my favorite.

00:53:59

I saw on Instagram the other day,

00:54:01

next week in Kyle, Texas, we, the Kyles,

00:54:05

are trying to break an important world record.

00:54:07

We're trying to set the record for the most people

00:54:09

with the same first name in one location ever.

00:54:12

Now, before you get too excited, this is our fifth attempt.

00:54:15

We have not succeeded before.

00:54:17

I think the reason is because Kyles,

00:54:19

we're not the most reliable people. You know what I mean?

00:54:22

Like when you hear the word Kyle, you're not like,

00:54:24

"I bet that guy shows up on time," are you?

00:54:26

That's not -- That's not what we think of.

00:54:28

I think we should probably change this up

00:54:30

and go for, like, most shots of Fireball at once,

00:54:32

or something, that's kind of more our lane.

00:54:35

Something with snowboarding, I don't know.

00:54:37

I love Kyles.

00:54:38

I'm a baseball coach for

00:54:39

my son's little league team, assistant coach.

00:54:41

This is no joke.

00:54:42

This is this is bonus content here.

00:54:43

Last night we were playing this other team,

00:54:46

and there was a kid named Kyle.

00:54:48

And this kid stepped to the plate, and he hits a bomb.

00:54:50

I mean, knocks in three runs. It was amazing.

00:54:53

And I heard his name was Kyle.

00:54:54

And I was like, "Yeah, Kyle. Great job, Kyle."

00:54:57

And all my little kids on my team are like,

00:54:59

"What are you doing, coach? He's not on our team."

00:55:02

I was like, "I know. He's on my team now.

00:55:04

Come on, Kyle, let's go."

00:55:08

We all have this natural empathy for people

00:55:09

who are like us, as ourselves.

00:55:12

That's why the Bible says

00:55:13

love your neighbor as your self.

00:55:17

God says you're a stranger.

00:55:19

It's no shock, then, that just 15 verses

00:55:21

after God says in Leviticus 19:18,

00:55:25

love your neighbor as yourself, He says this:

00:55:45

When it comes to Jesus, He doubles down on this,

00:55:47

as a by the way.

00:55:49

There was one time a self-centered Pharisee

00:55:51

walked up to Him and and he knew this verse.

00:55:54

At least he knew that he knew the Leviticus 19:18 part.

00:55:56

I don't think he knew the Leviticus 19:33-34 part.

00:56:00

I think he just knew the first part,

00:56:01

because he walks up to Jesus and he goes,

00:56:03

"Okay, love your neighbor as yourself, I get it.

00:56:05

But who is my neighbor?"

00:56:08

And he was trying to justify

00:56:10

not helping people who weren't like him.

00:56:13

You know what Jesus did?

00:56:15

He answered the man by telling him a story

00:56:17

about a foreign born hero who comes to help

00:56:21

someone who's a foreigner to him.

00:56:22

You've actually heard this story.

00:56:24

It's called the parable of the Good Samaritan,

00:56:26

the most famous parable in the history of the world.

00:56:31

And then there's the time when Jesus

00:56:32

was talking about how we would know

00:56:36

if we've actually served Him.

00:56:38

In Matthew 25 He draws a very, very hard line

00:56:41

in the sand when it comes to what does it mean

00:56:44

to love Him and take care of Him.

00:56:46

He describes Himself in need,

00:56:48

and He uses four adjectives, one location,

00:56:51

and one defining noun to do it that He takes on

00:56:54

himself personally. It says this in Matthew 25:

00:57:21

You took Me in. You cared for Me.

00:57:24

Why, why, why? Because these people,

00:57:27

the people who do this,

00:57:28

they get these six gospel identities.

00:57:30

They get them.

00:57:31

They understand that they were sick.

00:57:34

They were totally sick, but God healed them,

00:57:37

therefore, they'll love sick people.

00:57:40

They understand is that they were an orphan.

00:57:42

I was an orphan, but God adopted me into His family.

00:57:45

Therefore I will love and I will care for orphans.

00:57:48

I will seek to get them a home.

00:57:49

I was lost, but God found me.

00:57:52

I was a prisoner, but God set me free.

00:57:54

I was a stranger, but God let me in

00:57:57

and gave me citizenship.

00:57:58

Therefore I will love the stranger.

00:58:01

That's the gospel of the stranger.

00:58:04

It's about hope that you get

00:58:05

and it's about hope that you give.

00:58:09

I don't know what in that message might have struck you,

00:58:11

but I want to take just a minute before we close,

00:58:13

just a minute and just let it sink in for you, okay?

00:58:18

For just a second.

00:58:19

I just want you to close your eyes.

00:58:21

And I want you to ask God.

00:58:24

What stands out to you?

00:58:26

Maybe it was the part about the vertical gospel.

00:58:28

Maybe you've always felt like someone

00:58:30

who's on the outside, you've always doubted,

00:58:32

are you really in the right spot?

00:58:34

Does God really love you?

00:58:35

Does He really accept you?

00:58:37

And maybe today it felt like, "Yeah, you know what?

00:58:39

I think He might."

00:58:40

If you had that moment, just say to God,

00:58:43

"God, I believe You.

00:58:44

Help me receive how much You love me.

00:58:47

Thank You for making me a citizen of heaven.

00:58:50

Thank You, God."

00:58:52

Maybe for others of us there was something

00:58:55

in the horizontal part of the gospel.

00:58:58

The part about giving hope away,

00:58:59

the part about loving other people.

00:59:00

Maybe something in that just felt

00:59:03

maybe an invitation to you to step in.

00:59:06

Or maybe it felt convicting to you.

00:59:08

Either way, have a conversation with God about that.

00:59:12

You just say, "God, I want to love people

00:59:16

the way You've loved me.

00:59:19

I want to love strangers.

00:59:21

Show me people to love.

00:59:23

If You do, I will."

00:59:25

Just have that quick conversation.

00:59:26

I'm going to give you a minute

00:59:27

to have that conversation right now.

00:59:41

Let me pray for you.

00:59:42

God, thank You for Your gospel.

00:59:44

Thank You for clear pictures that even I can understand.

00:59:48

Thank You for the invitation to become

00:59:50

a citizen of Your Kingdom.

00:59:52

Thank You for the love that You give us.

00:59:54

I ask that You give us the courage

00:59:56

to both receive that love, to say yes to it

00:59:59

and to give it away to other people, God.

01:00:02

We want to be a church that preaches.

01:00:05

We want to be a church that works.

01:00:07

We want to be full of faith.

01:00:09

I want to be full of doing

01:00:11

what You've called us to do, God. Amen.

01:00:16

- Hey, thank you so much for joining us this week.

01:00:18

I want to say something again.

01:00:20

This place is not just content to watch,

01:00:22

but a place in a community that

01:00:24

you can fully belong to no matter where you are.

01:00:26

We have people all over the globe

01:00:28

who actually do life together, who know each other

01:00:30

and even take care of each other.

01:00:32

But we have thousands more who watch,

01:00:34

and honestly, we have no idea who you are

01:00:36

and we'd love to change that.

01:00:37

So, if you've been watching anonymously for a while,

01:00:40

man, I'd love to meet you.

01:00:41

I want to know your name.

01:00:43

Whoever you are, wherever you are,

01:00:45

there are ways for you to belong here

01:00:46

and really engage.

01:00:48

So whether you need some friends, prayer,

01:00:50

or just are interested in being

01:00:52

a part of something bigger than yourself,

01:00:53

I think this stuff happens best when you move

01:00:56

from watching Crossroads

01:00:57

to actually being a part of it.

01:00:59

There's an event that's perfect for this

01:01:01

coming up Tuesday, May 28th at 6 p.m. eastern

01:01:04

just for you called the Anywhere Vision Night.

01:01:06

This is an opportunity for you to hear about

01:01:08

the future of Crossroads Anywhere,

01:01:09

and to spend time with our Anywhere family

01:01:11

and staff team. We'd love for you to join us!

01:01:13

Head to Crossroads.net/anywhere to RSVP.

01:01:17

And if you've ever heard stories like we did today

01:01:19

and just looked around the world and wondered

01:01:22

how can all the really hard problems

01:01:23

in the world ever get solved?

01:01:25

And how can we even make a dent in it?

01:01:27

Hey, you really want to join us back next week

01:01:29

as we learn how Jesus brings hope to the poor

01:01:32

and how we can have a part in it.

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