Northside Church - Sydney
Success or Significance? Week 3: Unfathomable Stereotype
You're listening to another great message from Northside Community Church. Emo, yuppie, churchy, serfi, westy, one of the realities is life is full of stereotypes, right? There are all sorts of stereotypes, broad generalizations about who a group or a subculture of people are, and if you're anything like me, you've progressed through at least half of that list over the course of your life, but here's the thing that seems to be a unique pattern if you observe the world, that if you embrace, if you accept, if you take on those labels enough in your life, you actually become the very thing that people are calling you, begins to dictate who you are, and they begin to transform you into that, these labels become a reality, you know, question is what's wrong if it's a reality for people if they live purely by this label and this stereotype, and that is it's a challenge when it's the wrong fit. I mean, an identity that's sourced outside of God fits your life, that's what I'll say to you now, it fits your life like a bad pair of heels, I mean girls, you're with me right, to some extent, to some extent, I mean, like a bad pair of heels, it maintains its functionality, but there's always going to be a level of discomfort and a level of dissatisfaction with it, you see girls band-aids on the feet, if it gets really bad by 12 a.m., after a big function, you see the girls walking down the street just holding them in their hands, you know, like, they're not serving its purpose, it just doesn't quite fit, and what I'm trying to say to you is an identity sourced outside of God is like a bad pair of heels, and question I want to ask you tonight is how do you know that you're not band-ating your life like that as far as your identity is concerned, how do you know that you're not taking on an identity in your life that it's discomfort, there's dissatisfaction, it fits but not quite, and you see the question of this series success significance, the one question I've been asking each week, and we'll continue to ask as we journey through the book of 1 John, is that are you trying to steal your significance from your success, or are you living successfully out of your significance, and tonight we look at this pattern of life that, you know, outside of God your behavior dictates your identity, he's a good accountant, she's a great teacher, he's a great performer, oh she's that awesome doctor, your behavior in the world tends to dictate your identity and my question for you is what if it was the other way around, what if your identity dictated your behavior, we all live with stereotypes, emo, yuppy, eighties, boy band member, but tonight this passage teaches us just one that will transform you to forever pretty much, it's what I call the unfathomable stereotype, and that is you can be, if you're Christian you are a kid of the king, you're a kid of the king, the stereotype that if anyone who places their faith in Jesus Christ becomes children of God, that's what the passage teaches us tonight, it's pretty simple but it's profound, it's deep, and we're going to get into it now, first John, book of one John, chapter three, verses one through to three, how great is the love the Father has lavished upon us that we should be called children of God, and that is what we are, the reason the world doesn't know us is that it did not know him, dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known, but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is, everyone who has this hope in him purifies themselves just as he is pure. One of the things that's just really got me chuffed at the moment is that I think more than ever in this place here at Northside is we've got people coming in really secretly asking themselves a question, what does it mean to be a Christian, people that are travelling with us and are not Christians, they're just part of it all asking themselves what does it mean to be a Christian, and you guys want to hear me say it before, but there is a distinct difference between Christianity and Christianity, and it's not based on whether you live in Australia or New Zealand, you see, Christianity is what some people think, some people think Christianity is, is Christianity where you adhere to certain beliefs and you live by good principles and you live a strict life and you just find the right answers and recite them and you try to be a good person, but see the truth of this passage tonight here as it says, if we're called children of God, that to be a Christian is a position, it's a standing, it's to have rights in some sense, what we'll learn it's legal rights and access rights, you see kids of the king have legal rights first up, recently here at Northside last year we've had a family that have taken up an adoption through their circumstances, it'd been wonderful to watch and, and I clearly remember as I keep you as posted with all the emails is that in all of that anticipation there was still a distinct line with this little guy at which they sent that wonderful email and they finally sent out and said he's now ours, I don't know how much paperwork they had to go through and sign and the checks and the balances, but there was actually a point in which this young guy wasn't theirs and once everything has been said he was theirs, he was their kid now, and so in, in that instant he had, he had become theirs, he'd moved into the rights of all of that sort of family and what that would bestow, now here's the interesting, if that little guy had a bad week three days after they'd signed all the papers, I mean did you give him back? No, it doesn't sort of come with a return policy, you see your behaviour and your attitude have no bearing on your position with the ultimate father, you need to get that right tonight, like any good father the bad behaviour doesn't diminish his love, it doesn't make him want to send you back to where you came from, in fact like any good father it makes him want to be more of a father to you, oh come on my son, come on my daughter, come on you know you shouldn't be living like that, it doesn't diminish the love, it increases the love towards you, and so in that sense why it's because legally kids stand upon their position, once you're a kid you're a kid, you don't lose the heart of the father because you've had a bad week, why it's because in the first verse it says a word that we skip over, in the first verse it says how great is the love of the father that he has lavished upon us, I used to think this was a line from a Stephen Curtis Chapman song, it's actually in the bible, and how great that he's lavished upon us, what if the literal translation would lavished, literally means to bestow, to give us a present which is a really weird way to think about that when you're talking about a love relationship with kids, family and that sort of thing, but one of the best ways to put it is in a marriage when you get together and you stand up there on the altar like Sarah will be doing soon and Mark will all get there and will witness all the wonderful things that are going to be happening there and there becomes this definitive moment in which they will both bestow all it means to be them and their love for one another to the other person, they give it to the other person as a person becomes a line, an irrevocable line where they are changed and transformed forever by the act of that gift to one another, and so like any person that has bestowed love or had loved bestowed on that, we have these legal rights, we've become children of God and it wasn't meant to have legal rights in that sense, if you look back through the New Testament, you look at Roman adoption, you could actually adopt someone as an adult, if someone was, I had an incredibly massive estate, they had no kids, they couldn't have kids, they could adopt an adult and quite literally then and there, that adult at that point in time their debts were either cancelled or absorbed by the owner of the estate, at that point, even though they're an adult, that father literally becomes the legal father and the child becomes the legal child and that child now had rights to everything within that estate, the debts have been cancelled in that spiritual sense, it's what the Bible is getting out here, to be a Christian is to receive God's love bestowing on you like a marriage in such a way that all the rights have been bestowed to you and legally you've changed your sins are wiped out, your debts are cancelled and God accepts you as perfect and blameless in his sight as one of his own. Wow. Now, there's a challenge in all of that because many of us here are Christians and we go, that's cool, yeah, do that, next. But there's a challenge, I saw it when, I think I've shared this with you before, I went and we're doing them, the meet and greet, the mingle time, we're always feeling a bit awkward because you've got to go and say hi to someone new and so I went round and said good to the Van Bentham's up the back of the church and there was little Isabella of six months old, blonde hair and all, sucking on Daddy's debit card and I thought, oh sweet little thing, if only you knew what you've got in your hands, just wait until sixteen years later. You see, Isabella had access to what was her right as a child of the father to her in terror and it's all of Shane's inheritance in that monetary sense and she was treating it like a toy, she was sucking on her. See, it's one thing to know you have rights but it's another thing to know and to experience that access to those rights and so if you're a Christian, you stand up upon those, you constantly preach and teach this to yourself, it's why John says stop, behold, stop, look, take, stock spiritually, you've got a right to an unimaginable inheritance Christian but unless you constantly remind yourself what that is, you know, different than a six year old, sucking Daddy's debit card, you're with me. We're going to be always moving back to this preaching to ourselves. Also kids have not only legal rights but access rights, I think of Obama's little girls over there in the White House, all his team of advisors and his chief of staff and all those other staff that you would know if you watched the West Wing and you would all these incredible staff around him but there would be all sorts of protective people around him that wouldn't allow him to go to certain appointments and be his gatekeepers but there is one or two people in his life that would have access straight through any gatekeeper no matter how big they were in the White House and that was his two daughters and it could be through him in the morning and if he heard the cry Daddy, I want to drink of water. The most powerful man in the world would rise out of his bed and go to the tap of the kitchen and take it up to a bedroom, no one has that sort of access to a man like that, not even Mrs Obama. She'll say I want to drink of water, you probably say go and get it yourself but not me, I would get up, I would love my wife, you've got legal rights but you've got access rights to the father, God makes Obama look like a street sweeper in that sense, this is the God of the universe and we can have a father and he will run to us whether it be a drink of water or a drink of spiritual water in that sense. When you're a kid of the king you have incredible rights, legal rights, access rights because you're adopted, you're one of his kids and he's the thing about family adoptions and I love watching in this family at the moment and the way they are just growing in love for this young guy here at church, when they bought him around you can just see it in their eyes and the way they interact and Instagram that they love this little guy as if he was their own. And adopted families that's the thing right, if you've got the biological kids and that sort of stuff, it's a job of every adoptive parent to say to this kid I will love you as if I'll spend my life helping you know that you were loved as equally as my own. This is what gets me about this passage is because what John is saying to us through the word tonight is that when you place faith in Jesus Christ God lavishes upon you a love that is every bit as intense, every bit as unchangeable, every bit as real, every bit as equal as his own son, the one that the Bible calls Noah other equal, the one that is the fairest of them all, the one that was in perfect obedience to him, he loves you the same as him and it means, you know what it means for you tonight, it means that God when you place your faith in him can love you no more in a million years from now, when you've been through all the spiritual courses that you could possibly do and you've read your Bible about 583,000 times, he could love you no more at this end of the spectrum than he does here tonight. How does that go when you're facing Christianity, trying, striving, we're not trying to be Christians here guys, we're children of God, we're kids of the king, it's a position, it's a standing and in light of all of that then what incentive is there for the striving and the trying and that sort of stuff, that's what we see next, if you're a kid of the king, you not only have rights but if you're a kid of the king then you know you have responsibilities, I call this the Kate Middleton principle, you see what else is there better to do on a summer holiday than watch B grade movies, like seriously and that's what I did if you've got access to Foxtell which is a great privilege, talk about rights of the parents in law, I watched a B grade movie it was called William and Kate, the movie and it was a rip snorter and there was just a touching scene in this where we see Kate for the first time having to learn how to be a real princess and this mean old lady was there teaching how to bow and curtsy and address the queen and to sip cups of tea with a little pinky just exactly right in the right position, I think what would what would make go through all of that, you see her Kate's behavior we see now, she's changed from the days in the catwalk at university through to the waving of the hands down the mall in London, her behavior was in response to the significance and the visibility of her newfound position, her behavior was in response to the significance and the visibility of her newfound position, she'd gone from every day person to royalty, she's a princess now and see the whole of this book first John is his reminder and his appeal to Christian holiness or difference or distinction or to the Christian position, he's saying if you're like a Kate you've been raised you're a kid of the king, you're a prince, you're a princess and so when John says that God calls us children and that is what we are, you're God's kids, he's saying you not only have the legal status but that's who you are, that's who you are now, that's a whole new life, a Christian is a kid of the king not just by legalities but by nature, by nature, that's you're not a kid just by legality, you see by nature and like for the lovely Kate, her behavior doesn't earn her the position right, it's not like hundred curtsies and you get to be the princess, the definitive lion will has bestowed his love upon her and she has all rights and access to it but her behavior is in response to her elevation to that position and the privilege and after a while all the waving and the curtsies and the smiles and the greetings actually become part of who she is, you know, let me put it another way, kids are often a reflection of their parents, that's why when I was in primary school in year five, one of these many teachers came up to me, I didn't know who she was and she said you must be one of those hadn't kids, I'm thinking how do you know, she said because you're wearing a tie and that is because me and my little brother were the only two boys in all of Beacon Hill primary school that had to wear a tie in the summer time, I know, that was before bullying was a big issue on Seven Sunrise and so I would always have to wear this and I would plead with him please don't make me wear the tie but he would always say to me you're a hadn't kid, you're going to wear a tie to school and of course remember your behaviour in the real world affects your identity and I didn't want to be one of those dorky kids with a tie so each day I'd get the school, I'd just loosen it a little bit more and at I'd get the school the next week and I'd loosen it a little bit more until one day it was sort of hanging right half off my neck and one thing happened to me that is a fear of all kids are wanting to do the right thing by their parents as I came running around the corner from a game of bull rush as I looked into the canteen and I realised that mum was on canteen and my life went into slow motion like something out of the matrix, but it was too late she saw the tie was off it was different I got home that was so disappointed and we had a big sit down at the talk I said dad why why and he said son you'll always wear a hat and you'll always wear a tie you're a reflection of who I am in that school playground guys whether you're still actually in school wear a tie it's cool or whether the water fountain on Monday whether it Friday night drinks this week my question to you are you loosening the tie when the Bible talks about Christian holiness it's saying you're a reflection of your father you're a kid of the king and our behaviour doesn't dictate our position it doesn't make you any more loved by the father a memory can't love us any more than he would in a million years time but it's how we witness and it's how we're different as how we reflect who the real father is to be a Christian has received God's love in such a way that we're not only legally changed so our sins are wiped out debts are cancelled were accepted but were actually changed we're renewed so that injection of his nature so we want to wear the tie so we can be a true reflection of who the ultimate father really is Christian obedience is not the means to our identity but it's the overflow of that identity you're a kid of the king you've got responsibilities like Kate guys finally kids kids of the king know not only that they got rights and I know that they're not only they got responsibilities but they know who they really are it's saying here if you're a child now you understand that right now you aren't all that you are meant to be listen to verse two dear friends now that we're children of God and what we will be has not yet been made known but we know it we know that when he appears we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is it's saying for a child now you understand that you're not all that you're meant to be right now I mean if life was a movie if your life was a movie this would be the airport scene with Kate Hudson and someone else in it I mean if your life was a symphony this would be the great chord with the clashing symbol bit at the end of it that is sort of not out of your slumber from in the middle of it like that's this is the chord that you would be aiming for I mean if your life was a Tamagotchi this would be the digital program for which you were written and that is that there is a destination of your life all of God's creation that is to see him as he is to meet God face to face and not only that gaze upon his face to face and seeing him face to face it's such a mind numbing mind-blowing experience it will transform you will change the very person that you are what kind of experience is that is that to even hope for it changes who you are it must be you're so incredible so intense so massive that I feel that I'm going to just put it the wrong way tonight and and not get it across I hope the Holy Spirit will just walk it out but I think of it really is the gospel according to Beauty and the Beast you know I'm not talking the fairy tale I'm talking the classic Disney movie 1991 with with a great soundtrack with Celine Dion Pibo Bryson and the story of Beauty and the Beast if you haven't seen that wonderful Disney movie I'm take it that most of you have we've got a few nods there yeah is it's about a young prince who comes underneath the spell of an evil woman who because he didn't obey her turns him into an ugly beast and he's confined to a far away castle and he's given a rose whereby he must love and be loved in return before all of the rose petals have fallen off otherwise he'll remain a beast forever and and for years he's confined in this loveless place in this castle until the beautiful the gorgeous young bell comes along a French fair maiden who stumbles upon this castle and and whilst it's tumultuous start she eventually gets to know him a little bit better and hangs out in his library and and this gorgeous girl and this beast become friends after the months or the years so to speak pass and in the final scene is this this jealous human guy comes and he stabs the beast from behind and the beast falls off one of the balconies and and he falls pretty much to his death and just before the beast succumbs to his wounds bell runs across and whispers that she loves him breaking the spell just as the last rose petal falls and the beast in this wonderful moment of Disney animation long before they had Pixar and high definition stuff the beast begins to to transform to this wonderful soundtrack and beams of light rating out radiating out of who are years and and ugly hands turn into fingers and ugly faces turn into handsome young prince again and and disgusting toes turn into the strong legs of a young man and the prince is finally revealed for who he really is the gospels this guys that that our true self our true self has been locked beneath a spell beneath a persona of ugliness and we too can't unlock this spell on this trap until we've fallen in love and are loved by a true a true beauty that comes from the outside and sees us in all of the ugliness and loves us for who we really are to be a kid of the king is to know who you really are and on one hand this might sound really slack but all of us anyone that calls themselves a Christian recognize that at one level if we're real with ourselves that we are a beast that we are not all that we could be that there are imperfections that are a sins in our life that we are not all that God has created to be I mean even Paul the great apostle Paul says in Roman seven right I what a wretched man I am but the things I want to do I don't to he recognized that he was a beast at one level but that's not all there is that's not all there is to the gospel verse two in this passage says and what will be has not yet been made on the other hand your true self as a Christian has been hidden from view for all those years the beastly person is not who we really are where princes my princess is hidden under this spell of entrapment eagerly awaiting our transformation all says that same way since then you've been raised with Christ sit your mind on the things above sit your heart on the things above because for your life which is is hid with Christ will be revealed at the end of time when he is revealed in glory that's your true life that's the transformation of the Christian or a kid of the king awaits guys what am I trying to say Jesus is the true bell Jesus is the true beauty who's come in from the far away of your legend of the dark confines of our castle today he looks deeper than our outer image and he whispers at the cross and the death that we're currently dying slowly I love you guys we only have so many petals remaining in our life we must love and receive that ultimate love in return before we to can be transformed into the lightness of our hidden selves are you more than just friends with Jesus tonight do you love Jesus tonight have you received the love of Jesus tonight you can be you can do that and as Lumiere the candle said be our guest be our guest put our service to the test that's what it's all about every time we come here on a Sunday is to call people of the great story that is a gospel and the transformation and the revelation progressively of what is not fully known now but will one day be guys as I finished let me put it another way if that was a bit punchy for some of the boys see as Lewis puts it like this there are no mere mortals he says it's a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you may talk to may one day be a creature which if you saw of them now you would strongly be tempted to fall down and worship it's in the light of this overwhelming possibility and it's with all and the circumspection proper to them that we should conduct all our dealings with one another all friendships or loves or play or politics there are no ordinary people you have never talked to a mere mortal as if you're seeking a life of significance tonight I pray that God through his spirit might give you a revelation of that incredible identity where are you sourcing identity if you've got an identity that's fit in you like a bad set of heels there are no mere mortals you can be something that is so unimaginably breathtaking that if you caught a glimpse of who you really are in the mirror tomorrow you be tempted to fall down and worship yourself trust me I have a hard enough time as it is at the moment guys do you get your true identity you either are or you can be a kid of the king only until you have fallen in love with the true beauty that has come from the outside Jesus Christ do you know him do you love him tonight you can do that to be a Christian is to be a kid of the king know your rights live responsibly and rejoice in the fact that the best of you is yet to come let's pray [BLANK_AUDIO]