Tag Archives: brother

Sunday – February 28, 2021 Job 16 “Christian Thinking During COVID 19” Pt 9

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Sunday – February 28, 2021

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Word On Worship – Sunday – February 28, 2021

Romans 14:2-3
One man’s faith allows him to eat everything, but another man, whose faith is weak, eats only vegetables. The man who eats everything must not look down on him who does not, and the man who does not eat everything must not condemn the man who does, for God has accepted him.

Christians are in the building business—not in the demolition business. Judging others and demanding the right to exercise our liberty, regardless of its effect on others, tears others down. In the abstract, all things are clean for the one whose faith is strong and whose conscience is clean concerning their exercise. Yet these “good” things become “evil” for the strong if and when they cause another to stumble.

Paul provides two illustrations of differing convictions in Romans 14: eating meat (14:2) and the observance of certain holidays (14:5). Both the strong and the weak are tempted to sin against their brother. The danger for the strong believer is to look upon his weaker brother with contempt: “How could he be so shallow in his grasp of God’s grace and of Christian liberty?” The weaker brother stands in danger of condemning his stronger brother for his liberty in Christ: “How could he be so liberal? Does he not believe in separation?” Both of these brothers, the strong and the weak, are represented as judging the other. Both are looking down on each other, while at the same time thinking too highly of themselves.

How quickly and easily sin corrupts! For those who are strong in their faith, every Christian liberty is clean. The strong believers have more faith and a greater grasp of grace and Christian liberty.  But the moment my “good” causes “evil” for another, it becomes evil for me also. Any liberty I exercise at the expense of a brother becomes a sin for me (verse 20). For those who are weak in faith tend to fail to grasp the full implications of the work of Christ. This leads weaker saints to be inclined towards being legalistic. So weaker saints lean towards thinking believers cannot do what God’s Word allows.

The strong Christian then is left with two principal concerns. The first danger is exercising a liberty to the detriment of a weaker brother. The second danger is to be tempted to approve that which God does not—to press his liberty too far. To him, Paul says, “Happy is he who does not condemn himself in what he approves” (verse 22). The weaker Christian is left with one exhortation: “Don’t act out of doubt, but only out of faith.” The principle governing his actions is simple: “Whatever is not from faith is sin” (verse 23). Doubt is the opposite of faith, so actions produced from doubt result in sin.

Sunday – April 14, 2019 Gospel of Luke – Luke 17:1-4 “Sin Is Not a Solo Act”

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Sunday – April 14, 2019

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Word On Worship – Sunday – April 14, 2019

Luke 17:3-4
“Be on your guard! If your brother sins, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him.  And if he sins against you seven times a day, and returns to you seven times, saying, ‘I repent,’ forgive him.”

One of the things that I only half-jokingly tell people is, “If I haven’t offended you yet, please be patient. I will!” It is impossible in this fallen world to relate closely to anyone without causing offense at some point. Often it is unintentional, but sometimes, frankly, we mean to be mean! Relational problems not only occur in the church; they also occur in the home and anywhere else that people have to work closely with one another. What went wrong?

Relationships can be the source either of our deepest joy in life or of our deepest pain, depending on whether we follow God’s directives on how to work through relational problems. We live as sinners in a sinful world, and so we are prone to sin against others and they are prone to sin against us. But just because we’re all prone to sin, it does not follow that we should just go with the flow. Rather, we should do all that we can to avoid sinning against others and leading them into sin. And, we should do all that we can to avoid taking offense when others sin against us and to avoid being led into sin by the bad example or teaching of others.

The major reason that we are so prone to sin against others and to take offense when others sin against us is that our sinfulness prompts us to justify ourselves and to blame others. As soon as Adam fell into sin, he blamed his wife for leading him into it and he even subtly blamed God for giving him his wife (Gen. 3:12)! Ever since, we all play the blame game. If you don’t think that this tendency is inherent in the human heart, you have not raised children! They do not have to be taught to pin the blame on their brother or sister. It comes naturally!

When Jesus warns, “Be on guard,” He means that each of us needs to look first and foremost to our own hearts. Take the log out of your own eye and then you may be able to help your brother with the speck in his eye, but not before then (Matt. 7:3-5). When relational conflicts erupt, the first thing you should do is to ask God to show you what part you are responsible for. If you think that, being generous, you’re responsible for ten percent of the problem, you can safely multiply that number by four or five! We all are prone to justify ourselves and blame others. But healing will not begin in damaged relationships until each person allows the Spirit of God through the Word of God to shine into his or her own heart and reveal the sin that is there. We must be on guard against relational sins because we are so prone towards them.

Sunday – March 10, 2019 Gospel of Luke – Luke 15:1-31 “Lost and Found” Part 2

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Sunday – March 10, 2019

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Word On Worship – Sunday – March 10, 2019

Luke 15:31-32
“‘My son,’ the father said, ‘you are always with me, and everything I have is yours. But we had to celebrate and be glad, because this brother of yours was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.'”

The Bible is like a mirror. At first, we look into it and think that we are reading stories about others. It’s interesting to see how they are portrayed. We may chuckle at their antics or shake our heads in disbelief at their stupid ways. But the longer we look, the more we begin to notice that those characters in the Bible look more like us! Gradually, we begin to realize (with some embarrassment), “That is me!” The parable of the prodigal son is like that mirror. At first it just seems like an interesting and touching story. But the more you look, the more you begin to see your own heart either in the prodigal or in his older brother, or in both.

But the Bible not only reveals what we are like, it also reveals what God is like. This is important, because we cannot know what God is like apart from His revealing Himself to us. We can speculate on what we think God is like, but such speculations don’t mean anything, because they are just our opinions, not based in fact. Jesus Christ reveals to us what God the Father is truly like. While it is not a comprehensive picture, the father of the prodigal son gives us an important aspect of God’s character, namely, His abundant mercy toward all who will repent of their sins.

At the end, Jesus leaves the story hanging, with the older brother outside. We don’t know if he ever came in to join the party, in spite of the father’s gracious and gentle appeal. Jesus leaves the story there to make us consider our own response. If we are like the older brother, if we pride ourselves in being good, church-going people, if we see ourselves as better than prostitutes and drug dealers and thieves and other obvious sinners, then we need to judge our self-righteous pride. In the same way, we would be greatly wrong to go out and join in the sins of the prodigal, so that grace might abound. Neither son was right in their response to the abundance of their father.

We’re all sinners, desperately in need of mercy, not justice. Perhaps we started laboring in God’s field at sunrise and someone else comes in at 5 p.m. and gets the same pay as we do. Don’t begrudge him; just be glad that God is a God of great mercy, even toward the proud if they repent. If you, like the prodigal, have rebelled against God and have come to see your wretched condition, your response should be like his: Get up, leave your sin, go to the Father and appeal for His mercy. You will find it in abundance.

Sunday – August 20, 2017 Genesis 48:1-22 “The View from the Graveyard”

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Sunday – August 20, 2017 – Read the Word on Worship

Sunday – August 20, 2017 Genesis 48:1-22 “The View from the Graveyard” from Sunrise Community Church on Vimeo.

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Genesis 48:21-22
“Then Israel said to Joseph, “Behold, I am about to die, but God will be with you, and bring you back to the land of your fathers. And I give you one portion more than your brothers, which I took from the hand of the Amorite with my sword and my bow”

God’s covenant of faithfulness is the theme that permeates Jacob’s testimony in this chapter. Seventeen years before he had complained to Pharaoh, “Few and unpleasant have been the years of my life” (47:9). But now, Jacob has mellowed. As he takes a final look backward at his life, he remembers how God appeared to him at Bethel as he fled from his brother. Jacob had deceived his father and wronged his brother. God would have been just in finding someone else to use in accom­plishing His purpose. But He appeared to Jacob and affirmed the covenant promised to him as he fled from his brother to his uncle’s home in Paddan Aram.

Twenty years later, Jacob wasn’t much farther along. He had out-swindled his uncle Laban and headed back to Canaan. He had settled outside of the land without seeking God’s direction. Then his sons deceived and murdered a whole town because one young man there had raped their sister. But God appeared a second time to Jacob at Bethel and assured him that the promises were still good.

Even in Jacob’s great time of sorrow, when Rachel died, God’s comfort had been real. The pain of that loss was still with the old man as he reminisced here (48:7). But God had been with him. Then the hammer blow of Joseph’s loss had hit the grieving man. He had thought that he would never see his son again. He went through years of confusion, wondering how the loss of his one son who seemed to follow the Lord could fit in with the promises of God. But now, at the end of his journey, God had proved Himself faithful, as Jacob held in his arms not only Joseph, but Joseph’s two sons. And so as he blesses his grandsons, Jacob tells them how God has been his shepherd all his life to that day and how God will be with them (48:15, 21).

When others look at your life, are they inclined to say, “Your God is sure faithful, isn’t He”? Or, would they say, “Your God must not be very good, because you are always complaining about the treatment you receive”? Complainers tell others something untrue about God, namely that He isn’t faithful. People are skilled in reading between the lines of our lives. If we profess to know the Lord, but our lives are a constant complaint, they put it together and make a mental note that they don’t want anything to do with our God. We’ve got to tell them, by our words and our attitudes, that God is faithful, even through the hard times.

Sunday – July 16, 2017 Genesis 45:1-28 “Forgiveness is a Four Letter Word”

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Sunday – July 16, 2017 – Read the Word on Worship

Sunday – July 16, 2017 Genesis 45:1-28 “Forgiveness is a Four Letter Word” from Sunrise Community Church on Vimeo.

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Word On Worship – Sunday – July 16, 2017 Download / Print

Genesis 45:4-6
“Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Please come closer to me.” And they came closer. And he said, “I am your brother Joseph, whom you sold into Egypt. Now do not be grieved or angry with yourselves, because you sold me here, for God sent me before you to preserve life.”

There is perhaps nothing so moving as witnessing a fractured family being reconciled and reunited. That’s why Genesis 45 is such a moving chapter. We are allowed to look in on the reconciliation between Joseph and his brothers after 22 years of separation and estrangement. After Judah’s impassioned plea on behalf of Benjamin and their father (44:18-34), Joseph saw that his brothers had truly repented of their terrible sin of selling him into slavery. Imagine the rush of confusion and horror which swept over Joseph’s brothers when they heard this Egyptian governor say, “I am your brother Joseph.”

It is not an exaggeration to say that relationships are the most important thing in life, because the two greatest commandments in the Bible have to do with right relationships–first toward God and then toward one another. Whenever you see broken relationships toward God or in the family or in the church, you know that it is not pleasing to God. God is in the business of reconciling broken relationships and it should be a family business for we who are in the household of God.

As hard a pill as it is to swallow, the key to being reconciled to a family member or friend from whom you are estranged lies in your attitude. I know what you are thinking: What about their attitude? Obviously, at some point their attitude also has to change for reconciliation to be complete. But often the key to bringing them to change is when they see how you have responded to the wrong things they have done to you. Often it is the offended person, like Joseph here, who must take the initiative in reconciliation.

Focus on your attitude, not on the other person’s behavior or attitude. If you will deal with your attitude by forgiving those who have wronged you and by submitting yourself to the sovereign God’s dealings with you, He will use you as His agent of reconciliation to those who have wronged you. Joseph had already long forgiven his brothers before they came to the point of repentance Your attitude is the key to reconciliation. Ask God to give you His love and forgiveness toward the one who has wronged you and then you will know the joy of restored, loving, God-centered relationships.