Romans

Well, if you'd like to take up your Bibles, we're going to have our reading now, which this morning is taken from some Paul's letter to the Romans chapter 12 starting at first 1. And this can be found on page 1139 of the church bibles. And after this, Pete is going to come and preach on this passage. That's Roman's chapter 12, starting at verse 1, page 1139. Therefore, I urge you brothers and sisters in view of god's mercy to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice.

Holy and pleasing to God. This is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what god's will is. His good, pleasing, and perfect will.

For by the grace given me, I say to every 1 of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you ought. But rather think of yourself with sober judgment in accordance with the faith god has distributed to each of you. For just as each of us has 1 body with many members and these members do not all have the same function. So in Christ, we, though many, form 1 body, and each member belongs to all the others. We have different gifts according to the grace given to each of us.

If your gift is prophesying, then prophecy in accordance with your faith. If it is serving, then serve. If it is teaching, then teach. If it is to encourage then give encouragement. If it is giving, then give generously.

If it is to lead, do it diligently. If it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully. Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil, cling to what is good. Be devoted to 1 another in love, honor 1 another above yourselves, never lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual fervor serving the lord.

Be joyful in hope patient in affliction and faithful in prayer share with the lord's people who are in need practice hospitality. Let's pray. Father help us, please, as we back in Romans to look at these incredible words, they're your words, They're the word of the living god. They're not just good advice. They're words that can recreate us and make us and, challenge us and causes to be more like Christ.

These are very precious words. And we pray that your spirit would take these spirit words and apply them to our hearts and our minds, help us to knock down barriers that would stop us listening. Please be kind to us, allow us to have 2 ears to hear. We pray in Jesus' name, amen. The dictionary definition of the word, selfish is this.

I don't think it would surprise you. This is the Oxford dictionary definition of the word selfish. Deficient in consideration of others, alive chiefly to personal profit or pleasure actuated by self interest, appealing to self interest. Pretty obvious. I think we'd probably come out with a sort of definition like that.

But I've often thought, that selfish should be sort of defined a little clearer. I think there are sort of number of subheadings you could put under that word selfish. And, I'm gonna just tell you 3 that I think because of the 3 I want to sort of focus in on. So under the word selfish, I think we can define it better this way. I do first of all, have selfishness.

Selfishness, I think, is when I knowingly act in favor of my self over other people. I knowingly do it. So let's say there's 3 people in the room. There are 3 suites left in the tin. I know everybody in the room would like a suite, but I want all 3, and I selfishly choose to take all 3.

I deliberately it's a deliberate act of me thinking of myself above other people. That's selfishness. It's pretty obvious. But there's another 1 I think I'd wanna bring in, which is self absorption, self absorption. This is when I don't even really recognize anybody else in the room.

I'm just totally taken up with me, and I certainly don't recognize that other people have desires for a suite. So it's not a deliberate act of me over others. It's just that I don't even think there are others around. I'm just so taken up with myself, so I take all 3 sweets. But here's another 1.

Self over sensitivity. This is where I come in the room, and everything relates to me. So would I look greedy if I took a suite? I asked myself. Will people think I'm generous if I don't take a suite.

Everything's related to me. Do I deserve a suite? Have I done anything that would give me the right to take a suite? Why are they offering me a suite anyway? What's up with them?

What's their motive? Behind the suite is the suite gonna put on calories? You know, it's all about me. It's an overthinking so that my thoughts are so big about me that I fret about everything. Around me.

They're 3 little subheadings of selfish I would want to say. Now be opposite to selfish if you look up, the dictionary definition is selfless. And that definition is oblivious to self. Just don't actually think about self at all, oblivious to self. Now I wonder which 1 you are more inclined to.

I guess we all have our Achilles heels in this. Which 1 are you more inclined to? Selfishness, you actually know, and you deliberately cut people out, self absorption. You're not actually ever thinking about anybody else. Or self oversensitivity, which which 1 do you sort of tend towards?

Which 1 is it? Now, of course, Our world is dominated by selfishness, self absorption, self oversensitivity. It's dominated by By the way, just in reading the world, I I don't have you you've I'm sure you've noticed the sort of desire particularly in news items to find a hero. Have you noticed that? You the the BBC particularly are desperate to find a hero.

In a situation. And and I wonder if it's because we're in a world that's dominated with selfishness, self absorption, and self sensitivity that when anyone shows any slight selflessness, we want to say, aren't you a hero, aren't you a hero, if you notice that. But that's a, by the way, What's all this got to do with Romans chapter 12? We've been looking through Romans and we're in Romans chapter 12 versus 3 to 8. That's what we're gonna look at.

This morning. In verses 3 to 8, there are 2 commands. 2 commands, and then in the middle of the command like a sandwich, there is a reason given for those commands. The first command is verse 3, and it's saying this be a sober self judgment person. In other words, judge yourself soberly.

I said that very badly. Judge yourself soberly. That's the first commandment. The second commandment is in verse 6 to 8. Which is basically saying, use the gift that you have been given for others.

Use your gift. So it says each of us, it basically means you do it. If you have the gifts say of prophecy, which we'll look at in a minute, then do it in proportion with your faith. So 2 commands, and those 2 commands are surrounded or they have in them the reason, and the reason is verses 4 to 5. Versus 4 to 5 is because we are 1 body.

It's talking about the church, Although we have different gifts, we're all part of the 1 body. We belong to each other. Now I hope you're with me. If you link this up with verses 1 and 2, which we've already looked at in in a couple of sermons before the summer, If you link this up with verses 1 and 2 and they clearly are linked because you've got that word for a connecting word in verse 3, If you link them up, then this is how it's going. Have a sober judgment of yourself Using your god given gifts because we are part you are part of 1 body, as you do that, you are presenting your body as a living sacrifice to god, which in itself is pleasing to god which is your proper worship.

You see that? To put it backwards. So proper worship is what. Proper worship will be holy and pleasing to god. Proper worship will involve your using your body as a living sacrifice.

How do you do that by thinking soberly about yourself and by using your god given gift? That's proper worship. That's what worship is. True worship then is me, you me using my whole self giving my life to god, and it involves how I treat you, how I treat worship of god involves how I treat you. In fact, I think his argument is so close that I cannot be worshiping god if I treat you wrongly.

That's what he's saying. If I'm self obsessed and don't treat you as he's going to show us how we should, I am not a worshipper of god and stop saying that I am. That's what he's saying. In fact, it's all about love. Versus 1 and 2, very, very important words that we often memorize are linked with verse 3.

There is not a separate section going on here. You mustn't separate them. Paul is now spelling out what it is to really worship god. And actually from verse 3 of chapter 12, really to the end of the book now, he's gonna show us what really true worship is, and the heading, if you want the 1 big overview heading, is love. Is love.

You'll see sections on how we love the believers, how we love each other, how we love the world, how we're, supposed to live a life of love, in light of the law of the country. And then how we are loved to the believers again, the weak, the weaker weaker believers, and then he goes on. It's all about love. It's all about love. In the family, the church outside of the family, it's all about love.

That's what the next section is. But you'll notice in the verses that we're looking at, which is verses 3 to 8, actually the word love isn't used. It's not used until verse 9. So it's all about love, but act actually he's got something that he wants to do before he uses that word, and that is to get our thinking right. You get your thinking right, you're gonna learn to love.

That's how he's putting it. So let me just read verses 1 to 3, and you'll see the emphasis on the mind on thinking. Let me read it. Therefore, I urge you brothers and sisters in view of god's mercy. So in view of god's mercy is a thinking thing, In other words, you've got to think through, have a have meditate on god's mercy.

All the stuff I've said in verses chapters 1 to 11. I want you to think about in view about that. So that's a thinking word. Therefore, I urge you brothers and sisters in view of god's mercy to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to god. This is your true and proper worship.

Do not conform to the pattern of this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, thinking. This will, then you will be able to test and approve what god's will is, his good and pleasing and perfect will. For by the grace given me, I say to every 1 of you, do not think There's a mind thing again of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment in accordance with the faith that god has distributed to each of you. So he's gonna talk about love, but and it's all about love in in a sense, but before he gets to love, it's this thinking. So here's my first point then.

I hope you're with me. A transformed mind getting your thinking renewed, a transformed mind renewed thinking about self. That's the first thing he tackles in verse 3. Let me read it again. For by the grace given me, I say to every 1 of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you ought.

But rather think of yourself with sober judgment in accordance with the faith that god has distributed each of you. Now the little term, think more highly than you ought of yourself, it's 1 Greek word and we it's a sort of compound word. And within that Greek word is the word hyper hyper So what he's saying is do not get hyper about yourself, or don't super think about yourself. Don't over super hyper think about self. How should I think about myself, Paul, Well, don't go into hyper thinking concerning yourself.

That's what he's saying. In fact, he says think soberly. And the Greek word that's used for soberly means be in your right mind. It's a great word. In other words, don't be drunk on self.

Stop drinking from the drafts of self. Stop going down the pub and ordering itself. Or have a point of self, please, in fact, make it a liter. Stop drinking. Be sober about your you know, when a person drinks too much, They knock out their higher senses, don't they?

You know that? That their whole judgment goes wrong. Their sense of balance is wrong. A drunk is a is a pathetic being, really, when you look at someone who's drunk. They become in their own mind that they can do anything.

That's why you hear every year of young men that go, you know, on stag dues or whatever it is and they go to Spain and they drink a lot and they then go into their hotel and they look out their balcony and they think, oh, here we go. I can jump into swimming pool from the balcony. You know people that do that, and you know it goes wrong. I mean, I was reading about a bloke who when he's drunk, actually thinks he's spider man. You know, that's that's a serious disability because he isn't.

And he was the bloke who climbed up a, an electronic, you know, electrical, what do you call them, pylon, and died. He isn't Spider Man, you know? I don't think even Spider Man's stupid enough to grab hold of an electric cable. I don't know. Maybe he is.

But this bloke was, and he was stupid. When when you're drunk, you think too highly of yourself. You know what it is. When drunk drunk people always think they're funny, and they're never funny, If there was a drunk person here, they're likely to stand up and say, and and it and people start laughing because we're embarrassed. We don't know what to do.

And they think, oh, they're laughing with me. When I went we're laughing at you. Drugs are foolish. They're self obsessed. They think they have the final opinion on anything, but it's a form of insanity isn't it?

Trunken this. Don't be drunk with self, he's saying. You ought to think soberly you ought to think rationally about yourself. In other words, don't be governed by those inner passions, those impulse those desires, those instincts. Have a new mind.

Think soberly. Think rationally about yourself. Think in the light of the mercies of God about yourself. That's what it is to think soberly. And then he says at the end of verse 3, in accordance with the faith that god has distributed it to each of you, what is the faith?

Well, faith in Christ. Think soberly about yourself with faith in Christ. When you think about Christ, it's very, very hard to think over highly about yourself. Isn't it? Here is the high son of god who came down as a man and died on a cross.

Here was here was thy son of god who humbled himself to be a servant. If you're starting to be cocky and think about yourself too much, then have a think of Christ. In accordance with your faith. Doesn't it tell you that you can't be too high minded? You can't be too self centered Here was the 1 that owns the universe that created everything, but became in the likeness of a servant of a man.

See faith turns our human assessment into sober thinking. It turns everything upside down, really, all the right way up, would be a better way of saying it so that when I have faith, I have a deep appreciation of my own stupidity and the wonderful grace of the living god. The more faith I have, the less I'll think about myself. Selfless, oblivious to self. Is a very faith like act.

You know, modesty and humility are were regarded in in by the best pagan minds at the time Paul was writing, this letter. This is why the bible is, you know, if only we get how utterly radical it was when it hit hit the world. I'm just doing some thinking on that at the moment for the next contagious, just how utterly radical the thinking of of the bible is the Christian thinking of when it hit the world. The trouble is we read it, and we don't see how unbelievably radical it is. 1 of the reasons why in 1 sense it's quite good living in a a new pagan world because suddenly I just have to say a bible thing and people are sort of falling over and and, can't believe how.

If I wanna be radical, I just read the Bible. But this is amazing. So within the pagan world, when Paul was writing this stuff, humility and modesty were seen as utter weaknesses, utter weaknesses. And of course, they aren't seen as weaknesses today. That's why we're always told to believe in yourself, trust in yourself.

You need self expression, find yourself, be yourself, know yourself rights. We're living in a world where everything you invent now has to have an eye before it. I, I, I, I, I, isn't it? The selfie. We we there was a program on, a BBC which had took a hundred items that told you the history of the world.

It's an amazing program. It would take a hundred items from the history of the world in like a little pot or something and it would tell you how that sort of summed up that era of of civilization. Well, the selfie we're now being told is the thing that will sum up our world. It's amazing. I, I, I, I, you can't buy anything without eye in front of it.

But we're not to be conformed to the pattern of our world. We're to be transformed by the renewing of our mind. We need humility. We need it big time and we need it quickly. We need humility.

It's vitally important that we are humble We won't understand what it is to worship. We can't have our minds transformed without having this humility. That's why you could read and we know people like this. You could read the whole of Romans 1 to 11 and really understand it and get to grips with it and be clever at dividing it up. But if there's no humility to go with it, you don't know it at all.

We know people like this, don't we? They're very quick at understanding the Bible. And sometimes when you look at them and hear them, you get confused and think they must be a wonderful christian, but their character doesn't go with it. There's no humility. They're drunk on self.

Here's a little definition of, humility, from a book called, from pride to humility that I was reading. When someone is humble, they focus they are focused on god and others not self. Even their focus on others is out of a desire to love and glorify god. A humble person's goal is to, elevate god and encourage others. In short, They are no they no longer live for themselves, but for him who died for them.

2 Corinthians chapter 5 verse 50. They no longer live for themselves. They're a new creation. That's selfless. Life isn't for our own comfort.

It isn't for our individualistic pleasure. A transformed mind renews my thinking about self. I don't let self get drunk with selfness, self absorption, or self oversensitivity, I keep sober. Now Okay? I recognize that we're all different here.

And I I recognize when you hear like this because I I only I genuinely just think of, when I when I write a sermon, this sounds wrong now, I actually generally just think of myself. I just try to preach it to myself. I know that when I hear this and if I was sitting where you were sitting, myself would be rising up and arguing with this. Or you haven't said this. You didn't define this properly.

You made it too black and white. I understand all that because that's how my mind goes. But right now, this is god's word. And perhaps right now, we need to confess Perhaps right now, we need to seek god's mercy and confessing this issue. Perhaps we need to renew our minds in our thinking about self.

Why not take this opportunity to take the challenge and do that? Can I ask you to pray right now? Something hit you, something you're arguing with, something that you need to work through in your life? Listen to what it says about the lord Jesus Christ in Philipp chapter 2. Paul writes in your relationships with, 1 another, have the same mind set as Jesus Christ, who Being in the very nature god did not consider equality with god something to be used for his own advantage rather he made himself nothing.

Taking the very nature of a servant being made in human likeness and being found in the appearance of man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death, even the death on a cross, therefore god exalted him. In other words, that was true worship. God's pleased with that. Take a moment. Where have you gone wrong here?

What you need to ask god to help you with to enlighten you more perhaps confess, ask God to help you see his mercies. Will you work on that just for 30 seconds? So the first point, a transformed mine removes renews my thinking about self. But here's the second 1. A transformed mind renews my thinking about believers.

Other Christians, in other words. Look at verses 4 and 5. For justice, each of us has 1 body with many members, And these members do not all have the same function. So in Christ, we, though many, form 1 body, and each member belongs to all the others. You notice the word each there, each member belongs to all the others.

Yeah? So if the first point that I was making about transformed mind about the self, can be summed up in the word, humility. The second point can be summed up in the word belonging. Belonging. The danger for us, you see, is because we've been so indoctrinated with an individualistic way of thinking.

The danger for us is that we think that's what Christianity is. But faith in the Bible unites us to Christ as our head, and it also then unites us to the body, which is Christ's. Body. You know, you cannot really be a Christian without being part of the church. Augustin was right when he said that if you want god as your father, you have to have the church as your mother.

Now I know that's been abused, and it certainly was abused by the Catholic Roman Catholic church. But there is a lot of truth in that. If you want god as your father, you must must have the church as your mother. And church is utterly, utterly crucial for your Christian growth. In fact, I want to say you can't grow without it because you wouldn't be part of the body without church because it's called a body.

We belong. And we belong to each other. You belong to me. I belong to you. We belong.

It's not a club. It's not a casual thing. It's a belonging. It's a belonging. So we've we've we've we've we've just heard the lovely news of Tom and Anna, engaged.

Wonderful. See, they're saying, I belong. So if I start to muscle my way in and start trying to, you know, come in between their relationship, I mean, I know. But if there's another bloke, let's say who's, as handsome as Tom and, you know, can play the drums a little bit better than Tom, and has got a better job and earns more money starts sidling up to Anna. He says she belongs and he and she says I belong to him.

That's what's going to happen. It this it's not just a casual acquaintance anymore. They've now settled it They're not just girl and boyfriend, they're now saying, hey, no, no, no, no, no, this is now serious. We're going to a point of where we're going to say. He is mine, and she is mine or whatever the way it is.

And that's what church is. The body is an organic unity The body is not a collection of independent loosely attached things. It's not like there's a number of fingers just you know, that are independent, and they're gonna be stuck on a hand. And then the hand is sort of, you know, just stuck on an arm. And then the arm is stuck on the shoulders and the shoulders are just stuck on the sounds like a good song actually, but it's not it's not just that.

It's not independent members stuck on. This is a vital organic unity. There is a living connection between the parts. It's not a body if there isn't. The parts can't live on their own.

It's not a toolkit, the church. Where you have a toolkit, you have hammer and you have a mallet and you have a saw and you have a screwdriver and each individual thing is in a box. Yes. But, you know, there there's that he doesn't describe the church as a toolkit, useful things, things people doing being able to do different thing. Nope.

It's organic. It's a body. It's living. If 1 limb says to the rest of the body, I don't like you, actually. I don't I didn't actually choose to be a finger on your hand.

I don't like your hand. I don't like the hand. I'm clearing off. You know, I don't I I I don't like you. I don't need you.

I'm going independent. Fingers unite. Let's get out of here. Off I go. It's dead.

And if a limb says, I choose not to be part of the church. I do not want to belong to it. Then, you do not want to belong to Christ. That's what he's saying. The moment any part of the body begins to act on its own to begin begins to act independently.

You know that body's gonna fall apart. It's very ill. That's what a stroke does. That's what epilepsy does. That's what, you know, all kinds of fits do.

The body goes into ill, serious illness. If 1 of my arms is bleeding, every limb in the body will grow weak, not just my arm. If my arm works hard at feeding my mouth, every part of my body will grow strength. So the body, the church, it's a group of people that learn to love each other in the light of the mercies of god to them in the power of the Holy Spirit, and that gives glory to god and is part of worship in a way that a single individual isolated Christian cannot do. In fact, really, in the new testament, there isn't such a thing.

So the body, and what should that body be about? Well, each member should be doing their work. It's ridiculous if the arm says The alarm clock glows off. The ears hear the alarm clock. The eye and say to the eyes open up.

The eyes open up. The head sits up. Yeah. The body sits up. It's just to get, get, just to get out of bed and the leg says, no way I'm staying in.

I'm staying in. I'm having a duvet day. And and then you say, okay. Well, you stay there then, and I hope it goes alright. You know, I hope you feel better, you know, and I'm just going off to work.

Yeah? It doesn't work like. It can't work like that. We've all got a task to do. We're all called to be part of task.

However small you may feel your function is, we're each told to be part of the body. That's how Christ works. We need each other. We belong. It's organic.

And it's through this Organism through this church that we're told in 1 Timothy chapter 3 that that that that god makes the truth known through the pillar of the church, through the church that truth is known, the truth of god's mercy, the truth of how god takes diverse people, and brings them into the unity of the body, the truth that god forgives, and makes us have sober judgment the truth that we are worshiping the living god something more than ourselves because it's not just a personal worship thing. It's actually seen in action in the body. It's alive. So here's Paul spelling out what worship is. And what is worship, it's when we move towards belong in the fellowship, and that comes through sober thinking and thinking about what the what the church members are.

So now what about you? How are you doing here? Is it time to confess that you've not really belonged. It's not like you've been an all you've you've you've you've been like an observer of a body, not a vital part, not prolonged. Is it time to confess your individualism and to renew renew your mind on this?

In this, what are you thinking and praying about that? Have a listen to what 1 John says the apostle John writing his first letter. Listen to what he says in chapter 4. Just listen. Dear friends, Let us love.

He doesn't just stop there. Let us love 1 another. For love comes from god. Everyone who loves has been born of god and knows god. Whoever does not love does not know god because god is love.

This is how god showed his love amongst us. He sent his 1 and only son into the world that we might live through him. This is love, not that we love god, but that he loved us and sent his son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, Since god so loved us, we, or also ought to love on another. Then he goes on.

We love because he first loved us. Whoever claims to love god, yet hates a brother or sister is a liar. A liar. For whoever does not love their brother and sister, whom they have seen cannot love god, whom they have not seen. And he has given us this new commandment, anyone who loves god, must love their brother and sister.

You've got the same sort of stuff in James, where people are so spiritual. They're saying to brothers and sisters, I'll pray for you. Yeah. I'll pray for you and never help. There's no help.

And James says, that's a sham. That's nonsense. That's not faith you're talking about. Or actually you you sing a song in your worship services, James, where you're taken up with the song, and it looks like you're a great worshipper, but you use that same tongue to diss someone and not care for them. So do we need to do something on this?

Let me give you a little time to reflect on this. A transformed mind renews our thinking about brothers and sisters around us. Have a think of that. Ask god, confess perhaps Okay. The first point, I'm gonna use the word to sum it up is humility.

The second point, I'm gonna use the word belonging to sum that up. The third word I'm gonna say is using or doing, using or doing. So my third point is a transformed mind, renews thinking about gift and using them. So verse 6 to 8, we get it here. We have different gifts according to the grace given to each of us.

If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your faith. If it is serving, then service is teaching, then teach If it is to encourage, then give encouragement. If it is giving, then give generously. If it is to lead, do it diligently. If it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully.

Think about gifts, and our mind is to be renewed about thinking about gifts. Look, we don't choose our gifts. Did you notice that? We don't design the body of Christ The finger didn't shout out. I think I wanna be a finger.

I don't wanna be a thumb. Yeah? We we are what we are. By the grace of god. God designs the church.

He designs the body, and we're all given a gift. Every 1 of us has given a gift. To work in the body and belong to each other. So don't think you're great because of your gift. That's 1 application that he's clearly saying.

It's it's not yours to boast about, you know? Don't boast about your gift and think that everyone should serve you because you've got this great gift. And that was going on in the church. You've only got to read 1 Corinthians to see how ugly that had become. Everybody should serve me.

I've got this great gift my gifts better than yours and all that nonsense. No. So god gifts gifts. He gives everyone a gift, so you have got a gift if you're a Christian. You've got a useful gift for the body, the local body in the church here.

You have to be useful. You're going to If you work, don't go to sleep, don't leave it in bed. That will do us more harm than good. We'd be better to cut you off, actually. You know, if the arm is just gonna say I'm staying in bed, then in the end, you have to say, well, I'll just cut cut the thing off and chuck it in the fire.

You know, 1 of those blokes that Steve Kanard used to do this, take it that he used to take he told me about taking an arm to the incendiary, which is like weird, isn't it? It's a weird job, but rather, rather attracted to it. But, you know, that's what happens. So don't think you're a great 1. Don't not use your gift and hide it away or let it rust or let it die.

Use it. And don't let others not use their gift in serving you. That seems to be a big problem, isn't it? Sometimes we're so individualistic, we won't we won't be served. Now I was thinking about this this morning, this is daft, isn't it?

If the if the little toe gets trud on, yeah, and all it hurts all of our body. The whole body goes to the rescue of the toe and to help it out. Imagine the little toe saying, go away. I don't want your help. I won't receive help.

I'm an independent little toe. Go away because that's about as loud as a or so could go. The big toe senior brother, come on. I'm your brother. Let me help you.

No. All and middle toes, now I'm going a bit mental in my thinking, go down in tone. It's it's a it's a bit like the the Jackson 5. Actually, you've got Jamilio or whatever his name is deep here, and you've got little tiny. I'm going on my own.

And when he did go his on, his own, he did go nuts didn't he, actually? But there we go. Little Michael Jackson Tom. It's ridiculous. It's it's Matt it's it's just crazy to do that.

When you need help, please accept it. Don't be so oversensitive that you you actually don't allow the body to to run as the body. Do you see that? We belong. You belong.

If you're hurting, let's hurt with you. If you're laughing, let's laugh with you. Don't hide your gift, Don't think you're a big 1 because you've got a super gift. Use your gift. Use it.

And don't stop people using their gift when you're hurting and in pain. Do you see that? Look what it says. It says at the beginning of verse 6, and then at the end of verse 6, it's quite interesting, isn't it? It says we have different gifts according to the grace given to each of us in accordance with your faith.

We have different gifts. Of course, we have different gifts. But what I'm saying to you is this, will you use your gift for the building up of the church. And I want to say to you, can you carry as much responsibility as your shoulders can take. Now other people may have very broad shoulders and take a lot more than you it's not up to them to start saying, look at what I can carry compared to the piddling little bit you can carry.

That is wrong. That he's saying that's wrong. But can you have can you carry responsibilities within the body of Christ as much as your shoulders will take without you breaking. We don't want you to break because that does the body harm. But without you breaking, take more responsibility, take it on your shoulders.

What is it you can do to show you belong. Do you see that? I think that's really what he's arguing. Take as much responsibility as you possibly can on your shoulders without breaking. Can I challenge you to do that?

Each of you has been given responsibility in accordance with the grace given you Some have lots with big shoulders, some have small shoulder, some are broken at the moment and are just waiting to be mended. So that they can carry a weight. But do you see the body illustration? Take as much weight as you can. Don't lie in bed.

It's a disaster. And then he goes through these various gifts, and I'm not gonna do that. Particularly well, I'll go through them, but I'm not gonna take much time on Look at them. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your faith. I take it.

I'm not gonna go and prove it to you really. I take it the prophesying there. It's not foretelling the future. It's actually preaching. It's taking what the prophets say and speaking the prophets So that's what I'm trying to do right now.

I'm prophesying right now. This is a prophetic word from god to you. That's how I take that. This isn't just Pete Woodcock spouting his ideas. This is a prophetic word to you.

Now for me here that if your gift is prophecy, then prophecy according with your faith, then you take it seriously. You don't muck about. You don't just turn up with an idea. You work it out. You read the scriptures.

You apply the scriptures to scripture. You try and find out whether what you're saying is what the holy spirit says in his holy spirit word. You refresh your own heart. You challenge yourself. You don't stand up and preach at people.

You preach the word of god to yourself. You acknowledge your sin and your dependence on god. You diligently work in order to feed the sheep. That's my job. That's what I am called to do.

So pray for me that I would prophecy in accordance with the faith that I do this job diligently I try to feed you diligently. I try to know you and pick on the things that are you're weak on and and go for you on that to strengthen you. Try to give you extra sizes to do, but the arm wouldn't be weak. You got knee trouble. Well, here's some exercises to help your knee out.

You've got all kind let let the word of God. Pray. Pray for me as I prophesy. That you wouldn't just come here and hear nice words that don't challenge you or or or cut you. I'll pray for that.

So if prophesying, do it. If serving, then serve. Now that's the word for deacon, but I think it's broader than what you might call a deacon now. In other words, take responsibility for serving, giving, responsible, administration, caring for people, serving people. It's something all of us can do.

Some have broad shoulders, You've got, you know, you've got like Paul Simpson whose shoulders are like this, you know. And then some of us says, we need little tiny bad back shoulders. Well, but take it. Serv. If it's teaching, then teach.

If you can teach the kids, then do it, but do it with diligence, with patience, with understanding. Yeah? If it's encouragement, then encourage. That's the word for the Holy Spirit. Comforter.

It's the word for, coming alongside and spurring a brother or sister on. If you're good at that, keep doing it. We certainly need that, don't we? We really need to encourage each other. It's it if you're an encourager, you're you're a joy.

I I do you do you remember I'm I met her at she came with her new husband, to contagious because she hadn't been for ages and she wanted to come along. Do you remember Natalie Dobson? I mean, she's I mean, she used to get on my nerves. She was so positive. I used to say to her, tell me a negative.

Tell me a nage. Oh, Pete, you're so wonderful. And to what? No, I need to hit. I thrive or negative.

No. No. Oh, that's typical you, Pete. So love you know, she's the I I met her husband and I said, mate, I've I've never met anyone like her. You must be the most secure husband in the world.

He said, I am And she's going, oh, that's so lovely. It's so courage and courage. Let's have that. Do it. We have all the technology to encourage with little texts and emails and all kinds of stuff.

Let's encourage each other. Or look, if if it's giving, then give generously. If you can give, give it doesn't say how much. You know, might only be a woman with 2 little mites, but she put in everything. So give generously.

If you've got a gift of giving, give generously, try and earn more money. She didn't give more. Wonderful. Isn't it? How can I how can I if I get that job?

I can earn more money. I can give more hat way of going for that job. Yeah? Or if it's lead, Do it diligently. Lead means stand up before people.

Do it with zeal. Don't moan on about it. You know, do it with if you're gonna be a leader, there's always back benches waffling on and telling us that we're wearing explosives or whatever. There's always weirdos with stupid agendas that are attacked but have no ability to lead themselves. Know, there's always people sitting in the background.

But if you're gonna lead to it diligently, Do it do it with zeal in other words. Go for it. Stop saying, oh, better. I'm not sure. Let's go.

Come on. That's what we want, isn't it? And if it's to show mercy do it cheerfully, that means sympathy, comfort, strengthening, show mercy. It's not only the ability to show mercy. It's the ability to fulfill, you know, you to to fulfill the mercy that you're showing.

So how people We could all do these, but what I love about this is that however frail and broken that we might be, we can all do something of this. We can take a little bit more of a burden on our show. We can all try and encourage. You can you could say to someone next to you. Nice to sit next to you.

And if that's all you can say, well, that's nice, isn't it? Yeah? You could encourage them. Or you weren't listening. You need to listen.

That's Thank you. Yeah? Who's that? Who's doing that? Oh, Max.

See, Max? He's 1 of my max is 1 of my most encouraging listeners. Yeah? So I'm told constantly by I I mean, this is what she said. He loves he gets so excited when I'm preaching, and he's clapping, and Max is there encouraging me.

Thanks Max. Isn't that wonderful? Isn't that wonderful? You know, if you don't know Max, then you know he's got lots of issues but he can encourage. You see that?

That's the body. So let's finish, let's land, back time to finish. No gift or ability is of any value if you don't use it. It's like a dead arm. You cannot really devote yourself to the lord and pretend you're worshiping if you're not actively belonging to a local church.

It's all of a tense. This this passage destroys the idea that I can be a lone Christian that just comes and goes and does nothing. That is true worship. You wanna worship the lord Jesus. I hope you do.

You wanna worship in better and sounder and stronger and give him the glory. Then sober thinking about yourself, think about where you belong and think about using your gifts. Father god help us. We pray in all these things, for the glory of the lord Jesus, our