Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Speaker A: I want to thank Sarah for reminding us last Sunday how important. How important it is for us to show honor for one another. And she did an awesome job.
I also want to thank our elders for the quality work they do and their diligent efforts in getting our buddy Jovan ordained. They're beautiful people.
Our dear Heavenly Father, I pray this morning that you would enlighten our understanding to the riches of your character and how generous you are with what is best about you.
And I pray that as we see you clearly, we could be more like you.
In Christ's name, amen.
I have spoken to you on many occasions about generosity.
I wish I could convince everyone to be a weekly giver to the church, but there are things that money won't buy.
We have to be generous in more than just economic ways, and God models that for us.
God is generous with the qualities of his character.
In fact, Paul tells us that he is rich in kindness, clemency, and patience.
And he says, because God is rich in these character qualities, we live a better life and we have hope for eternity.
This is exactly what he says. Romans, chapter 2, verse 1.
Therefore, you have no excuse, O man, every one of you who judges, for in passing judgment on another, you condemn yourself because you, the judge, practiced the very same things.
We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things.
Paul starts out this teaching by saying, we don't have any good excuse for having an ungenerous spirit toward other people.
In fact, this word that gets translated, excuse, it's a very rare word. It's only used two times in the whole Bible. And both of them are right here in this chapter, this verse, and verse 15.
And at the core of this word is the ability to explain or defend yourself if you have an ungenerous spirit toward other people.
Paul says there's no defendable reason for that.
Who is he talking to when he says you have no excuse? Oh, man. Who exactly is he thinking of when he wrote that?
Well, it turns out there are two categories of people that he was probably thinking about.
The first are called noble pagans. They're people like Seneca. Seneca was a Stoic philosopher who lived at the same time as the apostle Paul.
And he became very well known for his ability to teach quality human character.
The trouble is, Seneca taught one thing and did another.
Seneca taught that we ought to be generous with the poor and lived in a villa that was ridiculously expensive.
Seneca taught that we ought to be kind. And he helped Nero plot the murder of his own Mother.
Not exactly what I would call a very noble guy.
So Paul, when he's thinking. He may be thinking of people in the Roman world who are very good at giving a philosophy of life, but they don't live it at all.
I think we have to hear this.
It's one thing to say, I am a Christian. It's another thing to live a Christian life.
And that's what Paul is talking about here.
Paul is saying it's not enough for you to understand what is virtuous and what is good and healthy.
You got to start putting these things into practice in your daily life.
And the issue that he wants to use as an illustration is the evaluations that we make of other people.
And this is what Paul says.
You may have worked yourself out a really good philosophy. You may have really good ideas about what a good life is and what it isn't.
But I see you treating people in such unacceptable ways that. How do you think.
You're not even going to pass your own. You don't even pass your own evaluations.
How do you expect to pass the evaluation of God?
Ah, I hope some of you can feel this. I feel it in myself.
My conscience commonly says to me, you are not as good as you should be.
[00:06:55] Speaker B: Church.
[00:06:56] Speaker A: Does yours.
Does your conscience from time to time say to you, you're not getting this right?
All right.
So Paul says, if you feel that in yourself, you ought to be more generous in your evaluations of others.
If you feel in your own self the difficulty of trying to live the quality life you want to live, that ought to make you more generous in how you evaluate others.
The second group of people are very strict religious people who have the idea that I'm better than other people because I obey more rules than they do.
And Paul makes a kind of long argument in the whole book of Romans about deceiving yourself that you're better than other people because you live by a certain set of rules.
He's. He's wanting to address the human condition.
And the human condition is we have a tendency to look at other people and to judge them improperly.
We have a tendency to look at other people and not be generous enough in our evaluations of them.
It's too. We are too quick to see what's wrong with people and too slow to see what's good with people.
This is the argument Paul's making. He's saying, if you don't have a generous attitude toward others, you are.
You are putting yourself in a precarious place with God.
Listen what he Says you don't have any grounds to defend yourself. All the ones judging other people, because the way you judge them, you condemn yourself.
Ungenerous judgments say more about you than they do about the person you're judging.
When you look at someone and you permit yourself to be ungenerous with them in your opinion of them, it says more about you than it says about that person.
Do I need to illustrate this or is it self explanatory?
All right, here's how it works.
You look at someone, you're in the grocery store, you're in the line.
Somebody's taken way too long in the line. It's starting to get on your nerves, and you start making evaluations of them.
What is this idiot doing?
No, okay.
When I do that, it says more about me than it says about the person who's in line ahead of me, struggling to get through the line just like I am.
Do you hear this? This is Paul's argument. We have to be generous in our thinking about other people because the way we think about other people, we end up condemning ourselves.
Some of you say, but, Doc, they really are bad. You don't know the people I know.
These people are really losers.
Could I remind you that Jesus said one day to some very religious people, you, who do not have any sin, you throw the first stone.
[00:11:17] Speaker B: Church.
[00:11:22] Speaker A: I'm not saying that you don't have to deal with broken people out there. You do. But guess what, brother, sister, people have to deal with you too.
Do you hear this?
Of course. When people have to deal with me, I feel like they should be generous with me. They don't know how hard a day I'm having, right?
But when I'm on the other side, I'm going, what is wrong with these people? Just park your car and get off the road.
This is exactly what Paul is talking about. Now, look, husbands and wives, I want to talk to you for a minute. If there's anybody in the world you should be generous with in your evaluation, it's your spouse.
[00:12:19] Speaker B: Amen.
[00:12:20] Speaker A: Would you please open your heart to me? If there's anybody in the world that you should be generous with in the way you evaluate them, it's your spouse.
I guarantee you, the more generous you are with your spouse, the happier relationship you'll have.
We start ruining our relationships when we can't be generous with each other.
When.
When we impose our judgments on reality.
Ah, you didn't do that on purpose.
I knew you wouldn't do that. What have you just done?
You've just Poured gas on the fire.
Right?
On the other hand. On the other hand, if you say, I understand, ah, ah, it's no big deal.
You've done a generous evaluation and you've caused the person to appreciate you more.
[00:13:32] Speaker B: Church.
[00:13:35] Speaker A: Parents, the same thing is true with kids. Be generous in your opinion of your children.
Don't drop your negative predictions on them.
You'll never get into college with those grades.
Kids get into college all the time with bad grades. Where do you live?
There are colleges that only take you if you have bad grades.
All right, you want them to do well, but they're not going to do better because you have a.
You are sharing an ungenerous opinion of them.
Can you hear me?
Jesus also said, with the measure you measure, it will be measured to you.
Could I tell you this again? I've shared it with you many times, but here it is again.
You teach people how to treat you by how you treat them.
You teach people how to treat you by how you treat them. With the measure you measure, it will be measured to you.
And so I want to ask you, are you generous in your evaluations of others?
Or maybe I need to ask you, how might you become more generous in your evaluation of others?
And then Paul contrasts our judgment with God's judgment. Verse 2. We know that the judgment of God is according to truth.
I know my evaluations can be pretty messed up, and they can. They can come out of flawed places in me, but God's evaluations are always true. Do you hear this?
God's evaluations are always true.
When Paul says, we know who is the we in there?
When Paul says, in this verse, we know that the judgment of God is true, who is the we he's thinking of?
It's the people who have already experienced the generosity of God's judgment.
Do you know how generous God has been in evaluating you?
I am very, very aware. If I was God, I would have fired me a long time ago.
If I was God, I would have sent me to the dust bend a long time ago. But he's been so generous in his evaluations of me. He's found ridiculous ways to tap into the richness of his kindness. And again and again and again, be generous to me in my. In my. In my soul. Can you say the same thing?
And God's judgments are always consistent with the truth.
God's generosity in reality confirms his generosity in judgment.
Now let me explain this.
Have you ever really, really been bad hurt or really bad sick?
I had an accident in the 80s and I came as close to dying as you can get.
God didn't want me to mess up heaven, so he didn't let me die.
When I look at that event in my life, I say, if it weren't for the kindness of God, I would not have survived that.
Can you look at things in your life that you say, if it weren't for the kindness of God, I'd have never got through that church?
Or have you had. Have you had emotional trauma? And you say, if it weren't for the kindness of God, I would, I would not have survived that.
Okay, this is God's generosity in your daily reality. If God is that kind to you in your daily reality, surely that kindness is an expression of the way he really evaluates you and judges you.
What if it turns out God loves you infinitely more than you've ever imagined and his judgments come out of the riches of his love and they don't come out of his annoyance with your failures?
Can you hear this Church?
Ah, let me remind you God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved.
And why is that true? Because God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son. Can you hear this? I believe if you could see how God judges you differently, you would be inspired to have a more generous evaluation of other people.
Verse 3.
Do you suppose, O man, who judges those who practice such things and yet do them yourself, that you will escape the judgment of God?
Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?
Paul asked two questions here.
[00:20:11] Speaker B: His.
[00:20:11] Speaker A: His first question is, do you calculate, O man, the one judging the ones practicing these kind of things and doing them yourself, that you will escape the judgment of God?
This question is addressed to thinking people.
The word that gets translated. Suppose the Greek word logizo, from which we get our English word logic, logi logic.
We just drag it over into English and it's, it's, it's. Paul likes this word. He uses it 19 times in the book of Romans. He likes this word.
And it's the word for being rational. It's the word for mentally calculating.
It's the word for being thoughtful.
And this is what he says.
Have you thought about this?
Have you calculated how God sees you when he has been so kind to you and you don't follow his model and you're so harsh to others?
Have you calculated how that, what the results of that's going to be.
Can I remind you, Jesus loved to tell parables. And he told the parable that two men owed another man money.
One of these men owed millions of dollars.
The loan came due and the man who had owed all the money showed up at the guy he borrowed the money from and said, I can't pay right now, but if you'll be patient with me, I'll pay everything.
And the guy who made the loan said, yeah, I can do that. I'll be patient with you.
The guy who just got a reprieve on his million dollar loan went out and ran into a guy who owed him $100.
And the guy who just got a reprieve on his million dollar loan, he grabbed the guy who owed him $100 by the throat and started choking him and saying, pay me what you owe.
And the guy said, I'm a little short now, would you just give me a little more time, I promise you I'll get the hundred bucks to you.
And the guy said, no, I'm not giving you any extra time turning you over right now.
Well, some other people who were friends with this guy, it bothered them and they went to the guy who was owed a million dollars and they told him the story.
And the guy called the guy who owed the money to him. He called him in again, he goes, what is wrong with you?
You owed me millions. And I, and I was, I was generous with you.
This guy owes you a stinking hundred dollar bill and you're abusing him.
And then Jesus into that parable by saying back in the day, you could go into debtors prison. The guy who was owed a million dollars said, I'm going to treat you exactly the way you treated this other guy.
And Jesus warned us, it was a big warning, that if God is so generous with us and he's so kind to us and he's so forbearing and patient with us, it is absolutely necessary that we follow his example and treat the people around us the way he treats us.
Can you hear it, Church?
Let me ask you a few questions. Have you calculated your present state of generosity toward others?
Are you generous in your thoughts?
Do you give people the benefit of the doubt or is it much easier for you to see everything with a little sinister twist on it?
Are you generous in your thoughts of others or are you jaded and it's easy for you to see the ugly you want to see?
Are you generous in your judgments?
We all have to make evaluations every single day. We all have to.
But how generous are you?
You see some mom in the grocery store and her kid is just having a meltdown.
Do you. Do you make a generous judgment or do you go, man, that mother is a bad mother.
Well, how do you know?
How could you possibly know?
Can you be a good mother and have a child who has a bad day?
I hope so.
[00:26:08] Speaker B: Church.
[00:26:09] Speaker A: You think the mom's having any fun?
Well, you think she's.
This is great. I love it.
Are you generous in your judgments of other people? At moments like that, Are you generous with your words?
Do you say the kind of things that encourage people?
Or do you love to get that jab in?
Are you generous with your help?
Does it make sense to you as you go through your day and you encounter people who are having difficulties to help them See, this is what Paul is arguing. He's making a strong argument that God has been ridiculously generous with us.
And he looks at our life and asks us to follow through and treat others the very same way he's treating us.
If God treated you the way you treat others, what would your life look like?
If God thought about you the way you're thinking about other people, how would that go?
If God judged you the same way you judge other people, how would that go?
If God spoke to you the way you speak to other people, how would that go?
If God helped you the way you help other people, how would that go?
And just one more, just one more.
If God complained about you the way you complain about other people, how would that go?
Did you hear this?
Paul is pushing us. He's saying God is generous with what is best about him.
He wants us to learn that from him and practice it in a broken world.
Paul asks the second question, verse four.
Do you despise.
Do you think poorly of the riches of his kindness and clemency and patience?
Not knowing, being ignorant, that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?
This question addresses people who have not learned a very important concept. They're ignorant of something. And what is the important concept? That the kindness of God helps you change your mind?
Repentance is metanoia. I change my mind.
I don't think there's anything wrong with changing your mind. Look, it's part of. It's part of getting more intelligent and growing up. If you never change your mind, you're just stubborn.
Do you hear this?
Intelligent people figure stuff out and say, I don't think about this the way I used to think about it.
Spiritually maturing people change their mind.
They start thinking about life differently than they did when they were spiritually immature.
Now Paul says some of you haven't thought about a very important idea and it's leading to a big mistake in your life. It is the kindness of God that lead you to change your mind.
Without the kindness of God, we are stuck in damaging thought patterns.
Are you self aware enough to know you've got damaging thought patterns? If you keep thinking that way, it's not going to turn out well.
Church, you got an ugly thought in your head about somebody, you think it over and over and over and over again. That's not gonna turn out well.
It is the kindness of God. It is the generosity of his kindness that God shows up in my life and says, dude, that is not healthy thinking. I need to help you change the way you're thinking.
That's his kindness that does that.
What about ugly attitudes? It is the kindness of God that leads the spirit that I have.
Being ignorant of the kindness of God that helps me change.
I am in danger of thinking poorly of the riches of his character.
Do you hear this?
Now Paul's going to tell us three characteristics of God. Where he is infinitely wealthy.
God is infinitely rich in kindness.
He generously spins his kindness on us.
Why?
Because of his pure, inexpressible love.
God is infinite in kindness.
And day after day after day he dips into the wealth of his kindness and he spins it on us.
God is extravagantly spending the riches of his kindness on you and me.
The second is, it's translated forbearance.
But that's another word that we don't really use in the English language much, do we?
I was forbearing last week at work.
It's kind of. It's kind of dropped out of our.
I'm going to try the word clemency. This is the idea of we are, we are more quick to forgive.
God is infinitely wealthy in the impulse to forgive.
Do you get this?
God wants to forgive you more than you want to be forgiven.
That's who he is. That's his nature.
His greatest desire is to look at you and say, I forgive you.
Your sins are forgiven.
I remember them no more.
I've removed your sins as far as the east is from the West. These are the thoughts of God.
And he is infinitely wealthy in the impulse to forgive. You cannot sin beyond the wealth of his forgiveness.
Do you hear?
And now he's saying, I'm going to ex. I'm never going to exhaust the wealth of my forgiveness. You can always come to me and be forgiven.
But I want you to draw on the riches of my forgiveness also. And I want you to start forgiving those people around you.
CHURCH Some of you have held a grudge for way too long. It's time to forgive.
Can you hear this? You say, oh, Doc, you don't know what they did. You don't know how you have offended God.
And out of the riches, the riches of his clemency, he forgives you again and again and again and again because of who he is.
And now he says, if you want to be my people, I want you to be generous in forgiveness just like I am.
[00:34:43] Speaker B: Church.
[00:34:46] Speaker A: And then patience. God is infinitely rich in patience. I always hate to speak about patience because I have no credibility.
But I know one thing.
The patience of God is infinitely rich.
God is patient beyond human comprehension.
In my own life, God has been ridiculously patient with me.
If God's patience could be exhausted, I would have done it.
But his patience is infinite. And day after day after day after day, he reaches into the vault of his patience and spins and spins and spins on me. Can you hear this?
[00:35:40] Speaker B: Church?
[00:35:42] Speaker A: And then he says, I want you to be my people, and I want you to be as patient with others as I am being with you.
[00:35:52] Speaker B: Church.
[00:35:57] Speaker A: If I'm not aware that it is the infinite wealth of God's character that makes me a better person, I am in danger of thinking poorly of the quality of God's character.
Have you ever thought someone didn't deserve to be treated as good as God treated them?
They didn't deserve that.
Anyone?
What are you thinking? God? Those people aren't even good people, and they won the lottery. You should be giving that money to me.
All right, listen, listen.
When I see the riches of the kindness, the forgiveness and the patience of God and how he spins them day after day after day after day on us, it changes how I want to treat other people.
Church I want to be more kind to people. I want to be more forgiving. I want to be more patient because I see the benefit I get by God treating me that way.
I see it makes me a better person. It changes my mind.
My mind is not changed because God is harsh, because he kicks me to the curb, because he scares me to death. That doesn't change my mind at all.
But when I think, oh, how he strives to be kind to me, oh, how he goes out of his way to forgive me, oh, how ridiculously patient he's been with me, that changes my mind. And that makes me want to be a better man.
[00:38:00] Speaker B: Church.
[00:38:03] Speaker A: And then Paul ends This by saying, because of your hard and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath for yourself. In the day of Wrath, when God's righteous judgment will be revealed, he will render to each one according to his works.
Paul ends this thought on the generosity of God with a warning.
Who is this warning to? It's to people who are stubborn and refuse to change their mind.
If you're sitting here this morning and saying, ah, that may be true for other people, but it's not true for me.
If you're sitting here this morning saying, I'm already too kind.
If you're sitting here this morning and saying, I've already forgiven more than I ever ought to have to forgive, if you're sitting here this morning and saying, ah, this person does not deserve my patience, you don't understand.
You're the person Paul's talking to.
You've allowed your heart to be stubborn.
You say to God, I like your kindness to me.
But this person that you're asking me to be kind to, they're not like me. They don't deserve it.
I kind of deserve your kindness. This person doesn't. Do you see the argument Paul is making?
And he says that kind of stubbornness endangers you with God.
Because God said, your whole life long, I've spent my kindness on you. Your whole life long, I've forgiven you and forgiven you and forgiven you. Your whole life long I've been patient to you.
And you're saying to God, yeah, but it's different. I deserve it and that person doesn't. And Paul says, that is a dangerous, dangerous way of thinking.
There's a second group that he's talking to, those who won't change their mind.
Some of you know it's true, but you think that's a harder way to live than the way I'm living right now.
Do well for me, huh?
I want people to be afraid to offend me, that I might not forgive them. That's worked out pretty well for me so far.
Paul is saying, if you won't change your mind, even though you know this is the way of God, it's a danger. You put your soul in danger.
Paul is saying when you hear this, that God is infinitely kind, infinitely forgiving, infinitely patient.
And he's asking you to receive that from him and share it with others.
And you won't change your mind. You endanger your soul. That's what Paul is telling us.
Whoever refuses to appreciate the generosity of God, his extravagant spending of kindness, clemency and patience, endangers themselves when God judges all in a right way.
But I can't. I'm not going to lend. There. We're ending on a better note. Martin Luther wrote, everything Christ does tends to help us acquire a loving confidence to the Father.
To simply fear God confers no benefit but to bear to Him a companionable love of rare quality makes us blessed.
Listen what Luther's saying.
Luther saying, everything God does, he does to raise your sins.
How lovable he is.
Everything Christ wants you to know that God is infinitely lovable.
To just be afraid of God is not what God wants.
What he wants is a companionable love. He wants you to love him as a companion.
He wants to say, I'm going to bless you in every way you can be blessed and this is all I want back in return. I want you to love me as your companion, as your friend.
And then Paul says, verse 6.
Whoever appreciates the generosity of God, his extravagant spending of kindness, clemency and patience, and follows his generous example, they will be rewarded generously.
You see, God doesn't just say, I'm going to be kind to you, I'm going to forgive you, I'm going to be patient with you. He says, if you do that for others, I'm going to. I'm going to bless your socks off.
I'm going to reward you for that. That's the kind of thing God likes to invest in.
Our dear Heavenly Father, I pray that we could see the riches of your grace.
I pray that we could sense how incredibly kind and forgiving and patient you've been with us.
And I pray that as we understand that, it would change our mind and we would be more generous in our treatment of the people around us.
And I pray that people would see our good works and glorify you in heaven. Amen.
