How to Live a Christ Like Life

TRANSCRIPT

I wanted to ask this morning if you've ever had this situation happen where you've been in the shops and then you walk out and you realise that you're holding something that you've never paid for. Has that ever happened? Oh, you're all shaking your heads. It's happened to me. I was at Coles back at Christmas time and I had decided to go through the self, the self checkout.

And I had, So many groceries, and so I was like unloading them, loading them into bags, and putting them back in the trolley. I was doing it alright. I get out to the car, I'm unloading, and I discover in my shopping trolley is the giant 24 pack of Coca Cola, my vice. Which you now all know as well. and I hadn't paid for it.

Now in that moment, let's be honest, you're like, I'm parked at the furthest possible distance from the shopping center. It's Christmas time. It's busy. It's Coles. Seriously, they've got money, right? Like It's not like it's the little corner store. Like all of this stuff is going through your mind, my mind at least.

And you've got a decision to make in that moment. Are you going to act for self and convenience or are you going to do the right thing? You'll be pleased to know I headed back into the shops and I went to the front counter and I presented myself and I said, Hey, I'm so sorry. I walked out and I didn't pay for this coke.

Do you know what the girl said? She said, you shouldn't have worried about coming back. And I said, she said, we wouldn't have known. And I said I would have. Can I please pay for it? I actually feel like it, she was more inconvenienced than I was by going back. But we have these moments every single day, don't we?

Yeah. And it might seem like a really small thing. And sometimes the things that we're presented with are, they seem insignificant, but they're opportunities to do the right thing. And they can actually reveal a lot about our character and our life. And I'm sure that you could share similar stories.

There are probably been times when you found the wallet. And you've returned it, you've made a way to find the owner with the cash still inside of it. Or maybe you, I don't know, you chose to be honest. You chose to give somebody the credit at work where credit was due. Maybe you've stuck to a commitment even though a more appealing social offer came up.

These are all opportunities that we have that kind of, give us that choice, as I said, to not choose self and not choose convenience, but to do something that responds with integrity of character. So today, as Pastor Kevin Taylor said, I want to unpack what it means to live counter culturally, not just in the big and the obvious parts of life where everybody sees them, but also in the private parts of our lives.

The Gospel, it calls us to live differently. And the decisions that we make in private when nobody else is looking, they actually become the building blocks for the actions and the character that we live out. At Our Church, for those of you that have been a part of this place for a while, and even if you're new or you're, visiting online, you would have heard us talk about, our values.

We have a set of values that we live by. And these are not just words that are framed and hung up on a wall, but they are values that come from the teachings of Jesus and that we choose to live by. And one of those values, and you'll see it right down the bottom, is counterculture. And we defined it back when we put these values together as living a Christ like life, pursuing full maturity in Christ with character and with integrity.

We are a people who seek to walk in holiness. And who stand for what Jesus taught, even when it's not culturally popular. That is what it means to be counterculture. You could say that counterculture begins when sin doesn't win. Now whether you profess to be a Jesus follower or not if you've ever looked into the life that Jesus led, I'm sure that you would agree that he profoundly changed the cultural norms of his time.

And I love just unpacking then and hearing what you guys all have noticed about the life that Jesus led when it comes to being counterculture in his teachings, he introduced so many new perspectives on so many things. And one of the ones that I love is that he taught us about compassion. You read about when he shared the story of the good Samaritan, and he's giving us a new way of living where he says no longer.

Is it okay just to walk past somebody, to walk around them? No, we've got to lean in. We've got to take action. We've got to respond with compassion and love and mercy. We've got to let go of self and choose to live the kind of life that he did. And in his teachings modelled for us just this radical new perspective on what it looks like to live.

And there's this beautiful passage in Matthew chapter five, and many of you would be familiar with it. We call it the Beatitudes, and it completely changes the way we even think about what life looks like. He talks about blessed are those who are poor in spirit, and blessed are those who, who mourn, and blessed are those who are meek, and blessed are those who are merciful.

and who are peacemakers and who are pure in heart. And he puts this beautiful list together of the way that we can live. And then he says, and he rounds it all out with this thought that you can be salt and you can bring light. to the community that you live in when you live like that. Jesus flips everything on its head that the culture and that we've been taught about success and happiness.

He turns it all upside down. And instead he brings us a message about humility and love and forgiveness in a world that really is more focused on self and power and status and success. And, Jesus, throughout the gospel, he's not just giving us some nice sayings and some lovely things to aspire to live by.

He was doing something incredibly radical. He was inviting us, each and every one of us today, to live a life that goes beyond or, uh, the opposite way of the grain of the world. Not living lives that are based on popular opinion, not living lives that are based on what culture says is right. Not even living a life that's based on what I think should happen, but instead living a life with a heart that aligns with the word of God and the character of Christ.

Choosing to follow Jesus is not a one time prayer. and then showing up on Sunday with my Bible and a smile, and living like nothing has changed Monday to Saturday. It's about a complete transformation of our lives. And I love what Pauline shared last week as she talked to us about what that lifelong journey of transformation looks like that comes from Christ and from the spirit that resides within us.

When we choose as followers. of Jesus to live a counterculture life. It's not just because we want to be different for the sake of being different. It's actually because we're choosing to live for the one that we love most in this world. Jesus. So what does that look like though? How do we live out this, in a world that really constantly pulls us in the opposite direction?

The Apostle Paul gives us some clues. He wrote a letter to some Roman Christians right on this topic to help them with it. Now, Paul is possibly one of the least most likely people you would think would shape this. The Christian faith. He had a divine encounter and he was transformed by God's grace.

And he went from being a persecutor of Christians to being like one of the most influential voices in his time and now for the gospel. And so he's writing to the believers in Rome and Rome at that time was a city that was, like the cultural and the political center of the ancient world. And so the Romans were surrounded by a culture that was powerful and wealthy and driven by selfishness and pleasure and ambition.

You could say it was similar. To what we are living in now. And yet Paul called them and he calls us to live differently. So let's unpack what he wrote to the Romans back then. It was in Romans 12, and we're gonna start at verse one. This is, 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, a living sacrifice. Now, at the time when Paul wrote this, the Romans were very familiar with sacrifices. This was a part of their worship of God and had been for centuries. It was part of their tradition. And so this would have been a really vivid image for them. And he's saying now, don't just bring a dead animal.

He's saying bring Your entire life, every part of us should be offered as worship. When we choose to follow Jesus, we surrender our life in its entirety. All of our life is offered under his authority and his lordship. Our old lives are dead. And that is represented so beautifully, isn't it?

When we go through the waters of baptism and we declare that our lives are, it's no longer I that lives. It's Christ who lives within me. And so we hold nothing back from God when we choose to surrender to him. When we choose to bring our lives as a living sacrifice, our everyday living. becomes worship.

It's all his. Our soul, our mind, our body, our desires, our homes, our work, our words, our thoughts, our dreams, they're all offered to Jesus as an act of worship. And so then he continues. He says, do not be conformed to the pattern of this world, but be transformed. By what? By the renewing of your mind. And then you will be able to test and approve God's will.

His good, pleasing and perfect will. Now if we go back one screen, the word conform here, it literally means to be moulded. or to be shaped by something. And so Paul is warning us, don't let the shape, don't let the world shape you. Don't let culture around you dictate how you should respond and how you should act.

Don't let culture around you dictate your values and your principles and your priorities and your way of life. Instead, he says, be transformed. By the renewing of your mind. Transformation begins in our minds as we allow the Holy Spirit to renew our thinking and align our thoughts with God's truth and Phil unpacked this for us.

I think the very first week of this series, it's not about information. It's about transformation. Paul is not just talking about accumulating head knowledge or trying to live, according to a certain list or, a set of rules. He's actually talking about a transformation that is fuelled by the Holy Spirit, aligning our thoughts and our actions with God's will, living out of his power, not self.

And that's why I love. my daily devotions. And that's why you will hear us constantly talk about our daily devotions, because the personal revelation that you get when you read his word. And not just stop there, but then apply it to your life. That's where transformation happens. It takes it from here to here and the life change is real.

We discover that God has truths for us that affect every single part of our lives, how we conduct our relationships. How we serve one another, how we forgive one another, how we show grace to one another. He tells us how we can honour him in marriage and in singleness. He tells us how we can honour him with our finances.

And by picking up a towel and serving one another, he tells us that all of work can become worship. He speaks into literally every single part of our lives. And as we discover these truths, we are then called. to act in obedience to them and to live them out. Culture, counterculture begins when sin doesn't win.

Because when we see this transformation happen in our lives, something incredible happens. We actually begin to walk in freedom. We're no longer tied to the desires and the things of this world, but we're living for Him. And we begin to look more like Him, don't we? That's what the purpose of transformation is.

Less of Ruth, more of Him. We start to live according to not the world's values, but the values of the kingdom of God. We live in a culture that tells us though constantly what we should value, how we should live. It defines what success looks like here and now. And even though we know that we're only passing through this world, it's still a really strong pull.

But the gospel has a stronger pull and it calls us to something different. Let's think about just, I could have, there were so many examples I wanted to give this morning, but even if we just look at relationships when you look at relationships through the natural, like through the world and the culture around us, you could say, let's, I've got a little diagram that they are sometimes, not always, but sometimes defined by selfishness.

They can be me centric. They can be about instant gratification here and now and they can sometimes be about Convenience, but what does Jesus say? He says in John 13 a new commandment I give you love one another as I have loved you. You must love one another It's by this that people will know that you are my disciples and so kingdom culture says that we're to love others As Christ has loved us and to love sacrificially and to forgive generously.

There's another beautiful passage in Philippians two you might be familiar with. It says, don't do anything out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility, consider others. better than yourselves. And so we take that on board, that kingdom culture thinking, and we say how can I prioritize somebody else's need in this moment?

How can I, in every relationship that I'm encountering, ask, what does love require? in this space. It's a different way to, to live, but it's all about kingdom culture. And, as we are beginning to be transformed and our lives align with the values of the kingdom rather than the world, we look really different.

Decisions and moments actually become opportunities to obey him. to worship him, to serve him with our whole lives, the one that we love most. We live for the audience of one. I so love that phrase, and we know that when we live that way, when we're living for the audience of one, that his ways, when we choose to enter in them, they are life giving and they are life bringing.

And for me, this idea is what holds me firm. in any decision that I have to make, knowing that I am loved by the one who has given me life and love and freedom and forgiveness and healing and peace and hope. All of this is found in the person of Jesus. How could I not offer him my whole life? So when I'm faced with a decision, I choose what God says.

It sounds so simple and it actually is. An example of this would be many of you know that I'm single and I am choosing to wait for marriage, which is what God says about the topic of relationships that there's something really special for the marriage relationship and I have had though a lot of people along my journey ask me why would you do that?

I've had friends ask, I've had colleagues ask, Not these colleagues. Colleagues when I was not working at the church in my former workplaces. And do you know what I say? I say because I'm choosing the one I love more. The one I love most. My reference point for any decision that I make in life.

is the character of Christ and what the kingdom of God has to say. Not what the world says is popular or right, but the authority of Jesus. God can and God should speak into every single aspect of our lives. Every single aspect. Not just some things. And when we live like this, we become authentic and consistent, not living one way here and another way at home, one way here and another way at work, one way here on a Sunday morning, maybe in front of the people that we want to impress, but living an entirely different way across the week.

When we live for the audience of one, there is no duplicity. The masks are taken off and a life of character and integrity should honour God no matter where I am or no matter who I am with, because we want to honour God. more than anyone else. Living counterculture is not just about the big public decisions that we make when people are watching.

It starts with the small, private decisions when no one else is looking. That's what integrity is, right? Who you are. when no one else is seeing. Many of you I've got an example that I want to share and I wasn't sure whether I'd do it, but I'm going to do it. Cause it's funny and a little bit awkward, but I thought that I will share it in the hope that when you think about it across the week you'll actually think about something really important and that is your private life.

So many of you will have. heard and seen this story go viral on social media and in the news from the Paris Olympics. This was one of the least crass headlines that I could find about this situation. It says, French pole vaulter goes viral after bar mishap. Yep. That story. So Anthony. Amarati, I think is how you pronounce his name.

He suffered an unfortunate mishap as he attempted to clear the bar at the Olympics in the men's pole vaulting qualification rounds. And he started really solidly, to be honest, like he had a great run in and he launched well, and it was looking pretty good, and he almost cleared the bar. Almost. But instead, he accidentally knocked it down with his privates.

That is what happened. And as humorous as it is to recount that and to perhaps have watched it on the news, it actually didn't end well for him. He was knocked out of the competition and His hopes of making the final and perhaps winning an Olympic medal crashed and burned because he was taken out.

His privates led to his downfall in a very public way. And I know you laugh, but private decisions can have public consequences.

And you're not going to forget that now, are you?

I wonder actually that this humorous story actually reflects a truth that we often overlook. in our own lives. There are moments that we think are private. There are moments that we think that nobody else is looking and that this decision or this action is not going to affect anybody else and that maybe it won't matter in the grand scheme of things, but they can.

A little white lie, skipping out on a responsibility. Maybe the kind of content that you find yourself constantly consuming. Maybe it's holding on to a root of bitterness. and just ruminating on and on that. Maybe it's fudging numbers on a report at work or striking up a chat on Messenger with an old boyfriend and not letting your spouse know about it.

What happens in private is often what takes people out in public. Small private actions can accumulate and they can lead to a larger, more public consequence that can affect your life and your relationships. Think about the headlines that sadly we often read about people that we respect and honor.

And oftentimes, when moral failure, as we call it, has happened, the Dan downfall actually began. many years or many moments earlier with a seemingly small private compromise. Our private decisions serve as the building blocks of our character and our actions and our habits and they ultimately become the foundation of a life that honours Jesus and lives, according to his truths every single day.

Living sacrifices bring all of their life, not just their public life, not just on a Sunday. Oh, I'm going very, sorry, not just on a Sunday in front of the people that we want to be respected by. but also in secret when nobody else is looking. We need to ask the Holy Spirit to help us shift our thinking and to align our private lives as well as our public lives with God's will, not the world.

So how do we do that? First of all, we live a spirit led life. We walk intimately with Jesus. We allow him to speak into and to convict us when there are things that we're doing that we shouldn't be. We consume this. We consume this. And we discover what God has to say about the ways that we should live.

But also we should choose to practice gratitude. And I know that might sound a little bit strange in the middle of a message on counter cultural living. And it's really simple, but it's really powerful. Often, it's a lack of gratitude that leads us to look for greener pastures or to, cut the corner in the business deal or because we want to get something better or somewhere faster or, do you know what I mean?

But if we are people that practice gratitude, we find that our hearts are content. Throughout the New Testament, we read about gratitude. Jesus actually says that gratitude is an act of worship and When we express our thanks to God, we're not only thanking him for his goodness, but we're also deepening our relationship with him.

and acknowledging his sovereignty and his grace in our lives. Gratitude isn't just a flippant gesture. It's a posture that we take. And in that we reflect back to God, our thanks for his provision for all of our life. We recognize and we thank him that every good and perfect gift that we have comes from him.

And I don't know about you, but I am grateful for God. I am so grateful for Jesus Christ. I am so grateful for the gift of this. I'm so grateful that we have a resource available to us. We can read in the old covenant and learn stories about, the characters that live and we can learn. But in the new covenant, we not only learn, but we apply what we're learning.

This is something that we should be so grateful for. So don't leave it on your bedside table, Monday to Saturday. Pick it up, devour what it says, apply it to your life, download the Bible app, find a community, join a village and learn together, just be discipled together in what God would have us do.

Paul wrote these words when he was in prison. He was facing uncertainty and hardship. He was even facing possible death and yet he speaks of a peace that passes all understanding. And you know what that comes from? an eternal perspective founded in gratitude and trust in God. When we live with gratitude, we invite God's peace into our hearts.

And that is counter cultural. Gratefulness shifts our focus from what we don't have. And it reminds us what we do have. And it reminds us of God's faithfulness and his kindness and his goodness in our lives. The greatest thing that we have to be grateful for. When you surrender your life to Him, He gives you a new life.

Forgiveness, grace, hope, joy, and freedom, and gratitude helps us to stay focused on Jesus and to live a for the audience of one, choosing to reflect his light and his love to the people around us. As the team come up and we finished this morning, I wanted to just finish with this quote that is actually quite heartbreaking.

Brennan Manning has said that the greatest single cause of atheism in the world today is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips and walk out the door and deny him with their lifestyle. This is what an unbelieving world is. simply finds unbelievable. As followers of Christ, we should look different.

We should behave differently. We need to live counterculture lives with actions that represent who Christ is to the world around us. And can you imagine the power in our communities? When each of us chose to live like that, a people whose lives are centered in Christ, a people whose lives don't deny him, but whose words and lives reflect him to the world around us, that kind of spirit led and spirit empowered life.

And it shows that Jesus changes everything. I've asked the team this morning to lead us in a really old song, but it's really beautiful. And I just wanted to give us each a moment, even now, to ask the Holy Spirit to speak to you. about everything that we've talked about this morning and maybe even in this moment he's going to reveal to you something really specific that you could do.

Maybe it's deleting a particular app off your phone that's, not going to result in a healthy relationship or choosing to stop consuming particular content. Maybe it will be a way of thinking that you've had that, It is not lining up with what God says about you as a child of his.

Maybe he's just going to highlight an area of your thoughts or your actions where Jesus does not have the final authority currently in your life. And I just would ask you to allow him the Holy Spirit to reveal that to you so that we can actually make a change and live differently because of his power.

Yeah. And. I just want to ask you as a body of people to, along with me, ask for forgiveness for when we stuff it up, because we're just human, but our God is gracious and loving and he is kind. But to commit every single day and moment by moment, To live a life that is counterculture. To choose to present all of life as a living sacrifice to Him.

So would you pray with me and then we'll ask the team to lead us. Heavenly Father, that is our simple prayer this morning, that we would live for You, only for You. God, I think of the words of this beautiful song that we're about to sing. Turn your eyes upon Jesus, look full in his wonderful face, and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of your glory and grace.

I thank you, God, that as we focus on you, living counterculture actually becomes a joy because we're living for something so much greater than ourselves. And Holy Spirit, help us. Help us to bring all of our life, the public part and the private part, as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to you, as you transform us.

And we thank you for that in Jesus name.