Do you, do you know, one of the things that, um. Creates difficulties for fathers stepping up and, and, uh, really leading the way God wants them to do? Up it's this little thing called sports. And, and John gets up here. I think he begins, this time of the year, he begins like every message talking about some college football team. OK. How many love college football? Great. There's 6 of you here. And I'm not one of them. It is a college football messing up young dads. You know what it is? It's T-ball. Yeah, it's T-ball. It, it's like, it's, it's soccer. It's volleyball. We have to help our son, who has 3 young kids, because they all, 5 and 6 and 11 years old, they all go in different directions. And we literally have gone to a volleyball game one day, the same day, gone to a softball game, and the same day had to get a child to, uh, gymnastics. It's just constant, isn't it? And, and so you're running all over the place. Here's a picture of my granddaughter last year. Yeah, isn't that cute? I, I thought you would do that. She, she says, I love the uniform of the catcher. I go, it's the equipment, it's not the uniform. Most of the time she wasn't the catcher. Most of the time, she was out in the field. And, and I had, had to tell her, I had to explain to her, the reason they gave you that uniform and the reason they put a glove on your hand is to get in front of the ball and stop the ball. Not a chance. That is, that isn't even crossing my mind. No, I'm out here to play in the dirt. I'm out here to be a ballerina. I, I'm out here to socialize with anybody who's close enough to hear me. But I am not getting in front of a ball. I, I, I thought about it. She, she got in front of a ball one time and, and the softball that they use when she's 5 years old is soft. So the batter got up there, hit it off the tee, drilled it right back, hit her right in the chest. She stopped the ball. You pick it up and throw it to first. No, I'm leaving. I'm out of here. You're going to hit me. I'm leaving. It didn't even cross her mind. That she was, she was supposed to stop the ball and throw the ball and get the player out, not even there. I use that as an illustration in our message and we're gonna talk about it a little more because I think her behavior. resembles many who call themselves Christians. That God calls us to be in the game and he has a purpose for us, and we're going, don't want to play that game. I want the uniform. I want the uniform. And I, and I definitely want to go to the party at the end of the season. No, not interested in stopping the ball. And so John is in the middle of a series on the Sermon on the Mount, and he calls it, what if Jesus is right? How many of us, when you hear the words of Jesus, think, you know what, Jesus is right. OK. A lot more hands than for college football. Um, But here's the deal, if Jesus is right, and we're going to go through the Sermon on the Mount, he says some pretty radical things. And, and, and many of us don't want to hear those radical things. Just tell us, just tell us and we'll sing Jesus Loves Me, a bunch of times. Just tell me that. But that's not what Jesus does. Jesus comes and he shares a message with us and so, uh, John has been talking about the fact that there, there are these case studies in, in the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus is doing the Sermon on the Mount and he goes through these case studies one after the other. Last week he touched on. Four of them. And this week I'm going to touch on the last 2 of these case studies. And he said that the, the, the series with the emphasis of these case studies was, is that we have to stop asking where the line is. And we need to start beginning to, to ask what does love require. So, the two case studies that I'm doing, really, I think the, the question that We, we're gonna answer is, do I have to be fair? How many of us think it's good to be fair? Yeah, OK, that seems logical. So do I have to be fair? And, and Jesus is going to answer that for us. Um, when, when we think about the 4K studies that John just did for us, um, he, he talked about murder because there were a bunch of people, and I really believe that Jesus is giving this message. And he's hearing people talk. He's hearing people ask some questions, and I always encourage people, if you're going to study the Bible, if you want to know what a passage means, you need to look on the at the beginning of the passage just before that passage begins, and you need to look at the end. You need to look at the context. So what is the context of these six case studies that we're talking about? What are the bookends? Of um this and, and so one of the bookends is just before he teaches about this, he says, you are the salt of the earth, not you should be, not you could be, not it would be nice if you were, you are the salt of the earth. What does salt do? Salt provides flavor and it's a preservative. That's who you are. And, and then he says, he follows it with bookend number 2 on the other end. He says, be perfect. As your Heavenly Father is perfect. Isn't it really too bad? This, this happens occasionally in the Bible, um, That Jesus or Paul, they They just aren't very bright people. Hopefully that's bothering you when I say that. But they, they clearly didn't say what they really meant because Jesus couldn't possibly have meant be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect. He really meant just give it a good try. Uh Is that what he meant? No, I think he meant Be perfect as as your Heavenly Father is perfect, and he said over here, be salt. And be light. And then to put it into context, he's going to be going one after the other through these 666 things, 6 case studies that these people are going, well, here's what the law says. And so at the beginning of that, he says this, I didn't come to get rid of any of what the prophets and the law say. In fact, If you write it out and you see that little dot there, I don't even want that to go. You see where they crossed the T, not even the crossing of a T. Everything has to be fulfilled and we're going, no, no, no, no, no, no. I grew, I grew up in church. They're just We don't have to do this, this stuff anymore. No, that's not what Jesus said. Jesus said, no. I'm not, I'm not ending that. In, in fact, um, a rabbi had a, a list of laws that they had their disciples follow. Some of them, um, had like 600 and some laws. In fact, in one, article I was reading. It says, um, In a rabbinic teaching, a yoke also described the commitment to a particular way of life, a teacher's set of teachings, or the responsibility of obeying the Torah. You get the picture. So a yoke. Do do you remember Jesus saying, My yoke is easy? Yeah. What does that mean? It means it's really super easy to be a Christian. That No, It means his yoke, his list of rules is really easy to remember. Because he says, I only have 2. These guys. have 600. I've got 2. And what are the two He says this in Matthew 22, Jesus replied, Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. The second is like it, love your neighbor as yourself. All the law and prophets hang on these two commandments. You got it? They go, you know, the others have all of these commandments. I got 2. Just love God with everything that is in you. Everything that is in you. And then love your neighbor as you love yourself. That's it. My yoke is easy. You'll walk. This group will walk out of here today. And this afternoon, if somebody said to you, what is Jesus' yoke, you'd be able to go love God with everything that's in you and love your neighbor as yourself. You'd know it. You, you memorized Jesus' yoke. Isn't that incredible? And, and so we come to this 5th case study. Matthew 5:28, and the law says, here's what the law says. The law says, be fair. We like fair. My, my wife and I were watching our grandchildren yesterday. I can't tell you the number of times one said to the other, that's not fair. We love fair. We learn it really young. And it doesn't change. You're sitting at work and you have an employee come and the employee says to you, Well, you know what, what you're asking me to do isn't fair. Yeah, you're right. The number of times our kids came to my wife and said, Well, that, that's not fair. And my wife says, Yeah, I know. Well, that's not the right answer. The right answer is, oh, OK, I'll be fair. The law says be fair. Here's what it says. It says, uh, you have heard that it was said eye for eye and tooth for tooth. That comes from the Book of Leviticus. But here's what the law says. If anyone injures his neighbor, whatever he has done must be done to him, fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, as he has injured the other, so he is to be injured. Imagine. Imagine. We, we have a fellow here. I'm not going to pick on him or have him stand up, but he was playing football and someone hit him and his kneecap that's supposed to usually be on the front went in another direction. OK, I hurt thinking about it. Can you imagine, imagine mom and dad, a mom and dad are sitting at home and there's a knock on the door, and it's the father of the football player and says, Yeah, I'm here to wreck your son's knee. What do you mean? Well, he wrecked my son's, I'm wrecking his. You'd go, that's a little weird, but that's what it says. An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, a fracture for a fracture, an injury for an injury. But you need to understand that that was in a biblical day when revenge was the way you handled problems. You broke my son's leg. I'm cutting off both your son's legs. You knocked my tooth out, I'm cutting your head off. You burnt down my chicken coop, I'm burning down your house. And, and it was always they increased the pain. They increased the revenge. And so when God said an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, that was radical. Whoa, whoa, you mean we're just gonna be fair? I don't, I'm not looking for fair. But Jesus says, we're going to change it. Remember how we began with the bookends. The bookends are, you are salt, you are light. If you're salt, can you not be salt? Have you ever gone to your salt shaker and put it out, tasted it, and go, oh, it's just not salty anymore? No, guess what? Salt is salt. And light You need to light a candle. I was in here yesterday and, and all the lights were out. It was completely black except for these uh exit sign lights. And after a little while my eyes adjusted and those little lights provided enough light that I could walk around this room. Light gives light. It can't. Jesus said, How ridiculous would it be if you lit a candle for light and then put a bushel basket over it. What a dumb thing to do. You are the light of the world. And be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. Reflect your Father. Reflect what he does. And so if you are people of the kingdom and You recognize that you're salt and your light and you reflect the Father, then you're not looking to be fair. You're, you're not expecting to be fair. Here's what Jesus says. Jesus replied, Love the Lord your God with no, Jesus said, But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him also, the other, and if someone wants to sue you for your tunic, let him have your cloak as well. If someone forces you to go one mile, go with him 2 miles. Give to the one who asks you and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you. What's Jesus saying? Some of us are sitting here going, if I lived like that, they would walk on me at work. My husband or my wife would dump all over me if I acted like that. So I'm just trying to be fair. And Jesus says, fair is no longer the standard. Instead, the standard is what? The standard is, did I show love? Can, can we do that? Can we be people who are salt and light? And reflect our father. Because that's the new standard. That's the standard Jesus brought in. He didn't lower the bar. And, and so often we think that, that Jesus lowered the bar. Oh, no, no, all Jesus said, it was all he said. He, he, he said, just say this prayer and get wet and we're all good to go. Doesn't seem like that's what he said. He said, be salt, be light, be perfect. Because that's what your Heavenly Father is asking you to do. And going back to the illustration of my granddaughter. You know, there's some here who are in this room, and I, I know you. I know you really well, and you so desperately want to be salt and light. I'm convinced that every morning. You pray, Lord, today, today, let me be light to someone. Today, let me reflect, you God. There's others who are in this room who are saying, I just feel like that's what God wants and, and I'm giving up my effort. I blow it and I hate when I blow it. You know, my granddaughter's playing her 2nd year now. And she tries to get in front of the ball and sometimes she stops it and sometimes she misses and she feels bad when she misses. And there's some of us who are like that right now. We're trying. I'm, I want to be the light. I know that's what Jesus Christ expects. I know that that's what Jesus Christ laid out for me and said, Here's what I want for you. I want to reflect my Father. And, and I so desperately. With and working at that and trying, and I need you to know that God, God loves you so much. He loves you and he loves maturing. He loves growth. But there's another group here, and you know who you are, who will go. I'm not even trying that. I have no interest. And going to work tomorrow and being delight. I have no interest. In walking into that office and reflecting God. That's not what I'm doing. I am trying to get ahead financially. I am trying to climb that ladder. And, and I know if I'm gonna climb that ladder, there's things I have to do that are not God honoring. But I'm gonna do what it takes to climb that ladder. There's those of you who have been in a bad relationship. And, and you go, no, you have no idea how my ex treats me. And there isn't a chance that my new standard is going to be, can I be the light to that person? Can I be the salt? Can I reflect my father to them? That ain't happening. Yeah, I want to be called a Christian. Yeah, I wanna, I wanna go to the party at the end. But there isn't a chance in the world I want to live like that today. And, and my challenge is to each group, for those of you who are being faithful, being the light and the salt and reflecting your father. My goal is be an encouragement. I want you to be encouraged, but I also want you to encourage that person who is saying, I'm trying, but I'm, I'm stumbling a little bit. Come alongside them, be an encouragement and a support and help them. And then for those who say, I don't even want to get in the game, I, I wanna encourage you to do something that I don't know if anybody's ever encouraged you to do. Be careful calling, calling yourself a follower of Christ. Be careful. You know, Jesus says in the last days there's going to be people who come to him and say, Lord, Lord, and he's going to look at them and say, don't have a clue who you are. You never wanted to be the light. You never wanted to be the salt. You had no desire to reflect me in your family, in your workplace, in anywhere else. I don't know you. And so I don't want to stand up here and tell you that if you're, you're in that category, don't worry, God loves everybody. Because Jesus says the standard is different for those who follow Him. He says that's the standard. People of the light, people who are salt and light respond differently. Here's the second one that it says. He says The law says only love what you value. Jesus, Jesus says this in Matthew 5:43. You have heard it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. Some of us are going Sounds pretty good. Yeah. Love those who are my neighbors, who are close to me, who are in my inner circle, but those outside of it, I don't have to love. You know that guy I work with, who is an absolute pain. Uh, that person who does everything that seems to be counterintuitive, I don't have to love them. That, that spouse who, who mistreated me, cheated on me, did all kinds of things to me. I, you, Dan, Maybe I have to be fair, but I don't have to love them. And Jesus comes And he says, the standard is different from my followers. He, he doesn't say it without compassion. You know, there's some of you who are going, you know, Dan, you don't know my in-laws. My in-laws are trying to destroy my family. It's trying to divide. Me with my spouse. They're the enemy, Dan. And here, here's what Jesus says. Jesus said, but I tell you. Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you that you may be sons or children of your Father in heaven. Why would we show love to people who are trying to destroy us, destroy our business, destroy our neighborhood, des destroy our, our culture. Destroy my family. Why, why would I be called to love them? That doesn't make any sense, Dan. Jesus explains it. He says He says, God is generous. With his natural resources, and he gives an illustration. He causes his son to rise on the evil and the good. And sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. You know, last week it rained. A lot. Uh, did anybody notice how it wasn't raining on that neighbor's yard who's such a jerk that God just sort of protected, you know, you got the rain for your plants, but you looked over there and went. Or when the sun came up that your neighbor didn't get any of the sun. Oh, you didn't see that? No, see, Jesus is saying God is generous with his natural resources, and we ought to be. Generous with the natural resource that we have as followers of Christ, and what is that natural resource? What We're gonna try that again. And what is that natural resource? Love That natural resources of love. And so Jesus is saying, here's what I want you to do. That person that you're describing as an enemy. I want you to love them. That, that person that you're describing as, man, a, a destroyer for you, I want you to start praying for them. That neighbor who is ruining the neighborhood, I want you to start praying for them. That, that ex who is wrecking your life, I want you to start praying for them. And, and not the prayer I heard one guy pray. Which was, Lord, change their heart or stop it. Not the prayer Jesus is advocating. Jesus is saying, I want you. To love them, pray for them. That's a challenge, and I know you're sitting here and going, Dan, you don't know the situation I'm in. You don't know the way these people have treated me. And Jesus would say, you're not going to believe it. They might crucify you. And I still loved them. And you are followers of mine. And so I want you in the middle of that situation to reflect my father. I want you to be salt and light. How is the world ever going to come to know Jesus Christ? Unless we are salt and light. People who are salt and light respond differently. Jesus says, if you, if you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Not even the tax, don't even the tax collectors do that. And if you greet only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that. B Perfect. Even as your Heavenly Father is perfect. So our big idea today is that we stop asking the question, where is the line? And, and we started asking the question again, what does love require in that situation? And friends, it, I, I really want to encourage you. This is like on a regular basis. This is on a regular basis. There, there are things, I, I wish that I could tell you that I stand here. I could just follow, follow me. I'll show you how to do it. I, I blow it so many times. I blow it so often. But when we put it into our head that that's what God wants. God wants me to be salt and He wants me to light and He wants me to reflect, and all of a sudden I put that in and that becomes a trigger in my head. And so I ask myself, when, when the temper is temperature is rising and, and I'm just thinking that my wife is just kind of this is, I go, it's time to be salt and light, Dan. When my grandkids are arguing about who gets the bigger apple. It says it's time to be the salt and light man. With, with the woman who I was driving down the street last Thanksgiving. And she ran into my car. And I said, OK, do you know what, let's, we'll try to avoid the insurance company so it doesn't go on your record. And it's now Thanksgiving and Christmas. So after Christmas, we'll settle this, OK? And, and she says, OK. And I said, all I need you to do is just text me. That you acknowledge that you ran into me and then we'll figure out the cheapest way to do this. Um, we, we had a couple of texts and then she stopped answering and this week as I'm doing a message I'm going my goal is not. To get something out of her, my goal was to be salt and light. So how do I text her one last message and said, I traded in the car, um, it no longer can be fixed because I don't have it, so don't worry about it. I don't want you to worry about that anymore. And, and God bless you. Oh, wasn't that heroic of Dan? I can't tell you how long it took me to type that thing. But God calls us to be salt and light and reflect our fathers. Does that make sense? Here's what, here's what I'm gonna ask you to do evaluate. What one of those three groups you're in? Are you, are you a person who every morning you say, God, I just wanna be salt today. I wanna be light. I wanna reflect you in every situation. Or are you the person who says, do you know what, I'm struggling. I don't always want to do that. In fact, most of the time I don't, and I, but I feel guilty about it and I want to get there. I want to move forward. Or are you that person who says, I know what God's requirements are, and I have no desire to follow them. I don't want that. I'm not going to ask anybody to elbow the person next to you and tell them what their number is. I'm gonna ask you, just think about it. Where are you at? Which one of those categories do you fit in? And do you want to be in the place where you say, Lord, I want you. To be in control of my life. I want to follow your standards, not my standards. I'm done looking for fair. I want to be the person who shows love even to those who aren't showing love back to me. So if you just bow your heads and close your eyes, and before we take communion, just listen to the words of this song, but more importantly, listen to God speaking to you. Is he saying something to you right now? And telling you, I want you. To be salt I want you to be light I want you to reflect your father. Father, I, I thank you for this group of people right now. I thank you that they have been attentive to your word, and I pray, Lord. That each of us would take it serious and we would recognize where we are. Whether we are people who want you and are living for you as our light, those of you who are struggling, living for that, but that's what we want are those who, I pray, Lord, that each one of us would take a step right now closer to the light so that we can reflect you. Thank you, Jesus. It's in your name that we pray. Amen.