Churches in Hampstead

“And and and did you notice it didn't say what displaced Jesus? It didn't say what took first place. It could have been anything on their list. He said, look at us. We're suffering for Jesus. Look at us. Look at all the good work we're doing. What could have gone first is anything on their list. It could have even been themselves, their own contribution, their own enduring, their own lack of weariness. See, in week one, we said it's love God, love others as you love self. Those are the three components. And God doesn't deny a kind of love for self. The the world can't answer that question apart from this correct order. But, man, oh, man, don't we love to invert that thing? And we go, wow, I love me, and then and then others, and then I'll get to God. And we just distort it. Right? And we put ourselves at the top of the list. We it doesn't matter, to be honest, what displaced Jesus and took first, because that's not the problem. The the emphasis is on this. Jesus is no longer first. It doesn't matter what took his place. If he's not first, that's the problem.”

“See, it's not only turning away from bad things, it's sometimes putting good things back in the rightful place. That really is the tension of this whole series. Because what we're saying is there are lots of things fighting for your attention and affection that are not evil or bad, but they're not ultimate and good. They're not the top of the list. They're not the best thing. They're simply not Jesus. So repentance sounds like this. When you're considering the things in your life, you should have this thought. This has moved too high or become too important. It has become something it was never intended to be. It's become, like a god, but it is not god. I treat it as something that can heal me, save me, comfort me, restore me, counsel me. And and and and all those things are uniquely reserved for God. The father, Jesus, the son, or or the holy spirit. But not our food, our video games, not other people, even good relationships like our spouse. If they become an ultimate thing, they become the wrong thing at the top of the list.”

“This shift happens in our heart. And and and let me clarify one more layer. Just because drift is passive doesn't mean that shift is deliberate. It doesn't mean that we're always knowingly or intentionally shifting the affections of our heart. What's different is that with Drift, you can point outside yourself. But with Shift, you have to own it. Once you see it, once you recognize it, once you name it, once you notice it, you have to own it and then decide, what do I do with this? Well, that's kind of the crux to the matter. But the craziest thing about a shift, to me is this, that you can actually still operate with the same activities of affection, but lose the engine driving it. You you can do the same things love taught you to do far after love becomes the motivation for why you do it. That's subtle, isn't it? That's sneaky. That's the shift in our heart that we need to be mindful of and pay attention to.”

“Jesus says, repent. And I believe that repentance is the biblical word underneath this entire series. I think that for three weeks, we have been talking about reordering our affections, and the Bible has a word for it. It's repent. It's not what maybe your cultural connotation is as of late, which is a little more condemning and judgmental. No, the biblical meaning of repentance is this, to turn, change the direction, or reorient yourself. It's it's an actual movement. It it it's a it's another form of shifting, isn't it? Repentance is a is a mental shift. It's rethink everything you thought you knew. It's an invitation to reconsider what you've prioritized and loved. It is to realize that something has become disordered and allow God to put it back in its proper order.”

“We forget who God is. We forget what he's done for us and the promises to come. We forget who we were before he saved us. We we forget the difference he's made in our lives. We forget where we were when God found us and rescued us from the pit. We we forget why we started following Jesus in the first place. And this is why the command to remember is one of the most prevalent commands in all of scripture. It is emphasized more and more frequently than many other things. Constantly, we are being encouraged to remember. Why? Because we are so prone to forget, and we forget all manner of things.”

“And and and when it comes to returning to our first love, reordering our desires, one thing is we have to consider how we've fallen in the list, how we fall on the list when it comes to the order of our affections. Remembering is part of returning, but it's not the whole thing. Because if if we're not careful, we interpret remembering to be returning. What do I mean by that? I mean that Jesus isn't asking us to manufacture feelings we had when we started. We've changed. Our relationship with him has changed. Our knowledge of him has changed. It would be silly for us to say that remembering means returning, going back to once, to what once was.”

“So sneaky. And and and and so there's a three part movement to how we return to God. How do you return to your first love when you faded? When you've, not just drifted, but but shifted? How do you get back? Well, the threefold pattern here is to remember, to repent, and to repeat. And I love alliterations. So this one just made sense to me. Remember, he starts by consider how far you've fallen. You have to remember. You you need to have aggressive moral inventory. Right? People in the 12 step program get this. You you have to actually take into consideration how you have fallen. And and and this just, again, this doesn't always feel good, but it's so important because it gets to the good news.”

“you hear things like, we grew apart. Maybe you've not just heard it. You've felt it. You've been in that position. And what I think we might call that risk is drift. We might call it drift, but here's why it's not. Because drift implies a passivity, doesn't it? Drift is like a distance thing. Drift is what happens when you're in the ocean and the ocean moves you. Right? You go, there's always a because when there's a drift. You can point to something outside yourself and say, see, that's why we drifted. I I don't think that the risk is drift. I think that the risk is a shift. It's a shift in our heart.”

“I don't think love disappears. It's a little like energy. You remember learning this? Energy can't be created or destroyed. It's transferred. It kind of always exists. You have potential or kinetic energy. And and and so I think love is similar. It doesn't just disappear. It doesn't evaporate. We were created in the image and likeness of a God who is love. We cannot help but love. We cannot help but have affections and attractions and worship something. It's the gravity of our heart. So love doesn't disappear. It gets displaced. It gets disoriented. A a subtle shift happens in the order of our affections.”

“You're not returning to the love that you first had for Jesus. You're returning to the love Jesus first had for you. And to the person considering turning to Jesus, your invitation is this. Have you considered what great love has been poured out for you? Have you had an opportunity to turn, to respond to that love? Communion is an invitation, and it's an opportunity to remember his body, his blood, to remember the cross, to remember the mercy, to remember the great love that he first loved us with. We only have a propensity to love because he loved us first.”