Compassion and Action: Prioritizing Love Over Legalism
Devotional
Sermon Summary
Sermon Clips
"Jesus answered, have you not read what David did when he and his companions were hungry? How he entered the house of God and took and ate the bread of the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ. Which it is not lawful for any but the priests to eat. And then he gave some to his companions. Then he said to them, the Son of Man is the Lord of the Sabbath." [00:24:23]
"On another Sabbath, he entered the synagogue and talked. And there was a man there whose right hand was withered. The scribes and the Pharisees were watching him to see whether he could cure on the Sabbath, so that they might find grounds to bring an accusation against him. But he knew what they were thinking. And he said to the man with the withered hand, come and stand in the middle." [00:24:47]
"He got up and stood there, and Jesus said to them, I ask you, is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath? To save life or to destroy it? After looking around at all of them, he said to them, stretch out your hand. He did so, and his hand was restored. But they were filled with fury and began discussing with one another what they might do to Jesus." [00:25:15]
"Despite his diminutive stature, though, he never backed down. He fought for what was right, no matter what. And that was made evident in his confession. I don't like bullies. I don't care where they're from. He's even maybe talking about his friends. He would go and he would fight against the bullies, even when he was that small, scrawny guy. He would lose. He'd get knocked down. He'd get back up and say, I could do this all day." [00:26:41]
"This is what eventually got him recruited anyways, because the super serum would increase every attribute of the person who took it. Okay, so yes, that would make this little guy super strong, but it would also increase his character. So if he had just like an ounce of hate, it would be multiplied and it would be really hateful, right? It would go beyond something that they could control. So they needed, most importantly, a good guy, not someone who was strong." [00:27:18]
"Jesus possibly did this out of frustration because the religious leaders only saw a law to be followed. They didn't care about this man in need. And before you say we don't do that anymore today, I'm going to challenge us a little bit, okay? For example, we might see the numbers of people killed in a school shooting. It's shocking. It's terrible. It's heartbreaking. But why haven't we made any progress towards stopping it or stopping gun violence? Because we see numbers. We don't see names and people." [00:33:14]
"Have you ever been frustrated, like the Pharisees were in this passage, when you saw a person or an organization heal the sick, provide aid, or give someone shelter? Were you upset when someone challenged you to have mercy and compassion for people that you'd rather cast out and ignore? Together, these Sabbath-shattering stories insist that the principle of doing good and saving lives is the principle of doing good and saving lives. It's the basis of ministry, the basis of our daily lives." [00:34:08]
"While this message from Luke about Jesus's ministry is clear, this is only the beginning because now I'm going to jump into all of our wonderful United Methodist history on stuff like this. The United Methodist Church has always been a holiness movement, but it's not just personal holiness. It might start there, but it also is about holiness around the world, social holiness. Because John Wesley says, the gospel of Christ knows no religion but social, no holiness, but social holiness." [00:35:14]
"Essentially, if you're trying to reach Christian perfection with doing it all on your own, without the grace of Christ, without helping other people, then you are sprinting away from Christ and towards your own religion. Because personal holiness is social holiness. If you care about yourself, you care about others. Furthermore, John Wesley gave us three simple pillars of our Christian faith. They're so simple to follow, and they're amazing." [00:36:24]
"Do no harm, do good, and attend to God's ordinances, or we've kind of simplified that as stay in love with God. Because if you love God, you will keep God's rules, such as do no harm and do good. Wesley set the example in his own life and ministry. He advocated and visited and reached out to the poor, the blind, the sick, the naked, the hungry, the least, the lost, the marginalized." [00:36:55]
"His understanding and theology on this subject bled into our polity today, into what we've called the social principles. We have established this part of our doctrine that's constantly revised and updated and amended and added to whenever General Conference meets. So anytime there are Methodists from around the world that gather, we ask them to do good. We ask them to do good. We ask them to do good. We ask adjust these social principles so we can take a stance on what saves lives and that's the whole purpose of this okay so just if we go to the preamble of our social principles it lays it all out it says as we're created in God." [00:37:55]
"image to live in covenant with God in the world we honor the dignity of all beings and affirm the goodness of life the whole point of our social principles our whole understanding of social holiness is to honor the dignity of all beings and affirm the goodness of all life that's the essence preserve life do good do no harm these rules challenge us to stand against the bullies regardless of where they're from and to be a good Christian who follows Jesus example first the call to preserve life is affirmed in pretty much every one of these social principles we won't get through them all you can go and look them up and learn more I would love it if you did that but for example the death penalty here's what our social principles say our commitment to the inherent dignity and worth of every person and our historic stance as United Methodists compels us to oppose capital punishment and the imposition of the death penalty our inherent our commitment to the inherent dignity of all people all life that's what it's all about the dignity and preservation of all life this is continued in a section about environmental justice and sustainability from the sacredness of all life human animal plant and the necessity for the life of all human beings and that's what it's all about for us to be good stewards of God's creation even on polarizing subjects like abortion the United Methodist Church is committed to all life our social principle says our commitment to the sanctity of human life makes us reluctant to condone abortion however after listing circumstances it also states we recognize that these and other tragic conflicts of life with life may justify this decision there's a section on migrants immigrants and and refugees. Again, it starts by saying we affirm the dignity and worth of all humans, migrants, immigrants, refugees, including displaced and stateless people." [00:38:13]
Ask a question about this sermon
"On another Sabbath, he entered the synagogue and talked. And there was a man there whose right hand was withered. The scribes and the Pharisees were watching him to see whether he could cure on the Sabbath, so that they might find grounds to bring an accusation against him. But he knew what they were thinking. And he said to the man with the withered hand, come and stand in the middle." [00:24:47]
"He got up and stood there, and Jesus said to them, I ask you, is it lawful to do good or to do harm on the Sabbath? To save life or to destroy it? After looking around at all of them, he said to them, stretch out your hand. He did so, and his hand was restored. But they were filled with fury and began discussing with one another what they might do to Jesus." [00:25:15]
"Despite his diminutive stature, though, he never backed down. He fought for what was right, no matter what. And that was made evident in his confession. I don't like bullies. I don't care where they're from. He's even maybe talking about his friends. He would go and he would fight against the bullies, even when he was that small, scrawny guy. He would lose. He'd get knocked down. He'd get back up and say, I could do this all day." [00:26:41]
"This is what eventually got him recruited anyways, because the super serum would increase every attribute of the person who took it. Okay, so yes, that would make this little guy super strong, but it would also increase his character. So if he had just like an ounce of hate, it would be multiplied and it would be really hateful, right? It would go beyond something that they could control. So they needed, most importantly, a good guy, not someone who was strong." [00:27:18]
"Jesus possibly did this out of frustration because the religious leaders only saw a law to be followed. They didn't care about this man in need. And before you say we don't do that anymore today, I'm going to challenge us a little bit, okay? For example, we might see the numbers of people killed in a school shooting. It's shocking. It's terrible. It's heartbreaking. But why haven't we made any progress towards stopping it or stopping gun violence? Because we see numbers. We don't see names and people." [00:33:14]
"Have you ever been frustrated, like the Pharisees were in this passage, when you saw a person or an organization heal the sick, provide aid, or give someone shelter? Were you upset when someone challenged you to have mercy and compassion for people that you'd rather cast out and ignore? Together, these Sabbath-shattering stories insist that the principle of doing good and saving lives is the principle of doing good and saving lives. It's the basis of ministry, the basis of our daily lives." [00:34:08]
"While this message from Luke about Jesus's ministry is clear, this is only the beginning because now I'm going to jump into all of our wonderful United Methodist history on stuff like this. The United Methodist Church has always been a holiness movement, but it's not just personal holiness. It might start there, but it also is about holiness around the world, social holiness. Because John Wesley says, the gospel of Christ knows no religion but social, no holiness, but social holiness." [00:35:14]
"Essentially, if you're trying to reach Christian perfection with doing it all on your own, without the grace of Christ, without helping other people, then you are sprinting away from Christ and towards your own religion. Because personal holiness is social holiness. If you care about yourself, you care about others. Furthermore, John Wesley gave us three simple pillars of our Christian faith. They're so simple to follow, and they're amazing." [00:36:24]
"Do no harm, do good, and attend to God's ordinances, or we've kind of simplified that as stay in love with God. Because if you love God, you will keep God's rules, such as do no harm and do good. Wesley set the example in his own life and ministry. He advocated and visited and reached out to the poor, the blind, the sick, the naked, the hungry, the least, the lost, the marginalized." [00:36:55]
"His understanding and theology on this subject bled into our polity today, into what we've called the social principles. We have established this part of our doctrine that's constantly revised and updated and amended and added to whenever General Conference meets. So anytime there are Methodists from around the world that gather, we ask them to do good. We ask them to do good. We ask them to do good. We ask adjust these social principles so we can take a stance on what saves lives and that's the whole purpose of this okay so just if we go to the preamble of our social principles it lays it all out it says as we're created in God." [00:37:55]
"image to live in covenant with God in the world we honor the dignity of all beings and affirm the goodness of life the whole point of our social principles our whole understanding of social holiness is to honor the dignity of all beings and affirm the goodness of all life that's the essence preserve life do good do no harm these rules challenge us to stand against the bullies regardless of where they're from and to be a good Christian who follows Jesus example first the call to preserve life is affirmed in pretty much every one of these social principles we won't get through them all you can go and look them up and learn more I would love it if you did that but for example the death penalty here's what our social principles say our commitment to the inherent dignity and worth of every person and our historic stance as United Methodists compels us to oppose capital punishment and the imposition of the death penalty our inherent our commitment to the inherent dignity of all people all life that's what it's all about the dignity and preservation of all life this is continued in a section about environmental justice and sustainability from the sacredness of all life human animal plant and the necessity for the life of all human beings and that's what it's all about for us to be good stewards of God's creation even on polarizing subjects like abortion the United Methodist Church is committed to all life our social principle says our commitment to the sanctity of human life makes us reluctant to condone abortion however after listing circumstances it also states we recognize that these and other tragic conflicts of life with life may justify this decision there's a section on migrants immigrants and and refugees. Again, it starts by saying we affirm the dignity and worth of all humans, migrants, immigrants, refugees, including displaced and stateless people." [00:38:13]
Chatbot
-
I'm an AI bot trained specifically on the sermon from Feb 02, 2025. Do you have any questions about it?