Covenant Over Convenience: Truth, Marriage, and Integrity

Jesus didn't make a contract with you. He made a covenant with you and he sealed it with his blood and god is not casual about what we treat casual. The world runs on convenience. The kingdom runs on commitment. We live in a culture that says, if it gets hard, I'm out of here. Oh, you know what? This isn't benefiting me, so I'm out of here. This doesn't make me happy. I'm just in a league. Thank god Jesus doesn't do that for us. Thank god, right? Thank god that Jesus doesn't just run off every time it's we we mess up. God says, if it matters, fight for it. [00:52:48] (51 seconds)  #CovenantOverConvenience

You can follow the rules and still be completely wrong. Last week, we talked about how close can we get to sin before it's actually a sin. Remember I said that if we play that game of how close can we get, it's pretty soon as then to consume us. So, this isn't really about divorce is what I started to look at. This really isn't about divorce. It's about what we do when relationships get hard. Do we fight for people? Or walk away when it cost us something? [00:44:31] (32 seconds)  #FightForRelationships

How many times have we sinned and how many times has god turned us, how many times has Christ turned his back on us and wanted to divorce us because we've made a little mistake or we've sinned. He's never said, I'm divorcing you because of that sin. He never said, I'm going to walk away from that because he created a covenant. He's created this covenant between us and him and here's the thing, Jesus commits to us not temporarily, not conditionally, and not when it's convenient to him. [00:52:09] (39 seconds)  #JesusUnfailingCovenant

Sometimes, telling the truth is the hardest thing that we can do But it's not ever going to benefit by lying. Jesus actually says the truth will set you free. How many of us has lied before and we've had that lie in our brain and we laid there at night thinking, I hope they don't they don't find out that I was lying. That truth will set that free. They they when you can get that truth out and say, you know what? I'm just gonna go back tomorrow and I'm just going to tell the truth. That truth will set you free. [00:56:50] (41 seconds)  #TruthSetsYouFree

This week, Jesus isn't just dealing with the big obvious sin. He's going to chase after something deeper. How we treat people? How we handle commitment? And whether your words actually mean something because in the upside down kingdom, integrity isn't optional. It's evidence. We talked about integrity a little bit last week and integrity is that word that we make sure that we're doing the right thing every day, not just on Sundays and we show up on Sunday mornings and we're doing the right things and saying the right things but in this integrity means that Monday morning, we still wake up and we're still do the right things. [00:41:42] (40 seconds)  #IntegrityEveryday

What's in our heart is what's going to come out. Your words don't create your character. You ever meet the guy that's always bragging about all of the stuff that he's done and saying, look at my trophies and look at my trucks and look at my boats and look what I've done and look I've done this and I've done that and I'm really cool and I got big muscles and I got big guns and I got this and, you know, I did this and I did that and you're just like, Your words don't create your character. They reveal it. [00:58:56] (32 seconds)  #ActionsRevealCharacter

Then, week four, Jesus tells us, this is what kingdom people look like. This is what you should do as kingdom people. As a Christian, he says that you need to be the salt and the light. And he teaches us how we should live in the world by being the salt and the light. He says that you are the salt of the earth. You are the light of the world. He's what he's saying is is we're not called to blend in with the world. We're called to stand out. And if our life doesn't look different, it's not pointing to anything different. [00:37:29] (31 seconds)  #BeSaltAndLight

Jesus starts by redefining blessing. He's he's not saying this is for the strong. This isn't for the successful. This isn't for the people that's got it all put together. But he says, this is for the poor in spirit. He says, this is for the ones who mourn. These are they this is for the meek. And this is for the ones that hunger and thirst for my righteousness. So, god's kingdom doesn't begin with strength. It begins with a a surrender and it's a full surrender. [00:36:45] (30 seconds)  #KingdomStartsWithSurrender