2014.11.09 How to Care for your Soul

11-09-2014 from Grace Summit on Vimeo.

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Lord, thank You that You love us and that on this journey that we live with You, You are present with us, interested in our good, and working on our behalf. You are here, and You delight in us coming together to listen to Your word and to support one another. You love the fact that we are a family – with one Father and one Lord, Jesus Christ – thank You that Your Holy Spirit fills us and as a result we can grow together as a body. We want to hear from you today – grace, mercy, and not judgment. Because of Your Son, You speak grace and compassion – thank You for that. In Your name we pray.
This is a letter from a friend – from John, who wrote 1,2,3 John and the Gospel of John – and he uses two words very often – Love and Truth. He uses the word TRUTH 45 times – 6 times in this short letter. The word LOVE is used over 90 times in his writings. He is known as the Apostle of Love – this letter focuses more on truth – but he puts the two together. There is a vital connection between love and truth. We tend to make these competing – you are either on the love side or the truth side – but John focuses on both.
3 John 1 The elder to the beloved Gaius, whom I love in truth.
For John, truth has a very specific meaning. We would tend to think – facts. If it is factual, it is truth. For John, the primary focus of truth is a PERSON – not facts. Every time John uses the word truth, he is speaking of the person of Christ. The recipients of the letter struggled with understanding who Jesus is.
John 1:17 – the law was given through Moses, Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
The Bible – the Law – is given through Moses – but TRUTH comes through Jesus Christ.
John 14: - I am the way, the TRUTH… - He is not just TELLING the truth – He IS the truth – the embodiment of truth.
The Jewish people knew the Bible well – but somehow they didn’t understand it – they knew what it said, but didn’t catch the truth in it. Jesus would often say, YOU HAVE HEARD IT SAID – and then he quotes a Bible verse – and then says – BUT I SAY TO YOU – He is not denying the verse – He is explaining it – giving them the HEART behind the words that are being said.
Another thing with TRUTH – it is not just information – but something that must be experienced and practiced – the way we experience it is by obeying it. Jesus is emphasizing that to know the truth you must obey the truth.
With Gaius –3 For I was very glad when brethren came and testified to your truth, that is, how you are walking in truth.
What he is saying about Gaius – he is living an authentic life because, not only does he know the truth, he is living the truth he knows. He is not a hypocrite. He practices what he preaches.
Understanding Biblical truth always leads to love – Love, according to Jesus, is the primary way we live out the truth. All obedience must result in us loving God more and loving people more. If it does not lead to love, it is false obedience. The religious leaders strictly obeyed the laws of the Bible, but the lacked love.
We pendulum swing – we are either lovers or truthers! Truth does not negate love, and love does not triumph over truth.
Some are all about truth – winning the argument at any cost – and this comes from arrogance and contempt – when truth is spoken without love – to simply win an argument.
From the sermon on the Mount – Do not cast your pearls before swine – they will trample it – why would anyone do that anyway? The pearls are probably referring to the truth of Christ – if there are people who are scoffers – maybe don’t cast the truth to them in that situation. In the context, this verse is in the midst of ‘judge not lest you be judged.’ – that is the context of do not cast your pearls before swine.
When we take the truth and use it as a hammer in judgment, we are devaluing the truth. We may have the right facts about the issue – but when we use it as a hammer without love – we are casting the truth before swine. We think it is about the swine – but He is saying this about us – we are the issue – not the swine.
On the other side, we have people who focus on love so much that they fail to speak the truth because they don’t want to offend anyone or to appear harsh or unloving. We need to be able to speak the truth – in love. We are all pendulum swingers – leaning to one side or the other. We need to speak the truth with conviction – yet without contempt. We should never speak it with judgment or contempt. The people with the most truth should be the most loving. The people with the most love should be able to speak the truth the clearest – and there is a serious problem when you only have one side.
Jumping to part 2 –
2 Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth.
Now – that is obviously an older translation – we don’t put up here that often – but what is this verse saying? It has been used, and when it is in this older language… there is this philosophy out there of the health/wealth/prosperity gospel comes from.
What is his wish? That you prosper and be in health – so people say – this is what God wants more than anything else – for us to be prosperous – and to be healthy.
What is misunderstood – this is a letter to a friend – a beloved, dear friend. It is like saying – I hope you have a good week! That is what he is saying – I hope things go well for you. We pray to be healthy. We pray for one another to get a job. We wish for one another’s well-being – that is what this is, one Christian wishing for another’s well-being. It is not a guarantee that you will be wealthy or healthy – but at the same time – we can pray for that – we can hope for those things.
All the newer translations say it like this:
2 Dear friend, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good health, just as it is well with your soul. (NET)
That good things would be happening in your life – and in good health – just as – it is well with your soul. He is addressing the priority – that you are prospering in your soul. The priority is the health of your soul. When the soul is healthy, all the other areas of your life can be healthy.
Our small group started a study – Soul Keeping – and it asks – how is your soul? I want to ask you this – when is the last time someone asked you that? We ask – how is your health? We might ask our kids or a close friend – how are you doing financially? But the most important, John is saying – is your soul doing well? We fail to ask that – how is your soul doing?
Jesus said –
What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?
All of us know of people who are rich (actors/athletes/singers) – who are rich and beautiful – and their lives are ruined. And you ask – what good is that? If everything is going well in your life, but it is ruined?
How do we take care of our souls when we are working 50 hours a week or are in school full time and working fulltime or taking care of 4 small children? And the good news is – YOU CAN DO IT! You can take care of your soul. You might not be in a great ministry if your life circumstances prevent that – but you can take care of your soul.
What is our soul? We have a limited view of our soul. We think it is something that must get saved. So we get the soul saved – and what do we do? We wrap it in a nice box and put it in the basement of our lives – and when we die – to open it up.
But the soul is the sum of our lives – it is who we become in this world – the total person we become. The saving of our soul has just as much to do with this life as it does with the next.
Jesus said – you shall love the Lord Your God with all your heart and SOUL.
This life is to be lived learning to love God with your whole soul – and of course, your mind and strength.
4 – heart, soul, mind, strength.
Heart – and the will go hand in hand – the decision center of our lives – it is from our will and heart that we make choices. They are the executive center of the human life. And the problem – it is limited and weak – it makes choice – Paul said – I do not do what I want to do – our heart can tell us to do THIS, but we end up doing THAT.
Mind – the thoughts and feelings – these are connected in the Bible to the mind. They influence one another. But the mind is weak and limited. Our thoughts and feelings control our heart. When you are feeling anxious, those feelings begin to control your decision making processes.
The Body – it is this physical thing that allows us to interact with the world and with our environment. The problem here – the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak – and the body tends to give itself to pleasure.
The soul integrates all these parts into one life – it determines who we become. When the soul is healthy and being taken care of – the soul has the power to transform all those other areas – that is why we must pay attention to what is going on in the soul. When a person loses their soul – they lose the ability to become the person Jesus wants them to become. We can lose it here as Christians – to lose the ability to become the people God wants us to become – because we become unhealthy.
You sit down at your computer – it is running slow – You think you saved it – but it is not there – and the processor is humming along and we tend to ignore it. Because the soul runs in the background – it is easy to neglect. The other parts SCREAM at us – when hungry – the body says, FEED ME! When we are stressed – the mind says, Help me! And we allow our passions to tell us we NEED!
There is a quote – if the soul is healthy, no external circumstance can destroy your life. If your soul is unhealthy, no external circumstance can redeem it. Nothing can happen in your circumstances that can save your soul if your soul is unhealthy.
Here is how we care for the soul – I’ll get real practical. The soul helps the other areas, but the other areas of the life care for the soul.
First – the will – we use it to care for our soul by choosing God, not self. He who tries to save his life will lose it – he who loses his self will find it.
If anyone wishes to follow Jesus, he must take up the cross and follow – surrender the will to God. Even if you are working 80 hours per week – you can still surrender yourself to God, and in that simple act, you are creating a healthy soul – it is doable and not complex.
Romans 12:2 –
NO matter what our circumstances are – we can, in our thinking – think about God and His goodness towards us. You can’t go to work and think – I have 45 verses to memorize at work! But you can think about – God loves me! You can have that in the back of your mind – and anyone can do that – no matter how stressful your job is – you can have, running in the back of your mind – God loves me and is here present with me in this – and that is not so hard. We are not going to do it all the time, but we can do it.
The body – we must present them to God for good and not to evil. Today, arms, hands, feet, legs, mouth – whatever I am doing – these are for God.
Everyone has four things in relation to this –
1) Job – what you get paid to do – it might be being a fulltime student – you get paid in grades – we all have a job – and whatever it is you can care for your should – whatever you do – do it as unto the Lord – and You can do that – and if you do whatever your job is as unto the Lord, you are developing a healthy soul.
We all have a ministry – not like, being in charge of Sunday School – but God has placed you on earth with specific gifts to accomplish things for him in your daily life.
I know of a person – wherever he goes, people tell him their story! People at work come by and tell their story to this person – that is a unique ministry that God has given this person. Any circumstance – and we all have things like that – sometimes we are just not aware because we think ministry is doing something at church. Maybe you are a person who organizes things – and people need you to help them and you are there for them – it can be done in family, job, community or the sidelines of a soccer match.
3rd – our work – the total lasting good we accomplish with our lives – taking all these other things and incorporating them, along with our family and community and recognizing that anytime we do something for another person, we are accomplishing something of eternal value.
When you go to school and study as unto the Lord, and I doubt any of us did – studying as unto the Lord, you accomplish something of eternal value.
4th and finally, we all have a life – the person we become – and that is the most important thing about you – and the most important thing about me. When we stand before God on that ‘day of reckoning’ – we will present something to God – and it will not be what we have gained or accomplished or positions we have obtained – or the ministries we have built – it will be look who I’ve become. That is what God is concerned about the most. Whatever our circumstances – we can become the person God wants us to become. If your situation is all you do is to care for an elderly sick person, and that is all you do – you can become, in that situation, everything God wants you to become – and that is the most important thing God asks of us.
The idea of, well done, good and faithful servant – there will be a lot of people who took care of a sick spouse or an ailing parent – who will hear this, or one who works 80 hours per week just to make ends meet, but does it wholeheartedly – because you became who you were supposed to become in that setting –
Lord, thank You that we are in the circumstances that will allow us to become like You – to become the people you want us to become – even if they aren’t cool, exciting, - maybe very mundane – but even in the most ordinary circumstances, we can become who you want us to become. And we can care for our souls – in Your name we pray, Amen.