Lesson 59b
Romans 15:1-7 · JD McCulley · Oct 11, 2020
Romans (2018-21), No. 133
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261920353672

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Before we get started, I wanted to follow up from last week. Last week, we were on the side of the road by Telluride when we were listening to the class, so I couldn't really respond to the thing. But I wanted, and I talked a little bit about this with Miles. He had a great point and it's something I was kind of wanting to follow up with after my lesson.

It was, when do we keep, as stronger brothers or sisters, keep relenting to the weaker brother or sister? Was this the legalism death spiral comment? Kind of, yeah. But it's that we keep, kind of after the lesson, we keep deferring to the weaker brother or sister. We defer, we defer, we defer. It is kind of a spiral. And I think Miles had a good point about that, just that, you know, where does that end?

And, you know, I kind of think of today, in today's society, we don't try and uplift people, we try and bring everybody down to the same lower level. It's kind of teaching, teaching or soccer, It drove me nuts when I was coaching soccer and they suddenly said you couldn't keep score because you couldn't say who was supposed to win. Everybody had to be down to a level. There were no winners, there were no losers, we were all equal. Just that mentality that we dumbed down people. and instead of lift everybody up. That same analogy I was thinking about with the lesson, when does the stronger brother lift up the weaker one? I think there's a lesson in there that it's not always deferring, deferring.

Yes, in love you do that, but there's a point where you have to lift up the weaker brother. In my reading this week, I was thinking of Hebrews 12, 12, I think. It's where Therefore, strengthen the hands that are weak and the knees that are feeble, and make straight paths your feet, so that the limb which is lame may not be put out of joint, but rather be healed. Men, pursue peace with all men.

And the saying goes on. But I keep thinking about that, that Maz had a great point. I think there is a point where you have to, in love, stop the spiral. I think that's really kind of a key. It's not an endless one where you defer, you defer, you defer, you bring down, you bring down, you bring down. There's a point where the stronger brother or sister has to lift the weaker one up. I think that was a great point that Miles had that there is a point where you have to stop the spiral in love.

The only thing I wanted to add to that in thinking about it afterwards is the fact that JD, you guys had no idea that for us, like our legalistic family upbringing was that you'd never eat at a place like that. That was like a legalism that was set in, but you had no idea. So it's not that you were like, trying to bother us by saying, hey, I love this restaurant. So the thing about it afterwards is there was definitely the Holy Spirit at work there, and that you were just telling us about this great restaurant and gave the Holy Spirit opportunity to work with us. But there was no intentionality on your part of shaking things up.

Yeah. Yep. And so Les and I actually covered this after the lesson last week, and I think we're going to talk about that a little bit today. So maybe I'll leave the further comments I have to what the lesson will bring up here. I will quote a verse that has become important to me that we've actually covered not too many, probably weeks or months ago, but Romans 12, 18. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, Sorry, I've got a pantry outside my window. I was ripping off a bunch of film and it just distracted me. Romans 12, 19, if it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone. Kind of the same point that you mentioned there, Courtney, from Hebrews.

It's become very important and I think that we're only going to find that these verses and these chapters that speak of that kind of piece are going to be even more important as we continue to move through this season of elections and so forth. It's just, it'll never not be important, but Anyway, let's look, we talked about, we're in Lesson 59, Chapter 15, 1 through 7. We said that after having read 1 through 7, that there shouldn't have been really a break between Chapter 14 and 15.

It's just a continuous flow. And I think, you know, that just is something to note to oneself. But we talked about You know, the timing of how God works and presses on our convictions. We talked about operating in grace and truth with others. We defined the stronger and the weaker and said that Mostly what differentiates between the two is an understanding. One is limited and one is more free because of the understanding of the word and their relationship. And then we moved on to talk about being a debtor, being under obligation, bound by duty. And that kind of got us into the question of how long are you under duty to support you know, the younger believer, and it's not a continuous, it's a lifting up that being a debtor is really all about. It's not about just enduring them alone, but also lifting them up.

We can talk about that a little bit more too, but then we went into the conversation on question number three, which was, is love a better attribute than knowledge? And we talked about how the expression of love ultimately is founded on the knowledge of God's word, but that if we were looking at just sharing knowledge without love, then we really missed the boat in terms of who we are in Christ.

That's not how he operated, and that's not the life that he's given us. And so we also said that grace doesn't please ourselves. And I was thinking about that comment. I made it at the very end of our last class. we are pleased because we are gracious. So it's kind of a, there's a, it's a little bit of a tricky way of saying it.

It doesn't seek to please ourselves. Um, but we, we are pleased because we know that, um, you know, the Lord is at work and that, that expression of grace is something that only Christians have. Um, you, you, you're not going to find that, uh, that attribute in, in any other, um, organized religion for lack of a better term. I don't think of Christianity as a religion, but you're not going to find that in any other teaching because he's the definition of grace, right? And we looked at Chester McCauley's definition and continue to use that. So now it brings us to question number four, and I'll stop reviewing.

What is the example of this principle given in the text? So the question has to do with love, right? What is the example of the principle of not pleasing ourselves given in the text? And we're kind of looking at more of the verse three here, you know, segueing from chapter 15, verse two to three. So if you want to read that real quick, and then we can kind of talk through that. What's an example of this principle given in the text? You want somebody to read the verse? Yeah, somebody read the verse. Or even Christ did not please himself, but as it is written, the reproaches of those who reproached you fell on me.

So. What does that have to do with us? Sounds like it's all about him. Or is it? Yeah. I think you're looking at it Here, an example of what we've been talking about, and the example is the Lord Jesus himself. It's amazing to me to think that he's God and he did what he did, that he took all the negative possible, the reproaches upon himself. kind of goes against the whole idea of, hey, once you believe, life gets a lot better for you overall. Or it could, you could look at it that way, but there's an entire, you know, perspective that... It was funny, Joel Osteen came on last week. I'm name dropping, so. Oh, jeez. Well, here's the funny thing.

Aiden had never seen or heard anybody on TV preach. He's grown up at Holly Hills. That's all he really knows, plus some of the youth group stuff he does. So he just doesn't have a context for Joel Osteen and what's happening on TV most of the time. Not all the time.

He looks at me with the most dumbfounded face and was like, what in the world is this? Oh, it was just the empowerment of the believer and everything that comes to you and how you're blessed with And I said, well, have you seen his house? So I Googled his house for Aiden. And he looks at me with these wide eyes, and he's like, well, what is that? I said, it's a compound, son. It's a compound.

But at any rate, Jesus did not please himself. And I think that really is the principle here. Hebrews 12, 2 talks about, it says, just reading, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before him. And that's really key. joy set before him endured the cross, despising this shame and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. So the word endured is really key there. But what comes right before it is probably the most important part, that it was the joy set before him. How do you not please yourself and have joy set before you and then you endure?

And in his case, death. So Yeah, it's interesting to know that he endured what the Jewish said before him. How do we do that? How does that relate to us? Yeah, it's a good point, JD, because along the lines of what Courtney was talking about, how long do you endure? Well, what Christ endured was to the point that he died. And he died in place of us. Didn't have to.

Am I to follow that in those footsteps that I endure until the end, until I die? Yeah, it's interesting. And I'm going to pose this question. This is what came to me when Courtney, you mentioned at first the lesson today. It's not. So is it how long you endure or is it what you endure? Can I add a question to that? Yep. Why are you doing it? In other words, why are you enduring?

I think all of this goes back to all of these scriptures that we've been quoting and doing. It's one that Christ was a servant. He came to do the Father's will. He did it out of love. He did it out of love for us. I'm just thinking of all the verses we went through in 14, even these verses that we've gone through. You looked at three, but one, two, and three. Now, we who are strong ought to bear the weaknesses of those without strength, and what? Not just please ourselves. Each of us is to please his neighbor for his good, to his edification. So again, it's done out of love for the other person. It's always, and that's what Christ did. Christ did love for the Father, and then ultimately love for us.

And the question you pose, how long and what, I don't think that's an answerable question. It's all dependent upon the individual and the situation. Yeah, I think you're right. It's not going to be definitively answered. But I will say that there's a couple of thoughts there, especially around the how long. Well, let's start with what with the what it.

Do we endure a really nasty personality in such a way that we continually subject ourselves to it? Or do we endure by praying for that person and supporting them as long as we can? But are we going to continue to subject ourselves to something that is not necessarily going to build them up? And we're talking about weaker believers here, so their growth, right? So I think there becomes a point in time where at some points you do have to step back and endure in a way that's not constantly active. I think the Lord did that. He prayed. He supported his believers through a different way. He was not able to endure every single thing that a person did.

So we're talking about how we're building one. The result is really the most important thing. So when we talk about the what, it's the result. It's that they grow, that they are lifted up, and that they have an opportunity to mature. And there's sometimes when you have to say something, and then you just have to let that be what it is until they grow through it. You can't force them to grow, and we talked about time last week. So it's not a constant, we're not constantly on top of people and just like, grow, grow, let's go, I'm enduring you, let's move on, let's go. So it's very much a patient, enduring and it does have that element of, it's not self-seeking. It's very much, it talks here in this verse 12 too, that it's a joy, it's a joy of heaven.

We see that this doesn't have to be something that is overwhelmingly difficult, but if you look at, if someone can read Psalm 69.9, I think this would be. Can I make a comment here? Yes, please.

As you were talking, I got to thinking about that verse in 1 Corinthians that where Paul was talking about that he planted a pile of water, but it was God who gave the increase. So I think the endurance is the increase, is waiting for God to give the increase. I agree. Yeah, growth, right? So that's a growth analogy. And it's important for us to know, and I'm glad you brought that verse up, because we may not be you know, everything that a person needs. And that's where that endurance comes in, right? We may plant, but we may not be able to water and to see the growth. Right. Yeah. Who's speaking here? Me. Yeah.

Well, I was thinking about Abraham and Lot, and it's an Old Testament example, but You know, Lot was driving Abraham crazy and, you know, really kind of ruining things. So Abraham had to distance himself from Lot in a nice way. You know, he was very gracious about it. But I guess that's a factor too. That's good. Yeah, I appreciate that. That's really insightful. Yeah, sometimes enduring and looking for an increase in a weaker believer has to do with distancing yourself, and not necessarily physically, but sometimes it's just relationally, just giving some space, letting the Lord work, knowing and trusting that He's got the timing under control. So, I like that.

I asked if somebody could read Psalm 69-9. Does anyone have that available? 69-9. For the zeal for your house has eaten me up, and the reproaches and insults of those who reproach and insult you are fallen on me. That's the key, right? Somebody have something? Thanks, Joanne.

I think, I agree with everything everybody says and it's, you know, you spoke about timing and waiting for something that you're praying for is difficult because we want things right away but God's timing is so different from ours and then what does God have in that for us?

What good is there in it for us as we're waiting and being patient? There's a lesson, there are lessons for us in that, right? Yeah, when you think about for a believer being, when we endure, we are growing as well. So it's a very big part of, it's probably one of the biggest parts of the Christian life is enduring those things that, yeah, not just weaker believers, but endurance and, you know, enduring rather in all the things that are not pleasing to the Lord and that we have to deal with as well.

A couple of things, JD, that remind me of the example I always use when you're pointing the finger at somebody, there are three pointing back at you. I think that's the growth that the individual has. You know, you're trying to get somebody else to grow, but three are pointing back at you during that endurance, that waiting period. So a lot of it's, you know, you may think it's for that person, but the God is really dealing with you. And, you know, we're trying to do this, but he's actually working on you at the same time, or if not more.

The second thing is, I always think of this too, is that we are in a fast food microwave, instantaneous information, get it done, find it, and that doesn't coincide with growth of a believer. set up to have something fast. And God works on a whole different timeframe on people.

That it grates against our worldly pattern. And I think that's the frustration people have. It's like, well, I've got all the truth, why don't you understand it? Why don't you understand it? And so many times you plant the word, 10 years later, two years later, somebody else comes up, says maybe the same thing, and they go, oh, yeah.

And so we just have to, you know, it's come to this, we have to leave it in God's hands. That's a good point, Courtney, because I think if you look back over your own Christian life, you see that God had placed people in your life. They were eternally patient with you, which teaches you, I think, to be more patient with them and that you know what the end game is. Like the Lord Jesus knew where he was headed and what he was there to do. We know when we're walking with a weaker believer where we're headed, and we're waiting and walking, waiting for God to give the increase, and it may take a while, you know? Yeah, I totally agree.

One thought, just to your first point, Courtney, is it better to have three fingers or two and a half pointing back at you? Because I'm curious about Mike. That's why it's a lot of slow growth for Mike. They're only two and a half pointing back at each other. Two up and one back. For those of you that don't know, Mike cut part of his finger off one day. Takes him a lot longer to learn things. Yeah, that's right. Yeah, I got three coming back and only a half going forward. Oh, so you can't make accusations as easily. No. I have to remember that.

Yeah, I wrote down, just to wrap up question number four here, I wrote down the idea of family interests. The family of God. What are our interests with our family? Maybe somebody wants to kind of speak to that. I don't need to spend a lot of time on it, but I like the idea of remembering that this is a family interest.

That's really good, J.D. I think that as you learn the principles yourself about, you know, what is God really up to in my life? What's he really, what's he gonna accomplish? Or what's he trying to accomplish? And I think ultimately it's the conformity to the image of Christ and the reason for that is that so we can glorify him.

You can't do it out of the flesh. So when you recognize the goal, and that all things are working together for that purpose that sometimes doesn't look like whatever circumstances that are happening may not be looking like that for my growth or your growth. Still, you have to trust the word when it tells you things like that. You say, well, it has to be under that heading. It has to be under what God says about what he's up to.

Yeah, I agree. And I think that as we're enduring with weaker believers, that we just continually remember that this is a family thing, and we all belong to the same Father, and we have the same life in Christ. Yeah, so question number five, what is our role in this principle? And I'm going to throw out this term, imitators of God. We know that's scriptural. We're called to be imitators of God. What does that mean in relationship to what we're talking about here? Because you can imitate.

It sounds like a potentially negative way about going through things, but yet it's there in the scripture. So if we're to be imitators of God and we're to endure, How do we do that? Is it pick up your cross and deny yourself and carry your cross daily and what would Jesus do? Where are we at with this? Trying as hard as we can.

Yeah, pull up the bootstraps, make sure it works. Yeah, right. Don't you find that we're called to live a life that we can't live? It's impossible out of the flesh to function that way. Well, imitators of God, I don't know. You tell me. Someone in the class. Dependence upon the Spirit. What's that? Dependence upon the Holy Spirit. Okay. For one thing. I agree. So walking in the Spirit.

What does that produce? It seems to me that that our role would be a very strong dependence upon God, because He's the one that's working through us and changing us, you know, so just listening to His Word and the Holy Spirit. How does grace factor into this? Well, in verse 5, now may God who gives perseverance, I mean that's a grace gift that He He gives you perseverance and encouragement.

I totally agree. I think that to kind of segue off what you guys have both or the three of you have said, by the Holy Spirit, we are given the ability to be gracious as we walk in with Christ. Right. So we're one with Christ. That's what we're told elsewhere. But it's a grace gift.

It's not an effort that you're seeking to complete on your own. It's a dependency. and a understanding that he will produce the endurance in you. It's his endurance, right? Is it your endurance? No. And the desire to not please ourselves is also a grace gift. Once you start walking in the flesh, what do you want? You want what I want. You want whatever you want.

So this is a very practical portion of the book about Romans that we're talking about, chapter 14 and 15. It just starts getting super applicable. with regards to our dependency. I like that word. So, imitators of God is not something that we get out and produce on our own. It is a dependency upon... I'm having a hard time with that word all of a sudden.

It's beholding Him through His Word, as we often talk about. And as a result, the Holy Spirit uses that knowledge and conforms us to his image. And that being conformed, it includes this endurance. And so, yeah, I think that's really our role in this principle is to depend, right? And it's a grace gift. So thanks for this. I think you're right about that.

I also think that one of the things that takes a long time to learn is that it's not an activity that I'm going to produce. Because if you read down through Romans chapter 7, Paul has gone through all of the methods and the means whereby he could produce this righteousness and this holiness that he desired to have, yet it ended up being a question of who. And I think the who is a critical understanding for a believer. And we're talking about the work of the Holy Spirit in us.

He's the one that shows us it's a who and not a what. It's not a method, it's not a list of compliances. It's the Lord Jesus Christ himself and the beholding of his glory and the work of the Spirit in us that even imperceptibly he's conforming us to the image of Christ and that conformity is designed so that we might be able to function in this principle, dependent, spirit-fostered life.

That's great, Mike. It's interesting, so interesting how all these verses come back to, not I, not me, but Christ. Yeah. If you look at it with that lens, it helps you understand so many of these verses we go through. I think you're right. I really do. there has to be that understanding.

And the stronger believer, I would say, probably has that understanding. The weaker believer doesn't quite have that. And so the stronger believer, what he's really doing is waiting for the spirit of God to show him or persuade him that this is how the life works. And the stronger believer has been down that road to some degree and knows how that life works. and knows it takes time, so he's willing to walk that road with them.

Okay, cool. Well, that was good. Question six, is the Old Testament meant to be confusing for us in the New Testament era? Last statement. J.D., could you say that 2 Timothy 3.16 answers that? All scripture is given. So I don't think I meant it to be confusing to us. That's a great quote, Joanne. You're exactly right. I wrote down in my notes that all scripture is, actually Mike shared this with me, the idea of interwoven. It's all interwoven together.

But having been involved in a lot of chronological teaching, I don't know how many times I've gone through the scripture chronologically, with the ministry that we and my family used to be involved with, with Good Seed, we saw just how important it is to get the foundational understanding of ultimately who you are, where you came from, where you're going that all comes from genesis and then you move forward you find out all okay you know there's this this thing called law and but yet there's still grace during the law and then you get to you know the new testament and you start to figure out that hey all this was the promised messiah you know the the the promise deliverer that was talked about in the very first book of uh... or the very first uh... book of the of the bible and so i could go on but the idea that the scriptures interwoven and dependent upon each other.

In order to make grace understandable, legalism was needed in order to identify what Christ was all going to provide, and it also produced that hope, that hope that was in the Messiah, and it taught you know, the patience that was needed in order to see the Lord work in those circumstances. So I think Paul himself in the New Testament is probably, as far as like comparatively speaking, in terms of the apostles, you know, proof of the power of what God was up to in transitioning a believer from legalism to grace. And, you know, I think it's really interesting to see how important you know, the entire scripture is in order to make Christ known and to make him, you know, the really center of everything that God's been up to all along. I like that. but the what one of those things that that comes up in the end and you know i i agree totally that all scripture is used i think the confusing part now is the miss teaching about law and that we're not under law anymore and you know i i i some of our friends uh... you know they uh... they say that the law law and in galatians three twenty four therefore the laws become our tutor to lead us to christ So the law is a great thing. It points us to Christ. But they always forget the following, the verse after that and the end of that. So that we may be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor.

So a lot of them, it is somewhat confusing in that we're not under law. And you see it all through Romans, what we've seen. We're not under law, we're under grace. You see that totally through the book of Galatians. But there is that confusion that comes by people trying to apply law. That doesn't mean that we shouldn't use, as the 2nd Timothy or the Timothy passage, to use all scripture. But I think the teaching has to be there that says that what Paul is pointing to, that we are not under law anymore. And that's specifically that part of it, that we are not under law. And that's, I think, the confusing part of anything from the Old Testament that people incorrectly teach about being under the law and don't understand what grace is.

I totally agree. We may not choose to use the term dispensation, but God is not up to the exact same thing throughout the course of history. I mean, His story transitions, and things are not going to remain as they always were. So to put a blanket statement across the entire New Testament age of legalism would be an incorrect understanding of what how God transitioned into the church age.

There's so many things, Isaiah 53 telling us about what Christ was, the crucifixion. There's so many things that were about his character that we get out of the Old Testament. It's the legal part that gets to be the confusing in the New Testament age. I was going to say the other thing is the Old Testament just shows us like thousands of blood sacrifices over and over and over. And at the exodus when they had to put the blood over the doorpost or their firstborn child would die.

I mean, all of that points to Jesus and makes it actually, like, just seals it all together is how important the blood of Jesus, the real Lamb of God is. The one other thing I've noticed in Genesis and in Exodus, the last months that we've been studying him, that God is the same there as he is now.

He desires that those, like in the case of Exodus, that the Jews know him. And he takes every precaution and every, he implements, we look at the laws as separating. Really, he set it all up so that they could have some sort of an understanding about who he is and how his personality and character is, and that he is a... The thing that the Old Testament shows, at least showed to me in the study of Genesis and Exodus, is he's exactly the same, you know? And even with Noah's Ark, where he just totally destroys every living thing to show that God is a righteous God.

He will judge. And then he brought a whole new all of us together out of the one family of Noah, still having issues. But it's like judgment, salvation, judgment, salvation. Well, I think I'm at time here, guys. Those are a lot of really great thoughts. OK. Yep. I'll pray for us, and then we can move on to the second hour here. OK.

Father, I thank you for the truths of your word and what this book of Romans in chapter 15 is teaching us about dependence and knowing that our dependence, our faith in who you are and what you've said produces a life in us that is like no other. It endures, it's gracious, it does not seek to please itself. And especially in light of working and walking alongside weaker believers, Lord, we know that that is the purpose of your life in order to build them up and to see them grow. And Lord, we trust that the timing and the method that you used to go about that is all in your hands, but it requires us continually beholding and trusting you for who you say you are and who we are in you. And now we just pray for the second hour here and just a great opportunity to study again. And for those that can make it physically, we just pray for their continued safety and love you so much. And thank you for your grace and your love. In your name we pray. Amen.