Loving The Ain'ts Series

Falling In Love Again: Loving The Aints

2/6/11 Isaiah 53:1-15 Luke 4:14-20

Today we are starting a new series, “Falling In Love Again.” How many of you have fallen in love at least once. Everybody likes the feeling of falling in love. As a matter we even get so caught up in somebody’s else’s falling in love so that we have a ton of questions we want to know. The first one is usually 1) How good do they look? Then comes how much money do they have or what kind of job do they work. How old are they. We want to know what family they come from and how do they treat you? We want to know if they are a Christian. We want to know how the two of you met.

Now we all like to think that when we fall in love, we have got us a good looking, mentally balance, well behaved, faithful person with no serious defects. You don’t have to raise your hand on this one, but how many of you found out that’s not who you fell in love with. Now I got some good news and some bad news for you. If you have not married the person yet, you can still change your mind and look for someone else. The bad news is that whoever you do find is also going to be messed up in some area because of the limited number of people you have to choose from.

If you are looking for someone born on this planet, here is what God says about the available pool in Romans chapter three verses 9-18.

10 As it is written: “There is no one righteous, not even one; 11 there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God. All have turned away, they have together become worthless; there is no one who does good, not even one.”[a] 13 “Their throats are open graves; their tongues practice deceit.”[b]

“The poison of vipers is on their lips.”[c] 14 “Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness.”[d] “Their feet are swift to shed blood; 16 ruin and misery mark their ways, 17 and the way of peace they do not know.”[e] 18 “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”[f]

Everybody fits somewhere in these categories and most of us fit into more than one. Now which category of persons do you want to fall in love with because there are not any more people left. Can we be honest with each other for a moment? How many of you know, if everybody knew you, as well as you knew you, they would be reluctant to fall in love with you up front. You know, deep down inside we all know that we really ain’t all that. Now if you are one who didn’t know it, then I’ll tell you—You ain’t all that.

Many times we try to even hide who we are from the very person we are trying to win. Why do we do it? Because all of us know that we have things wrong with us. You see everybody who goes through life, gets battered and bruised at times. We are left with wounds and scars that cause us to see ourselves in negative ways. All of us carry around emotional scars. Even the person you envy and wish that if only you could be like them, has scars.

Some of the scars come from being part of the Ain’ts crowd. You can be from a poor family or rich one, a Black family or a white one, an uneducated family or college degreed one, an unknown family or famous one and be among the Ain’ts. The Ain’ts crowd is made up of people who have been battered by an event in their lives that has caused them to see themselves in a particular way. Somebody gave them a label that stuck in their brain. How did it happen.

Coming home from school with a report card full of A’s and B’s but having 1 C only to hear, you ain’t smart enough. Your brother got all A’s. Listening to everyone say to your sister, how pretty she is, but never hearing anyone say how nice you like. You hear, you ain’t pretty enough. You tell someone that one day you’re going to be a doctor, and the words come back, you probably are going to be just like you old daddy, and you ain’t going to amount to much of nothing.

You didn’t respond quick enough to help your little brother, and you hear “you ain’t deserving of nothing but a beating. You miss curfew once, and you hear, “you ain’t no good and you’re probably a slut. You displease someone, and they you’re worthless say ain’t noboby going to love you. You try out for a team and you don’t make the squad. You here, You ain’t nothing but a failure and that’s all you will ever be. What a disappointment you are.