"What, I'm Supposed To Love Who?" Series

Series Title: How to have Godly Character

Type: Series/Christian Growth

Objective: Every Christian Can display Godly Character by applying three supports that are found in John 15.

Sermon 2: “What, I’m Supposed To Love Who?” – The Fellowship of Believers

Text: John 15:12-17

Intro:

Has anybody here ever heard of a man by the name of Coach Lou Holtz? He is a retired college football coach and a motivational speaker.

Coach Holtz has been a builder of (football) programs throughout his illustrious 32 years as a collegiate head coach. First at William & Mary ... then at North Carolina State ... then at Arkansas ... then at Minnesota ... then at Notre Dame ... and then at South Carolina.

At all six universities, Holtz has led those programs to a postseason bowl game by his second season at the helm and regularly has produced winning teams that also record superlative graduation rates.

Coach Holtz entered the 2004 season as the third winningest active coach and ranks eighth all-time with 243 victories, while his 12 bowl game victories rank fifth on the all-time list.

Prior to going to Carolina, Holtz served as a college football analyst for CBS Sports for two years.

He was the ultra-successful head coach at Notre Dame for 11 seasons from 1986-96, where he rekindled the football fortunes of one of the country’s most prestigious programs, claiming a national championship in 1988 and leading the Fighting Irish to nine consecutive New Year’s Day Bowl games.

Coach Holtz is a phenomenal man who has an incredible message.

He has put together motivational speeches on DVD for Fortune 500 companies which cost thousands of dollars to purchase.

I recently heard a speech given by Lou Holtz who was speaking at a prayer breakfast that was re-played on James Dobson’s “Focus on the Family.” You can hear the whole speech if you go to family.org.

But before I tell you about his message let’s review where we are in our sermon series.

You’ll remember that last week we began a three week mini-series of sermons called “How to Have Godly Character.”

We saw from God’s Word that having Godly character is not something that a person can fake, and it is something that He wants us to have.

Godly Character flows out of a person who is connected or plugged into Jesus, just like apples grow naturally on a branch if they are connected to the tree.

We learned that the first support structure that Jesus left us was the ability to have fellowship with the Son of God by Abiding in Christ.

Without Christ, we can do nothing…including having Godly Character.

So, it all starts there – our own efforts at producing Godly character apart from Christ will only result in living a life of frustration and failure.

But, using that first support structure of Abiding in Christ will produce a life that bears much fruit for the Kingdom of God.

We will continue reading from John 15 in just a moment to see the second support structure for having Godly Character, which I call ‘fellowship of believers’, and the Title of today’s message is “What, I’m Supposed to Love Who?”

And we will see in just a moment as we pick up our text in John 15:12 that Jesus has commanded us to love one another – in essence He has commanded us to have true fellowship with each other.

I hope to show you that Godly Character is on display for all to see when we truly ‘love one another’.

But right now, let’s get back to Lou Holtz.

DESCRIBE CLIP

(find clip at http://oneplace.com search Lou Holtz, its amazing!

When enough people care…

I have heard others and I myself have preached messages on the topic of the power of one.

I have preached many times about how God has used one man that was willing to obey Him to change the course of history.

I have tried to challenge people to understand that God and One person make a majority.

It is true that throughout the O.T. God used individual men to bring about His progress of redemption.

And, I believe that God still uses individuals to lead others to impact lives in this world for Christ.

But the truth that I want to share with you this morning is that although God always uses the individual, the One man, the One woman, real change occurs only when enough people care!

Yes, I said the “c” word – change.

I want to challenge all who can hear me today to consider allowing change to take place in your lives.

Change from a heart that believes our church, our religion, or our own lives are meant to be lived in a selfish pursuit of happiness to hearts that truly display the very character of God by loving one another.