Title : THE LETTER i
Intro:
This mornings message is entitled…………
I don’t know about you I could be the most self indulged person at times even as a kid
( give me no its mine mommy) I was selfish and still I am at times.
I Remember one of my friends and I got this brilliant idea………………….on how to earn money and to expand our finances………… We were thinking about ourselves and wanted that rush feeling. What we did was selfish, that year the baseball team could not buy uniforms I found out years later. Because of my selfishness, it cost others something.
How many of you think I was a selfish, a self-centered jerk?
Sure, I totally was. I was only thinking about me.
Here is the last question, how many of you can relate – just like me, you have been selfish at some point in your life?
So If you raised your hand, this morning’s letter of the day is i.
You see, for all of us, we have a choice, my life can revolve around I, in the theory that I am the center of the universe or my life can revolve around God and putting other people’s needs ahead of my own.
Let’s be honest, it is a lot easier to be self-centered than others-centered. It’s easy to buy into my father in-law saying he who hesitates is lost , its all about you and you being the first one in line, the first to talk, the first one you think about when a circumstance happens – how will I benefit from this?
One reason that this comes so naturally is because the world around us is very I focused.
So much so, when they hear that someone does something that is for others they think your from some other planet that you are strange, and have some sort of problem.
You’re doing what you are spending your spring break serving other people it’s your spring break and you even have to pay for it out of your own pocket or your parents pocket I guess what’s the difference ,that’s weird why would you do that? And what You gave your iPod away and took a homeless guy out on a date to McDonalds and he didn’t leave a tip your crazy!
Like I said earlier, it is a lot easier to be i-centered and focus on one person, especially when that person is me than to be other’s centered. Here is the problem Being I centered comes with some side-effects or I problems. Let me share just a couple of them with you.
There are 2 i-problems
1. I is not in the word love. It is almost impossible to have a true meaningful relationship with a person who only thinks about themselves.
Think about it………..
The Bible puts it this way:
In James 4:1-2
Vs 1- What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Don’t they come from the evil desires at war within you?
Vs 2- You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it.
The cause of relational conflicts is simple: someone is not getting their way.
As long as I put I first, it is only a matter of time before I meet someone else who wants to be first and the result according to the bible is “fights and quarrels.”
Let’s Test this theory think back to your last fight with your parents or friend:
What was your fight about and why “What did you want?” if we really looked at it and had you come up here to share what it probably came down to is you were mad because you didn’t get your way?”
There will always a first in something. At a door, only one person can go through the door first. At lunch, only one person can order first. When determining who will talk and who will listen, guys if you are talking to a girl you will be the one listening, but seriously only one person can talk first. When there is a disagreement, only one person is going to get their way.
Either I go first or I allow you to. If I go first and make you wait, there is the potential for conflict.
But if I let you go first, there is potential for relationship. That relationship in God’s eyes is more important than you being first.
Selfishness is the enemy of relationships. I is not in love. Ultimately I destroys families, friendships, teams, rock bands, student ministries and holds us back from what God wants to do in our lives.
For Example: Divorce – someone put their needs ahead of everyone else’s, and now you are forced to have two different families. Being the one that has to be recognized for everything causes your friends to walk away, Being the one that has to be catered to leaves others out.
When we choose to make I #1, we are saying no to making others first. We are saying no to love. There is no I in love.
2. I is always in the middle of sin. Sin is when we miss the mark, we miss where God wants us to be.
Sin is an archery term. When an archer misses the bull’s eye or the center of the target, it is called a sin.
For some of us, we are barely missing the target, for others, we couldn’t hit the ocean, we are so far off.
In both of these situations, we are sinning. We are missing the mark. We are not living where God wants us to be. The reason we do this is because of i.
I is always in the middle of sin.
How many of you have ever lied? Yeah, we all have. Have you ever told a really stupid lie and got away with it, at least for a while?
I remember this kid named jay in junior high,…….car……..rock……..lied…….his dad………
What would have been the right thing to do in this situation? told his sister and my dad parents the truth, take the blame, clean up the mess, and receive the punishment. Is that what I did? No way.
I didn’t want to be grounded. I didn’t want to get in trouble. I had to do what was best for me and telling the truth was not an option, so I told my dad it was not me there was no way with the car going that fast that they could say it was me, it was one of the other kids walking home from school I saw it happen, so my dad asked me do you know who it was no I don’t know the kid.
I intentionally did what I knew I shouldn’t do to protect I. I lied because I thought that was the best thing for me.
YOU SEE Every sin comes back to selfishness.
When your parents ask you to do something and you don’t do it. Selfishness.
When we have a chance to serve and don’t. Selfishness.
When we date that person we know we shouldn’t. Selfishness.
When we gossip. Selfishness.
When we have a chance to stand up for someone and don’t. Selfishness.
When we get too busy for God. Selfishness.
HOOKS, HOOKS, HOOKS
We are basically saying “God, I am going to do what I want to do, not what you want me to do. I choose I, and not You, and in a sense we claim to be god.
I is always in the middle of sin.
I think Jesus knew that we would lean towards I, that we would want to do our own thing.
I believe this is one reason why when Jesus came to this earth, He wanted to show us what would happen if we took the I out of the center of our lives.
Check out what the Bible says:
Philippians 2:5-8
Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death—even death on a cross!
What if Jesus said man I’m not dying on that cross……
You see Jesus didn’t come for Jesus. Jesus came for others. Just like me and you, Jesus could have said, this life is about me. I was a king in heaven and now it is time to be king here on earth. But he didn’t. Instead he humbled himself and put others first. Jesus came to serve.
And we are called to do the same thing. Why don’t we serve?
We pour into ourselves because we think that will exalt us. It will make us better. It will make our lives matter, but Jesus had a different take on this.
Matthew 23:12 But those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.
What Jesus is saying is that those who are trying to make themselves something will become nothing, and those who are choosing to become nothing by putting others before themselves will become something.
This last Fri Brooks and I were talking …………..
So what about you?
Are you trying to be something or are you trying to be nothing?
What about as student ministry?
What would happen if for one day, the one hundred or more students who make up the Inner State Youth ministry took one day and said, we are going to be nothing, we are going to take the I out of middle of our lives and focus on other people?
For one day, we are going to pour our lives into others. What would happen?
A lot more of your friends would be here for starters. People would look at us differently.
Our relationships would change. Our lives would change.
Most importantly, we will become more like Christ, who humbled himself and poured out his life for others.
Close:
There are some of you who are living like this world revolves around you and you are pouring into you. If that is you, if like me you have a tendency to be selfish, I am asking all of you to make a commitment to pour your life into other people.
Because of our selfishness, we are separated from God. Jesus came to serve, and pour his life into others, and then he took it another step further. He poured out his life completely on a cross for you and me so that we could be filled with God, and have a relationship with Him.
LET’S PRAY:
