“For whoever keeps the entire law, and yet stumbles at one point, is guilty of breaking it all.” (CSB – Read the chapter)
We like for things to be incremental. We want to be able to advance toward pretty much everything in life in a step by step fashion. Every big store offers payment plans for their big ticket items. Cars get paid off over three or four years (and increasingly more). Houses take 30 years even though few people live in one place that long anymore. Why can’t the same be true with getting into Heaven?
“If anyone thinks he is religious without controlling his tongue, his religion is useless and he deceives himself. Pure and undefiled religion before God the Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” (CSB – Read the chapter)
So, last time, we started out by spending some time looking at our culture’s struggles with the idea of religion. I told you that one of the common self-distinctions people often make when it comes to religious identity is that they are “spiritual, not religious” (SNR). People claim this identity because although they have been trained by either personal or impersonal experience or both to think poorly of religion, they don’t consider themselves secular or even merely agnostic. They just don’t like religion. For professed Christians who would claim this identity this is a real problem because they can’t grow well without the church and the church is a form of religion. As I asked before: What do we do with this?
“If anyone thinks he is religious without controlling his tongue, his religion is useless and he deceives himself. Pure and undefiled religion before God the Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself unstained from the world.” (CSB – Read the chapter)
One of the trends over the last few years when it comes to self-identifying religious preference is for folks to say they are spiritual, but not religious. This has in some ways been a partner to the rise of the “nones.” Many folks from this media darling social group don’t want to identify themselves as associated with any particular religious group, but at the same time, they don’t want to give the impression that they are claiming to be atheists. So they’ll say, “I’m spiritual, not religious.” How should Jesus followers respond to this?
This past Sunday morning we kicked off a brand-new teaching series called Being Useful. That’s something we all want, isn’t it? We want to be able to confidently say that we have made a difference in the world. Our heart pulses with that beat. Over the next few weeks, we are going to be examining the character that will guarantee we reach our goal in the areas that matter most. I look forward to going on this journey with you. Thanks for reading.
The Secret to Mattering Most
Let’s start this morning with a quick pop culture survey for you. Shout it out if you know the answer. What do Dude Perfect, PewDiePie, HolaSoyGerman, and elrubiusOMG all have in common? They are all YouTube stars. PewDiePie leads the pack with 96 million subscribers to his YouTube channel. The other three all sit north of 35 million, with Dude Perfect leading the second-tier pack at over 42 million. A lot of subscribers translates into a lot of money because of the way YouTube shares ad revenue with its viral video producers. In 2018, Forbes Magazine reported that the highest grossing YouTube channel was not actually one of the top 10 by subscriber totals, but rather Ryan ToysReview. This seven-year-old whose channel started when he was four and features him playing with toys…really, that’s it…made him (and his proud parents) $22 million. The Dude Perfect channel—which is produced by some friends from Texas A&M whose stated goal is to glorify Christ in all they do—made $20 million. That kind of income allows them to keep making videos like this one as their full-time job.
“But be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.” (CSB – Read the chapter)
Have you ever heard a really stirring speech or maybe a sermon that grabbed hold of your heart and made you feel like you were ready to go take on the world? Did you? Or perhaps have you seen one of those commercials with the old white guy promising not to let anymore African kids starve if you give him your money filled with all kinds of really pathetic-looking little ones? Did it yank on your heartstrings? Did you send him money? Being stirred to action emotionally is one thing. Actually moving is something entirely different. James agrees.
The Nexus 