James Richards

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Sunday Morning Service

Jeremy Richards

Copalis Community Church

03 May 2024

Bible References

• 2 Corinthians 12:13-14

Audio MP3 PDF

We're going to be in second Corinthians, two corinthians twelve. Second Corinthians, 12, 13, 14. For what is it in which you were inferior to other churches, except that I myself was not burdensome to you? Forgive me this wrong. Now for the third time I am ready to come to you, and I will not be burdensome to you, for I do not seek yours, but you.

For children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents from the children. For the children. Just ask that you just pray with me. Okay. O Holy Father, O God.

Lord, in our hearts, Lord, we long for the fruition of spiritual authority, Lord. We look and desire the benefit of what it brings to our hearts, Lord. The miraculous work it does in other people, Lord, and the glory it gives to you, Lord, forgive us for being trained and for walking in the ways of the world, Lord. I just ask in this time that you would renew our minds, Lord, to help us to see clearly, to break free from the bonds that we've become accustomed to. Oh Lord, we ask in Jesus name, amen.

We were talking a couple weeks ago about the position which biblical authority comes from. This comes along the tail end of a section where Paul is explaining how much more he has than the false apostles in a desire to sway the Corinthians from following a group of people who were not following, who were not walking straight forward with the simple gospel that Paul preached. Paul was brought to a place of what he describes as foolishness to describe how much better his ministry, how much more it offered than these other apostles. He had more stripes, more ministry, more brokenness, more hurts. And he's trying to show that he is different.

He is walking a different path than these other individuals who are leading people astray. And then we came a couple weeks ago to the place where he describes where biblical authority starts. And I'm going to just hold here for a second and go back to this just for a minute. Biblical authority. We're given the example that Jesus Christ became nothing.

And this is where our, where real spiritual authority starts. But you and I oftentimes agree with things. Mentally, we have an idea that, yes, that's true. I need to become nothing. But practically it's actually different.

And I would like to know how we actually think of ourselves. How do we know where our spiritual authority comes from? Where do we know the actual place that we stand? Well, mentally, the truth is that we agree that Jesus's ministry was by far the most authoritative ministry that there ever has been. And it's the right way to minister.

But oftentimes you and I don't practically walk in what we believe is true. One of the ways I saw that is Moses was called to lead the children of Israel out of Egypt into the promised land. And he did such a. Well, such a good job rushing into the midst of them ten times, falling down and praying for them, repenting. But then the last time, right, this last test that he was brought to at the waters of Meribah, that he struck the rock and he said, you rebels.

You rebels, individuals. How we talk about other people is actually a better indicator of what we believe about others than what we say. We believe people undermine and speak negatively about people who are inferior to them. You don't ever do this in a place of being under someone who was there as a servant that goes into the place where their master works or lives and begins berating them or speaking badly about them. No, it's not true.

A person's position is more correctly understood by how they talk about other people. We say that we want the biblical authority like Christ had, becoming nothing, but we expose our true position through our mouth. That our mouth is actually a better. Gives us a better understanding of what we believe than what we think we believe. We live in a culture that is terrifying at this moment.

The stickers and the things that people are saying about each other is astonishing. The Bible says that you have heard that. It was said that he who murders will be in danger of the judgment. I say that whoever is angry with his brother without cause shall be in danger of the judgment. But whoever says Raqqa will be in danger of the judgment.

Whoever says, you fool, shall be in danger of hellfire. We have people that we are surrounded with that are very different than we are. Those are the people we're called to minister to, but those are the people who, when we're around, we expose the effectiveness of our ministry by opening our mouths. We expose whether or not we will have a fruitful ministry by what our mouths tell us about the position we are actually standing in, not by whether or not we say, we're christians, you fool. Talks about a kind of individual that we disagreed wholeheartedly with, something about them.

We don't like the way they dress. We don't like how much metal they put in their faces or what color their hair is or what kind of party they belong to. We find ourselves sometimes surrounded, and we're more of a kind of people who undermine groups than a position with biblical authority. Start from mean nothing and being called to serve others, I would like you just to question that you're here, and I hope that your goal is to begin to walk in a way in the authority of Jesus Christ. Thank you, Chuck, because that is the only place that breeds and brings results, like the most effective minister that has ever walked this earth being Jesus.

But this week, when you find your mouth tearing down other people, it's time to repent. It's time to repent not because it's wrong, which it is, but because your ministry is being eroded. Your authority is disintegrating. What a terrible thing when the spirit left the temple. What an awful thing when people chose not to walk with Jesus.

Our mouth brings us to the place where our authority crumbled before our eyes. Careful. There is no enemy that exists on this planet except the devil. All the rest of the people are our brothers and sisters, those who are created in the image of God. And God holds severe account with those who would say, you fool or Raqqa to those individuals.

So I just wanted to be careful. We're so quick to undermine and view hatefully people. But a person who finds themselves in a position when they recognize themselves as nothing, it's a much easier position to serve other people. I just pray that you would just consider that and watch our mouths. I find as I listen to myself and my family, that I belong to a family that is extremely judgmental of other people, that people don't walk like us, tend to be hurt in my home when we talk about people and harm them.

And I'm sorry. And I recognize that my authority is limited to the degree that I harm God's people.

We're going to move on. Jesus or Paul here has been magnifying and lifting up the positive parts of his ministry, I believe talking about where true authority comes from. But now he's going to talk about an area in his ministry where he's less than others. Less than others. So we're going to go to chapter twelve, verse 13.

It says, what is it in which you were inferior to the other churches, except that I myself was not burdensome to you. Forgive me this wrong. Now for the third time, I am ready to come to you and I will not be burdensome to you. We all are called to a certain kind of ministry. And in that ministry there is a level of authority that God has called you to.

In the christian church, apostles do not hold all authority. Evangelists have authority in God's church. Prophets have authority in God's church. Pastors have authority in Christ's church. Teachers help and whatever other kind of gift that we would like to include, all have a position of authority in Christ church.

We also say that there's a level of authority in business also. We could say in exactly the same way that employers do not hold all authority in the business. Employers have a role of authority in a business, as do employees in a home. Husbands do not hold all authority in the home. They have a position of authority in the home as the wifes also have a position of authority in the home.

Parents do not hold all authority in a home. They have a position that has been given to them by God of authority in their home. But children also have a position of authority in their home. You and I are called whatever position God has placed us in to use the authority that God has given us to maximize the fruit of that position.

There are individuals in whatever type of authority or structure that exists, in which the effect of their authority becomes burdensome.

I don't know if anyone here has ever been under authority before.

Anyone? Has anyone been under authority that was burdensome? I'm not sure why it came to my mind, but I've heard about a hen pecked husband before where a woman uses her authority in a way that's burdensome. I've heard of men using their authority, and instead of the blessing being passed down to their wife, what ended up was a burden on their wife. I've heard of parents being exasperated by their children.

I've heard of children being discouraged by their parents. And it doesn't really come from my neighbor's house that I hear these things right. Employees. Employees. Instead of this authority structure producing the level of blessing that God wants, instead, there ends up being a burden which deflates and discourages and breeds anger and resentment in the lives of people.

Though I don't understand it very well, the church also has an authority structure where, as a body, we all use our gifts to encourage each other to move forward in a way in which we all are benefited to a degree that's more than could have been attained by being individuals. That authority has been misused at different times, and people have felt burdened in church, that they felt individuals in authority, whether from one direction of another were burning them, pastors burn out and discouraged, or people in the church feeling that they're being manipulated. This is a kind of authority. But Paul says, I determined not to burden you. This kind of burdening authority we see about in Matthew.

Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to his disciples, saying, the scribes and Pharisees sit in Moses deceit therefore, whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works, for they say and do not do. For they bind heavy burdens hard to bear and lay them on men's shoulders, but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers. You and I have been given a position of authority. Sometimes we're induced by certain things in our flesh or the world to use that authority to burden the people that we have authority over, and we won't even lift one of those burdens with one of our fingers. Those individuals whom we have been given a gift to have authority over, not because of any exaltation or any skill that we possess, not because of some masculine or feminine trait that you think you have, not because of anything that you have or don't have.

You've been given a position because God has determined that you would use it for his glory and for the benefit of the individual that you have authority over. But some of us have used the position that we've been given to put a burden on the people that we were given the job to help as an individual sharing. Today, my job is not in any way to make you happy, but I will have done something right if there's somebody, if there's a man here or a woman or a child or a parent, and recognizing that I have place burdens, I have used something in my nature to force myself on an individual whom God has given me to lift the burdens off of their shoulders. Paul says, I will not be burdensome to you. There's a reason that he is not going to be burdensome.

There is a reason that we always are burdensome. We burden other people for a reason. We don't do it just because we like to make ourselves and others miserable, though that's what it does. We burden people for a purpose.

Paul says, I will not be burdensome to you, for I do not seek yours, but you. The reason we burden people is because we want what they possess, and when they don't give it to us, we make them pay for it. There are things that every person, whether in authority or under authority, always is expecting, and we place burdens on people when we do not get what we want. Paul says, I do not seek yours, but you. We are called, if we are being called as christians into christian authority, we are always called in the same line as Jesus Christ, a man who became nothing.

But it also says that he left what he had in heaven and he came down. It says, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son. I was pretty close to being in heaven last night, right? I was in my chair. Micaiah brought Obi's mp3 player, so I was listening to Obadiah's playlist, right?

I leaned my chair way back. I tried. I had three kids in my house, which seems like almost none, and I was just laying there by myself at that moment, if someone would have asked me to do something, I might have been a little perturbed. I was enjoying myself. It was kind of like the throne room of heaven, but that's where Jesus came from, surrounded and seated on the throne of God, surrounded by angels.

There. He had nothing to benefit by coming to earth. I was in. I've been mudding up in the house. I've been covered in mud.

I've been working a lot. I was in clean sweatpants, and everything was just nice. Jesus came down, and what did he come down for? Is there anything he gained or was he looking to receive something? Was there something he was going after?

No. He got a bunch of friends who were complainers. He got dirty feet, he got wounded, he got cries. He got all sorts of difficulties. He left his throne in glory to come down to mix with you and I.

He wasn't seeking what you have. The goal of christian ministry. The whole purpose. We have to get our mind around the fact that if we're to walk like Jesus, we actually have to.

If you're looking for the people that you minister to, to provide something for you, it's not Jesus you're following.

If you find yourself irate and irritated when the people you minister to aren't providing for you, it's because you're not walking like Jesus. We have to be able to understand if we're to enter into christian ministry, it has to be like the example of Jesus who did not come to serve. To be served, but to serve. We all like the example of James speaking about the church. And if there comes into your assembly a rich person, right, and if there comes into your assembly a poor person, right?

And you say to the one, sit here in a good spot, into the other, sit at my feet, you have become judges. The reason you become judges is because you feel like you can get something from the rich person and you don't minister into the same way to a person who you feel can give nothing back to you. But that is the very example of what christian ministry is. It's all about serving others, the whole thing. If you find yourself wanting to serve because of someone has something, then you're really not serving at all.

It should be expected that this ministry be one about serving others, not because of what they have. This comes down to an absolute base. Base. Here in the next section, it says, for the children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children. How natural it is for us to look at.

Or how unnatural I guess it would be for David and Nevaeh to put the baby down and then start screaming at it for not giving to them. Whatever. Didn't you go to work today? Where's the dishes? They're not done.

What? Are you crazy? No, no. There's a certain realization that comes. Look, those who are in authority provide for the needs who are under their authority.

It is natural spiritually to understand that if you are in a position of authority, that your position is to provide for the people under you. You're to use your position not to lord over, not to make a burden for, but you and I are called to serve. Those individuals who have been entrusted to our care for children ought not to lay up for the parents, but the parents for the children. If you have been put into a position of spiritual authority, you have been placed by God in a position to provide for the needs of someone else. Verse 15 says, and I will very gladly spend and be spent for your souls.

One of the things about spiritual authority is that when an individual is walking in the spirit, there is a joy that comes along with serving other people, a recognization, that this is not a burden for me, but a privilege. This is not a yucky chore, but this is my princely duty. This is what I have been called to do. This is what Jesus set the example for me for. Not because necessarily it makes me feel good, though I think it does, but because it is the most effective way possible for results.

Interesting, but we live in a culture that demands a kind of authority to get a result right. The military or people they're pushing. But here we see that Jesus sets up a new kind of authority that's based on no personal rights at all, that a person has and is based on a certain servants hearts towards others. And I can just see people ridiculing. How could that ever work?

That seems ridiculous. That's stupid. And yet here we are in the year 2024, agno Dominio, right in the year of Jesus reign, where twelve men and a handful of followers went out in obedience to Jesus teaching and with the biblical authority, changed the whole world. Who really should say which works? Shouldn't you and I be encouraged to spend and be spent for other people spend means that there is a financial cost involved.

Jesus says in Luke 16 the parable of the unjust steward. So the master commended the unjust steward because he had dealt shrewdly. For the sons of this world are more shrewd in their generation than the sons of light. And I say to you, make friends for yourselves by unrighteous mammon that when you fail they may receive you into an everlasting home. He who is faithful in what is least is faithful also in much.

And he who is unjust in what is least is unjust also in much. Therefore, if you have not been faithful and unrighteous mammon who will commit to you the true riches? And if you have not been faithful in what is another man's who will give you what is your own? No servant can serve two masters. For either he will hate the one and love the other or else he will be loyal to the one and despise the other.

You cannot serve God and mammon. I have to tell you guys absolutely straight. Ministry to other people costs resources. Expect it. It's not unusual Jesus died with nothing, having exhausted all the resources he had on those individuals around him.

It costs, whether we want to, say, money or resources, Paul says, I will very gladly spend and spend on the people I've been called to minister to. But also he says, I will be very gladly spend and be spent for your souls.

Not only does it cost resources, it costs energy to minister to other people around you. Christian ministry costs and it costs energy also. There is a gladness that comes along with it. But there is also another thing that we can pick up from here. It says, though the more abundantly I love you, the less I am loved.

You and I are often brought to a point of demonstrating christian authority in some way and get turned aside right before the harvest. Everyone gardened before. I don't like how a lot of people garden. You know, they get excited in the spring, discouraged in the summer and they put all this effort and it goes to absolutely nothing. It's a waste of time.

Why'd you even spend the money? Why were you digging in the soil at all? You should have put the money somewhere else. That's the way I think of most gardeners. But there are people who push through and actually get a harvest.

There are many people who are in a place of authority have been brought to a place of almost enjoying the harvest and get caught up at the last possible moment get discouraged and abandon the field. That's not a smart person.

It is normal spiritually. It is natural spiritually. You are working along the right path and following after Paul and Jesus. If you become discouraged because you feel like what you've been doing is not working, how many of us has given up right before the sun comes out? How many of us have become discouraged right when around the corner it was time to reap the harvest just because they didn't seem to be responding?

I would like to encourage you. If you've been putting your hand to the plow, if you've been working and exercising your spiritual authority, don't be discouraged just because your children are such rascals.

In due season, you will reap. He who wins souls is wise. If you've been investing respect towards your husband or love towards your wife, and it just seems like the more you invest, the honor they get, don't be discouraged. It always is that way. Before some spiritual birth can happen, right in your workplace, in your church, if it just seems like things just don't go right, remember, in order to birth something spiritually, it's going to hurt.

I hope at least some of the women can say so right. It hurts. It's normal for it to hurt. But be that as it may, I did not burden you. Even though there's no response, even though that happens, you have to come to a spot and say, I am unwilling to abandon the spiritual place that God has called me to.

I will not become a pharisee in my home. I will not burden you. I will not fall. Force you into respect. I will not push you.

I will not do it. I will not burden you. It is a spiritual gift that God does. I won't do it. I'm going to stay committed to that place where Jesus has called me to.

Nevertheless, being crafty. I caught you by Cunningham, you by cunning. Paul talks about ineffectiveness of this place of spiritual authority, this place of ministry. It looks like, oh man, I'm just getting all walked over. This is not working.

But Paul says, no. The end result, as I caught you, by cunning, there is a goal. It says that he who wins souls is wise. We don't have to go out unknowing that it's going to happen, but we need to be willing to go out because in the end, God's word will not return. Void that place.

When we walk with Jesus, we're guaranteed spiritual result in some way because that is the path that Jesus tells us to walk on. And his walk produced spiritual fruit. So I would just like to say, if you're in a position of authority or you feel that you've been called to minister to somebody, it's time to go out stealthily. It's time to go out spiritually committed to an idea that this kind of individual or this relationship that I am, I'm going to catch it by cunning. How many people go out in the forest with Obadiah's mp3 blaring, trying to hunt a deer?

No. There is a cunningness involved, and that cunning is acting and walking in the spirit. When you and I determine, yes, there's an end goal that I want, that I see, that I believe God has called to me. I don't have it now, but it is my goal to have it, and I am going to walk in this way. I refuse to burden other people, and I am going to work in this way, demonstrating Christ's love.

And I believe there will be a harvest in the end. I would just like to encourage you in that no matter where you are, whether your ministry is just your husband or your wife or it's your children or it's your employer relationship, God has called you to it. What kind of person are you? Are you a burdensome person, or are you a spiritual person who says, you know, I'm going to walk in this way no matter what, and I'm going to be the one that sees the fruit in the end? Let's pray.

Oh, Father, we do just come to you, Lord. Guilty. Guilty. Guilty, O Lord. Lord.

But at the same time, sinners starting from nowhere but looking up with a radiant face. Lord, appreciative of the chance to start again, Lord, appreciative that your ways are right and bear fruit. Lord, encourage our hearts. I ask, O Lord. Lord, that stealthily and with coming would put your ways into practice.

In Jesus name, amen.