Joyce Meyer - Why Can't We Get Along? (08/20/2019)
Jesus' new commandment to love one another as He loved us sums up the entire law—how we treat people matters most to God. Showing no partiality, valuing everyone equally without prejudice or favoritism, and overcoming evil with good breaks down walls of division, releases anointing and blessings, and glorifies God far beyond just "sneaking into heaven."
The Commandment That Sums Up Everything
Jesus said, one new commandment I give unto you, and this one sums up all the law and all the prophets. You can keep everything else, everything, the spirit of the law in the Old Testament will be kept if we learn how to walk in love.
And love is very simply how we treat people. Let me tell you that when you're around people, they may not remember much of what you said, but they will always remember how you made them feel. Amen?
They will always remember if you made them feel good, or if you made them feel bad. If you made them feel valuable, or if you made them feel unvaluable. And that can be something as simple as learning to listen to other people without interrupting them every two seconds.
I mean, there's a lot of little ways that we can add value to people if we will let God show us how to do that.
Why Treating People Right Matters Most
Now, I don't know if you believe what I'm saying yet or not, but I'm telling you that loving other people and how we treat people, I personally believe that how I treat people is the most important thing to the Lord.
I think how I treat all kinds of people is the most important thing, and I think that that has everything to do with the anointing on my life and the anointing on your life.
And I can tell you, if we spend our lives making sure that we value people and we treat other people right, you are not going to have to concern about your blessing package because blessings will chase you down and overtake you.
So maybe we need to fix our focus a little bit. I've been saying this, and I think it's a good statement. And I think we need to spend here getting ready for there.
And so maybe we spend too much time thinking about our instantaneous comfort and not enough time thinking, it doesn't really matter if I'm comfortable here or not. I've got forever to live.
And I want to make sure that I'm living now in such a way that when I stand before the Lord, I've got a full reward coming because I've been faithful while I've been here. Come on.
You know, my dad was just an awful man. And at 83, I got the privilege of leading him to the Lord, and he's in heaven. I know that I know that I know that he's in heaven, and I'm grateful for that.
But I'm still sad that he wasted his whole life. And I'm sad that he mistreated so many people. And so let's just don't live a life where as long as we sneak in the back door of heaven, we're okay.
Let's live a life that really glorifies God, that can really make a difference in somebody else's life.
No Partiality or Prejudice Allowed
So now I've probably preached my whole sermon, but we'll go back and look at the verses. James chapter 2, verse 1. My brethren, pay no servile regard to people. Show no prejudice, no partiality.
Do not attempt to hold and practice the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, together with snobbery.
For if a person comes into your congregation whose hands are adorned with gold rings and who's wearing splendid apparel, and also a poor man in shabby clothes comes in, and you pay special attention to the one who wears the splendid clothes, and you say to him, sit over here in this preferable seat, while you tell the poor man, now go stand over there or sit on the floor, are you not discriminating among your own and becoming critics and judges with wrong motives?
Now, we all like to think that we're not prejudiced. But to be honest, I think probably everybody in this room today may have a little bit of prejudice in some area of your life.
Breaking Down Walls of Judgment
Let's just take for an example, you know, he's given the example of the rich and the poor. And to be honest, sometimes people of means will shy away from people that are poor, but also people that are poor right away can form an opinion that's totally wrong of anybody who has more than they do.
I'm telling you what, the opinions that we have that are based on nothing are very, very sad. I said, the opinions we have that are based on nothing, we don't know anything about what we're talking about, and yet we have a solid opinion of those people.
And so, I really don't want to be like that. I don't want to judge and criticize and form opinions about things that I really don't know anything about.
But we have a tendency to shy away from what is not like us. Okay, we're going to go slow. Example. If you're 50 or above, you come from a certain generation, which we all do. And I'll tell you the truth, we do think generationally like it or not.
And so, let's just say that I walk into a coffee shop and the girl that's behind the counter has got tattoos all down both arms. Lots of piercings. Her hair is three different colors going in 40 directions.
And if I'm honest, there's something in me that kind of goes, there's this kind of wall just kind of like... All right. And chances are, she might feel the same way about me.
I go in with my three-piece rhinestone suit and my earrings and every hair in place and every piece of makeup perfect. And she might automatically think, well, who are you?
And so, we have to purposely... And I'm doing this because we all have an issue with this. And I purposely want us to start bringing down those walls.
I mean, we're going to have to do it on purpose. There are so stinking many walls of division. And it's keeping us divided and causing us to even hate people.
And all it does is just tear down our power, especially in the church. Especially in the church.
Love One Another as Christ Loved Us
And Jesus said, look, I mean, these are the words of the Holy Spirit. Don't be prejudiced. Don't show favoritism to one person while you mistreat another.
And let's stop thinking that everybody needs to be like us to be okay. Amen?
You know, we... Several years ago, we changed up some things in the ministry and we started getting younger worship teams. And... I mean, I still... I'll still be sitting over there.
And... I mean, you know, they dress different than we do. And so, maybe I get one and they've got rips and, you know, in their jeans.
Now, I still can't figure out why anybody wants to pay $100 for a pair of jeans that's got holes in it. But... I can tell you this. It's not hurting their anointing.
I said it's not hurting their anointing. I said it's not hurting their anointing. But I'll tell you what can hurt mine if I've got a snooty I'm better than you attitude.
Come on now, don't make me come down there. And we don't know anything about somebody because they've got a tattoo and it's something we would never have or they've got a nose piercing and we would never do that or they've got holes in their jeans and we would never do that.
We don't know anything about them. And we need to take the trouble to get to know people's hearts.
And you know how we are? It's like, oh, one of those. Whatever that is. You know, it's like to some people I'm one of those. I'm one of those televangelists that's just out to get everybody's money.
You know, I am so excuse me fed up with labels. I mean, we want to put a label on everything and we don't even know what we're talking about.
And for the sake of the gospel, we need to broaden our circle of inclusion. And I don't mean by that that we have to start accepting sin and saying that it's okay just because that's what somebody wants to do.
But I will tell you this, we can love the sinner. Amen?
James warns the believer to treat all people the same regardless of their wealth or social standing.
A Personal Lesson in Valuing the "Unimportant"
I've told this story way too much but I can't resist telling it again. I met a doctor's office several years ago waiting for my appointment. there was an elderly man in there who'd fallen on the ice and broke his leg and he kept wanting to tell me about his leg more than once.
Now, I kind of knew the guy lives alone and he's just lonely and I'm sure he just wants somebody to talk to but I did not want to talk to him. I wanted to read my Bible and be spiritual.
I mean, I had it. I had the Bible. I mean, I was praying, reading the Bible. This man kept trying to talk to me and I actually said to the Lord, would you make him leave me alone?
Now, there are some prayers we can pray that God is not going to answer. So, the Lord spoke to my heart and he said if that was Billy Graham would you listen to him?
I mean, God knows how to just rip you up, doesn't he? With just a couple of words. And I didn't even need a further sermon. I knew exactly what God was saying.
You would listen to somebody that you thought was important because you would think that that would make you important or that maybe they could do something for you.
So, let me tell you something. I never try to give you guys anything that God hasn't made me eat first.
Overcoming Hatred with God's Love
A few weeks ago I was out doing my morning walk and I was just thinking about a lot of the stuff that we hear and I just thought you know what? I am so fed up with hatred.
I mean, I'm just so tired of people hating people and groups of people hating groups of people just because they're different than somebody else.
So, I asked Pastor Mike to help me and we did a little bit of study and there are multitudes of wars that have been fought through the centuries because people from one culture or ethnic background despised those from another.
Started in Genesis with Cain and Abel. They were different. Cain killed Abel.
In 1618 to 1648 there was a war of religious hatred that existed between Catholics and Protestants. Now, I'm just telling you here about the religious wars and we're not even going to get into all the other stuff.
I mean, they're not all religious wars but they're all just because people are different.
The Nazi Jewish Holocaust six million people were killed simply because they were Jews. No other reason. I just don't like you. You're not like me. So, we're going to eradicate you.
In 1967 to 70 one million people were killed in the Nigerian Civil War a war between two tribes who hated one another.
Rwandan genocide in 100 days one million people were brutally slaughtered and that war was due to ethnic hatred between two tribes the Tutsis and the Hutus.
There has been a conflict and war in Ireland for years between the Catholics and the Protestants.
Ah, this one was kind of like jaw-dropping. There's a war actually called the Cold Religious War that has lasted for 962 years and it is between the Western Catholic Church and the Eastern Catholic Church which is the Greek or the Russian Orthodox and they split in 1054 over doctrinal differences and have not officially fellowshiped together since then.
The doctrinal difference they split over was the origin of the Holy Spirit and rather they should have the Eucharist with leavened or unleavened bread.
Now I'm not... you know... and then we wonder why the world is not impressed by us.
And then I looked up this morning online how many Christian denominations there are. 33,000 divisions in the body of Christ. I mean, we gotta stop this sealing us. Amen?
I'm not trying to be disrespectful but I'm just saying this stuff is ridiculous. I mean, it's like we're playing right into the devil's hands.
He wants us all to find a new reason every week to hate each other but Jesus said one new commandment I give unto you that you love one another just as I have loved you.
And I'm certainly not saying that there's not groups of people who mistreat other groups of people because we all know that there are.
But I can tell you what, if somebody hated you so much they mistreated you for you to now spend your life hating them back is certainly not gonna solve the problem.
You know why? Because the Bible the Bible the Bible the only real truth we have says that we always only overcome evil with good.