Pastor Brendan Kelly - Showing Hope

Morning Service, December 6 2009

This message refers to our Christmas campaign www.whereishope.com.au. The website includes the advertisement referenced in this message.

Introduction

This year our approach to Christmas comes from a desire to simply be Jesus to our community. This can be summed up in one thought: Where is Hope? As Christians, we understand we get our hope from Jesus Christ.

Today, it is not uncommon for the community to see Christians as a type of 'moral police force'.

Unintentionally, our signs or declarations about 'morality' make people feel as though we are saying they should feel guilty for not doing the things we do, such as going to church and being a Christian.

What messages do we send to the world around Christmas and Easter time? What would they say if we asked them "What do you think about church?"

We need to intentionally bring Jesus to our community in order to bring hope.

How do we bring hope?

1. We need to stop being 'professional Christians'.

There is no point in telling people about Jesus if we are not being Jesus.
We've got to be confronted on how to be Jesus to others without condemning or devaluing them.

Read Luke 10:25-37 New King James Version

In Luke 10:25-37, a lawyer asks a similar question to Jesus when he asks 'Who is my neighbour?'
What the lawyer in this passage was really asking was 'Who should I love?' because he already knew he was supposed to love his neighbour.
This lawyer had an extensive understanding of how people were to live according to the Levitical and Jewish laws, and spent most of his life instructing people and following the law as a profession.
It is very easy for us to become known as 'Professional Christians', spending much of our lives telling people how they should or should not act according to the scriptures. For this reason, Jesus' response is relevant to our question 'How do we bring hope?' in the parable he told the lawyer.

2. We need to see people as people—not according to their colour or creed.

Many commentators believe the phrase 'a certain man' (NKJV) implies a man whom those passing by would not normally be drawn to.
Regardless of the religion or race of a person, we need to see them simply as a person and treat them as the Samaritan did: as a person of value.
It is highly likely the man in this parable that was left to die was of a different race, colour or creed to the Priest, Levite and Samaritan. The Samaritan was able to look past their differences and give unconditional love.

3. We need to be people who give generously of our resources without expecting anything in return.

The Samaritan looked after this man at a personal cost, yet nowhere do we read he expected anything in return.
Even the hidden agenda of expecting them to come to church after we've helped them is manipulation.
Of course we want people to find Jesus as their personal Lord and Savior and find a church family to belong to, but we need to be a 'just because' church, who help people without a motive other than it’s simply the right thing to do.
For this reason, we purposely left our name 'Spring Street Christian Church' from the whereishope.com.au advertisement. Our agenda was not to promote our church or get people to come along; it was simply to offer hope to the hopeless this Christmas.
We need to be humble and be careful not to communicate to others that we think more highly of ourselves than we do of them.

4. We need to have credibility within our community.

In verse 35, the Samaritan had credibility with the innkeeper.
As a church body, we are trying to do all we can to have credibility. We can achieve this by being a people who under-promise and over-deliver.
We need to build relationships with other credible organisations in our community.
Credibility is not just important corporately, but as individuals we need to ensure we are being credible, generous and are known as individuals with good motives.

5. We need to be able to count the cost of working with people who may want to take advantage of us.

It is risky when you give a lot of yourself; it can be costly.
When Jesus came, He counted the cost on the cross. He knew He was coming to a people who would take advantage of Him.
In verse 35, the Samaritan said to the innkeeper 'Whatever more you spend, when I come again I will repay you.' This reinforces his credibility with the innkeeper, but also his heart to do whatever it took to count the cost to help this man.
People will, at some point, take advantage of us, but we must remind ourselves: How many times have we taken advantage of Jesus?

Conclusion

At least the lawyer knew that bringing hope starts with loving ‘the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, and with all your mind,’ and ‘your neighbour as yourself.'

Being hope and a genuine help to the community can be very confronting, risky and costly, but we'll find those same things wrapped up in the cross.

If loving the Lord with our whole heart is where we are at, we will want to love our neighbour, be Jesus and show the way to hope.