Separation from the world is not the same thing as isolation from the world. And if we're not going to be isolated, we're going to have to learn to live like Christ. Christ-like characteristics. Witnessing your faith is a verbal witness of Christ, or a verbal expression of your faith. That's the witness. The testimony lets them become a witness of your relationship with Christ.
The witness and the testimony. And now here's Pastor Rick as he teaches in Galatians chapter 6 and then continues in Romans 12 on this edition of Cross Reference Radio. I have watched this verse materialize through the lives of other believers over the decades and it is glorious to see this love being dispersed. Distribute to the needs of the saints, given to hospitality. The word given there, one word in the Greek, a single word, it means to press. It's translated elsewhere, even in this chapter and we'll get to it in verse 14, it's elsewhere translated persecute. Persecute with kindness.
That's where he's going with this. You got to love how he's using the language. He says given to hospitality. Now hospitality is to love a stranger or a guest. To show them love. It's a high love.
Agape is the highest, the spiritual love that comes from Christ, but phileo is a good one too. Not to be dismissed. And it is here another compound word, hospitality, phileoexa in the Greek, the love of strangers, not strange love. And that should have got a chuckle out of you guys.
You're going to have to help here. Anyway, so the sentence does read persecute strangers with love. And it's a poetic moment and, you know, you hear it that way. You say, yeah, I know there are some of you here, you've got that gift. I don't have the gift of hospitality. Well, I'm hospitable, I'm kind, but if you show up to my house unannounced, I'm going to say, what are you doing here? But others, others are like, yeah, come on in, have some food, you know, and it's so hospitable. So, but I've noticed that they can't come to my house unannounced, but I don't mind going to theirs if they like it. I'm just helping them out.
Anyway. Well, in all fairness to me, you know, because a lot of times I'm prepping. You know, my life is I'll be in that pulpit Wednesday and I'll be ready and I'll be in that pulpit Sunday and I'll be ready and I'll be ready for something that pops up. And to do that, I've got to guard my time. Well, anyway, I would hope all pastors would be that way.
I think one wrote a book, Sunday's Coming, and he was talking about that. Well, I'm built for that. I'm ready for it. I've learned to be ready for it. Anyway, verse 14, bless those who persecute you, bless and do not curse. God's standards are high and he does not lower them.
I know this for a fact. God has not given up on me and I have given him plenty of reason to, and he's not going to give up on you either. Thus the pursuit, Christian pursuits. What would happen if God says, you know, you get 10 mistakes and after that you're done? How often should I forgive my brother? Seventy times, you know, and Christ just said, listen, forgiveness is an ocean and you've got to learn to sail that ocean. And when you forgive, oftentimes it's going to cost you something. Well, when David said, I will not give to the Lord unless it costs me something. He is talking about money, but God is talking about sacrifice. Well, this word bless in verse 14, bless those who persecute you, and that word persecute is the same one used in verse 13 that we talked about, pressed upon, and the context lends to whether it is hostile or just perseverance. Bless here is where we get our English word eulogized from.
When someone has a loss in the family like that and they meet and we plan out the service, I ask, do you have someone who's going to do the eulogy? And many times, what is that? Well, I like that moment. It's two words, you know, from the Greek, good word. It's to say a good thing about the person.
So Luke chapter 6, verse 28. Bless those who curse you and pray for those who spitefully use you. What does that mean, bless them? Do I have to say, Lord, can you give them more opportunities to hurt me? Of course not. But it means don't say anything bad about them then.
Just take it. You can tell the truth, but it doesn't help matters. And, you know, a kind word turns back wrath. And so we'll come back to that because it's in here elsewhere. He says bless those who persecute you. And again, what is the alternative?
Vengeance is the alternative. Justification of un-Christ-like behavior. That would make us like Islam.
That would allow us to retaliate mercilessly and justify ourselves in doing that. The Quran freely espouses anti-Christian behaviors. Islam has made slaves of Muslims. You just try to get out of it once you're in.
Just say, you know what, I'm going to become a Christian now. It treats all women like possessions. It has wrecked all Muslim countries. Persia used to be a great country. You know, one of the great kingdoms of the ancient world. Modern day Iran. Babylon, the great. Syria, both of those are in Iraq.
They were in Iraq, what is now called Iraq. It has done much harm in certain areas of Pakistan. Inbreeding has really negatively or had disastrous results, I should just put it that way. Could Satan have done a better job at ruining a people? Everything Islam touches turns to violence, to darkness, and to suffering. You say, you shouldn't be saying these things.
Why? They're true. You're suppressing the truth on our rights. It's like saying, hey, pastor, don't tell us that murder of the unborn, we don't want to hear about that.
No, you have to hear about that. That's upholding the word of God. It's not enough to believe these things. Sometimes you've got to say them or else the wicked gain momentum. You go into the workplace and someone says, Islam's a peaceful religion.
Don't put up with that. Unless the Lord says, keep your mouth quiet, then you've got to do that. But if the Lord doesn't say that, I disagree with that.
That's an unfounded opinion. Well, anyway, the spirit of retaliation will silence the witness of Christ. So the things I've just said about Islam and the murder of the unborn is not retaliatory. It's facts.
It's truth. It's not a spirit of vengeance on them. Our Lord practiced what he preached and what he preached is what he told us to do. While on the cross, he prayed for them who mocked him, taunted him, impaled him. He knew they were going to spear him.
He knew how they were going to treat him. He opened the gates of paradise for one of the outlaws that just a moment ago was bad-mouthing him with the other outlaw. They both were taunting Christ. Matthew 27, verse 44. Even the robbers, plural, who were crucified with him, reviled him. And yet Christ made a way to bring him into paradise that day.
It's like, you know what? In just a few minutes or maybe an hour or so, you'll be in paradise. Even at death, surrounded by disbelievers and enemies. So separation from the world. What we learn about the life of Christ and the saints of the New Testament church.
Separation from the world is not the same thing as isolation from the world. And if we're not going to be isolated, we're going to have to learn to live like Christ. Christ-like characteristics. Witnessing your faith is a verbal witness of Christ or a verbal, it's a verbal expression of your faith. That's the witness. The testimony lets them become a witness of your relationship with Christ. The witness and the testimony. One is verbal, one is visual. I'm really boiling it down.
They work both ways, but that's boiling it down. Hebrews 11, verse 2. For by it the elders obtained a good testimony. Matthew 5, 43.
You have heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy. Then he goes on to say, but I say to you. And those those teachings of Christ, we do not take lightly. We take them as the word of God, especially the fact that Christ did not say, thus sayeth the Lord.
He never said that. He always said, when the time came, I say to you, because he is the Lord. Verse 15. Rejoice with those who rejoice and weep with those who weep without envy, without indifference. If someone gets a new vehicle and you're still driving a jalopy, rejoice with them. Otherwise, envy is getting the best of you. If someone is in sorrow, some great loss, don't make it, well, if they had done it this way, they wouldn't have had this problem.
Don't be indifferent. Verse 5 of Romans 12. We, being many, are one body in Christ and individually members of one another. We're not detached.
And if, you know, you can feel an insect land on your finger, that message has been sent to your brain and it's in an instant. And the body of Christ is to behave that way too. Verse 16. Be of the same mind toward one another. Do not set your mind on high things, but associate with the humble.
Do not be wise in your own opinion. Well, when he says, be of the same mind toward each other, what he's talking about is, don't treat some people, I'll put it this way, Jesus gave the same amount of courtesy and respect to the woman at the well who had gone through five husbands and just shattered romances for her. He treated her with courtesy and respect, the same that he gave to Nicodemus, a scholar, a teacher in Israel of the law. He was loving to the dying thief on the cross and to his own mother from the cross. Go back to that first part of verse 16. Be of the same mind toward one another. James chapter 2, the first four verses, he deals with that.
He talks about what was happening in some of the churches, that there were some pastors that were fawning over the rich and the wealthy and really disrespecting the poor. Well, you're no benefit to this ministry, why don't you go sit in the back? What if the rich guy was sitting up front and was a distraction in the service?
Well, he needs to go sit in the back or in the corner with a little hat shaped like a comb. Christ was patient with Judas while being betrayed and he was patient with Peter when Peter was disagreeing with him. These guys might stumble, not me. He says associate with the humble. Some translations read condescend and that's not accurate.
That word for us is a stigma attached to it and not a positive word as we use it mostly. But the Greek is to be carried away. So he's saying be carried away with humility.
Some are carried away with pride and arrogance. So, you know, again, the sense of inability that we discover in our own hearts from time to time is in itself a preparation to serve Christ. There are times that I come up into this pulpit and I don't know what I'm going to say. I know I've studied and I've got it all in my head, but, you know, who am I? And then I get in and I open it up and the Lord just ministers to me.
At least that's me telling the story. I think if you ask a pastor, how'd you do? If he says I did well, I think what he would, I'll say what I would mean, I made my points.
I don't know how they were taken. I don't know any more than that. I know that I had things I felt the Lord give me and I was able to say those things. Now, if I come up and I can't make my points, then you say, how do you do that?
I say, I don't know. But inside I'm saying, oh, man, I said this wrong. I did that wrong.
I came off too mean, too harsh, too this. And these things should be the same for you in the sphere of ministry that you serve in. Verse 17, repay no one for evil. Repay no one evil for evil.
Have regard for good things in the sight of all men. Personal retaliation is forbidden. I say personal because there are times when retaliation is merited. If you're a Christian and you're a general, you might have to say, you know, we've got to put an end to this and you may have to retaliate with sufficient force to end it. There's turning of the other cheek is what we're talking about when you have been slapped. Joseph to his brothers. And how we do that, it's like, okay, would I turn to your other cheek if I'm slapped?
What about if I'm punched? There are limits to these things, you know. Joseph, because it's a negative witness, who here would allow their family to be slaughtered?
Not me. What kind of witness is that for Christ? So, you know, you have to navigate through these things and we do that by looking at other parts of Scripture, of the character studies, and Joseph, the son of Jacob, is one of the sons, is a great example. Remember how his brothers treated him? They persecuted him, ridiculed him, sold him into slavery, threw him into a ditch. We're going to kill him. And what happens in the end?
He vets them. He finds out whether they're still these monsters or not all those years later and he discovers they're not the same wicked men. Then he provides for them, he pardons them, and he protects them.
That's love. Repay no one evil for evil. And so when you ask yourself, well, why did he do that with Simeon, jail him, and why did he do this? He was making sure these guys were not the same, ready to unleash more wickedness.
If they had taken out a sword against Joseph, I think that would have been bad for them. Verse 18, if it is possible as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men. Well, he mentions in Acts chapter 24 that he strived before God and men with a good conscience. He put in effort. The disturbances that came his way were instigated by his enemies. Paul did not start riots by breaking some law.
He just told the truth. Verse 19, Beloved, do not avenge yourselves, but rather give place to wrath, for it is written, Vengeance is mine. I will repay, says the Lord. Well, this does not cancel civil justice, as we'll get to in chapter 13, nor does it cancel out church discipline, as you might find in 2 Thessalonians chapter 3, verse 6, and other places, but I'm just giving you some places. James chapter 1, verse 20, the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God. You get in the flesh, you lose your temper, you fly off the handle. I lost my temper once in front of some unbelievers 30 years or so ago, and I'm still ashamed of it. I don't want to ever do that again, because you get in the flesh just like that, just like that.
You know, all happy and jolly and thinking things are going well and then something just comes in. So be ready for that. Vengeance is mine, I will repay. You know, God's vengeance is justice.
It's not random. Road rage is one example of rejecting this truth. Trust God, do not usurp his authority or his promises. Verse 20, therefore, if your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him a drink, for in so doing you will heap coals of fire on his head. There's a lot of, I mean a lot, there's some differing views on that, but in the context of what's being said here, it says if you want to learn how to de-escalate the situation, appeal to their common sense of decency.
That might work. It doesn't work all the time. Some are just too far gone. Blessed are the peacemakers, because peacemakers are a big deal. Some Christians have it. They can just tactfully say the truth to somebody, and by tactfully, without making things worse. You know, I'd rather shoot the guy than talk him out of being shot.
That's not good. Psalm 15, Proverbs 15 one, a kind answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. Well, why is a serpent as harmless as doves? How to win friends and influence people the Christian way? A kind word turns back wrath. Well, let's, before we close, I want to use some verses here that talk about killing them with kindness, as we, you know, persecute them with love. Proverbs 25, 21. If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat.
If he is thirsty, give him water to drink, for so you will heap coals of fire on his head, and Yahweh will reward you. Now, I read that verse to say Paul is quoting scripture when he says this. The Old Testament is every bit scripture as the New Testament. However, we're ministers of the New Testament, meaning the Old Testament gets filtered through the New. First Peter, chapter 2. For this is the will of God, that by doing good you may put to silence the ignorance of foolish men.
That should keep you busy. For so you will heap coals of fire on his head, and the Lord will reward you. 2 Kings, chapter 6. This chapter 6 in 2 Kings is Elisha the prophet, who was more gracious than Elijah the prophet, but Elijah the prophet was certainly one of Israel's greatest prophets. Anyhow, Elisha was telling the king where the Syrian king's troops would be, to ambush him. And the Syrian king said, somebody on my staff is leaking information to the Jews in Samaria. And one of his servants said, no, but they've got that secret weapon over there. They've got Elisha. He can hear what you're saying in your bedroom. So the king said, get troops and go get them.
You've got to take this guy out. And that's when the servant wakes up in the morning, and he sees the camp surrounded by the Syrian troops. And Elisha prayed that God would open the servant's eyes to see that they were more with them than they were on the side of the enemy, which God did do. There they were, surrounded by the armies of the Lord on chariots of fire. Well, Elisha, instead of calling fire down, as Elijah would have, Elisha smites them with cognitive blindness. In other words, they could still see, but they couldn't connect what they were seeing to what they knew. And so he leads them away blind, in this blindness, to Samaria, where the Jewish troops were. And the troops come out, and they surround them, and their eyes open.
And they realize, how do we get here? This is not good. The king of the Jews, the northern kingdom is where we are, he says, my father, my father, shall we slay them, shall we slay them? And so we pick it up, 2 Kings 6, but he answered, you shall not kill them, would you kill those whom you have taken captive with your sword and your bow?
Set food and water before them, that they may eat and drink and go home, go to their master. He's heaping coals of fire, and then we're told, Syrians never came back to Samaria again, into the northern kingdom. Blessed are the peacemakers. And there's an example, one of many, of course Abigail's probably one of the greatest to me, when she goes out and tells David, what are you doing? Don't you know who you are? Don't you know who God made you, David? You're fit to be a king. And you're coming here to, what, slaughter a bunch of farmers? Stop it.
He doesn't say it that way, but that's exactly what happened. And as David is walking away, some artist should draw a picture of him scratching the back of his head, scratching it like, what just happened there? Blessed are the merciful, they shall obtain mercy.
I sure want a lot of that. The cross of Christ, it exposes the expression of hatred towards God, but it also expresses the love of God towards those who hate him. And we ought to preach the cross of Christ. Verse 21, do not overcome, do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. Bottom line, be filled with the Spirit, the Holy Spirit. Don't get sucked under by Satan's dirty work and his deception.
He is very slick. Now remember, you're not dealing with Lucifer, you're dealing with his troops. That's Satan, the enemy. They're very experienced, they are highly trained, and they are determined.
They're tireless. And yet, we've got the Lord on our side. So it's like playing with a game of baseball against a better team, but you've got a guy that's going to hit a home run every time he's up, and it's not possible to lose. Or you've got a picture that will strike out everybody. I mean, we've got the Lord.
Well, I just wanted to get something baseball into the message to counteract this confused approach to sports with whatever all the sports are. Anyhow, be overcome, but overcome evil with good. Be victorious. We close with this verse. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony because they did not love their lives to the death. Those are persecuted saints in the tribulation age.
They overcame by the blood of the Lamb, the cross of Christ, the forgiveness that that brings, and the word of God. This is a ministry that puts an emphasis on the scripture, on the word of God, because the word of God puts an emphasis on the scripture. Thanks for joining us for today's teaching on Cross-Reverence Radio. This is the daily radio ministry of Pastor Rick Gaston at Calvary Chapel Mechanicsville in Virginia.
We're currently going through the book of Romans. If you're in need of hearing this message again or want to listen to others like it, head over to crossreferenceradio.com. We encourage you to subscribe to our podcast, too, so you'll never miss another edition. Just go to your favorite podcast app to subscribe. On our website, you'll be able to learn a little more about the ministry of Cross-Reference Radio, and make a note of it, crossreferenceradio.com. That's all we have time for today, but thanks so much for listening. Pastor Rick, we'll be back next time in the book of Romans here on Cross-Reference Radio.
