Valuing People Over Pigs - Life of Christ Part 27

Well, it's time for Family Feud with Herbert, Gloria, Robert, Linda, and Ronald.

Now, if you were watching television, you might think we were looking at a game show, but if you live in Washington, D.C., you know this is no game show. It's the halfs. You know the half family? The ones that own Dart Drug Group, Crown Books, Track Auto, but all is not well in pompadour land and actually things are not so good there at all because Robert, oldest son Robert, introduced a plan not too long ago for his father, Herbert, to retire. Well, Herbert didn't like that. And so Herbert, as a result, booted his son off the board of Dart and off the board of Crown and removed him of all posts within the organization. Then all of a sudden, his wife, Gloria, got involved.

She supported her son, Robert, so Herbert defrocked her from everything in the company. As a result, Gloria and Robert sued Herbert and Herbert sued Gloria and Robert back. And they all got their lawyers and now, as a result of this, Herbert has transferred his assets to his youngest son, Ronald, with the understanding that Ronald can't do anything unless Herbert tells him he can do it, but at least his wife can't get his assets because they're not in his name anymore. You know how that works. His daughter finally got involved, jumping in on the side of her mother and her oldest brother, and on and on and on it goes. And right now, things are so bad that only the lawyers are talking to each other, and that's bad. And I won't even tell you any of my lawyer jokes.

I'll spare you this morning. But Newsweek Magazine said, and I quote, that the hafs are the latest contenders for the title, Corporate America's Most Dysfunctional Family. Now, when I look at the hafs, I don't know what you think, but when I look at the hafs, I see a human tragedy in the making.

Do you see that? I mean, look, no amount of money, no amount of corporate holdings, no amount of power is worth the people damage that these people are doing to one another. You say, but Lon, maybe one of these days they'll fix it up and they'll all be back together again or whatever, even if they do. You know, you can't always put Humpty Dumpty back together again after something like this. And what really concerns me as I look at the haft family is not just that they have this particular problem.

They do. But what really concerns me is that their problem is endemic to all of American society, meaning that when I look at American society, I find this attitude everywhere I look that there are other things more important than people. That's the attitude the hafts have, that what my wife thinks or what my son feels or what my sister feels or what my brother feels or who they are is not nearly as important as the dart group and crown books and keeping my power and keeping my money. And I'll step on people if I have to, to get what I want.

This attitude is all over America, that something else is more important than people. And this morning, as we look into the Bible, we're going to find that our passage is all about this subject, all about the importance of people. And I hope that God's going to challenge us to take a hard look at our own lives, to take a hard look at our value systems, to take a hard look at how we treat and honor people. And I'm trusting God that maybe as a result of your being here this morning, you'll walk out saying, gosh, I see things just a little bit differently than I saw them when I walked in.

Let's look together. Luke chapter 8, I'm in verse 26. And they sail to the region of the Gerizines, which is across the lake from Galilee. You remember now when we left off last time, Jesus and the disciples were in the boat and they were in the middle of that big storm and Jesus calmed the storm out in the middle of the Sea of Galilee. Well, now they've landed on the other side.

And they've landed on the southeast side of the Sea of Galilee. It's a Gentile region. And that explains why they're raising pigs. I mean, no Jewish person would raise pigs. But Gentiles raise pigs because they like bacon and ham and barbecue and all kinds of other good stuff like that.

And so that's what they were doing. Now, verse 27, when Jesus stepped ashore, he was met by a demon possessed man from the town. For a long time, this man had not worn clothes or lived in a house, but had lived out in the tombs. As we move through Luke's gospel here, we find just recently that Jesus has been demonstrating his power. First, he demonstrated his power over sickness. Back in Luke chapter 7, he healed the centurion servant of sickness. Then he demonstrated his power over death.

You remember he went to a little village called Nain and there was a widow's son there who was dead and he raised that boy from the dead. Then he demonstrated his power over the forces of this world and the forces of the universe right here in Luke 8 by stilling that horrible hurricane out on the Sea of Galilee. Now, Jesus is about to demonstrate his power over the devil and over his kingdom of demons because this man comes to him, the Bible says, possessed by demons. Now you say, Lon, wait a minute. Hold on just a second.

Time out and wait. You know, the devil is just a symbol, right? I mean, the devil is just a symbol for evil. The devil is just kind of a Christian symbol for human suffering. Isn't that right? The devil is just kind of a Christian symbol for all the bad karma that's in the world.

Isn't that true? Well, the answer is no and not the way the Bible presents the devil. The Bible teaches us that the devil or Satan, as he's alternately called in the Bible, is a real being, that he is a real angelic being. He was an angel who revolted against God back before the world began and the demons were his fellow angels who followed him in this revolt. As a result of the revolt, God threw them all out of heaven but they're still on the loose.

They're still on the loose. When the end of the age comes, Jesus Christ is going to grab hold of the devil, grab hold of his demons, bind them and cast them forever into a place the Bible calls the abyss, A-B-Y-S-S. Revelation chapter 20 says, it's a place where the devil will be tormented along with the demons day and night forever and ever. So this is their final destination. Now that, folks, is the fastest course in biblical demonology you will ever get, about a minute and a half.

But that's what the Bible teaches. You say, now Lon, hold on. You're an educated person. You went to the University of North Carolina. You graduated.

You took chemistry and physics and math and all the normal things people take. You seem to be a relatively normal human being. You don't really believe this, do you? I mean, you really believe that the devil exists and the demons exist and people can have demons in them? Yes, I do. And if you claim that you believe that the Bible is the inspired word of God, then I hope you believe it too, because this is what the Bible teaches. You say, Lon, you believe this man actually had demons inside of him? I do. Well, do you believe that that could happen today to people? Well, I believe it can happen today to Christians because we have the Spirit of God inside of us and are sealed by him.

But can it happen to people who aren't Christians? Yes, I do. As a matter of fact, I have met lots of two-year-olds that I am convinced this is the problem. This is the problem.

Now, actually, I'm teasing. But you know, this really isn't a laughing matter in some places in the world. If you go to Haiti or if you go to parts of Africa or the third world, this is not funny.

There are people there who are involved in voodoo and witchcraft and all kinds of demon stuff, and this is not funny. You say, well, we never see much of this here in America. That's right, because in every culture, Satan will work in the most effective way he has. And in America, the most effective way the enemy has to work is not to demon-possess people, but the most effective tool he has in America is the media.

If he wants to fill something in America, don't fill people, fill the media, because it is the most powerful tool in shaping American values, and that's where he's working. You say, all right, so I'm gonna leave here and go out and say, you said everybody involved in the media is demon-possessed. No, no, no. I didn't say that. I didn't say that. I was at a party last night with a whole bunch of media people, and none of them looked demon-possessed to me.

They all seemed like very fine people. But I am saying that in any culture, the enemy will figure out the most effective tool to use to shape values to go his way, and in our culture, it is the media. So you're not gonna see a lot of voodoo in our culture or a lot of demon-possession because that's not an effective tool.

But you travel the world, and you'll find out this is a very real problem in many places in our world. Could this man be full of demons? You bet. Now, what happened? Well, look, verse 28. And when he saw Jesus, he cried out and fell at his feet, shouting at the top of his voice, what do you want with me, Jesus, son of the most high God? I beg you, don't torture me. And Matthew's gospel says, don't torture me before the time. You say, what time? Well, the time when at the very end when Jesus has already told them they're gonna go into the abyss.

They said, don't do that to us yet. For Jesus had commanded the evil spirit to come out of the man. Many times it had seized this man, and though he had been chained hand and foot and kept under guard, that's what the townspeople did to keep this guy under control. They wrapped him up and chained him and guarded him, but it didn't do any good. He had been driven by the demon into the solitary places.

The Bible says he'd broken those chains and gone out and lived in the tombs. Jesus asked the demon, what is your name? And the demon said, my name is Legion. A Roman Legion was over 6,800 Roman soldiers. And so by saying Legion, he meant, there's a lot of us in here. Legion, he said, because many demons had gone into this man. And they, the demons, begged Jesus repeatedly not to order them to go into the, look, see it, the abyss.

That's where they're headed eventually. They said, don't do it to us now. Now there's two things I want you to notice here that are very interesting. First of all, what the demon said, and second of all, what the demons did. First of all, what did they say?

They said, what do you want with us? Verse 28, Jesus, you son of the most high God. Isn't it interesting that the disciples were in the boat just a few minutes ago saying, who is this man? That even the wind and the sea obey him. And as soon as they land, they get a guy full of demons coming to answer their question. Theophylact, the great church historian and commentator of the 11th century said this, while the men in the boat were wondering what manner of man this is, the demons came to tell him.

He is the son of the most high God. And interesting. Also it's interesting what they did. If you remember, nobody could keep this guy under control. They chained him up. They put him up to the wall. They wrapped him up in rope. They guarded him. They locked him in his house. The guy was completely out of control.

He was completely unable to be subdued. In fact, in Matthew's gospel, it says that the man was so violent that nobody could even pass by where he was living. He would come out and assault them and beat them up. This guy was absolutely out of control.

But would you notice what he did? When Jesus came, the Bible says that he came to Jesus and fell at his feet begging him not to send them to the abyss. Isn't it interesting no human power or authority could tame these demons? They tried chains. They tried guards.

Nothing worked. But as soon as they saw Jesus, they fell at his feet acknowledging he had absolute authority over what happened to them. That interesting. Verse 32. And a large herd of pigs was feeding there on the hillside and the demons begged Jesus to let them go into the pigs.

And he gave them permission. And when the demons came out of the man, they went in the pigs. And the pigs rushed down the steep bank into the lake and the whole herd was drowned. Now how many pigs were there here? Mark chapter five says there were about 2,000 pigs.

And all of them drowned. Now that represented an enormous financial loss to whoever owned those pigs. You say, well, who owned them? Well, we don't know for certain, but I think they were probably owned by the whole town because in a minute we're going to find the herdsman went not to tell some person your pigs are drowned, but to tell the whole town the pigs are gone. Even in Israel today, you know, if you live on a kibbutz, the kibbutz collectively owns the farm or the cows or whatever else they're raising.

They sell them and it benefits the whole kibbutz. And I have the feeling this was the town industry. This was a collective herd. Well, that explains what happens next because it says in verse 34 when those attending the pigs saw what happened. For the first time, we find out there was an audience. There were some people watching all of this going on. When they saw what happened, they ran off and reported it to the town and the countryside. Can you imagine now they come running in the town and they yell or they beat a drum or a bell or whatever they got in the town. They get everybody out in the town square and then these guys start. They say, man, you would not believe what just happened.

I mean, you would just not believe what just happened. We were down there at the river, you know, tending the pigs like we always tend to pigs and here comes this little tiny boat putting on up and the boat docks and out of the boat steps this guy and then he steps out of the boat with them 12 of the ragtaggiest guys we ever saw in our life. And they come walking up the hill and you know that guy Legion who lives up there in the tombs and beat everybody up and nobody wants anything to do with him, never has any clothes on.

He came running out but instead of jumping on this guy and whacking them and beating them up the way he does everybody else, he fell down at their feet. And all of a sudden, we hear the leader of this group say to the demons, come out and the next thing we know, all our pigs start yelping and jumping and running all around like they just ran into a herd of skunks and they run on down to the sea and they drown and they're all floating around down there on the lake right now like little corks. You all ought to come see this. Probably went something like that. The town people said, yeah, we better come see this. And so they all turned out.

Verse 35. And the people went out to see what had happened. And when they came to Jesus, they found the man from who all the demons had gone out sitting at Jesus's feet dressed.

Now he'd never been dressed before and in his right mind. And they were afraid. And those who had seen it told all the townspeople how the demon possessed man had been cured. When they got there, they found legion sitting there in his right mind well and heal and whole. And they found all their pigs floating dead out in the middle of the Sea of Galilee. And the people who let them down there pointed to Jesus and said, he's the one see him. He's the one who did all of this created all this mess. We have to drag all these pigs in and bury them and it's his fault. Now let's stop for a moment and think. If you were part of that crowd that went down there, what would your response have been to all this? I mean, how would you feel? Here he is, legion sitting there, fine. All you pigs are floating out there in the sea.

And they're saying, Jesus, this guy right here, he's the one that did it. Now what would your response be? I don't know. Well, you know, your response would depend on your value system.

Say, what are you talking about? Well, now listen, think what you got here. You've got a single human being whose life was an absolute disaster zone, who suddenly is in his right mind and he's healthy and he's healed and he's made well. And you've got 2000 pigs representing an awful lot of money floating out in the Sea of Galilee dead. Now listen, your response or my response would depend upon which of those we value more, whether we valued our pigs more and the money they represented or whether we valued a human life more.

And these people reveal their value system real quick. Look at this, verse 37. It says that all the people of the region of the Gerizins asked Jesus to leave. Go away. They said to him, look, hey pal, we don't know who you are and we don't know where you're from buddy, but wherever you're from and whoever you are, you just go get right back in that little boat, turn that little boat around and take that little boat right back where you came from. We don't want anything else to do with you. We don't want you here. We don't want you visiting. We don't want you staying at the hotel. We don't even want you anywhere in town.

Get right back on that boat and please leave. Why? Well, look what it says here. It says because they were afraid. Afraid of what? Were they afraid Jesus was going to hurt them?

No, I don't think so. Were they afraid that he was going to come in and do something nasty to all the people in town? No, not after he'd taken this demoniac and made him. Well, why would they be afraid of that? What were they afraid of? I'll tell you what they were afraid of. They were afraid they were going to lose more pigs. That's what they were afraid of. They'd already lost 2000 pigs. They'd already had an enormous financial loss and they didn't want any more.

This is what they were afraid of. And would you look what Jesus did? Verse 37, it says, so he got into the boat and he left.

He got in the boat and he left. And the man from whom the demons had gone out begged to go with him. Jesus could have said to him, you know, you're right, Legion. These people have rejected you all your life and they rejected me now. Why don't we wash our hands of these people?

Come on, get in the boat with us. Let's get out of here and leave these people alone. But he didn't do that. Jesus said to him, no, I'm sorry.

You cannot go. You say, Lon, why would he say that to him? Was there no more room in the boat?

Yep, they could have gotten one more in. That wasn't it. Jesus said to him, no, you cannot come. But Jesus sent him away and said, you go home, return home and tell how much God has done for you.

You see, even though these people have rejected Christ, he hadn't rejected them. He still loved them. He still cared about them. They said to him, go away. So he was going. But he still left Legion there because he wanted Legion to keep trying to reach these people for Christ. He still cared about them. And so the Bible says this man went away and told everybody in town and everywhere else how much Jesus had done for him.

The first evangelist on the east side of the Jordan was a fellow named Legion. Now let me stop and say here that if you're here this morning and you've never embraced Jesus Christ as your personal Lord and Savior, maybe a friend brought you here this morning or a relative brought you here or some neighbor or a husband or a wife brought you here or you don't even know why you're here, but you're here and you've never made a personal decision to trust Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. Can I ask you to pay careful attention to what just happened here? When these townspeople asked Jesus to leave, he did.

Would you notice that? Jesus never pushed himself on these people and he won't push himself on you. Jesus honored their freewill choice. They made a freewill choice, which was Jesus, get out of here.

We don't want you. And Jesus honored it. He said, fine, I'll honor your freewill choice.

Whatever it is, I'll honor it. And you know, as far as the Bible tells us, Jesus never came back to this place again. This was his one and only visit.

This was their one and only opportunity to have him right there. Could I say to you that every time Jesus Christ offers himself to a person and they decline, they have done exactly what these townspeople did. They have basically said to Jesus, go away. We don't want you. We're not interested in having you change our lifestyle. We're not interested in having to deal with the changes that you might bring our way. We're not interested in having you touch our life or tamper with it. We're perfectly happy.

We're not prepared to pay the cost. Please go away. That's what you're saying. And you know, maybe you've had Jesus Christ offered to you by people many times. Maybe your wife's been offering you Jesus Christ for years or your husband. Maybe your parents have been offering Jesus Christ to you if you're a young person or your children have been offering him to you if you're a parent. Maybe some friend or some neighbor or some relative or some coworker has been offering Jesus Christ to you.

And I'll tell you this morning if you're here, I'm offering Jesus Christ to you. My dear friend, be careful about telling Jesus Christ to go away because he will. He'll go away if that's what you want.

But the results will be eternally tragic. So are you threatening me? No. I'm just trying to share biblical reality with you. It's something for you to think about. Be careful when you tell Jesus Christ go away because he just might. Now that's the end of our passage this morning, but it leads us who are Christians here this morning to ask the question, so what? Right. What difference does this make?

Now let me see if I can bring it all around and answer it in the little bit of time I got left. You know there's some great lessons here. One of them is that this is a great reminder about the fact that Jesus Christ has power over the greatest forces of evil in this universe and that as his children by faith in Jesus Christ, we are never at the mercy of the devil. We are never at the mercy of his henchmen.

We have no reason to fear because Jesus Christ is in absolute control and authority over the devil and there's not a thing for us to worry about. And there's a great lesson here about that. But that's not what I want us to focus on. What I want us to focus on this morning is the value system of these townsfolk. You say the value system of the town folks?

Yeah. What strikes you most about their value system? I don't know. What strikes you, Lon?

Well, I'll tell you. What strikes me is that these people were pig centered, not people centered. Does that strike you? They were pig centered, not people centered. I mean, look, when they showed up where Jesus was, what impressed them most was not that this poor tormented man had been healed, had been restored.

What bothered them the most was that their pigs were gone. Never mind the fact that this demoniac had been made whole and given his life back. Never mind the fact that a wrecked human life had been reclaimed.

Never mind that. They weren't worried about that. They didn't care about that. What they were grieving over was the loss of 2000 pigs. In their mind, 2000 pigs was too high a price to pay to restore human life. Did it ever occur to you that maybe there were other sick people in their town?

I think there probably were. That there were other paralyzed people in their town. That maybe there were some other demonized people in their town. Did it ever occur to you that maybe they should have been concerned about all these other people's lives right there that were hurting and suffering and being tormented and that they should have invited Jesus Christ to come into town and do for these other people all the things that he had done for the Legion out there in the tombs, but they didn't do that. They weren't worried about the people that might have been benefited by Jesus being invited to stay. All they were worried about is how many more pigs they might lose, how much more money they might lose.

The bottom line is these people valued pigs more than they valued people. Now, how does the attitude of almighty God compare with this? We say, well, now how are we going to find out the attitude of almighty God? Where are you going to go to get something like that?

Huh? Well, I'm gonna go right to the Bible because Jesus said in John chapter 14, the person that seen me has seen the father. In other words, see Jesus's heart on any subject you've seen the heart of God. Seeing Jesus's response to any subject, you've seen the response of God. So let's look and see how did Jesus Christ value people? If we can answer that, we can answer how God values people. How did Jesus Christ value people? Friends, he valued people more than anything else in the universe. He valued people more than his own comfort.

You say, how do you know that? Well, because Philippians chapter 2 says that he didn't regard the comforts and the prerogatives that he had in heaven, something to be grabbed ahold of, but rather he was willing to let go of those things because of the value he placed on us. And he was willing to come to earth and do something for us that we could not do for ourselves, but that we desperately needed done, that every one of us needed our sins paid for, but there was no way we could pay for them ourselves. And we desperately needed somebody to pay for them for us. And Jesus said, I'm willing to give up my comforts. I'm willing to give up my prerogatives because I value those people more than my comforts and my prerogatives.

And I'm going to earth to do for them what they can't do for themselves. Jesus Christ valued us more than any kind of earthly power. It says after he fed the 5,000 in John chapter 6, that the people intended to come and take him by force and make him king. Could he have been king of all the world? Sure he could have, but that would have destroyed his mission, which was to die on the cross for you and me.

So Jesus, the Bible says, withdrew himself to a mountain by himself so they couldn't find him. He valued us more than any kind of human power. He valued us more than money or material things.

He said to his disciples, he said, you know, guys, he said, the birds have nests and the foxes have places to lay in, but I don't even have a pillow that I own. Jesus could have amassed a fortune if he wanted it, but again, it would have interfered with dying on the cross for us and doing his mission. He valued us more than money. Jesus valued us more than getting his own way. You remember in the garden of Gethsemane, he lifted his hands and he said, God, he said, I don't want to go to the cross.

If there's any way you can take this from me, take it from me. I don't want to go, but not my will, but yours be done. And what was the will of God for him to go to the cross and die for the sins of people because people were worth that much to God. Finally, Jesus valued us more than even his own life. Every time we look at a cross, it ought to remind us.

It ought to be like a neon sign just flashing out to us. Every time we look at a cross, God loves people. God values people. God is steams people more than anything else in the universe. God values people. The Bible says no greater love, no greater value could anybody place on another person than this, that he would give up his life for that person. Do you place enough value on your child that if your child needed you to, you'd die for your child if you've got a child?

Boy, that's asking a hard question. How much value do you place on that child? You say, Lon, you know, as hard as it would be, I think I value my child enough, I would do that. Good. That's good. Let's talk about your husband or your wife or your boyfriend.

Would you die for them? You say, I don't know. Depends what day you ask me. Depends what day you ask me. How about your boss? You go, my boss?

You got to be joking, pal. My boss? That's not even in the realm of possibility to die for my boss.

Given the opportunity, I might turn it around and do it the other way with him, but not me for him. How about your enemy? You say, my enemy? My enemy?

Why would you ask something stupid like that? Nobody would die for their enemy. Oh, listen. The Bible says that Jesus Christ demonstrated how much we were worth to him in that while we were yet his enemies, Christ died for us. Don't let there be any doubt, my dear friends, the value God places on people.

You are more valuable to God and people are more valuable to God than anything else in the world, in the universe. More valuable than the planet Jupiter? Yeah. More valuable than the solar system? Yeah. More valuable than the Milky Way?

Yeah. You are more valuable than anything else in the world. And if you ever have any doubt about it, just look at the way Jesus Christ lived and look at the cross. And you know, that's the way Jesus Christ wants our value system to read.

We have a little saying in our family. It's called people are more important. See, that's the whole saying. That's it. It doesn't seem that significant. Well, it is.

We use it all the time. People are more important. People are more important than what? People are more important than anything.

We try to teach this to our children. People are more important. You say, have they gotten it yet? No, but we're working on it. We're working on it. People are more important. And I don't know if you agree with that.

I hope you do. Are people more important than power or promotion or any prestige position that you might get in this world? Are people more important?

I hope so. Are people more important than any honor or any award? If you had to step on people to get it, would it be worth it or are people more important? I hope they're more important. Are people more important than money and material wealth?

I hope so. Are people more important than parking spaces at the mall at Christmas time? Say, I don't know Lon, you're really getting close on that one.

People are more important. My wife and I were riding home from a visit to her parents, my in-laws. This is about a year ago. We were riding down the interstate and the kids were in the back, way back of the station wagon playing and my daughter had fallen asleep and so we were sitting in the front seat and actually had a few minutes to talk.

Can you believe that? We actually had a minute to talk. And so we started talking. And one of the subjects that came up was about a little family heirloom that my wife's folks had had. And I don't know how your families work, but you know, as parents start getting up in age, heirlooms start getting divided and handed out. And this heirloom had just kind of trickled its way over to one of the other children, you know, kind of like by osmosis. You know how that happens sometimes in a family? And you just kind of notice it's not here anymore.

At the parents' home, it suddenly moved over to one of the other homes. But nobody ever said anything about it moving or would anybody else like it to osmose their way instead of the other way? You know what I'm trying to say? So we were having a little discussion about this because it irritated us. And the more we talked about it, the more it irritated us. And so we stopped for a second and we're just riding in silence. And God gave me the ability at that moment to step back for just a second and evaluate.

And I said to Brenda, I said, you know, let's stop for just a second and evaluate. Is this thing really worth damaging our relationship with family? I mean, really. I mean, if we put up a big stink and maybe if we actually got it by putting up a big stink, would it be worth the people damage we'd have to do to get it? Would it be worth the messages about the value of people we'd be sending out? I mean, what are we going to do with it if we get it anyway?

Brenda, it's going to sit up on our shelf for 40 years until our kids fight about who gets it. I mean, is this worth it? And we both sat there and looked at each other and said, no, it's not worth it.

It's not worth it. People and family are more important than things. But you know, you have to be reminded of that because you get out there in the heat of battle and you forget this.

The heat of battle is good at making you forget this. So let me ask you a question this morning as we conclude. My question for you is, what pigs have you been valuing in your life above people? Where are the places in your life where you will step on people to enlarge your herd of pigs?

Maybe with your career, would you do it there? Or maybe with some achievement or some goal that you've had all your life and you've made up your mind, you're getting there no matter who you have to step on. Or maybe some position of power or maybe some material holdings or maybe some personal comfort or leisure, whatever.

Where is it that there's some pig in your life that's more important than people? Where you've decided you'll step on people to get a bigger herd. Vince Lombardi, who was maybe, I don't know, one of the greatest coaches of all time in football, legendary coach of the Green Bay Packers. He had a motto. His motto was this.

It's a very famous motto. He used to say this, winning isn't everything, it's the only thing. Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing. Now I have an enormous respect for Vince Lombardi, an enormous admiration for him. But I'd like to respectfully say he's wrong.

He's wrong. Winning is not the only thing. Winning is not even the most important thing. I used to believe that. I don't believe that anymore. People are the most important thing. Jesus Christ did not die for football. I know some of you men don't believe that, but it's true.

This afternoon we're going to have a hard time knowing exactly whether you believe that. Jesus Christ did not die for football. Jesus Christ did not die for your career. Jesus Christ did not die so you could fulfill some lifelong ambition that you have, and Jesus Christ did not die so you could amass all the material wealth you ever wanted. Jesus Christ died for people. This is how Jesus Christ wants us to see life in this world, that people are more important. Now here at McLean Bible Church, we have 10 ministry values that shape our ministry.

I'm not going to ask you to name them because I'd be personally disappointed with how few you could probably get right. But anyway, the first one is, let me just repeat. The first one is people matter to God and to us. And by saying that first, what we're trying to say is that more than any other value, we want this one to shape our ministry. Nothing is more important than helping people.

Nothing is more important than caring for people. Seeing people come to know Jesus Christ in a real and personal way, seeing the power of God transform people's lives, seeing people's lives reclaimed as this demoniac's life was reclaimed. This must be the driving passion and piston of this church.

Nothing else. I was at a social not too long ago with one of the groups in our church and it was kind of like a Q&A type thing. And one of the people sitting out there said to me, I got a question. My question is, what is the best part about being the pastor of McLean Bible Church and what is the worst part?

That's a pretty interesting question, isn't it? What do you hate the worst about being a pastor? Want to hear what I said? All right, if you don't want to hear, forget it. I'm not going to tell you.

Let's bow for prayer. No, I'll tell you. You want to know? Okay.

Here, I'll tell you. The worst part about being a pastor is church politics. I hate church politics.

I despise them. Everybody running around with their own little agendas and everybody backbiting everybody and everybody pushing for their own little way and everybody carrying a little intrigue and all of the conflict and the hurt and the pain and the disruption that that brings to the work of God. I hate church politics.

And I thank God we don't have too much of that around here anymore and I'm grateful for that. You know the best part about being a pastor? What do you think the answer is? You say, being in a big, brand new building like this. No. Having lots of staff that you can boss around. I don't boss my staff around, but no, that's not the answer.

Getting your name in the newspaper on the radio. No. Having all these people come here on Sunday and watching them go, hold on, hold on. No, no, no, none of that.

Not at all. You know what I said and what I believe? The best part about being a pastor is seeing people's lives changed by the power of Jesus Christ. Seeing people's lives that were a wreck, reclaimed and delivered and made whole by Jesus Christ touching their life. That's the best part of this.

That's really the only part that makes it all worth it. And friends, when it comes to us as Christians making an impact on that world out there, let me tell you something. What that world out there needs is not another televangelist. You agree with that? What they need out there is not another faith healer and what they need out there is not another Christian celebrity.

What that world needs and will make a difference out there is everyday Christians like you and me who are willing to put people first in our lives and show the love of Christ to people even above our own comfort, our own welfare and our own desires. Look, we can't compete with that world out there when it comes to technology. They're way ahead of us. We can't pull in every sharp and new thing that's going on and be ahead of them. We can't compete with them on any of those bases.

We can't run programming that will outdo the world's programming. But the one thing we've got that the rest of the world cannot offer people is the love of Jesus Christ expressed through the lives of the people who believe in him. That's what we've got.

And if we're going to change that world, that's the only way we're going to do it in the 90s. That's what we're dedicated to as a church. And if you're part of us, I hope that's what you're dedicated to because we can't do it unless you do it because we're you. That's what the church is. And I hope that God will challenge your heart and challenge my heart and make us change the way we see the world and people as a result of being here this morning. Let's bow together and pray. Heavenly Father, sometimes the word of God confronts us. Sometimes it rebukes us because we need it because we've gotten out of step with you and we've lost touch with your values that should be our values as Christians. And I thank you this morning for doing that very thing for us.

Lord, you know it's so easy in the heat of battle to lose sight of this very important truth that people are more important. But I pray, Father, that you would bring us back to that value this morning and help us live it. Lord, I want to pray for someone who may be here that has never trusted you as their personal Lord and Savior, that you would use the story that we saw this morning to remind them how dangerous it is to tell you to go away and leave them alone. And I pray if there are people here who've been offered you, even if they're not sure that they are ready to take you yet, at least, Lord, may they be willing to say, Jesus, I'm not sure I'm ready to take you, but please don't go away. Keep working with me. Keep talking to me.

I'm trying to listen. And for those of us who are Christians, Lord, may you make this church and us as individual Christians effective in reaching and making an impact on this community for Christ more than any other reason because we are willing to go out and put people first and show them the love of Jesus Christ. Give us the power to live differently, Lord, if we become convinced that we need to. And we pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.