Robby Sermon Series - Romans 14:1 - Feed My Sheep

Thank you for listening this Truth Network Podcast. So to say I was thrilled when James called me a few weeks ago and said, Robbie, would you consider not one, but two.

I haven't done a twofer here in a long, long time. So I get to be with you this Sunday, and I get to be with you again next Sunday. What an honor. And Bob was saying, I'm a de facto member of Peace Church.

There's no doubt. I often think of you all. And again, a lot of you call my radio show, which is really, really nice. And then I get a chance to listen to the sermons online sometimes. And sometimes I'm forced into that because of what happened this time.

So I have to tell you a funny story. You know, James called me and asked me to do this. And about two weeks later, which was probably about three weeks ago, he said, oh, and I forgot to tell you that we've been doing this reading plan. And so you need to preach Romans 13, 14, 15, excuse me, 14, 15, and 16. And I went, OK. And he was talking about Romans chapter 14, 15, and 16. And he said, yes.

And I said, OK. And then, you know, that was the conversation. So I went about thinking, oh, my word, I couldn't read Romans 14, 15, and 16, you know, in the time that's allotted. How am I going to preach on this whole overall concept? And so, you know, I started like, OK, well, I'm just going to I love to listen to the Bible in my car, you know, and I've got this little Bluetooth speaker and I can put the Bible app on and I can just listen to Romans 14, 15, and 16.

And I'm trying to climb to 40,000 feet to go, what's the overarching thing, you know, because how could I do this? And so I thought, well, I know what I'll do. I'll listen to James' sermons to see how he gets three chapters of the Bible into one sermon. And when I listened to his sermon, it was one verse.

And so I called him and said and told him the story, it was kind of funny. And he said, oh, yeah, Robbie, you just find one verse and then, you know, but they're doing this and we want everybody to enjoy God's word. So it was a treasure hunt.

I mean, it just was. And so let's pray that God will because, you know, what good is treasure if God doesn't put the light on it? What good is a treasure if God doesn't put his light on it so that you can see it, right?

You know, you could dig in the dark and if it's dark down there, you can't see it. So we're going to pray God will do that. Jesus, thank you for this amazing book of Romans that Paul, just a brilliant man of God, but you through the Holy Spirit certainly gave him something there. And I pray that as we dig into this today that you would lighten it up for us in new ways, that we would find a way to not only shine the light on the treasure, but shine the light on you for other people, that they too would be able to come into your family and be healed and be found and to feel chosen. And we ask this in Jesus' name.

Amen. As I was going over this and over and over and over and over trying to figure out how I could do Romans 14, 15 and 16, the overarching thing, it seemed like it just happened in the first verse. So if you got your Bibles with me, if you don't, it's perfectly okay. You're probably familiar with the verse. It's Romans chapter 14, verse 1. And what's interesting is I climbed to look at the overall picture of all these chapters and then it seemed like he took me on a microscopic vision down into this one verse to see how it kind of applied to the whole three chapters.

So what Paul said here, depending on your translation, is something along the lines of, now except the one who is weak in faith, but not for the purpose of disputes about opinions. So, wow, there's a whole lot there. And so I thought I would give you what this feels like practically. Here I am again. I started to walk away.

You guys just give me the sign like Robbie get back in line with the camera. So when I was 22 years old, so this was in 1977, I had decided one night that I was going to commit suicide because I felt all alone. My family lived in Kansas City at this point in time. They left me in Albuquerque.

A few broken hearts along the way with girls that didn't, the situation didn't work out. And I was doing a job I really didn't enjoy and I didn't see much hope in life. And so I figured that there was just no sense in all this effort and whatever that I should just end my life. And being the creative person that I am, I didn't want to do anything that was painful or nauseating. And so I thought, well, if I take medicine, that's going to make me sick.

I don't want to feel that way. And if I cut my wrist or something, this isn't going to be good. I have a plan and my plan was to just lay in the bed until I starve to death. You know, this wouldn't be hard. It would be not painful. And I could just lay there until I was gone. And nobody would know that I was missing because nobody cared about me and it just didn't matter. So I proceeded on my plan to commit suicide by laying in the bed. And as God would have it, and I do see God in this and I hope you see it later.

You may not see it initially, but I think you will. As God would have it, there came a knock on the door. Now, this is Albuquerque, New Mexico in 1977, OK? So it would not be unusual for what happened to happen is there was a girl at the door and she was selling the book Dianetics, the Modern Science of Mental Health. For those of you who may not be familiar with that book, that book was written by L. Ron Hubbard, and he is the founder of the Church of Scientology.

And so not unlike the Jehovah's Witnesses, in that time in Albuquerque, the Scientologists would go from door to door selling this book in hopes that somebody would read this book because that is the entry point into the Church of Scientology. Of course, I was just disturbed that she was at the door because I'm trying to die here. And so my motive was just to get her away from here because I've got to go back to what I was doing, which is laying there dying. And so she hands me this book, it's $2, and she says to me something that will never be forgotten, you're going to read that book and you're going to call me in the morning. And I was like, sure I will. And I took her book and I went back to bed. And as I'm laying in bed, of course I thought, well, I've got nothing else to do. I'll read this stupid book. And the book made perfect sense. You know, it was describing the basics of what I would find out would be used in many psychotherapy treatments or ways that you could find things that were going on in your life that were messed up that you could get healing from this, like, wow. And I was clearly very messed up. I saw no hope in life. And then all of a sudden, as I read this book, guess what started to happen? Hope.

Right? And so sure enough, man, next morning, as soon as the mission opened up, 9 o'clock, I'm calling. You know, what's up with this stuff? You didn't know I was in the Church of Scientology, did you? Actually, I was in it for over two years and ended up in the Sea Organization. But this next morning, I experienced Romans chapter 14, verse 1. Because those people received me. When I walked into the Church of Scientology, you could not have felt more grace. You couldn't have felt more like you were their favorite. You couldn't feel more accepted. You couldn't feel more loved. I mean, this was how these people treated you. Because what?

You were an opportunity for them to write and grow their religion. And so Satan has this figured out. I mean, he knows this stuff actually, to my opinion, better than we do. That he knew that if I can make Robbie feel accepted and loved and part of the family and validated for having some understanding, Robbie will fall right into this trap. He will. And he did.

He did. And you know what? They never said, well, are you a Christian? When I came in, they didn't say, you know, they didn't try to argue with me about anything I believed. Their whole deal was that they were going to receive me and they were going to love on me and they were going to do this.

They were going to take somebody who's actually quite weak in their faith and love on him. I mean, it's a beautiful thing in its own way. Because it really, in its own way, saved my life. It was just my story. And my story is the Church of Scientology showed up at the door in 1977 and took me in and loved on me. It made me feel worthwhile and accepted me.

So as I began to study this, I thought it was kind of interesting that I've experienced this. I know what that feels like, but what's Paul getting at here? What's he really getting at? Well, interestingly, when he said, except the one who is weak, you see that first verse, weak? Well, that word could just as easily be translated in Greek or Hebrew, depending on whether you want to choose which language, as diseased.

That's an interesting take on that, right? Because at one point in time, Paul says that a certain person in 2 Timothy, he makes reference to this person being sick. So sick and weak are similar, but when you think about people, like if you had known me, like Tammy knew me, okay, when she met me, I was still a Scientologist. I was not a Christian. So she was literally unequally yoked to me, okay? But she received, I mean, she loved me, and she made me feel wonderful, and we got married. I was still a Scientologist, but she had something that was just really captivating to me. She believed in God. And I could tell that she believed in God. See, her faith wasn't diseased. Mine was. I literally was diseased.

I wasn't just weak. I had tumors growing on what faith was and who God was that literally needed to be removed at some point in time, but at this point in time, she just accepted me without disputing my religion. She wasn't like, well, tell me what Scientology is, and I'm going to tell you where that's stupid, okay? Now, if you're in the Church of Scientology, and I was, if you don't continue to go to the Church of Scientology, you get a call at least once a month, sometimes every week, which goes on to this very day. And so I've had unbelievable opportunities compared to most people to witness to Scientologists. Now, to prove this passage is so accurate that if any of those Scientologists call me, and I begin by disputing with them about where Scientology is false, I can never, ever, ever come close to winning them to the thought that maybe Christianity would be a better plan. You can't do it. I mean, you could argue till the cows come home.

You're not going to get there. But if you get them on the phone and you begin to accept them and realize that you're not going to argue them into the kingdom, you're going to tell them, wow, you know, there are some really good things about Scientology and there are some really good things about Scientology. There are probably really good things about Buddhism, whatever. But the thing of it is, when you feel welcome, accepted, and loved, and like you're not an idiot, then people all of a sudden are interested in what you have to say, as Tammy did with me. So when I was studying this word, weak, it led me over to an unbelievable passage that really just engaged my heart a lot. And that comes in Ezekiel 34. And if you wouldn't mind turning back to that, you're going to find that actually in Ezekiel 34, 4 is kind of where Paul was going with this because it speaks to exactly the same thing. So if you find Ezekiel 34, and one of the cool things is that passage begins that I just would share as a side note that I think is really exciting, is the way that Ezekiel starts the passage in context is the word of the Lord came to Ezekiel.

That's pretty cool. And what he said was, Son of Man. That's the way you've always heard it, right? You've always heard it, Son of Man. And Jesus referred to himself often as Son of Man.

And that's rich, but listen to how much richer it is if you really think what is going in there. If you could read that in Hebrew, it would actually say Ben Adam, which is Adam. Because man and Adam are the same word. A-D-A-M is Hebrew for man. So when he said Son of Man, what he was really saying is Son of Adam.

Why is that important? Because Adam had some kids. One of them was Seth, and he went the right way and followed God. And he had another kid named Cain, which were all the people that chased after other gods.

And so when you see C.S. Lewis in the Narnia series, he always used Son of Adam. He didn't use sons of Adam. The reason he did that was because those of us that are in Christ are in the line of Seth, which puts us in the line of Christ. And so literally what God was saying to Ezekiel, literally he was saying Son, Son. Because Ezekiel was in the line of Seth, you see.

He was saying Son, listen to me, I got something for you. And he was basically saying prophesy against the shepherds. I got this against the shepherds. And thus you get the title to the sermon, which is Feed My Sheep. So in Ezekiel 4.4, he is prophesying against the shepherds.

And here's what he says. You do not strengthen the weak, heal the sick, or bind up the broken. The strays you don't seek for or the lost. He's telling you how to, what to do with the weak, right?

First you've got to find them. Those would be the lost sheep. That would have been me if you had known me back when Tammy met me. That dude was lost, okay?

And my friend Bill Mixon on the show Saturday, if you heard it, really I've thought about it ever since he said it. The Desmond Tutu said that when Jesus was talking about the lost coin, the lost sheep, the lost son, the whole prodigal son idea was in that one set of parables. And he said that sheep, we always think of the lost sheep as being this little cuddly, cute, baby sheep that got lost.

Because Desmond Tutu said no, that was the old, belligerent, hard to get along with ram. He's the guy that had chased off into the thicket and gotten himself into all kinds of trouble. That what Jesus was going to leave the 99 little good, sweet sheep and go after this hardened bonehead over here. Okay, that would be me.

Did you see the picture? And you're not going to get that hardened bonehead to come to you if you start calling him a hardened bonehead. I mean, it just won't work. If somebody had told me how stupid I was for being in Scientology, they wouldn't have gotten past anything. And that's what Paul is saying. If I want to feed my sheep, right, Jesus said to Peter three times, do you love me? Feed my sheep.

Do you love me? Feed my sheep. It gets back to he is the good shepherd.

And he even one time gives us this illustration of determining what's a good shepherd from a bad shepherd. If you're the one that's going to receive, God slipped this to me yesterday so beautifully. I said, what's the secret? What's the magic word? And he said, it's care. Which, fascinatingly, on my way to talk to you guys this morning, I saw this big billboard for Cracker Barrel. It said, the secret ingredient, care. Well, why could Tammy, why could she draw this old ram to Christ is because she cared about me.

You see? Because the good shepherds really care about the sheep. That's what Jesus said. I'm the good shepherd. I care about the sheep. Well, find somebody that really cares about people and you're going to find yourself a pretty good shepherd.

Right? And if you really care about them, you won't just leave them out there in the daggum thicket. So if you're going to receive these people and not to argue with them, to me, the secret ingredient, the wonderful, believable, uncool ingredient is that you care. And Nancy called in that, you know, your member Nancy called in yesterday and talked about her care when she goes to different, you know, in home health and how she prays God, show me how to care for this person.

Because chances are they're going to be old and obnoxious and they're not going to be really glad to get up and walk around this morning. Just think about what she faces every day and you get that picture. And when you think about how we can receive people, we think about how can we be a good shepherd and how do we go about caring for people. And I found another nugget this morning that I'm hoping God will illuminate for us.

I was just like, oh wow, look at that. So Paul wrote back in Romans 14 one, now except the one who is weak, what, in faith. He's weak in faith. And here's where the real like man, man, that word faith can mean a lot of different things. But Paul used a very specific word there that fortunately for us we can track.

Through the technology of today we would never have been able to do it before. But you know, he wrote it and it was translated into Greek. But in the Greek it gives us an idea through what was used in another translation called the Septuagint so we can go back and see where did this word come from. Where's the first place in the Bible which Paul would have known based on his understanding of the Bible that the first place you use a word is where you really get its meaning. And so where's the first place you find this word faith, this specific word faith that he uses in the Bible and you're going to find it just beautifully in Exodus chapter 17. And so I know you've been around this morning on your Bibles but this will be worth it. Put a mark there. Don't ever forget this is worth to me the whole deal right here.

Here's the enchilada. God gives us in this picture and Paul meant for it to be there in my opinion. He wouldn't have used this word if he didn't intend for us to see what he was talking about. So you may be familiar that when the Jews were out there running around in the wilderness that the Amalekites were not their good friends and so they wanted to kill them. And so here in Exodus 17 there's a war between the Amalekites and the Israelites. And God had told Moses to get up on top of a hill and do what? Right. Raise his hands. But when you raise your hands you're doing what this church does better than any church I know of.

And I mean that sincerely. You're praying. Right. Get up there and pray Moses. You've got to raise your hands.

Okay. And so Joshua did as Moses said and fought the Amalekites while Moses and Aaron and her went up on the top of the hill. When Moses held up his hands Israel prevailed. But when he let down his hands the Amalekites prevailed. Moses hands grew very heavy so they took a stone and put it under him. And he sat down and Aaron and her held up his hands one on each side so his hands were steady until the sun went down. And when that word steady right there in your translation whatever it may say secure or up that word is faith. That word is that word that Paul used. That these guys this see what he was weak.

Right. He was diseased. He couldn't keep his hands up. So what happened? Well the first thing they did which is this is beautiful just absolutely amazing to me. The first thing they did was they slid a stone under him for him to be his foundation. It wasn't just any stone. Right. The foundation is this. They put a Bible under his rear end.

Okay. That's what they did. The first thing they did and by the way how did Robbie come to faith? They slid a Bible under my nose and at some point in time right this is this is where it starts.

But in order to have an understanding of this Bible you've got to pray. You've got to raise up your hands and you've got to have people that will help you lift your hands. And so we had Aaron and we had her that are holding up these hands in a community of three. Now did you not think that there's more to it than them just holding up his hands. There was more to it. Of course there was.

Because when two or more are gathered right you have a church. It was her which if you know her really cool guy. He was Miriam's son.

Really really cool guy. And Aaron clearly high priest. These three very righteous men are praying as they are holding up Moses's hands. So you want to know how to strengthen a diseased weak sheep that's out there all messed up. Slide a Bible under their rear end.

And get a hold of their hands now. Because I just love this stuff so much I'm just going to give share one other nugget for you OK. In the 16th Psalm which God put it on my heart to memorize like the 20 like the 23rd Psalm. It's just like oh my goodness which talks about the good shepherd right.

He leads him beside still waters and all that. Well the 16th Psalm you may know the ending of it. Is so beautiful it's unbelievable at the last verse of the 16th Psalm it says I will show you the path of life. In your presence is fullness of joy. And I will have pleasures forevermore. So I thought to myself how did how did David get there.

How did he get from. The first verse which is. Preserve me oh Lord because I put my trust in you had to get from there to. In your presence is fullness of joy and you'll find it there by reading the other. 10 verses of the 16th Psalm it's not a hard one to memorize because it's not that long.

So what what happens is. I think it's verse seven or eight yeah eight and nine and first eight nine it says. I will place the Lord always before me. At his at my right hand I will place the Lord always before me at my right hand. Is the Lord. And I will not be shaken. So when you think about. That right hand right there. OK. I don't know if.

Just going to share more stuff with you. The word for intimacy in Hebrew is yada. Which is hand. Expressed.

So. Intimacy has everything to do with your hands or what's what's Moses doing he's lifting up his hands why. Because when we get our hand the hand with God when you touch his hand.

Right. He's got the whole world in his hand. There's so much that has to do with intimacy in hands it's unbelievable but Jesus. And right hand if you were to look at the way it's spelled in Hebrew.

They're synonymous. Jesus is your right hand. When you say right hand you're saying Jesus. I promise. Your right hand is in fact. Jesus and of course it is because he's sitting at the right hand of God. OK.

I mean it's just like oh wow all this stuff comes together somehow. Well. If Jesus is at my right hand. I will not be shaken.

But then it says. Therefore. I will be glad. My glory rejoices. Did you know you had glory that rejoiced. Like you know that's your halo and that means it gets it shine on when Jesus is at your right hand. Your glory is going to rejoice. And it says my flesh.

Will rest securely. So if I can get the Lord always before me. Jesus at my right hand.

Then I get all this all these goodies. It's all there. Well that all is prayer you see as we raise our hands.

Right. This is intimacy. God is waiting for your hand.

He wants to. There was no magic that the Beatles I want to hold your hand became the biggest hit of all time that they knew something that we all know. Hold your wife's hand or your husband's hand for a minute and just get a sense of what's there. All these nerve endings are in here. You intimacy has everything to do with your hands. And the hand of God is absolutely spectacular.

And so for these two guys. Her and Aaron. To hold up Moses's hands.

You see in order to do that what were they using. Their hands. What could be more intimate.

Now if you're like most men I do not like holding hands and I mean it's don't. Satan is trying to attack where he knows he can put something between us. He just does. He understands this stuff.

If we go back to Romans 14 one. Paul. Knew everything I'm describing to you at a level that I just can't even fathom. Right. He knew. He knew. What weak in faith meant. And he knew how to strengthen people that were weak in faith.

And he knew that laying hands on somebody is no small deal. When I had cancer. Maybe you've heard this story before but if you hadn't I'll share it with you one more time. I had lymphoma of a kind that was called killer cell lymphoma. My sister told me that I wouldn't live two months after I got it.

And she worked for the University of Michigan Hospital at the time. So I was really facing what I thought was death. I'd been a Christian for about two months. And I was okay with going to be with Jesus.

But I wasn't okay with leaving my family at that stage of my life and all those things. I had these tumors that were all over my skin. It was T-cell lymphoma and so it was in my skin. And all over my body were all these big flat tumors. And from my perspective I looked like a freak. So I worked at the time at a Chrysler store in downtown Winston-Salem.

And so I wasn't going out on the showroom floor because to me it was embarrassing. And so I was back in my office trying to run the dealership from back there. And a pastor by the name of Richard Little from Ronaldo Presbyterian. Which happens to be a great friend of James if you didn't know that. Who you know they've been friends up until he passed away about a year ago. But anyway he came by the dealership and he told my friend who was the finance manager who he knew, Joe Valls. He said, the Lord has told me there's somebody in this place that needs to be healed.

And Joe said, man it's got to be Robbie because he's back in his office. I mean he's got this lymphoma and you know it's got to be who the Lord put. So Pastor Little came back to my office and I don't want you to get this picture that I had the faith to be healed. Because I actually thought the guy was whacked. I mean he wanted to pour oil on me and he wanted to lay hands on me.

Okay and so here's this guy been a Christian for two years, Scientologist for longer than that. And believe me this was not equating in my world of how Robbie's going to get well. But nonetheless he was a very sincere, very, very dear man. He lays hands on me and he prays.

This was on a Friday. I remember it all too well. And undoubtedly there were lots of people praying for me.

But this is the one that certainly stuck because there was something that I felt in his prayer as he laid hands on me. And he left and I was like thank you very much whatever I thought. Well Monday I was supposed to start my oral chemotherapy which I did in fact do. But before I got there every single tumor that I had did this in fact disappear completely gone. And it wasn't one it was like 30 maybe. There were a bunch of them and they were big and they were round and they were all gone.

And so they did a biopsy on the place where one of them had been and they said that cancer had turned on itself and it ate itself. Praise God. Yeah.

Through what? A man laying his hands on me. A righteous man. I was diseased. Right. I was weak.

And here came this. And do you realize I mean just what that did for me for my faith for my understanding. You know something obviously at my testimony like Christian on the road to this celestial city I put that down in my bosom and I always hold it right there that Jesus you know came and did that for me. So that I could have these next 25 30 how many 40 years in order to share.

I mean how cool is that. Again your hands and prayer are very connected. However you go about doing that.

It just it just works. And so as we see these people that come into our church or we go after that lost sheep you know be pretty easy actually. If a homeless person walked in here I bet you every one of you would put your arms around them or a prostitute or a drug addict if they walked in through those doors we'd all and did not dispute with them saying you know what you've been doing has been bad. You know that would be easy. Let me tell you where it's hard.

OK. Because I thought I've had two weeks to think about where it's hard. It's where it's your own family member. Right. The ones that are really of your flock. The ones that really you've gotten madder and madder and you know all these things have been going on but what's really going on for them is our battle isn't against flesh and blood it's against spiritual forces and I places and they clearly their faith is weak and they are diseased. We don't see them as a person with cancer. We see them as a person with a bad attitude. We see them you know as a person that is hungry which is what they are.

We see them as a person who's made horrible choices. Well here's the beauty and I mean this. The more I study this the more I come to understand that this is in fact Jesus and Jesus is this. So when it says feed my sheep the reason you know like any truth that we can feed these diseased any way that we can slide a Bible under their rear end.

I'm telling you. No matter how disease no matter where their faith. I mean this is the deal here.

Here it is. OK through prayer through laying hands on them they can begin to see the light that's inside of this but all their answers the whole thing for their faith and Paul knows this is right here. That's why Jesus said to Peter three times. Look at Ezekiel 34 read the whole passage you'll get the idea of what does God want him to do feed my sheep quit eating them and feed them right. Because what happens we get mad at people and believe me my family sitting right here and they will tell you I'm completely I'm completely capable of eating a person alive. Right when I lose my temper and who do I'm going to lose my temper at that poor homeless person over there or no my relative that has driven me crazy right. And unfortunately for whatever reason those are the people that God really wants me to slide the Bible in and really pray that God will begin to give them truth.

Help them to understand what faith really is and have that belief that God is who he said he is. Look at that I stayed here. Are you impressed Larry.

I didn't move too far. Hey Robin. Good to see you guys. I will pray and we will close. Jesus thank you for my friends and a chance to share what you have given us today Lord I pray that you would help us to digest this in some way that would glorify you that people would see what an amazing amazing shepherd you are and that they would realize that a right at your right hand or pleasures forevermore. That in your presence is fullness of joy and that you show the path of life Lord. We pray that you would make all this happen for us. In Jesus name. Amen.