If twelve can change the world, we can at least change the community. Jonathan Evans challenges believers to move beyond their comfort zone.
The problem is we've been satisfied with being the salt to the shaker and not the salt to the world. This is the alternative broadcast featuring the timeless biblical teachings from the archives of Dr. Tony Evans. In a world full of distractions, it's easy to lose sight of what truly matters. Today, we begin a series of messages from special guest, Pastor Jonathan Evans, as he takes us back to the basics, showing how Jesus was able to cut through the noise of his day and get down to what's really important. Let's listen in as Jonathan challenges us to refocus on what God values most. Alright, turn to the book of Matthew 22, verse 35 through 40.
It says, one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question, testing him. Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law? And he said to him, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest and foremost commandment.
The second is like it. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commands depend the whole law and the prophets.
Today I want to talk to you from the title Back to the Basics. Here you have the Pharisees and Sadducees in context of this chapter asking Jesus questions in order to trip him up. This is a group of smart gentlemen who have prided themselves on their understanding and knowledge of the law and the Ten Commandments and 613 statutes and ordinances. And one of them who is a lawyer, which means he's proficient in law, comes and sits down and tests him and says, which is the greatest and foremost commandment? In other words, there's a lot of these commandments. Tell us which one you would put first.
Put them in order so that we can understand what you think is the greatest out of all of them. And so he's setting to trip Jesus up for him to make one law more special than another and do all of those different things. And he's trying to test him. This is actually what trips up a lot of believers, though, because a lot of believers are trying to figure out what should I do first? Where should I start? Let me figure out the list where I can move the spiritual needle forward in my life. Let me figure out how I'm supposed to do this. We're a part of the how-to generation. Y'all spend a lot of y'all's time on YouTube watching how-to videos so that you can figure stuff out on how are you supposed to do stuff.
So we're the how-to generation and we're trying to figure out what is the list or metric or rubric or blueprint so that I can do this right and get the most out of this. And that how-to generation still hasn't figured out how to live the Christian life consistently. And so he's trying to trip Jesus up by asking him the how-to or put this in order for me.
What is the most important in the law? I'm sure they were expecting some historical context, some, you know, ethical teachings, philosophical elaborations, ritualistic observations, like give us something. This is a smart group, kind of like an ordination that he was at where they were testing him, trying to see what he knows and what he was going to bring to the table.
And when the lawyer came and said, which one is the greatest? He said, love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind and love your neighbor as yourself. Evidently, God is not looking for rule followers. He's looking for followers that rule.
And there's a difference. He said, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the greatest commandment. He's not interested in contractors of the faith.
He's looking for people who are going to be full time. But a lot of Christians get tripped up trying to figure out what's most important, what's least important, put it in a pot, stir it together and hope they can come out with something good enough. This isn't spiritual jambalaya.
This is following Jesus. And he's not giving them a list of what's most important and how you do it and where you should start. He just tells them, love the Lord your God. He did not want to talk about law. He wanted to talk about love. He didn't want to talk about a list. He wanted to talk about a whole life. He didn't want to talk about your rituals. He wanted to talk about relationships. He didn't want to talk about your performance.
He wants to talk about your passion. Now, trust me when I tell you, the law is good. It's a good thing. Romans 7, 12 says the law is righteous and holy and good. But in Philippians 3, 8 and 9, Paul says, but knowing Christ is to the greater. That I counted all my fleshly, not just desires, but the things that I've accomplished due to my flesh, I counted all as rubbish in comparison to knowing Christ. So you understand that, yes, the law is good, but knowing Christ is greater. And once you understand that knowing Christ is greater than 2 Corinthians 3, 6 says, now you are a competent minister that can go out and teach other people about the new covenant, which knowing Christ will get them following the law. And once you realize that the law is good and that knowing Christ is greater and then you become a competent minister to be able to perpetuate that new covenant, then you can serve and be unleashed, no longer bound by the written code. The Bible says people want guidance, but they don't want the guide. They want direction, but they reject the way.
He said, no, I'm talking about you actually loving me. OK, now picture this. Now that you've seen the forage, you know I like acting, so. Picture Jesus at the table with the Pharisees, and they're smart. They pride themselves on their memorization skills and understanding of the Old Testament and the law. And they sit down with him and they say, what is the greatest law? And after asking that question from the astute lawyer, you can imagine all of them leaning in to see what he was going to say. And Jesus said, love me. There is a group of Pharisees and Sadducees who pride themselves on their knowledge and understanding of law and the memorization of the Old Testament. And they ask him, what's the greatest commandment? And they all lean in waiting for the astute answer.
And Jesus says, love me. OK, come on, man. OK, you're supposed to get this.
Let me try one more time. It's a group of Pharisees. And they ask, which is the greatest command? And they've got the knowledge and memorization skills and they've got the Bible memorized.
And they all lean in for the answer. You know what Jesus said? I need you to do the thing you don't have.
Love me. You got all that knowledge. And you missed the entire thing. It's an indictment answer on who he's talking to. He's telling the Pharisees, you missed the whole game. And you know all that?
You're playing the game without the ball. You don't love me. The Pharisees, these are people who like themselves. They know a lot and they know they know a lot. But it's totally disconnected from the love of Christ. They're like the butchers of the faith.
That's the only reason why they pick up the sword. You know when you leave a social media video and they're in the comments and they're only in the comments to talk about how bad your video was? Or something you said that was off. Or they sit in church and they're only listening to dig into what you missed. They're not here to learn and grow.
They're here to think about how smart they are. And Jesus says, yeah, but you don't love me. I understand that you know all this, but disconnected from love, you missed the entire game. And I'm not saying that you shouldn't know the word. You should. The Bible says meditate on my word day and night.
But not so that you can just be smart and like yourself. Not so that you can pray loud, nice prayers that everybody can hear with the vicissitudes and all of that kind of stuff. He don't care about none of that. And he looks at the Pharisees and he says, I know that that's you. I can tell by the way you pay your tithes. You do it because you know you should, but you don't love me. I can tell by the way you serve and give.
You do it because you've been in church long enough to know you should. But you don't love me. You know what to do. You know what to say. You know how to play the game. The entire indictment on the person who asked the question was disconnected from all of that knowledge is love.
And it all doesn't matter if love is not involved. Jonathan will return with more of our message in just a moment, including a look at what God really wants from us. First though, what we're hearing today is the beginning of a special collection of messages from Pastor Jonathan Evans called Discipleship for Every Day. Our primary responsibility as believers is to be and make disciples. And this six-part series can help you fulfill that divine calling and give you a vision for the impact it makes when you do.
As we've already begun discovering today, faithful disciples lead to thriving families, impactful churches, and a flourishing society. And we'd like to send you this audio collection as a way of saying thanks when you make a contribution to help support the ministry of the alternative. For a limited time, along with the audio messages, we'll also include a copy of Your Time is Now, an insightful book from Jonathan that exposes the distractions that can reduce the Christian life to a mere hobby. Together, these resources will inspire you to embrace God's calling to pursue His kingdom and live your purpose fearlessly in His presence. You can get all the details on this special double offer at tonyevans.org or by calling our 24-hour resource request line at 1-800-800-3222. That's 1-800-800-3222 or online at tonyevans.org. I'll repeat that contact information for you after the second part of today's message.
Here's Jonathan once again. So I want you to learn. I want you to grow in your knowledge of Jesus Christ and read His Word, but not to show off. A guy came to me, asked the question, so what do you think about revelations when it says, and I could tell by his posture, once you start pulling on your shirt and you start buttoning, you start doing all that. And he was talking about the bowls and the trumpet, you know what I'm saying? And this is, and so he's asking the question, then start telling me what he thinks.
And I could tell, I was just like, and the whole time I'm like, come on, bruh. So he finished asking the question and I said, tell me about your relationship with your wife. I said, what that got to do with the bowls and the trumpet? I want to know, do you love your wife?
I want to know, do you take care of your kids? I want to know, do you sit around the table and talk to them about them bowls and them trumpets? Don't come to me with, I'm not with all that. I'm just saying that I'm not, you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart. The heart is the central location for life. Spiritually speaking, it's the central location of the overwhelming desire to radically live for or follow Jesus.
It is the desire within a person. I used to have coaches who would say that boy or that girl got heart. They're not talking about the science. They're not even talking about whether they're good at it. They're not talking about their training. They're talking about their passion in the game.
In other words, it's evident. And then they'll say, that's not something you can teach. I can't even coach that. Like, I want that kid.
I could teach that kid. Because their heart in which they play the game, they value the game. And you can tell, my dad would always say, are Christians destroying America? Because they leave the church and they don't play with no hearts. Yeah, they like debates and all of those things.
Social media, let's do all these debates. But do you have, people can see hearts. I was playing for Baylor. We had a conditioning test. And the conditioning test was six 300s with 30 seconds rest. Six 300s and you only get to rest for 30 seconds?
That's not normal. So this was our summer conditioning. I stayed home. I stayed at the house for the first half of the summer conditioning because it wasn't mandatory. So I said I'm going to come later.
I got a call and my boys were like, bro, you're going to die. You're not here working out. You're not here getting trained. He's teaching us how to run it, how you're supposed to do all of those different things.
And I said, well, what is it? They said six 300s with 30 seconds rest. Now, the way they were running it is they were running a lap around the outskirt of the football field that equaled 300 yards.
He didn't tell me that. All I knew was I wasn't going to show up and look like a fool. I was going to make my time. So I took my stopwatch, wrapped it around my hand, went up to Duncanville High School by myself and started running 300s. The way that I ran them was wrong.
They ran one continuous lap. I didn't know any better. So I ran 100 yards, stopped, turned around, ran 100 yards, stopped and then ran back 100 yards.
Do you all know how hard it is to stop and build your speed back up, then run a continuous lap? I didn't know any better. I didn't have the training. All I knew was I had a desire to win. So when I came to the summer workouts and they was like, bro, you're going to die. I got on the line. I started running.
And as I was running, I said, are we just running around the field? And I got back after number one. I was like, OK. Then we got to number two. We got to number three. At number three, I'm still standing there.
And they like this. And I said, oh, I'm going to make it. We got to number four.
I got a little bit more tired. But then the boys were like, he might make it. And when you get to two left, when you only have two left, you got to make it.
Like, you got to make it. So we got to number six. There was two guys ahead of me and I started picking up.
It's my last one. And I heard the coach say, that boy got heart. You can't coach that. We finished. I made the time.
Six guys made it out of 60. I went down to the other field and the coach was so mad that the people who trained couldn't make the goal. He made him run six more.
I know. And he looked at them and say, how y'all got the training and you couldn't meet the goal? It's because he got heart.
And a lot of people have been running for a long time and you still missing the goal. Because you ain't got no heart. And you're still trying to figure out the Christian life and you're still trying to figure out, based on training, how you're supposed to do it and what's the rubric and what's the list and what's the law. And Jesus was like, give me your heart.
And once you give me your heart, that changes the entire game. The Pharisees had it in their head, but they didn't have it in their hearts. Let me tell you about the disciples. Acts 4 13 says they were untrained men, but they knew they had been with Jesus.
The Pharisees didn't change anything. The disciples, 12 of them, changed the world. And what happens when you have 22 to 2,500 people who can leave church with the heart that has been given to Jesus Christ? If 12 can change the world, we can at least change the community.
The problem is we've been satisfied with being the salt to the shaker and not the salt to the world. So we come to church and we learn, woo, that was a good sermon and we leave with the same stale heart that still hadn't fallen in love with Jesus. He sat down with the Pharisees and he said, I got your brain. I'm trying to get your heart.
That's the law. Oh, and you look good, but I don't care about that. Jesus said, love me.
Do you have heart? And many of us, just like me, for a long time, I thought I loved him, but I didn't. I list him or law him. And we get it confused when we list him or law him because it's like this little line where we do so that God will respond instead of responding to what God has done. He said, love the Lord your God with all of your heart. That's the unleash part.
You can't teach that. He says, love the Lord your God with all your heart, beating desire, and all your soul. While your heart gives life, the soul is positioned to petruate the life that you have. The heart is the inner beating desire on the inside. The soul is the disposition that will parade that desire around on the outside. In other words, the soul is your temperament, your personality, your personhood. It is your character.
It is you. Sing it with me. It is well with my soul. Okay, sing it together.
It is well with my soul. My brother was here at first service. He was like, oh, don't do that.
You can see him like this at first service. That's not your gift. It don't matter. But when you sing that, you can feel that. It's well with my soul. What you're saying is, I'm okay. I'm at peace.
I'm going to be all right because it's well with who I am. That's why Matthew 10-28 says, fear not the ones who can kill the body, but cannot kill the soul. Because the soul, that's who you are. The body without the soul is just an empty shell. The soul still lives on. And so the soul is who you are. So when he says, the Pharisee says, which one is the greatest law?
Jesus says, love the Lord your God with all of your desire, all of your beating desire from the inside. And then he says, give me your whole soul. I want all of you, not just your head knowledge, not just your ability to put on fig leaves to cover yourselves up in front of people. I want your whole soul. I want your will, your time. I want your talents, your past experiences, your future aspirations.
I want your positioning and your posture. I want your whole soul. I want the heart of the man or the woman.
I want the whole soul of the man or the woman. Pastor Jonathan Evans, talking today about refocusing our lives on the things that matter most to God. A full-length version of today's message entitled Back to the Basics is available to help you explore this fundamental topic more deeply. But you can also get it along with five other practical lessons on spiritual renewal as part of a brand new collection of messages from Jonathan Evans called Discipleship for Every Day.
The Bible has a lot to say about being a follower of Christ. And in his engaging and down-to-earth style, Jonathan unpacks those biblical truths to help you respond to God's call, be filled with his peace, and live a life empowered by his Spirit living inside you. As I mentioned earlier, we're making available a special double offer that includes this entire six-lesson discipleship series on CD or digital download, along with a copy of Jonathan's encouraging book called Your Time is Now. This bundle is our gift to you, and thanks for your donation to help support the ministry of the alternative.
It's our way of showing appreciation for the continued support of listeners like you who make this program possible. Get all the details online at tonyevans.org. Again, that's tonyevans.org. Or you can call our 24-hour resource request line at 1-800-800-3222 and let one of our team members help you.
That's 1-800-800-3222. A serious athlete is far more likely to achieve victory when fully committed to the sport. In the same way, our spiritual lives thrive when we're wholly devoted to God. Tomorrow, Pastor Evans continues his look at what happens when we truly commit to loving God with all our heart, soul, and mind. Be sure to join us.
