Everyone needs compassion, love that scared to failing, let mercy fall not in need. Everyone needs forgiveness, the kindness of the Savior, the hope of nations. Savior, He can move the mountains, my God is mighty to save, He is mighty to save, forever, author of salvation. He rose and conquered the grave, Jesus conquered the grave.
Take me out to find me, all my fears and failures, live my life again. I give my life to follow, everything I've needed. Now I surrender. For us, for His disciples, for apostles, and for God.
And there was very, very little that He did for Himself. I mean, He ate to nourish Himself, and He took care of Himself in terms of how most people take care of themselves today. Whether it be hygiene or health, He took care of that aspect of Himself. But in terms of things He did, they were predominantly for everyone around Him and for furthering God's kingdom.
And so Jesus was, again, the complete embodiment of selflessness. And so we talk about, in Luke, you see, when He was 12 years old, and they were in Jerusalem, they were heading back home. And His parents made it a day. Joseph and Mary, they made it a day's journey.
And Jesus was not with them, He was at, He was in the temple. They make it back to Jerusalem, and for three days, they still hadn't found Him. They found Him in the temple with the scholars, and He was asking questions, He was listening, He was learning, He was giving responses. And everybody was amazed at how knowledgeable this young man was.
And his parents, let's go. Like, where have you been? We have been trying to go home. And his basic response to them was, I've got to be about my father's business.
Jesus was not in the temple for Himself. Jesus was in the temple for God. And so then you flash forward a little bit to when He gets baptized by John. And that story, you see John the Baptist there is paving the way for Jesus and telling people, I'm this guy, I'm doing this thing, you should be baptized in faith, and I'm here to facilitate that.
But there's coming one after me that's greater. And he's referring to Jesus. Well, Jesus comes down to where He's baptizing people, and John the Baptist is like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, you need to be baptizing me. And Jesus was like, Nope, nope, for now, right now, this needs to happen.
You are paving the way, and I need to do this. And ultimately, what He was doing was fulfilling God's will, giving us that perfect example that we need to follow. And right after He comes up out of the water, the Holy Spirit falls on Him like a dove, and then you hear from God, This is my beloved Son, whom I am well pleased. And I think some versions, maybe every version, I'm not sure, but it's just to hear Him.
And so Jesus, at that moment, He could have said, Yeah, you're right, John. You are right. I need to baptize you. That is my role.
I am the Son of God, and you need to understand your place. Jesus very well could have done that. He was powerful enough. He was the man.
He is the man. And I think a lot goes to show that He is the man from the standpoint of He showed us how to be, and that John was doing this, and it was for purposes greater than just who Jesus was. It was purposes greater. It was a heavenly purpose, and that's the reason why He had John do it.
That was the whole purpose behind it. So He took a step back. He was selfless in that act as well, or in that event in His life. And so the Bible talks about being selfless, putting others first, thinking of yourself less, thinking of God more, putting others before yourself, loving others as much as or more than you love yourself, and some other things.
And so we're going to look at a few verses. Before we do that, however, we're going to look at just the basic Google definition of maybe Google or Webster. I don't know. Joe, the average Joe provided me with this definition, and I thought it was excellent.
And so it says selfless or selflessness. It is concerning yourself with the needs and wishes of others more with the needs of others and wishes of others than with one's own. And so here you're talking about where if you can maintain some vision to where you are less important than the people around you or less important than everyone, then you should conduct yourself selflessly, and selflessness should pretty much be made manifest from the way that you act if you have that opinion, where other people are in need of things. You may have some things, and we're going to kind of get to that, where if you have some things that other people need, then it's a selfless quality to give that to them.
And so here in the Old Testament, Proverbs 19, verse 17, Whoever is generous to the poor lends to the Lord, and he will repay him for his deed. So here, I mean, yeah, it kind of seems like there's a get behind this, where if you do something, then you get a bit of a reward. But, I mean, that should not be the focus, okay? Jesus was not doing something so he could be rewarded with being at the right hand of the Lord God.
I mean, that's not Jesus' purpose, and so he did what was needed of him. And so we also see in Proverbs 11, verse 24 and 25, One gives freely, yet grows all the richer. Another withholds what he should give, and only suffers want. Whoever brings blessing will be enriched, and one who...
Waters will himself be... Okay, I started thinking I copied that thing wrong. That's funny. And so this is why you should give.
This is why you should help. This is why you should be selfless. Because my major philosophy behind being selfless or trying to help people when they're in need is what happens today whenever I'm in need? And if I'm asking, if I did not give somebody something that I was able to give, then I'm just going to be sitting there in need, and nobody's going to want to be helpful.
At least that's what I have in mind. Now, there are people who will probably help, regardless of things I've done in my past. But here you have a conversation of you reap what you sow. And if you sow the flesh, you reap corruption.
I don't know the verse, but I know that that's there. And so reaping what you sow, and if you're sowing selflessness, then you will in turn be rewarded in some capacity. And I think that holds very, very true. And hopefully, if someone is in need, and I can supply it, I try to do my very best to help with that.
And hopefully it comes the day where I'm not in need. That is everybody's hope, where you hope that you're not ever in need. But if the day comes when you are, and you were stingy with what you had before you were in need, what's to say you're going to be helped out whenever you are in need? And so there's a whole lot of karma is kind of a word you can throw around here.
And so being selfless has its own reward. And its own reward is you help somebody else, and that's all that's necessary. That's all that's needed. There is a topic that we're going to be talking about, doing things in secret.
Okay, so we're going to be talking about that soon. But if you do something, and then you shout it out from the rooftops. I mean, we already talked about humility. What are you really doing that for?
Are you doing that to be helpful? Are you doing that to do something for someone else? Are you doing that to be seen of others? And so there's a whole topic there.
But whenever you do things, do them in secret, and you'll be rewarded openly. And so I believe that's also a Bible verse. But again, I'm not necessarily the best at memorizing and quoting the specific scriptures. And so the Old Testament discusses how we should be selfless, and in what ways we should do it, and reasons why we should do that.
But here we have Jesus, examples of him being selfless. We have here that in 1 Peter 2, verse 24, He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. And so in this verse, you have so many things going on.
And if you talk about the entire story of Jesus, whenever he gave his life on the cross, there was the entire discussion between him and God. The prayer between him and God when he was in the Garden of Gethsemane, before he was taken and put on trial and then put on the cross, he was saying, if there's any other way, if there's any other way, let it be. If I don't have to go through this excruciating experience, that's what I want. I would want that.
Who is going to just not have a desire to not be put on the cross if that is their fate? And so of course Jesus had these moments where if you're talking to God, please, if there's any other way, let it be so. But, he says, if this is the way, then it is your will, God. It is not mine.
And so Jesus, yes, he does not want to be put on the cross. He does not want to be scourged. He does not want to be ridiculed and despised by everybody. He wants some other way to happen, but he wants God's will, first and foremost, to be taken care of, and that was God's will.
There had to be a perfect sacrifice for sin, and Jesus was that. And so Jesus, not only in his act, his ultimate act of selflessness on the cross, demonstrated this quality for us, but what he did was, he taught this as well. In Luke 6, verse 27 through 36. I'm going to have to go here and read that.
But I say to you who hear, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, and pray for those who spitefully use you. To him who strikes you on one cheek, offer the other also. And from him who takes away your cloak, do not withhold your tunic either. Give it to everyone who asks of you.
And so the average Joe gave me this context here, and I thought that this was excellent. And so your basic idea here is, it is easy. It is extremely easy to do good, to love, to help those who help you. It is extremely easy to love those who love you.
The difficult thing is extending that mercy, or extending that helping hand to those who don't love you. Maybe don't even know you. The word enemies maybe is a little bit harsh, maybe a little bit too specific sounding, but if you just think about the second greatest commandment is to love your neighbor as yourself, the word enemies here can very easily be the people around you, your neighbors. These people don't know you, and very well could be an enemy to you.
They could be seeking ill towards you in some capacity. But we are told that if we do only good to people who only do good to us, if we love people who only love us, then we really have no credit. The first thing that popped up in my mind was Hitler. Hitler loved the people who loved him.
He did not love his enemies at all. In any way, shape, or form. He made people his enemies just because of who they were and where they were from. And so in his verse, to me, it's saying you are no better than Hitler in terms of selflessness.
Now, I'm going to be stressed, but I'm putting it out there. This is on the Facebook Live. But basically, that's what you're hearing. You're hearing that just because somebody loves you, and you love them, that's kind of expected.
However, if somebody who knows nothing about you, and you love them, you do loving things toward them, it has a great benefit to you. And so we keep going here with selflessness. Here, this is not Jesus preaching anymore. This is now his apostles are teaching selflessness.
And in 2 Corinthians 9, 6-8, the point is this. Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. Whoever sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must give, as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion.
For God loves a cheerful giver, and God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work. And so this ultimately is basically the same type of context that we saw back in Proverbs. If you give little, then you can kind of expect little in return, from whomever that may be, whenever you're in need. And so another thing, I meant to say this whenever that Luke passage was up, but one of the things, a buddy of mine, a guy named Eric Rucker, love this guy, love his whole family, there was a time where my truck got towed because I was not very smart.
I parked, I covered parking in an apartment complex at a buddy's house when we were going to go play some cards. And it got towed about five minutes before I walked outside. And so somebody in the apartment complex said, oh, that may have been your truck that was driving or that was being hauled off. And I was just completely defeated.
And so credit to Eric here. Eric, he looked at me, he's like, how do you get home? And I said, well, you got to get me two legs, I guess. And so he said, that's, you know, that's ridiculous.
You're far away from home. Let's take you to, let's take you to the place and get your truck back. And this was a time where I was not very, I had some financial issues. You know, we were with young kids and a lot of money was potentially in debt or tied up in credit cards and all this other stuff.
You know how young, young married couples are. And so, and so he said, how are you going to pay for that? I was like, well, I'm probably going to have to put it on a credit card. And it was a couple hundred bucks.
I don't remember exactly how much, you know, to me, it doesn't necessarily matter. And he said, well, there's no other way without putting you further in debt. He kind of knew my situation a little bit. And I said, well, I'll pay you back when I can.
And he said, and he told me this, and this is what has resonated with me ever since that day. This was about eight years ago or so. At least it feels like it was about eight years ago. And he said, if you have the ability to pay me back and you feel like you need to pay me back, do that.
But Eric said, I don't want you to. I don't want you to give me any money unless you feel like you need to. And if you can take that money that you were going to give to me and help somebody else out, do that. And so any time that I have felt the need to help somebody out or somebody has felt the need to reach out and ask for help, my comments to them are, I don't want you to pay me back.
If you want to, great, whatever. If that makes you feel better, then fine. But I don't expect this to be returned to me because ultimately it was money that I had. It was something that I had.
It may not have been money, but it was something that I had that I didn't need at the time or potentially ever. And so I said, here you go. Take this. Do with it what you need to do with it and take care of you.
And it's very difficult to have that mindset. And that's only been in the last couple of years. I'm 35 years old. It's very difficult to have that mindset of not feeling like you need to be paid back.
And because, let's face it, money, things, they're valuable to us in our eye. But if you think about it, we can't take any of it with us. So if we can do something for the good to help somebody else, that is where the benefit comes. That is where the after this life is over, that's where we're going to be benefited.
And so we continue here in Acts 20, verse 35. In all things, I've shown you that by working hard in this way, we must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he himself said, it is more blessed to give than to receive. And so this is something where you hear on a regular basis. You hear this more often in Christmastime.
And so I just kind of went back to that verse without thinking about it. So I'll come to Romans here in a second. But you hear it's more blessed to give than to receive, and that's because of that idea of expecting something in return. And if you can, in some capacity, give without expecting something in return, it is doing much more benefit not only to you but to those around you.
And it is setting an example that is Christlike. In Romans 12, verse 10, love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. So I like this.
It kind of sounded a little bit showy. But in this regard here, when you show honor, you don't say, look how honorable I am. You have a level of humility about yourself that keeps you honorable. If you're shouting from the rooftops, look how honorable I am.
You're not necessarily being that honorable. So that takes that same concept of doing things in secret and being rewarded openly. And so outdo one another in showing honor. And that is just another way of saying be more selfless than the people around you.
Do everything you can to outdo people in selflessness, in humility, in any of these other characteristics we've talked about. I think this is maybe the sixth week, and fifth or sixth, I'm not exactly sure. But so many of these qualities, and I've talked about this so many times throughout any of these videos, is that they hinge upon the other one. So love hinges upon all these other things, or all these other things hinge upon love, forgiveness, and forgiveness, humility, strength, all the stuff, strength that Jesus provides for us.
All these things are tied together. And so here you're going to see how humility plays a role here in Philippians 2 verses 1 through – we're actually going to look at basically verses 1 through 8. So we have, therefore, if there is any consolation in Christ, if any comfort of love, if any fellowship of the Spirit, if any affection and mercy fulfill my joy by being like-minded, have the same love, being of one accord, of one mind. And so in verse 3, we have that we are to do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves.
I don't see how that's anything less than just utter selflessness. And then in verse 4, we have let each of you look not only to his own interests – this just basically reiterates what it said in verse 3 – let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also the interests of others. And that's basically the definition that we get from Webster. Webster probably pretty much took all those words and just said, you know what, I'm going to make those my own.
And so we have that being, that person, being someone who is not seeking his own is extremely important. And so I'm going to connect love here. If you talk about 1 Corinthians 13 – I believe it's 1 Corinthians 13, the greatest gift – 1 Corinthians 13, verse 4, I'm just going to read it here off the screen. Love suffers long in its kind.
Love does not envy. Love does not parade itself. Love does not puffed up. Love does not behave rudely.
Does not seek its own. It is not provoked. It thinks no evil. Does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in truth.
Bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things. And here you have love tied so closely together with selflessness. Love – if you are loving, you are not seeking your own interests. There is just no way to be loving and be self-seeking.
And so in Philippians 2, 5 through 8, we're going to continue on in this verse or these verses. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing. Taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on the cross. And so that whole section there, Philippians 2, is an excellent, excellent context that discusses Jesus and his selflessness and the example that he set.
Now, none of us can live up to that type of selflessness. First of all, none of us are Jesus. None of us are the Son of God directly in terms of the way Jesus is the Son of God. You have the idea that Christians are brothers and sisters of Christ.
So in that regard, if we're brothers and sisters of Christ, then we're sons and daughters of God. But we were not born of a virgin. There's no way I'm trying to compare us to Jesus in actuality. But we have this thing where we can try to emulate this.
We can try to live selflessly. We can try to put others first. And hopefully, we're all trying to do that. I know it is very, very difficult to do that.
If you have kids, it's maybe a little bit easier to see yourself when you put yourself before them or when you put yourself before others. Because for the most part, when you're at home, if you're trying to raise them and trying to set a good example for them, you're trying to put them before yourself. And if you can see yourself doing that for them, then you should be able to see yourself doing that for others. Galatians 5, verse 13.
For you were called to freedom. Not only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another. And so, in that verse, their service to one another is where the selflessness comes in. Selflessness is, again, very difficult to do without trying to be, without being selfless.
It's very difficult to serve with a selfish mentality. And so, I've got all kinds of buzzers going off tonight. I apologize for that. But, you know, another verse here in the New Testament.
But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him? Here we have seeing that we are tied to being a godly or a righteous person by if we give, if we help, if we put others' needs in front of our own. Or if we don't, how is that love, how is that righteousness, how is those type of characteristics that we need to exhibit holiness being set apart? How does that reside in us at all?
In Hebrews 13, verse 2, do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unaware. And so, here you have that, you have this verse and you have others like, I don't know the verse, but Jesus is talking about giving little children water. And, man, it's losing, I'm losing it, but it's early in Matthew. And the children are kind of being maybe ridiculed a little bit, and Jesus is like, no, no, no, no, no, no, don't do that.
As a matter of fact, why don't you feed them and give them something to drink as well, because that's what we do. That's what Christians do. And then last verse I want to look at here is in context, if you want to call it context. 1 Peter 3, verse 8, 9, and then we'll jump down to 18.
Finally, all of you be of one mind, having compassion for one another. Love as brothers, be tenderhearted, be courteous, not returning evil for evil, reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, blessing. Knowing that you were called to this, that you may inherit a blessing. And then, if you jump down, for Christ also suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh, but made alive by the Spirit.
Here, this is basically one way that you can just demonstrate selflessness. It is extremely easy to, whenever somebody does something against you, it is extremely easy to jump to conclusions and do something against them. It is taking some form of vengeance, being vengeful. And God says, you know what, let me be vengeful.
Vengeance is mine, says the Lord. I don't know the verse, but it's there. And in no way, shape, or form should you be trying to return evil for evil. But on the contrary, blessing for blessing.
Somebody gives you a blessing, you should be returning that blessing, whether it be to them or paying it forward to someone else. And so, again, in that verse, I'll put it up there again. But we're called to that. We're called to giving blessings upon blessings and returning blessings for blessings, that we may inherit a blessing and a promise from God.
And so, Jesus is selfless. There is no question about how selfless you have to be in order to go through what he went through. At the end of his life, at the end of his life on earth, before he was resurrected, he put himself through that because it was God's will and because it was the only thing that could get us back to reconciliation with God. It was the only way for Jesus to be that mediator between us and God that we need.
The word propitiation is a word that's used quite a bit. And there's no way that we could be redeemed by the blood of the Lamb without the Lamb. And so, Jesus is the complete embodiment of selflessness. And if you, in any capacity, can find yourself a way to be selfless, Jesus is the ultimate example.
He always has been and always will be. If he can do what he did, then we can do something. We can do something that's on that scale. I'm not saying, again, I'm not saying that we can compare ourselves specifically to Jesus.
He's so great. And everything he has is so high. And it is unattainable. Jesus is that perfect sacrifice in every one of us.
Sin. But Jesus, if it's a spectrum, if in any way, shape, or form we can be on the spectrum of Jesus, then how can that be something that can be taken from us? And so, I have one final verse that I want to look at. It's very well known.
It's in Philippians chapter 4, verse 8. Very, very well known. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think on these things. And so, here, if there's anything that I give you in any of these videos, if there's anything that you can take from something that either I say or maybe that happens in the comments, which if there are, there are.
If there are, if there are not, that's okay, too. But if there's anything worth thinking about it, if there's anything worth pondering, if there's anything praiseworthy in any way, shape, or form, it all goes to God, or it should. And that's the only purpose for this. This is supposed to be the Monday night encouragement.
I completely put it off and didn't even think about it until about 6 o'clock. And Joey said, hey, what are you doing tonight? And I said, oops, I completely forgot. And I said, you know what?
I'm going to do it tomorrow night. And hopefully tomorrow comes, and I can't. And that's okay. That happens.
Everybody kind of gets caught up. And so, at least I'm going to justify that to myself. I got caught up, and I forgot. But tonight, hopefully I made it up, and hopefully I did a good job.
Hopefully not the other part. But you know what? If I didn't, I'll settle for a single. But guys, if there's anything that can help build you up, that is the sole purpose of this vlogcast.
And I think I'm going to hashtag vlogcast. But if there's anything, anything honorable, anything that can help you be encouraged, that is what this is for. Think on those things. Think on them.
Help you through the week. Help you until next Monday or Tuesday whenever I come back on. Hopefully you like listening to this. Hopefully you get something out of this that helps you with your race, that helps you with your life, and your religious views or your religiousness, if you want to call it that.
And so being selfless like Jesus, being loving like Jesus, being humble like Jesus, being – I forgot the last couple that we've done – but going to Jesus for strength. These are all things that we as Christians should be doing, and hopefully we're trying to attain some measure of that on a daily basis. But this is How Do You Feel About Jesus by The Average Joes. Tune in next time.
How Do You Feel About Jesus How Do You Feel About Jesus