Welcome to the Mariners Church Life Group leader podcast. This weekly conversation is designed to equip and resource you to build a healthy life group community that studies God's word, practices spiritual rhythms, and changes the world together. Welcome back to the Red Letter Invitations Discussion Guide conversation between Jeremy and I as we help you lead great life groups as we're walking through the weekend teaching series. And so we've been on quite the journey so far and now we are at week seven talking about love your enemies.
The classic invitation from Jesus, the one that everybody knows about Jesus. They say, if you know one thing about Jesus, he says, well, you gotta love your enemies, right? So here we go. We're gonna try to have a fresh discussion about an age old invitation.
So Jeremy, what do you have for us today? What's the outcome we're hoping for? So this week, we're really looking at personal reflection and even repentance where it's needed. The goal this week with, I mean, wow, loving your enemies is really to have our hearts often by the Holy Spirit and just to let Jesus kind of work on us and remind us of how great his love and grace is for us and in turn how that should spur us on to loving good deeds towards others.
That's great. What you're really saying here is forgive because the Lord forgave you, right? I mean, this is what it comes down to. It's simple, but it's not easy.
That's exactly right. But what I love and I'll give it away right now is that Jesus never asks us to do something that he has not yet done for us, right? He will always do for you first what he then expects and asks you to do for others. And so when we think about loving our enemies, we were once enemies with Jesus and he says, no longer are you my enemy, he dies for us, he saves us, right?
So that right there means that we have the ability to do anything that Jesus asks us to do because he has once done that for us. Now, as leaders, we have to be ready for this conversation and we have to be prepared for it because we are going to talk about repentance and we'll spend a few minutes on that towards the end of this conversation. But this could be an opportunity for you as a leader. So Jeremy, how can we best prepare as we get ready for this opportunity this week?
I would say one of the first things we can do as leaders is to think back to the conversation that we had just last week with the story of the demon possessed man and going and sharing our stories, the great commission. And as we shared those stories, as you thought through your own story as a leader, you may have kind of uncovered some times of hurt where others hurt you or neglected you or any number of things could have come up. Like we mentioned last week, the Legion, any number of things could cause oppression and affliction in our lives. So think back in your own story and to what people shared in your group last week and be praying for those wounds that may have surfaced that the God would begin working towards healing.
And that's not always a nice neat kind of bow and everyone lives happily ever after, but we're going to look at what it really, what it looks like to kind of lean into and press in on those wounds a little bit so that we can feel that pain and not just be numb to it but so that we can let it go and love like Christ has loved us. So again, just read the room and check the pulse, like be prepared to set that pace again, like know what that appropriate level of sharing is and comfort and how to kind of invite people to take those next steps. And one thing I want to encourage everyone to do as they prepare three times in this passage from Luke this week, Jesus says, really sit with these words. Jesus says, if you love those who love you, what credit is that to you?
Even sinners love those who love them. Three times he asks, if you do these things, these good things, so what? Like everybody does that. And so the question to really ponder this week as we think about loving our enemies is what makes us different as Christ followers?
What makes our lives any different than anybody else? Anyone can be nice to those who are nice to them. Anyone can kind of appreciate and show honor to those who it benefits us to know and associate with but what makes us different? And that's the love and grace that Christ has shown us.
So what are we going to do with it? Yeah, it's an incredible invitation when we remember that, Jesus, when we have a pursuit of holiness, the whole foundation of holiness is to be set apart. It is by definition, you're a different community, you're a different person. And so we have to find those little anchor points that set us apart.
And this is exactly one of those, right, Jeremy? Yeah, this is Christ says they will know you're my followers by your love, right? Not just by your schedule and by your right beliefs and all these things like we've talked about before, but by the way, you treat other people. One of the most distinctive things we can do is to forgive or to love our enemies.
It's hard, it's hard, but the world takes notice when we treat people differently than everybody expects us to. That's right. It's important that we do call out in a conversation like this that there are people in our groups that have been painfully wronged. People who have had things done to them that are not right.
And loving that person does not mean that you have to agree with what has happened. It does not mean that you have to give them any kind of leverage over you. It is not a power. In fact, what it is, it's releasing the negative power that they once had over you.
When we love and when we forgive, we are releasing the grip that that person has on our heart, whether we realize it or not. But again, that doesn't mean that you're basically saying, oh, I condone the action that was done to me or to this other person, not at all. That isn't what Jesus is getting at here. And I do think that that opens the door for us to be able to be vulnerable in our groups and share some things that perhaps we haven't shared before or to dig beneath the surface and get down a couple of layers deep and say, I want to acknowledge this thing because it's healthy for me to talk about it.
It's healthy for me to get into a place where I can at least express some of the pain that I've experienced in my past. Again, not to make it right, but instead to say, I need this community, I need this group to be with me and the way that Jesus was with others. Yeah, I think that's important that this week, with the topic that we kind of started there with that disclaimer or things to avoid, that to love our enemies, that you can acknowledge the pain and the sin even without letting them to continue to have power over you. And it does not mean that we're not to have healthy or wise boundaries.
There are times where there are still consequences, there are still wisdom. That's how we started this whole year, right? With being wise. So we want to be wise, but we want to kind of look at those people and remember that as Christ loved me while we were still enemies, what does it mean to forgive the sin that they've committed against me?
While still continuing in my life. And I would say one other thing to avoid is don't let anyone off the hook this week. And what I mean by that is help people see how we justify enemies, so to speak, in little ways all the time. Probably a lot of us would say I don't have enemies.
Like when I think about I don't have enemies. Sure. But we do this in little ways by labeling people, kind of categorizing all people that do this or think this way or vote this way or believe in this or drive this kind of car or live in this neighborhood, whatever, they're all like this. Or we demonize people who think differently or believe differently or vote differently than we do.
And we reinforce our own biases all the time through our news, through social media, through our jokes. I mean, the things that we joke about constantly, what it does is it can dehumanize and degrade and demonize other people. And so in essence, there are little ways all around us that we have this concept of enemies. But then some of us have very, no, this person, I can identify as a person or a group of people in my life that have either hurt me intentionally or unintentionally or just cause major problems in my life.
So for some people it's gonna be very tangible and for others don't let them off the hook. That's like, I'm not really having enemies. Like we do this in all kinds of subtle ways. It's part of every culture in the world to kind of start grouping people into us and them.
Right, so what I'm hearing you say, Jeremy, is that the sort of quote label of enemy may be something as macro picture as the people or the group of people that we keep at a distance from ourselves, right? That we just don't know, that we don't have relationship with. And so it may subtly drift towards when we have a lack of knowledge or lack of relationship, we can start to develop some prejudice against or something like that. But it also might be very specific.
So there's a macro and or there's a micro picture here and it moves from a people group that we keep at a distance to a person that we keep at a distance, right? And we may not even feel like we're doing something intentional about keeping that person at a distance. It might be the other person's decision to keep us from a distance. But the reality is what Jesus is inviting us into here is to identify the people or the person and to say what might it look like for us to extend love and to care for those people in a way that Jesus did for us.
Once again, bringing back to, this is exactly what Jesus did for us, right? Yeah, and what you said there about the principles, like as you read through this list and this text, it'd be easy to kind of read over this and feel distant from it because culturally, we're probably not dealing with literally having to turn the other cheek or walk a mile or give up a tunic, things like that. But Jesus is laying out some principles that we can all relate to. And in the Deletor Guide, we hit these seven things under love your enemy, doing good to those who hate you, blessing those who curse you, praying for those who mistreat you, not retaliating, giving freely, and treating others the way that you wanna be treated.
Like those are things that apply anywhere in the world, anytime. And so even if we can't deal with or relate to the exact cultural environment that Jesus is in, we all can struggle with these things and what it does to our hearts when we bless instead of curse or pray for people who have mistreated us or just don't retaliate, those sorts of things are life-changing. So be ready to kind of point those out and just ask the questions like, which of these are our hardest for us? Like, which of these, where do you feel like, just kind of when I say that, it's like there's that rock in your shoes, it's just that pain that's just kind of digging in and it's like, man, I know that that's kind of where the spirit is pressing on me, that I've got an issue with retaliating or whatever it may be.
Really give space for people to kind of bring the things to the surface that need to come up. Excellent. So move us towards the rhythm for this week. I would imagine that as we have these conversations, as we bring to the surface, these areas where we have been wronged or hurt, there may be an opportunity for us to put our own relationship in its right place with Jesus.
And so tell us a little bit about this rhythm this week. Yeah, so the rhythm of repentance. A lot of times we may think of it as repentance being much more tangible, like I'm doing these things that I need to stop doing. Sometimes those are sins of commission, things that we're doing, we're committing these sins.
There's also a category of sins, sins of omission, things we're just not doing that we should. And you mentioned several weeks ago, you brought up in your own life, in your own story, coming to a point where you had to let go of this unwillingness to forgive or to see a relationship restored. And so for some people, they may be actively treating somebody poorly, but other people may just have unforgiveness that they're scared to let go of. They don't like who, what will happen if I let go of this?
So unforgiveness can be one of those things that we need to repent of in my own life. That has been one of the hardest things to deal with was when I was finally deeply wounded by somebody to process those emotions in a healthy way and then get to a point where things may not ever go back to the way they were before, but to find healing and freedom and really love that person and want what's best for them and genuinely want God to work in their life, not in a pointing my finger and like God better work in their heart because they're a terrible person. But like, I do want to see God working their lives. And I'm grateful that he's, you quoted Paul and I believe Romans earlier that at just the right time Christ died for us while we were still enemies of God, like that's a bit worse, enemies of God.
And if God can change my heart, I want that for others too. Yeah, Romans 5a. So when we think about repentance, it's pretty common for people to think that repentance is the one-time act when we gave our life to Jesus, but it's actually an ongoing rhythm. It's an invitation for us to continually say, God, would you search me and know me, bring to the surface of my mind the things that I am either committing or omitting in my own life so that I may turn away from those things.
Repentence is just simply turning from something towards Jesus, right? It's 180 degree turn. And so ask God and do this frequently as a group, right? This is why it's a spiritual rhythm in our groups.
It's not just a single one-time thing because I know that I constantly navigate and gravitate towards those negative areas of my life. And I get the opportunity to repent of those things knowing that this came up in my rooted group this last week. There was a woman who shared and we were talking about what are some of those false beliefs that we still have of God. And that by the way, a false belief of God is something that's worthy of repentance.
And she said, my false belief is that I will exhaust God by not being good enough and all exhausted by constantly having to turn back to him. And I'm like, my goodness, what a beautiful reminder that we can repent every single day and we will never exhaust God of his grace that he has extended for each and every one of us. Repent continuously and you will always face him, right? If we always repent and turn towards him, we will become more like him over time.
And so life group leaders, this is a great chance for us to practice a spiritual rhythm and remind people, theologically that repentance is something that we can do when needed to be honest about those areas of our life that we either commit sin or those things where we refuse to do things we're invited to to turn back to him. And that is a beautiful life-giving conversation in a life group. So with that in mind, Jeremy, any final thoughts for us? I would just encourage group leaders to have everyone in their group at least identify one next step.
Like there's gonna be people who they know, they're harboring unforgiveness, for example, being willing to admit, I'm not there yet. Like I don't even know if I want to forgive this person. I don't know if they deserve forgiveness. Don't allow room to justify that kind of like someone doesn't deserve forgiveness but allow the space to be honest enough to say, I'm not there yet.
But the step for them may just simply be, God, I want you to work on my heart because I know I'm not there yet. And so just even if it's the simple step of saying, God, work on my own heart because I really don't want to do this or don't want to forgive that person. Just have everyone identify one explicit step of moving more towards Christ-likeness in their own life. Yep, I love the specific nature.
That is a really good practice to say, in a conversation where it will feel more comfortable to stay abstract, we have to bring specificity to this and say, this is what I'm going to do right now or this week. So great, Jeremy. I would kind of say here in this conversation is, I am so grateful that we can turn away from our anger, we can turn away from our wounds, we can turn away from our sin and we don't turn towards nothing, we turn towards Jesus himself. He's right there with us.
And as soon as you turn from it, you are met with him. He sees you, he loves you, he knows you. And so life-repleters, would you be encouraged that even as you invite people to share and share those places where they do have actual enemies or they do need a repent of something, you can rest assured that Jesus is right there, the Spirit of God is in your discussion and waiting for that person to turn and face him to be met with his open arms, his loving embrace. That is exactly what is waiting for them.
So be confident as you lead into this conversation. Do not be afraid, open the conversation and let's see what God wants to do. And then share those stories with us. These are great stories that we love to celebrate when people turn away from their sin, their separation, their anger, even their hatred of their enemies.
And they turn towards Jesus and God does something in their life, share those stories with us. So we're praying for you as always and I hope that you have a great week. Take care everyone.