You're listening to Mountain View Church Audio, Christ-centered teaching from the Wilderness City, Whitehorse UConn. Here's this week's message. In Western society, we've created a type of kindness or a way of kindness that's centered on agreement. And it points to a deeper cultural problem. We've connected love with affirmation. The idea is if you disagree with me, then you're being unkind or unloving. And maybe you've heard some of these statements in your life in social circles. If you love me, you'd accept me for who I am.
If you really cared about me, you wouldn't judge me. A real friend would be happy for me and celebrate my choice. Now, this is a Western ideal, a Western problem. It's very, very prevalent in Canada, where I live, where we're at. And I just wonder, are we allowed to disagree? Are we allowed in society and culture to challenge ideas and values? And if we do, is there an assumption by the opposing party or discussing party, the party we're in conversation to, is there an understanding by them that we're being unloving and that we're not showing love by asking deeper questions, by challenging the ideas or the statements, the values that they're putting forward?
And if that's true, what does love really mean? What's it really all about? My name's Jeremy. I'm the lead pastor of Mountain View Church. And we are in week four of our questions and answers series. We're striving to find truth in God's word. And we've covered a lot of ground already. We started in week one with the authority of the Bible. Then we moved on to the value of human life. And then last week, we dealt with the tough topic of gender and identity. And if you missed any of those, you can go back and watch them on a number of platforms. But you can just go to our website, mountainview.church slash watch listen. And then you can choose the video format or audio format that you'd like.
Today's topic is the topic of love as you may have guessed and we're testing the biblical understanding of love and specifically love shown in speech and conversation and we're challenging culture's view and we're putting them together and saying is what culture is saying about love and about conversation that it needs to always be affirming and that affirmation is demanded is that really love or maybe there's this idea of truth and honesty and challenging ideals and sometimes having hard conversations and maybe just maybe that that's the more loving response. And so we're looking at all of this within a biblical text by the Apostle Paul, his first letter to the Corinthian church. So let's get started. Good morning, Mountain View Church. My name is Josh Johnson. And this morning we're doing our scripture reading from 1 Corinthians chapter 13, verses 1 to 7. Feel free to follow along with the physical Bible under your seats in front of you or the Bible app as well.
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient. Love is kind. Love does not envy or boast. It is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with all the truth.
Love bears all things, believes in all things, hopes all things and endures all things. We are in 1 Corinthians 13. Now, this is usually a passage that's chosen to be read during weddings, but it doesn't really match with the context of the letter. Paul wrote this into a bunch of Christians, a church in the city of Corinth that were in a fight. There was arguments over spiritual maturity and the level of faithfulness. And by the time we get into the passage, Paul starts talking about love. He's describing love, but then he starts moving into how love acts or some of the action and word attributes of love.
And today I want to focus on two verses, in particular, verses 5 and 6 of 1 Corinthians 13. Let's read it here. He says, it, or speaking about love from the previous context, it, love, does not insist on its own way. It is not irritable or resentful. It does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth.
Now, the temptation of all human beings in our fallen state is the complete opposite of this. And I've had times like that. I'm sure you have too. And before I knew Jesus, I was definitely like that. And I slip back into my old ways all the time when I'm not staying focused. And maybe you're the same, but here's the opposite. You know, the opposite is to always insist on our way, that our way is primary. It's to be irritable. It's to be resentful. And it's to rejoice in wrongdoing or wrong things. And lastly, it's to neglect or ignore the truth.
And really, this is a bit of a throwback to week one, the truth and what is authoritative truth. And the authoritative truth found in scripture, we rejoice in it. embrace it. And when we don't embrace the authority of scripture and the truth of scripture, we go in the opposite direction. But let's pick this apart a little bit more. So let's look at the first part of verse five here first. It says, love does not insist on its own way. The deeper meaning of this in the original language is to seek or to plot, to be about or desire, endeavor, inquire for, require, seek after for, or by means of. So the whole concept of this is to demand or seek out our own way over other people. We're talking about the conversation piece. We always want the
conversation or the center of the conversation to be about us. And we want to navigate it our way. We want everything that's spoken to us and about us to be self-focused. And moving on, if we look to the second part of verse five, it says, love is not irritable or resentful. And if we look at the deeper meaning, to be irritable is to arouse anger or provoke or irritate, easily provoke or stir up. The resentful is a very interesting term in the original language. It actually means to take inventory. It's an accounting term in the Greco-Roman world, and it's a keeping a ledger of wrongs. And so love, love's not irritable. That's pretty straightforward.
irritable or easily offended, the word of the day would be triggered. Someone who's showing love and conversation has self-control. They're not triggered by what's being said. And the other thing is, is they don't hold grudges. You have conversations and you're challenged about things or some of my questions that you're saying or disagreeing, but you're not immediately writing them off and kind of putting them on a list of, oh, I don't listen to these people or nothing they have to say is of value. It's a short record. You're not keeping a ledger of that.
And so moving on to verse six now, let's unpack that a bit more. Love does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Super interesting here. In the original Greek, we see here in English, it says rejoice twice, but there's actually two different Greek verbs. So the first one is the personal rejoicing, which is to rejoice or to be glad internally, personally. But the second, Paul uses a form of communal rejoicing, which is to rejoice with. It's corporate, to corporately congratulate or to corporately celebrate. And so if we unpack that in regards to conversations and discussions and showing love and listening and affirming is the big term right now.
We refuse to gloat over wrongdoing, either wrong thoughts or behaviors, and we don't celebrate those because they're very self-focused. They're self-focused pleasures and pursuits, which we talked about last week with the identity message, pursuing personal pleasure and pursuits and passions. But we cling. Instead, we cling to what's true, that truth is a key part of life and of loving, that a loving person clings to truth and a loving person is willing to give truth and honesty to someone. And that is community focused because the truth of scripture and the truth overall, being honest, that helps society overall. All right, now let's widen the perspective back out to our cultural moment right now into society and the conversations we have and this idea of showing love through affirmation. Is it really best?
And based on the scriptural truth that Paul's talking about, how we interact with love, do they match? And what do they look like? And I want you to think about it in two ways. So the first way is like a doorway. And it's a doorway of affirmation and celebration of certain beliefs, values, and ideologies. And it's demanded upon entry. It's like gatekeeping. If you come to that door, there's suspicion. And they're taking cues on what you agree with and don't agree with, what you affirm. And if you hit all the markers, you get into the room.
And this is problematic in like both ends of the spectrum. The extreme left does this and the extreme right does this. This isn't a, it is a politically polarizing thing, but the gatekeeping happens in all avenues of culture. And the other idea that I want you to think about, instead of like a doorway, I would say Paul's describing a table. And in a table, everyone's welcome. You have to get through the doorway, the entry, you have to get through the living room, and you have to actually sit down at the table. A lot of times there's a meal there, and there's discussion, and there's challenges, and there's disagreements. There might even be debate over dinner. And there's an understanding at the table that there's still love there. There's still acceptance. But acceptance and love isn't dependent on agreement.
And that's what's very, very different about the Christian ideal of love versus what the world is, and the Western world, is pitching right now. And simply stated, and what the data is going to show us, is that love is found at a table conversation, not a doorway affirmation. Love is found at a table conversation, not at a doorway affirmation. And this is the idea I want you to keep in mind as we walk through some of the data and what we're seeing in our culture, all right? Because Paul connects love and truth. Remember, love rejoices in truth. They can't be separated. And we dealt with a couple weeks ago this idea of everyone's truth, right? That was the first week. And you can all have your own truth, but eventually there's going to be disagreement.
There has to be one authority of truth, which is scripture, and love is interconnected with it. But in our culture, if love and truth are together and united, we have a problem or culture has a problem. Now let's look at how this works in conversation. So first, a major self-esteem research review commissioned by the Association of Psychological Science found some interesting results. Psychologist Roy Baumeister, along with colleagues from several universities, found that boosting self-esteem through constant praise, regardless of actual performance, does not reliably produce better outcomes.
The same research found that narcissism, not self-esteem itself, was what predicted aggression, specifically when someone's self-image was directly challenged. What this means is constant affirmation or the demand for affirmation. regardless of life choices, it doesn't deliver what it promises. And you're just backing up a self-image that eventually gets dangerous. Now, let's keep looking at some data here. So a field experiment out of the University of Chicago and Carnegie Mellon put honesty to the test. Researchers assigned people to be completely honest in every conversation. That would be crazy in Canadian culture, by the way. So with every person in their life, every person in their life for three straight days, before starting, participants predicted it would be unpleasant and it would damage their relationships.
You know, for a Canadian, that would be a nervous thing for us. We don't readily speak our minds all the time, especially if we came across someone who we didn't really deeply trust. Either way, it didn't work out the way they thought it would. Being honest turned out to be more enjoyable, more socially connecting, and less relationally harmful than they expected. In a follow-up experiment, people gave honest negative feedback to someone close to them, and the same pattern held. The researcher's conclusion was that we consistently overestimate how badly others will react to our honesty.
which is crazy when we think about Paul's instruction and attaching love with truth. And all through scripture, honesty, no matter what, honesty given with grace, of course, we have to be kind, but telling the truth, not lying, not being deceptive, not just being agreeable to be agreeable, not just affirming for the sake of it, but being honest, it doesn't cost as much as we fear it will. And there's actually some great respect, self-respect that's gained and respect with other people when you're graciously telling the truth and when you're not demanded. to just go with whatever is the line of the day or the line of the encampment. And so the takeaway of this is by constantly demanding affirmation, we're avoiding conversations that could actually help us. And so again, coming back to the doorway and the table, the doorway promises safety, right? It promises that gatekeeping of your own people are in. And some groups would call it an ally, right? And so we're making sure that our allies are allowed in and no one who's not an ally, we don't let them in.
But it doesn't deliver authentic connection over the long haul. And the table feels very risky. To sit at a table, to listen, to ask questions, to be challenged on ideas, to look at factual information, to look at data and research, to see what's really going on. It feels like it's going to be terrible. It's so terrifying.
But if you walk through it, in the end, it's a loving way to deal with people. It's a gracious way to deal with people. And it's actually a beneficial way to deal with people. And honesty and community are found and honesty and community thrives. With all this in mind, we suddenly see how Paul's instruction on how we love.
It makes a lot more sense. Choosing the selfless, truth-seeking way of life is better for us. It's better for each other. It's better for society. And so for us as Christians, if you have chosen to follow Jesus, as I have, we need to be the front runners on this. We can't be Bible-thumping people about it. They're not gonna be convinced that way. But the connection we have, the joy we have, the peace we have, the self-respect and...
I guess, inner peace that we have. It's found in Jesus because as we talked about last week, he's our identity. He's where we find that. And so we can speak honestly to people and we can embrace hard conversations. Christians should be at the forefront of embracing hard conversations. And we should be receiving, accepting of hard conversations and challenges because for us, love and truth are interconnected and they're good for us.
And even if we think about the beginning of the series, if you remember in John 1 verse 14, John says this statement that Jesus is full of grace and truth and that our pursuit of Jesus isn't just all about grace and love and it's not all about truth and law. He's a fullness of grace and truth. Much like Paul's saying now, a fullness of love and truth. They go hand in hand. And we were talking about a table and it's fitting that as we talked about creating these table conversations.
It's fitting that we would end our time today with communion. That's what we're going to do. And so at this moment, you can pause the video or audio if you would like to participate in communion together with us, wherever you're at. Maybe you're watching with people or listening with people. Grab some bread or crackers, wine or juice, and get the elements together. And then come back and we'll hit play again. And then we'll walk through the communion passage in Matthew 26. And we're going to come to the table, which is...
the main thing in our theology as Christians and our whole belief system, our faith system that connects us. No matter where we are, no matter what denomination, country, language, all over the world, we take communion together and we share this in common. And so it seems fitting also because it resembles and remembers the greatest act of love that was ever done in all history. when God sent his son Jesus, and Jesus willingly died on the cross to take our sin. And so we're going to remember that now as we talk about what is love, what is really at the bottom of love, what's authentic, true love. Well, it's sacrificial love. It's the most selfless thing that could have ever been done, and it's through Jesus. It's him who did it. So gather the elements, come back, and let's remember Jesus' sacrifice together.
Okay, welcome back. Hopefully you have your elements ready. The process for communion today is I am going to pray for the bread first. I'm going to read Matthew 26, 26, outlining when Jesus and disciples took the bread, and then we will take the bread together, and then I'll do the same process for the cup. So would you pray with me for the bread that represents the body of Christ? Dear Father, I thank you for sending your son Jesus. I thank you that he took our sin upon the cross to be the ultimate sacrifice.
Fathers, we take this bread, we remember his body that was broken and beaten and nailed to the cross. And we take it in sorrow on one level and yet in thanksgiving on the other. And Jesus, we thank you for willingly going to the cross. And we take this bread and we remember in our mind's eye, your body hung there, taking the punishment, ultimately taking the wrath of God on our behalf. Bless this bread. In your name, Jesus, we pray. Amen. Matthew 26, verse 26.
It says, now as they were eating, Jesus took bread and after blessing it, he broke it and he gave it to his disciples and said, take, eat, this is my body. Now let's pray for the cup. Dear Father, we transition now to the cup, which represents the blood of your son, Jesus, poured out for the sins of the world, the atonement, the final atonement, the final sacrifice. We thank you for this cup and what it represents. Jesus, we thank you again for willingly shedding your blood for us.
We think of the wounds all over your body, your hands, your feet, the crown of thorns on your head, and eventually the wound in your side, and the blood that was shed. We thank you for the atonement. We thank you for your willingness to die for us and shed your blood. Bless this cup, in Jesus' name. Amen. Verse 27. And he took a cup, and when he had given thanks, he gave it to them, saying, Drink of it, all of you. For this is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.
I tell you, I will not drink again of this fruit of the vine until that day when I drink it new with you in my Father's kingdom. Thank you so much for being here today. If you're new to our channel, new to this feed, new to this audio, wherever or however you're watching or listening, we would love to connect with you. Go to our website, mountainview.church slash connect and fill out the connect card there. You can share your prayer requests, whatever's going on. We want to get to know you more. If you're watching on social media, you can go to at Mountain View Whitehorse, send us a direct message. And if you're on YouTube, please consider subscribing to the channel. Now we have a few weekly updates of what's going on in Mountain View, around Mountain View. So check this out.
Hi Mountain View. My name is Haley. I'm the ministry leader for the Young Adults Ministry. I have two announcements today. So first of all, our next Young Adults event, which is ages 18 to 35, is happening next Sunday, August 2nd. We're going to have a park afternoon over across the street at Rotary Park. So we'll have some lawn games there, some snacks. We're going to do a little water balloon toss competition with prize. So it's a great chance to bring a friend and come to the event or come by yourself and meet somebody, get to know some people in the church or on a similar stage of life as you. Hope to see you there next Sunday, August 2nd, 3 p.m. at Rotary Park.
And asset number two is that I'm going to be stepping down as the Young Adults Ministry Leader. I've absolutely loved doing this for the last two and a half years. It's been such a joy and such a great community to be a part of. However, I feel that it's a good time, the right time for me to take a step back as my husband Alex and I welcome our first child. So that being said, we are looking for a new ministry leader for young adults. And if this even sparks your interest, I would encourage you to reach out just to find out more information, have an informal chat about it. You can come talk to me or you can come talk to Pastor Jeremy. If you'd like to send me an email, my email is Haley at Mountain View Church.
And I hope to hear from you. Have a great week. This is the last week to apply for ministry apprenticeship. This is a deeper level of discipleship in cooperation with Northwest Seminary and Bible College. And there's a one year up to a four year option to serve with Mountain View Church while getting your biblical theological education. And so if you're interested in that, you can go to mountainview.church slash apprenticeship, or you can email me directly at jeremy at mountainview.church.
We already have Chad Bark and Ryan West signed up, and we're super excited about what God's going to do in their lives over the next couple of years. And we'll be hearing more from them, I'm sure, in the future, maybe even on camera. And let's move on to ministry mentorship. Not so intensive as the apprenticeship and shorter, just the school year, but ministry mentorship is a deeper level discipleship as well. And it happens in-house here in Mountain View. You have to be 18 years old or older than that. And there's no limit on the top. There used to be. There's not anymore. And we have a few candidates already signed up. And this isn't the last week, but I want to say that we're just going to accept applications in the next month probably. So this month is the time where you need to seriously consider.
whether or not you want to join our mentorship program and walk through some leadership development. There's accountability. There's prayer. There's small group leadership discussions and a deeper biblical study into the New Testament over the year. Lots of great stuff. And so if that interests you, please go to mountainview.church slash mentorship or email me directly at jeremy at mountainview.church. All right. Last but not least, let's talk about our discussion and prayer focus for this week. Gather around with the people that you're with right now, or you can drop a comment in the feed. And here is the question. How has affirmation-based love impacted your social circles?
How has affirmation-based love impacted your social circles? We started with that idea of being in conversations where you have to agree with the person to be accepted or for them to love you or to show love. Have you faced any of that? Have you seen these? Have you been in these discussions? If you have, talk about it. What's it like? What's it feel like? And then spend some time in prayer together. Pray for the courage to pursue love and truth in your conversations this week. Hopefully longer, but pray for the courage to pursue love and truth, both of them in your conversations. Be loving, be gracious, and yet also.
that rejoice in the truth, rejoice in honesty. And so let's do that this week or practice it this week. And may this be our life's journey that we always pursue love and truth. All right, this next week, if you're an online viewer only, we're gonna be taking a digital break. We have a special guest coming and we have a Q&A with Dr. Barton Preeb. He is the president of Northwest College and Seminary. And he's gonna be discussing relativism, cancel culture and moral confusion, big stuff. And the big question that we're gonna be tackling, he's gonna be tackling, I'm gonna be the interviewer.
he's going to give us his wisdom and knowledge is, is there such thing as absolute truth? And this truth line has been really floating through the whole series because we're finding truth in God's word. But he's going to answer the question, is there such thing as absolute truth dealing with relativism, cancel culture, and moral confusion? If that interests you and you're in the Whitehorse area, it would be amazing to have you here. You can be here at 9.30 a.m., 11 a.m., or 3 p.m. And even though our 3 p.m. is the Tagalog Filipino gathering, it'll all be in English. So you can, if you speak English...
or to Gallic or Filipino, Canadian, you can be there and we'll have it for you. All right, see you next week. And if you're not in the Whitehorse area, we'll see you the week after. Thanks so much. If you prayed to receive Jesus today or would like to connect with our church community, visit mountainview.church and click the connect link. If this podcast and radio ministry has been a blessing to you, please consider partnering with us or making a tax-deductible donation at mountainview.church. Thanks for listening to Mountain View Church Audio. Join us next week for more Christ-centered teaching from the Wilderness City of Whitehorse UConn.