A Life Pleasing to God: The Love of Christ Is Not One-Sized-Fits-All

Pastor Fletcher preaches from 1 Thessalonians 5:14. Discussion points: The love of God is tailor-made for the condition of your soul, admonishment is done with a spirit of reconciliation rather than aggression, Jesus knows exactly how best to love and admonish us in our specific situations.

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  Scipture reader: [1 Thessalonians 5:14] And we urge you, brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the faint-hearted, help the weak, be patient with them all.

  This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God.

  Preacher: All right, good morning. How's everybody doing? It's good to see you all. Thanks a little bit of excitement over there. my name's Fletcher. I'm the lead pastor of the church, so it's a joy to have you this morning. If I haven't gotten a chance to meet you, I'd love to have that opportunity to get to know you. there's few things in the world that I hate more than clothing that is labeled one size fits all. And that's because I have a very large head and let me tell you one size does not fit all. It, I went last night my wife and I were on a date and we were like searching for hats that might fit my head and we ended up on the HatsForBigheads.com website. One size is not something that works for everyone.

  You may have heard the saying, to a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Have you heard that one before? Well, to many Christians, all problems look like a sin to squash. Do you think about it like that at times? Have you, have you experienced that maybe in the church? All problems to a Christian many times look like a sin to squash. Are you feeling depressed? You better squash it. Are you feeling anxious? Well, that's a sin. Jesus tells you not to be anxious about anything. And so, squash that too. Stop sinning.

  And the problem with the stop sinning approach is that it is, yes, OK, I want you to stop sinning, but that is a very oversimplified approach to our lives as complex human beings, in relation with one another and in relation to God. It's an oversimplified counterfeit to what the Bible actually teaches, because the Bible doesn't teach us to treat people all in the same way with the one size fits all approach. The love of God is not meant to be one size fits all, but the love of God, it's tailor-made for the size and condition of your soul. The love of God is tailor made for the condition of your soul.

  Several years ago, I read an article that really changed my life, if I'm going to be honest with you. It was an article called Familial Counseling by a man named David Paulson. Now he's not a well known, pastor, so, so to speak, but to me he's a hero, and he died just a couple of years ago. I think that I cried more at his death than I did many other people that I've known personally, even though I've never met. David Paulson and in the article he really inspired me. I mean, I think that that article honestly did change my life, from what I read in that article and several others by, Paulson, it inspired me to it's what I spent a large portion of my doctorate, dissertation and and research on, it's what I spent. what motivated me to start with my wife, the Boston Center for Biblical Counseling, we were just really motivated by what we were reading and a lot of his writing.

  And that article is called Familial Counseling, and what he does in the article is just about this verse. And so I'm just really excited to be able to camp out on this verse and be able to share what I've learned from him on this verse is one that I'm very familiar with and one that I use all of the time. So he compares what's going on with this verse with the life of a large family, have you ever seen one of those families, one of those that, you know, they have to own a van or maybe a bus to get around? Do you know someone like that? I don't know why this is. If you seem to have more than 4 children, it's like automatically you're homeschooling, but, you know, I don't wanna make stereotypes, but I don't know how many families of 10 kids I've seen in the public school system. It's just not something I've seen very often.

  And he says that this verse is like a large family like that. I'm just curious. If you don't want to participate, don't participate. But I'm just curious, if you have 4 or more siblings, hands up. OK, keep your hands up, OK? 5. 6 siblings. If you don't want to participate, you don't have to, OK? But you, you, I'm, I'm gonna keep 7 siblings, 8 siblings right here, champion, OK. But he compares it to a large family because what do you see in a large family? You see the older siblings, what do they start doing? They start becoming like second parents. We only have 3 kids and we see this, OK, already. The older siblings, they start becoming second parents and taking care of the younger siblings.

  Back when Megan and I were were fresh newlyweds, Megan used to say that she wanted to have a large family like this, that she wanted, you know, 7 or 8 kids in this kind of way. And I was like, you know, I think I'm good with 2 or 3, and she was like, no, I want 7. And I did the smartest thing I've ever done in my entire life. I did not argue with her, as is my normal tendency in any sort of issue. Instead, I simply found the largest family I could find, and I offered to babysit for them. So it's a wonderful family. I think that they've continued that he's actually visited our church before, the, the father in the family. I think they have like 12 kids now. At the time they had maybe 8, and I just found them at church and said, hey, we would like to babysit for you and we drove out and we, we babysat and went.

  Well, the older kids were taking, I think the older kid like changed the diaper for the baby like they were like, if you need anything just ask this one he'll tell you where it is or this one she knows too like it was really clear that there was a pecking order in this family and they were helping each other and we had a great time. We watched Annie, the, the musical, the old one, it was good, on the way home, I kid you not, Megan said, I think I'm good with 2 or 3. That was my most proud moment of winning an argument.

  We care for one another, the ways that in the way that siblings might care for one another in a large family. Every sibling has their own kind of issues, their own things that they need help with and those of you who have siblings, you know that some of your siblings kinda have their life more well put together, and others need more help constantly. Some of them are more prone to depression, anxiety. The others are more prone to just like being lazy or whatever it might be. And so as a family of God, we care for one another, the way that a large family might care for one another, and that is what Paul's saying. And so he gives us basically four categories for where people are in the church, and I want you to think about these four categories as kind of the primary colors of the state of your soul. And from these four categories you can have any sort of combination thereof. You can be a little bit of one and and a large bit of another one, but each one they should mix together to give us like a good synopsis and color for where our soul is.

  Those, let's read the verse again and then I'll highlight the four. We urge you brothers, admonish the idle, encourage the faint hearted, help the weak, be patient with them all. So the 4 different types of children in the family of God are 1, the thriving, healthy child, mature, thriving. 2, the rebellious idle child. 3, the fearful faint hearted child. And 4, the helpless weak child. Let's walk through each one.

  First, the thriving mature child. Now this isn't actually stated as a category in this passage on 1 Thessalonians 5, and that's because it's actually written to the thriving healthy child. It's not written about the thriving healthy child. It's written to the thriving health healthy child because these are the ones that. Paul is assuming it is going to receive this letter, are going to receive this letter, and they're going to be able to go and implement what he is saying to do. These are the Christians who are following the normal growth curve for Christian life. They're the ones that are having their devotions. They're the ones that are. Leading their family well, that are growing in their love for Jesus, that are not struggling with active addictions, who are taking care of their marriages, who are living an active life of faith.

  And I praise God. Our church, if this was like one of the primary colors, this one would be spread all throughout our church. I'm so thankful that. Many, many of you have at least some of this in your color well. That the Lord has given you some thriving mature relationship with God, but specifically, these are your CG leaders, your elders, your deacons. These are the people that you expect to be thriving and implementing these things. It's not to say that these people are perfect, but they're able to care for other people. That's the whole point, that they're the older siblings. The other day I was, I walked in, we had a big party saying goodbye to Emmanuel and Erica, and I walked into a conversation. Where several people were talking about one of our elders, Michael, and they were like, he's like my big brother and I was like, that's it. That's that's what I'm talking about like a big brother. I was like, he's kind of like my little brother, but that's fine. We'll we'll go with it, but yeah, he's like a big brother that's what we're looking for we're looking for big brothers and big sisters in the family of God.

  And one important note on this is just because a child is thriving doesn't mean that they don't need nurture. I mean, how many times do you see the healthy mature children? Get neglected. It's the ones that are quiet, they don't need anything. Those are the ones that we tend to ignore. But friends, as the church, we have to continue to care for them just because a child is healthy and mature, it doesn't mean they don't need a hug. It doesn't mean they don't need a good meal you we still have to care for them. So as we see healthy thriving people, we still have a word of encouragement. We still have fellowship, we still have confrontation and challenge at times.

  And so the second type of person here that he says, he says, we urge you brothers, admonish the idle. And so here we have number 2, the rebellious idle child. Now the word for idle here, you get the idea of someone's idle, they're just kind of sitting back, they're lazy, they're not really participating. And it could also be translated into insubordinate or undisciplined or unruly. These are the believers who aren't taking their faith seriously. They're idle in the faith, you might say. They're sitting back and not pressing forward toward Christ. And I would also say that all of us have a tendency to slip into this where we just let other priorities take over our lives, where our minds are more captivated of visions of glory in work or in in play and recreation, whatever it might be, than it is with the glory of God.

  This sort of Christian has a hard heart and has reverted to irreligion. They're deprioritizing their church friendships and relationships and worship of God in favor of any sort of other things, whether it be sleeping in or just hanging out or brunch or or drug usage or or or work or golf or whatever it might be, but their laziness is usually just one symptom of a greater disease. To be idle in the faith is just one symptom of greater disease, and it's just selfishness, and it's not, it it's taken over their soul. And there's usually other symptoms that are a part of it, bitterness, addictions, manipulation, explosive anger, lingering porn habits, adulterous relationships. These are all symptoms of the disease of sin and selfishness, and in many ways what the scripture tells us to do with those who are idle in the faith is the most clear of them all, because it just says admonish and to admonish someone is to warn someone is to tell them, hey, you're going the wrong way.

  Now to admonish someone is not permission to beat someone up. It's not permission to tell them you're wrong about everything. Although a close friend might be able to say those things, those words to you, and at times you may need to hear it, but to admonish someone is to come alongside them and say, come on. Let's take this thing seriously. Let's work together. It's never meant to just beat up on folks. It's a loving correction, and if their heart is soft to Jesus, they should thank you for it afterwards, and I can't tell you how many people I've interacted with. And immediately, usually when you admonish someone, if they're ready for it, they'll say thank you. I've had dozens of that type of situation. A lot of times people get defensive. And then, they don't say anything, but you see the changes they implement in their lives. And it happens all the time.

  The third type of child in the family of God is the fearful or faint-hearted child. Again, the, the passage says, admonish the idle, encourage the fainthearted. I love this word fainthearted. When you look at the, the root of this word for fainthearted, it literally means small souled. Do you feel as though your soul is small today? You are faint hearted. These are brothers and sisters who have lost hope, they're discouraged. They're the discouraged sibling over in the corner. They don't feel like they belong in the family, they're hurting, they're depressed, they're anxious, they're ready to give up. And in my experience as a pastor, many of the times that most of the time we would think that this person might be idle in the faith. The reality is they are actually faint hearted. That many of the people that come looking for help in their faith are faint-hearted believers who need encouragement. They need a word of encouragement. They're at the end of their rope, they feel like a failure, they're overwhelmed.

  And so how do you encourage someone like this? The word for encourage, I think we can just find more there. In that word, it also can mean to comfort or to console. You see, it's very similar to admonishing except for with encouraging, you say, God is here with you. And what you're doing matters, and who you are matters. With the idle, you say God is with you and what you're doing is hurting your relationship with him. But with the faint hearted, you say God is here in this mess, along with you, and so am I. And I'm gonna walk alongside you and I'm gonna care for you every step of the way.

  I coach, I coach a 3rd grade soccer team. It's a lot of fun. It's a joy. my team is the, the ADHD team for the most part, and here's one thing I've learned about this, not all of them, but a, a significant portion, They respond so much better to encouragement than they do criticism. Maybe you've experienced that in your own life, that encouragement's a lot easier to take than criticism. And one thing that I'm trying with my soccer team, I can stand out there, I mean they're 3rd graders, so I'm like they're doing everything wrong, you know. But if I just find the things that they're doing right, they'll replicate those things. They'll do it again. So every time I'm looking, what is this kid doing right? What's this kid doing right?

  And friends, I encourage you, you might not know who is faint-hearted around you. Find the things that we're doing right. And work on those first. And then we'll work on the things that we're doing wrong. Far too often we admonished the faint hearted. To a nail, everything looks like a hammer. But sometimes we're just weak souled. And we need a word of encouragement, not an admonition.

  Fourth, the helpless weak child. Paul says, help the weak and a family, it's easy to tell who the weak ones are. It's the infants, right? They're not able to take care of themselves and so the older siblings have to take care of the infants or if you are in a family that has someone with a disability, it is a weak person in your family that you must come alongside and help. And so in the church, we have those who are weak. In fact, Jesus loves those who are weak. My, my friend Mike, who shared a few words last week, Mike Hong, he's a pastor over at CoaH Brookline, and we, the church always has people that have some special needs that are, are either disabled or just have, need for, for more help than others might need, and it is exhausting often to take care of people with more needs, but what Mike always says, and it always gave me a better attitude is he would just be like, yeah, Jesus' favorite people. It's another one of Jesus' favorite people, and they're gonna take more of your bandwidth, but it's one of the ways that you become more like Jesus is by helping them.

  And so in the church, we have to care for Jesus's favorite people, those with disabilities, mental and physical, the elderly, those with debilitating diseases, the abused, the abandoned, the victimized, the impoverished, those who have nothing to offer in return. And what does he say that we do? He says that we help, we help them. We help them, we hold on to them. We moved them along.

  And then he adds at the very end of this verse. Be patient with them all. And I think that is a key, that we're patient with all of them. He's not in a hurry with any of them. Change is not a fast process. In fact, sometimes the goal isn't even change. How can you look at someone who has disabilities that you're helping, and you say, oh, this is a temporary thing, you'll change. Well, no, sometimes you just have to help the weak, and you have to keep helping the weak. The goal is not necessarily changed, but the goal is to care for them with the care of Christ and the love of Christ.

  Friends, Christian care is not one size fits all. As brothers and sisters in Christ, we're called to care for one another with a tailored approach that reflects the love of Christ, because this is the way that Jesus loves us. Have you experienced his tailor fit custom made care in your own life? It looks so different. In fact, I would encourage you to ask a friend this week what the care of Jesus looks like and what was an example. And I guarantee you, sometimes people are gonna share things. I have, I have a brother who enjoyed, not a literal brother, I'm an only child, but I have a brother who, the word of the Lord to him often sounds like admonishment, and my weak small soul would be crushed often. Because the Lord is often having to come alongside me with a word of encouragement. Cause I, I'm not like the most bold, big souled person. I need, I need that that constant encouragement from the Lord.

  I just think about the way that Jesus literally did this as he walked around on earth and how he, his care for different people was custom built. Think about Mary and Martha, OK? Martha is probably my favorite character in the entire New Testament. I know that might sound weird, but I'm, I'm definitely a a Martha supporter, OK? at one point, Type A people unite, OK? At one point in the scriptures, it says, now Jesus loved Martha and her sister, and I just like that because it doesn't even mention Mary. And most of the time people are like, oh, Mary, she's got a heart for God. And it's like, well, he didn't even say her name. He said Martha and her sister. I wonder how she felt about that.

  When he shows up, so Jesus shows up, Mary and Martha, their sisters, several different stories in the scriptures about Mary and Martha. They have a brother named Lazarus, and at one point, Lazarus dies, and Jesus shows up too late. They know that Jesus could heal him, but he shows up too late. And so he walks in, Martha, being the type A older sister that she is, it doesn't say she's the older sister, but she's the older sister. She walks straight up to Jesus. I imagine the finger right in Jesus' face and says, Lord, if you were here, my brother would not have died. And so what does Jesus do? He engages with her in intellectual debate about the validity of the resurrection. And she like engages back, they start, he starts arguing with her. Because that's the way that you love Martha. Some people need to be argued with to be loved, amen. Anybody out there? Anybody's spouse out there? He argues with her and then he gives her a speech and he says, I am the way, the truth and the life. And then he moves on, he doesn't say I'm, I'm the I'm the resurrection of the life, excuse me. He says, I'm the resurrection and the life.

  And then he moves in. And he finds Mary and Mary didn't go out to find him, he just finds her out in the home later, and he draws close, and Mary says the exact same thing to Jesus. She says, Jesus, if you were here, my brother would not have died. And how does Jesus respond? But he just weeps. You see, some of us need an argument. And some of us just need tears. We just need the loving, kind hand of God alongside of us, the love of Christ is custom built to the needs of your soul.

  Look at another example, the woman at the well. This woman is an outcast in society, she's a Samaritan, she's an outcast among the outcasts. She goes to the well in the middle of the day when there's no one else going to the well. Jesus approaches her. He seeks her out. He starts a conversation with her. He makes sure his disciples are away out of the way, and then she's there getting water and he asked her for a drink of water. She's like, why are you talking to me? And every time that he talks to her, she tries to blow him off. She's like, Don't talk to me. What are you doing? You're a Jew. I'm a Samaritan. Why are we talking? And then he continues to engage with her and then she's like, well, you know, like get your theology right, man, and, and like if you were if you were a Samaritan, you know, we worship here, you worship there, maybe I can just distract him with that.

  He is persistent to love her. And he reveals to her everything that her life has been about and then he reveals to her who he truly is. And in the book of John it's the first person that she, he reveals himself to in a public kind of way and it's amazing love that he pursues after her and cares for her in this way.

  Now compare that with the rich young ruler who comes to Christ. Jesus sought out the woman at the well, the rich young ruler, complete opposite different stratosphere of the cultural and social structure of the time. He's rich, he's young, he's, he's a guy in finance, 6'5, blue eyes. He's, he's looking for Jesus because he wants to get everything right. And he finds Jesus, and he's got questions. And with every question, it's like Jesus is giving him one word responses. You know, with the, with the woman at the well, she couldn't get Jesus to shut up. She couldn't get Jesus to stop asking him questions, but with the rich young ruler, he's the one asking all the questions, and he's like, what must I do to inherit eternal life? And he's like, you've read the Torah, dude. Why are you asking me? He's like, yes, I've read the Torah. I'm glad you know that. I'm very good at reading the Torah. And so Jesus tells them, scriptures, tells them what the greatest of the commandments is, and, and he responds, and they have this conversation.

  And then Jesus says one thing you lack. You have to go sell everything you own and give it to the poor. And the man went away sad. Why didn't he say that to the woman at the well? At the at the well, he's just like. You can be my follower. Come on, I see you. But with the rich young ruler, he says, you need to go sell everything, give it to the poor. Because Jesus has X-ray vision into our hearts and can see all the things that we care about more than what we care about than than him, and his love for us is custom built. That he'll say what we need to hear. And it might not be what my neighbor needs to hear.

  And so friends, I'm just gonna encourage you this morning. That we meditate on this passage one more time, and that we open ourselves to hear what Christ has to say to us. I have just a couple of questions. I'm gonna read the passage and then I'm just gonna give, lead us in a, a guided meditation here as we wrap up.

  Verse 14. And we urge you brothers, admonished the idle. Encourage the faint-hearted, help the weak. Be patient with them all. What is the condition of your soul? We have time So just bow your head if you want. Take a moment. Ask the Lord help me to see my own soul. Are you the healthy child? The idle rebellious child. The faint hearted small souled child, or the weak child. What combination thereof? Where are you in the family of God? What place And what does Jesus want to say to you? Given the condition of your soul. What's the weather report for your soul? Is it stormy, is it windy, is it? Sunny And what is the care of Jesus look like for you right now? What does he want to say? I'm just gonna encourage you to say. Your father, your servant is listening. Help me to remember truth. Just say that in your hearts. Because the truth is the answer to all of these. It's how you admonish, it's how you encourage, it's how you help. It's how you grow.

  Here's some things that he might wanna say to you, and I'm just gonna invite you to hold on to one of these if it's, if it's one for you. But come to me all you who are weary and heavy laden. And I will give you rest. I think maybe someone needs to hear, ask and it will be given. Seek and you will find, knock and it will be open to you. Some may need to hear, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven. But the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Whoever finds his life will lose it. Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? And what or what shall a man give in return for his soul? The Lord may be encouraging you to lose your life so that you may find your soul. And I encourage you to take whatever steps necessary.

  The goal today isn't to hit you over the head with the with the admonition. But it is to lovingly come alongside you with truth. And the grace of Christ. And encourage you that you are not enough. But that Christ is. And you can always find your sufficiency with him. And that he is always there to help and care for you. And as leaders in the church and as members of the church, we reflect his love by the way that we care for one another. And a custom made love of Christ. So you can come back if you, if you want.

  I will, will encourage you if you are following Christ this morning. If you're able to engage with him, and you're saying, yeah, I'm willing, I'm, I'm following after you with all of my life, God. I encourage you to participate in the sacred meal that we're going to participate in in in just a moment, just called communion. And on the night that he was betrayed, Jesus took a loaf of bread and he broke it, and he said, this is my body broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me. And he took a cup and he said, this is the, the cup of the new covenant represents my blood. Do this in remembrance of me. And so each week we participate in the sacred meal here at our church, where we tear off a piece of the bread and we dip it in the juice or the wine, whichever our conscience permits, and, and you receive that, and you're being reminded that Christ's body was broken for you and his blood was shed for you, and he's with you in a very powerful way, as you take this meal, you're being reminded in this physical kind of way. For this next song, I invite you to stand and come and receive at one of these two aisles as we prepare our hearts for the communion meal.

  Jesus, as we come to your table, we pray that you would help us to, to experience your love and your truth once again. That you would encourage us in our faith, that you would admonish or warn us where we're idle, help us to see the corners of our soul that we've left off limits to you. Father, I pray that we're able to be helped by you, when we are weak. You are strong. And so God, we pray that as we enjoy this meal, that You would enlarge our hearts and help us to receive your grace anew. Father, you are good. You are sufficient. And we ask these things in Christ's name, Amen.