Grace With a Face - Journey to the Heart of God

Um, I'm gonna describe a world to you guys really quick. Uh it is it may sound familiar. Um it is a world on the brink. It is a world that is Filled with hatred. Everywhere you turn, you just see angry It's a world where things that we didn't think were possible or should be possible become possible with assassination attempts and sadly successful assassinations. It's a world that's still filled with racism and the feelings that go with that. And it sounds a lot like today, doesn't it? But I'm not talking about today. I'm talking about a time in the really late 60s, early 70s, and there was an individual who in a time of just anger and outrage He walked into our world about five times a five times a week. Mr. Rogers. I I was looking and I that show aired for a number of years and then went off the air for like two years. And then was back on until the year 2000. Uh so for 25 years now, we have uh been living in this post-Mr. Rogers world, but when you look at him The way he navigated issues, the way that he looked at things, he didn't shy away from the hard topics on a show for children. He talked about things when there was an assassination. He talked about it in a loving and caring way. When there was hard things dealing with racism, if you remember the episode where he sat with his feet in the pool. With his black friend and the stir that that caused because they're just sitting there together in that shared space. He didn't shy away from these things, but he handled them. With love, and he handled them with grace. It doesn't sound much like the world that we live in now. They one quote said, a person said of Mr. Rogers, he was a balm of kindness and empathy. In divisive times. In the 25 years since he his show went off the air, let's face it, the issues that we talked about at the beginning have exponentialized. We can't go for a day, much less a few hours, without hearing of something that has happened, some anger, protest, whatever it may be. And we are quick to point out which side we're on. Well, there's this protest and I'm clearly on this side or this side. But we live in the challenges right now, we live in a world without grace. We hear it everywhere. We see it everywhere. You can't not see this. We also know that a graceless world, though, is a dangerous world. So we live in this world without grace, but it becomes a graceless and dangerous world. 2 Timothy 3, 1 through 4 talks about this. We shouldn't be surprised by this because it says, but mark this, there will be terrible times in the last days. Not maybe, there will be terrible times. Verses 2 through 4 show us why. Look at this list. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive. Disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good. treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God. Good morning, everyone. All right. Great way to start your Saturday. But welcome to 2025. That's really that's where we're living right now. When you look at that list of verses, those lists of attributes, characteristics in uh verses 2 through 4. There are eight Greek without words in those two verses I had three verses, two through four. Eight Greek without words, without obedience, gratitude, holiness, love, forgiveness, self-control. love or what's good. Our hearts cry out with every newscast, with every scroll, with every swipe. Where is the hope? Where is the peace? Where is the grace? That's those moments where we get to hold up the mirror and say, oh, I can be that. And that's why I'm so grateful we find grace in the life of David in a very unexpected place. In a very unexpected time for him, but he models grace for us. Let's look at our next Hesed place. Sorry, Dad. There we go. Place. Wild goats rock in the place of Engedi. So 1 Samuel 24, verses 1 through 7. We're going to read through this real quick All right, after Saul returned from pursuing the Philistines, he was told David is in the desert of Engedi. First of all, who told him? I mean it does I want to I read that and I'm like, who told? But it doesn't tell us So Saul took three thousand able young men from all Israel and set out to look for David and his men of the crags of the wild goats. He came to the sheep pens along the way. A cave was there, and Saul went in to relieve himself. Sorry. David and his men were far back in the cave. The men said, This is the day the Lord spoke of when he said to you, I will give your enemy into your hands for you to deal with as you wish. Then David crept up unnoticed and cut off a corner of Saul's robe. Afterward David was conscious stricken for having cut off a corner of his robe. He said to his men, The Lord forbid that I should do such a thing to my master, the Lord's anointed, or lay my hand on him, for he is the anointed of the Lord. With these words, David sharply rebuked his men and did not allow them to attack Saul. And Saul left the cave and went on his way. So David is on the run here. Saul is chasing him. He wants to kill David. This wasn't a bring him in for questioning kind of search. He wanted to kill David. And David has been found. Someone tells on David, and it's like, here's where he is. And Saul's closing in. David has his chance. He has his moment. He sneaks in and he kills. Saul's wardrobe. I don't I mean that's all that he did. He he cuts off the corner of his robe and he says You know what? I'm not going to take his life. This is a huge grace moment. David's example is a person after God's own heart who runs head-on into grace. He doesn't consider the other alternative here that we see. He chooses grace. It's part of that Hesed love. David is strong. He does what needs to be done. He's not wimping out here. That's not what this is about. He's also mighty in grace because he knows that a real follower of Christ is supposed to be mighty in grace. Yes, mighty for sure. Strong. Obedient. But full of grace. And so that's why we're going to look at passion number four this morning of life's greatest journey, giving out grace. In the life of David, we see the first thing that I see in David's life of grace is he embraces and elevates the hurting. He is all about welcoming them. If you read through David's life, he's gathering this community around him. And he's not it's not like he's going out, he didn't post on ZipRecruiter or Indeed or anything. He is just gathering people around because they are weak. They are hurting. They are forgotten. 1 Samuel 22 verses 1 and 2. David left Gath and escaped to the cave of Adalom, when his brothers and his father's household heard about it, they went down to him there. All those who were in distress or in debt or discontented gathered around him. And he became their commander. About 400 men were with him. The marginalized, the broken, the hurting, those that don't belong. They're flocking to David because they see, yes, a strong leader, but they see a man who is full of grace as well. He becomes this magnet. And then when I think of it in For me in today's world, it as a follower of Christ, I think we'd all agree we want to be that. We want to be that person that people will come to when they're lost or hurting. But let's face it. Though when the marginalized come, when those that others have forgotten come, it's hard. It's kind of messy. It doesn't come without risk. It doesn't come without challenges. But that's the part we've got to get about embracing those who are hurting. And those who don't have another home, those who don't have someone else that they feel understands them. And for me. I have had for a lot of years, for most of my life, I had a tremendous model of grace. My dad for sure, but my mom. That is a model of grace. Starting towards me, uh I was a bit of a pill at times, uh, according to her. Um and uh she always was there. To show me grace in the way that God wants and in some key ways. But that picture there that you see, it's actually uh mom would do that to me. Um if she had been in this room. Today, before I came up here, she probably would have planted lipstick on my cheek right there. And I still remember early on. Well I wiped it off. Ooh, don't do that. She said, don't you wipe off your mother's kisses. She said, you rub them in. And I learned to rub the lipstick in, which probably m made it look like I had rouge or something, whatever it is on one side. She she said rub the lipstick in and so I I try to apply that in different areas of things I learned from mom Growing up and including she did some of the things in the ministry that I oversee now and I learned from her. And some of the things that I was like, why is she doing that? And I didn't get it. Now I get it. And grace is one of those things. That rubbing the lipstick in of the way mom showed me grace and the way she showed Native Young People Grace. She was known as Mama Hutch because She was a mom to them. She was messaging them at 2, 3 a. m. on Facebook and just when they were hurting, she was there. That is a model of grace in my life. And it shows me, it reminds me that we should aim to make the unwelcome welcomed in our lives. Making them feel safe, needed, valued. It's interesting because a phrase that my um mom and dad used growing up and and we have applied in our lives is seeing the needs behind the deeds. So many times people are hurting and they're looking for help and we're just seeing the action. We're seeing what they've done and it is messy and it's like I don't I don't want to deal with that But when you take time to see what's been happening in someone's life It makes a difference and yet For me, do you know one of the hardest places for me to embrace and elevate someone who may be hurting Our local Denny's here in Branton, all right? Um it is you would think that's not the case. I mean uh on the big picture, I w native young people, they're coming to us with their issues and everything. It's like I can show them grace, I can love on them. And then I don't know what it is with this one here, but there's my family will tell you I'm kind of the king of birthday rewards. I mean I get emails filling up my inbox and I'm just like chart making a map. It's just like where do I go to get this? Um Denny's great deal. You know, free meal. Okay, so I I'm in for that. And we just go in every time we stop by there, it's like you're waiting for five minutes for someone to even come and check on you to get you a table And I'm sitting there and I'm just like getting frustrated and there's one person that is waiting on all the tables in the place. She may have also been the cook. I don't know, but She is, she's, you could tell she's really stressed. What's my initial reaction? I can't believe this. I don't get a free meal today. And instead, I should be thinking Wow, she's waiting on all these tables. I don't know who didn't show up for work that day. I don't know what the needs are behind the deeds. Did I leave that denage? Yes, I didn't have time to stay, but it wasn't because, you know, uh I was enraged or anything. Um it was it was just this fact of seeing that I needed I need to see things a different way to be able to show people this grace in a way that God has intended. So the other place I would see this is this phrase. Where people can say, you will be safe with me, where that's the vibe we're putting off, you will be safe with me. The leaders of David's army were people who felt safe with him. David's mighty men. Were people who felt safe with him? And we have seen, I this one little hint for you. We've seen the leaders on the Hopi Reservation And in on Eagles Wings, but especially when we were out there, young people would come in with all sorts of needs. And you'd kind of look at them and you'd be like, man, that that person's gonna take a lot of work to pour into And you start kind of looking at who could become the next leaders, who could be the next leaders of our youth group out there and kind of step into student leadership roles. And so many times I was wrong in who the next leader would be. Because they had their own plans, but then those who had felt the most unloved, the most undeserving, maybe seemed the most messed up, when they experienced Amazing grace, when they experienced unconditional love, they thrived. They grew and they learned to lead. It was an amazing lesson for me. So we see that David. In his grace, he embraces and elevates the hurting, but we also learn that he refuses to give those who hurt you what they deserve. I the when you read this story, it's so easy to gloss over and be like, well, good job, David, but would I have done the same thing? He could have ended it. He knew he was supposed to be king. I'll just help God's plan along. We like to do that, don't we? I'll just help God's plan along a little bit here. But no, he did not hurt Saul, even though that's what he deserved. This grace does not strike back. The great Southern Strike Back. 1 Peter 3, 8 and 9. Finally, all of you, be like-minded, be sympathetic, love one another, be compassionate, and humble. Do not repay evil with evil or insult with insult. On the contrary, repay evil with blessing. Repay evil with blessing. Because to this you were called so that you may inherit a blessing. First Samuel 24, 4 and 5. The men said, This is the day the Lord spoke of. We read this before David crept up unnoticed and cut off a corner of Saul's robe. Afterward, David was conscious strike again for having cut off a corner of his robe. I'm I when I read that I was kind of honestly I was a little surprised. I'm like, he was He even had a problem with cutting off a corner of his robe because to me and uh not to give anything away for someone who might go see David, but this is in there. Um and to me, I would be like Kind of bringing it back to the guys and being like, I could have done it, but I didn't do it, and just messing with Saul. But David was convicted even of that Chapter 26, verses 7 through 9. So David and Abishai went to the army by night, and there was Saul, lying asleep inside the camp with his spear stuck in the ground near his head. Check this out. This is a different time. So before we finish these verses, if you're wondering what do I do with the people who keep bothering me, who keep offending me, who keep attacking me. This is a couple chapters later, but this is a different location. Saul finds David again. And what does David do? Adam and the soldiers were lying around Saul. Abishai said to David, Today God has delivered your enemy into your hands. Now let me pin him to the ground with one thrust of the spear. Not even asking David to do it. I won't strike him twice. But David said to Abishai, don't destroy him. Who can lay a hand on the Lord's anointed and be guiltless? So if you're wondering What you should do with the person that didn't just hurt you once, but that has offended you again, that is really bugging you. David shows us it is grace, it is grace, it is grace. Turn the other cheek Bible says 70 times 7 we're supposed to forgive. Love your enemies. Wow That's not what we see modeled in today's world, but it can be what we see modeled in this body of believers and in the body of Christ. So we have to forgive them again? Yes, we do. And again. And again. When we show this type of grace, it can soften even the hardest heart. When you look at Saul's response, it is almost a definition of grace. Saul didn't intend for that to be, and he kept coming, even after this, but 1 Samuel 24, verse 16, 17, when David finished saying this, Saul asked, Is that your voice, David, my son? And he wept aloud. You are more righteous than I, he said. You have treated me well, but I have treated you badly. And we see in the next time he was after him. Then Saul said, I have sinned. Come back, David my son, because you considered my life precious to-day. I will not try to harm you again. Surely I have acted like a fool, and have been terribly wrong. Then Saul said to David, May you be blessed, David, my son. You will do great things and surely triumph. So David went on his way. And Saul returned home. Even though we know Saul kept coming and kept trying, in those moments. His reaction was basically one of grace. I'm sorry. I I shouldn't be doing this. Please come home. So when we show grace, It fuels other people showing grace. Get that. We can be part of in a graceless world showing people grace and growing grace in. them. The model of grace that Jesus shows us does not depend on how he is treated. And neither should ours. Aren't we grateful? Aren't we forever grateful that God's amazing grace does not depend on how we treat him? Again and again and again. We offend, we sin, we fall short, we're outside of his will And he says, come home. I will show you grace again. That should be our heart. I think one of the places I've seen this, I know that I mean it's it's been so much of my ministry. I I know I mention uh some of the native young people we work with often, but that's been a primary calling on my life. When we see the OEW Warriors fall, because sadly some do, they choose to go back to their old life. There was one who we worked with on the Hopi Reservation, who I we knew her from when she was really little. And uh she came to our events and she uh was part of things and she was wanting to choose Jesus and then she turned away. And she got kind of not just avoided coming to stuff, but you know, sometimes someone turns away from the Lord and kind of, you're the face of Jesus in their lives, so they don't want to have anything to do with you. Because you may remind them of something that they're not ready to be reminded of. And so there was a, we weren't able to really talk with her for a number of years, and then out of nowhere. Sarah got a message from her and she said, I remember those things you guys taught me. I've been through a really hard time. And what did Sarah do? She showed her grace. It wasn't a, I can't believe you did this, I can't believe that is, let me help you through this. And I tell you this story because this young lady she did really well for a few years. And because of some hurt from a relationship. Right now, it's not the end of the story. It's a chapter, not the book, but she's not doing well again right now. And I know that if she writes Sarah again, she will find that grace. And she will have a friend again to help her walk through coming back to the Lord, which I believe she will. But that's what God calls us to do again and again, to be able to show grace. So others can find grace. Who has hurt you? Who has hurt you again after you show them grace? So often we want them to honestly kind of at least get a little of what's coming to them so they understand the hurt that we felt. Yet God says more grace. The one thing I want to point out, this does not mean you are a pushover. This doesn't mean that you never speak or stand up for truth. We need to do that. But let's face it. Not usually the part we struggle with. Usually we can do the truth part as long as it doesn't get messy, as long as we can say it and run. That's that's what social media is. It's I'm gonna drop the bomb and I'm gonna do keep scrolling. That's the culture we live in. But so we shouldn't be pushovers, but we should always be in pursuit of a Christ-like balance of grace and truth everywhere that Jesus shows us his model. It is grace and truth, grace and truth, grace and truth. We're not supposed to just live in a world and walk this road of saying, well, we love everybody. Yes, we do. But if you don't love with the truth as well, and you have that balance that Jesus had, so how do we find that balance? Well Jesus, the truth. We didn't deserve to we deserve to die for our sins. The grace. Jesus showed us amazing grace and took our place. We have the ultimate model there, a balance of grace and truth, where we have to deal with our sin. We have to deal with the consequences, but there's still grace there. Real quick, a couple places where we see graces Often needed the most and seen the least. A couple of places here. Where what comes to mind for you guys? Driving. Driving? Ha! says the lady from the northeast. Alright, that is Amen. All right. Driving, that's good. All right. Where else? Family? Oh, family for sure. We'll we'll go with friends there too. Friends and family. We we've listed social media Uh that's certainly one. Anywhere else that comes to mind? Politics. Politics you say. No, um we won't go down that road, but yes. Uh that politics for sure. Anywhere else? Church. That was the other one that I written down and like, not my church. Uh yes, church. Um there are so many that come to mind. That we uh need to be able to show more grace and be the hands and feet of Jesus. We move on to the fact that grace also embraces those who can do nothing for you. And the best place we see this in David's life is when Dad I mentioned it when he is dealing with Saul's grandson. I mean who would have been in line to be king at some point. And Mephibosheth goes through a just bad accident and is basically an outcast then and uh certainly not a threat at that point, but Here's what David does, 2 Samuel 9. David asks, is there anyone still left of the house of Saul to whom I can show kindness for Jonathan's sake? Now there was a servant of Saul's house named Ziba. They summoned him to appear before David, and the king said to him, Are you Ziba? At your service, he replied. The king asked, Is there no one still alive from the house of Saul to whom I can show God's kindness? See answered the king, There is still a son of Jonathan. He is lame in both feet When Mephibosheth, son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, came to David, he bowed down to pay him honor. David said, Mephibosheth, at your service, he replied. Don't be afraid, David said to him, for I will surely show you kindness for the sake of your father Jonathan. I'll restore to you all the land that belonged to your grandfather Saul, and you will always eat at my table. Mephibosheth bowed down and said, What is your servant that you should notice a dead dog like me? Then the king summoned Zebas, Saul's steward, and said to him, I have given your master's grandson everything that belonged to Saul and his family. You and your sons and your servants are to farm the land for him, and bring in the crops, so that your master's grandson may be provided for, and Mephibosheth, grandson of my master, you will always eat at my table. Now Zeb had fifteen sons and twenty servants. Good work, crew. Then Zeba said to the king, Your servant will do whatever my lord the king commands his servant to do. So Mephibosheth ate at David's table like one of the king's sons. Grace elevates in the words from the passage there a dead dog to like one of the king's sons. When someone can do nothing for you, do you still show them that same grace of treating them like one of the king's sons after all that's been done? Let's have a who can I bless heart. We're talking about the 2 Samuel 9. 1 version, not the southern version. Alright? Found my southerners in the room. I when I moved to Harrison, Arkansas, it was one of the first lessons early on that I learned. It did not take long to learn that when someone said, bless their heart That I should duck. Uh that was they didn't mean it. They they meant here's something you should know about this person. Bless your heart was followed with gossip really quick. And I got to a point where I had to be with people. So like, bless their heart. I'm just like, you you just stop there. You're just like, yes, let's do that. Let's pray together now. No, I it is You just want to make sure that it is the 2 Samuel 9. 1 version where David is saying, who can I bless in my enemy's line? Not just who can I bless, but who can I bless in the line of Saul, I love that who can I bless heart. This isn't always easy. Like I said before, it's messy, it's hard to show this type of grace. Two things stand out to me that I from David's life, of where he learned this grace. And one of those is in his family line. When you look back, It is hard to see maybe sometimes in our lives where grace has been shown to us. It depends on the family you grew up in. I have a story where I can say I saw a lot of it. But maybe you grew up in a house where there wasn't much. David had some in in his lineage. Ruth, his great-grandmother, she showed grace, she demonstrated profound hesed by leaving her own homeland and people to stay with her widowed mother-in-law She didn't put her own needs first, but chose to show this loving kindness. If you have had that in your family, continue that tradition. Continue that in your own life. And if you come from a place where it is you've never had that before, you've never had someone in your family who has shown you that type of loving kindness, become that person for the generations to come. Be that person that they can look back to and say, my mom, my dad, my great-grandma, my great-grandfather, my auntie, my uncle, whoever it is. They showed loving kindness, and I can do the same. So maybe it's in our history that we learned some of that, as I mentioned with my mom. But we also certainly see it as David did in Psalm 51. 1. I won't go deep into this. We'll cover this a little more later, but I David is in coming off of the awful season of sin. This season of falling away from the Lord. And what does he say in Psalm 51, 1? Have mercy on me, O God, according to your unfailing love. According to your great compassion, blot out my transgressions. If you break this down a little bit, Have mercy there. Stoop in kindness. I know I am low, Lord, but would you stoop in kindness towards me? According to your unfailing love. Hey, guess what that is? Hesed. God's unfailing love. According to your great compassion. God's grace is greater than David's sin. So the man who is after God's heart, the man, the woman who is after God's own heart. is a man or woman of God that extends grace greater than the sins against us because we have experienced God's grace towards us. So David is coming out of this situation, this sin, and saying, I know that I am only able to move forward by God's grace. He didn't deserve it and he knew it. Are we willing to do the same because of the grace that has been extended to us and say to others, I will show God's grace, even though they may not deserve it? But I understand there are needs behind the deeds. I understand there's so much more than there possibly could be that I know. I'm going to extend this grace. I'm going to extend this grace no matter how many times I've been hurt. I know that God keeps doing that for me, and I need to do that for others. I love this. Some of you will know this. Probably most of us in this room will uh have heard this, but uh Andy Johnson Flint, there's uh the song He Giveth More Grace. And I love a couple of the verses from this. He giveth more grace when the burdens grow greater. He sendeth more strength when the labors increase. To added afflictions, he addeth his mercy. To multiplied trials, his multiplied peace. His love has no limits. His grace has no measure. His power no boundary known unto men. For out of his infinite riches in Jesus, he giveth and giveth and giveth again. Is that how we give out grace? We giveth and we giveth and we giveth again. The uh obviously one of the huge news stories recently that was covered in a major way was the aftermath of Charlie Kirk's assassination. Where Erica Kirk said, I forgive him. It was powerful. And all of a sudden all these news outlets are talking about that. But there's another one that was a few years ago that The news coverage was simply stunning in some of the things that were said about that. You may remember June 17th, 2015, Dyl Dylan Root. He's in Charleston, South Carolina, and he goes to a Bible study at Emmanuel A. M. E. Church. And he sits in in the Bible study I mean, he didn't just walk in and open fire. He sat in on the Bible study. He hears people sharing from the Bible and he hears people praying for him, for the people there. And he opens fire at the end of that. Nine people were killed in that shooting. And as I I still remember just my dad texting us about a couple of things he was seeing in the coverage and as CNN broadcasts about the shooting. Anderson Cooper had noted uh had they noted attorney Mark Garagos on his show. Two guys who weren't prone to you know talking a lot about Jesus. They have their own slant. But here's what they said. They watched the response of people at the church. They listened to what the people from the church were saying about forgiveness. And in the wake of this awful tragedy, Mark Garego said, I've never seen such an outpouring of forgiveness. It's shocking, he said. Anderson Cooper said, there is so much grace here, amazing grace, and it's not just a song. He went on to say, as dark as the darkness has been. the light has been much brighter. We all have a choice to make. Will we choose the status quo of a graceless world? Or are we going to choose the make-a-difference choice of I will give out grace?