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Mar 14, 2021

Reframing Altruism

Reframing Altruism

Passage: Philippians 1:9

Speaker: Andrew Kerhoulas

Series: We Must Love One Another, or Die - Lent 2021

Keywords: disinterested love, not self-centered, acting in the interest of others, biblical altruism

Biblical love is not self-seeking; it doesn’t make demands, or seek its own advantage. If our hearts mirror our self-absorbed age, we need the power of the gospel and the work of the Holy Spirit, which spell judgment on a life centered on the self.

Readings & Scripture

PREPARATION: Psalm 8
LEADER: O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth! You have set your glory above the heavens. 2 Out of the mouth of babies and infants, you have established strength because of your foes, to still the enemy and the avenger.

ALL: 3 When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, 4 what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?

LEADER: Yet you have made him a little lower than the heavenly beings and crowned him with glory and honor. 6 You have given him dominion over the works of your hands; you have put all things under his feet, 7 all sheep and oxen, and also the beasts of the field, 8 the birds of the heavens, and the fish of the sea, whatever passes along the paths of the seas.

ALL: O Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!

Romans 5:5-8
LEADER: and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
ALL: For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die—
LEADER: 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars, which you have set in place,
4 what is man that you are mindful of him,
and the son of man that you care for him? (Psalm 8:3-4)

Prayer of Adoration: Psalm 27:3-4
LEADER: 3 Though an army encamp against me, my heart shall not fear; though war arise against me, yet I will be confident. 4 One thing have I asked of the Lord, that will I seek after: that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to enquire in his temple.

Prayer of Confession: Psalm 130:1-4
LEADER: 1 Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord! 2 O Lord, hear my voice! Let your ears be attentive to the voice of my pleas for mercy! 3 If you, O Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand? 4 But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared.
Prayer of Petition: Matthew 7:7-11

LEADER: 7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. 9 Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
Pastor ends with Prayer for Illumination.

RESPONSE: The Lord’s Prayer
Our Father in heaven, hallowed be Thy name.
Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil

For Thine is the Kingdom
and the power and the glory
forever and ever. Amen.

BENEDICTION: Based on John 5:30, Romans 5:5, 1 Corinthians 10:24, Ephesians 1:6
LEADER: Now may the love of the Son who sought not his own will but the will of his Father be poured into your hearts by the Holy Spirit,
ALL: That we may seek not our own good, but the good of our neighbor, to the praise of his glorious grace. Amen. 

ILLUSTRATIONS:

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

  1. What are factors in our culture that push against the call for selfless love? What about in your own life? 
  2. Dallas Willard said, “Salvation is a life.” What does the gospel bring to a conversation about loving selflessly? How is it different than other motivations for altruism? 
  3. Connecting Sunday to Monday, what could altruism look like in your work? What about in your home?

QUOTES:

  • “Push as hard as the age that pushes against you.” Flannery O’Connor 
  • “Consciously or not, we are “logging on” to the unending worship of the triune God across creation and throughout time. No matter how edgy or how stodgy our particular worship may seem, no matter how connected or how isolated any group of worshippers may feel, we are all part of the cosmic reality hymn writer Maltie Babcock called “the music of the spheres.” — Emily R Brink
  • “If you’re deconstructing, you’re likely seeking to make sense of your faith—if Jesus is worth trusting, if it’s your faith and not just some inherited belief system, if there are too many problematic or perplexing issues with Scripture, if it’s worth putting up with the failures and hypocrisy of so many who claim the name of Christ. Perhaps these concerns have only exacerbated your doubts, with so many to count that you don’t even know where to begin. Maybe you look around at the contemporary church landscape and think, This can’t be what Jesus had in mind. Perhaps you’ve observed a version of cultural Christianity that has more to do with the American Dream than Jesus of Nazareth....Deconstructing, however jarring and emotionally exhausting, need not end in a cul-de-sac of unbelief. In fact, deconstructing can be the road toward reconstructing—building up a more mature, robust faith that grapples honestly with the deepest questions of life.” Ivan Mesa 
  • “Whereas a combination of faith, character, and virtue was the rock on which traditional leadership was founded, each of these components has crumbled in the twentieth century.” Os Guiness
  • “There is, therefore, a great need for discernment in our self-understanding. Who am I? What is my “self”? The answer is that I am a Jekyll and Hyde, a mixed up kid, having both dignity because I was created and have been re-created in the image of God, and depravity because I still have a fallen and rebellious nature. I am both noble and ignoble, beautiful and ugly, good and bad, upright and twisted, image and child of God, and yet sometimes yielding obsequious homage to the devil from whose clutches Christ has rescued me. My true self is what I am by creation, which Christ came to redeem, and by calling. My false self is what I am by the Fall, which Christ came to destroy.Only when we have discerned which is which within us will we know what attitude to adopt toward each. We must be true to our true self and false to our false self. We must be fearless in affirming all that we are by creation, redemption and calling, and ruthless in disowning all that we are by the Fall.” John Stott
  • “There are many principles contrary to love, that make this world like a tempestuous sea. Selfishness, and envy, and revenge, and jealousy, and kindred passions keep life on earth in a constant tumult, and make it a scene of confusion and uproar, where no quiet rest is to be enjoyed except in renouncing this world and looking to another. But oh! what rest is there in that world which the God of peace and love fills with his own gracious presence, and in which the Lamb of God lives and reigns, filling it with the brightest and sweetest beams of his love; where there is nothing to disturb or offend, and no being or object to be seen that is not surrounded with perfect amiableness and sweetness; where the saints shall find and enjoy all that they love, and so be perfectly satisfied; where there is no enemy and no enmity; but perfect love in every heart and to every being. Jonathan Edwards, “Heaven, a world of love”

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