Care Deeply

A cowboy named Bud was overseeing his herd in a remote mountainous pasture in California when suddenly a brand-new BMW advanced out of a dust cloud towards him.
The driver, a man in a suit, dress shoes, sunglasses and tie, leans out the window and asks the cowboy, 'If I tell you exactly how many cows and calves you have in your herd, Will you give me a calf?' Bud looks at the man, obviously a yuppie, then looks at his peacefully grazing herd and calmly answers, 'Sure. Why not?' The yuppie parks his car, whips out his Dell notebook computer, connects it to his Cingular cell phone, and surfs to a NASA page on the Internet, where he calls up a GPS satellite to get an exact fix on his location which he then feeds to another NASA satellite that scans the area in an ultra-high-resolution photo. The young man then opens the digital photo in Adobe Photoshop and exports it to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany. Within seconds, he receives an email on his Palm Pilot that the image has been processed and the data stored. He then accesses a database through a connected Excel spreadsheet with email on his Blackberry and, after a few minutes, receives a response. Finally, he prints out a full-color, 150-page report on his hi-Tech Miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and finally turns to the cowboy and says, 'You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves.' 'That's right. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves,' says Bud.
He watches the man select one of the animals and looks on amused as the man stuffs it into the trunk of his car. Then Bud says to the man, 'Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give me back my calf?' The man thinks about it for a second and then says, 'Okay, why not?'
'You're a Televangelist,' says Bud.
'Wow! That's correct,' says the yuppie. 'But how did you guess that?' 'No guessing required,' answered the cowboy.
'You showed up here even though nobody called you.
You want to get paid for an answer I already knew, to a question I never asked.
You tried to show me how much smarter than me you are.
And you don't know a thing about cows.
'This is a herd of sheep --
now give me back my dog.'

Today we continue a sermon series entitled:Live Simply Love Generously Care Deeply Speak Kindly Leave the rest to God…Let’s dig into CARING DEEPLY
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You probably already know this about your pastor…But I’m a pretty EMOTIONAL person…It’s a strength and a weakness…The greatest struggle I’ve had as your pastor is People coming and going, actually I don’t mind the coming part it’s the going part…I was talking with some members of our church just this week who have decided to leave us…It always breaks my heart…Because I care deeply I try to talk them through it without manipulating AND ofcourse it doesn’t ever change their minds BUT it does let them know I love them and will miss them…I think RRAG is the greatest church in the world, I don’t ever want to give up on building a church that is truly all about loving God and loving people…
But I do not want to play the American Consumerism game…So many are going to church to see what they can get out of it…what ministries do you have to meet my needs…instead of going to give and to find ways to minister to…
One pastor said to me…you gotta get used to preaching to the parade…they come thru and sometimes they come around again but their always coming and going…I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to just get used to it because I really do CARE DEEPLY…I think I would rather feel my heart break than feel nothing at all…

Matthew 24:3-14
I know you have heard this time and time again…some of you all your lives growing up in the church…But I truly believe we are living in the last days
Or as verse 8 puts it…the beginning of sorrows
Today I think the Lord wants us to talk about some OBSTACLES TO CARING DEEPLY
Verse 10 of Matthew 24 says that many will be offended, betraying one another, hating one another…
I truly believe the greatest obstacle to the heart being able to CARE DEEPLY is being easily offended or being offended at all!
Once you choose to take up an offense you are only hurting yourself…the bitterness you live with does nothing to heal a relationship or if your feeling vindictive…hurt the other person your offended with…
Being quick to forgive and struggling hard to forget is the only way to live in freedom
Let this truth set you free today!
Verse 12 says because of lawlessness the love of many will grow cold…
Our society preaches unfaithfulness…our society knows nothing of commitment…
It’s like scotch tape
You stick it the first time it stays stuck pretty well…but then if you rip it off what it’s stuck to, some of the stickyness is lost and the more you stick it, the more it doesn’t stick…
Sounds like church hoppin…we’ve lost our stickyness…
My goodness you could use this analogy for every relational difficulty…families have lost their stickyness…marriage has lost it’s stickyness…friendship has lost it’s stickyness…the love of many has grown cold…
So, the obstacles to caring deeply
#1 taking offense
#2 loss of stickyness
Don’t roll your eyes at me…stickyness is a great theological word I just made up
Listen the only way to regain your stickyness, to become a new piece of scotch tape… is to practice commitment, faithfulness, Let the Spirit work his fruit in you…ask and you shall receive
Listen I’ve got the secret to CARING DEEPLY
You wanna hear it?
come back next week I’ll tell ya
Just kiddin
Verse 13…but he who endures to the end shall be saved
ENDURANCE…it’s the only path to real life, a life of abundant love and according to this verse eternal life in heaven…
Again the obstacles to caring deeply
1…taking offense
2…loss of stickyness
3…lack of endurance

This seems like the place most preachers add a good story…
He arrived late one night, on a business trip, so he decided to have dinner in the hotel. As he was finishing his meal, an older couple came in to dine. They were holding hands and had lovely smiles on their faces. They sat three tables from him. He was amazed at the love they showed for one another. It seemed to strike home, all the more, because this was shortly after ending a 20-year marriage and he still had such pain in his heart.
His waiter was also their waiter. As he paid his bill, he inquired as to what their bill was, the waiter informed him, and he gave him the $40 to pay their tab. The waiter asked if he knew them and he told him "No, I just wanted to repay them for the love that they were showing to each other," and then he departed. The next day his business meeting ended two hours before the flight back to Houston. He entered the restaurant to dine prior to his departure. After he had been seated the waiter, from the night before, came up to his table. The waiter said the strangest thing happened after you left the restaurant…When the older couple went to pay for their meal, they were informed that another guest had paid for it. When they inquired as to whom it was, the hostess told them they had never seen the man before, and that he said, "I just wanted to pay them back for the love that they were showing towards each other" and that he already had left the restaurant. The couple were amazed, they looked around, and asked for the bill of two young couples, who were seated together (in their 20's or 30's), paid their bill and departed saying "Love begets Love" to the amazement of the hostess and waiter.
The man smiled and said "That's nice," and ordered his meal. About 45 minutes later, he had finished his meal and was getting ready to head out, his waiter was no where to be found. He waited and waited and finally walked over to the Hostess stand and explained that he needed to pay for his meal and hurry and get to the airport. She smiled and explained that he would not have to pay for his meal. The waiter and hostess felt compelled to pay his bill, she said, due to the joy that was brought to the faces of the elderly couple and the amazement of the young couples from the night before. When he told her that they didn't have to do that, she said with a smile "Love begets Love."
I understand that that’s a sappy story AND the truth is sometimes Love feels like it breaks down and forgets to beget…But, when you CARE DEEPLY despite the obstacles, when you LOVE GENEROUSLY even when the begetting breaks down…that’s real life

Before we close the service with prayer and worship…I want to echo what was preached last Sunday at the Church in the Park…
First of all, if you missed it, you really missed out…thousands gathered to fulfill a beautiful vision of unity…
God is so Cool…How He works everything out…Here I am preaching Caring Deeply and the focus of last week’s service very much compliments what I’m preaching and the vision God has been birthing in our church: everybody’s a minister, everybody needs a ministry…
This year’s focus was discipleship and honoring leaders of small groups or whatever you want to call it… Sunday school, bible studies, home groups, ect…
We have some small group ministry on Wednesday Evenings but, there’s something special and more intimate about Home groups…MABYE God is working in your heart to begin a home group in our church…Please come talk to me about it…
I know what your thinking…I’m not a leader…I would love to help and be a part of it but not the point person…But if everybody says that we never have any home groups…
Listen, don’t complicate it, it can be very easy to lead a home group…and the truth is, it’s better if the leader of a home group isn’t the charismatic leader type…Because it’s about sharing life together…Asking a lot of questions, not knowing all the answers…
So talk to me if God is calling you to jump into home group ministry…It truly is very rewarding if you get over your insecurities and just do it… There are so many great resources out there to help you make a great home group…
Scripture truly does support the need for corporate worship AND gathering in homes, doing all those one anothering things…
It is possible to attend church regularly, just practicing religion and never truly have a relationship with Jesus…That’s why these more intimate settings added to corporate worship can awaken the heart to truly becoming a disciple of Jesus…
Hebrews 10:23-25