new way to be human: what a loser

I think that my next comment is starting to become a real trend here…

I have a confession to make.

You know that I like to try to live my life as an open book. I don’t hold much back. Some might say that I try to be transparent. What you see is what you get. In keeping with that, I have this confession today. It’s a bit embarrassing. I really don’t know what you will think of me after I tell you. But… enough beating around the bush. This is going to be easier if I just come straight out and tell you.

I watch “Beauty & the Geek.” In fact, I’ve watched every season of it. I get together each week with friends… we mark out time in our schedule so we can watch it. It’s kind of sick… But I watch it and I enjoy it. That’s that!

Seriously though, this show “Beauty & the Geek” is pretty interesting. They take 8 geeks and partner them up with 8 model-like beauties and then put them through challenges that are supposed to help them to work together and develop them into something more than just a beautiful face or an over sized IQ. It’s so interesting because as the weeks progress you can watch the people change and you can watch the walls come down. Hopefully they will leave as more well-adjusted and well-rounded people. This show, as much of a novelty as it is, confronts one of our society’s most foundational truths. “People ARE exactly as they are SEEN.” Remember, this is what our culture says. What you see is what you get. If I wear this, I must be that. Let me give an example. I was watching a TV show about some people trying to break into the rap music industry. One of the participants on this show is a white guy from Texas that has a Mohawk, piercings, and a variety of Waylon Jennings or “Don’t Mess with Texas”-themed t-shirts. There is no way I would have guessed that he was a fan of rap music. Why? He didn’t look like he would. He didn’t dress like he would. This goes for everyone and everywhere for nearly everything. We pigeon-hole people based on the way they look all the time! If you think you can honestly say that you don’t ever buy into stereotypes, well… Good for you! I would just be concerned about the increasing length of your nose.

The saddest thing is that this happens in our churches as well. Followers of Jesus also make judgments of people based on meaningless criteria. I’ll speak about this more in just a little bit, but first, let’s look into the Bible passage for this week.

1Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord! It is no trouble for me to write
the same things to you again, and it is a safeguard for you.
2Watch out for those dogs, those men who do evil, those
mutilators of the flesh. 3For it is we who are the circumcision, we who worship
by the Spirit of God, who glory in Christ Jesus, and who put no confidence in
the flesh— 4though I myself have reasons for such confidence.
If anyone else thinks he has reasons to put
confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5circumcised on the eighth day, of the
people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to
the law, a Pharisee; 6as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for legalistic
righteousness, faultless.
7But whatever was to my profit
I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8What is more, I consider everything
a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for
whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain
Christ 9and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes
from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that
comes from God and is by faith. 10I want to know Christ and the power of his
resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him
in his death, 11and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.
12Not that I have already obtained all this, or have already been made
perfect, but I press on to take hold of that for which Christ Jesus took hold of
me. 13Brothers, I do not consider myself yet to have taken hold of it. But one
thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, 14I
press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward
in Christ Jesus.
15All of us who are mature should take
such a view of things. And if on some point you think differently, that too God
will make clear to you. 16Only let us live up to what we have already attained.
17Join with others in following my example, brothers, and
take note of those who live according to the pattern we gave you. 18For, as I
have often told you before and now say again even with tears, many live as
enemies of the cross of Christ. 19Their destiny is destruction, their god is
their stomach, and their glory is in their shame. Their mind is on earthly
things. 20But our citizenship is in heaven. And we eagerly await a Savior from
there, the Lord Jesus Christ, 21who, by the power that enables him to bring
everything under his control, will transform our lowly bodies so that they will
be like his glorious body.

Can you hear the passion that Paul conveys here? We’ve talked a bit about Paul and his soul obsession. He is consumed with love for God and love for others. So much so that he even writes with tears that there are many enemies of the cross of Christ. It disturbs him so much that these people hate Christ and will not receive the blessed salvation through him that he weeps over the fact. This is living out the heart of the Scriptures that tell us to “love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us.” These people that Paul was weeping for would have likely sought to kill him in a moment’s notice because of the love he had for Jesus. I’ll tell you that I struggle to have a heart like this. It’s difficult to love people that much. Can you agree with that? But that’s what we really need to strive for.

What we see here is an example of seeing past the façade and focusing in on the heart of a matter. Let’s jump back to the start of our passage and look at what were talking about earlier. Paul starts giving a warning about these men that he calls “dogs” and “mutilators of the flesh.” This isn’t a pleasant picture he’s painting is it? He isn’t really dancing around this subject. These guys are worthy of Paul’s disdain apparently. Why? They are going around and forcing new converts to Christianity to be circumcised. This was in holding up a traditional Law given to the people of the nation of Israel. (Genesis 17:1-11)

1 When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to him and said, "I
am God Almighty; walk before me and be blameless. 2 I will confirm my covenant
between me and you and will greatly increase your numbers."
3 Abram fell face down, and God said to him, 4 "As for me,
this is my covenant with you: You will be the father of many nations. 5 No
longer will you be called Abram; your name will be Abraham, for I have made you
a father of many nations. 6 I will make you very fruitful; I will make nations
of you, and kings will come from you. 7 I will establish my covenant as an
everlasting covenant between me and you and your descendants after you for the
generations to come, to be your God and the God of your descendants after you. 8
The whole land of Canaan, where you are now an alien, I will give as an
everlasting possession to you and your descendants after you; and I will be
their God."
9 Then God said to Abraham, "As for you, you
must keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you for the generations to
come. 10 This is my covenant with you and your descendants after you, the
covenant you are to keep:
(Imagine Abram waiting for God to reveal the sign
of the covenant... and then…)
Every male among you shall be
circumcised. 11 You are to undergo circumcision, and it will be the sign of the
covenant between me and you.

In the Old Testament, God instructed that his people would be circumcised; in fact, it was the sign of a covenant that God made with Abraham that God would be his God and the God of his descendants forever. These guys were basing things off of an understanding that a person’s faith wasn’t valid unless the man was circumcised. These were Jewish Christians that believed that Gentiles (non-Jewish believers) had to follow the rules set down for the Jews in specific thousands of years prior. Paul says that they were missing the heart of what God was getting at. The point is that we obtain salvation through the grace, the free gift, of Jesus Christ… not by performing ritualistic acts.

Let’s hit pause for a second here and let me explain something briefly. There is a lot of debate about how we, as followers of Jesus, should handle the Old Testament. There are a lot of people who say that because Jesus came and fulfilled the Old Testament laws, we don’t have to pay any attention to them any more. Read the New Testament and go from there. No. That’s just not the truth. Jesus did come to fulfill the law. But he also said,

17"Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not
come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18I tell you the truth, until heaven
and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen,
will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished.
19Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to
do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices
and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20For
I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and
the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.”
(Matthew 5:17-20)

Jesus didn’t wipe out the Old Testament. He fulfilled the Law by living a perfect life. And he fulfilled the Prophets through the way that he lived that life. The fact is just as Paul writes to his disciple Timothy.

16All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting
and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly
equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)

The heart of the scriptures never changes and the whole Bible is useful for leading our lives because the whole Bible was “God-breathed” or “inspired by God.”

Back on track now… The “mutilators of the flesh” were following Paul around and trying to “enhance” his work by giving people faulty information. They said that you have to look this way and wear this thing and do this or that and… ultimately, be circumcised. What’s Paul’s response? WRONG! Paul says that if anybody should have confidence in the flesh, it should be him. He rattles off a resume that would be impressive to any God-fearing Jew in his day. Then he calls it all, what? Rubbish! The word used in the original Greek language actually meant: rubbish, trash, decaying refuse, and even dung. The fact that Paul had this amazing resume meant nothing when compared to knowing Christ. He knows what matters.

Now think about this, we started off talking about the way we judge people on external appearances. We label people geeks, or beauties, or punks, or jocks, or whatever, right? Don’t some people judge, by appearance, whether a person loves Jesus or not? For the people Paul was writing about, they said, “They can’t love God. They’re not circumcised!” What do people say now? “How can that man be a follower of Jesus? He has tattoos!” “She was smoking outside the church.” “He didn’t take his hat off to pray.” What about the reversal? Have you ever seen someone just get rude when they were dealing with a cashier and then you follow them out to their car and they have a little Jesus fish on their bumper? Or have someone praising Jesus on a Sunday morning… and using his name in vain on a Sunday afternoon?

Now, let me just say that I am glad to be in a church that this is not that big of an issue. I’m not saying that we don’t deal with this issue, but I don’t see it as much here as I have in other churches I’ve been at.

You see, appearance isn’t everything. It doesn’t matter what you look like, or where you’ve come from. It doesn’t matter who your mama or your daddy are. It doesn’t matter if you’ve been lovin’ Jesus since you were 3 or since you were 43. What matters is knowing Jesus.
This is what Paul is saying when he says,

7But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ.
8What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness
of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I
consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9and be found in him, not having a
righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith
in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. 10I want to
know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in
his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11and so, somehow, to attain to
the resurrection from the dead.

What does Paul say is important? He says it’s about knowing Jesus and being found in Him. Am I saying that our actions aren’t important? They absolutely are… we talked about this over the last two weeks. We need to show love for God and for one another. We need to live in a way that is consistent with what we believe. But does that mean I need to wear a cross around my neck? No. Does that mean I have to have a certain Bible? No. Does that mean I have to listen to only Christian music? No. Does that mean that I can only wear shirts that have Jesus’ face on them? I sure hope not! I’d really be up a creek! Do you get the point?

Love, love, love, love, Love, people! The message behind this text is that God meets us where we’re at. We come from a hundred different backgrounds. We all have different stories and are in all in different places along this journey with God. It can be so easy for us to buy into the worldy mentality that we can pull rank on people and judge them as based upon their appearances. Not so. God meets people where they are at and so must we. As followers of Jesus we seek to imitate Him. Sometimes we need a reference we can see. Paul says it’s okay to imitate someone mature in their faith. Maybe you’ve experienced some unconditional love from someone that has a strong relationship with God. Learn from him or her. Just don’t put that person on a pedestal. We all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

We need to accept people in and heap love on them. It’s this sort of heart that Paul is displaying when he is weeping over the enemies of the cross. We need to let love into or heart and let it change the ways we think and the ways we see people and the ways we behave.
Now, along with this “meeting people where they’re at” concept, this applies to the process of developing faith. What we should be looking for, in brothers and sisters in Christ, is progress, not perfection. Paul himself says that he hasn’t achieved all these things. He doesn’t live out his faith perfectly. But he is trying to get better. I love the way he words this process. He says,

13“But one thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is
ahead, 14I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me
heavenward in Christ Jesus.”

Do you get that? He says, I’m not there yet, but I give everything I’ve got in order to make my way there in the end. I want to know Christ in every possible way. I want to love people as He wants me to. I want to join Him through anything. And I’m not going to let anything get in my way. He says that he’s going to forget what is behind and press on. He’ll put aside anything from the past… good or bad. Then, he will strain forward in order to gain Christ.

Let’s call this a “Loser” mentality. Last week we talked about the “Me” mentality and how it’s devastating to unity. Today, I want to tell you it’s good to be a loser. Through all of this, Paul explains that he has learned a “New Way to Be Human” by letting go of his accolades, letting go of his awards, and letting go of his pride. To some measure, he says that he has let go of his whole identity because he has found a new one in Christ. Let’s take this a step farther, it’s not a stretch to believe that he’s also talking about letting go of resentment, guilt, hurt, addictions, fear, anxiety, and so on… He counts EVERYTHING a loss when compared to knowing Christ. He lets loose EVERYTHING go so he can obtain that goal. Paul is a “Loser.” He loses his baggage and gains Christ. What an exchange!

What could you stand losing in your life? What is on your resume that you’re holding high? What are you hiding? What hurt do you have in your heart that holds you back from moving forward? What resentment is crippling you? Do you have fears about people finding out what you’ve done in your past? Do you think that what you’ve done is who you really are? Are you still judging people based on their outward appearance? Do you judge based on their past? Are you living up to the judgments that people have heaped on you all your life?
It’s time to lose the baggage. It’s time to cut loose the chains and strain forward toward God.