sermon

Sunday Inspiration: Fruit of the Spirit: Love, Joy, Peace

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Fruit of the Spirit: Love, Joy, Peace

Galatians 5: 22 – 24

This morning, I want to introduce you to Sir Entitle-a-Lot – if you are a child of the 90s, not to be confused with Sir-Mix-a-lot. This knight of dubious valor believes that he is the center of the universe and that everyone else is merely an extra in the grand epic that is his life. 

Sir Entitle-a-Lot’s story begins in the mythical land of Instant Gratification, where everyone is told from birth that they are special—so special that the world owes them everything. Our hero, raised on a steady diet of participation trophies and undeserved accolades, grew up convinced that he was destined for greatness without the inconvenience of hard work.

If you don’t know him by his name, “Sir Entitle-a-Lot,” you may know him by his nicknames of “Chad” or “Karen.” Sorry for all the thoughtful and generous Karen’s and Chad’s for whom Sir Entitle-a-Lot has robbed of their good name. 

We always find “Sir-Entitle-a-Lot” demanding his way in customer service lines by claiming what he deserves or what should be his right.

Armed with his smartphone and an overinflated sense of self-importance, he takes to social media to air his grievances and demand recognition. Whether it’s a lukewarm latte or a delayed delivery, no slight is too small to escape his wrath.

He crafts epic posts filled with CAPS LOCK and exclamation points, expecting his followers to rally to his cause. His cause usually begins with, “How dare they…….” and is filled with calls for his rights to be respected and his over-inflated ego to be caressed. 

If we are honest, we all have an inner “Sir Entitle-a-Lot” in each of us. 

Entitlement usually occurs when we approach life out of obligation. When our “get to” turns into “have to,” we are on the path to entitlement. When we get to go to work to support our family and provide a good service to people, it turns into “I have to” go to work, and then we begin to get resentful. When we get to spend time with friends, it turns into “I have to” spend time with friends; we start thinking that the time we spend should be in a way that meets our needs. 

Before long, what is an opportunity becomes an obligation. An obligation produces the attitude of resentment, and resentment that festers transforms into entitlement. 

Entitlement is a failure to understand the concept of freedom and the responsibilities that come with it. Entitlement is false freedom. 

Freedom consists of not doing whatever we want but of the commitment to do what we should. 

The apostle Paul addressed this confusion about freedom in a letter to the churches in the region of Galatia. 

Christianity began as a Jewish messianic movement in Jerusalem, but its message was for all humanity, so it quickly spread beyond Israel. By the time Paul became a missionary, there were as many non-Jews as Jewish people in the Jesus movement. 

Starting as a Jewish messianic movement meant that the first Christian leaders were influenced by practices mandated in the Torah, such as keeping the Sabbath, eating kosher food, and circumcision for men. There were many Jewish Christians who believed that for non-Jews to become a part of God’s covenant family, they needed to obey the laws of the Torah as well. Some of these Jewish Christians had come to the Galatian churches and began undermining Paul, demanding the circumcision of all male Christians.

The Christian converts in Galatia, located in Modern day Turkey, were non-Jewish. So, imagine if someone came in after this service and started teaching that to be Christian, any males in the congregation needed to go through a ritual similar to circumcision. You can imagine there might be more than a few saying to themselves, “Yeah, I don’t think this is for me.”

When Paul found out, he was both heartbroken and angry. He says about those causing trouble, “I wish those who unsettle you would castrate themselves” (Galatians 5:12)!

Paul argues that if you give into this false teaching, you will be enslaving yourself to the very law that Christ has come to set you free from. He says, “For freedom, Christ has set us free. Stand firm, therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (Galatians 5:1). 

Falling for the false teaching of those trying to lead the people astray is a big deal for Paul. He says, “If you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will be of no benefit to you. Once again, I testify to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obliged to obey the entire law. You who want to be reckoned as righteous by the law have cut yourselves off from Christ; you have fallen away from grace” (Galatians 5: 3 – 4). 

But Paul also warns that the freedom you have been given is not the freedom to do whatever you want. Paul warns the people in Galatia not to be enslaved to the law, but he doesn’t want them to see their freedom in Christ as liberty to live their lives however they want. 

He says, “For you were called to freedom, brothers and sisters, only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become enslaved to one another” (Galatians 5: 13).

Freedom is not for self-indulgence but for the love of others. Freedom is not for selfishness but for the sake of the neighbor. 

We live in this freedom by being led by the Spirit of Christ, who lives in us. We refuse to be shaped by the desires of the flesh, which always leads to selfishness and entitlement. If we live by our selfish desires, we get the fruit of those desires, which is self-indulgence. But if we live by the Spirit, we produce the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Say it with me: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. 

For the next three weeks, I want us to examine the fruit of the Spirit and consider how our lives should reflect these characteristics. The first description of the fruit of the Spirit is love. Ask yourself, “What is keeping you from being loving towards others?” Is it pride? Is it selfishness? Is it greed?  When Jesus says, “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you” (John 15:12), the love he calls us to is the self-giving love God has shown us in Jesus. Love is how God chose to communicate with us. God sent Jesus into our experience to show us the love of God, and for those who have experienced the depth of God’s love, God sends into the experience of others to show the love of God. Love is a verb, not an adjective. It is something we do, not just feel. Love is about choosing to be present.

The second description of the fruit of the Spirit is joy. Joy is focused on relationships rather than circumstances. Joy is the experience of connection. Joy says, “I am glad you exist.”

The third description of the fruit of the Spirit is peace. Author Anne Lamott says, “Peace is joy at rest.” Peace is the result of a heart that is grounded in Jesus. The world might be in chaos, but the soul rests in HIm.

I started out by talking about entitlement. I said that entitlement is a false freedom. It usually shows up as a byproduct of resentment, and resentment comes when we let opportunities become obligations.

I want to reverse that pattern and say life in the Spirit is grounded in love expressed in joy with a heart at peace.  

Before leaving the house each morning, remind yourself, “I will walk in the Spirit, loving others by spreading joy and carrying peace in my heart.” Say it with me, “I will walk in the Spirit, loving others by spreading joy and carrying peace in my heart.” And in doing so, you are living in the freedom of Christ. Amen.

Pastor Jamey

(Click Here to Watch the Worship Service from Gainesville First United Methodist Church, Gainesville, Georgia.)

Discussion Questions

  1. How do you recognize “Sir Entitle-a-Lot” in your own life? Can you share a recent experience where you felt entitled and how it affected your actions or attitude?
  2. The sermon mentioned that true freedom involves responsibility, not just doing whatever we want. How does this understanding of freedom challenge how you live your daily life?
  3. What does it mean to you to “walk in the Spirit”? How do you practically live out the fruits of the Spirit—love, joy, peace—in your interactions with others?
  4. The sermon highlighted that love is a verb, not just a feeling. How can you actively show love in your relationships this week? What specific actions can you take to demonstrate love in a tangible way?
  5. Joy was described as being rooted in relationships rather than circumstances. How can you cultivate joy in your life, especially when faced with difficult situations?
  6. The sermon quoted Anne Lamott, saying, “Peace is joy at rest.” How do you find and maintain peace when your external circumstances are chaotic? What practices help you stay grounded in Christ during turbulent times?

Prayer

Gracious God,

As we reflect on the fruits of Your Spirit—love, joy, and peace—may they take root in our hearts and transform our lives. Help us to love as You have loved us, to find joy in the relationships You have blessed us with, and to carry peace within us, even in life’s chaos.

Lord, as we go through this week, may we walk in Your Spirit, spreading joy, showing love, and carrying peace in our hearts. Let us be a reflection of Your grace and mercy to a world in desperate need of it.

We ask all this in the name of Jesus Christ, who has set us free.

Amen.

Benediction

Go now in the freedom of the Spirit to love and serve others, to spread joy, and to carry peace in your heart. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Jonah and The Big Fish

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(I did not preach this weekend. So, I am sharing a sermon I preached in 2022)

A digital painting of a large whale underneath the waters below a boat.

Jonah and the Big Fish

Jonah 3

Let’s start this sermon at the end of the story. God asks Jonah, “Should I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and many animals” (Jonah 4: 11)? 

Don’t forget about the animals. 

This question is being presented to Jonah as he sits baking in the desert sun while throwing himself a pity party over the fact that God’s mercy is more than he can handle. 

Jonah is unwilling to live without his old beliefs intact. He refuses to let God transform his anger into love, and he would rather die. From a place of self-loathing, Jonah says, “It is better for me to die than to live” (Jonah 4:8).  

Hang out with God long enough, and you will learn that God’s mercy, not God’s judgment, represents the biggest threat to our religious ordering of the world. 

Friends, I have a whale of a story to tell you today. It might challenge how we try to lay claim to God and God’s gift of grace if you are brave enough to hear it.

The story begins with God telling Jonah, “Go at once to Nineveh, that great city, and cry out against it; for their wickedness has come up before me” (Jonah 1:2). Jonah is like, and no, thank you! He hops on a ship in the opposite direction. He is determined to put as much water between him and Nineveh as possible. He might have been a prophet, but he wouldn’t waste his gifts on the ruthless Ninevites. 

I can’t blame Jonah. I wouldn’t want to go to Nineveh if I were an Israelite. It would have been like being an American immediately after September 11th, being asked to track down Osama Bin Laden to preach to him instead of killing him.

Nineveh is the capital of Assyria, the nation that laid waste the northern kingdom of Israel and held the southern kingdom of Judah as a vassal for almost one hundred years. Assyria was more than an enemy. And it was a brutal force that robbed Jonah’s people of their livelihood. Jonah is told to go into enemy territory and preach God’s judgment. 

Later in the story, we learn Jonah’s real reason for being so reluctant.  After the Ninevites repent, Jonah says in prayer, “O Lord! Is not this what I said while I was still in my own country? That is why I fled to Tarshish at the beginning; for I knew that you are a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love, and ready to relent from punishing” (Jonah 4: 2). 

Jonah understands God to be merciful. He isn’t ready for God to be merciful to those he doesn’t like. Jonah is not prepared to be part of God’s club if it includes the Ninevites. Jonah is not upset that God is merciful. He is upset that God’s mercy extends to all. 

It is worth repeating: Hang out with God long enough, and you will learn that it is God’s mercy, not God’s judgment, that represents the biggest threat to our religious ordering of the world.

What will you do when you learn that God’s mercy outweighs your judgment? What will you do when confronted with the fact that God’s character to be compassionate extends to those you don’t believe deserve God’s compassion? 

Jonah got on a boat. He tried to put a sea of water between his convictions and God’s call to step outside his old beliefs and love people he determined should not be loved. Running away seems safer than letting God’s compassion shatter his long-held convictions. 

But you just cannot outrun God. So, Jonah ends up in the belly of a fish. Or, as Ms. May Bruner corrects us in the video, “It is a whale!” 

After three days and nights of severe indigestion, the big fish pukes Jonah on dry land. He walks to the city’s edge, covered in seaweed and smelling like fish vomit, to deliver a message to the people of Nineveh from God. He gives the wimpiest sermon, “Forty days more, and Nineveh shall be overthrown” (Jonah 3:4). 

And that was all it took. The sermon had such an impact that even the livestock was covered in sackcloth. The king of Nineveh gave a decree, “Human beings and animals shall be covered with sackcloth, and they shall cry mightily to God. All shall turn from their evil ways and from the violence that is in their hands” (Jonah 3: 8). The cows repent; they turn their mooing to the Almighty! 

God heard the cry of repentance, changed His mind, and forgave the people. 

And Jonah? Jonah gets mad, depressed, and wants to die.

The crux of the story is not the revival that breaks out on enemy territory. Instead, it is about Jonah’s reaction to the revival. 

What is wrong with a merciful God? Everything is wrong with it when God’s mercy for me is also God’s mercy for them. When you learn that the God who gave you a second chance is the same God who gives them a second chance, it changes how you think about them. 

And you are left with a choice. You can run away with your old beliefs intact, hoping you don’t become fish food, or be open to the possibility that God’s compassion is more profound and broader than you first imagined. You can loathe in self-pity or let God transform your anger into love. 

In Flannery O’Connor’s lastshort story, Revelation, the scene opens in the waiting room of a doctor’s office where a smug Ruby Turpin is chatting with another woman. Ruby is self-righteous. She sizes up the people sitting around her, judging each of them and letting her conversation partner know why she is better than the rest of the white trash, blacks, freaks, and lunatics in the room. 

The daughter of the person she is conversing with is Mary Grace. The young lady is overweight, her face is covered in acne, and she is unflattering. 

Mary Grace can no longer take the self-righteous banter from the so-called Christian lady, Ruby Turpin. She throws the book across the waiting room, hits Mrs. Turpin over the left eye, and lunges towards her. The young girl screams, “Go back where you came from, you old wart-hog! 

  Stunned, Mrs. Turpin returns home and wrestles with the Lord, angry and confused. “What do you send me a message like that for?” she rails at God. “How am I saved and from hell, too?”

At the end of “Revelation,” after she’s wrestled with God and shaken her fist at God for allowing her to suffer injury and insult at the likes of the lunatic Mary Grace, Mrs. Turpin has a revelation—a vision. In this vision, she sees all the saints—including the poor, the white trash, and the blacks she has disdained all her life—marching into heaven. Behind them, she spots herself and her husband, not first but last, yet joining joyfully in the chorus of saints “shouting hallelujah.” As a result of her painful humiliation, Ruby Turpin exchanges self-righteousness for true righteousness.

The book of Jonah ends without any resolution. We don’t know what Jonah finally does. Does he finally come to terms with the expanse of God’s grace? Does he acknowledge that God’s mercy is greater than his judgment? 

Can Jonah live in a world where God’s mercy extends to even those he would rather not live in the world with? We don’t know. 

But then again, I could be Jonah, and you could be Jonah. We all have our own Nineveh. Will we stop running and let grace catch up with us? 

I mean, this is God. Where do you think you are going to hide anyway? 

I want you to consider who the Ninevites in your world are. Who are the people that you find difficult to love? Or feel unlovable? For whom are you acting like a Jonah? Maybe the Lord invites you to stop running and let grace catch up. Amen.

Discussion Questions

  1. Why do you think Jonah resisted God’s call to go to Nineveh? Can you relate to Jonah’s reluctance to show compassion to those he deemed unworthy?
  2. Who are the “Ninevites” in your life—those you find difficult to love or believe are unworthy of compassion? How might you begin to see them through the lens of God’s mercy?
  3. Jonah tried to run from God’s call. Are there areas where you feel you are running away from what God asks you? What might it look like to stop running?
  4. Reflecting on the story of Ruby Turpin from Flannery O’Connor’s “Revelation,” how does the journey from self-righteousness to true righteousness resonate with your spiritual journey?
  5. The sermon suggests that God’s mercy threatens our religious ordering of the world more than His judgment. How do you understand this statement, and do you find it challenging?

Prayer

Heavenly Father, Transform our anger and judgment into love and understanding. Help us to see the world through Your eyes, recognizing that Your mercy knows no bounds and extends to all of Your creation.

May we always remember that our greatest strength is found in Your mercy. Let us walk in Your grace, offering forgiveness and love to everyone.

In Jesus’ name, we pray. Amen.

Benediction

May the boundless mercy of God surround you, the transforming love of Christ fill your hearts, and the abiding presence of the Holy Spirit guide your steps. Amen.