Sermon Cloud

“Learning to Live for Something—5 Traits”

Luke 14:1-24

Key verse:  “But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind.”  Luke 14:13  (NIV)

1. Compassion. 

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree, helping each other to one or other of these destinations. It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities [indeed one or the other is an eventuality], it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another… all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics.”  C.S. Lewis, Weight of Glory

2. Humility. 

Galatians 6:14, “But may it never be that I should boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.”  (NAS)

3. Hospitality. 

4. Urgency. 

5. Joy.

Application:

1. Confess to God your lack of compassion for the lost. 

2. Be with the lost in order to do random acts of compassion.

3. Pray for people God brings your way. 

4. Make yourself happy.  Memorize Philippians 1:1-18.

5. Learn to give your personal testimony. 

6. Learn the gospel essentials.  Accurately. 

7. Learn to answer objections, questions. 

Eleven evidences of the new birth

 1. Those who are born of God keep His commandments, 1 John 2:3-4; 3:24.

 2. Those who are born of God walk as Christ walked, 1 John 2:5-6.

 3. Those who are born of God don’t hate others but love them, 1 John 2:9; 3:14; 4:7-8; 4:20.

 4. Those who are born of God don’t love the world, 1 John 2:15.

 5. Those who are born of God confess the Son and receive (have) him, 1 John 2:23; 4:15; 5:12.

 6. Those who are born of God practice righteousness, 1 John 2:29.

 7. Those who are born of God don’t make a practice of sinning, 1 John 3:6; 3:9-10; 5:18.

 8. Those who are born of God possess the Spirit of God, 1 John 3:24.

 9. Those who are born of God listen submissively to the apostolic Word, 1 John 4:6.

 10. Those who are born of God believe that Jesus is the Christ, 1 John 5:21.

 11. Those who are born of God overcome the world, 1 John 5:4.

 John Piper, Finally Alive