From the Jan. 16 sermon, "Jesus Heals a Demonized Woman," preached out of Luke 13:10-21: Jesus heals a demonized woman who has suffered physical pain for 18 years and she glorifies God. But, rather than rejoicing, the pastor criticizes Jesus for healing on the Sabbath. Jesus is tender with the woman and tough with the religious man. He rebukes the pastor publicly for treating livestock better than this woman. He then tells two parables to show that the kingdom of God starts small and grows big. How do you avoid religiosity? Remember the King and his kingdom.

"The law in and of itself will be something that troubles you unless you know who God is. Jesus tells us that God is a loving father. So when your loving father tells you to do something or not do something, you have to presume and assume he loves you, he’s trying to protect you. He’s not trying to rob you of joy and freedom and expression. He’s trying to save you from harm and suffering and death."

What’s your cause? What’s your thing? Some of you are single-issue voters. You really only care deeply about one thing. Some of you have causes that are more "Christian" in orientation. Children, midwives, homeschooling, Christian schooling, public schooling, school choice, conservative politics, pro-life. Certain kind of student ministry, youth ministry, family ministry. Certain kind of musical style. Certain theological system. Certain author. What’s your cause? What’s your cause? What’s your cause? Others of you, your cause is not necessarily Christian. And you could be religious and an atheist, but you can have a religious devotion and zeal for a cause. Recycling, small carbon footprint, biking to work, feeding hungry people, giving clean water to those who are poor and sick and needy and diseased. Healthcare for those who are in need, affordable housing for those who are poor, liberation for those who are in the sex trade. See, everyone’s religious. Martin Luther’s right, religion is the default mode of the human heart. Some of you have more Christian causes. Others of you have just moral causes, but we all have causes. And some of you would say, "Don’t attack my cause. I have a good cause." And I would say, "You probably do. But what about Christ?" What about Christ?

One sickness you’ve probably caught from me is a difficulty in rejoicing in God’s grace poured out in ways that you weren’t expecting in the lives of people that you find perplexing and churches and ministries that don’t do it the way we do. It’s a sin that God continually convicts me of. It doesn’t mean we don’t have convictions, but first we should have rejoicing at what God is doing. Which means if there’s another church, another ministry, another denomination, another theological team, another organization, or other people that disagree with us on some things but they’re part of the family of God, they believe the Bible, they love Jesus too—if good happens for them, if they are blessed, we should rejoice and celebrate. And if we disagree, rather than doing it publicly and starting with a declaration of war, like this man did, like in times past I have, we should go talk to them privately and say, "Okay did I miss something? Let’s see if we can figure this out." And if in fact there is real error or there is sin, then we do need to protect God’s people by being honest, but we don’t start with an attitude of criticism, self-righteousness, haughtiness, or pride. We need to seek and celebrate the evidences of God’s grace wherever we find them. Love people, give them the benefit of the doubt, and if we disagree go talk to them to see if we can’t work towards some resolution.

[Jesus is] preparing a kingdom that will never end. Right now, Revelation says repeatedly, he’s seated on a what? A throne as the King of kings and Lord of lords. There will be a day that he returns, not in humility but in glory, not to suffer but to put an end to suffering. We believe that. There will be a resurrection of the dead and there will be eternal life for those who belong to him and do not. Some in heaven, his glorious kingdom, others in hell, final justice. He’s a king. He’s a king. And his question is, "What is the kingdom of God like?" And the big idea from the two parables is this: it starts small and it grows big. That’s the big idea.