Authentic - Being Real!

On the front of the bulletin we hand to you each Sunday there are three words that describe the way we live our faith here at the Assembly. Would you say those three words with me, please?

• Authentic, Accepting, and Accelerating

These are not just words! We believe they are a way to express God’s will for this church and those who are a part of her ministries. I’ve spoken about them before and, because they are so important, will be speaking about them this month, once again.

This morning, we look at the first word - Authentic. The challenge I’d like to present to you today is a call -

∙ to live counter-culturally,

∙ to become a person who will not tolerate insincerity in himself,

∙ to be ‘real.’

Being ‘real,’ making the choice to live as authentic disciples of Christ may seem simple. It isn’t! Americans live a culture of image, a culture of superficiality, immersed in a ocean of words that are often disconnected from the truth. I don’t want to use the next phrase, but it is so descriptive I must. We are so accustomed to b__s___ that becoming part of the culture of hokum take no effort.

Ill. We just completed an election cycle in America and the worst part of the whole year-long show was the insincerity that was in so much. It wasn’t limited to either party. McCain spent months trying to convince the nation that Obama was too inexperienced to be President, then selected a woman with absolutely no experience in national politics to be one heartbeat from the Presidency as his running mate! Obama spent months trying to convince us that people like Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton were not worthy of our trust and then selected them to be part of his government.

In my own house, I’ll admit to the problems with integrity, too. There have been so many preachers and priests exposed as frauds, whose words are little more than religious b.s., that many tend to discount all preaching!

The fact is that we live in an age when many people confuse image with integrity. Often the greater desire is for looking good, rather than actually being good! We live in a culture that is focused a great deal on ‘image,’ on external appearances. We want to wear the right fashion, drive the right car, send our kids to the right schools, to look good...

Pretending is fun when we’re kids, right? With minimal props, a little boy can become Superman or the Lone Ranger. If he’s a little older, he can slip into the cool mode and become a rock star, just by buying certain kind of shirt or sunglasses!

Of course, we big boys get tempted to do that every now and then, don’t we? When I get into my Miata and put the top down, I can pretend (for a few minutes until I have to get back out of it) that I am 30 again! The issue of pretending, while harmless in our childhood and our daydreams, is deadly when we let it become a part of what we think is ‘real’ life.

Integrity, that is a unity of person, is a basic quality of an authentic person. We admire integrity and we want those who are around us to be honest people, don’t we? A person who allows himself to be a fake in one area, is not trustworthy in any area!

Jesus says that just looking good on the surface has no place in His Church or in the lives of those who are his followers!

Text- Matthew 6:1-8; 16-18

READ

The Message says, “Be especially careful when you are trying to be good

so that you don’t make a performance out of it!”

The number one criticism of Christians, both fairly and unfairly, involves HYPOCRISY - the very opposite of AUTHENTICITY.

Let me be very clear on an important sub-text here: We are not hypocrites because we fail and sin!

If that were true then we’re all done in! I sin, you sin. “There is none righteous, not one!” the Scripture says.Hypocrisy results when we fail to live up to what we profess and won’t admit that a gap exists.

Few people expect that disciples of Jesus can live without making some mistakes or even having some inconsistency between ideal faith and real life! We are working out the implications of what we are taught by Jesus all the time. The accusation of hypocrisy arises when our pride stops us from admitting our sins and our mistakes.

Jesus wants us to be AUTHENTIC, faithful and honest, not only before our world, but also in our relationship to God. He reserved his strongest condemnation, not for those who were outwardly the worst sinners, but for those who carefully hid their sins under outward pretense of goodness! He preferred to spend his ministry time with those who were honest about their spiritual need and he was attacked for it! In Matthew 9:13 we read that

He said, I have come to call sinners, not those who think they are already good enough.”

It’s not that Jesus was ‘soft on sin!’ He would NEVER excuse one sets of sin while denouncing another. He was equally concerned about the dishonesty of the tax collectors and the immorality of the prostitutes. He confronted both about the need to change their ways and extended the grace of God to them with the challenge of learning to live differently in the power of the Holy Spirit. But Jesus was deeply offended by anyone who was more interested in making a good impression than in actually being good!

Take a look - Matthew 23:1-11; 23-24, 25-26 page 1536

Jesus called pretending in real life by an ugly name - hypocrisy. He pointed out this sin in the lives of some religious leaders of His time, and His words still carry their sting. Take a look.

He was critical of the Pharisees, not because they were scrupulous about being good, but because they were content to let their hearts remain full of sin, under cover of a great religious act! He noted that they saw their own financial dishonesty, for example, as being merely ‘shrewd.’ They despised the poor and the weak, believing that their plight was the result of God’s judgement! Jesus condemned them for their willingness to misuse their authority to oppress the poor, to exploit the weak; sins to which they were completely blind.

I am concerned that I might easily become a 21^st century Pharisee!

What might Jesus say to those of us who are so careful about external things but so unconcerned about having holy hearts? For example-

∙ We would never sleep with another woman, but we’ll watch the beautiful, nearly naked women on “Dancing With The Stars” lusting over them while in the privacy of our living room.

∙ We wouldn’t think of robbing a bank, but we’ll cheat on our tax return.

∙ We will guard our speech against profanity - but use our power of speech to demean others with cruel criticism or lying gossip just for the pleasure of running our mouth.

∙ We will make a great show of attending church, but fail to make a commitment to ministry because ‘we are so busy.’

∙ We will profess great love for the poor or weak but keep our money in our pockets or expect the government to take care of them.

Those things and a hundred like them are evidence of a failure of authenticity, a lack of integrity.

THINK - We have not necessarily reached the level of ‘authentic Christianity’ just because we are socially acceptable even to our church friends.

Authentic faith reaches the core of our being, to our very values system. We will not be living an authentic Christian life IF we are content to measure ourselves on the scales of comparison to others! The only evaluation that really matters is that of God Himself. We are foolish if we comfort ourselves by saying, “I must be a good disciple, an authentic person, for I’m better than this one, or that one. I don’t do this or that!”

Jesus told a story about a man who measured his spirituality wrongly.

(Luke 18:9-14, The Message)

"He told his next story to some who were complacently pleased with themselves over their moral performance and looked down their noses at the common people:

“Two men went up to the Temple to pray, one a Pharisee, the other a tax man.

The Pharisee posed and prayed like this: ‘Oh, God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, crooks, adulterers, or, heaven forbid, like this tax man. I fast twice a week and tithe on all my income.’

“Meanwhile the tax man, slumped in the shadows, his face in his hands, not daring to look up, said, ‘God, give mercy. Forgive me, a sinner.’ ”

Jesus commented, “This tax man, not the other, went home made right with God. If you walk around with your nose in the air, you’re going to end up flat on your face, but if you’re content to be simply yourself, you will become more than yourself.” "

An authentic Christian is a work in progress -

always learning,

always responding as the Lord leads him/her into a deeper place of devotion.

It is an intense process of growth that begins with conversion and ends with our glorious entry into the Kingdom of Heaven.

What is the catalyst for this growth?

Authenticity never flows from a need for the approval of other people. It must come from a heart deep desire to know and to please God!

Authenticity is accomplished in us by a combination of factors.

∙ We must experience God’s grace. Through faith in Christ we are born anew, and a process of transformation of our person begins. We can never be authentically living in the image of God until His Spirit life gives us life!

This is not a ‘once and done’ experience. Yes, we are born once of the Spirit, but we must be renewed in Him, daily. We cannot deal with life as an authentic Christian if our only or primary experience of Him is confined to Sunday morning.

∙ Authentic Christian living requires a lively conversation with the Holy Spirit.

“Lord, what are you asking of me today? Lord, speak, for I am listening!”

In Romans 8 Paul tells us that [13-15] ... if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live, because those who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive a spirit that makes you a slave again to fear, but you received the Spirit of sonship. And by him we cry, “Abba, Father.”

Believer, God, the Spirit, wants to guide you and me on an ADVENTURE, every day presenting us with

new opportunities, steadily deepening our relationship. This is the FOCUS of prayer! Tragically, many of us have reduced prayer to a one-way presentation of our shopping list. Meaningful prayer demands time, quietness of soul, disengagement from life, and real perseverance. But the reward is friendship with God.

∙ We will also be engaged in the study of the Bible, the Word of God. Our study won’t just be about accumulating knowledge about the Bible as important as that might be. It will be about knowing the Bible well enough that God can use it to speak to us about Himself, His purposes, His plans.

James 1:22-25 But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.

But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does.

∙ To protect us against self-deception, God calls us into community. We are to live among other Believers, sharing our lives, our hearts, our thoughts, and our worship. From this regular interaction, we urge each other to greater devotion - or at least we should! Proverbs says that we ‘sharpen each other!’ Hebrews 12:15 says- "Look after each other so that none of you will miss out on the special favor of God.’ Authenticity demands humility that allows us to admit our failures - to God and to others! That humility, the Bible says, is the doorway to re-creation! In 1 John 1:8-10 we find this great promise:

If we say we have no sin, we are only fooling ourselves and refusing to accept the truth.

But if we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us and to cleanse us from every wrong. If we claim we have not sinned, we are calling God a liar and showing that his word has no place in our hearts.

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A Christianity that is authentic, that really effects our day to day lives, is not only God’s will for you and me.

It will make His church beautiful!

Paul, writing to the church in Corinth, said,

"But thanks be to God, who always leads us in triumphal procession in Christ and through us spreads everywhere the fragrance of the knowledge of him.For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task? Unlike so many, we do not peddle the word of God for profit. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God with sincerity, like men sent from God." (2 Corinthians 2:14-17, NIV)

Believer, God’s desire for Washington Assembly is this kind of authenticity. Nothing we do, individually and as a church body, should be done to impress anyone, or because ‘it is a good way to attract a crowd.’ I want us to be people who do everything solely for the glory of God - to the extent that imperfect human beings can live that way.

∙ I am calling on each one of us to commit ourselves to an examined life that let’s the Spirit reveal our blind spots!

∙ I am urging each on us who lead ministries in this church, to re-examine the motives of your ministry. Do you do what you do to lift up Jesus Christ, and to encourage those to whom you minister to be open to God’s great and exciting work in their lives? Ministry done for any other reason will be flawed.

God calls us to AUTHENTIC Christianity! It’s an adventure, not something to fear. Living real will certainly have the appearance of being messy, but the results will be beyond challenge, for lives will be transformed by the Spirit, the Word, and the Fellowship.

I want to close today with a story called the Velveteen Rabbit. It is a tale written nearly 100 years ago...

THERE was once a velveteen rabbit, and in the beginning he was really splendid. He was fat and bunchy, as a rabbit should be; his coat was spotted brown and white, he had real thread whiskers, and his ears were lined with pink satin. On Christmas morning, when he sat wedged in the top of the Boy's stocking, with a sprig of holly between his paws, the effect was charming. ...

For a long time he lived in the toy cupboard or on the nursery floor, and no one thought very much about him. He was naturally shy, and being only made of velveteen, some of the more expensive toys quite snubbed him. The mechanical toys were very superior, and looked down upon every one else; they were full of modern ideas, and pretended they were real.

...Even Timothy, the jointed wooden lion, who was made by the disabled soldiers, and should have had broader views, put on airs and pretended he was connected with Government. Between them all the poor little Rabbit was made to feel himself very insignificant and commonplace, and the only person who was kind to him at all was the Skin Horse.

The Skin Horse had lived longer in the nursery than any of the others. He was so old that his brown coat was bald in patches and showed the seams underneath, and most of the hairs in his tail had been pulled out to string bead necklaces. He was wise, for he had seen a long succession of mechanical toys arrive to boast and swagger, and by-and-by break their mainsprings and pass away, and he knew that they were only toys, and would never turn into anything else.

For nursery magic is very strange and wonderful, and only those playthings that are old and wise and experienced like the Skin Horse understand all about it.

"What is REAL?" asked the Rabbit one day, when they were lying side by side near the nursery fender, before Nana came to tidy the room. "Does it mean having things that buzz inside you and a stick-out handle?"

"Real isn't how you are made," said the Skin Horse. "It's a thing that happens to you.

When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but REALLY loves you,

then you become Real."

"Does it hurt?" asked the Rabbit.

"Sometimes," said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. "When you are Real you don't mind being hurt."

"Does it happen all at once, like being wound up," he asked, "or bit by bit?"

"It doesn't happen all at once," said the Skin Horse. "You become. It takes a long time. That's why it doesn't happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in your joints and very shabby. But these things don't matter at all, because once you are Real you can't be ugly, except to people who don't understand."

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Are you willing to let God put you to service in His work?

Are you willing to let yourself be worn, used, and - in the process - lose the pretensions that keep you from being

an authentic Believer, loved and loving?

In that ‘real-ness’ an indescribable beauty is released.

God make us real! Amen.