Turning Point

David Michael Jeremiah: There are dark days for the world, filled with hatred, revolt, and violence. As a Christian, are you contributing to that darkness, or are you shining your light? Today on Turning Point, Dr. David Jeremiah challenges believers to stand against the rising tide of lawlessness by reflecting God's love and kindness. To introduce the conclusion of his message, "In a World of Lawlessness, BE KIND", here's David.

Dr. David Jeremiah: I remember as a little boy, one of the first verses I had to remember as a student in my Sunday School class was a verse about kindness: "Be kind one to another". You know, there was a lot more said about kindness in the past than is being said about it today. There's never been a time when we've needed more of that quality in our lives, in the lives of the people that we interact with, in our ministries, and in our interactions as individuals.

Kindness is gold in the Bible. It is a beautiful quality. Jesus was kind. In spite of all the things that were done to Him, He was kind. We're learning that in a world of lawlessness, we too can be kind. Jesus said that in the end days, there will be times of lawlessness, times of chaotic behavior, and times of cruelty. In the midst of all of that, even now, kindness will prevail.

We'll talk more about that in just a moment, but first let me just tell you that all of the information about kindness is in the book, *The World of the End*. All of the verses, the illustrations, and the objective points that are made are there. You can get this book by sending a gift to Turning Point of any size during the few days that are left in April.

In the month of April, this is our resource. Every month, we have a book or a project of some sort that we send to our listeners to help add value to their lives as believers. This is our spiritual resource for the month of April. It's a 241-page hardback book, really beautifully designed. Here, you will discover how to navigate the world of the end. You will study what Jesus taught His disciples in Matthew 24 and get practical biblical instruction about living for Jesus Christ in today's world. It's only available from Turning Point, only available right now for a gift of any size to this ministry. Send your gift and when you do, simply say, "Please send me *The World of the End*," and we'll do it.

This is part two of "In a World of Lawlessness, BE KIND".

Wherever you take God away, wherever you take Jesus away, wherever you push Him to the perimeter, you leave a vacuum. That vacuum is always filled, not with good, but with evil. That's what's happening in our world. Jesus said that's what's going to happen. He's not telling that to us because He wants it to happen, but because He knows it's going to happen.

Then the Bible says when this wickedness increases, love will grow cold. That phrase is a translation of the Greek word *psycho*, P-S-Y-C-H-O, the word from which we get our words "psyche" and "psychology". I want you to notice that here in Matthew 24:12, the word is literally used in the sense of blowing air across something.

Think of your coffee when it's too hot to drink. What do you do? You blow on it, allowing the air to stir the top of the liquid, cooling it just a bit. That's the word Matthew used. As the winds of lawlessness blow across our world, it chills our love, and the world becomes a colder place. That's what's happening.

If you need more evidence, think of the loneliness and lostness of multitudes of people around us. A recent study concluded that 36% of all Americans experience serious loneliness. You wonder why I'm so fired up about small groups? That's why. You wonder why I want to say to our men, "Get to the men's Bible study"? That's why, because we live in a lonely world. Don't think it doesn't touch Christians just because you're a Christian. This includes a whopping 61% of young adults. 61% of our young adults are lonely.

Look at the rise of diseases of despair over recent decades, including addiction, anxiety, depression, suicide, and more. All of these are skyrocketing in America and across the world. In fact, the medical journal *BMJ* conducted a review of health insurance claims between 2009 and 2018, and they found a 68% increase in diseases of despair on a broad level during that time. That was before COVID, and COVID has spiked them.

So this is what Jesus is telling us the world will be like, and we know He was telling the truth because we live in that world. I may have pushed the limits a little bit today to get your attention, but every one of you knows I'm telling the truth. This is the way it is.

I try to make this as clear as I can so that what I'm about to tell you will mean the most that it can. What do we do about that? What do we do about people who are lawless and loveless? Well, the first thing I want to say is: don't be that way. Don't be lawless and don't be loveless. That's a pretty good start.

It's difficult to watch the world disconnect from God, isn't it? Humanity's slide toward lawlessness and lovelessness is painful. We feel a jolt when forces corrupt the institutions and customs we've cherished for so long. The darkness seems to be deepening over our culture like the edge of night, but we are not powerless.

We are children of God, without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, among whom we shine as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life. You need to nail that verse. Listen to it again. We're in the midst of this lawless, loveless generation, but listen to what Paul wrote to the Philippians. He said, "You, we, are children of God. We're without fault in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation. In this generation, we shine as lights in the world, holding fast the word of life."

One of the biggest ways we can make a difference is by bringing back a revolutionary concept called kindness, which in many ways is the antidote to lawlessness. We have limited ability to control the lawlessness and lovelessness in our society, but we can control how we respond to it.

Some people pray, "Lord, change the circumstances so I can feel better," and the Lord says, "No, I'm going to use the circumstances to make you be better." I think that's what's happening to us now. I know that as I see these things happening in the world, and I see them as you do, I don't feel so much anger about it, but I feel, "Lord, how can I be the person I ought to be in the midst of this?"

Everybody is looking for hope, and we have the hope of Christ. We need to turn our candles up higher and shine brighter. We live in a dark world, but we are here on purpose. God could have put us down in any generation He wanted to, but He plopped us down in this one—in this particular generation that seems to be coming unglued. We are the light of the world. Jesus is the light of the world, but before He went back to heaven, He pointed to us and He said, "You are the light of the world."

So before we can ever be purveyors of kindness, we have to embrace it ourselves. So let me ask you this question: do you feel and embrace the kindness of God toward you? Let me just tell you a story to help you with that.

Guest (Male): Rich Mullins wrote his best-known worship song, "Awesome God," in 1988, and he sadly died in a highway accident in 1997. A few years later, James Bryan Smith wrote a book about Rich's life in which he shared how Rich grieved that his dad never spoke the words, "I love you." Rich also battled feelings of worthlessness as a teenager. "God," he once prayed, "why am I such a freak? I wanted to be a jock or something, but I'm a musician. I feel like a sissy all the time. Why couldn't I just be a regular guy?"

Despite his struggles, Rich attended church. He read his Bible and began writing worship songs. But all the time he was doing this, he was feeling like God didn't love him and didn't care about him. Along the way, he began to truly embrace the love of God. It struck him when he looked at the creation around him. He became awed that God in His love gave songs to the birds, majesty to the mountains, and laughter to the children—all of that for our benefit.

He became centered on Jesus. Rich's brother, David, said that Rich always struggled with feelings of self-worth, but he found his self-worth in Christ's death for him on the cross. Once, he told a concert crowd, "If you only knew how crazy about you God really is. God has already loved you, if you only knew." Rich's mother said he actually felt God's love. I think because he was a stranger everywhere he went, he leaned into God and drew close to Him. He was not a saint, but it was his sense of being loved by God that made him different.

Rich discovered that the love God has for us is not an emotion, but it is, in fact, the essence of who God is. The death of Christ is the indisputable sign that shouts to you, "God loves you. God loves you." God said, "I'm going to love My children. How shall I tell them? I know what I'll do. I'll send them My only Son to die for them so that they won't misunderstand the depth of My love."

Dr. David Jeremiah: I know many people who listen to me today who've been jolted by life and you've never had the human love you needed. Many in my generation growing up had that situation with our parents. It wasn't that they didn't love us; they just didn't know how to say it or didn't think it was right to say it. And if you don't have love from your parents, especially if it's the father in the family, the father in the family is the metaphor for your heavenly Father. If my human father doesn't express love to me, how do I know my heavenly Father loves me? That kind of works in your soul.

And like Rich Mullins, you have not heard the human love you needed. Maybe you've been abused, neglected, or mistreated. We all battle issues of self-worth, and perhaps everyone wonders at some time or another if God really loves them. If you only knew how crazy God is about you. If you really knew how much He loved you. It's being loved by God that makes us different. It's His love that's not mere emotion; it's the essence of who He is, and He loves you. Somebody told me once, "If God had a refrigerator, your picture would be on the cover."

So our prayer should be this prayer that was written by Paul to the Ephesians.

Guest (Male): I pray that God would give us power, together with all the Lord's holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ and to know this love that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God.

Dr. David Jeremiah: Paul prayed to the Ephesians, "Here's what I pray for you: I pray that you would know how high God's love is, how low it is, how wide it is, and how great it is, and how much God loves you." And I want to just say on the authority of the Word of God to all of you here today: God loves you like you cannot imagine. Maybe you wonder if somebody else loves you. Maybe you wondered if God loves you, but I'm here to tell you on the authority of the Bible: God loves you. He always has, He always will. He isn't just about love; He is love, and that love extends to you. Before you can ever express love to anybody else on behalf of God, you have to accept that God loves you. You cannot give to somebody what you don't have.

So I urge you today, in this time of craziness in our world, whatever else you believe, concentrate and meditate and read the scriptures and remember that God loves you. People who possess the knowledge of God's love for them become insulated from the chilling winds that cause warm love to become hard ice. When we embrace the love of God through Christ, we own love that will never grow cold.

That's why Paul reminded the earliest believers, "The love of God has been poured out in our hearts by the Holy Spirit." That's why John said, "We love because He first loved us." On a practical level, men and women, our sense of God's love deepens as we spend time with Him. Many of you know what I'm saying. You've had moments when you've been reading the Bible, listening to a worship song, or just praying, and you can almost reach out and touch the Lord. It feels like He's right there. And when we go through those times of stress, we always say the same thing to our friends who are Christians: "I never felt God's presence like I did during that time."

Now let me ask you this question: does God get closer to us at one time than He is at another? No, He's omnipresent. It's that we feel His love. It's the things that happen to us in our lives that cause us to be sensitive to what's already there. God loves you. He actually loves you more than you can imagine. And maybe you don't realize it, but when you go through stress, if you're a believer and you're in the Word of God and you know the Holy Spirit is in control of your life, the things you experience will make you aware of what's already true: you are loved by Almighty God. He loves you desperately.

And because that's true, because you are embracing God's kindness, now you can express it. Now you can share that kindness with others. When we embrace God's love, it becomes natural to express it. In many ways, kindness is God's love expressed through action. Nothing is more obvious in the Bible than God's command to love the world in tangible ways, such as providing a cup of cold water in Jesus' name to the thirsty.

Guest (Male): The leaders of Bear Creek Community Church in Lodi, California, took on the task of expressing God's kindness. They felt a burden to help provide safe water to impoverished parts of the world. The project wasn't in the church's budget, and many of the congregation's families were already under financial strain. So who took up the challenge? The children's ministry did.

There's a strong recycling emphasis in California, and the children began collecting bottles and cans to bring with them to church. Other congregations started to rally to the cause, and would you believe it? So far, they've raised almost a million dollars for clean water projects around the world. Jesus turned water into wine; the kids at Bear Creek turned garbage into water.

Dr. David Jeremiah: That's what I'm talking about. I'm talking about us being channels of the love of God. We aren't supposed to just get love from God and store it. We're not a reservoir; we're a channel. God loves us, and He wants to love the world through us. He wants His love to come through us, and we become His hands and His feet, His eyes and His hugs to the people around us. It isn't a call for a select few; it's for all Christians.

Guest (Male): Psalm 82:3 says, "Defend the poor and the fatherless; do justice to the afflicted and the needy." Proverbs 14:21 says, "Blessed is the one who is kind to the needy." Jesus said, "He who has two tunics, let him give to him who has none, and he who has food, let him do likewise." James said, "Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble." And the Apostle John said, "Whoever has this world's goods and sees his brother in need and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him?"

Dr. David Jeremiah: Expressing God's love means fulfilling these commands in small ways, doing things that you see need to be done. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure this out. Everywhere you go, in your neighborhood, among your friends, if you just say, "Lord, today help me to see the needs of people that I might be able to help," He will show you, and you will have a list you won't be able to keep up with.

The fact of the matter is, over the years, we have trained ourselves to blind ourselves to the needs around us, to live in our own little world, to pull the moat up in our house when we go home at night and not to see what's going on. Today in our world more than ever before, there are people who are just waiting for someone to share with them. Because you see, people don't care how much we know until they know how much we care. And when you help them with their physical need, they will listen to you when you try to help them with their spiritual need.

The point is not that we become famous for what we do, but that we just do something. God's love is not about warm thoughts and well wishes; it's expressed through action, through actually being kind. It's expressing God's love through our daily attitudes and actions. We keep it fervent. We keep it hard for the devil to blow his cold breath over our heart by doing the works that God calls us to do.

That's the spirit I'm recommending. Those of us who know God have embraced His love, and we have to resist the urge to just become complacent and to say, "Oh, this world is going to hell in a handbasket. There's nothing I can do. Get me some food for this week, close the door and lock it, I'm going to just be me." The Bible teaches us that these things that are happening are happening not to make us feel better but to make us be better. And I don't know about you, but I have a passion in my heart: I want to be better. I want to be better for God. I want to know Him better.

So embrace God's kindness in your heart, express His kindness, and then embody it. How do we pour out kindness in a world that's defined by lawlessness? There's no better solution than just to be known as a kind person, a gracious person, a loving person. What if you and I were to reflect God's love to such a degree that the world around us said, "Oh, you know that guy? Oh my goodness, you should meet him. He's the kindest person I ever met." Or, "Oh, you know her? I tell you, if you go near her and you whisper that you've got something wrong in your life, she'll be at your house with something to help you." I mean, she's just the kindest, most loving person you ever met. Don't you just kind of in your heart wish you could be like that? People are going to talk about you anyway. Why don't you figure out how they can talk about you and talk about you in a good way? Give them something good to talk about.

Jesus gave us another picture of what it means to embody His love, and I want to introduce it by taking you through a little exercise. I'm going to ask you to use your imaginations. I want to take a moment and mentally transport you back to the ancient world of Jesus' day. It's late in the evening and the sun has set, and the last of its light is fading from the night sky. You've been walking for more than ten hours under the heat of that sun, and you're not sorry to see it go, but you're also tired and sore and hungry.

And then you see it: a glimmering light in the distance. Another few minutes of walking and that light becomes the welcoming glow of a city built next to a road on the side of the hill. The light you see is not produced by wires and bulbs, but by cookfires and hearths and oil lamps hanging on doorposts. There are people in that city and water to wash the grime off of your feet and a bed to recline as you take your evening meal. As a weary traveler, can you imagine anything warmer or more wonderful in that moment? Could you stumble upon anything more welcoming and refreshing?

That is the image Jesus used to describe how His church should shine the light of the gospel in the middle of a dark and dreary world. Here's what He said in Matthew 5: "You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. Nor do they light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on a lampstand, and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father who is in heaven."

Here's a simple principle: light shines the brightest in the darkness. The darker the night, the brighter the light. In a world frozen from lawlessness and the lack of love, you and I have the opportunity to radiate spiritual warmth that comes with the gospel, the warmth of community, the warmth of kindness, the warmth of fellowship, the warmth of intimacy with our Creator. We may not be able to control what's happening in our world—we wish we could, but we can't. I can't do anything about the lawlessness that's in our country right now. I don't have that kind of power.

But I do have power over me by the Spirit of God. And I can use what I see around me that's so wrong to ask God to make me so right. To make me the kind of person that people will say, "He's kind. He's gracious. He cares. There's something different about that person." And then the Bible says that as we do that as a church, we become like a city on a hill, a light in the midst of the darkness. And here's the principle: the light that shines the furthest has to shine the brightest at home. We must never forget what God has called us to do. When He sets before us an agenda, we must follow it. We must do it with all of our hearts because God has called us in a world of darkness to be light.

Let me ask you this question: is He the light of your life? Because what I'm talking about in the world in which we live is the same for you individually. We don't have the light in us until we accept it. Jesus Christ comes and offers Himself to us. He wants to come and live within us and take the darkness away, become the light of our life. If you haven't accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior, if He's not the light of your life, there's no way for you to shine to anybody else. You cannot give away what you don't possess. So let me ask you this question: are you a Christian? Is Jesus Christ the light of your life? And if He's not, wouldn't you like Him to be?

I hope that you have made the most important decision of your life, and that is to put Jesus Christ on the throne of your heart, to give Him control of your life. He will cause you to be kind. He will give you His kindness to give to others. He is available to you every day. He is, most of all, available to forgive your sin and give you the gift of eternal life, which He promises to all who believe. So make that decision today and let us know about it. We'll send you some information to help you grow in your walk with the Lord and get you on the right direction going forward.

We're going to take a break for the week and I always like to take just a moment and encourage you to get to church on the Lord's Day. I believe in that more than most people because I live in that world every day. I want you to be in church wherever you go, wherever you live, and be a part of what God is doing in your local assembly. We'll be here on Monday and we hope you'll join us then. Have a great weekend, folks.

David Michael Jeremiah: Our message today originated from Shadow Mountain Community Church and senior pastor, Dr. David Jeremiah. Turning Point is also on radio and TV this weekend. To learn where you can find it, visit our website, davidjeremiah.org/radio. That's davidjeremiah.org/radio. Or call 800-947-1993. Ask for your copy of David's informative book, *The World of the End*, with the special B-D-A answer bookmark. Yours for a gift of any amount.

You can also purchase the Jeremiah Study Bible in the English Standard, New International, and New King James versions, complete with notes and articles from Dr. Jeremiah's decades of study. If you're encouraged by this ministry, let us know by writing to Turning Point, PO Box 3838, San Diego, California, 92163. This is David Michael Jeremiah. Join us Monday as we continue the series "The World of the End" on Turning Point with Dr. David Jeremiah.