Shane Idleman emphasizes the need for genuine love and compassion in the Christian life, contrasting the attitudes of Pharisees who are hard on others but lenient on themselves with the spiritual man who is self-reflective and gentle towards others. He challenges the congregation to examine their hearts and to weep for the brokenness in society, urging them to seek a baptism of love that reflects God's heart. Idleman points out that without love, even the most eloquent preaching or acts of faith are meaningless, and he calls for a return to a heartfelt, prayerful relationship with God. He stresses that true love for others stems from recognizing one's own need for God's mercy and grace. Ultimately, he calls for a church that prioritizes prayer and compassion over mere activity and performance.

A.W. Tozer said a Pharisee is hard on others and easy on himself, but a spiritual man is easy on others and hard on himself. So I want to ask this question this morning, what side of that do you fall on? Are you hard on others and easy on yourself? Because that's a sure sign of misplaced fruit. That's a sure sign of rotten fruit. We should be hardest on ourselves and more gentle and loving on others. And you might say, well why is that? That doesn't make sense because you know the real you. Come on, I'm going to go there this morning. You know the real you. You know how often you drift from God, do things you shouldn't do. We should be hardest on ourselves and gentle and more loving on others. Do you want this fruit? This first service was pretty incredible this morning. And I asked that question, do you want this fruit? Do you want the fruit of love? That's what we need in our culture today. Do you think the political parties are going to get closer together? There's going to be more violence. There's going to be more upheaval. There's going to be more civil unrest. What we need is more people baptized with the spirit of God and love flows out, not anger and frustration and fighting and complaining. The love, do you remember when you, I don't know when you first came to Christ, you used to love people. Remember you see that homeless person and not ridicule them? You'd see that person caught in an addiction, your heart would break for them. Now it's become cold and callous and hard. We have no love for people. We don't weep. When was the last time you ever cried over this condition of America or of our city? I think we should. I think it's healthy. I think you should see the child abuse and you should weep over that, the sexual perversion, sex trafficking in your own city. Did you know that? In your city where you live, they traffic young women. That should break your heart. That should get here to get you to the prayer meetings and have you praying and saying, Oh God, use me even if it's just one that I can bring home and you break for the condition of your people. God doesn't do that, Shane. Oh yes he did. Jesus cried over Jerusalem. He was looking over the city and he said, Oh Jerusalem, Oh Jerusalem, I sent to you prophets. I sent to you messengers. You saw the condition of your heart. I wanted to gather you as a mother just gathers her children and holds onto them, but you rejected me. You rejected the Messiah and I see that your destruction is near. When Titus comes in in 70 AD and wipes out the Jewish people and the blood is running down the streets, Jesus said, I see it. I see it. And I weep for my people. What caused him to do miracles? He saw, he had compassion. He had compassion on the blind, on the deaf, on the mute. He had compassion on the leopard and the lame. He had compassion. It has to start with love and that's my concern. The church has grown so cold and callous. Love is everything. If you don't leave here with anything, leave here with this. Love is everything. Have you received a baptism of love? I don't care what you call it, but you better have it. An overflowing sense of God's love and then you can love others. Paul said, though you speak with the tongue of men and of angels. If you have not love, you have nothing. In other words, you can be a wonderful speaker up there, Shane. You can be, you can be a wonderful motivator, but if you have not love, it profits you nothing. You can understand all mysteries and have great faith, you faithful people out there. Paul said, you can have great faith. You can tell this mountain to be moved, but if you have not love, it profits you nothing. You can have your body to be burned at the stake. Give everything you have to the poor, but if you have not love, you have nothing. In other words, you can preach as well as Billy Graham and Charles Spurgeon, Shane, but if you have not love, you are nothing to me because you are just a clanging brass and a sounding cymbal. You do not have the heart of God. Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast. It's not proud. It's not rude. It doesn't keep any record of wrong done against it. Tongues will cease. Prophecy will cease, but the love of Christ will endure forever. That's why I believe Paul said, when I was a child, I spoke as a child. Paul said, when I was a child, I spoke as a child. I understood as a child. I talked as a child, but when I became a man, I put away childish things, and men need to get back to the fact that they need to be lovers of God and not lovers themselves. They need to let the humbleness come back into their homes. They need to be men of love, not men of whatever this ungodly passion is. I run into guys all the time. They rule their house with a rod of iron, but they have no love. They'll get so involved in sports and so involved in work, but have not love. We wonder why our kids are rejecting Christ. We're wondering why we have no passion for the things of God. We've lost that love. Or what's scarier, you might have never had it. You may have never had it. To experience the love of God, it comes from a broken heart. It comes from a broken heart that sees your own need. Isn't that where it starts? God, I see your love for me. I see how you forgave me. I see the mercy you bestow on me. Give me a heart like yours, and from that heart comes a heart and a love for others. I mean, I'm pointing fingers at myself right now, too, but isn't it how pathetic how many Christians we have in the valley, and we do very little because there's no love in the majority of people. Granted, there's some wonderful Christians doing great things. Praise God for that. I know they're praying about bringing a teen challenge here to Lancaster Palm Dive. I was in a meeting about that and talked to people. That's encouraging. We've got people starting homeless ministries. There's a lot of things, but as a whole, as a whole, we're not broken. We're not loving. Then also, during our prayer time, I often say, let's pull down heaven. What I mean by that is let's pray the name of Jesus. Let's ask Christ to change our hearts and change our lives. Pull down heaven basically means you're saying, Jesus, that name is greater than any other name, is it not? Do you believe the scriptures that say every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord? I'd love to shout that from Broadway in New York Times Square as long as I didn't get shot, but get me on a platform and just pray and just say, oh, every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Christ is Lord. Wall Street will bow. The stock market will bow. Political parties will bow. Russia will bow. Iran will bow. China will bow. Every name will bow. Why? Because there's power in the name of Jesus Christ. You pray that name and you say, God, watch over my family. Watch over my marriage. Jesus, I need you. See, I believe, I believe I'm one of those people and I will admit it to you right now in case you don't already know, that I believe you can have an atmosphere saturated in prayer. The atmosphere matters. You're not going to watch all this junk on TV and all this media thing and have the atmosphere of God in your home. The atmosphere. Heaven looks for that name. They're looking for that person crying out saying, God, I have a broken and contrite heart. I call on the name of Jesus Christ. Break me out of my bondage of shame and guilt. That name. Heaven listens. Heaven answers that prayer. Heaven's not closed on Sunday. They don't take days off. God doesn't sleep. We just read it earlier. God says, I am the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. I do not sleep. I do not slumber. I hold Israel in the palm of my hand. I will deliver you from your foes. But what do you have to do? The one common denominator throughout all the scripture is when men and women of God would call upon him with broken and contrite hearts and say, God, break me in this place. I need to hear from you. I lay my pride down at the altar. God, whatever you want to do, do it and work through me. Every prayer. You show me a prayer in the Bible that God answered as a prayer of haughtiness and arrogance. Never. There's one example. Do you know what I'm talking about? The Pharisees said, oh, I'm so glad I'm not like this other sinner. I tithe and I give and look at this guy. And the Bible says Jesus clearly said that that man, that sinner, beat his chest and said, oh, God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Please, God, a broken and contrite heart. And Jesus said that man left justified. The other man is on his way to hell. False religions pray. Jesus said vain repetition. I do not hear. Don't be like the heathens who pray with vain repetition. I do not even hear those. And I always think what I used to do. Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus, 16 times. And then go out and sin like nobody's business. That's going to save you. Folks, we have to, this is a serious issue. There's no, that's why I get passionate. If you can tell me one other issue that is more important than this, I'll gladly listen. But the issue of salvation, the issue of praying for our children, that's why our nation is in the condition it's in. Can you imagine if churches across our landscape would just become churches of prayer? My house will be called a house of prayer, Jesus said. But we like a house of preaching. We love a house of worship. We'll go to that. I'm not going to try this. And I don't want people to feel bad, but I would be here because I'm here anyway. But if I said next Sunday, I'm not preaching, all we're doing is praying, I have a feeling we'd be half full. Would we not? Why is that? The most important thing is always the hardest. The most important thing in your Christian life is always the hardest to do. To lead your family, man, it's going to be hardest thing you've ever done. To have a daily devotional, it's going to be the hardest thing you've ever done. To exhibit self-control in the midst of adversity is going to be difficult. But these things are rewarding. It's what God's called us to do.