In this sermon, the speaker focuses on the opening verses of the book of Romans. He begins by expressing his gratitude to God for the faith of the believers in Rome, which is known throughout the world. The speaker emphasizes his dedication to serving God and constantly praying for the believers in Rome. He expresses his desire to visit them and impart spiritual gifts to them for their growth and establishment in their faith. The speaker also mentions his previous attempts to visit Rome, which were hindered, but he still hopes to have a fruitful ministry among them, just as he has had among the Gentiles.

Romans 1 8 First I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world For God is my witness whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his son that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers Making requested by any means now at length I might have a prosperous journey by the will of God to come to you For I long to see you that I may impart unto you some spiritual gift to the end that she may be established This is that I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me Now I would not have you ignorant brethren that oftentimes. I purpose to come unto you But was let hitherto that I might have some fruit among you also even as among the Gentiles I am a debtor both to the Greeks and the barbarians both to the wise and the unwise So as much as in me I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at Rome also Father we thank you for your word. And as we look at it this evening, we ask that you would feed us Teach us Lord as we get some wonderful insights into this wonderful man the Apostle Paul and Lord we might learn something as we see his heart kind of opened up and Exposed to us in this greeting. We ask that you teach us Strengthen us all in Jesus name. Amen One of the things that is very common I think oftentimes in fact if you are one to read commentaries And follow them oftentimes you'll notice that many commentaries they kind of you know They they'll actually break down the commentary, you know with all sorts of outlines and things with it Which is very good very helpful but oftentimes at the beginning it'll just have it'll explain a greeting and it'll just say Paul is greeting the folks in and saying hello to so-and-so and doing this and that but they just kind of have a general thing as if it's a greeting and they almost have a great tendency just to kind of fly by a lot of the opening things in many of the Paul's epistles and Oftentimes maybe almost beginning at verse 16 that we won't look at tonight But where Paul says I'm not ashamed of the gospel of Christ for is the power of God into salvation And this is where many look at now Paul beginning to really Teach and to really get into things but so far he's kind of given a greeting He said who he is what's going on and where he's been and what he's doing and then kind of giving some initial greetings To those that he is writing to but actually I believe that there is Tremendous information about Paul and about his heart and about what made Paul the man that he was Sometimes we look at somebody and we wonder God Why is it that some people you look at this guy? He saw this scripture so mightily. He understood them. He taught so Tremendously, he he had this tremendous gifting He had this tremendous heart this tremendous capacity to minister and we almost envy it and wish God Why I wish I could do these things and had this capacity to teach or do to minister or to be used mightily and but I think God when he picks somebody and he uses somebody it isn't for their ability It isn't for the giftings He is going to put in them or any human capacity as much as oftentimes It has an awfully lot to do with the type of a person They are with their heart and here in the initial opening part and portion of this book here Paul Opens his heart to us in a tremendous a wonderful way in the sense that if we were just to slip by these Greetings we would miss a lot Because I believe that if you and I can pick up the truth in these verses we're looking at tonight. It can transform our very life I believe that and so as we look at it I hope you'll look at this and wonder is there something that I read here that is that transforming? but here as we look at Paul, we're looking at obviously a tremendously godly man a Spiritual man a mature man a man there that had so much to give and so much to share with so many people But one of the things first of all that he says first there He's like the first thing I want to say to you is in verse 80 says first I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all that your faith is spoken of throughout the whole world But Paul is somebody the first thing he meant mentions to him He's not got a lot of things. I want to tell you and I'm gonna be writing a letter He didn't know he was writing Romans He just thought he was writing the letter to some friends at Rome And as he's writing that he just pouring his heart out to him and the very first thing he wants a she's first I want you to know how thankful I am for you and one of the things about a spiritual person About a godly person about somebody whose life is really desiring to be used and this fact is being used You'll see from Paul not just here But in many of his letters and we're gonna look at a number of his greetings in a moment But you'll see he is constantly thanking God for people and he is constantly thanking people For their lives and what they mean to him and what they mean to the kingdom of God Paul He could look at somebody and and you just sense within him as you read his letters that here was a man immensely grateful to people in First Corinthians 1 4 and I'll just read these these are the greetings in his epistles and 1 4 He says I think my God's all my God always on your behalf for the grace of God, which is given to you by Jesus Christ He's looked it was he starts to the church at Corinth. I thank God always on you for you in 2nd Corinthians 8 16 he says but thanks be to God which put the same earnest care Into the heart of Titus for you, but he looks at Are we how wonderful of a God we have how thankful we ought to be Godly people are thankful people. They're people that they look around and they can't believe they get to be alive They can't believe that God wants to use them and God gives them all of these people around them in Philippians 1 he says I thank my God upon every remembrance of you He just had this wonderful memory of people in Colossians 1 3 he says we give thanks to God and the father of our Lord Jesus Christ prayed always for you over and over in Paul's epistle Then first Thessalonians 1 we give thanks to God always for you all making mention of you always in our prayer He's somebody that he just read my remembrance of you my my thoughts of you As soon as like Paul you get as soon as your name would pop up in my mind. I'm thankful for you I even the memories I have of you and it's interesting many of the people that Paul was actually So excited to tell him how he remembered them they were not happy introductions when he met them Some of them beat him Some of them had him in prison Some of them, you know stoned him left him for dead and he was sent back now The Lord wakes him up lets him live send revives him sends it back That is now those people that just tried to kill you go back and tell him again. We love him and God loves him He said okay, let's go, you know and and then he would go but God had done so many things within his life That something had happened that he realized I do love them and I am thankful for people You know and in one of the most wonderful things that begins to happen in somebody like the Apostle Paul We're God's grace and peace as we looked at last week It transformed his life is that that Greg grace in that piece that is so powerfully come in He looked at people in an entirely Different perspective. He saw people differently. He looked at God. I'd see people. He was like a kid in a candy store People look at him all God. It is so wonderful in many times We you know, we've got people around us and we're not thankful for them And then as soon as you're not thankful for somebody or that very moment I think you've been extremely limited any capacity you have to work with them to help them to encourage them to bless them to teach Him to do anything for him of any good the Bible says speak the truth and love many times we speak the truth, but if there's no love if we are not thankful for The people that we're we're with and ministering to or around we will not be able to help them in one of the greatest Things that can happen in somebody's life was when God gives them a grateful heart and one for people that they love them How many times and maybe tonight you may you mean you think coincidentally, but maybe some of you you got a bunch of people You don't like You sit right here right now And as soon as I bring up the thought and I said you got a list already going and I even even asked you for a List yet, and you said I sure do you know or something and then you could go down, you know My boss my husband my wife my these people that my neighbor, you know or whatever else it is and on out of these people people people people, you know or something and You know and then that'll destroy your capacity if you don't love people even more than your own life That's how Paul was and he was thankful for them so often we're kind of like the two great buddies supposedly out one day taking a walk through the forest and as they come out into a clearing in a little Valley there all of a sudden they look over and here's this huge Grizzly bear that has just looked and seen lunch and it starts running at him and one of them he reaches down He grabs into his knapsack and he's putting on his tennis shoes and his friend looks over He says are you kidding? He said so but you can't outrun a grizzly bear and he looks at him He says I don't have to outrun the grizzly bear. I just have to outrun you You know, but sometimes we think we're great friends, but when push comes to shove We'll run over each other Survive Paul was not that way. He looked at people and he cared for them. He loved them they meant an awfully lot to him and First Thessalonians 2 13 Paul says for this cause. I also thank God without ceasing Because when you receive the Word of God, which you heard from us you received it. He looks at them. He says, I'm just so grateful I'm so thankful first Thessalonians 3 9 for what? Thanks. Can we render to God again for you? Here's the guy. He said I don't even know how to thank him anymore for you. I I'm just you what? Thanks more. Can we render to him? I'm just so immensely Grateful and maybe you know one thing tonight. You just might if there's people you look and realize I don't like them I don't like people. I don't need people, you know Or the you're it immediately it has a greater effect on you than the people you don't like than the people you aren't thankful for Paul was somebody God was so powerful to him. He was so real to him He was so sovereign to him that even when people were doing things to him Throwing rocks at him wanting to kill him one that he could she could see a look in their eye That he was he saw that look it was something there that He no doubt remembered I had that look once That's my look. That's how I was and God won me the gospel changed me and Paul I think he could look at people and realize I want I want you to know I know how we can get that look out of your eye and we can transform you And if there are people we don't are we and we're not thankful for and we can't love And we don't want around we're in trouble Kind of like I don't know if I ever told you the study of the father's the story of the full-on trip to Israel You know with his wife and mother-in-law and his mother-in-law died tragically. Sorry, but you know and on the trip in Israel and and the Undertaker meets with him and says to him. He says well, we've we can either bury her here for $150 or We can send her back to America for 5,000 Fella says send her to America. He said no. I don't think he understood He says if we can bury your mother-in-law here for $150 or we can return her they send her back and have her buried in the United States, but it's 5,000 He says I don't send send her back. He says why and he says 2,000 years ago You killed somebody and buried him here in three days later. They rose from the dead And I don't want to risk that with this woman Sometimes there may be somebody that if they were dead you'd be fine And you'd pay $5,000 to have it done. And then you're and then at the same time you would you'd you're Wish God would change their life. I think God looks as I'd like to change you first But how important is are we thankful for people has that ever got into us because that is one of the greatest keys That there is in life And it's also a great weakness at least with many and I suppose to me It's a tremendous weakness to tell you that be very honest with you on one hand I have a tremendous gratitude for people, but I'm terrible at verbalizing it Paul wasn't Paul was somebody you could hear over and over. I thank you. I'm so thankful for you You're so wonderful, and I don't know why I don't have any excuse. My parents are this way You're my mother You can't get around her without getting kissed and getting touched and getting hugged and how grateful for you Okay, I love you, too You know or whatever and I get my I got two brothers my older one I he calls me and he calls me sister. I am so thankful for you. You're the greatest brother and I say oh Sorry you feel that way, you know or whatever and they're so verbal my sister. I mean people I don't know why I fit in this family or where but but the thing is is that I am is I'm unbelievably grateful by verbalizing it When we determined God teach me how to say what is in my heart to communicate These things Paul had so no such weakness He could look at people and what in and he loved him and he could tell him and he was thankful for him and he would tell him and Not only though did he did he was he thankful for him. It goes on there in verse 9 and she said For God is my witness whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers People that are thankful for people pray for people. They're truly thankful to God They realize I am thankful for them. They're they're gonna be somebody that that they are gonna be gonna pray for them They're gonna not just realize well, I'm thankful for him, but it is something there were Paul. He had not just a heart that Had that for people they look as he said, I'm thankful for you, and you're always in my heart But then he could look at him and he says and the reason I'm you're in my heart is because I'm praying for you always Caring for you. He just Paul doesn't think about people He just didn't wonder about people. He just didn't consider people. He prayed for people a lot of times How many people do you have in your your your life that maybe you're not thankful for them? Well, if you're not thankful for him, you're probably not praying for him either, you know, sometimes, you know My nature is I can look at somebody and say well, I don't pray for you, but I pray about you You know or something but Paul was somebody he says I pray for you And there's a huge difference when there are people if we are thankful for people you then you will Automatically you'll pray for them And if you have a difficult time praying for people, you probably are having a difficult. I'm being thankful for people James 5 James writes and you know He says can fish confess your faults one to another and he says and pray for one another that ye may be healed He Paul says pray for each other that God will work within your lives And the the thing here is that Friends are not only people that that are thankful for each other. They pray for each other. They intercede for each other Okay, you know with Aaron and her, you know the story of course, of course with Moses when? Exodus 17 and begins his and then came Amalek and fought with Israel and Moses spoke unto Joshua and he says take out, you know The men gathered them together and Aaron and her and I we're gonna go up in the mountain and you take you know The army down in the valley and you'll fight but then they went up in the hill and Moses had the rod of God in his Hand it tells us when the rod was held high when Moses just lifted up and interceding Offering up himself and the people to God there that says when Moses held the rod of God high Israel prevailed But is he tired and the hand was down? It's his Amalek prevailed and then Aaron and her it says one got on one side and the other on the other side and they lifted up his hands and You know, the the battle was won as Moses was weary, but there they came alongside They know what it was to bear one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ Know what it is to do to pray and I don't think sometimes we realize how that that seems to touch God's heart when he sees people that pray for others They care for each other one of the most interesting Phenomena I thought suppose that there is about prayer in the Bible is the Lord says when two or more you agree on earth touching anything Do it Says when you can come and there is an agreement that happens when you know, you and and you come to me with it and You know, it moves my heart. I love it. I think God's so used to seeing his kids we come God I need this God. I want this God. How come when you know, come on But when but when somebody else Sounded like our own kids sometimes when they're young and growing up daddy. Can I daddy? How about when please? and I don't know how much we listen as parents, but I had three sons and when The two of them would bring the third and say dad, would you please? Do this for him Sit there and say, all right. What are you guys up to? Don't you with this see three of them unified? To see three of them coming and and two of them laying hands in a sense on the other green not for themselves But for somebody that they love God loves to see is brought together that that would motivate me to say look I don't even really want to give it to you and it's probably a bad decision, but just seeing you guys Care for each other like this you can have it You know and and I don't know what you're gonna do with a stick of dynamite, but have fun but anyway, nobody or whatever else but the point of it is is that when we When we realize that what it is to intercede And what it is to care and to pray for one another I've had a friend that I've had for over 40 years grew up with him and Yesterday called me and we've been through a lot of times through our lives He's still in and out of contact is in different levels and things, but we have a great love for each other And yesterday he called me and told me that he'd found Cancer in his lung and In here it was unlike any conversation We've ever had and we've had a lot of conversations spiritually And there's been a lot of time a lot of scripture a lot of sharing but there was something there that just was so real and You realize this is out of man's hands in it. This is in God's hands and In here I not only I look there is somebody that I'm very thankful for But they're all sort of realize the opportunity before we hung up to pray for him And then I had to tell him I won't cease to pray for you I well, I can't know I won't stop praying for you And when we have something, you know And we when you care for people you you pray for people and Paul had this this heart and this is a these are great Fundamental ingredients of a godly person. Do we are we thankful for them? Do we pray for them and In verse 11, he says for I long to see you that I may impart to you some spiritual gift that to the end You may be established You know People that are thankful for people pray for people and people that pray for people long for people in Poem Paul says longing there, you know I'd be in in Philippians Paul says I long for you all in the bowels of Jesus Christ In other words, this is something when Paul says there is the people he's gonna write this tremendous letter to why did God give him? The letter why did God give him these great truths? Why did God give to Paul one of the greatest, you know things ever written the book of Romans? And I don't believe it was just any little coincidence He just happened to be the right guy came along at the right time and God wanted to send a letter somebody here You got the time you can write here send it No I think there was somebody that because God was giving the some of these great truths to somebody that that was thankful for people He we loved people he prayed for people he longed for them Do you ever have something happen where for another person? He ever had something that can maybe happen in your life to where you literally when Paul says how I long for you in the bowels Of Jesus Christ the pit of your stomach is what he's in You ever have something that it literally in the pit of your stomach. It just grabs you Emotionally it is so profound. This is how Paul when he thought of people When he cared for people when he was thankful for people and when he prayed for people He says how I long for you. They weren't just statistics. They weren't just People they were people that he deeply cared for that. He deeply wanted to see Happen in Romans 9 later on Paul is gonna write and he's gonna tell him in this very letter He says for I wish I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren my kinsmen According to the flesh Paul looked at these people that everybody else could hate These Jews that were so hostile and angry and trying to destroy the church His brethren, but he looked at him and he said, you know, I I wish God could take my name out of the Lamb's Book of Life and write their name in it Now that is a remarkable thing Think about that Think about is there anybody in the world that you care for you long for so much? I mean we look there. We're kind of like again the guys out there in the forest, you know Hey, you're a great buddy. But when the grizzly bears coming, I'm sorry. I got a run It's you or me But to think there that Paul looks there and he says I could wish myself accursed for my brethren's sake They would know God There's a man who longs there is a man who sees people with the heart of God Because you see that's exactly God's heart God long for people so much is he let his son be accursed For our sake and when God can implant this kind of a heart within us Do I long for people do I care for people is this in my heart for people? And it is something there were you know Paul had this a Great love a great care a great compassion, you know for people Read a story of a couple of fellows back in World War one actually But they growing up they were inseparable so much so as they enlisted in the army together. They trained together They were shipped overseas together They fought side-by-side in the trenches and one time during an attack one of them was out of the out of the trenches Trying to get over to another one and he was shot and laid out there dying and there was no way anybody could possibly even Dream to get in who he's a sitting duck, but just laying there dying in front of him and this buddy He started to get up to go out and a sergeant comes over and grabs him and pulls him back in He says I order you don't go. There's nothing you can do for him except for you will just die trying And so at the moment the sergeant turned around to go this fella Still jumped right out ran out there and grabbed his buddy coming back. He was mortally wounded here He by the way and his buddy had already died He comes back and he by the time he gets him back his buddy is dying is dead He's dying the sergeant is both angry and yet moved and he says why? Why did you do this? And he says it was such a waste of your life and of his And yet and then he says oh no his last words, you know, we're not a waste He said his last words out of his mouth. He said when I got to him Sergeant the only thing he said was I knew you would come Jim There was something there that he looked at his friend and realized I've got somebody in the world that I know he'll come and Paul was that kind of guy he looked at people and he so loved them He so cared for them that he was going to get to him one way or another He was going to pray for him. He was going to intercede. He was going to reach out He was going to find a way to make a trip to him I long to be with you that I can impart something to you and when these are the type of people so often we want to get to a letter and study it and learn the Greek and study the Hebrew and learn how to parse the sentence and do all sorts of things when they come to the deeper meaning But so often the people that the deepest meaning really comes to are the ones that find themselves Sitting before God and saying make me this type of a person One time many years ago, I am in Mary very long and at the time I was over one night Jean I were or day. I can't remember whether it's day or night now, but uh at My mother and father-in-law's house and while we're there the phone rang and it was wilbur smith Now some of you may have heard and know that name. He was a very good friend of my father-in-law's and they prayed together Billy graham once said about wilbur smith. He'd never man who knew the bible better in all the world than wilbur smith He was a brilliant man with the bible but he Called and my mother-in-law answered the phone. She's so high and she's and uh, my father-in-law He was kind of said put out his hand to take the phone and and because it was always, you know Calling to talk to him and he's holding his hand out there and and she says, uh, oh just a minute Let me get your fill or something. He and she says oh Oh Oh Oh, you know, she just kind of several times said yes. Well, oh, yeah, okay You know or whatever and then she says yes and bye to you, you know and hangs up the phone and we're looking at this thing and And she said there. What was that? He says You know, what what was that conversation? She said well it was wilbur And he asked me if i'd pray for him And I said, you know what, you know and and he said well i'm tired i'm starting to teach romans again He says i've already taught the book over 50 times in my life I know it very well But as I was studying at this time the lord put you on my heart and asked told me to call you And ask you to pray for me as I teach this book because he spoke to me and he said You do not know it as well as marguerite anderson And there was something I think that when we find sometimes I mean just look at this guy Boy, he knew it on one level, but he looked at her and he says I don't know it like you And when there is something within us that we're saying god, I want your word not just in my mind I want it to penetrate my heart What makes me tick who am I when I think of people when I think of the world? When I think of the frustrations or I think of what happens in life. Am I somebody that before god so? Deeply I want to be a thankful person I want to be somebody i'm a prayerful person. I want to long for other people These are the ingredients. I believe that made paul so much of what what paul, uh paul was Even like moses had this kind of a heart It reveals to me why god chose moses in so many ways when one time god even You know is upset with the children of israel and he says moses step aside. I'm gonna just destroy him That's it And moses i'm sure god knowing exactly, you know What was in moses's heart but allowing a situation for moses to have some wonderful work happen within him Where something rose up within moses's heart and he comes back before god. He says wait a minute God if blot my name out of your book Not theirs and I think god looked and he says That's what I was looking for you care And moses he could get angry and he could be frustrated and he was at times But he was somebody there that he uh, he knew what it was to long for people And paul knew what it was to long for people not and because he longed for him He also encouraged him in verse 12. It says and that is he says that I may come That I may be comforted together with you by the mutual faith both of you and me He looks at me. So i'm just long. I'm just looking together for us just to be together Our faith talking about it sharing together being comforted and the word there it suggests means encouraged He said I could just to get with you and just have something that we start talking I know it'll be so encouraging to be with you I know it'll be so wonderful if I could just get there and we could just sit down and we could talk and we could Be together. I got so many So many things that I know would just be such a wonderful time we could have A Paul was the type of guy. I think sometimes when he looked at people he they he did it was everybody He saw it was almost like a saint Or it was somebody who didn't know that That's what god's plan for him was yet And he could just look at him to say I got so many things to tell you If you'll just let me talk to you if you'll let me share a little bit I can tell you what god thinks about you And what he's got for you and what he's got to give you the mutual faith He's the way I can share it and I can I want to come I want to be there with you Paul was the type of guy, you know that you all would always hope I suppose to be around with you when you're in trouble You look at this guy if ever there's somebody you might want to call on when you're down You realize this guy no matter where he was he had hope He could be in anything and he had encouragement and he had a message and he had a heart And half the time when he'd write these letters he'd be in prison he'd be in chains But when you wrote the letter you thought you'd think he's sitting on tahiti, you know out on the beach You know with the waves coming in with you know with somebody playing music while he's saying let me write a letter What will I say today? They're so beautiful They're so powerful and yet here he's in prison and he's suffering and he's going through terrible things and yet It's like paul. Could you say let me think about people And he could sit there in prison and all of a sudden in his trials he could run I'm, so thankful for these people They're so wonderful And I pray for him and I long for him and I want to encourage them I got something for him and I think most of people when they get one of paul's letters and he's so positive so Overwhelmingly wonderful paul's the type of guy to me you'd read his letter And you'd almost think you know jesus Lord why can't I be in prison like paul, you know or something? It's sort of a thing. This guy's got it made. Look at what he's what Why does paul get to go to all the prisons, you know or something? He was a guy that he had so said victory was so deep and so real within him It had nothing to do with any external situation And you'd get around a guy like this and you'd just look at him and just say talk to me I don't care what you say I know you love me. I know you care and I know you you'll pray for me And when we are somebody that we would long to be like that if you because paul was somebody just in Encouraged and he and he loved and he enjoyed people in verse 13 He says now I would uh not have you ignorant brethren how that oftentimes I purpose to come unto you And I led some other place That I might have some fruit among you also i've been wanting to come and I'd have some fruit as And he said I just wish I you could just see how much paul was this type of a guy that he just seemed to enjoy people He seems like the ultimate christian Socialite, you know sort of a guy this the did he loved being around people? And the amazing thing about this is this was not what he was Paul was a guy that when you look back at his life before you want to meet a guy who hated people And hated life people were the major irritation in the world for him He loved to make people miserable And so often we sometimes maybe think well, you know, i'm not real outgoing i'm not real sociable It's one of my things. I mean, I I do love people but and i'm kind of thankful for him But but we have this thing. Well god made me different I'm, not one of these social people. I'm not outgoing You know, I i'm a single, you know, my only child I have only child syndrome And you know or something and you know only child I was just told, you know Speak when you're spoken to and they never spoke to me, you know, or whatever We have all these excuses on why we are what we are. Well, i'm reclusive in my nature And we have all of these things. We'll get over it So what? that We think that we're that that's Who we were or how we lived or how we came Into the world and therefore that's fundamentally what we are Most people don't believe this about me, but I my mother when she tells me when I was a little child There's four children in our family four children in four years. They're all born And i'm the second child. I have second child syndrome in the uh But it's something to where she said, you know, you were so reclusive You didn't need anybody in all world when you're a little child And the four kids kids would be out there and playing and they'd all have the toys And you just take a bunch of toys and you go over and sit in the corner And you'd have the greatest time you'd go for hours just playing with your own toys and then one of the kids would come over and look and take take one of the toys and walk away and you would just Stare at them walk and walk like would you do that? And then they come back and they get another toy and you'd watch them go But then you'd go on playing until they got the last toy and then we'd watch you every time Then you'd sit there a minute and stare at them Then you'd get up and walk across that room and grab that toy and spack them with it and go right back And sit down in a corner I mean, you know, I mean which I I look there and realize that's me I'll tell you what I mean to this day I don't have fellowship that I enjoy with anybody in the world like I do myself You know, I mean by human nature a lot of us we can just just put me in a corner. Leave me alone And we get along we all agree me myself and I I don't need anybody But paul looked at that as if to say get over it Romans 12 13. It says that we are to be given to hospitality A leader is to be blameless the husband or wife vigilant sober good behavior given to hospitality Paul writes to the church and tells titus. He says be a lover of hospitality First peter 4 9 peter writes and he says use hospitality one to another without grudging. He says open your life Open your life and share it with people Not because it's your nature But because it's god's call In so many times I do people they they say i'm not that's not me. I'm, just not that type And i'm a loner, you know, well That's not an excuse That's like somebody saying i'm a thief I was born a thief I stole from my brothers and sisters when I was little you see I'm a thief Well, that's sin You got to get over it Let he who stole steal no more But when we sit there and say well i'm a loner get over it And when we realize that is god did not create me to be a loner It means one of the sad things I mean the world sometimes you see people that they they bought into some sort of a thinking that i'm supposed to spend my life Alone because my nature seems to be that way I mean even animals play with each other You know no big thing Let me just read a little thing to you that kind of touched me a little bit If you can start the day without caffeine If you can get along without pep pills if you can resist complaining to and boring other people with your troubles If you can eat the same food every day and be grateful for it if you can understand Uh when your loved ones are too busy to give you any time If you can overlook it when something goes wrong and through no fault of yours and those That love you take it out on you If you can take criticism and blame without resentment if you can ignore a friend's limited education and never correct him If you can resist treating a rich friend better than a poor friend If you can face the world without lies and deceit if you can conquer tension without medical help if you can relax without liquor If you can sleep without the aid of drugs If you can say honestly that deep in your heart you have no prejudice against creed color religion or politics Then my friend you're almost as good as your dog A dog does all those things and it's still your best friend Still yeah, it takes all sorts of rejection. We kick them around. We leave me alone. It's your fault same food every day and yet it's still Social You think it ate us But the thing is is that when we look there and say god give make me a lover of hospitality a lover of people and then lastly Paul was somebody that one of his most wonderful qualities that I think had so much to do with the man that he was as he Was indebted to people Verse 14. He says I am a debtor both to greeks and to barbarians both of the wise the unwise So as much as in me I am ready to preach the gospel to you that are at rome also Paul was somebody there that he looked at every person. He said I owe it to you I owe god's love to you I go my love. I owe my thankfulness. I owe my prayers to you. It isn't something I just Choose to do although it's either choice involved. It's more than that I owe it to you I'm a human being that's created in god's image on the way to being recreated in jesus christ's image and therefore I owe you because god seemed to have his heart where he Gave all of these things in his heart I owe it to you as well So I love you and I care for you and i'm thankful for you And I pray for you and I want to encourage you and I want to bless you You know Jesus had taught greater love hath no man than this and he laid down his life for his friends Paul could look at all of them and just say I I owe it to you God has so blessed me with the greatest eternal truths The most fabulous and wonderful information all the world. He has made me a steward of it And i've got to get it out. I owe it to you. I am a debtor to you And when we realize that this is great love lays its life down I'm sure many of us for one reason or another growing up probably read the tale of two cities charles dickens book And if you remember the book you remember that there was these two very close friends charles darnay and sydney carton and these two friends, uh You know darnay is a frenchman and to make this story extremely short he ends up where he gets thrown into a dungeon And about to go to the guillotine the next morning But his friend carton There was somebody that he looked there. He had all but wasted his life corrupt englishman Ruined everything about his life, but he looked over at his friend there that was going to the guillotine the next morning And he gets into the uh, the prison He drugs his friend Changes outfits with him has his friend dragged out Where he's left and as you know the story the next morning he's heading off there to the guillotine And there to die in the place of his friend And there he turns and as dickens says as he writes there as he's going to the guillotine He says greater love this man. He turns greater love hath no man in this thing laid down his life for his friends And he realized you know, I can waste my life But if I can learn before I die to love somebody more than me I've learned something And when we realize that when you look at paul again here a man there A man, as I said, he once hated people He was feared by people. He couldn't stand people couldn't tolerate people Nobody was good enough for paul and paul wasn't even good enough for himself And yet when god's love changed him When their god's grace and god's peace overtook him The next thing you know is he he became somebody says the love of christ constrains me It's gripped me. It's grabbed my heart and then through the rest of this letter We're going to see some tremendous theological truths But one of the greatest aspects of it is the heart to the man from which it comes And when we find and ask ourselves lord, what am I? Do I love people? John writes in his epistles and he says love not the world Neither the things are in the world for the things are the world the lust of the flesh the lust of the eyes and the pride of life And all that the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the pride of life is The lust of the flesh is your passions The lust of the eyes is possessions and the pride of life is your position and a lot john says don't ever love Your passions don't love possessions and don't love your position in life They're all things Don't ever love something that is inanimate and can't love you back Love those that are in god's image they can return it And many times, you know, we we love the world We love our this or we love that and then this or that or something's denied us and we're hostile and we're angry but when we love people And we love loving people And say god this is why i'm created Not to love a thing Let it go Not to love a position not to love a passion Not to love a sport not to love other desires Oh, we're around the world and we're in it, but we're not to be of it, but we're to love one another And that when we say god give me this heart. I think we're on the right road Let's pray father, we just thank you and praise you for your love Thank you dear lord for your desire for us And lord, I pray that tonight your love would constrain us We would look and maybe again there's people that we don't care about That we gladly outrun them and leave them for the bear to eat There are people that if they just died right now we'd just say that's just fine Lord I pray that you would give us a heart Like yours Because these people that we're so angry at You look at and you say well, they Just a saint that doesn't know how to be one yet It just hasn't been delivered the goods they don't know mercy and love and grace they don't know Forgiveness and hope they don't know my power But lord, may we come tonight and say lord, would you may your love constrain me? And as paul goes on later in Romans When he says the love of god is shed abroad in our hearts by the holy spirit who has given to us Lord, may this kind of a love That isn't ours. We can't cultivate it on our own. We can't decide it It's a gift from you It's poured out when we begin to cry out to the spirit of god to say I want heaven's love. I'm tired of my own My own is so impatient. It has so many limits It's so weak. It's so vulnerable. It isn't consistent It has no staying power But I thank you that the love of god. There's no shadow of turning in it. It's the same yesterday today and forever It changes not Lord, this is the love we want And tonight we just want to open our hearts and ask lord that you would just take your word And father, maybe some of us need to say lord, forgive me just take out These attitudes towards people people that jesus you died for People that you still look at and you love them as much as you ever loved me Before I ever met you And lord, may you give us love and may we find ourself being able to be thankful And lord, may we find ourself in the gratitude of life Lord of being able to to pray And to long And the lord begin to put people in our heart in such a way Instead of in our mind where we're angry But in our heart where we love Lord teach us these things We ask it in jesus name amen