The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.
00:00 Let me just start off the sermon. This is a story, a movie most of you who watch Avengers won't see.
00:07 We brought up in a diet of popcorn movies. How many of you have seen this movie called Tully? See any? Oh, wow. We
00:14 have a few people. Yes, I think doctors see it. Right now, let me just explain a
00:19 bit of story. It has Charisone and you know, she's such a great actress and she plays the role of a mom who's basically
00:27 struggling. She had one kid who is difficult. He goes to the kindi and you know he's a sensitive kid. She just gave
00:34 birth. The husband is not like husband doesn't care. He doesn't know how to connect. So he plays video games at
00:39 night. He kills zombies and then goes to bed in her own actual words. So she she struggles. One day she meets a nanny and
00:48 the nanny's name is Tali. And so the movie basically goes around the
00:53 relationship between Tali and Charlie. Boring movie, right? Everybody watches
00:59 Endgame won't watch a show like this. They'll fall asleep. Now the whole movie has a lot of
01:05 dialogue and basically you see the character development between these two. But what happens to the movie? It does a
01:11 night shyan on you. Those of you who watch night Shyamalan, you should know what that means. There's a twist. You
01:18 see the character Tali, she doesn't exist.
01:23 She's in the mind of Sharis Throne.
01:29 What she has is that she's suffering from postpartum depression to the point
01:34 of being so bad she has projected a younger version of her of herself is
01:39 becoming a psychosis. And so at the end of the movie you find out that Sharis Tron is actually having
01:46 a mental burnout and she finds she has no support from the husband from anyone else. She
01:53 projects this imaginary character. The movie became highly controversial
01:60 because it deals with this issue called postpartum psychosis. How many of you ever heard of this before I spoke about
02:06 this? It's a real condition. And in interview Charlie Stone says
02:12 something which we're going to do today. We don't talk about it.
02:18 So what we're going to do, we're going to start off a series of sermons about speaking the truth in love. Today the
02:24 introduction sermon. They're all going to deal with topics that we don't talk
02:29 about in church. So once a month we get uncomfortable. So here are some things we don't talk about. Do we talk about
02:36 domestic violence? The statistics tells you we don't. We don't talk about mental
02:41 health. How about suicides? That's really on the rise in the church. And when we don't do it, when you do
02:47 statistics, they'll tell you the church not only doesn't talk about it, the church pretends it doesn't exist. One of
02:53 the recent uh uh scandals involved one of the largest mega churches Wiggle
02:58 Willow Creek and Bill Hibels and there was a case of basically a sexual
03:03 inappropriate behavior in the 1980s and he had to take a secular movement
03:09 like me too to bring this to justice 40 years later.
03:15 Now let's not just go there. Let's not go to all these difficult uncomfortable depressing topic. Let's just talk about
03:21 normal things. You know, I cannot tan honor.
03:27 Are you going to tell me that? Hi Anna.
03:32 And it will be the same way. So we we live in a culture where we don't know
03:37 how to speak the truth in love. I had a talk to few men and you should
03:44 hear what they say about marriages. They will all tell you it's hard to talk to your spouses. You you talk to wives,
03:50 wives will tell you the same thing. We have the same issue your children. You talk to the children, they put on
03:55 the headphones and then go on the iPad. So this is an issue and and it happens
04:00 very much in church. So what we do once a month is go on real topics. So today
04:05 we're going to do overview and we're going to talk about two things. how to talk about sensitive difficult topics
04:11 like suicide, depression, violence, postpartum depression, and how to talk
04:17 about things where I just don't get on with you. You know, I you get on my nerves, I know. And how do I get that
04:25 across? So, we're going to talk about speaking the truth in love. Let's open
04:30 uh in prayer and
04:44 Yes.
04:55 And the translation is a river, however dirty,
05:00 you can clean it at the bottom, you'll still be dirty,
05:05 but until you get to the root of it at the top,
05:20 And Lord, we pray that the words we use, that we are conscious of speaking words
05:25 that build one another up and don't tear each other down. And we ask this morning you be with us. I pray that I disappear,
05:32 I get smaller, and you get so large your glory fills this place. And we say this
05:38 in Jesus name. Amen. Let me just give you the synopsis. Speaking the truth in
05:44 love in relation to sensitive issues. Number one is not taught in school, work or church how to discuss sensitive
05:51 issues lovingly. Consequently, we pretend like these issues don't exist to maintain some semblance that everything
05:57 is okay. But love rejoices in the truth. 1 Corinthians 36, as we are not practicing
06:04 this, therefore our love for each other is crippled. So if I'm in church and I I had an issue in the past, something bad
06:10 happened to me in the past, I'm not going to bring it up to you. even struggling with postpartum depression,
06:16 I'm not going to talk to you. If I have a kid who's suicidal, I'm not going to talk to you. If one of my children is
06:22 gay, I'm not going to talk to you. I'm going to come to church and say, "Hi, brother Anna. Hallelujah.
06:30 That's what I'm going to do." And there's much more truth to that than we like to imagine. Number two, speaking
06:35 the truth in love in relation to confrontation. Again, we're not taught in school, work, or church how to
06:41 confront others lovingly. We are told we're supposed to do it in Matthew 18. We don't know how to do it.
06:46 Consequently, we repress how we feel about others to maintain some semblance of peace. Come on, everybody here loves
06:52 me. No. Do I love everybody here? I can say yes. But those are words. How do I
06:60 demonstrate it? Let's be very honest. We all don't get on with one another in church. And some characters like me who
07:06 are a bit more irritating, even worse. So that's the truth. But love rejoices
07:11 in the truth. 1 Corinthians 36, as we are not practicing this, therefore our love for each other is crippled. And
07:17 we're not talking about enemies. We're just talking about resentment. I don't like the way you do things. You know,
07:23 you you did something to me that just really got on my nerves. And hi, Anna. Smell e smell smell eco. Don't talk to
07:31 you, ma. All right. So, let me just go to the text. The text is fantastic. You are facing some issues
07:38 in your marriage. We still talking about speaking the truth in love. According to the text, you should approach your spouse and gent speak the truth in love.
07:46 This should be done gently in a nonconfrontational manner. Is this true or false?
07:52 What do you think? I don't want you to raise your hands because all of you know raise hands on it. I say true or keep quiet. I say false or so keep quiet.
07:60 Correct. Not waste time. Let me tell you it's false. It's false.
08:07 That is not what the text is teaching. And in fact, the Bible has places where the confrontation is very brutal. You
08:14 find it in Galatians. Paul rebukes Peter publicly. Wow. So no face. You know, you
08:21 look at the letter to the Corinthian church is so brutal. In second Corinthians, Paul had to explain why he
08:27 wrote such a brutal letter. In the letter to the Galatians, he calls them, "You foolish Galatians, write off." Very
08:34 brutal. So the text isn't saying it. Now I'm not saying that it's wrong to do it.
08:40 In fact, it's great if all of us had this practice where we got to issue, we're going to go across to another
08:46 party and says, "Dear, I got a problem. I talk to you." How many of you actually do that? 99.9% I suggest don't. We just
08:54 keep quiet. Now, I'm not even going to say whether that's right or wrong. Let's see what the text says. Here's another
09:01 problem of this. You can be very nice about it, but your intention could be wrong. If someone come up to me, if
09:08 Peter came up to me after my sermon and say, "Hey, brother Anna, thank you, brother Arnold." You know, you did a
09:14 great sermon, very encouraged, but brother Arnold, I want to tell you there was something not quite right about it.
09:20 I will tell Peter, "What's wrong with you today?" Because you don't need to talk to me
09:25 like that. They call that salesmanship. So just because you know all the tactics
09:32 you know who are the worst patients for counseling let me tell you this is quite common and I'm not going to insult
09:38 anyone you'll be surprised you know do you know who they say are the worst patients for counseling or who are who
09:43 which is the subgroup which will never go for counseling doctors.
09:49 doctors because doctors are trained. They all trained on bedside manners.
09:58 So you can have the skill of the bedside manner but the heart can still be hard.
10:04 So just because I talk to you nicely, gently and all of that. That's just technique.
10:09 But my heart could be very far away. No offense to any doctors here, but this is what you read on the net. Huh? Okay.
10:15 Okay. The gospel truth is the foundation of all truths. So when the text talks
10:22 about speaking the truth in love, you got to look at the book ends of the book. Ephesians 1 opens up and says you
10:29 were including Christ when you heard the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation. So the context here is false
10:36 teaching. Now how we going to lead that to speaking the truth and love in a personal level? I think there's a lot of
10:43 ways. And at the end of the book of Ephesians, he says the same thing. Stand first then with the belt of truth. And
10:50 in between there are two main themes happening in the book of Ephesians. How God in a cosmic manner brings all
10:58 creation under the cross. And from chapter two onwards, the whole thing
11:03 deals with the unity of the church. And we're going to merge the two together. Now look at what it says here. Instead
11:10 speaking the truth in love we will one truth is corporate grow to become in
11:17 every respect the mature body. So truth is not just a process is a corporate
11:24 process. So you want to know whether you feel what you feel about
11:31 Anolim is right is not just you and me. It's a process that involves the whole
11:37 church. That's the key here. That's what really is one of the main drivers of Ephesians. Now let's see how
11:44 we break this down. Number one, the text links with that very famous prayer in
11:50 the earlier chapter because he begins off with the word then. And we had that fantastic prayer about how wide and long
11:58 and deep is the love of God. So that ties to this. It not only ties to the chapter before, it ties to the chapter
12:05 after this because he says, "So I tell you this." And after that we have this whole section of putting all the old
12:12 selves, putting on the new self. And then it goes on to marriage, it goes on to work. So how you behave at work, how
12:19 you behave in your marriage, how you behave in church is tied to this chapter is tied to that famous prayer. That's
12:24 the big picture of the whole thing. So give you three points before you speak
12:31 how sure are you is the truth. Speak the truth in love by living the
12:36 truth in love. Speaking the truth in love is a community endeavor, not a solo
12:43 effort. So let's look at the way unity is just all over the text. And there actually
12:49 three main sections in it. We're going to break it down. The first one verses 3 to 5, Paul really talks about we all
12:57 one. Remember in the chapter beforehand, he talks about how Gentiles and Jews no
13:02 longer wall of hostility. Now you're one. This text is very similar to 1
13:07 Corinthians chapter 12. One body, one spirit, one Lord, one baptism. So here in these verses he stresses unity. We go
13:16 down to verses 9 onwards verses 11 he talks about the various offices of the
13:21 church. Again you should cross reference to 1 Corinthians 12 and Romans 12. These
13:26 three all have offices or have gifts. From unity he's going to what? He's
13:32 going to diversity. And then verses 14 onwards 15 we had this verse speaking the truth in love.
13:38 We will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head.
13:43 From him the whole body joined and held together by every ligament grows and builds itself up. He's now going on
13:50 maturity. So you get unity, diversity, maturity and the glue that hels it
13:56 together is the gospel because the gospel manifests the love. Let me just
14:01 break it down together. So this is what you call the breeding ground for
14:06 speaking the truth in love. You don't have this breeding ground. It's just you versus me. Your opinion, my opinion. You
14:14 need a church which is united. What is it united? United is not the same as
14:21 uniformity. United simply means that all of us have one common goal and the goal
14:28 is the cross. The gospel broke down all barriers. That's a chapter beforehand.
14:34 And then there's diversity keyphience diversity between Jews and
14:39 Gentiles in Galatians, men, women, slave, free, all of this, various offices, various
14:46 gifts, diversity, different ages. It's like what we see here today. And that is
14:53 difficult because diversity often brings conflict. And so you move to maturity.
14:59 Let me try to go this down a little bit deeper. 911
15:06 narrative is that it shows you the dangers of religious extremism. If you do a poll among southern Baptists in
15:13 America or what you call the rust belt of America, 99.9% will say, "See this is
15:20 what you get when we are too tolerant on immigration issues.
15:26 Tighten up the airports. Some religions are just extremists.
15:31 Now take this picture and bring it to Palestine. Take it to Iraq. Take it to the Middle
15:38 East. Take it to Jordan. The narrative is different. It'll tell you the daily
15:44 consequences of a foreign policy that destroys nations. Now, what am I telling you here? Because this is not unity. Is
15:51 uniformity. You're white, conservative, churchgoing,
15:57 narrative one. You're Arab, Middle Eastern, Christian
16:02 or Muslim, narrative two. What is the similarity? Different racial group.
16:09 So that's uniformity. That's what Paul is trying to drive at. Let me give you something simpler. The belt and road
16:16 initiative. Same group of people will tell you is a predatory dep trap.
16:23 just go on to Fox News. You go into all of this uh the Chinese
16:28 will put you into a debt trap. But it's quite I find it quite
16:33 hypocritical because the same people who say this didn't say anything when the IMF brought a lot of people into debt in
16:39 the 80s. Take this narrative to China. What do you get? Do you think they say that?
16:44 They say no. Win-win. I got a Huawei phone.
16:51 Next year I cannot access Google. Whose fault is it? You ask all the
16:56 America, all the Chinese, America's fault. They try to bully us. They've been
17:03 bullying us since the Opium War. We must take the long road and B out. Correct or
17:09 not? Take the same thing and go to America.
17:14 Southern rust belt. Whose fault is it? China's fault. Because Huawei and the
17:21 government are interchangeable. Why do you think they arrested someone in Canada? You cannot trust the Chinese.
17:27 They don't believe in democracy. What's the issue here? Again, same
17:34 thinking to a particular racial group. You could repeat that in Malaysia. You
17:40 ask Malays what they feel about what Masley says in the education. You go and do a poll. Same statement. You go and go
17:47 to the Chinese and do a poll. Now I want to spend a bit of time with this. What am I trying to tell you? Our
17:53 thinking is very much conditioned by the group.
17:59 And if the group is all the same in race, same in uh social standing, same
18:07 in certain things, you will take the beliefs of the group. They call this group thing or they call this the
18:14 illusionary truth effect. So if you're in a church that tells you speaking tongues is bad is bad is bad you go say
18:22 it's bad bad all tongues have ceased because you've been downloaded that you
18:28 go to church where they tell you everyone should speak in tonesues everyone should speak in tonesues everyone should speak in tonesues you go
18:33 away singing hallelujah not insulting anyone speaks in tong
18:39 because at one point I thought I spoke in tones but the group has a lot of impact on do.
18:45 So, the evangelical church needs diversity. What's wrong with this picture? And why don't I want to take
18:52 some time to really go into this? Because everyone here is white.
18:57 And how many blondes do you see there? I never seen so many blondes in my life. Do you see a Hispanic? You see an
19:04 afroamerican? You see a Chinese? by all means paying Jesus for Trump if
19:12 that's your religious if that's your conviction. But if he tells you that paying 25%
19:18 tariff is being paid by the Chinese government and not by American companies, that's a blatant lie. Do you
19:25 think those people will say anything? You see how we are colored?
19:31 You see, we've with with rightwing and I I try not to be offensive rust belt
19:36 Americans. So long you are pro-life, anti-gay, pro- Israel, everything else
19:42 goes out the window because you measure truth only by these three things. It's a
19:47 moral proposition. Now I tell you why this is so deadly.
19:52 And why is so deadly for ABC? Let me give you a statement. The time is fulfilled for this country.
20:00 It is because of this leader that Christ God the help and redeemer has become effective effective among us. This
20:08 leader is the way of the spirit and the will of God for this country's people to enter the church of Christ.
20:14 You know who is talking about Hitler.
20:20 And when Germany was reeling from national disaster from the first world
20:26 war group think happens we are ashamed. We all need to think forward. You blind
20:34 yourself to horrors that come except for one man called Dietri Bonhoffer and the
20:40 confessing church. Now why am I telling all of this? Because you and I are a product not of the Bible.
20:48 You're a product of the group you hang around with. So let me give you a simpler example worship.
20:56 Say me and Chuch Chan get into a fight about worship. Huh? I get a group of people say yeah his worship very loud.
21:04 He don't like hymns. You know he turn into performance. I get five 10 of
21:10 people. It becomes truth. Chuchan just get a few people this honor very oldfashioned.
21:15 He don't appreciate progress. He don't know what is victorious singing. He put five 10 people that that become truth.
21:22 You see where we going in our church. This is the issue. So Paul recognizes that you want to have a breeding ground
21:30 from group. You all better mix around. Old people, young people, single people, married people, intergenerational,
21:37 Indians, Chinese. You don't mix but you all hang around out globe cafe all same kakang.
21:45 You have no idea what that does to your brain. That is what he's saying. You
21:51 see, Ephesus is an interesting book because it's very generic. It doesn't give you a much of the social context
21:57 like say one Corinthians or Galatians. But in Ephesus, it's a famous temple
22:02 called the temple of Armus. We just talked about uniformity. Here's another
22:08 thing which Paul talks about which is very dangerous. So we have one, the danger, uniformity. Here's another one.
22:14 At those time the gods were on the hill and the gods create confusion because
22:22 one god says this one god says that all the gods have various views. Today the
22:28 biggest religion which everyone practices even in the church
22:33 the gods are not on the hill the gods are in the valley. To be more
22:40 accurate, they are the gods of Silicon Valley. This is your god today.
22:49 Social media. If you're in a certain social group now and we and 5G hasn't come on us, you
22:57 know how many of you who go to Lazada after a while the popup will come up. They know your price point. They know
23:04 what you're looking for. Why do you think data analytics is such big business? They're not doing it because
23:10 they really want to help you. They are mining data to milk you for stuff.
23:16 They have deceitful intention. Data is king, not cash.
23:22 Is data because data profits people because you can see the studies. You
23:27 open your handphone and how many time do you get sent a message from say Malays who have issues with Chinese? You don't
23:34 get it. But how many times do you get messages from Chinese who have problems with Malaysia? You get it all the time.
23:40 Correct? You never get messages from the other side of fence. This is what social media does is selective data. And
23:48 selective data when the gods of Silicon Valley push it, this is what happened. A
23:55 young girl, 16 year old in Sarowak, wants to know whether she should die or live.
24:01 61% people vote she kills herself. And you and we tell ourselves we don't
24:09 talk about this in church. To me that's highly irresponsible. You know we reach a pandemic issue when
24:18 people are killing themselves by taking a vote on social media and the church has to respond. So this is part of what
24:25 we're doing today. So Paul says this then we will no longer be infants tossed
24:31 back and forth by waves. On one hand, uniformity, you become dumb. The other
24:36 thing, diversity, without an anchor, you just pick what you want. You you you you
24:42 as what he says, you your itchy ears gather what you want to hear. And they're cunning people who sell you
24:48 stuff. They sell you whatever you want. And that frames your thinking. And when that frames your thinking, you cannot
24:54 speak the truth in love because your mind has been downloaded a lot of crap.
24:60 It's like diet, right? Some people tell you eating rice will make you thin.
25:06 Other people tell you eating rice will make you fat. Who do you believe?
25:11 And if you go and check the the net, those who tell you eating rice will make you thin. I checked it. No, you know who
25:17 are people pushing it? Indian restaurants, Japanese restaurants. Not kidding you. Bispati rice suppliers.
25:24 Not kidding you. I did a lot of research. Why? Because they have some schemes in it. They feed you data
25:31 because they want you to buy their rice or go to their restaurant. People tell you rice is bad. They want you to take
25:36 their challenge, their diet. So they all vested interest. So the world flips and
25:42 flops, but we anchor ourselves in a few things. And what is Paul telling you to anchor yourself? One, you anchor
25:47 yourself in the gospel truth and scripture. Then you anchor yourself in in a community which is united by that
25:55 by diverse. With that, you're able to speak the truth in love.
26:01 And how does this then flow on? Paul tells you he flows this on into few areas in your family life, in your work
26:09 life, in fact, in your place in the world. That's chapter one. Let me give you a simple example. Let's go back to
26:14 say you have an argument with Anolim and you
26:20 in your view, what he did to you was wrong. That's a proposition. And that's very
26:26 common, right? So, how do you discern truth from truth from that very chong
26:31 explanation I gave you? Let me give you four points. Number one, is it built on
26:37 a careful diverse study of scripture? Because you can nitpick the Bible to tell you what you want. Here's one
26:43 example. Um, I go up to someone and say, "Hey, someone told me that you did
26:49 this." You know, really, he got problems. You talk to me. That's what Matthew 18 says. Ma, why he talk to you? Big mouth. talk to me. He's right.
26:57 Matthew 18. He's also wrong because you're cherry-picking scripture. Do you think those words are gracious?
27:04 They're not gracious works. They are not speaking the truth in love. Number two,
27:09 does it build the other party party up? If I go up to someone and says, "Hey,
27:16 I heard you talk about me. You know, you got problem. You talk to me. Am I
27:22 building you up? I just read you the riot egg. You know, if I'm the other party, if I'm not very
27:30 mature, I'll show you the finger in very if I'm a bit more mature, toilet, I walk
27:37 off. So, we don't build ourselves up. Then afterward, everyone say, "Hey, I never fought with Peter." You know,
27:44 this doesn't happen. So, everyone go elders fighting.
27:51 So, this unity has happened. So you find what Paul is saying is is so crucial and
27:57 and can I humbly suggest to you everyone here from pastors, elders, deacons,
28:03 ministry leader, we all are guilty of this from simple ways of how we put things in
28:11 WhatsApp, how we talk, we stumble everybody all the time. And Paul is saying get into
28:18 the culture to talk to people who are different. Get into the culture of
28:23 reading scripture from various point. Get into the culture of building yourself out suddenly speaking the truth
28:31 is easier. And when all else fails because we are such sinful people and we
28:36 will hurt each other words which says he gives you the final glue. Does the love
28:41 of Christ hold away your processing the issues? Because chapter 3 tells us he
28:46 says you know what church I pray that you can find how wide and long and high
28:52 and deep is the love of Christ. And once I have the love of Christ and is so much in me I look at you I suddenly you don't
28:60 look so ugly after all and you look at Anna and maybe not so
29:06 that's how he's trying to do it. And this is such a simple truth
29:12 and all of us fail in this. I I I've been in this church for a long time. If
29:18 is anything I tell you, I suggest the more you know the Bible, the high you up in church leadership, the worse it is
29:25 because you and I lack humility, which is the first thing Paul starts off with chapter 4.
29:31 Whoops. So now go to the second point. The fact that you all didn't respond
29:36 means all of you are not millennials. Never saw Avengers. You saw Avengers, didn't get it. You don't understand that
29:42 thing, ask your kid. All right? I'm not going to explain it.
29:48 Feel very hurt. Anyway, ask your kid. You your kid will
29:54 tell you something called measure up. Mashing. Mesh. Mesh. That means you merge things. One very famous scholar
30:00 called Leon Morris. He calls this speaking the truth in love by living the truth in love. He calls it truththing
30:06 the love. Meaning chapter 4 goes in the heels of chapter five because he ends
30:12 verse 17. I tell you and insist the Lord you must not live like this in the thinking and then he tells you putting
30:18 on a new self. Meaning speaking the truth in love flows with living the
30:24 truth in love. they flow. In simple English, very simple thing. You can't
30:31 speak the truth in love if the other person doesn't believe you love them.
30:37 It's as simple as that. And we fail to communicate that across. You see that
30:43 famous prayer comes with a doxology. And the doxology is telling you, you know
30:49 what, church? God can do a lot of stuff in you to him who's able to do imaginary
30:54 more than you can ask. Do what? Do what?
30:59 Make you a lot of money? Give you whatever you want. No.
31:05 Be able to live a life worthy of the calling. That's how the text tie.
31:11 Imaginary more to live a life worthy of the calling. And there are four qualities or three because the first two
31:17 is a pair to be humble, gentle, patient and bear with one another.
31:24 In simple English, we call this biblical empathy. We give an illustration in a
31:30 gama class which is not about the nail. Uh those of you ga had saw a bit of
31:35 this. Let me just explain this a little bit. Say your wife has a nail in her head.
31:41 The nail is a metaphor. The nail is a metaphor for the problem
31:46 she is facing. What would the husband do? So all you husbands, your wife has a
31:52 nail in the head. The nail is some issue she's facing.
31:58 What would you husbands do? Remove the nail law because men are all problem solvers. Ma
32:06 may What's your problem? Nail in the head. Remove nail. Problem end. No problem.
32:15 You ask the wife. You do that to wife. You see what happened to you. To the wife, feel my pain.
32:22 You don't understand. You always trying to solve things. You
32:28 never listen to me. You always think about yourself.
32:34 They call this being empathetic to the pain. Now that's the point of this video which we studied at length in the in GMA
32:41 class. To remove the nail, you must feel her pain first.
32:47 She's not going to let you remove the nail unless you feel the pain.
32:53 And that is really the gospel story, isn't it? God saw us in the pain of our sin and he
33:02 came down to take our shape, our size, our flesh
33:08 and he took that pain on the cross. It's not about a nail. It's about the
33:13 nails that were driven into the cross. That is biblical empathy.
33:19 Let me explain how this works out because just now we talked about speaking the truth in
33:25 confrontation. Let's talk about speaking the truth on sensitive matters. I think you're caught in a sin. I I
33:32 don't know how to talk you to about it. I think you got a problem in your marriage. I want to talk to you about
33:38 it. I think you have fill in the blank.
33:44 So four things anchor it. Let's see whether we can break it down. Humility,
33:50 gentleness, patience, bearing one another. I'm going to make this very simple. Number one, check your agenda.
33:59 Most of the time, our agendas are mixed. Either we want to project this hero
34:05 mentality or we have an agenda to just ventilate. Here's one. If if someone has
34:11 hurt me and I I go talk to someone else, I say, you know, Ann Arnold, what he did was really really bad. What am I looking
34:17 for? I'm looking for validation. I'm just looking for you to validate. Say, yeah, you're right. Anna is such a
34:23 terrible person. He shouldn't be elder. That's what you're looking for. The moment you tell the person, "No, I think Anna was right." You will go to another
34:30 person. So, check our agendas, that's the starting point. Number two,
34:37 you put yourself in their shoes. That's again what is the gospel teaching
34:42 us. You go to a person where his pain is. You don't try to bring that person
34:49 to where you want them to be. Men particularly have this problem.
34:55 Number three, you don't give your views first. I heard you did this, you know.
35:00 Do you know it's very wrong. You ask open-ended questions. Let's just say someone offended you and you go up to
35:07 the person. Don't start off the mouth by saying, "I heard you did this to me. You got problem. They talk to me." You kill
35:12 the whole conversation. You just ask, "Hey, I I was told that maybe you did
35:18 say this. Is that true? I'm not trying to judge you." But the way we couch this
35:24 helps a lot. A lot of us, we kill it by by that, you know, open up already. You
35:29 know, I ask you to help me, you never help me. You're such a hypocrite. Die already. What kind of church is this? I ask you
35:35 to help this. You cannot help me. You're a hypocrite. Die. That's it. Conversation gone. patience.
35:43 Number two, we like to interrogate. How do I know this? Because in the GMA
35:48 class, we gave a case study and I was in one group and we did we did a gathering
35:53 after everybody ended up interrogating. Why you do it? Huh? Are you sure? You sure it's not your fault? You sure you
35:59 didn't do that? Maybe you like that. You know, maybe you should have read the Bible more. No, we we go into this. We have no gentleness.
36:06 Number two, you need to affirm. You need to affirm. Let let me give you a simple example very simple at home you
36:14 have your kid and you talk to your kid and the kid ask you know mom can I have the salt in your mind I say this fellow
36:20 very lazy one every time alo put the salt so you say go and find yourself
36:27 so you keep doing it and the kid looks at you you know what the kid will do next time I want salt I'm not going to
36:32 ask mom now you have just programmed something to to the kid in your mind
36:38 you're trying to teach the kid something. But because you're not affirming the kid, you're just pushing,
36:44 you're not pulling back. He's being he's being programmed something. So next time he goes to work, he goes to meeting room
36:50 and he says, "Uh, uh, I don't know where the file is." And his manager says, "You
36:56 don't know. You're going to find it yourself." He's going to connect the dots. You know,
37:01 he's going to connect the dots. That's how the mind works. So affirmation is critical, verbal and non-verbal. And
37:08 then in the end you you you never tell people what to do with their lives. You're not God. You explore together.
37:15 You say, "Hey, you got a marriage problem, right?
37:20 Maybe it could be this. What do you think?" You don't tell a person, "Ah, this is what the Bible says. You're not
37:26 following the Bible. You better do this. Let's pray." Gone. You never do things like this because
37:32 you empower the other side. That's how you speak the truth in sensitive methods. And sometime it doesn't work.
37:38 It escalates. When it escalates, you learn to just tone it down.
37:44 And then please come to our GMA if you want to know more. And we studied this in GMA. We're going
37:50 to go into this in deeper next time. It's called tacos. Sometimes the tone of voice goes up. You learn not to
37:56 threaten, not to argue, challenge, order, shame. And we all do this subconsciously. I'm going to humbly
38:02 suggest everyone in this room, everyone without exception, including me, we all struggle with this. That's why I think
38:09 these topics are important. Let me end quickly. Speaking the truth in love is a
38:14 community endeavor, not a solo effort because that's really what the text is. It's all about unity, diversity, and
38:20 maturity. Uh there's this installation artist who did what she called a
38:25 confession booth in Vegas. Basically, you walk into the studio and you write a
38:31 confession and then you put it up. And so, people write a lot of stuff. It
38:37 became very famous. It went viral. So, I looked at some of the stuff people write.
38:43 I begin to realize one thing. People need to ventilate.
38:49 And sometime the ventilation sometime the ventilation
38:54 shows deadly symptoms. So let me ask you one thing as we end soon. When was the last time you
39:01 ventilated? Do we even give people here a platform
39:06 to ventilate? So I come to church and I really really
39:12 am struggling with loneliness. I put on a face. I say hi. I go back but I really
39:17 want to scream out certain things. You see we we we criticize the the charismatic church for the outer cause.
39:24 We say ah these people play with emotions. That may be true but at least the charismatics have a platform.
39:33 But here what we do in this church we bottle everything up.
39:38 That's why we cannot speak the truth in love because we build walls and people
39:44 can't come in. So what does Paul teach us? Number one, he's teaching the church to be a confessing community.
39:52 You see, con if confession comes before rebuking, it's easier to do it. There
39:58 was a young American missionary called Zach who really taught me this. There was somebody who offended him so much. I
40:04 remember the case. He told it to me because if I was in shoes, I'll take a chair and throw at a guy. But he started
40:09 off by confessing his own sins. You know, I want to ask maybe I did wrong. If not here, somewhere else. You see if
40:16 all of us learn to confess and make it a habit to publicly confess. Paul
40:21 confessed publicly about his past. Augustine wrote a book about his confession sins. If we all learn to
40:27 confess and that becomes our diet, becomes our normality. It's easier to
40:33 rebuke. Why? Because everyone sees our faults. But if you start to rebuke before confessing, people will put a
40:39 wall. You will never speak the truth in love. So we need to create this culture of confessing. So let me first explain
40:46 everything I told you today. I'm not a good example. I'm probably the last guy to teach this. So I'm teaching myself.
40:53 I'm impulsive. I say things without thinking. I shoot my trap off.
41:00 But if all of us learn to confess simple things, the sinner in your midst who
41:06 struggles with a deep sin won't feel so bad. The person who has some hurt in his past
41:12 won't feel so bad. Suddenly, you know what? This church is more vulnerable.
41:18 Maybe I'll talk to someone with my issue. Here's another point about community endeavor.
41:25 You know why I don't think is true that all of us should always talk to the
41:30 person if we have a concern issues? Because sometimes we are not the right person.
41:35 Sometime is not you. the way you say things, you're just going to get me worked up. And you know what's
41:43 interesting as we end this that he he gives an example of officers, apostles,
41:49 prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers. They are all agents of truth. The same thing happens 1 Corinthian 12
41:56 and in Romans 12. Meaning there are certain people who can carry
42:01 the truth better than you. You can just do a bit, the other person will do a bit. So here's how it works. The
42:08 apostles tell something, the prophets solidify it, the evangelists preach it, the pastors teach it and then after that
42:16 it goes down to the common person. So here's how it works. Maybe today in church in this sermon you
42:24 heard something after that what happens you go out
42:30 and you talk to someone in garden cafe. Someone else takes that and speaks to you. Then next week you go to a prayer
42:39 meeting, someone speaks to you. You see, speaking the truth is something we all
42:45 do. Every single one of us is not something I do alone. It's something we do
42:52 together. I'd like to invite the worship team up. I want to challenge us to take
42:57 a small step and let's end this message. Let us go through our three points
43:03 before we speak. How are we sure is the truth? Number two, we speak the truth in
43:08 love by living the truth in love. And speaking the truth in love is a community endeavor, not a solo effort.
43:15 Let me just end with this. The last verse says this, from him the whole body joined and held together by
43:22 every supporting ligament grows and builds itself up in love. And here's the word, as each part does its work. You
43:30 know miss here today there are some of us who are struggling with issues they won't tell you
43:37 they won't tell me how do you and I get them to a point
43:42 where they will speak it to someone else so that they can be comforted.
43:48 They will only do it if we all do our part.
43:54 So as the worship team plays and speaks the truth in love. What do you all do?
44:00 You sing. And as you sing,
44:05 you pray. And when you do that, the spirit of love
44:11 moves around us. And then as you leave, you live quietly.
44:17 And perhaps those who struggle will sit behind. And then our counselors will see them.
44:24 Maybe the braver ones will come in front. And then truth is spoken
44:30 collectively. Would you help me do that? Not for my
44:36 sake. I could do an out call out altos and no one comes. It doesn't matter. But
44:41 for the sake of your brethren who suffer, who struggle with hurts
44:47 and they need to ventilate. And we don't ventilate by writing
44:53 anonymous cards and hooking it up on the wall where people see and do nothing. We
44:59 ventilate so that the Lord who loved you so much
45:05 will send his people to comfort. Can you do that? Let us close in prayer as we
45:12 prepare ourselves for the last song. Lord, we we ask that we we ask right now
45:17 for those in our midst who struggle who who who have things buried deep down inside for years and they don't know how
45:22 to just bring it out and we don't know how to speak it. We don't know how to approach them.
45:29 We don't know how to speak the truth in love. We ask you prepare the ground. We pray this morning the truth was
45:36 spoken through worship. The truth was spoken through the sermon.
45:41 Truth was spoken through the prayer. And now as the congregation rises, truth is
45:47 spoken as we all sing. And as we sing, anointing is released. And the people
45:54 will come forward at the end of the service and they'll just say, "I need to talk to somebody. Would you pray for me?
