Speaker 1: Hello, and thanks for joining us today on Pastor Rick's
Speaker 1: Daily Hope. This is the Bible teaching ministry of Rick Warren,
Speaker 1: and today we are continuing in a series called the
Speaker 1: Miracle of Mercy. Rick will show us how God's mercy
Speaker 1: can lift your guilt, heal your wounds, and transform the
Speaker 1: way you live. And now let's jump right in with
Speaker 1: Rick with part two of a message called being an
Speaker 1: Agent of Mercy in the World.
Speaker 2: Here's the third principle, choose my words carefully. If you're
Speaker 2: going to be an agent of mercy in the world
Speaker 2: this week, you're God's secret agent of mercy, and you're
Speaker 2: going out and you're showing mercy in the workplace and
Speaker 2: in the neighborhood and in the grocery store and at
Speaker 2: the post office. You have to choose your words carefully.
Speaker 2: Mercy puts a monitor on my mouth. If I'm going
Speaker 2: to be an agent of mercy, there are some things
Speaker 2: I just can't say. Does that make sense. I can't
Speaker 2: be mean to people, I can't be rude to people.
Speaker 2: I can't be sarcastic to people, and I can't put
Speaker 2: them down. I have to choose my words carefully. Colossians
Speaker 2: four to six. When you talk, you should always be
Speaker 2: kind and pleasant, so you will be able to answer
Speaker 2: everyone in the way you should. Circle the word pleasant
Speaker 2: and kind. You are never persuasive when you're abrasive. If
Speaker 2: you can't get what you want in a grocery store
Speaker 2: or at in a department store, at a restaurant, and
Speaker 2: you're being offensive and you're being rude to the clerk
Speaker 2: or the waitress, you are never persuasive when you're abrasive,
Speaker 2: he says. When you talk, you should always be kind,
Speaker 2: always be pleasant, so you'll be able to answer everyone
Speaker 2: in the way you should. That's what agents of mercy do.
Speaker 2: Let me show you another verse up here on the
Speaker 2: screen Ephesians four twenty nine. Do not say harmful things
Speaker 2: which tear people down, but say what people need. Words
Speaker 2: that will help others become stronger. In other words, words
Speaker 2: that build them up, not tear them down. Do your
Speaker 2: words tear down people, they build them up, words that
Speaker 2: will help others become stronger. Then what you say will
Speaker 2: do good to those who listen to you. That's the Bible,
Speaker 2: that's God telling you how you are to speak. If
Speaker 2: you're an agent of mercy, you do not say harmful things.
Speaker 2: But you say what people need words that will help
Speaker 2: them become stronger. Okay, Now, how in the world do
Speaker 2: I do that? How do I know if I've had
Speaker 2: this pattern? Maybe you grew up learning. You're in a family,
Speaker 2: it's common to put each other down. How do I
Speaker 2: break that habit my life? You ask God for wisdom. Wisdom.
Speaker 2: We talked about this a while back. Makes you patient.
Speaker 2: The more wise you are, the more patient you'll become.
Speaker 2: The more wise you are, the more merciful you'll be.
Speaker 2: The more you understand the hurts of other people, the
Speaker 2: more you cut them slack, the more gracious and merciful
Speaker 2: you are. James three, verse seventeen. The wisdom that comes
Speaker 2: from heaven is pure, and it's peace loving. In other words,
Speaker 2: if I'm wise, I love peace, not conflict. There are
Speaker 2: people on the internet who are not wise. They don't
Speaker 2: love peace. They love conflict. They love arguing, they love trolling,
Speaker 2: they love getting into a fight. They're not wise, they're unwise.
Speaker 2: The wisdom that comes from heaven is peace loving. It's
Speaker 2: gentle all at all times. When I'm not gentle, I'm
Speaker 2: not being wise, And it's willing to yield to others.
Speaker 2: Wisdom is full of mercy. The more your life is
Speaker 2: filled with mercy, the wiser you're going to be. And
Speaker 2: the wiser you become, the more merciful you're going to
Speaker 2: be to people around you, even people who totally disagree
Speaker 2: with you, even people who don't like you, even people
Speaker 2: who consider themselves to be your enemy, you still show
Speaker 2: them mercy because you're wise. Okay, now, let me give
Speaker 2: you a fourth principle. Start looking and listening for people's needs.
Speaker 2: Don't be offended by people's sins. Choose your words carefully.
Speaker 2: And here's the fourth principle of mercy. Value saving people
Speaker 2: over keeping rules. In God's books, saving people is a
Speaker 2: whole lot more important than keeping rules. Rules are not
Speaker 2: nearly as important as relationships. In God's book, rules are
Speaker 2: not as important as relationships. You value saving people over
Speaker 2: keeping rules. Now, Jesus modeled this over and over and over.
Speaker 2: I gave you one example there, Matthew, chapter twelve. It
Speaker 2: was against the law, a religious law, for you to
Speaker 2: pick grain in a field on the Sabbath and eat it.
Speaker 2: That was considered work in the traditions of that day.
Speaker 2: And yet jesus disciples were hungry so you'll just get
Speaker 2: some get some grain there, eat some of that. And
Speaker 2: the religious Pharisees, the the legalists, they were indignant. They go, hey,
Speaker 2: why are you guys breaking all this rule? Because they're
Speaker 2: just hungry. He cared more about his disciples empty stomachs
Speaker 2: than he did care about their traditions. And over and
Speaker 2: over agin again, Jesus often broke rules to heal people
Speaker 2: because healing people was more important than keeping rules in
Speaker 2: God's book, that is, the God of mercy. Here's a
Speaker 2: good example, Matthew, chapter twenty three, verse twenty three. Jesus
Speaker 2: says this to the legalists, to the judgmental Pharisees, he said,
Speaker 2: you know, you Pharisees, you're careful to tithe ten percent
Speaker 2: of every part of your income. But he said, then
Speaker 2: you ignore the other important matters of God's law justice,
Speaker 2: you know, being fair to people, showing mercy, treating people
Speaker 2: of mercy, and faith, having faith. Yes, you should tithe,
Speaker 2: but he says you should you also shouldn't neglect the
Speaker 2: more important things. I think this actually versus kind of
Speaker 2: funny to me. Because Jesus did not get along with
Speaker 2: the Pharisees. They did not like him, He was full
Speaker 2: of grace and mercy, and they were full of legalism
Speaker 2: and judgmentalism. The only thing that Jesus ever complemented in
Speaker 2: the Pharisees was this. He said, you guys, tithe. He goes, you.
Speaker 1: Got that right.
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, you got that one right. You tithe ten
Speaker 2: percent of everything you make goes back to the Lord
Speaker 2: to say it really all belongs to you, and this
Speaker 2: is to prove it. I'm just honoring you with the
Speaker 2: first ten percent. He said, that's a good thing. You
Speaker 2: got that one right. But he says you can't use
Speaker 2: as an excuse to not do the other stuff, like
Speaker 2: treating people fairly, showing mercy, and having faith. By the way,
Speaker 2: sometimes you'll hear people say Jesus never spoke about tithing.
Speaker 2: Of course he did. There's one example. He says, you
Speaker 2: should die, But he says that's minor comparison to treating
Speaker 2: people with mercy and being fair and just with people
Speaker 2: and not ripping them off, because that's the more important stuff. Yeah,
Speaker 2: keep tything, you need to do that, but this does
Speaker 2: not give you an excuse to overlook the other important stuff.
Speaker 2: So you need to value saving people overkeeping rules. So
Speaker 2: those are four principles of mercy. Now, what I want
Speaker 2: to do is talk for just a couple of minutes
Speaker 2: on six places to be an agent of mercy. I
Speaker 2: could give you a bunch of them, but I just
Speaker 2: want to give you six examples. And rather than having
Speaker 2: me teach on it, you're going to hear a very
Speaker 2: short little story from normal people who actually modeled this point.
Speaker 2: So let me give you six ways that you can
Speaker 2: be a secret agent, not even secret, just an agent
Speaker 2: of God's mercy. This next week you might write these down.
Speaker 2: Number one, here's the first way to be an agent
Speaker 2: of mercy this week. Look for people in a crisis
Speaker 2: and listen to them. They need to be listened to.
Speaker 2: When people are in a crisis. Your ear is a
Speaker 2: healing tool. You can heal people just by listening to them.
Speaker 2: That's why people pay big money to have counselors listen
Speaker 2: to them. There's healing and listening. Look for people in
Speaker 2: a crisis and listen to them. Galatians six to two
Speaker 2: says this carry each other's burdens, and in this way
Speaker 2: you will fulfill the law of Christ. Okay, first, what's
Speaker 2: a burden, Well, a burden could be a lot of things.
Speaker 2: Could be a physical burden, could be a financial burden,
Speaker 2: It could be a relational burden. But most of the
Speaker 2: time burdens are emotional stress. And when people are under
Speaker 2: emotional stress, they're burdened down. They're going through a crisis,
Speaker 2: and it dampens their emotion. He says, you know, carry
Speaker 2: each other's burdens. How do you do that? By listening?
Speaker 2: When you listen to somebody who's going through a crisis,
Speaker 2: you're carrying their burden. And he says, in this way
Speaker 2: you fulfill the law of Christ. What is the law
Speaker 2: of Christ? The great commandment? Love God with all your heart,
Speaker 2: Love your neighbor as yourself. Anytime you listen to somebody
Speaker 2: in a crisis, you were loving your neighbor as yourself.
Speaker 2: Anytime you listen to somebody and they unload their burden emotional, physical,
Speaker 2: or whatever on you, you're sharing it. You are showing
Speaker 2: love for God and love for each other. I want
Speaker 2: you to hear Rob's story. Would you give him a
Speaker 2: warm welcome?
Speaker 3: Good to see you saddleback. When I was a twenty
Speaker 3: one year old working for a major construction and land
Speaker 3: development company, I was a part of a three man
Speaker 3: crew that did all the excavating work necessary for the
Speaker 3: new subdivisions. I was a brand new Christian and I
Speaker 3: wanted to share my faith in Jesus with others. My boss,
Speaker 3: his name was Mitch. He called me a lot of names,
Speaker 3: most of which I can't mention here today. Because I
Speaker 3: carried a Bible on the dashboard of my truck, I
Speaker 3: spent my lunches reading it and I would pray before
Speaker 3: I ate, and invited my boss many many times the
Speaker 3: church and I tried to witness to him about how
Speaker 3: Jesus had saved me from both my addictions and even
Speaker 3: from ending my own life. But my boss showed no
Speaker 3: interest whatsoever. I just couldn't get through to him. I'll
Speaker 3: never forget today that my boss came to work and
Speaker 3: he was obviously distraught. It was clear that he was
Speaker 3: in a crisis. I asked him what was the matter,
Speaker 3: and he said that his wife had abandoned him and
Speaker 3: their small son over the weekend. He was devastated. Wanting
Speaker 3: to show mercy, I just listened to him. Then I
Speaker 3: asked him if I could pray for him, and to
Speaker 3: my surprise, he said yes. God was using this crisis
Speaker 3: to get Mitch's attention, and over the next couple months
Speaker 3: our relationship changed completely. And as I listened to him
Speaker 3: poured out his pain, He'd begin to ask me questions
Speaker 3: and I would listen and he would listen to me.
Speaker 3: Sharing his pain with me made it easier for him
Speaker 3: to handle. As I said, I was a brand new Christian,
Speaker 3: so I listened a lot. Thanksgiving Day that year was
Speaker 3: Min Dana's first Thanksgiving as a married couple. We knew
Speaker 3: it would be a tough day for Mitch, so we
Speaker 3: invited him and his son to our studio apartment for
Speaker 3: Thanksgiving dinner. It was an act of mercy, and I
Speaker 3: was surprised that Mitch accepted and showed up with his
Speaker 3: young son. Spending that day together made a huge impact
Speaker 3: on him, and just a few weeks later, in my
Speaker 3: work truck with my Bible on the dashboard, Mitch prayed
Speaker 3: with me and he opened his life to Christ. The
Speaker 3: mercy of God has broken through this guy's defense, and
Speaker 3: we've remained friends and brothers in Christ. God bless great
Speaker 3: thanks Robing.
Speaker 2: Okay, So there's a good example of looking for people
Speaker 2: in a crisis and listening to them. That's what Rob
Speaker 2: did okay, here's the second way to be an Asian
Speaker 2: of mercy. Look for people with unmet needs and help them.
Speaker 2: Practical needs. You know, you need a car, You need
Speaker 2: me to drive you somewhere. You need somebody to do
Speaker 2: an erran for you. Can I help you paint your house? Whatever?
Speaker 2: Look for people with unmet needs and help them. That
Speaker 2: is being an agent of mercy. The Bible says this
Speaker 2: in Romans fifteen two and three. Each of us needs
Speaker 2: to look after the good of the people around us.
Speaker 2: There's that word look. You gotta see it. Look for
Speaker 2: the good, after the good of people around us, asking ourselves,
Speaker 2: how can I help? That's exactly what Jesus did. He
Speaker 2: didn't make it easy for himself by avoiding people's troubles,
Speaker 2: but he waited right in and he helped out. This
Speaker 2: is what mercy does. We look for people downe met
Speaker 2: needs and help them. I want you to hear an
Speaker 2: example from Ashley give her one while.
Speaker 4: Pastorik asked me to share an example of someone who
Speaker 4: came to know Christ through the acts of mercy of
Speaker 4: our HIV and AIDS ministry team. So I'd like to
Speaker 4: share the story of Jacob while participating in an AIDS
Speaker 4: walk at Irvine Park, Jacob saw Sadovac's HIV and AIDS
Speaker 4: Ministry booth. At first, he was angry because he thought
Speaker 4: we were there to protest those living with HIV, but
Speaker 4: soon he realized we were there to support, love and
Speaker 4: care for those living with HIV and AIDS. Jacob said
Speaker 4: he'd never imagined that any church would do that, and
Speaker 4: he wondered if stadle Bach Church would help him. Jacob
Speaker 4: quickly learned that the answer was yes. Our HIV AIDS
Speaker 4: Ministry began to show Jacob mercy in many many ways.
Speaker 4: Sat a Back members brought him several weeks worth of
Speaker 4: meals and he was too sick to shop. And what
Speaker 4: meant even more to him was that people didn't just
Speaker 4: drop off the meals, they stayed and ate with him
Speaker 4: like a friend. A stato Back small group came over
Speaker 4: and cleaned his apart, his garage and even his refrigerator.
Speaker 4: Other Saddleback members walked his dog when he had a
Speaker 4: foot surgery. In one small group, hearing that he couldn't
Speaker 4: afford a medical scooter to keep his leg elevated, went
Speaker 4: out and found one so that he could get around
Speaker 4: more comfortably. Another small group took Jacob to the movies
Speaker 4: because he hated going to the movies alone. Most recently,
Speaker 4: when Jacob was hospitalized, it was not his close friends
Speaker 4: or family that came to visit him. Instead, it was
Speaker 4: people from Saddleback's HIV support group, and even members he
Speaker 4: didn't know who stopped buying encouraged him because his critical
Speaker 4: condition required extra projection from germs. Jacob's hospital stay was
Speaker 4: in a room surrounded by glass. Jacob explained, but when
Speaker 4: I awoke after surgery, people from Saddleback's HIV AIDS group
Speaker 4: were there to support me. They hung out, they prayed
Speaker 4: for me, and I no longer felt alone. It meant
Speaker 4: so much to me, especially when others seemed scared of me.
Speaker 4: As a result of all these agents of mercy, Jacob
Speaker 4: eventually opened his life to Jesus. He said, I accepted
Speaker 4: Christ and got baptized a Saddleback because their kindness and
Speaker 4: extreme helpfulness. The fact that my HIV status is not
Speaker 4: considered a hindrance for me becoming a Christian and being
Speaker 4: a part of this church, well, I just don't have
Speaker 4: the words for that kind of love. There's no stigma
Speaker 4: or judgment. Here, no one questions me. Instead, I found
Speaker 4: open arms embracing me and big hugs from everyone. God
Speaker 4: continues to show mercy and kindness through satur Back members,
Speaker 4: and it is transforming one life after another through our
Speaker 4: ace ministry. I invite you to join us. A's changed
Speaker 4: Jacob's life, but God's love through merciful Christians changed it
Speaker 4: even more.
Speaker 2: A third way, God wants you to be an Asian
Speaker 2: of mercy this week, look for people who are grieving
Speaker 2: and comfort them. Look for people who are grieving and
Speaker 2: comfort them. Every day of your life, somebody around you
Speaker 2: has a loss. They lose a job, they lose a
Speaker 2: loved one, they lose finances, they lose their dream. Loss
Speaker 2: is the universal problem in life. You're going to have
Speaker 2: many losses in your life, and everybody around you is
Speaker 2: going to have many losses in there. There is no
Speaker 2: loss without grief and pain, and when that happens, God
Speaker 2: wants you to be an Asian University. Are you too
Speaker 2: busy to notice the people who are grieving where you work?
Speaker 2: Do you even know those who are grieving? Do you
Speaker 2: even know enough about them on what's happening in the
Speaker 2: losses in their life? The Bible says in Two Corinthians,
Speaker 2: Chapter one, verse three and four. God comforts us in
Speaker 2: our troubles, so that we can comfort others who are
Speaker 2: in trouble with the same comfort that we ourselves received
Speaker 2: from God. I want you to hear an example from Vicky.
Speaker 2: Give her a warm welcome right now.
Speaker 5: HI, look for people who are grieving and comfort them well.
Speaker 5: When I was teaching aerobics, I had an elderly couple
Speaker 5: in my low impact class. They were there every Wednesday
Speaker 5: morning in the front row, smiling through the entire class.
Speaker 5: Suddenly they were not there for a few weeks, and
Speaker 5: I was concerned that they may have fallen ill. So
Speaker 5: I tried to find out their condition, but I couldn't
Speaker 5: find any information on them. When they returned, I could
Speaker 5: see that something was heavy on their hearts. They were there,
Speaker 5: but their smiles were missing. So I talked to them
Speaker 5: after class, and they had told me that their adopted daughter,
Speaker 5: an only child, had been killed in an automobile accident.
Speaker 5: They were devastated and they were in deep grief, and
Speaker 5: they were worried because they were the only relatives left
Speaker 5: to raise their young granddaughter. This elderly couple asked me
Speaker 5: how I got through the loss of my dad, and
Speaker 5: I told them about my faith in Jesus and the
Speaker 5: comfort he gives us and our grief. Of course, I
Speaker 5: invited them to saddle Back Church and they loved it.
Speaker 5: They loved it, they started to serve. It was wonderful,
Speaker 5: surrounded by all the love and mercy we all feel here.
Speaker 5: They both accepted the Lord very soon after. Over the years,
Speaker 5: they were constantly thanking me for showing them mercy and
Speaker 5: telling them about Jesus. A few years later, their granddaughter's
Speaker 5: long lost father suddenly showed up to take their granddaughter
Speaker 5: from them. This was another huge loss that they would
Speaker 5: have to grieve, but this time they were grateful that
Speaker 5: they had Jesus and our church family to comfort them
Speaker 5: through that loss. So years later, the elderly wife grew
Speaker 5: quite ill and she asked me to come to her
Speaker 5: hospital room to talk to her visiting granddaughter about the Lord.
Speaker 5: I felt totally unequipped for such a big responsibility, and
Speaker 5: I went anyway, asking God to show me mercy. As
Speaker 5: I walked through the hospital parking lot, my mind was
Speaker 5: just scrambling with what I would say. For some reason,
Speaker 5: I looked down at the ground and on the wet
Speaker 5: parking lot was a familiar piece of paper that I'd
Speaker 5: see hundreds hundreds of times. It was one of Pastor
Speaker 5: Rick's sermon outlines that someone had evidently dropped and from
Speaker 5: a saddleback message that was just that weekend. So I
Speaker 5: picked it up and guess what I found? Just the
Speaker 5: words that the Lord had for me. It included the
Speaker 5: same verse, the same verse that is on our message
Speaker 5: notes today. Second Corinthians one three through four says God
Speaker 5: comforts us in our troubles so that we can comfort
Speaker 5: others who are in trouble with the same comfort that
Speaker 5: we ourselves received from God God. When I read that verse,
Speaker 5: I started crying. It was God reminding me that when
Speaker 5: we feel unworthy or unequipped to show mercy to others,
Speaker 5: we're just not alone. God is with us, and he
Speaker 5: will help us as we show that mercy. I now
Speaker 5: walked into the hospital room with his words, not mine.
Speaker 5: I still have the inkstate and outline as a reminder
Speaker 5: to me. About a month later, Anne passed away and
Speaker 5: went to heaven, and I had the privilege of helping
Speaker 5: Pastor Glenn with her memorial service. I thank God for
Speaker 5: the privilege of showing mercy to that elderly couple, knowing
Speaker 5: that we will now be friends forever in heaven. And
Speaker 5: I encourage you to show mercy to people that you can.
Speaker 5: And by the way, here are my notes.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 2: You know those sermon outlines are instructible. Make them. We
Speaker 2: make them out of titanium, and only kryptonite can actually
Speaker 2: cause them to do okay. Number four fourth way God
Speaker 2: wants you to be an agent of mercy this week.
Speaker 2: Look for people needing friends and show hospitality. Look for
Speaker 2: people needing friends and show them hospitality. Now I'm talking
Speaker 2: about people who are shy, people who are reticent, people
Speaker 2: who are retiring, people who aren't the life of the party.
Speaker 2: They might be socially awkward, they might feel uncomfortable in
Speaker 2: social sittings, they settings, they might be unpopular. Everybody needs
Speaker 2: friends in their life. God hates loneliness, and one of
Speaker 2: the ways you can be an agent of mercy is
Speaker 2: look for people who are lonely and love them and
Speaker 2: just show them hospitality. Romans twelve, verse thirteen says this
Speaker 2: look for opportunities to be hospitable.
Speaker 1: Wow, what a great message from Rick today. You know
Speaker 1: a lot of you already know that one of our
Speaker 1: deepest needs is to feel peace in a world that
Speaker 1: rarely slows down. But true, lasting, unshakable peace isn't found
Speaker 1: in circumstances. It's found in Jesus, the Prince of Peace.
Speaker 1: The Bible says his piece exceeds anything we can understand,
Speaker 1: and one of the surest ways to draw close to
Speaker 1: Jesus is by spending time in God's word. And that's
Speaker 1: why Pastor Rick created a fifty two card scripture collection
Speaker 1: called Experiencing God's Peace. You know as you read these verses,
Speaker 1: you'll steady your heart on God's truth, let his peace
Speaker 1: wash over you, and begin memorizing scriptures so that you
Speaker 1: can recall it right when you need it most. And
Speaker 1: these cards aren't just for you. You can use them
Speaker 1: to encourage others. Give one to a friend and write
Speaker 1: a personal note on the back. If a scripture speaks
Speaker 1: to you, frame it. Place these cards where you can
Speaker 1: see them throughout the day and be reminded that God
Speaker 1: is with you. Request your set of Experiencing God's Scripture
Speaker 1: cards when you give a gift to support daily hope
Speaker 1: and help share the hope of Jesus with a world
Speaker 1: in need. It's our way of saying thanks. Just go
Speaker 1: to pastorick dot com to get your copy of this
Speaker 1: great resource. That's pastorick dot com. Or you can just
Speaker 1: text the word hope to seven oh three oh nine. Again,
Speaker 1: that's the word hope to seven oh three oh nine.
Speaker 1: Be sure to join us next time as we look
Speaker 1: into God's word for our daily hope. This program is
Speaker 1: sponsored by Pastor Rick's Daily Hope and your generous financial
Speaker 1: support