Episode 992: Love in the Midst of Strife

[00:00:00] Scott Maderer: Thanks for joining me on episode 992 of the inspired stewardship podcast

[00:00:07] Matt & Jocelyn Woodrum: I Matt. And I'm Jocelyn from the family life movement podcast. We challenge you to find a way to balance your work and your family. And one way to be inspired to do that is to listen to this inspired stewardship podcast by my friend, Scott Maderer.

[00:00:25] Scott Maderer: I've seen people time after time find their calling out of pain. It's the idea that our mess becomes our message. The thing that we're doing becomes big enough and hardly. That all of a sudden, it's what we have to do. Welcome. And thank you for joining us on the inspired stewardship podcast. If you truly desire to become the person who God wants you to.

[00:00:58] Then you must learn to use your [00:01:00] time, your talent and your treasures for your true calling in the inspired stewardship podcast. We'll learn to invest in yourself, invest in others and develop your influence so that you can impact the world.

[00:01:15] And today's spiritual foundation episode about impacting the world. I talk with you about mark chapter 12, verses 28 through 34. I share how mark is more than just about loving God in this passage, but also about community and identity. And I share how this identity can come about despite and sometimes even because of strife, mark chapter 12, verses 28 through 34.

[00:01:44] Goes like this. One of the scribes came near and heard them disputing with one another. And seeing that he answered them. He asked him which commandment is the first of all. And Jesus answered. The first is here. Oh, Israel, the Lord, our [00:02:00] God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord, your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your.

[00:02:08] The second is this. You shall love your neighbor as yourself. There is no other commandment greater than these. Then the scribe said to him, you are right teacher. You have truly said that he is one. And beside him, there is no other. And to love him with all the heart and with all the understanding and with all the strength and to love one's neighbor as oneself, this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.

[00:02:35] When Jesus saw that he answered why. He said to him, you are not far from the kingdom of God and that no one dared ask him any other. So the idea here of this challenge of Jesus, about what is the greatest commandment comes in a set of passages in mark, where they're a trap being laid for [00:03:00] Jesus describes the Pharisees, the Herodians.

[00:03:03] These are all people that in mark are held up to be the bad guys in the passage. And the idea here is that in the passage of mark this characteristics of the congregation or the group that is being taught to believe that Jesus is a prophet of the end of times, and they believe that the realm of glory, God included bringing together the Gentiles and the Jews into one community.

[00:03:34] This idea of unifying the Gentiles and the Jews shows up time and time again. And the truth is. Is the biggest commandment is a question about identity. It's a question about community because there was a huge argument about what is the commandments that we keep above all. [00:04:00] Is it the temple that makes people Jewish in this community?

[00:04:04] Is it burnt offerings? Is it something else? What is the essential characteristics of this? And I would argue that we still argue about that today. We argue about our identity. It's often what the fights are about, whether it's on the internet, whether it's on TV, we argue less about where we want to go and more about how we want to get there, because that is what makes us have an idea.

[00:04:36] And Jesus says the first commandment, the thing that makes us is loving God with all of our heart. And he includes loving God with all of your strength, with all of your mind, with all of your soul, a little bit of a tweak over what was actually what he's quoting from the old Testament. But it calls out this idea that loving God with [00:05:00] all that you have is what makes.

[00:05:03] Us a community. And then he extends that and says, loving your neighbor. As one self, this connection into community is made explicit. It says that the truth is to be a community. We have to care for each other. We have to care for each other, even beyond just the simple level of caring and into a depth of caring.

[00:05:32] Like we care for ourselves, this is what makes us, that's what he saying. This question about community and identity cannot be separated from the question of loving God. Jesus is saying that these things are tied together, that if we can't act out that love in the real world, then [00:06:00] we aren't really able to act it out in our hearts.

[00:06:04] And if that happens well, then we're not walking the walk. So to speak. And identity like this can often come about in times of strife in times of pressure. In times of argument, in times of pain, I've seen people time after time find their calling out of pain. It's the idea that our mess becomes our message.

[00:06:33] The thing that we're doing becomes big enough. Hard enough that all of a sudden it's what we have to do that out of pain can come joy, not in a superficial way, not in a it hurts so good kind of way, but it's out of that painful experience that often we find a [00:07:00] connection to community and to other.

[00:07:03] And it becomes a place where we go, we want to help people so that no one else has to go through. The thing that I went through. I've talked and trained dozens and dozens of coaches over the years, I've talked to hundreds and hundreds of clients and over again, often out of those times of strife, out of those times of pain, out of those times of pressure and argument is when their ability to stay.

[00:07:31] And go to the next level and build a community and connect with other people becomes real. How to strive often comes our sense of identity and our sense of community. And I think that's part of what Jesus is saying here in this passage in mark Jesus, doesn't say this is an easy commandment. He doesn't say this is something that is simple.

[00:07:57] In fact, if you look at the rest of mark and the context [00:08:00] where this is, it's clear that he's saying it's not easy to do. And yet he's saying these are the greatest commandments that we are all called to. Thanks for listening.

[00:08:13] Thanks so much for listening to the inspired stewardship podcast. As a subscriber and listener, we challenge you to not just sit back and passively listen, but act on what you've heard and find a way to live your calling. If you enjoy this episode, do me a favor. Go over to facebook.com/inspired stewardship and like our Facebook page and mark.

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