Heavenly Father Desires Compassion

I don't know if you saw the message on this bulb when we tried to restart it. It said, bulb's life has expired, you can't do anything more. We've been trying to get as much bulb life out of that for some time now, and it's reached the point where you can't do any more.

And I sat there thinking, that's going to happen to us one day. All the CPR and chest compressions and defibrillators that doctors will try will be of no use anymore. Our life on this earth will be over.

There will not even be one more second after God calls time. And sadly for many people, including many people who sat in churches, good churches, they'll wish they had one more second to set one more thing right, to apologize, to confess, to forgive, but there will not be that last second. So it's another reminder for me today that that time is coming soon for all of us, whether we're young or old, one day that'll be it.

We've all probably had some situations that could have put us in harm's way where we could have died. I've been in situations like that. I know I could have died, even, you know, somebody running a red light.

You did it, you obeyed the rules, you did everything right, but somebody else ran the red light. You hear about that often. We're not in control of our own destiny.

We're not the one that wrote the beginning of our lives or the end. So that's why it's for us to live in readiness at all times. As Jesus said many times, live in readiness, live in readiness, be dressed in readiness is what he said.

So all of a sudden when God pulls the plug and now there's no more life on this earth left in you, will you be dressed in readiness? I hope so. I want to wish all of you fathers a happy Father's Day. It's a tremendous thing to be a father.

God calls some, not all, to be fathers. But I remember when I first became a father how it changed my perspective of my relationship with God where, and I think I've shared this here at times in the past, it used to be my Christian life was mostly thinking about my attitude towards God, and that's important. But after I became a father for the first time, it changed where the primary focus was God's attitude towards me.

And that changed my attitude towards God. So my attitude towards God was the result of knowing God's attitude towards me. And dear friends, that's all the difference in the new covenant.

You see God's perspective of you, and that controls how you live your life. It's no longer you trying to live up to a certain standard, but you've seen God's perspective of you, God's thoughts of you, the way God thinks about you and all of those things. Because I found coming out from me love for my child and my children.

I didn't have to try. As I held each of my children in the hospital room, just looking at them, I didn't have to try to love them. It was the easiest thing in the world for me as a father to love this child.

I didn't have to take time to think about it and work on it. It just flowed. And in that moment I saw that God's love for us flows out from his nature.

God doesn't have to try hard to love you, dear friend, dear brother, dear sister. God doesn't have to try hard to love you. He just loves you.

And I know you think he has to try hard to love you, because if you were him, it would be hard to love you. I've thought about that at times. If I was God, it would be hard for me to love me.

Because I know myself in and out, and I see that I don't do this, and I don't do that, and I do this other thing, and I do that other thing. I must be a hard person to love. But God's not like that.

It's easy for God to love you. He enjoys loving you. That's what changed for me when I became a father.

I saw that as easy as it was for me to love my child without trying, that's hard to love me. Because where did I get that love for my child? It came from God. It's what he's full of.

So I'd like to speak a little bit about what this father love is like. Let's turn to Psalm 103. One of the characteristics of the love of the father, love of a father, is compassion.

Compassion. Every good father has compassion on his children. That's not, I'm sure you agree with me, if you think about it.

Now maybe you didn't have a good father. Sometimes when I speak about a father, people have written to me afterwards, or come and talk to me afterwards and say, hey, I didn't have a good father. How do I, now what do I do? Yeah, I had a good father.

I think I had the best father, and I'm sure you all probably think that you had the best father too. But regardless of how your father was to you, earthly father was to you, think about the best earthly father, whatever that, in your mind, what would have, if you had the perfect earthly father, what would that be like? What would he have been like? And you compare that with the worst earthly father. The difference between the best earthly father and the worst earthly father is very, very, very small.

Minute, tiny difference. So all of us are somewhere in this little spectrum of the best earthly father, whoever that was, whoever lived on this earth, the best earthly father, like I said, I think I had it, and you probably think you had it too. And the worst earthly father, whoever that was, that's very small compared to how good God really is.

So now that ought to help you realize and maybe understand a little bit just how good God really is. Because what will matter in eternity is not that you had a good earthly father, because that wasn't your choice, but that you knew the only good heavenly father, that you knew his love. But yet we're told here in Psalm 103, verse 13, that you see here that David compares, in order to try to picture or to give us whoever he's writing the psalm to, I imagine David singing it to somebody, to some group of people, and here we are reading it 3,500 years later, and the Holy Spirit inspired him to say that, and he wanted us to see the heart of God, our heavenly father, and in order to do that he used earthly fathers as an example.

And so he says, just as a father, an earthly father, has compassion on his children, so the Lord has compassion on those who fear him. Now I want you, dear family, to think about the compassion of our heavenly father today. Think about the compassion of our heavenly father.

God is a tremendously, deeply compassionate father. If you turn with me to Isaiah 49, in the midst of everything we stand for and preach, in the holiness of God, his righteousness, his judgment, we must remember that his nature, if I could describe it this way, in earthly language, begins with compassion. Isaiah 49 is an interesting chapter, because before that you read in chapter 48 about Israel being stubborn and stiff-necked, obstinate, disobedient, and then in the middle of chapter 48 he promises deliverance, and then he starts to talk about his great love for this obstinate child.

See, when we think about, when he says, just as a father, I think the King James says, pities his children, the real there is pity not in a sense like, oh, I have pity on you, like you would on a stranger that's in need. This is a compassionate pity, a compassion, a love, an interaction that causes me to make allowance for this child, because he's my child, she's my child. That's what he's talking about there, that he's compassionate, he's long-suffering, he makes allowance for it.

Imagine that I came to you, or somebody came to you and told you that your child misbehaved in some way. If it was somebody else's child, sure, you can say, oh, we need to train that child how to do better. And I agree that you would do that even for your own child, but before that, there is going to be a natural compassion and allowance you're going to make for your own child, because he's your own child, she's your own child.

And because that's your child, you will have a compassion, and that's what the psalmist is talking about there, that's what David is saying, it's like, look at how a father has this compassion and pity for his child, and that's how our Heavenly Father has compassion for his children as well. And even a disobedient child, all of you fathers, even when your child disobeys you, you know that deep down there's a compassion, even when you have to discipline that child, there's a compassion deep down that you feel for that child, for that son or daughter of yours. And that's what we see here in God's dealing with Israel, and after Israel has demonstrated disobedience and stubbornness, let's pick it up in Isaiah 49 verse 8, Thus says the Lord, in a favorable time I have answered you, and in a day of salvation I have helped you.

And we know from the new covenant, what is the favorable time and what is the day of salvation? Today, this is, Jesus said, Luke 4, he came to proclaim that which Isaiah said, one day there will be a favorable year and a day of salvation, Jesus said in Luke 4, this is it, this is the favorable year, this is the day of salvation. So, for the people of Israel it was a year to come, for us it is now, right now. He says, so read it this way, Today I have answered you, verse 8, today I have helped you, and I will keep you and give you for a covenant of the people, to restore their land, to make them inherit the desolate heritages.

And listen to this, saying to those who are bound, Dear friend, if you are bound by something today, are you bound by a bad habit, an addiction? Saying to those who are bound, come out, go out from that bondage. Today is the day to come out and go forth from that life of bondage. To those who are in darkness, if you've been sitting in darkness, and you've got things that you have hidden, you're ashamed of, you don't want that to come to the light, the way you think or the things you do in secret.

To you, because the Lord is compassionate, not because He's angry at you, but because He's compassionate, He's saying you can come out, it's safe. People hide in the darkness because they're afraid of what will happen when they bring it into the light, when people realize what they do in secret when the lights are off, or when they're locked in a room where nobody else is there. God is proclaiming a favorable year and a day of salvation saying, it's safe to come out, I have compassion on you.

I won't be to you like others might be, but I will be compassionate. So it's safe to come out from the darkness. To those who are in darkness, show yourself, come out into the light, don't hide anymore.

Along the roads they will feed and their pasture will be on all bare heights. They will not hunger or thirst, this is verse 10, nor will the scorching heat or sun strike them down, because here's why it's safe to come out, dear friend, from your bondage. Why it's safe to come into the light, because He who has compassion on them will lead them.

Or I would paraphrase it this way, God will lead us with compassion. It is His compassion that is inviting you to come out now from the darkness and come out from that bondage. It is His compassion that's saying, it's safe, you can come out now.

I won't stone you, I won't put you to death, because you confess your sin. I will cleanse you. I will put a new heart within you, a heart of flesh.

It's safe, brother. It's safe, sister. It's safe, dear children, to come into the light, because God is a compassionate Father.

And I will guide them to springs of water. I will make all my mountain a road. And we sing about that, bigger than all my mountains.

He'll make all your mountains, all of those mountains, He'll make it a road. It won't be up and down anymore, it'll be a road. And that road will be a lifted up road, not a road in the valley.

My highways will be raised up. Behold, these will come from afar, and lo, these will come from the north and east, and from the west, and those from the land of Sinim. So, when you have really seen the compassion of the Lord, you'll hear heaven rejoicing.

Shout for joy, oh heavens. And our response from earth will be to rejoice as well. Break forth into joyful shouting, oh mountains, for the Lord has comforted His people, and will have compassion.

Three times in this chapter, He uses that word, compassion. Will have compassion on His afflicted. Doesn't even say the afflicted, His afflicted.

He has taken ownership of you. You're His child, you're His son, you're His daughter, you're His. And so when you're afflicted, you are His afflicted.

Not just some afflicted person. I mean, if you were driving on the road and saw somebody in trouble, maybe got into an accident, and they're by the side of the road bleeding, even if it's a stranger, I know any one of us would stop and help. See if we can call 911 and stay with them till somebody comes to help, right? That's what we would do for a stranger.

And perhaps, until now, you thought of God stopping by you as a stranger and saying, oh, you're in trouble, sure I'll help you. Oh, you fell into sin again, sure I'll help you. No, this is different.

This is you, His afflicted, His son, His daughter. What a different reaction you would have if it was your son that you saw that was in the car accident, and your daughter. It won't just be, I'll stay here till I call 911.

It will be, this is my life, you are mine, your affliction is mine. Took our afflictions, identified with our suffering, we are His afflicted. But Zion said, the Lord has forsaken me and the Lord has forgotten me.

And our response is, no Lord, it can't be. When I look at my earthly circumstance, I don't feel like you are that person, that compassionate father. I feel like you're distant.

I feel like when I pray, you don't really answer. And I've been asking for this and asking for that, but I haven't heard an answer. Oh, that you would trust me.

Can a woman forget her nursing child? Can a mother drive by and see her son in distress and just move on without a thought? And have no compassion, there it is in her womb? Maybe a mother will one day reach such a point that she doesn't care anymore, that she can just go on past her child that's in distress. But even if such a day should come, it will never happen with me. I can never run out of compassion for you, is what he's saying.

He's using an analogy. You can never imagine a good mother, even the best mother, ever reaching a point where she'd be like, Yeah, you're my son, but I couldn't care less. But God says, even if it should come to such a point where the best mother on this earth loses compassion for her son or daughter, I will never.

If you turn with me to Exodus 34, we see God identifying himself as a compassionate God. Earlier, God had called Moses up to the top of Mount Sinai and given him the Ten Commandments and the law. You read that in Exodus 20 and onwards.

And as I thought about God writing, it says God used his finger to write on the tablets of stone. It was a picture for me of God writing a book of my life. And in Psalm 139 verse 16, you've heard that verse enough in this church that you should know it by heart, that God has written a book of your life and he finished writing the book before you were even born.

He wrote every page of that book of your life, the ups and downs. He knew all the things you were going to do. He knew all the things, all the ways you would dishonor him, all the sinful things you would do.

He knew all of it. He wrote it in the book. And across every page, he wrote love, love, love.

He wrote it with love. The ink, if you will, of that page of your life, even that page that day that you're embarrassed about and you're thankful nobody else knows about it because it's cleansed in the blood of Jesus Christ. But even that page was written in love.

And on the last page, you've heard me say it often, it's written, Santosh is conformed into the image of Jesus. Now that's my book. What's written in your book? Have you seen it? Conformed into the image of Jesus.

It's written there. And I tell you, dear brothers and sisters, it has really changed my life when I saw that last page one day. I'd heard about it.

Intellectually, I had understood it. I knew Romans 8 verse 29 by heart, but I didn't know it by heart. I knew it from memory, but I didn't know it by heart.

I didn't know in my heart that God had predestined me conformed into the image of his son Jesus. That's Romans 8 verse 29. And that's why everything that goes on in this life, day by day, page by page, he is causing to work together for good.

That's Romans 8 verse 28. And every now and then, in my mind, I like to go and check the back page and say, Yup, it's still there. Conformed into the image of Jesus.

It's still there. God wrote it. And he's never going to change that.

And I hope for whatever you've been through, or are about to face today, this week, this month, this year, the years to come, whatever that trial, and whoever else might be involved in it, that you've seen that God wrote it all out in love. And on the last page he said, conformed into the image of Jesus. It has revolutionized my life, and I hope it will be yours as well.

That in those moments where you're shaken, and the devil's trying to shake you, that you turn quickly and say, Yup, nope, it's written. So come what may, whatever God has ordained to be written in today's page, it's okay, I can handle it. By the grace of God, by the power of God in humility, knowing that that's just another page that's getting me closer to the final page.

In Exodus 34, God was writing a law of love for his people on tablets of stone. And while he was writing, you shall not have any other God. You shall not make for yourself a graven image.

You can read it, Exodus 20 verse 4, I think. You shall not make for yourself a graven image. Guess what the people were doing for whom he wrote it? They were making a graven image.

You read in chapter 32, they made a golden calf. As he was writing, you shall do this because it's for your own sake. I'm writing, don't do these things.

But they made a golden image. While he was writing, do not be anxious about anything. We were anxious.

While he said, cast all your cares upon him because he cares for you. We took our cares upon ourselves. Thinking that it was up to us to handle it.

That's what's going on here. And then Moses comes. Now Moses doesn't know that this is going on.

But God, God saw it. God saw the people worshipping the golden calf while he was pouring out his love on the commandments of love. And then Moses comes down and sees what's going on and he throws the tablets down.

Now what? You know, I thought about this. That God could have said, fine Israelites. I'm going to pick somebody else.

I'm going to make my covenant with the Moabites or the Philistines. There were lots of people here on the earth at that time. But God said, Exodus 34.

Sorry, I ended up in Genesis somehow. Exodus 34, verse 1. Now the Lord said to Moses, cut out for yourselves two stone tablets like the former ones, and I will write on the tablets the words that were on the former tablets which you shattered. God says, I'll write it again.

You messed it up. I'm going to write it down again. In love.

I'm going to factor it all. I'm going to factor it all into that final page that says conformed into the image of Jesus. You skip down because then when Moses gets up there, up to the mountain, then the Lord comes down and they meet at the top of the mountain.

Verse 5. The Lord descended in the cloud and stood there with him as he called upon the name of the Lord. So Moses is calling upon the name of the Lord. And then the Lord tells Moses his name.

Now remember when God told him, what's your name? Moses asked him and God said, I am. Here's God I see expanding a little bit on what does this I am look like? What is I am like? What's your nature like? And God says, the Lord, the Lord God, compassionate. It's as if God was saying that my beginning is compassion.

You want to know this law I'm about to write, where you better not commit adultery else I will stone you. Or if you do this other thing, you'll be punished and you obey these laws exactly. Let me start by saying that I am compassionate.

And so we see that every one of the commandments of God that he gave to the Israelites was out of his compassionate nature. The beginning of the Lord is compassion. What about the end of the Lord? We're told about that.

You know that God has an end? Now it's just a way of speaking. Turn with me to James chapter 5. So we saw the beginning of the Lord is compassion. James 5 verse 11.

We count those blessed who endured. You've heard of the endurance of Job. And think about what Job went through.

James uses the example of Job in that he was a God-fearing man. He was faithful, God-fearing. So God-fearing that God himself could say, this is a God-fearing man.

Of all the people on earth, God could say, this is my faithful servant. I'm well pleased with him according to the light that he had. The first person that we know of that's written about, because Job was written before Genesis.

The first person about whom says, I'm pleased with such and such a person. To this person, God allows such calamity to happen. Wherein one day he loses every single thing of his possessions.

And loses all of his children. And God says, what was the whole reason for that? And then sometime later he gets a sickness, a horrible sickness that just soars all over his body. And he's in such miserable pain.

On top of all the emotional suffering on the inside over what he lost. Now he's going through physical suffering. I don't think any of us has ever experienced anything like what Job experienced.

And yet Job said, can we not receive blessing from the Lord? And when he doesn't, and a curse. The Lord's given, the Lord's taken away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

Why did God allow that to happen to Job? Was it just for Job's sake? No. Otherwise he wouldn't have recorded it in scripture. And James tells us exactly why God allowed that to happen to Job.

Now one day you ought to go to heaven and thank Job. Because you say, Job, thank you for staying true. Because I got the lesson.

Now I hope we get the lesson because we're told here in James 5 verse 11. The point of it all is so that we would see the end of the Lord. The literal phrase there is, you have seen the end of the Lord.

Have you seen the end of the Lord? None of us has seen it yet. But if you could, if you could look ahead. God has no end.

He has no beginning or no end. But we're using picture language here. If you could see the beginning of the Lord, you'd see compassion.

We saw that. And if you could see the end of the Lord, you would see the end of the Lord is that He is full of compassion. From beginning to end, God is full of compassion.

This is our Heavenly Father. I hope it encourages you on this Father's Day, for all of us, men, women, and children, that our Father in Heaven is full of compassion. He's so full of compassion.

Far more compassionate than we realize. Now, having understood that, having realized that, what should our response be? I was thinking about this recently in Matthew 4 verse 19. We read that Jesus said, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.

Now, for many years, I treated that like a command. Oh, I better go out and evangelize. I better be a fisher of men as well.

I better hand out tracks or tell somebody about Jesus and feel good about it. Until a few years ago, some years ago, I saw this as a promise. Because anytime you see God saying, I will, that's a promise.

God's saying, I'll do it. You don't have to do it. I'll do it.

I'll do it in you. And then I saw, okay, Lord Jesus, you said it's a promise. You said that if I follow you, you will do something in me that will result in me becoming a fisher of men.

You will make me a fisher of men. That's what you will do, Lord. And somehow I closed myself to it, or I've not been following you properly.

And then it became a challenge. I said, Lord, okay, I'm going to follow you. And the proof of that is going to be not just that I become a little bit more patient, or a little bit more loving, or a little bit more free of anxiety.

That's great. But I will also be a fisher of men. Because you said if I follow you, I would be a fisher of men.

And I had to take an honest look at myself. I said, Lord, who have I fished? What's in my fishing bag? The other day we were with the boys and the men. The men went out fishing and we came back with one fish that was good.

It was good enough for all of us to eat. And we had to put a few back because we're not allowed to take them. But that was still, we all felt a sense of joy that we got something.

It wasn't a whole day of ours wasted, nothing. But I thought about that spiritually as well. Jesus said, Matthew 4.19, write it down somewhere, brother, sister, children.

This is what it means to be a disciple. You know that we are a church that wants to make disciples. This is our commission.

Go into all the world, Matthew 28.19 and 20 and make disciples of all nations. Baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son, the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that. Making disciples, which means what? Making, if we are really disciples, we would be fishers of men who are fishers of men and who are fishers of men.

That means if I say I'm a disciple, you ought to be, Hey, Santo, show me your fishing bag. What's in it? How have you fished? How have you been a fisher of men? And you ought to ask your children, how have you fished? Not in a way like, oh, okay, I gave a track to somebody or I talked to somebody on the plane or something like that, if the Lord leads you to do that. But there must be a burden.

This is what I'm getting at, dear brothers, dear sisters. At RLCF, there must be a burden. If we are really disciples of Jesus, there must be a burden.

Lord, I must reach out to somebody, some way. It could be through an old friend maybe, an old high school classmate or something I share with them or a text message or a brief phone call or something I post even on social media, if you use social media. Whatever it might be, Lord, you must use something that you do in me.

Not me trying to manufacture the gift of evangelism. God calls some to be evangelists. But all of us must be fishers of men.

And then I put this in the context of how I was fished. How did God fish you? We've already seen that. By compassion.

Romans 2 verse 4 says, It is the kindness of God that drew us to repentance. How did God draw me? How did God draw you? His compassion. That you saw that no matter how much he messed up, he was just more compassionate on you.

That's how it was for me. The more I messed up, the more he poured compassion on me. And then I messed up again and he poured more compassion on me.

And finally said, Lord, I've got to get close to you. Because there's nobody else that the more I mess up, the more they're compassionate and kind to me. I've got to know you more.

I've got to know you more intimately. Who are you that you would love me at my worst? And when I continue to fail and continue to dishonor your name. Who are you? That's why I want to know God.

That's why I want to know his compassion. And to have his compassion in me. It's the kindness of God that leads us to repentance.

And in his love, in his compassion, he drew us. You read in Ephesians 2 also, verse 4. It is his kindness. So God fished me with compassion.

How am I going to fish somebody else? The same way. Not by hitting at them. You know sometimes I see street preachers standing in front of usually sports arenas.

With big signs and megaphones saying, You're going to hell because you're doing all this and doing all that. No, I'm not here to judge them. Maybe they mean well.

And maybe God sometimes uses that to draw people. But I know how he drew me. Ultimately, it is the kindness of God.

If they only see a God that's going to send them to hell, which he is going to send all sinners to hell. That's true. But that's not how we start.

That's not how God starts. He starts with compassion. Yes, he was going to tell them about the laws that they would be punished for, but he said, Let me tell you, my name is the Lord, the Lord God, Compassionate.

And my end is compassion as well. So I saw that in order for me to be, as I am a disciple of Jesus, there will be this compassion that fills my heart. I must open my heart then to allow God to fill my heart with his compassion.

We sing that hymn. We'll have to sing it again sometime soon. Fill our hearts with thy compassion, Lord.

That's been the prayer of my heart on this Father's Day, building up to it even. Say, Lord, I see the compassion I have for my children. It's just there.

I have it. No matter what they do, there's a compassion I have for them. Yes, I discipline them.

Yes, I correct them. Yes, I speak to them. But every one of them can tell you, Dad's a compassionate dad.

At the end of the day, he explains why he is strict. But have others seen it? Do you have a father's heart towards the church? Has that father's heart now? Now it's just not for the dads. It's not just for the males.

It's for every one of us. Paul said he longed that the church in Corinth would have more fathers. Not preachers.

Many people are wanting to preach. Oh, they get upset. In fact, we've had more people get upset because we don't allow them to speak until they become members in the church and leave this church over that.

Many people want to preach and teach. Women want to be in the pulpit preaching. But how many are there who want to have the heart of a father? This is what the church needs.

And this is how the church will be built up. To have a heart of a father, full of compassion. Man, woman, or child.

Brother, sister, or child. Ask God to fill your heart with His compassion. The compassion of a father.

Of our Heavenly Father. Let's turn to Matthew 19. It's a phrase that's been going through my mind for the last few weeks.

Matthew 19, verse 30. Matthew 19, verse 30. Many who are first will be last and the last first.

Let me read that again. But many who are first will be last and the last first. I don't know how you've thought about that verse.

I'm sure it's a verse that you've heard before. You've read it before. How have you thought about that? I know how I have typically thought about it.

Yeah, I'm one of the last, so I'll be first. And I just move on to the next verse. Because I want to be first and I assume I'm first.

And then I, for the last couple of weeks or so, I meditated on this verse and the Lord showed me that I'm actually one of the first. For me personally, I'll tell you why. I've had the privilege of, what do I mean by first? I've had the privilege of knowing these truths.

The truths of the new covenant from the time I was born, practically. From the time I was old enough to understand English. I was taught the true counsel of God.

The pure doctrine from the time I was old enough to understand English, really. And so I'm one of the first. I believe it.

And all of a sudden I realized that Jesus was saying that many, like you Santos, who are first, will be last. Which means there's a greater likelihood that I will be last in eternity. Just by virtue of being one of the first.

I will say that for all of us at RLCF, we are among the first as well. We've had the privilege of hearing truth. I believe that the truth that we preach, I'm not saying this arrogantly.

But the reason I'm a part of this church is because the things that we stand for, I see are in the new covenant. And the things that I see in the new testament are what we stand for. Everything.

And that's why I'm here. This is the church, I believe, in its teaching at least, that most closely exemplifies the teaching of the new testament. Otherwise, if there was another church in this area that more fully exemplified the teaching of the new testament, I'd be there.

And I'd ask you all to come there with me. I have no allegiance to this building or the name. That really means nothing.

I have an allegiance to Jesus Christ and his kingdom and his word. And so the reason I'm here is because what I see in this church, what we stand for, is teaching that most fully exemplifies or seeks to teach and live out all that's written in the new testament. Everything.

Without making an excuse for this or for that. And for that reason, I would say we are in the first category. That Jesus said, many who are first will be last.

What do I mean by that? We've had the privilege of knowing the truth and seeking to follow the Lord. And that's good. But there is a danger, if you take Jesus' word seriously, that we could end up last.

Because in Jesus' day, and if you read the context here, let me set the context a little bit, you can read it for yourself. There was a rich man who not only had a lot of money, he was also young and eligible bachelor. He had a kingdom.

He had authority. And he was God-fearing. He had kept all of the commandments from the time he was a boy.

Perfect. The most eligible man, bachelor of his day, you would say. And yet to this man, Jesus said, you're missing one thing.

One thing you lack. And without this one thing, everything else is meaningless. All your money, all your power, all your youth and zeal, and all your so-called keeping the commandments is worth zero.

Because of this one thing. I thought of it like this, you know how sometimes on these online forums, you can check a box, check a box, check a box. And then there's a apply to all box at the top.

You check that box and it automatically checks everything. And then there's an uncheck all also. Where you select that and it unchecks all the boxes.

And that's exactly what it was for this rich young ruler. He had checked this box, and checked this box, and checked that box, and checked that box, and checked that box. But at the top God had checked the uncheck all box and it meant nothing.

That's exactly what it was. That for this man, because he lacked something, Jesus was saying, you've got to check this box. And then everything else will get checked.

All the other aspects of your life and the discipline and the obeying and keeping the commandments and all that is meaningful because you've checked it. But if that's not checked, no matter how many times you check it, God's unchecking it every time. That's what Jesus was offering this man was, go, I'll let you check this box.

And then everything will be taken care of. Go sell all that you have and come follow me. And what were the disciples thinking at that moment? They thought, we have sold all that we have and followed you, Lord.

And Peter's the one to voice it, you know, trust Peter to say what everybody is thinking. Here he is in verse 27. Peter said to him, Lord, I've left everything.

We have left everything and followed you. So aren't all our boxes checked? For Peter, it was a different box that needed to be checked. Jesus said, yes, sure, if you've followed me, left everything that you had and come follow me, forsaken all, that's great.

But, verse 30, many who are first, Peter, you're one of the first. You're the first disciple, one of the first disciples I called. You 12, you're the first ones I called.

Many of you who are first will be last. And the last will be first. It's as if, if I could paraphrase Jesus' words, Peter, watch out that this rich young ruler doesn't end up first in the kingdom.

Why? Because he went home and took it seriously and actually did forsake everything. And came and followed Jesus with the right attitude. Whereas Peter thinking, I followed you, Lord.

I'm proud of, I sense a little bit of pride and kind of like, Lord, that thing that you told the rich young ruler to do, I've done. I've checked the box. And Jesus said, don't miss it.

What is it then? Let's turn back a few chapters to Matthew chapter 9. What is this box of all, the master box that checks them all? Without this, all our doctrine, all our meetings, Bible studies, all of that gets unchecked automatically. Wouldn't it be a tragedy? This probably happened to you. Sometimes you go to a forum and you check that box and then something got refreshed or you did something and it got unchecked somehow.

You're like, I thought I checked that box. Wait, what happened? That's going to happen, dear brothers and sisters of the judgment seat of Christ. There are going to be people who busily through their life check that box and check that box and check that box and find that it was unchecked at the end of their lives.

Why? Do you have a burden to know? I do. I say, Lord, if you put it in your word, if you warned me so many times, let it not be that I check, busy checking my box and then get there to the end of my life and realize all of them got unchecked by God. And he tells us very plainly, Matthew 9. Jesus called Matthew from the tax gatherer booth.

It's a tremendous thing if you think about it. Matthew 9 verse 9, as Jesus went on from there, he saw a man called Matthew sitting in the tax collector's booth and he said to him, follow me. Jesus fished him.

I imagine Jesus looking with compassion at Matthew. And something had been going on in Matthew, in his heart. He'd heard of Jesus, I believe.

He knew of him. And there was a wrestle going on. It's like, do I choose the world or do I choose Jesus? And this wrestle's going on and Jesus gave him a look, a look of compassion that drew Matthew and he got up.

He didn't even waffle for a second. He didn't think about the consequences and like, oh, what about this and what about that and what am I going to lose? What's the financial loss I'm going to incur because of this? He got up and followed him. And dear friend, if God's calling you with compassion today to give up something, to let go of that old self-centered life where you only think of you and your family and yourself and your own needs and your own wants, and he's calling you with compassion, don't wait.

If Matthew had waited one more day, I believe, the devil would have come and planted something in there that told him, yeah, no, not today, wait another day. He had to put it off, put it off. And maybe Matthew had put it off for some time.

But the day came when he finally said, he saw the look of compassion in Jesus' eye and said, I'm coming, Lord, out of my bondage, Jesus, I come to you today. Perhaps that's the word somebody here needs to hear, that today if you hear his voice, don't harden your heart, come. Come out, come into the light, show yourself.

Be freed from that. You don't have to be the same old grumpy person that you've been. Jesus invites you to come out into the light, it's safe.

Jesus says, because I'm a compassionate God, I'm a compassionate Father, it's safe here. You know what the very next thing Matthew did? Verse 10, he says, Lord, you've shown me such compassion, I've got to show this compassion to somebody else. I've got to set up an opportunity for others to receive this compassion as well.

That's what he did, he threw a party. Verse 10, then it happened that as Jesus was reclining at the table in the house, Luke 5 tells us it was Matthew's house. Matthew had been drawn by the kindness of God, drawn by the compassion of God that he said, Lord, you've filled my heart with such compassion.

And the proof of that is I can't just sit here and enjoy to myself, I've got to open my house to somebody. Can I throw a party and invite all my tax-gatherer friends? Because Jesus, if you invite them, they might not come, because they might be afraid of you, they don't know you. But I can invite them, Lord.

And that prostitute, she'll come, because she hangs around in our circles. And those sinners, they'll come. Dear friend, there is a circle that you know that's unique to you.

It includes sinful people, hopefully. People who don't know the compassion of God yet. It includes believers, sure, but does it include some sinful people? And are you allowing the Lord to fill your heart with compassion that you're going to set up, that you're going to make an invitation to them? And say, Lord, you've filled my heart with such compassion, now I have to be a fisher.

See how Matthew immediately, I mean, that moment he became a fisher of men. And all he had to do was not preach the gospel, he just had to make plans for a dinner party, that's it. Set up the meeting, Jesus will take care of the rest.

You make the arrangements, Jesus will speak. And in this context, of course, the people who thought they knew God, the Pharisees, verse 11, said, oh, what is this going on? Jesus hanging around with tax collectors and sinners, he can't be a prophet. Why is your teacher, verse 11, eating with the tax collectors and sinners? And Jesus heard this, he said, it is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick, but go and learn what it is.

That's the literal word there. Go and learn what it is. What is what? What is the final exam? What is this box that checks all the boxes? And if you don't have that, it unchecks them all.

Go and learn what it is, go and do your homework. I've said it like this before, it's an open book exam that we're going to face at the judgment seat of Christ. The problem is most people don't open the book.

You know, when we were in India, we never had open book exams. So for those of you grown up in this country, you know, I didn't even know such a thing was possible. You mean you can actually check what the right answer is? But that's the thing, our eternal, the one final exam that matters, the exam of all exams is an open book exam.

Have you opened the book? Have you seen it? Is this the book that captivates your life? Because this is the book that will make all the difference? And have you seen that Jesus said that box that checks all the boxes is this, I desire compassion. If you check all the boxes of Bible reading, taking up your cross, following Jesus, denying yourself, victory over sin, you used to be addicted to lust and pornography, but you're not anymore. Thank God for that.

You used to be full of gossip. No, God is giving you victory over that. But you don't have compassion.

The fact that you came to victory over sin in that area gets unchecked immediately. I desire compassion and not sacrifice. I desire compassion.

That's what God is looking for. He said the same thing in chapter 12. I desire compassion.

And he was saying, it's not the sick. It's not the healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick. We pray often for the presence of the Lord in this church.

I believe He's here. He's here in our midst. He's hearing everything I'm saying.

He's hearing all your thoughts. He knows your attitudes, your motives. He's watched you all your life.

He knows what you're going to do later today. He knows what you're going to think and how you're going to act and the words you're going to speak the rest of this week. And He's full of compassion.

Knowing what you're going to do this week, He's full of compassion. And He's sitting here and we've thought often about the presence of the Lord. And this verse has come so clearly to me.

The Lord is near the sick. If we want Jesus to be in our midst, He must see in us a spirit of being sick. Recognizing that we are sick.

The moment we start to think, I'm healthy. Oh, everything's good with me now. I know a few sick people out there.

I know some of my old friends, they're sick. But I'm healthy now. Lord, You've cleaned up my life.

Now I'm not talking about going back to habitual sins and falling into the same sins that we did before. No, we're being transformed glory. Every day being changed a little bit more into His image.

But part of that change as we come to victory over sin is becoming more a greater partaker of His compassion. Where the more I'm freed from sin, the more compassionate I am for those who are still bound by sin. Where the Pharisees had the exact opposite of it.

Now think about somebody that you know that's still maybe half-hearted. Backslidden. Somebody that just doesn't get it.

Somebody whose spirituality doesn't match yours according to your idea of spirituality. Whether in this church or outside of it. Or in the world perhaps.

Think of somebody. Somebody that's bound in sin. Somebody still in darkness.

Who hasn't heard that God is compassion and that it's safe to come into the light. It's safe to come out of that bondage because He's full of compassion. Think of somebody you know and you see them acting, playing the fool.

Acting all worldly and dressing immodestly and being flirtatious and acting like this and loving money and deceiving others and cheating others and hurting others. And unless you have the compassion of Christ, Christ is far away from you. The Lord gave me this picture of this woman caught in adultery and the people who supposedly hadn't.

Who were condemning her. You read about it in John 8. And where was Jesus? Two sides of the fence. Here's a group of people saying, Lord, thank you that you're in our midst.

You said where two or three are gathered. That's what the Pharisees said I'm sure. Thank you, you know, they didn't know that verse.

But they imagined that God was with them as they prayed. I thank you Lord that I'm not like that. Not realizing that the presence of the Lord was with the adulterous woman.

And the presence of the Lord will be in our midst if we remain sick. If we have the attitude of the sick. And so, it came to me like this, that when Jesus said, many who are first will be last.

And the last shall be first. I want to be. I'm first, I can't help it.

You're first, you can't help it. You've heard the truth. But we must be first with the last mentality.

What does it mean to have that last mentality? We have compassion. We have compassion for others. Why is it that the last will be first? It's because they have compassion on others.

They'll say like the parable that Jesus told in Matthew 20 later on. Let's go back to Matthew 19. Many who are first will be last and the last first.

That's Matthew 19 verse 30. And then he tells this parable of different labors that came into the vineyard. And some went out in the morning and he said, I'll give you a denarius.

And they worked for pay. And then he went out in the third hour. And they also worked for pay.

He didn't tell them exactly how much. But he said, I'll give you what's right. Verse 4. Verse 5, he went out the 6th hour.

That's 12 o'clock. And then the 9th hour. That's 3 o'clock in the afternoon.

And he said, I'll give you what's right. The same to them. And then the 11th hour, 5 o'clock in the evening.

There's one hour of work left. End of the day is 6 o'clock in the evening for them. At the 11th hour, he goes around and finds people who are just standing around.

Now I don't know why they weren't part of the earlier group. I'd like to think that they've slept in. They overslept.

The alarm too many, the snooze on the alarm too many times. Woke up and it's like noon. Like man, half the day is gone.

Do you feel like that with your life? You hit snooze too many times. Put off the salvation of God. Put off the kindness of God for too long.

And you think, now is it too late? No, if you've come in the 11th hour, if you take it seriously. If you open your heart to God's compassion, it's not too late. And he goes to the ones in the 11th hour.

And he said to them, why you've been standing here idle all day long? Verse 6. They said, because no one hired us. We're not strong enough. We're not good enough.

Nobody wants me on their team. I have no gift. What's my calling in the church? Nothing Lord.

He says, you go to the vineyard too. Go work. No pay.

He didn't promise them any pay at all. Just go work. And at the end he gives them the same amount of pay.

And of course, you know, he started with the last. The last for first. He brings the last.

The ones who came in in the 11th hour says, here, here's a full day's wage for you. Lord, I only worked one hour. I only realized this and I gave my life to you on, what are we on? June 15, 2025.

I should have done it. I'd heard it many years before. But I finally did and I didn't know that I only had one hour left.

But I gave it to you. He says, you get a full day's wage. Because you trusted me.

Because I'm a God of compassion. So the ones who gave their life to Jesus when they were little boys like me. Come within and think, okay, you gave him a full day's wage.

I ought to get 300 times that or 50 times that at least Lord. And he gives me also one day's wage. He says, that's what I promised you.

And God revealed, this is a parable, Jesus revealed the attitude of the first. That they liked being first. They deserved being first.

They wanted the wage of somebody who was first. And they weren't happy when the one who came last also got the same as the first. And that's why they were last.

And God used this to reveal to them, oh, you think that because you hear these truths, you're better than that person? You're better than that other person? You think you're better than them? Is that so? You'll be last in my kingdom. I desire compassion. God desires compassion, dear brothers, dear sisters.

I'll close with one more verse in Hosea chapter 6. If you don't know where Hosea is, the major prophets are Isaiah, Jeremiah, Lamentations, Ezekiel, Daniel, and then after Daniel, Hosea. The first of the minor prophets. Hosea chapter 6 verse 6. Now when Jesus said in Matthew 9 and in Matthew 12, I desire compassion and not sacrifice.

He was actually quoting from Hosea. Jesus knew this quotation. The prophecy of Hosea.

The word of Hosea. We read here in Hosea 6 verse 6. But it's interesting that Jesus changed the word. It's not that he forgot it.

Jesus knew the law thoroughly. He knew it exact. He could teach the teachers of the law.

He knew it exactly. And when he said, when he quoted it and said, I desire compassion. He was showing us the meaning of Hosea 6 verse 6. So the New Testament to me, even though we're not under the Old Covenant anymore.

The Old Covenant is still valid in the sense that the New Covenant shows us the true meaning of what's written in the Old Covenant. So in the Old Covenant when you read, I delight in loyalty rather than sacrifice. The Pharisees came up with their own interpretation of what that loyalty means.

Loyalty means you never pick grain on the Sabbath. You don't do any healing on the Sabbath. And you wash your hands ritually.

That's loyalty to God. Loyalty to the law. Loyalty to the law.

And Jesus said, no. Loyalty is compassion. Loyalty is loyalty to the nature of God which is compassion.

Because he's compassionate at the beginning and compassionate at the end. That's loyalty. That's what Jesus was saying.

Let me explain that word loyalty to you now. I know you Pharisees have explained it as strictness and stone that woman to death because she sinned because the Lord said so. And we're loyal to the law of God.

And Jesus was saying, let me show you what loyalty is. Compassion. I desire compassion.

My dear brothers and sisters at RLCF especially, this is how God is building this church. This is how he's going to build the church. Through compassion.

And I pray that if this message sits in your heart, that it will do something that it's doing in my heart. And that is lighting a fire to have a compassion for those around us. Beginning with those around us.

When you see people who do things differently from how you would do. And they're careless with it perhaps. Have compassion.

Be long suffering. This is what God looks for. And what delight he gets when he sees his nature of compassion multiplied at RLCF in our midst.

And then flowing out from us to visitors who come and see us. Or watch us online. Or people we interact with in our neighborhoods.

In our workplaces. In the grocery stores. On the streets.

Even while we're driving. Compassion. Compassion.

There may be a good reason why that person cut you off on the road. But let's begin with a household of faith. There are plenty of opportunities to have compassion right here.

In your own home. With your spouse. With your children.

With the brothers and sisters. With the children of this church. With everybody.

As different as they are. As we are from each other. I desire compassion.

My dear brothers and sisters. It's absolutely true. I believe with all my heart.

That's the box that checks it all. You've got that? God will give you grace to check all these other things. You don't have compassion? You can spend your whole life.

And I praise God that we stand for the right doctrine and the right truth. But that all gets negated in a moment if we miss compassion. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father I pray that you will seal this in our heart. In a way that I'm unable to do Lord. And I feel my words have been feeble.

But let your Holy Spirit come and write compassion in our hearts. And fill our hearts with your compassion. We ask in Jesus name.

Amen.