Aligning with the Forces of Good

The following video transcript has been lightly edited

There is transcendent good in the world. I'm sure you've experienced it maybe at the birth of your child or the resonance you feel in the midst of an incredible relationship - your children play. Perhaps there's a story that you've heard recently from a friend or even on the news in which someone's level of generosity and excitement makes you think, man, this world is incredible.

Now, it's also true that the world is filled with darkness, evil, and brokenness. And we talked about that last week. So this week, what I want to talk to you about is the forces of good. Forces of good that are in the world that remind us that there is a transcendence to all of this thing we call life.

And how do we align ourselves with these forces? 1st Peter writing a letter to the church, sketches out three forces of good that I think it's really important we pay attention to. Grace, the Holy Spirit, and the church itself. And so Peter's writing and he's saying, hey, the grace of God has been revealed in the person of Christ. And that's a reality now, but it's also something that it's, is still to come in an even fuller version. This world is still just a shadow. It's still a world that is marred by sin and evil and death. But there's a world to come that will be fully restored. And we've seen a preview of that in the life, death, and resurrection of Christ.

And so, Peter is talking about how this is grace. Grace sometimes is just seen as forgiveness, and it includes forgiveness, but it's even more than that. It's the life, death, and resurrection of Christ. It's God in the incarnation. It's the future hope. It's the restoration of all things. Grace is the reality that changes and transforms everything, and God is in the business of grace.

Why? Because God is a generous giver. And that's what is at the core of grace, is its generosity. God gives us life. You and I, we just exist. We had nothing to do with that. Generosity is the experience of love and affection and beauty and wonder. All of these things, we've had nothing to do with them. We can't really make them, we can't earn them, but we can receive them.

And so that's the business that God is in, to be a generous giver who gives life and grace and renewal and peace and restoration.

Now our world is not set up as a grace based world. Grace is about giving and receiving. Our world is about buying, about selling, about earning, about taking, about controlling.

And so you and I naturally don't necessarily align ourselves with this force of good, this force of grace, because we are so busy aligning ourselves with the ways of the world. And so what you and I want to do is we want to shift our mindset. And the way we're going to do that is by focusing more on what we're giving and what we're receiving versus what we're taking, earning, and fearing.

And that can play out in all kinds of ways, but think of it this way. Has greed and pride ever helped you in your life? No. In fact, greed and pride disguise the gifts you have. You can't see them because all you can think about is what you want more, "if only if". And so if we want to align ourselves with grace, we want to align ourselves through the actions. of giving thanks for what we receive and giving to others and that's the pattern we see in God. And that grace that is gonna, that is transforming the world, we align ourselves when we participate and focus more on giving and receiving rather than buying and taking and selling.

Okay so the second part is the Holy Spirit. So Peter talks about how the Holy Spirit inspired the prophets to share the good news of Christ's arrival and that that same spirit is something that is foretelling the future of restoration. And it's such a cool thing that even the angels admire it. I think that's fascinating. So one of the things we have to do in our life is if we want to align ourselves with the forces of good, we wouldn't, we need to listen to the spirit.

I teach a session to leaders often about how to listen so others feel heard. And there's a element of it where I talk about tuning in to the hopes, dreams, and feelings of others. And we're not just engaging the words they say, but we're engaging their whole person. And when we can do that, other people feel heard.

Same is true with the Holy Spirit. We have to tune in to the Holy Spirit in order to listen. What will we hear? Well, we'll hear things about God's Kingdom, because the Spirit ushers in and announces God's kingdom. That's what the Spirit does. And so we'll hear words of encouragement and words of challenge that are centered around things like kindness and gentleness and hope and peace and grace and restoration.

But we have to tune in. How do we tune in? Think of it like a radio. If you're not tuned into the right channel, you might hear multiple channels. You might hear just fuzz. You might hear part of your channel and and fuzz if you're tuned in you can hear it crystal clear And so that's the action of prayer prayer helps us align ourselves with the force of good known as the Holy Spirit Now to do this it requires us to set aside some time for quiet -some for reflection I encourage you to begin by just giving thanks to God and for life and all the good things that helps you get on track of grace of giving and receiving. And then from there just allow yourself to be quiet Ask God how God might be directing you listen for the spirit and maybe what you hear from the spirit is offering forgiveness.

Maybe what you hear from the spirit is a word of encouragement for yourself. Maybe what you hear from the holy spirit is a direction to serve or grow in the world, whatever it might be If we want to align ourselves with the forces of good, we need to take time to tune in to what the spirit might be saying to us.

Lastly, the force of good that Peter highlights is the Church. And he gives the Church very specific direction. He says, prepare your minds for action, discipline yourself, and set your hope on the grace of Christ. Those are his instructions, and so the Church is supposed to be agents of good in the world.

Now, candidly, the Church has failed at this in many ways throughout the course of history, as they've allowed themselves to drift to more of a place of control and authority, out of fear and anxiety and the desire to maintain power and control. The church has done a lot of things. I don't think the spirit led them at all and they are not aligned with the forces of good.

But it's also true that as the church has prepared its mind for action and disciplined itself and set its hope on Christ, it's done incredible things. Many of our hospitals and universities were begun because they were setting their mind, setting their hope on the future of Christ. While the church sadly supported slavery, the church was also the one to rise up against it and to fight for its demise.

It was the church through Martin Luther King Jr. that stood up and sought reconciliation. The church is a force of good in this world. It is an agent of good. In this sense, we want to align ourselves with that good work. We want to be disciplined and we want to shape our minds to action, action of love and service and sacrifice.

When we're willing to align ourselves that way, both together and then out collectively in the world, we'll be able to align ourselves with the forces of good and it's because of the grace of God and the Holy Spirit ushering in God's kingdom of peace and kindness and gentleness. And at times, it's the agent of the church doing good in the world.

And we get to participate and be a part of it. The world is filled with goodness. You, yourself, have experienced these moments that are beyond description. And it's because of the grace of God and the Holy Spirit ushering in God's kingdom of peace and kindness and gentleness. And at times, it's the agent of the church doing good in the world.