 I'm going to read to you from Matthew 18, 23 to 35, message version, which sometimes says these things a lot better. I love its street nature language that it has, and it says the kingdom of God, Jesus said, is like a king who decided to square accounts with his servants. As he got underway, one servant was brought before him, who had run up a debt of $100,000. He couldn't pay, so the king ordered the man to, along with his wife, children, and goods, to be auctioned off at the slave market. The poor wretch threw himself at the king's feet and begged, Give me a chance, and I'll pay it all back. Touched by his plea, the king let him off, erasing the entire debt. The servant was no sooner out of the room when he came upon one of his fellow servants who owed him $10. He seized him by the throat and demanded he pay up now. The poor wretch threw himself down and begged, Give me a chance, and I'll pay it all back. But he would not do it. He had him arrested and put in jail until the debt was paid. When the other servants saw this going on, they were outraged and brought a detailed report to the king. The king summoned the man and said, You evil servant, I forgave your entire debt. When you begged me for mercy, shouldn't you feel compelled to be merciful to your servant, to your fellow servant, who asked you for mercy. The king was furious and put the man to the screws until he paid the entire debt back. That's exactly what my Father in heaven is going to do to each one of us who doesn't forgive unconditionally anyone who asks for mercy. The context of this you may recall is Jesus is answering with this idea of what the kingdom is like, this parable, this metaphor, this insight, because Peter said how many times should we forgive someone that hurts us? And he said as many as seven, as if that was an impressive number I think, I imagine the tone, many as seven? And Jesus like tried 70 times seven. Now the Pharisees, the religious people would do the math and make it 490, assuming that what he meant was there is a limit after all on forgiveness and mercy. So when you get to 490 you're out and with some people you could use 490 up quickly. Could be a day with your children. So Jesus is telling this story in response to the question about how many times should we forgive people that hurt us and Jesus is kind of making the point that the forgiveness isn't about quantity, it's about quality. That really forgiveness is done right, you should only ever do it once. And if you forgive someone once you realize that the gift of that is more to you than to them. And to repeatedly forgive means you never forgive properly I suppose in the first place and I'm not pretending forgiveness is an easy or cheap thing, but I think the point he's making is forgiveness isn't a moral issue, it's an energy issue. That if you don't forgive the energy that requires from you to sustain that hatred, to sustain your offense is going to wear you out and rob you of your life. So to forgive once is an energy saving exercise, isn't it? When you think about it that way. And I think Jesus is as much saying that as anything else. But I digress a wee bit to want to get you to my magic show because he's talking about what the kingdom of God is like. He said the kingdom of God is like. When Jesus says that we have to figure out as readers and students and communicators of Scripture which part of this does he mean? Which part of this is the kingdom like? Is the kingdom like all of it? Do we overthink it? Do we get into the minutiae of the text? Some would do that. I think what he's saying the kingdom of God is like the primary principles at play in the scenario is what he expects us to take from this. He says the kingdom of God is like a merciful king ruling over a kingdom of forgiven people who should be outraged when some amongst them don't pass that on. Isn't that fair? He's saying the kingdom of God is like a merciful king ruling over a kingdom of scoundrels, of forgiven people, of debtors, of people that couldn't pay. We all owed what we couldn't pay. So he's ruling over a king, the kingdom like a king that's ruling over a kingdom whose subjects, whose citizens, all of us, no exception, all of the citizens of the kingdom, all of us are ex-offenders. We're all people that couldn't pay and should have been thrown in jail. But when we looked to him for forgiveness and for mercy, he forgave us. But the kingdom is also like other servants in the kingdom who see when one of their own does not forgive someone else like they were forgiven. And the job of the rest of the servants, the rest of the subjects, our job is to be outraged when you know someone that has been forgiven like you have that does not pass it on. Don't forget that bit about what the king is like. What happened to outrage in the church? We've been outraged about all the wrong stuff that God didn't even care about. But the kingdom is like a population that at its core has an outrageous streak because they're outrageously forgiven and are outraged when one amongst them does not do that. And the title of this message, and I'll bring you to the magic show, is love is not a gift. Love is not a gift. It's a button. Mercy, love, forgiveness, grace, kindness, acceptance, all of these we could say are expressions of this. All of those are component parts of being a loving human being. But I want you to understand what is at the core of this story Jesus tells is this idea that love is not one of these. This is more girly, isn't it? This present? Yeah, it's too feminine to give to a man. So I'm going to give it to you. Love is not one of those. Love is one of these. What's not love is when I decide that this belongs to me. Who do these belong to? Think about a race. Who do these belong to? They don't belong to the runners. These, this idea and the reason I've got props and I don't always use props or use them well because it's like multitasking for me. The reason I wanted to bring these two props is that you that learn visually better than audibly will remember these props more than you remember the content of my speaking and that will be a good takeaway because I want you to always from tonight onwards. This doesn't mean that you don't already know this, but this is a refresh. Want you from tonight onwards to always think of love as one of these and if you think of it as one of these and not one of them, you can't possibly hold this. You can't possibly take it home because it doesn't make sense. The people in the race that handle this don't take it home nor do they bring it with them because we are carriers and passers-of-the-button. We are not keepers and protectors of it. But we have been. We have been for generations. Our church was for 20 years. We sang about passing love on in the lyrics of our songs and in the language of our prayers and preaching. I think we were we were passing this on in our virtual reality. In the flight simulator of church life we were passing this on, but there was nobody different coming to our church to the people that were already there. You know why? Because we decided we decided we get to choose who we pass this to. So we don't pass it to people of a different color. We don't pass it to people from a different side of the tracks to us. We don't pass it to youth or elderly. We don't pass it to drug addicts or homeless people or prostitutes or homosexuals or we we we only pass it to people we feel comfortable passing it to because we don't want people to be involved in our world and if we pass them love they might think we're permitting them to be in our world. So let's be careful and I want you to know that selective baton passing is as bad as not passing. You know you know the people you know the people in the relay race don't get to decide oh I don't want to pass it to you I prefer him or you know what I'm just gonna keep it and run keep running. The race is over everybody's disqualified. If the runners hold on to this everybody's disqualified not just the one that's holding it everybody suffers. When you don't pass this on when you don't pass love on this whole church suffers just imagine and this is only a fraction of your church but just imagine if this was the entire church here tonight just imagine if every single one of you decided from tonight onwards you will see love differently you will stop receiving love as a gift that stops with you it's mine my precious you will stop protecting it warehousing it holding it cherishing it admiring it loving it showing it off taking pride in it finding your identity in it. If you would go home from tonight and decide I am going to be a passer of the button of love and you may not feel very loved but if you feel at all that God has forgiven you anything at all then you are already indebted to this king you're already one of these scoundrels that have been forgiven and whatever you feel every degree to which you feel you've been forgiven I want you to go home from tonight and start passing this on it might start with text you have to send to someone tonight might start with a phone call might start with being kind to someone that you have not been kind to might just be a simple act that no one notices no one celebrates didn't make any big difference on its own but it cost you a lot because maybe it's in the direction of someone you have not passed this on to for a long time but I gotta tell you if you don't pass this on it's not neutral it doesn't just it's not okay and it's not enough that would appear preaching about love on the heart of God and you say amen but in your heart you are harboring love and you are not passing it on or you are selective in who gets it or you are delayed in passing it on or you're making your mind up this is not an easy message this is not easy for us to do I'm I'm sitting where you're sitting in my mind when I do these messages there are some people that I don't want to pass this on to I want them to feel what it's like to not be loved to not be included because maybe they made you feel that way so I get why this becomes difficult for us to pass on but love has to be passed on see that lady's face you still got it is to pass on keep passing it on you had one job and so into this unforgiving world comes Jesus and what they hated about him was that his love was out of control he did not care who was permitted by the religious status quo to be loved and not loved and we all know don't we that he opens his massive heart and he suddenly includes people that the church were not including this was our church we included people in our circle of love that we felt were safe and we felt that we would not be overstretched and over demanded in inconvenience by and so we had our own version of passing love but we were passing in Canada between us and Jesus comes into the midst of that kind of scenario which is true for many churches around the world that have become that have become sippers and connoisseurs of love that have become backseat drivers and critics of love and if they don't feel that the love is right or the love is enough for the love is served in the way that they prefer and like they write letters to the pastor or they leave saying there's no love in this church because they have no awareness no allowance for the nature of this love so when I got outraged with our church I was outraged with myself under our church because I was part of creating the problem of our inward-lookingness I want to realize 20 years in that we had been loving ourselves and we'd been warehousing love that we had been holding on to love I realized that this was our greatest crime if you like and I wasn't outraged and I remember getting a phone call around that time from the minister's fraternal in the city every city has one watch out for them sounds very posh and something like you want to be part of but it normally isn't the minister's fraternal contacted us and invited us to be part of the minister's fraternal but they wanted something from me and they said we would love you to come and attend our meeting this week that never contacted me before I've been in the city 20 years they said because I don't if you know or not but the circus of horrors is in town and we had we are getting a protest march of all of the christians in the city we had more christians in our church than they did so I think the borrowing our strength like churches sometimes do from your church so would you get your people mobilized we're going to take placas we're going to and the circus of horrors was a big top tent that are pitched in the middle of our city in a park area and it was a circuit it was called circus of horrors and it was like you know it was like a circus ring but it was kind of based on kind of horror so all the actors were like dressed up as vampires and chainsaw massacre people and all this stuff you know the horror of the gore all the all the prosthetics and all the sort of special effects of exploding heads and blood everywhere that's the kind of vibe of the circus of horrors and it's in our city so the contacting me to come and get involved in marching against the circus of horrors and he said come here rely on your support and I said no way he said what do you mean this is so important this is the disgrace we have this in our city I said listen why would I waste my and our people's time why would you waste your people's time in protesting against a circus of horrors that will leave town tomorrow when the real circus of horrors that will never leave our city you have never called me about once I said when we when we drove our vehicles down into the red light district to reach the prostitutes I don't recall being in a queue behind your vehicle and we should have been I said there's no competition for those people because we're all trying to steal each other's people I said I wish when I went to feed the homeless that we had to get in the line behind all the other churches that have beat us to it but when we found the homeless there was no churches to be seen isn't that the circus of horrors in our town that we should all be outraged about well of course he was very offended um said a few unkind things to me that confirmed what he felt about the arrogance about church and never invited me to the to the fraternal again for which I was very happy but that's my point that for for generations we're outraged about stuff that God doesn't even care about and the stuff that God does care about we were indifferent to where's the baton gone who's got the baton no no wave it for me is it back there fantastic it's got right to the back row keep it moving see watch this now where's the present it's where I left it that's my point because who's going to give away that beautiful package you ain't gonna pass that on are you if I come to you and love takes that form but I come to you and and and give it to you like it's the most precious fragile beautiful gift in the world and it's just for you and I love you and I'm for you and there there there then we kind of feel it it stops with us it's for me I need that you know and don't get me wrong some of you in here are many people that are not here tonight that want to be here or not sure whether or not they'd be welcome because they think the church is this instead of a passer-on of love some of you in here tonight have needed a lot of love in your life but are people not here tonight that are desperate for lack of love in their life so I understand how it feels like a gift when you've had none I understand how mercy and forgiveness feels like a massive relief a gift when you've had none and this is the point that Jesus is making that the kingdom of the kingdom of God is is like people that have been forgiven this massive amount and the least of that should be that we don't hold it we don't think that that is where the kingdom stops and I gotta tell you if you want to see God mad not a lot of stuff makes God mad if you want to see God get angry then just don't pass love on a few things make God angry this is why Jesus cursed the fig tree he's not been a bad day and needs a sabbatical talking to trees he gets angry with this tree because it had no figs on it but it's a fig tree with no figs so he curses the fig tree nothing happens then the next day when they return their journey and go past the fig tree it's withered up from the roots what is what is all that about it's Jesus saying that the fig tree is a living violation of its creational mandate its creational purpose is to receive and pass on so is ours it is not just our creational mandate that was given to Adam and Eve to fill the earth and to bless the world that was all of humanity's original mandate but if we forgot it it is restored in our relationship with Christ when we enter into a new beginning with him that whole mandate comes again to the fore so it's both for us a creational mandate and a redemptive mandate we double responsible in the church for passing love on and so Jesus curses the fig tree because it's using up the soil and it's demanding attention and it's taking in the elements and enjoying the rain and the sun but it's not producing fruit so he curses it because it's a metaphor it's a picture of the state that the church was in in his generation it's still a metaphor about much of the church around the world and 98 percent of our population in England and Europe are not in church and an anti-church and I don't blame them because we have not we have not done this to the church we have done we've done this to the world we've not done that to the world we've not gone with open hearts and open arms we have more come across like this and I get why so many can't come here can't be in our churches because they don't feel the love and I want to ask you to take away from tonight that you will commit afresh to be a passer of the baton that you will not hold it another day that you will not warehouse that you will not make it about you that you don't make this church about you and one of the things you're blessed in with your leaders and this matters too in churches because sometimes our style as leaders is making the problem worse Jesus tells an interesting parable and we won't turn to it for time but but you want to make a note of it because you won't believe it's in the bible because it's one of these obscure ones that you don't read nobody mentions this parable when we're talking about the parables but it's in Luke 13 where Jesus tells a story about a man a gardener that had a vineyard and a fig tree was in the vineyard but the fig tree wasn't producing any fruit so the owner of the garden comes to the gardener and says hey I've been coming here for three years to check out the welfare the productivity of the vineyard and this fig tree is never produced any figs you need to cut it down it shouldn't be using up the soil and the gardener says to the owner you know what I know hey I'm working on it give me another year I'll dig around it I'll fertilize it I'll make sure next year we get something from it so the gardener puts up a case to justify the non-fruitfulness of the tree that has had a lot of attention and I want you to know that the most successful progressive thriving churches are not led by gardeners they're led by people with an owner mentality because owners are concerned with productivity and return for amount of labor put in ratio all progressive companies all corporates all people that know that the bottom line is about return for investment our world would not exist we would not have the infrastructures that we do we would not have companies like Apple and others that we take for granted these massive corporates we would not have them had they said you know why it doesn't really matter about a profit or a return let's just keep giving stuff away tuning stuff out and churches that are led by people with a garden mentality and gardeners are obsessed with plant welfare and owners are not but gardeners have a cut-off point owners have a cut-off point gardeners don't so this guy's asking for a fourth year the owner says it's been three years and the gardener says let's go another year and the owner's like let's plucky up because he has no right to take up the time and the attention and the effort that it's getting and I built a church where we give massive disproportionate effort and time to overfed under exercise Christians that just believed it believed that they were entitled to all this time from our pastoral care team and we'd spend hours and hours and weeks and months loving and helping and serving these people I'd be awake at night worrying about them while they were fast asleep then they'd leave saying there's no love in this church and you are blessed here because your leaders are have an ownership mentality and you should not be upset or offended by that because you need to have that with your kids and with your relationships and with where you work you need to have this hey by now we should be seeing some return some some resolve some movement some growth some some development some some response from all this time we're putting in because this is an in this picture god is a picture god is embodied in the owner god is not the gardener in this picture he's the owner coming to the gardener and this is the owner's mentality and this is my mentality as a pastor and a leader for the last 20 years but not the first 20 because I was a gardener for the first 20 and it nearly killed me trying to fertilize and dig around people that never had any intention of growing any figs it's exhausting and I changed to become an owner and I'm like no I won't see you nor we're not going to counsel you now I'm done with giving you time because I'm realizing these are the time wasters that are stopping us passing love on because they're warehousing it and they're consuming it and they're treating it as a gift and an entitlement and I'm exhausted pouring all my love into unproductive people because we didn't see love was a baton because we keep pouring into the same people and it parks itself up where's the baton gone where is it oh it's getting around eh where's the present thank you because the owner's mentality is this this is this is this is proper leadership mentality okay you don't want your pastor to not be a leader these churches are not growing it's impossible for a church to grow if the pastor is not is does not have a leadership gift because pastors by definition without that leadership edge are gardeners that are addicted to you thriving and if you don't thrive pastors take it personal because pastors are hardwired for retention we feel if you're not thriving it's our fault so we try harder and if you leave the church we're like oh it's my fault I didn't love them enough especially if they're right and tell you that because you didn't love us you never called us back so where you looked at me you're okay I'll be out of town soon don't worry about it I'm not I'm not your pastor so hold on the letter okay write it to him the owner's mentality is this and this needs to be ours and yours where you pass your love around listen his mentality is if everything in the garden is growing and the fig tree is not the problem's not the garden the problem's not the soil if I have five kids and feed them all the same food and four of them flourish and one of them doesn't the problem's not the food there's something wrong with that child the food's not helping that child because there's something in that child's physiology that means that we have a problem because everybody else is thriving and and for generations pastors keep changing the menu because one or two people aren't thriving as if it's their fault it may well be that that they are obese with love they have love obesity I just invented that in my head right now that's the post right there love obesity are you suffering from love obesity what what are you so loved up that you can hardly stand it anymore if so you are living full staying full I'm protecting your fullness and that was never the intention of God for his people where's the baton it's gone full circle I love it where's the present I know I know that line's getting tired now but maybe I'll do it one more time then I'll leave you alone I wonder if the outcome for tonight would be a good outcome that you would leave here and ask yourself am I a hoarder of love do I see it as a gift or do I see it as something that I must pass on because we're dealing here with the very DNA we're dealing with the very nature of love here Jesus said the kingdom of God is like and he's describing he's describing what mercy is like that mercy that mercy doesn't end with anyone that mercy is not mercy unless it's in motion love is not love unless it is being passed around and grace isn't grace and kindness isn't kindness if it's not being passed around there's something about it it goes off it gets passed a cell by date it starts to smell off and many churches smell off because they're warehousing stuff and stockpiling stuff and not passing it on it's passing love on that keeps the church fresh it's giving stuff away that keeps us fresh and keeps God interested but when we hoard it and hold it with anything you hold and hoard that was meant to be kept in the cycle of life these things were meant to be in the cycle of life and when it stops whenever these things stop around that place where it stops all manner of weirdness and dysfunction happens in humanity entire countries entire governments are stockpiling and hoarding and warehousing wealth and stealing it from the people and the country is dying through abject poverty and the leaders are billionaires because they're not passing on they came to government to fill their own pockets to take care of their own futures and families and don't pass it on they've got bank accounts all around the world and their people are starving so entire countries are guilty of this idea let alone churches this is something in humanity humanity do not see grace and love and kindness and blessing and prosperity and good fortune they do not see it as something to pass on because i've got to keep it in case i lose it in case i'll be without and if you've come from a poverty lack malnourished background you are malnourished of love and kindness then the moment you get some you grab it and hold it this makes relationships weird it makes marriages weird and friendships weird because one of them one of them in the marriage is a spender and one is a hoarder one gives away love and hospitality and kindness and the other one is shut down and closed because of past and history and damage and it's true of the world and so i don't think just because you're in a good progressive church that this isn't worthwhile talking to you about because i've got to tell you we don't default to we don't default to this we we always default to comfort and love and attention so we don't default to baton we default to present where's the baton where is it somebody nicked it eh ah where is it it's there yay who's got it now okay stand up you the sort of the baton stand up stand up you have the baton what's your name rachel rachel that baton looks beautiful in your hand it's red sets off your outfit well suits you well love looks good on you but you've got to pass it on love