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We encourage you to jot down what you hear God speaking to you about today as you listen to the teaching. Plan on diving deeper into the message by downloading the study guide on Sunday night so you can compare your notes with the guide as a path for deeper spiritual commitment. Once posted, the teaching video and study guide can be found under the Media tab.
By The Spirit … Kindness
But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! —NLT Galatians 5:22–23
Kindness without Goodness is superficial and unsustainable.
Goodness without Kindness is self-deception and mental trickery.
Divine goodness is to be reflected in the human experience through kindness…
While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” —NIV Matthew 9:10–13
There was a great divorce the Pharisees experienced. The disconnect between our beliefs regarding God and our behaviors toward others…
He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God? —ESV Micah 6:8
For merely listening to the law doesn’t make us right with God. It is obeying the law that makes us right in his sight. —NLT Romans 2:13
But don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise, you are only fooling yourselves. —NLT James 1:22
What good is it, dear brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but don’t show it by your actions? Can that kind of faith save anyone? Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing, and you say, “Good-bye and have a good day; stay warm and eat well”—but then you don’t give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do? So you see, faith by itself isn’t enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless. —NLT James 2:14–17
Four corners for growing in Kindness
1. Planned
Kindness must be cultivated… It doesn’t come natural
2. Spontaneous … In the Moment
Preach the word; be prepared in season and out of season; —NIV 2 Timothy 4:2
Always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have. But do this with gentleness and respect, —NIV 1 Peter 3:15
3. Scattered for all
Let it become what you are known for… Kindness is your reputation
4. Even when
Dear friends, never take revenge. Leave that to the righteous anger of God. For the Scriptures say, “I will take revenge; I will pay them back,” says the LORD. Instead, “If your enemies are hungry, feed them. If they are thirsty, give them something to drink. In doing this, you will heap burning coals of shame on their heads.” Don’t let evil conquer you, but conquer evil by doing good. —NLT Romans 12:19–21
No greater test of our commitment to being a loving sacrifice… our spiritual maturity… than how we treat others who have treated us unfairly…
Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they don’t know what they are doing.” And the soldiers gambled for his clothes by throwing dice. —NLT Luke 23:34
When Jesus saw his mother standing there beside the disciple he loved, he said to her, “Dear woman, here is your son.” And he said to this disciple, “Here is your mother.” And from then on this disciple took her into his home. —NLT John 19:26–27
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