You are listening to a message from First Baptist
Church, Wichita Falls. For more information about
First Baptist, click the link in the show notes
or go to FBCWF .org. Good morning church family.
Welcome and welcome to those at Shepherd and
West and 11 East. We are so thankful that you're
here today. My name is Sam Powers. I am the middle
school pastor and it is an honor to preach God's
Word while Pastor Bob is out. If you have your
Bibles open up to Matthew chapter 9. As you open
up your Bibles, I wanna just tell you a little
bit about me and my family. We've been here just
coming up on three years, and our family is absolutely
blessed by this church. Our two daughters, Charlie
and Audrey, have been involved in our preschool
ministry and also our wee school ministry. Our
son Colson has been involved in first kids ministry.
My wife has been involved in women's ministry
with Jamie, and I've had the pleasure of getting
poured into with men's event with Justin Mendel.
And we have the opportunity to pour our hearts
and to tell middle school students about who
Jesus Christ is. And we're so thankful to serve
with Steven Patterson, our student pastor, who
leads an amazing student ministry but also leads
an amazing bridge ministry. And I wanna challenge
you, if you have not been poured into by the
ministries of our church, I wanna challenge you
to get involved and get plugged in because it
will change your life and be a blessing for you.
In Matthew chapter nine, it says this starting
in verse 35. And Jesus went throughout all the
cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues
and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and
healing every disease and every affliction. When
he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them,
because they were harassed and helpless, like
a sheep without a shepherd. And he said to his
disciples, the harvest is plentiful, but the
laborers are few. Therefore, pray earnestly to
the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers
into the harvest. Let's pray. God, I pray as
we just come before you that you would challenge
us, that you would speak to us, that you would
encourage us, and that you would send us out
into the harvest. I pray that as we just hear
your word that it would change lives and allow
us to see your truth. In Jesus' name we pray,
amen. So Jesus is out traveling and he's going
from cities and villages and he's doing three
primary things He's opening up the Old Testament
and he is teaching God's word The second thing
he's doing is he's proclaiming the gospel of
the kingdom So he's taking what the Old Testament
has said about the Messiah and he's revealing
that it's him He's telling people that he is
the way, the truth, and the life, and no one
comes to the Father except through Jesus. And
the third thing he's doing is he's healing every
disease and every affliction. You see, Jesus
was so impacted and made an impact in both the
physical, the spiritual, and the emotional support
of the world. He cared deeply. He uses this word
that when he saw the crowds, he had compassion
on them. And this compassion can be defined as
a deep concern about the pain and suffering of
others and willingness to lend a helping hand.
You see, compassion should be what drives us
as the church, as the body of Christ, to go out
into the nations and to meet the physical, spiritual,
and emotional needs of the world. And when Jesus
had compassion, it gives a reason on why he had
compassion. Because they were harassed and helpless,
like a sheep without a shepherd. When I think
of this image of harassed and helplessness, I
don't think of the image of sheep without a shepherd,
though you can probably draw the analogy. I think
of an image that I have when I was a young boy
of a dog that was tied to a tree, and it had
a chain on it, and so it was a dirt path and
a circle all around the tree, and there was grass.
And the grass was kind of the safe area, so you
could get up to the dog, you could kind of harass
and tease the dog. And I remember one time watching
this cat walk right past it. And the cat was
kind of like, taunting the dog and the dog is
going crazy, barking at this cat, just wanting
to get to the cat, but it's chained up. Can't
do anything about it. And I'm not gonna tell
you the story about the little boy who would
also tease the dog and run across, but I do have
a scar on my left calf because if you run into
that perimeter, the dog can also get you. But
this harassed and helplessness is the reason
why Jesus had compassion. He saw the crowds,
and he was looking at them, and every single
one of us, we are harassed and we're helpless.
And it's not by God, it's by Satan. Like God
had compassion when he saw this, he said, this
isn't the way I intended the world, this isn't
what I created humans for, it's to be helpless.
And so he challenges them to do something. And
the problem that we have is we don't see the
world like God does. We see the world through
our own lens. Now, my daughter Charlie loves
sunglasses, and I brought a few different pairs
of them. No, I'm not going to try them on for
you. But you can find her walking around our
house. with a pair of sunglasses on, a purse
and a baby doll, or even the grocery cart. And
what she's gonna do is when she puts on these
glasses, it distorts her view. And she trips
over toys and she runs into walls and it distorts
the view. And so today I wanna use this analogy
of glasses that we wear that distort our view
of compassion. So what blocks compassion? The
first thing that blocks compassion is a distorted
view of sin. The way we view sin shapes the way
we view the world I grew up in a family where
there's a lot of drugs and there was alcohol
and it was a broken home I didn't meet my dad
until I was 16 years old and I was literally
the redheaded stepchild and I remember when I
was asking the question that every kid asked
is How are you a good person? How does someone
go to heaven? I answered that question was, I
just have to be better than my parents. So if
I don't drink, if I don't do drugs, if I don't
leave my kids, that makes me a good person. And
I set up a standard in my life that was here.
And so as long as I was above that, I was a good
person. But this distorted view of what sin was
led me. down a path that I was just trying to
be better than other people. And it blocked compassion
because when we view sin as this ladder and as
people go higher and higher, they sin more and
more, we lack compassion and empathy for these
people. And that's how I viewed it. It was this
holy huddle of we get together and it's us. And
in my teenage years, I looked at God's word and
I found verses like Romans 3 10 that says no
one is righteous. No, not one. No one understands.
No one seeks for God. All have turned aside together
and have become worthless. No one does good.
No, not one. You see, the way God views sins
and the way we can view sin is when we remove
the glasses, it's not this ladder. Sin is sin.
And any sin separates us from a holy God and
we are not good. And our acts, our ties, our
offerings, our church attendance doesn't put
the standard of covering that up. And as we look
at sin, we see that people struggle with sin
and they're all in need of compassion. I'm thankful
God removed those blinders and I accepted him
when I was 14 years old. The second thing that
blocks compassion is a distorted view of others.
As you read the Bible, there's a lot of examples
of people that you should look up to and that
just knock it out of the park. But there's also
a lot of examples of people who just fail miserably.
And one story of one of those people is a guy
named Jonah. You see, Jonah was told to go to
the city of Nineveh and preach the gospel and
to tell him to repent. But Jonah decided to run.
And so God picked Jonah up in the Uber Express.
A great fish or how I like to call it, the great
well mobile 3000, right? You can argue whether
it's a well or not, but he put the GPS coordinates
for 316 Nineveh shore and Jonah was dropped off
on the shoreline. He walked into the city and
he preached the shortest sermon, eight words,
told him to repent. And what happened afterwards
is found in Jonah chapter three and Jonah chapter
four. Jonah 3 10 says this. When God saw what
Nineveh did, how they turned from their evil
ways, God relented from the disaster that he
had said that he would do to them, and he did
not do it. But it displeased Jonah exceedingly,
and he was very angry. I don't know about you,
but if I preach an eight -word sermon and the
whole city of Wichita Falls repents, I'm gonna
be excited, I'm not gonna be angry. But Jonah
wasn't preaching a sermon to his hometown. Jonah
was going and told to go to the people he didn't
like, the people he didn't respect, the people
he saw unworthy of salvation. So it distorted
his view of compassion on the way he saw other
people. He saw that they weren't worthy of it.
He had no compassion for it. And verse two says
this. And he prayed to the Lord and he said,
is this not what I said to you while I was yet
in my own country, that I made haste to flee
to Tarshish, for I knew that you were a gracious
God, and merciful, slow to anger, abounding in
steadfast love, relenting from disaster. Jonah
said, I knew you were compassionate, I knew you
cared about people, I knew that you wanted it,
but I didn't like them. If we're honest, sometimes
we relate more to people like Jonah than we do
to people like Paul. See, Paul, they took his
handkerchief and they were healing people. No
one's come and asked me for clothes of mine so
that I can go heal people and do miracles. But
I can tell you I've had attitudes and I've had
convictions and complaints in my heart that made
me have a distorted view of other people, people
I didn't like. Maybe it was their personality.
Maybe it was just something about them, but we
have distorted view of people and if you were
real Maybe there's some unread text messages
on your phone because you don't like the person
and don't want to respond to Maybe there's people
that annoy you that you avoid on purpose the
way we view people should be taken away and we
should view people like Jesus does. There's a
group of people that had a disease called leprosy.
Leprosy was this flesh eating disease that just
tore apart every part about you. Not only were
you dying and decaying from the outside, you
were isolated and you were told to be by yourself.
And when people would come near you had a crowd,
unclean, so that they didn't come there. The
people of the day would have said, it's some
kind of sin that you must have done that gave
you leprosy or maybe you're just cursed by God.
These people were broken and they were left alone.
And in Mark chapter one, we see a leper that
comes to Jesus and he implores him and kneels
down before Jesus and he says, if you will, Mark
1 .40, if you will, you can make me clean. And
moved with compassion, Jesus stretched out his
hand and he touched him. And he said, I will
be clean. And immediately the leprosy left him
and he was made clean. When Jesus saw this man,
he didn't just see a man that was sick that could
get him sick. He saw someone that was harassed
and helpless in need of compassion. The way Jesus
views other people sometimes so much more radically
different than how I view other people. My wife
gets sick and I wanna quarantine her off and
be like, I'll throw you the soup, you better
catch. And the way Jesus viewed a man who was
isolated, outcast, hurting. He reached out and
he could have healed him a million different
ways. He could have spoken it. He could have
picked up dust and blown it at him. He could
have not touched him. But Jesus was the only
one that knew the last time someone embraced
him and made human contact with him. So Jesus
stretches out his hands, embraces him and heals
him. This is the God we serve, a gracious, a
merciful, a compassionate God who loves you.
and loves the people of the world. There's a
Latin phrase called Amago Dei. In Genesis 1,
27, it says, so God created man in his own image.
In the image of God, he created a male and female,
he created them. See, when Jesus saw this man,
he saw a reflection of himself. Because God had
put an imprint on him that gave him value and
worth and love. And sometimes, We view people
because they speak a different language, from
a different part of the world, different skin
color, different socioeconomic class. Maybe they
just have different personalities or different
hobbies than us. Maybe they have some disability
or special needs and we view them differently,
like they're lesser. But God made it clear from
the beginning that we were made in His image.
And I'm so passionate about this issue because
if we had the right mindset of how to view people
as the image of God, it makes sin extremely hard.
There was a professor and he took his class and
he had them draw images of people they disliked.
and the class got together and just started drawing.
And some of them made characteristics and put
big pimples on them, and they drew people who
cheated on their boyfriend, or they drew people
that backstabbed them or stole or lied about
them, people they really were harmed and hated
by. And the professor one by one had them come
up and put the picture on a dart board and throw
darts. And they did it. And some of them threw
with a lot of anger. At the very end of the lesson,
he starts removing every single picture. And
the very last picture that he had placed before
the class had started was a picture of Jesus.
And he explained that when we throw darts at
other people, when we are a distorted view of
how we see others, it's a distorted view of how
we see our Creator. Point number three, as another
thing that blocks compassion, is a distorted
view of ourself. The view of how others see us
directly shapes how we see ourselves. So how
other people see us, how your parents talk to
you, what was spoken to you is how you see yourself.
And that shapes how we see it. And a lot of us,
we have a distorted view of ourselves. And so
if someone asked you today and asked you, how
are you doing? The answer is always, good. It's
never, I'm horrible, today sucks, it's not a
good day. It's always, I'm doing good, I'm doing
great. And if you were to expand on it, you'd
probably use words like, man, life has just been
busy. And that would be like the most vulnerable
that you get. And see, part of it is we don't
think our issues matter. We think there's people
out there that are starving, there's people that
are homeless, there's people that are medically
in a lot of need, and we're doing better than
them, so we don't need compassion. We don't need,
we don't feel that we're harassed or helpless.
Because we're not down at this certain level.
And that distorted view of ourselves puts a blocked
view on where we can have compassion. See Jesus,
when he has compassion, he has it for you too.
Like he loves you, he cares about you. So many
people think that Jesus of course can save other
people, but Jesus could never love me. Jesus
could do this for so many other people, but not
for me. You see, Jesus loves you. Jesus made
you in his image. Jesus cares about you. When
I was thinking about just kind of this selfishness
and just like, how do we view ourselves, the
thing that came to me was our cell phones. You
know, every social media algorithm, every app
that you have, it is all catered to what you
want and what you desire. Everything about it
is catered to what you want. and what you desire.
If you don't like something, you swipe past it,
the algorithm picks up on it and doesn't show
you any more of that content or shows you less
of it. If you spend more time on something, it
caters to you. And so it's hard to be compassionate
when everything about our phone... cowboy hats,
like country, riding a horse makes no sense to
me. You have a truck and the truck has a seat.
Like there's other ways to do this. But I applied
for an Evening Star Ranch foreman position. I
was newly married and me and my wife needed money
to survive. And the sweet family, the Clarks,
gave me a job interview. And in that job interview
they started telling me about how their operation
works. You see the Clarks at the Evening Star
Ranch took in wild Mustangs, They broke and trained
them. I think it's really dumb to jump on a horse
and get bucked off. I don't think that is a smart
way to do it. And if you've ever been a job interview,
but you needed a job and you needed money, you
probably lied at the job interview. So when Doug
was asking me if I was OK with this, if I was
this kind of person, I was like, absolutely.
I wore jeans to the interview just to impress
him. And I was all in because I was a broke,
married college student. And I needed a job.
that provided for my family. I'm very thankful
for Doug because Doug taught me that there's
more than one way to break an animal. There's
this thing called desensitization. Blah, I messed
that one up. Yeah, desensitizing the Mustangs.
And so my job wasn't to jump on the horse and
get bucked off and get back on and get bucked
off. My job was to brush the horse and move my
hand real fast. And when it started, the horse
to calm it down and do it again. And I was to
put the saddle on the horse and take it off and
put it on the horse and take it off. And we desensitized
the horse in like a million different ways. I
had a flag and I would just like wave the flag
when I was near him and it would scare the horse.
But sooner or later, the horse just got used
to this crazy redheaded guy just waving stuff
around and making some noise. And they became
calm and they became tame. It's crazy to watch
horses do that. But in the terms of compassion,
our culture's doing it to us. You see, we get
on our phone and we see our favorite sports clip,
our athlete top 10 moment from ESPN, and it's
so cool, and it's so awesome, and we get the
endorphins, and we think about what it was like,
and if only there was cameras when I was a student
and I was playing sports, because I would have
made the top 10. And then we scroll, and there's
a flooding that kills kids. and our hearts is
filled with compassion. But instead of doing
anything with it, we scroll again. And there's
a puppy video that's really cute and we're all
happy again and we forget about that. A little
bit later scrolling, we see another devastating,
heartbreaking situation that breaks our heart.
But instead of letting God build that compassion,
it blocks the compassion because we can scroll
and do it. The world is desensitizing us as Christians
to compassion. So what do we do about it? We
have to build compassion. And so how do we build
compassion? First, you have to live for the kingdom.
As a Christian, every day, every single day of
every single moment, we are on mission for God.
And God is giving you opportunities to build
compassion at your job, in your home, in the
work field, no matter where you're at, God is
doing it in your hobbies. every aspect of our
life is a mission field. And I'm so glad that
God allows each and every single one of us have
different mission fields because where you work,
you get to be the hands and feet of Jesus to
those people. But you have to look up and have
vision because God's gonna give you opportunities
every single day to have compassion. The question
is, are you gonna be ready? I've learned one
thing about God is that when he gives opportunities,
it's not like I can say, hey God, I wanna be
more compassionate. Can we block off Tuesday
from like four to five and I'm just gonna be
on mission for you right then? No, it's always
at the most inconvenient time. I absolutely love
flying, but I absolutely hate flying. because
I roll the dice on who I sit next to every single
time. Some of those are good conversations, some
of those are bad, but when I'm flying, especially
when I'm returning home from flying and I'm exhausted,
my conversation goes like this with God. God,
can I just put my AirPods in and just fall asleep
and just relax and enjoy it? Can the roll be
empty? And usually God laughs because when I'm
tired and I'm exhausted and it's an inconvenient
time to be compassionate and be the hands and
feet of Jesus, that's when he shows opportunities.
And if you're willing and you're able to listen
and look for those admissions and those compassionate
opportunities, God will be faithful. And there
will be amazing stories of what he does in everyday
moments. Some days I get done with work and I've
gotta run to Walmart or Target and pick up one
item and I wanna get in and get out and I'm in
a rush and that is the moment when I meet someone
from my past 15 years ago and we start connecting
and we start talking and of course they ask what
I'm doing and I get to say I'm a pastor and I
get to tell people about Jesus and that's always
the best set up just to be like, hey, so do you
go to church? Do you know Jesus? And I get to
ask that question. And some of those conversations
aren't always easy and some of them are sticky
and some of the people are going through divorces
and they're having a hard time in life and they're
harassed and helpless. And as a compassionate
person every single day in those moments that
I don't want to, it gives me the opportunity,
it gives you the opportunity to be the hands
and feet of Jesus. I want to warn you that when
you live every day for the kingdom, When you
have this kingdom -minded or the kingdom vision,
it's gonna change how you see everything. You're
exhausted to come home, guess what? Your kids
need compassion. Your wife needs compassion.
Your husband needs compassion because Satan has
been speaking lies all day and you get to be
the hands and feet of it. Number two, you get
to serve on mission. Here at First Baptist Church,
we talk a lot about serving because serving can
change your Serving is so important for the Christian.
That's why we had the volunteer video. And there's
many different ways where you can serve. You
can serve in preschool, and you can serve in
the media team, and you can serve with the greeting
team, you can serve in kids ministry, or you
can serve in 180 ministry. Yeah, yeah. And as
you look at all these places to serve, this builds
compassion. And it builds compassion in a different
way. Because what I find is when we go serve,
a lot of times we're looking at the people we're
looking to help, but God is doing something in
our own heart, in our own mind. When you serve,
God wants to change your heart, your compassion,
your mind. And you have to be willing to let
him do it. It gives you a better perspective
and allows you to see that compassion can change
you, but it also changes the people that you
do serve with. And not only should you serve
locally just here, like you should go on a mission
trip. It's easy to give to a mission trip, but
when you go on a mission trip, right now as they're
in Kenya and they are serving, their perspective
is radically being changed. Their heart is being
softened for compassion as they see different
needs of the world and they see different people.
When you go to Mission Arlington just down the
road, it gives you a heart of compassion and
it builds it because you see the needs of the
world. And so you should serve. And not only
does it change you, but it changes those you
serve. Life changes when you're willing to sacrifice
and give abundantly to those around you. You're
willing to see the harassed and the helpless,
and you're willing to tell them that they're
not harassed and helpless by God, but by Satan.
and that there's a shepherd and there is a savior
and his name is Jesus Christ and he loves you
unconditionally and he is compassionate for you
and you get to make his name known. Point number
three in there, how to build compassion is to
stay in God's word. When we're on our phone,
we get to see what we want, what our desires
needs, but when we open up God's word, guess
what? Doesn't really care what you want. what
your desires are or what your need is. It speaks
truth into your life. And as you read the story
of the Bible, you're gonna read stories of people
who spit in the face of God and you're gonna
be like, God, why didn't you just destroy these
people? They were stubborn. They were all running
away from you. They didn't care about you. And
God's gonna turn the flip. And you're gonna see
that you're stubborn, that I'm stubborn, that
I deserve, God, not to be slow to anger. but
he's compassionate. And when you see the compassion
that he has for other people in the Bible, when
you see the picture of how he can save people
like Jonah, he can save people like Paul, he
can save people like Nineveh, he can heal people
like the leopard, it changes your heart. But
it's when you force yourself to read what God
wants you to, you can see how God is a gracious
God. how God is a merciful God, how He is slow
to anger, how He's abounding in steadfast love,
and how He is relenting from disaster. Even now,
in a world that doesn't deserve it, He's showing
compassion. Compassion should produce action,
though. That's my final point. Passion should
produce action. It is impossible to have compassion
without action. Almost every instant of scripture
where we see Jesus have compassion, there is
an action that follows. He sees the leopard,
and he has compassion on him, and he touches
him, and he heals him. He sees the crowds, and
they're hungry, and they're tired, and he says,
feed them, and he feeds them. He sees in this
passage, and he gathers up his disciples, and
he says, who pray for laborers because the harvest
is plentiful but the laborers are few. Jesus
prays for laborers. Me and you, we are the laborers.
Jesus is challenging you. Jesus is calling you
out. The laborers are right here. They just haven't
been sent out yet. So as you're in the seed and
as you're listening, there's people all around
us. They're harassed. They're helpless. They're
at Walmart. They're at Target. They're at those
moments where it's real busy. And let's just
be honest, they're right here in this room. It's
me. So many times, I'm just like harassed and
I'm helpless, and that's not because I have a
one year old. It is the moments where Satan is
speaking lies to me. He's trying to tear me down.
Someone says something that they didn't mean
anything, but all of a sudden it's got me in
a bad attitude and it ruins my day. And I need
more compassion. for myself, but I also need
more vision to see compassion for those around
me, those who are hurting, those who are lonely.
Compassion must produce action and if it doesn't
produce action, it will callous your heart and
your heart will become hard and you'll see God
as an evil God who's not loving, who's not kind.
Some people in this room, you are harassed and
helpless. and you're at the point of giving up.
Some of you that are in this room, you have blocked
compassion out for so long that you feel numb.
Some of you who are in this room, you've never
seen the compassion that Jesus has for you. And
I want you to know there's a savior. His name
is Jesus. We're not helpless if we call out to
the one who can help us. You've been listening
to a message from First Baptist Church, Wichita
Falls. For more information about First Baptist,
including gathering times and locations, click
the link in the show notes or go to FBCWF .org.
We'll see you next week.